Oct 24, 2013 | Facebook marketing, Regulation, Social media
Facebook has backtracked on its policy on violent and offensive content, after mounting pressure from politicians and the public over a video showing the beheading of a woman by a Mexican drug cartel on its site. The move comes just 24 hours after the social network...
Oct 23, 2013 | Facebook marketing, Regulation, Social media
Facebook is adding a new security feature to its website that it says will keep users from stumbling across violent or potentially offensive content on its website, following an outcry over the discovery of beheading videos on the site. In a new move, Facebook has...
Oct 18, 2013 | Facebook marketing, Regulation, Social media
Facebook has loosened its privacy rules for teenagers, letting them post status updates, videos and images that can be seen by anyone, not just their friends or people who know their friends. While Facebook described the change as giving teenagers, ages 13 to 17, more...
Oct 15, 2013 | E-commerce and E-retailing, Regulation
WHSmith has become the latest retailer to become embroiled in the ebook porn scandal, taking its website down as a result in a bid to “protect our customers and the public”. Last week, it was revealed that high street giants could face possible prosecution for...
Oct 14, 2013 | Online advertising, Regulation, Search engine marketing
Google has sparked more privacy controversy with new Facebook-style ads that include user names and photos, as the internet giant looks to make its ads more social and personalised. Under the new scheme, Google can add users’ name, photo and product reviews...
Oct 10, 2013 | Regulation
Last week, Adobe was hit by a hack attack that exposed the bank details of customers using its popular software such as Photoshop and Acrobat Reader. Revealing the breach in an official blog post, chief security officer Brad Arkin also said that the perpetrators had...
Oct 4, 2013 | Regulation
The FBI has closed down Silk Road, a black market website used to buy drugs and hitmen, arresting its owner in the process. Ross William Ulbricht, 29, is accused of “controlling and overseeing all aspects” of hidden website Silk Road, as well as plotting...
Oct 2, 2013 | Regulation
Several US government websites and Twitter feeds, including NASA and the Department of Homeland Security, have been suspended following a partial US government shutdown. The first partial shut down in 17 years began on Monday was sparked by a legislative deadlock....
Oct 2, 2013 | Regulation, Search engine marketing
Google’s long-running battle with the European Commission could be coming to an end, with the search giant potentially agreeing to link to rival sites on specific channel searches, such as shopping or maps. Under the new proposals, Google will offer a larger space in...
Sep 18, 2013 | Online advertising, Regulation
The Digital Advertising Alliance has pulled out of an international working group looking to determine a global online privacy standard, as the ‘Do Not Track’ cookie monitoring debate rumbles on. The DAA is an industry group representing the Interactive Advertising...
Sep 16, 2013 | Mobile, Regulation
MEF, a global community for mobile content and commerce, has launched AppPrivacy with the goal to build consumer trust in mobile apps by helping developers apply best practice in the collection and sharing of personal information. The free online tool provides an...
Sep 12, 2013 | Regulation
The UK government is supporting a review into whether offensive words should be banned from .uk domain names. Currently Nominet – the organisation responsible for the new .uk infrastructure – does not have a policy of banning offensive words or phrases. In...
Sep 5, 2013 | Regulation, Social media, Twitter marketing
In what could signal a new trend in customer relations, a disgruntled passenger has paid to promote a tweet complaining about British Airways. UK businessman Hasan Syed was unhappy with the way the airline was dealing with his father’s lost baggage. However,...
Sep 2, 2013 | Mobile, Online advertising, Regulation
Health and fitness apps have been passing on user’s personal data to insurance and pharmaceutical companies, according to a new report. Privacy group Evidon claims that the top 20 health and wellness apps, including MapMyFitness, Web MD Healh and iPeriod, have been...
Sep 2, 2013 | Facebook marketing, Online advertising, Regulation, Social media
Facebook has emailed its vast user base of 1.2bn subscribers to explain how it uses their data for advertisers, as part of a settlement in a US court case. The social network has revised its two key documents — Data Use Policy and Statement of Rights and...
Sep 2, 2013 | Regulation
Microsoft and Google are suing the US government, after both firms have been unable to release documents showing official requests for user data. The suits were filed back in June when the news on theNSA web spying scandasl firsdt broke, but have only been made public...
Aug 30, 2013 | Mobile, Regulation
MEF, the global community for mobile content and commerce, has published analysis into how the top 100 free mobile apps inform consumers about their use of personal data. More than a quarter (28%) of the top 100 apps available from the App Store and Google Play still...
Aug 29, 2013 | Facebook marketing, Regulation, Social media
Facebook has revealed the extent of government spying on its social network users, following recent revalations surrounding the US PRISM web monitoring programme. In a special report, Facebook revealed that governments around the world requested information on about...
Aug 27, 2013 | Mobile, Regulation
Google has updated its Play Store policies in a bid to crack down on apps that send ads and create shortcuts of websites on users’ homescreens without permission. The move means that apps now cannot send users ads on the notification bar or create shortcuts on the...
Aug 21, 2013 | Facebook marketing, Mobile, Regulation
Facebook has joined with Samsung, Ericsson, MediaTek, Nokia, Opera, and Qualcomm to from Internet.org, a project dedicated to getting the internet to the five billion people who cannot get access to it. Watch this video promoting the initiative below: This coalition...
