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Simfin

online safety and digital citizenship specialist

Young People News

01 October 2023

 

The Department for Education (DfE) is keeping files monitoring the social media activity of some of the country’s leading educational experts, the Observer can reveal.

At least nine experts have uncovered files held on them, some as long as 60 pages. One individual even discovered the department had compiled an Excel spreadsheet in which officials had detailed who she interacted with.

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24 September 2023

A town in southern Spain is in shock after it emerged that AI-generated naked images of young local girls had been circulating on social media without their knowledge.

Police are now investigating and according to reports, at least 11 local boys have been identified as having involvement in either the creation of the images or their circulation via the WhatsApp and Telegram apps.

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23 September 2023

Police leaders and teachers' unions are warning that TikTok frenzies that encourage anti-social behaviour are putting a strain on public services.

It comes after the BBC revealed how disproportionate engagement driven by TikTok was linked to disruption.

The BBC found four recent examples, including public interference in the police investigation of Nicola Bulley's disappearance and school vandalism.

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08 September 2023

YouTube has launched a verification system for healthcare workers in the UK as it battles disinformation online.

In 2022, health videos were viewed more than three billion times in the UK alone on the video-sharing platform.

Doctors, nurses and psychologists have been applying for the scheme since June and must meet rigorous criteria set by the tech giant to be eligible.

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29 August 2023

Google is trialling a digital watermark to spot images made by artificial intelligence (AI) in a bid to fight disinformation.

Developed by DeepMind, Google's AI arm, SynthID will identify images generated by machines.

It works by embedding changes to individual pixels in images so watermarks are invisible to the human eye, but detectable by computers

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18 July 2023

When the minor was abducted by Roberts, she was not allowed to bring anything, though she did have her Nintendo Switch on hand.

The girl used the console to download games and watch YouTube, with a friend seeing her name pop up.

That friends' family alerted the police, and with the help of Nintendo, they were able to track down the girl once and for all.

The console manufacturer were able to to retrieve the console's IP address, allowing the FBI to locate the girl just 11 days after she went missing.

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