A long week for Facebook
Facebook and other apps owned by Facebook like WhatsApp and Instagram were down for over five hours last Monday. The shutdown showed just how dependent people around the world have become on Facebook. Just one day later, last Tuesday, a former product manager at Facebook turned-whistleblower, Frances Haugen, explained to a Senate subcommittee how Facebook “deliberately kept people — including children — hooked on its services,” according to the New York Times. Zuckerberg, the chief executive of Facebook, immediately rebutted the claims.
Other News
- Kurz, Austria’s chancellor announced on Saturday that he would resign
- The WHO approved the first-ever malaria vaccine. The vaccine was developed by GlaxoSmithKline and could potentially save the lives of tens of thousands of children in sub-Saharan Africa.
- The city of Venice in Italy is using hundreds of surveillance cameras and buying the cellphone data of tourists in an effort to establish more crowd control, according to the New York Times
- The cost of oil, natural gas, and coal has increased drastically the past few months. The rise is caused in part by oil companies refusing to produce more to prevent the prices from dropping.
- In an order last week, the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the government should pay families who have lost family members to COVID-19 50,000 rupees (around 671 U.S. dollars)
- The world has lost around 14% of its coral reefs since 2009, a new study revealed
