If "Facebook Is Private", Why Are They Feeding Users' Private Messages Directly To The FBI?

 Authored by Matt Agorist via TheFreeThoughtProject.com,

Despite decrying censorship when it was happening to them last year, when Donald Trump was banned from Twitter and Facebook earlier this month, the left praised the move by big tech. “Facebook is a private company and can do what they want,” the pro-censorship hypocritical crowd chanted ad nauseum through the digital ether after bad orange man was silenced. But as we have said time and again, Facebook being private is simply not true.

Now, however, Facebook has made an unscrupulous Faustian bargain with the federal government which should eliminate all doubt once and for all. They are now willfully handing over private messages of Trump supporters who talked about the events at the capitol on January 6.

Google, Apple, and Amazon all moved to wipe the pro-Trump social media network Parler from the internet earlier this month because of what users on the platform discussed. It was alleged that the handful of dolts who stormed the capitol on January 6 had solely used Parler to plan their laughable, unarmed, silly, unsuccessful, and pitiful attempt to keep Trump in the White House.

Despite the ragtag group of Trumpians posing for selfies, photo-ops, and hanging from banisters, the only thing they accomplished was having D.C. turned into a scene akin to North Korea for Biden’s inauguration. Most honest experts in the media have acknowledged that though a few members of the mob thought they were part of some historic coup to keep their leader in power, the idea that they had any real chance at an insurrection was misleading at best and sheer propaganda used to further the domestic police and surveillance state at worst.

Oh gosh, I hope this doesn't mean the magnitude of the threat has been wildly exaggerated for political gain, media excitement and ratings, censorship orgies, and laying the foundation for a new fear-driven Domestic War on Terror to control politics and information. https://t.co/oHhUPojpSO

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) January 21, 2021

Deferring all responsibility for the planning of the raid on the capitol, Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg had stated shortly after the incident that the protests were largely organized off Facebook. However, she was not telling the truth, and likely knew that large portions of the pro-Trump protests were talked about and organized on Facebook. But was Facebook wiped off the internet like Parler? No, no it was not. Here’s why.

This week, Facebook began furnishing the Federal Bureau of Investigation with data on Trump supporters who discussed the events at the capitol on their platform - up to and including their private messages. Through this action the social media giant is acting as a de facto intelligence collecting arm of the US government.

In contrast, when Syed Farook, otherwise known as the San Bernardino mass shooter, wouldn’t unlock his iPhone for the feds, Apple refused to create a backdoor for them to access it acting as an actual private company supporting the privacy rights of its customers. But Facebook is more than willing to open up its data mining services for their friends in the federal government — because, as we have stated numerous times, Facebook is not private.

As TFTP reported in 2018, Facebook announced that it partnered with the arm of the government-funded Atlantic Council, known as the Digital Forensic Research Lab that was brought on to help the social media behemoth with “real-time insights and updates on emerging threats and disinformation campaigns from around the world.”

The Atlantic Council is the group that NATO uses to whitewash wars and foster hatred toward Russia, which in turn allows them to continue to justify themselves. It’s funded by arms manufacturers like Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, and Boeing. It is also funded by billionaire oligarchs like the Ukraine’s Victor Pinchuk and Saudi billionaire Bahaa Hariri.

The list goes on. The highly unethical HSBC group — who has been caught numerous times laundering money for cartels and terrorists — is listed as one of their top donors. They are also funded by the pharmaceutical industry, Google, Goldman Sachs and others. However, the funding that comes from the United States, the US Army, and the Airforce directly negates the “private” aspect of the partnership.

The “think tank” Facebook partnered with to make decisions on who they censor is directly funded by multiple state actors — including the United States — which voids any and all claims that Facebook is a wholly “private actor.”

The Atlantic Council wields massive influence over mainstream media too, which is why when this partnership was announced, no one in the mainstream press pointed it out as the Orwellian idea that it is. Instead, headlines such as “US think tank’s tiny lab helps Facebook battle fake social media(Reuters)” and “Facebook partners with Atlantic Council to improve election security (The Hill)” were put out to spin the fact that a NATO propaganda arm is now censoring the information Americans see on Facebook.

But this partnership with the state-funded “think tank” is not the only reason Facebook is not private.

From government funded censorship arms to the revolving door of high level bureaucrats who fill the ranks of the oligopolies, the “private company” Facebook concept comes crashing down when taking a closer look. Private-sector firms do not need to be explicitly nationalized to further the establishment’s interests; it’s enough to install their alumni in top regulatory positions. Through these methods, Facebook can put on the façade of privatization while actually acting as deputies for the state but alleviating any constitutional checks in the process.

All the while, whenever the censorship acts in their benefit, half of the masses cheer it on and defend it, keeping resistance at a minimum.

What’s more, as the government hangs the threat of antitrust litigation over their heads, it can force these companies to act in their benefit even without explicit partnerships like that of the Atlantic Council. In fact, prior to the state getting involved in the talks of regulation into big tech, information flowed relatively freely with Facebook only removing racist and violent content. Now, however, as they bend to the will of their partners in the federal government, people like myself find ourselves on 30 day bans for saying “censorship leads to tyranny.”

This is why the answer to the government big tech censorship leviathan lies not in regulation but in boycott. The time is now to get off these platforms who spy on you, ban you, sell you to the highest bidder, and who are tearing society apart. Censorship free platforms exist and are far more user friendly and treat you as the actual customer instead of the sheep they are leading to slaughter. You can check them out here.

Banks repeatedly violate RBI’s circular, deny student loans citing parents’ credit score

By Aathira Konikkara

Despite the mandate of an education-loan policy to benefit poor students that has been in place since 2001, India's public-sector banks continue to deny student loans citing poor credit ratings.

INDRANIL MUKHERJEE/AFP/Getty Images

Nearly twenty years after the National Democratic Alliance government introduced an education loan scheme to benefit students from poor families, India’s public banks continue to deny loans to students whose parents have poor credit ratings. The Indian Banks’ Association, a representative body of all banks with offices in the country, had prepared this proposal as a model education loan scheme in 2000. The next year, the NDA government announced the scheme in the union budget, promising concessions to students wishing to pursue higher education, and the Reserve Bank of India notified it in April that year. But the experience of students and the continuing need for judicial intervention indicates that the scheme’s implementation is not steered by the benefit to aspiring students, but by the caution of banks.

The RBI’s circular stated that the loan scheme “aims at providing financial support from the banking system to deserving/meritorious students for pursuing higher education in India and abroad.” To be eligible under the scheme, students should have scored 60 percent in the qualifying examinations for graduation courses; for Scheduled Caste or Scheduled Tribe applicants, the requirement was 50 percent. The scheme permitted all commercial banks to provide loans “subject to repaying capacity of parents/students,” with a ceiling of Rs 7.50 lakh for courses in India and Rs 15 lakh for courses abroad. Further, it offered a moratorium on the repayment of the loan for the period of the course and one year afterwards, or six months of getting a job, whichever came earlier.

“The main emphasis is that every meritorious student though poor is provided with an opportunity to pursue education with the financial support from the banking system with affordable terms and conditions,” the RBI’s circular stated. “No deserving student is denied an opportunity to pursue higher education for want of financial support.” Yet, students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds who apply for an education loan are commonly rejected by public-sector banks, citing their parents’ low CIBIL score. A CIBIL score refers to a three-digit number issued by the Mumbai-based credit-information company TransUnion CIBIL, which was formerly known as the Credit Information Bureau India Limited.

Banks refer to this score while assessing the creditworthiness of a potential borrower. However, the RBI’s circular does indicate that the students, and not their parents, are considered the principal borrowers. In fact, in August 2015, the Indian Banks’ Association released “Revised Guidance Notes” on the education loan scheme. “The student borrower has no credit history and as such he is assumed to be creditworthy as this is a futuristic loan,” the Guidance Notes state. It even addresses circumstances where an applicant-student’s parents have a poor credit rating. “It is likely that the joint borrower for the loan has a credit history and any adverse features could have a bearing on the assessment of credit risk … To overcome this, the bank may, as a prudent measure insists on a joint borrower acceptable to the bank, in case of adverse credit history of the parent/guardian of the student.”

But none of these appear to be implemented in practice. Vani Rajeev, a student pursuing her bachelor of science in radiology, was one such student whose education-loan application was declined by the State Bank of India citing her single mother’s poor credit history. “We had applied for the loan in February,” Anju Jayan, Vani’s mother, told me on the phone. “My daughter does not have her father. She only has me. I had a CIBIL record since I had applied for a housing loan before. The loan was rejected because of my CIBIL record.” In February 2020, Jayan applied for a loan of Rs 4 lakh for her daughter’s education, but SBI’s Kulasekharamangalam branch, in Kottayam, rejected the application soon after.

In July 2020, the Kerala High Court ruled in a similar case against a decision by a branch of the same bank in Kerala’s Kollam district, where a student’s loan application was rejected by the bank because of his parents’ low CIBIL score. “I am of the opinion that unsatisfactory credit scores of the parents of the petitioner cannot be a ground to reject an educational loan in view of the fact that the repayment capacity of the petitioner after his education should be the deciding factor as per clause 10 of Ext R1 (a) scheme,” the verdict stated. The exhibit cited by the court referred to a 2016 circular issued by the IBA, which revised the original model education loan scheme to “enlarge the coverage” and “address some of the weaknesses noticed.” The clause 10 mentioned in the judgment stated, “In the normal course, while appraising the loan, the future income prospect of the student only will be looked into.”

The petitioner in the case was a 20-year-old student, Pranav SR, who had applied for an education loan of Rs 5,70,000 in order to pursue a bachelor of technology course in Tamil Nadu. The loan application was rejected on the grounds that Shaji R, Pranav’s father, had defaulted on a commercial vehicle loan, according to his CIBIL report. “I paid the money that was due this month in the following month,” Shaji explained to me. “I paid the dues this way for two months. They informed me that my CIBIL score is low because I had a month’s arrears pending.” Shaji then closed the vehicle loan so that Pranav could apply again, but the bank rejected his application again stating that his parents had poor credit histories. 

Shaji said he felt dismayed by the treatment of bank officials towards borrowers, noting that his wife and Pranav had approached SBI’s Kadakkal branch to apply for the loan. “The manager there told my wife that if you have children, you should educate them only if you have money,” Shaji said. “It really upset me to hear that. What is even more upsetting is that they never bother to even accept the application by hand. They just ask you to drop the application on the table and leave.” The application was declined again, in May 2020.

The family then moved the high court and received a favourable order in two months. But even after the order, Shaji said, the bank tried to delay the sanction of the loan “as much as possible,” before eventually processing it. Their advocate, B Mohan Lal, said the bank officials were “reluctant to comply” with the order. “We had to intimidate them with the prospect of a contempt notice,” he said.

The previous year, Lal had appeared for another student, Noorjahan NS, who had filed a writ petition in the high court against SBI’s Kottarakara branch in Kollam after her application for an education loan had been rejected on similar grounds. Noorjahan had applied for a loan of Rs 7,40,000 to cover the expenses of her course at a dental college. As in Pranav’s case, her loan was also rejected because of arrears on a vehicle loan availed by her father. “I had bought a four-wheeler in 2010 on a long-term loan that could be repaid until 2017,” Najeeb Khan, Noorjahan’s father, said. “I missed paying three instalments of the loan on time. It affected my CIBIL score.”

The SBI’s counsel argued in the case that the court cannot interfere “in a commercial decision of the present nature.” However, the court observed that the loan scheme was introduced as a “socially and economically relevant scheme” to support the pursuit of higher education of students who may be in want of financial assistance. The court finally ruled in Noorjahan’s favour, noting that SBI’s rejection of the loan application based on her parent’s credit score was arbitrary. The court stated that repayments under this scheme “were contemplated to be made not on the financial position of the parents but solely on the projected future earnings of the students on employment after education.”

Lal pointed to the similarities in the two cases. “In both the cases, the parties had paid off their dues through a one-time settlement or otherwise,” he said. “But when you apply for a loan and you have to deposit a particular amount by say, 15th every month and you pay the amount on 16th, you are treated as a defaulter. Even if you pay dues of two or five months in a single instalment, you will still be a defaulting person. Then they will always perceive you as a thief.”

The advocate also pointed out that both students belong to Other Backward Classes, a fact mentioned in both court orders. “In the case of Noorjahan, she had obtained admission in the management quota in a self-financing college,” Lal told me. A management quota refers to seats for admission that are filled by a university based on its discretion, and not strictly by the general eligibility criteria. “So they argued that she is not a meritorious candidate. They raised the same point in the second case as well.” But the IBA’s guidelines, as revised in 2015, stated that “a student getting admission offer under merit quota may choose to take up a course under management quota as a personal preference. Such students may be sanctioned loans under this Model Scheme.”

Despite the recent court orders, Lal said that rejection of education loans based on parents’ CIBIL records continues to be commonplace, as reflected by the case of Vani Rajeev. In July, soon after Pranav’s case was reported in the papers, Rajeev approached SBI’s Kulasekharamangalam branch again, and tried to argue her case using the high court’s ruling. “But they said that they have received no such directive,” her mother Jayan told me. She was working as an accountant in UAE until 2014, when she lost her job and returned to Kerala. In desperation, Rajeev even wrote to the prime minister Narendra Modi and the union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, informing them of her situation, in October last year. “I am requesting you with great agony and advice me to continue my studies to support my family,” she wrote. “My only hope of survival is the education loan.”

On 30 December, Rajeev received a letter from SBI referring to her letter to the prime minister. It simply repeated that Jayan was denied the loan because of her CIBIL score. The family was unsure about challenging the bank’s decision in court because the legal fees would be expensive. “I am educating her by borrowing money,” Jayan told me. “Denying her an education is not an option.”

As early as 2011, the Madras High Court had ruled that students are the principal borrowers of education loans, and not their parents. In its judgment that year in the case of Hannah Dotris versus Assistant General Manager, State Bank of Mysore, the court held, “The bank should adopt a more reasonable and pragmatic approach to the entire issue bearing in mind that the repayment shall be made by the student concerned, who avails loan and such repayment commences after completion of her course of study.” Yet, public-sector banks have continually denied the loans, leading the Madurai bench of the Madras High Court to take note of it in 2018. Citing the 2011 judgment, the bench observed, “It is rather unfortunate that the aforesaid order came to be passed in the year 2011 and various subsequent orders of this court had also passed, even then the financial institutions have been continuing to reject applications of this nature on similar grounds.”

K Srinivasan, the convener of Education Loan Task Force—a Chennai-based voluntary body that offers guidance to students in the application process—said that housing and vehicle loans, unlike education loans, are sanctioned after assessing the present financial status of the borrower. “IBA has clarified that educational loans have to be dealt with in an independent manner and not to be linked to the CIBIL rating of your parents,” he said. In case a bank is concerned about the credibility of a borrower because of their parent’s poor CIBIL rating, Srinivasan suggested that a family member or anyone who does not have a low CIBIL score can stand in as a third-party guarantor on the repayment of the loan.

In 2015, the union ministry of finance collaborated with the department of higher education—under the ministry of human resources development—and the IBA to launch Vidya Lakshmi, a web portal to ease the process of securing education loans. According to Srinivasan, while the portal created a single window for students to apply to multiple leading banks across the country, its implementation has been poor. “You apply to three banks but none of the banks will take it seriously and the students don’t know where to complain. Nobody takes a decision because they think the other person will,” he told me. He suggested that instead of a simultaneous submission of loan requests to three banks, there should be a hierarchical process where the student has to consult a second or a third bank only after her first choice of bank declines her application.

Emailed queries to the concerned SBI branches, the IBA and the MHRD went unanswered. This piece will be updated if and when a response is received.

Srinivasan pointed to one recurring factor that led to mistrust between banks and borrowers in Tamil Nadu—during election seasons in the state, political parties promise a waiver on education loans. “It unnecessarily misguides the students,” he told me, noting that he receives hundreds of queries from students who ask him when the loan waiver would be implemented. “Later, when a statement is given that it is not possible, no media will take it up. If DMK or AIADMK declare that education loans will be written off, that will come as a prominent news item. Then all students who borrowed will get misled. With the hope that the government will write it off, they will stop repayment.”

The data suggests a steady decline in education loans to less privileged students. In January 2020, the Business Standard reported that according to RBI data, there has been a steady drop in the growth of education loans since 2016, with outstanding loans contracting by 3.4 percent as of November 2019. The report further stated that high-value loans—of above Rs 10 lakh—were rising, and only smaller loans, which benefit the lesser privileged, were shrinking. According to RBI data, the report stated, the sum of outstanding education loans smaller than Rs 10 lakh declined from Rs 60,000 crore in March 2016 to Rs 53,000 crore by the end of November 2019. In December 2019, Sitharaman had said that there is no proposal under consideration for waiver of education loans, adding that banks have been instructed to adopt a “non-coercive strategy” to recover the loans.

Srinivasan said education loans were not a priority for the banks or for the government. “There are serious attempts at every level—at the banks’ level, at the government level—to discourage educational loans,” he said. “Nobody takes it seriously. Interest subsidy also is not properly disbursed.” Srinivasan added, “Education loan is an investment, it is not a loan at all. It is a national investment, investment on the future knowledge of society.”

Source: The Caravan

Indian Medical Association (IMA) calls for nationwide relay hunger strike against surgery by Ayurveda doctors

The IMA on Thursday announced a pan-India relay hunger strike of doctors starting February 1, in protest against a notification issued by the Central Council of Indian Medicine (CCIM) that authorises post-graduate practitioners in specified streams of Ayurveda to perform general surgical procedures, stating that it will lead to "mixopathy".

The Indian Medical Association (IMA) is giving immediate directives to all members across the country to launch the "Save Healthcare India Movement", the doctors' body said in a statement.

Under the campaign, the IMA will launch a massive awareness drive across the country as this is a clear threat to the safety of healthcare of people.

Doctors will take turns to sit on the hunger strike 24x7 from February 1 and the IMA will release posters and banners to raise awareness on the issue across the country, the statement said.

"All IMA members shall update their Members of Parliament and MLAs regarding the true picture of the notification and the integration policy. The IMA will also give its representations to all state governments. Under this movement, all NGOs will be updated about the core issues," it added.

Besides, all IMA members will write and convey their feelings to the prime minister, the association said.

Representatives of the IMA shall visit various places across the country to raise awareness among the public and apprise various associations from different countries of this "unscientific" notification, it said, adding that the global voice of modern medicine shall echo the feelings of the Indian Medical Association and its members.

The IMA has condemned the notification issued by the CCIM, a statutory body under the AYUSH Ministry, authorising post-graduate practitioners in specified streams of Ayurveda to be trained to perform surgical procedures such as excisions of benign tumours, amputation of gangrene, nasal and cataract operations.

The doctors' body further said the recent policy tilt, as evidenced in the medical pluralism advocated by the National Education Policy 2020 and the four committees of NITI AAYOG for officially integrating the systems of medicine in medical education, practice, public health and administration as well as research ostensibly for a "One Nation, One System" policy, will "ring the death knell of all systems of medicine as a whole".

"The IMA respects all streams of healthcare. We object mixing of the streams as it is unsafe and unscientific...one doctor cannot give all systems of medicine to one patient. Mixing the Pathies and providing substandard healthcare is definitely wrong.

"The IMA demands withdrawal of the CCIM order and dissolution of the NITI AAYOG committees for integration. The IMA appeals to the government to consider the sensitivity of the medical fraternity and take appropriate steps. The IMA will be constrained to intensify the agitation until the steps towards implementing mixopathy are abandoned," it said.

Six miners killed in Meghalaya

Five of the victims were from Assam, four from Karimganj and one from Cachar district

By Umanand Jaiswal

Guwahati 23, 2021: Six miners were killed while working in a remote coalmine in Meghalaya on Thursday evening after a machine malfunctioned, according to a statement issued by the police.

Five of the victims were from Assam, four from Karimganj and one from Cachar district. One of the deceased is yet to be identified. The bodies were recovered on Friday.

The mine is located in East Jaintia Hills district’s Sorkari Dienshalu area, over 12km from the district headquarters.

The police said prima facie it seems that a “machine at the mining area had malfunctioned, which may have unfortunately led to the untimely demise of the six persons”. The bodies have been sent for post-mortem likely to be completed by Saturday afternoon.

When asked whether the mine was an active or an abandoned one, an official said that there were no traces of coal at the site.

Another official said they could have been involved in coal or stone mining.

The last major mine mishap in the district had claimed the lives of 15 miners in 2018.

First sewage treatment plant in northeast India starts functioning in Manipur

The primary objective of implementing the sewage treatment plant in Imphal is to control pollution in Nambul River which flows into Loktak, the largest freshwater lake in northeast India

By Sobhapati Samom

For the first time in northeast India, Manipur government has started to implement a sewage treatment plant under the banner of Imphal Sewerage Project phase 1 in Imphal to control pollution.

“So far we’ve provided sewerage pipeline connection to 12,000 households and other establishments in nine out of targeted 11 municipal wards,” said executive engineer Arambam Ibohal of public health engineering department (drainage and sewerage division), the implementing agency in the state. “The remaining households will be completed within March 2021.”

The primary objective of implementing the sewage treatment plant in Imphal is to control pollution in Nambul River which flows into Loktak, the largest freshwater lake in northeast India, Ibohal said.

With a project cost of ₹345 crore, Imphal Sewerage Project phase 1 has a generating capacity of 27 million litres per day and is designed to cover core areas of Imphal through its primary and secondary lines. It was officially commissioned in June last year after conducting a trial run for one-and-a-half years.

“In this project, we are targeting to reutilise the sewerage water collected from the households and other establishments after its proper treatment at the plant site at Lamphelpat for different purposes so that only the rain water runs in our drains,” Ibohal said. “So we’re requesting the public to use the facility judiciously.”

The department is also planning to begin phase 2 with a generating capacity of 49 million litres per day. This project is to be completed within three years. The cost of the project is ₹1,471 crore. “We’ve already prepared the detailed project report in this regard,” he said.

What do you think of the Covid Vaccine Passport?

Vaccine passports 'essential' for resumption of international travel

https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2021/jan/22/vaccine-passports-essential-for-resumption-of-international-travel-says-world-tourism-organisation

Could this be cure of Cancer?

Korean scientists developed a cancer-targeted phototherapeutic agent that promises complete elimination of cancer cells without side effects. It involves only one injection and repeated phototherapy. In a mouse model, it showed no toxicity while the cancer was completely removed.

Chemotherapy with light; only one injection required

Italy orders TikTok to block underage users after 10-year-old girl dies doing viral challenge

Authorities said the temporary ban will last until 15 February.

Italy's data protection watchdog has ordered TikTok to block access to users whose age cannot be confirmed.

The ban comes just days after the death of a young girl in Palermo, who had been taking part in an online "challenge" that has been viral on the platform.

"The Italian Data Protection Authority (GPDP) has ordered Tik Tok to immediately block the use of user data for which the age of the user has not been ascertained with certainty," it said in a statement.

"The authority decided to intervene as a matter of urgency following the terrible case of the 10-year-old girl from Palermo."

The Chinese-owned app has been prohibited from processing user data that is not "in compliance with the provisions related to the age requirement".

The temporary ban will last until 15 February as the authority continues to assess data privacy regulations. The GPDP also stated that they had informed Irish data protection authorities "given that recently TikTok has announced that it has set its main establishment in Ireland".

The President of Italy's Commission for childhood and adolescence, Licia Ronzulli, described the ban as "right and timely" on Twitter.

"The safety of minors must be protected at all costs and we cannot, as happened in Palermo, allow a social network to be an accomplice in a suicide".

Tiktok had already been accused of data privacy violations by the GPDP in December over the "lack of attention to the protection of minors".

The social network had also been accused of weak policies, which allowed users under the age of 13 to circumvent age-restricted rules.

The public prosecutor's office in Palermo indicated that it has opened an investigation into TikTok for "incitement to suicide" after the 10-year-old's death by asphyxiation, which provoked strong reactions across Italy.

"The safety of the TikTok community is our top priority," the platform said in a statement, adding, "we are at the disposal of the competent authorities to collaborate in their investigation".