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July 3, 2019 Emergency evacuation


A Facebook mail facility near company headquarters in California was
evacuated Monday after a routine check found mail possibly containing the
nerve agent sarin, AP wrote.

Science & Technology

Facebook may be ‘pivoting’ Other racial groups ‘look alike because of


to something worse visual, neural processes’

DADO RUVIC/REUTERS

By Dave Lee* groups where police officers, The site has said its ability to
from more than 50 different de- use algorithms and AI to detect
Over the past few months, Mark partments across the country, hate speech and misinformation
Zuckerberg has spoken at length shared racist memes, islamopho- still falls short, and therefore it
about his grand plan for fixing bia and conspiracy theories. still relies heavily on users re-
Facebook. And The Washington Post porting inappropriate content.
In short, it involves “pivoting” detailed a flurry of groups of- In groups, this of course be-
— as they say — to a more pri- fering bogus cancer treatment comes far less likely: The inap-
vate social network. One which “advice”, such as to “use baking propriate content is the reason
focuses on closed spaces, like soda or frankincense” instead people joined the group in the
groups or messaging, rather than of chemotherapy. These groups first place. And Facebook has NEWSTEAM
the public News Feed. are able and allowed to flourish shown limited willingness to

T
He unveiled this plan in — the Post reported at least two proactively look for these kinds he common perception that people area of the face-recognition region was ac- The team also did not take into account
March, a year after the Cam- with more than 100,000 mem- of abuses itself. from other racial groups look alike tivated when the participants saw a white how diverse participants’ social groups
bridge Analytica scandal hit. bers. Groups have, of course, been is rooted in the way human brains face compared with a black face. Six par- were — those with close friends from dif-
At the time, I noted that crit- Facebook said it provides re- a feature on Facebook since the process what they see, researchers said. ticipants showed no activation at all in that ferent racial groups would be expected to
ics were concerned that the shift lated news stories to posts that early days. But never before It has long been known that people find region when presented with black faces. be more sensitive to facial differences in
would mean Facebook was ab- might contain misinformation, have they had such prominence. it easier to tell apart members of their The team then showed participants sev- such groups.
dicating some of its responsibili- but we don’t have any statistics Facebook, as directed by its own race than those of a different race. eral series of images each composed of ei- The researchers said the findings could
ties. Making Facebook more pri- on how effective this measure is. leader, is aggressively pushing But the mechanism behind this has been ther six white or six black faces. The faces help to investigate ways to avoid harmful
vate would arguably not remove (Facebook has, however, users to use groups more often. the topic of much research, the Guardian shown were engineered to have a certain biases. Camp said some evidence suggest-
the problems of abuse — though banned some women who had There’s an advertising campaign reported. level of physical similarity ranging from ed the phenomenon could depend on which
it would make it harder for out- shared mastectomy scars as an — which includes hand-painted Now a new study backs up the idea that them all being identical to completely dif- characteristics were used to group people,
siders to find instances of Face- act of solidarity and encourage- murals — and a new button the phenomenon is rooted, at least in part, ferent. for example if people were part of the same
book’s failures. ment with others facing their placed front and center in its in visual and neural processes. For both black and white faces, brain or rival sports team. He said, “Getting peo-
Recent stories have demon- own battle with cancer.) mobile app. Private is the new Nick Camp, the coauthor of the research activity increased as dissimilarity be- ple to think about groups in different ways,
strated that concern was perhaps public. from Stanford University, said, “What it tween the faces in the series rose — the or re-categorizing individuals, might be
justified. Hidden from view “This vision could backfire tells us is that our tendency to see members team suggested this was because the im- an effective way of combating even these
On Monday, the American terribly,” warned French journal- of our own [racial] group as individuals ages were perceived by the brain as more low-level perceptual biases.”
nonprofit organization ProPub- What makes these examples ism professor, Frederick Pilloux, and de-individuate members of other racial novel. However, this increase was more Dr. Holger Wiese, an expert in face
lica revealed the existence of a of abuse more significant than in 2018. groups, that is something that happens on pronounced for white faces than for black recognition at the University of Durham
private Facebook group which what we’ve seen in the past? “An increase in the weight of sight.” faces. The researchers said that it sug- in the UK who was not involved in the
contained disturbing jokes alleg- They show how Facebook’s ‘groups’ means reinforcement The team said the study was impor- gested participants were better at picking research, described the study as elegant.
edly posted by US Border Patrol strategy has the ability to push its of Facebook’s worst features tant as it showed that what human senses up on physical differences between white He cautioned against linking the phe-
agents. problems into the shadows. — cognitive bubbles — where picked up was not necessarily an accurate faces — even for faces completely differ- nomenon to prejudice, noting it was not
The investigative site said ProPublica was only able to users are kept in silos fueled by a representation of reality. That, they added, ent to each other, brain activity was higher clear how or if it tied into stereotyping,
comments included mockery of observe the Border Patrol group torrent of fake news and extrem- mattered since biases in perception could for white faces. which tended to be rooted in assuming
migrants that had died in cus- thanks to someone sending them ism.” lead to harmful actions or behaviors — A further three experiments, outside of personality or behaviors are universal
tody, as well as aggressive, sexist screenshots — otherwise it was Make no mistake: Few, if such as assuming one person’s behavior the scanners, involved participants rating within a group. He said, “We don’t know
remarks about prominent female entirely hidden from view. any, of the problems Facebook was typical of all within that social group. how different they thought a series of faces whether what they describe here is the
politicians. The group has exist- Reveal had to use specially- is “working hard” on at the mo- It might also fuel errors ranging from inac- of a given race were, whether two faces basis for racial prejudice — the paper
ed for more than three years and written software code that cross- ment would have come to light curate witness statements to embarrassing were different, and whether they had seen a doesn’t say that at all.”
has almost 10,000 members. referenced members of hate were it not for external pressure social mistakes. given face before. The results showed that Dr. Brent Hughes, a coauthor of the pa-
A Facebook spokesperson groups against users who were from journalists, lawmakers, ac- The researchers, whose study has been participants had a greater likelihood of rat- per from the University of California, Riv-
told the BBC, “We want every- signed up to legitimate pages ademics and civil rights groups. published in the Proceedings of the Nation- ing black faces as more similar to each oth- erside, stressed that the biases reported in
one using Facebook to feel safe. about police work. The examples I’ve raised here al Academy of Sciences, reported how 20 er — or having seen them before — than the study were not fixed.
Our community standards apply The Washington Post reporter pose a question: Is Facebook fix- white participants were shown a series of white faces, even if the faces of both races He said, “Individuals should not be
across Facebook, including in was able to access some groups, ing itself, or merely making it images including faces, numbers and ob- had been engineered to show the same lev- let off the hook for their prejudicial at-
secret groups. We’re cooperating but was swiftly banned and harder for us to see it’s broken? jects, while they had their brains scanned el of similarity. titudes just because we see evidence of
with federal authorities in their blocked when it became clear using functional MRI — a technique that The study has limitations: Only a small race biases in perception. To the con-
investigation.” who she was. * Dave Lee is the North allowed the team to spot changes in activ- number of participants were involved, and trary, these race biases in perception are
Separately, a report last month Even Facebook finds it more America technology reporter. ity. the experiments only involved responses malleable and subject to individual mo-
from California-based investi- difficult to find itself accountable This article was first published In 19 of the 20 participants, a greater from white people. tivations and goals.”
gative group Reveal exposed when it comes to groups. in the BBC.

Cigar-shaped interstellar object Amazon plans to create 1,800 jobs


‘not an alien spaceship’ in France in 2019
Scientists said a mysterious cigar-
shaped object spotted speeding through US online retail giant Amazon said
the Solar System in 2017 is probably on Tuesday it will create 1,800 per-
not an alien spaceship. manent contract positions this year in
However, after investigating the na- France, its largest European market
ture of the object called Oumuamua, after Britain and Germany.
astronomers still remain uncertain over The increase will bring Amazon’s
how to classify it, Sky News reported. total number of permanent staff to
Oumuamua’s odd shape and motion 9,300 by end 2019 and reflects the
had prompted some scientists to won- group’s commitment to the French
der whether it was some form of alien market where it has invested over €2
technology exploring the cosmos. billion ($2.26 billion) since 2010, the
But after poring over the data, an in- statement said, Reuters reported.
ternational team of researchers wrote Amazon has been expanding stead-
that “we find no compelling evidence to ily in France where it has 20 sites, in-
MARTIN KORNMESSER/ESO
favor an alien explanation”. cluding six logistics centers, the most
Scientists tracked the reddish-color- Maryland astronomer Matthew Knight, muamua is that it is a planetesimal” — a recent slated to open over summer in
ed Oumuamua from October 14, 2017 coleader of the research published in planetary building block — or a frag- Brétigny-sur-Orge near Paris. JOSEPH PISANI/AP
until January2, 2018, after which it be- the Nature Astronomy. ment of one — formed in faraway star Amazon is the ecommerce leader Amazon Prime express delivery ser- In April, it expanded its partner-
came too faint to detect even with the “Yes, if it made a sudden, unexplain- system. in France with a market share of 17.3 vice in Paris since 2016, has made ship with French food retailer Casino
most powerful telescopes. able turn that would certainly have Its composition remains unknown, percent, but its grocery market share no secret of its desire to launch a with Amazon installing pickup lock-
“Our key finding is that Oumua- warranted further exploration,” Knight including whether it is just rock or in- stands at just two percent, according grocery delivery service in France ers in Casino stores and making more
mua’s properties are consistent with a added. cludes some metal or other ingredients. to Kantar data. as part of its ambitions to expand in of the French company’s products
natural origin, and an alien explana- The researchers wrote that a It is currently located beyond Saturn, The US group, which has run its food retail. available on Amazon.
tion is unwarranted,” said University of “straightforward explanation for Ou- dashing out of the Solar System.

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