Facebook paid contractors to transcribe users’ audio clips
By MAE ANDERSON and RACHEL LERMAN AP Technology Writers
NEW YORK (AP) — Facebook has paid contractors to transcribe audio clips from users of its Messenger service, raising privacy concerns for a company with a history of privacy lapses.
The practice was, until recently, common in the tech industry. Companies say the practice helps improve their services. But users aren’t typically aware that humans and not just computers are reviewing audio.
Transcriptions done by humans raise bigger concerns because of the potential of rogue employees or contractors leaking details. The practice at Google emerged after some of its Dutch language audio snippets were leaked. More than 1,000 recordings were obtained by Belgian broadcaster VRT NWS, which noted that some contained sensitive personal conversations — as well as information that identified the person speaking.
People react differently when they know other humans have heard them rather than machines because it’s a different type of connection, said Jamie Winterton, director of strategy at Arizona State University’s Global Security Initiative.
“We feel we have some control over machines,” she said. “You have no control over humans that way. There’s no way once a human knows something to drag that piece of data to the recycling bin.”
Facebook said audio snippets reviewed by contractors were masked so as not to reveal anyone’s identity. It said it stopped the practice a week ago. The development was reported earlier by Bloomberg.
Google said it suspended doing this worldwide while it investigates the Dutch leaks. Amazon said it still uses humans, but users can decline, or opt out, of the human transcriptions. Published reports say Apple also has used humans, but has stopped.
A report last week said Microsoft also uses human transcribers with some Skype conversations and commands spoken to Microsoft’s digital assistant, Cortana. Microsoft told tech news site Motherboard that it has safeguards such as stripping identifying data and requiring non-disclosure agreements with contractors and their employees. Yet details leaked to Motherboard.
It makes sense to use human transcribers to train artificial intelligence systems, Winterton said. But the issue is that companies are leading people to believe that only machines are listening to audio, causing miscommunication and distrust, she said.
“Communicating to users through your privacy policy is legal but not ethical,” she said.
The companies’ privacy policies — usually long, dense documents — often permit the use of customer data to improve products and services, but the language can be opaque.
“We collect the content, communications and other information you provide when you use our Products, including when you sign up for an account, create or share content, and message or communicate with others,” Facebook’s data-use policy reads . It does not mention audio or voice specifically or using transcribers.
Irish data-protection regulators say they’re seeking more details from Facebook to assess compliance with European data regulations. The agency’s statement says it’s also had “ongoing engagement with Google, Apple and Microsoft” over the issue, though Amazon wasn’t mentioned.
Facebook is already under scrutiny for a variety of other ways it has misused user data. It agreed to a $5 billion fine to settle a U.S. Federal Trade Commission probe of its privacy practices.
___
Lerman reported from San Francisco.

One day after the eyes of America–and perhaps the world–were on Beaver County as President Donald Trump visited the Shell cracker plant in Potter Township, it was back to work for the Commissioners and crew at the daily work session. However, the protest to President Trump was brought up during the meeting, as County Solicitor Garen Fedeles cleared up any concerns about the Courthouse being used as a grounds for the Anti Trump crowd:

 

While the anti-Trump crowd was at the courthouse on Tuesday, the pro-Trump crowd was across the street in McIntosh Park.

The other major issue brought out at the Commissioners’ work session on Wednesday was the current association with two organizations focused on Beaver County’s homeless: The Cornerstone of Beaver County and Crossroads Men’s Shelter (both located in Beaver Falls). Commissioner Chairman Dan Camp explained the current situation:

 

The Commissioners will meet again on August 21 at 10:00 AM.

Army veteran pleads not guilty in anthem assault on teen
SUPERIOR, Mont. (AP) — An Army veteran pleaded not guilty to assaulting a 13-year-old boy who the suspect said refused to remove his hat during the national anthem at a rodeo in Montana.
Attorney Lance Jasper has told the Missoulian that defendant Curt Brockway, a 39-year-old veteran with a traumatic brain injury from an automobile crash, believed he was doing what President Donald Trump wanted him to do.
Brockway told investigators the boy cursed at him when he asked him to remove his hat.
Witnesses have said Brockway picked the boy up by his neck and slammed him to the ground. Court records say the boy suffered a skull fracture.
Brockway, of Superior, Montana, entered his plea Wednesday in the Aug. 3 encounter.
He remains free without bond. His next hearing is Oct. 23.

Ex-Blackwater contractor sentenced to life in Iraq shootings
By ASHRAF KHALIL Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — A former Blackwater security contractor was sentenced Wednesday to life in prison for his role in the 2007 shooting of unarmed civilians in Iraq that left 14 people dead.
Federal judge Royce Lamberth issued the sentence after a succession of friends and relatives requested leniency for Nicholas Slatten, who was found guilty of first-degree murder by a jury in December.
Prosecutors charged that Slatten, of Sparta, Tennessee, was the first to fire shots in the September 2007 massacre of Iraqi civilians at a crowded traffic circle in Baghdad. In all, 10 men, two women and two boys, ages 9 and 11, were killed.
The defense had argued that Slatten and other Blackwater contractors opened fire only after they saw what they mistakenly thought was a potential suicide car bomber moving quickly toward their convoy.
Defense attorney Dane Butswinkas described Slatten as “a person of high integrity” whose family members had served in the U.S. military for four generations.
Several of Slatten’s supporters openly accused prosecutors of scapegoating an innocent man in order to placate Iraqi public opinion. The shootings strained U.S.-Iraqi relations and focused intense international scrutiny on the extensive use of private military contractors in Iraq.
In 2014, a jury convicted Slatten and three other contractors — Paul Alvin Slough, Evan Shawn Liberty and Dustin Laurent Heard— who were part of a four-vehicle convoy that was protecting State Department personnel in the area. An appeals court overturned that conviction, saying Slatten should have been tried separately from the three other men.
Slatten was retried last summer, but a mistrial was declared after the jury couldn’t reach a unanimous verdict. A subsequent jury convicted him of murder in December 2018.
Slatten’s father, Darrell, paused in addressing the judge to speak directly to his son, who sat largely impassive in a beige prison jumpsuit.
“Nick, please accept my apology for what your country has done to you,” he said. “We will fight until hell freezes over to correct this travesty of justice.”
Slatten himself told the judge that he was a victim of an “unjust prosecution” and that government lawyers cared more about producing a conviction than uncovering the truth of what happened in Baghdad 12 years ago.
“This is a miscarriage of justice and it will not stand,” he said.
But Judge Lambert, in issuing the life sentence, dismissed much of the family’s claims that Slatten was a scapegoat for international political considerations.
“The jury got it exactly right,” he said. “This was murder.”

As a result of a hearing, Zachary Dinnell will be sentenced soon. Sandy Giordano has more on this story…

HONG KONG (AP) — Hong Kong police say they arrested five people over violence involving pro-democracy protesters at the city’s international airport. Spokesman Mak Chin-ho says all of the men aged between 17 and 28 were arrested for illegal assembly. Two were also charged with assaulting a police officer and possessing offensive weapons. He says additional suspects are expected to be arrested, including some who assaulted an officer as riot police sought to clear the terminal, prompting him to draw his sidearm.

NEW YORK (AP) — A person familiar with the investigation into Jeffrey Epstein’s apparent suicide in a federal jail says surveillance video reviewed after the death shows guards did not check on inmates every half hour as was noted in log entries. Epstein is believed to have killed himself early Saturday at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York, where he was awaiting trial in a sex trafficking case.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — A federal appeals court says high tolls on the Pennsylvania Turnpike don’t violate the right of truckers and other motorists to travel between states, upholding dismissal of their lawsuit. The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday Pennsylvania’s use of turnpike tolls to pay other costs was authorized by Congress. The ruling upholds a federal judge’s decision in April to dismiss the lawsuit by the Missouri-based Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association and others.

Pipe replacement begins Thursday on Ohioville Road, otherwise known as Route 168, between Route 51 and Forest Lane. Work will take place between 7 am and 5 pm. Traffic will be detoured via Route 51 and Route 251.

An Ohio man is accused of forging checks from a local physical therapy office. Franklin Township Police say the owner of Burk Physical Therapy was contacted by Huntington Bank in June after a man attempted to cash a suspicious check from her bank account, and the man left after being pressed for more details on the check. The accused is being charged with 2 counts forgery, theft by deception, theft by unlawful taking, and access device fraud.