You are here

  • Home
  • Indonesia bans sales of Google smartphones days after blocking Apple’s iPhone 16

Indonesia bans sales of Google smartphones days after blocking Apple’s iPhone 16

Indonesia bans sales of Google smartphones days after blocking Apple’s iPhone 16
Above, the new Pixel 9 smartphone series during an unveiling event in Mountain View, California on Aug. 13, 2024. (Reuters)
Short Url

https://arab.news/cb26h

Updated 12 sec ago
Reuters
Follow

Indonesia bans sales of Google smartphones days after blocking Apple’s iPhone 16

Indonesia bans sales of Google smartphones days after blocking Apple’s iPhone 16
  • Block comes a week after Indonesia said it had blocked the sales of iPhone 16 domestically, also for not meeting local content rules
  • Indonesia has a huge, tech-savvy population, making the Southeast Asian nation a key target market for tech-related investment
Updated 12 sec ago
Reuters
Follow

JAKARTA: Indonesia said it has banned sales of smartphones made by Alphabet’s Google due to rules requiring the use of locally manufactured components, days after blocking sales of tech giant Apple’s iPhone 16 for the same reason.
Indonesia blocked sales of Google Pixel phones because the company has not met the rules which necessitate certain smartphones sold domestically to contain at least 40 percent of parts manufactured locally.
“We are pushing these rules so that there’s fairness for all investors in Indonesia,” Febri Hendri Antoni Arief, industry ministry spokesperson, said on Thursday. “Google’s products have not adhered to the scheme we set, so they can’t be sold here.”
Febri said consumers can buy Google Pixel phones overseas, so long as they pay the necessary taxes, adding the country would consider deactivating the phones that are illicitly sold.
Google did not immediately respond to a message and email requesting comment.
The block comes a week after Indonesia said it had blocked the sales of iPhone 16 domestically, also for not meeting local content rules.
Companies usually increase the use of domestic components to meet such rules through partnerships with local suppliers or by sourcing parts domestically.
Google and Apple are not among the top smartphone makers in Indonesia. The top two smartphone makers in the first quarter of 2024 were Chinese firm OPPO and South Korean firm Samsung, research firm IDC said in May.
Indonesia has a huge, tech-savvy population, making the Southeast Asian nation a key target market for tech-related investment.
Bhima Yudhistira, director of the Center of Economic and Law Studies think tank, said the move was “pseudo” protectionism that hurts consumers and impacts investor confidence.
“This creates a negative sentiment for investors looking to enter Indonesia,” he said.

Topics: smartphone Indonesia Apple iPhone Google Google Pixel 9

Related

Google rolls out Pixel 9 phones earlier than usual as AI race with Apple heats up
Offbeat
Google rolls out Pixel 9 phones earlier than usual as AI race with Apple heats up
Apple embraces the AI craze with its newly unleashed iPhone 16 lineup
Offbeat
Apple embraces the AI craze with its newly unleashed iPhone 16 lineup

‘Polarization of journalism’ rising amid Israel attacking, killing media workers

‘Polarization of journalism’ rising amid Israel attacking, killing media workers
Updated 59 min 36 sec ago
Zaira Lakhpatwala
Follow

‘Polarization of journalism’ rising amid Israel attacking, killing media workers

‘Polarization of journalism’ rising amid Israel attacking, killing media workers
  • Reporters not respected anymore, says veteran journalist Mohamad Chebaro
Updated 59 min 36 sec ago
Zaira Lakhpatwala

DUBAI: On Oct. 25, an airstrike in south Lebanon killed Al-Mayadeen TV’s camera operator Ghassan Najjar, broadcast engineer Mohammed Reda, and Hezbollah-owned Al-Manar TV’s camera operator Wissam Qassem.

It also injured several others including camera operator Hassan Hoteit and assistant camera operator Zakaria Fadel of the media production company Isol.

Other journalists hurt were photographer Hassan Hoteit from Al-Qahera channel, and Youmna Fawaz, a correspondent for MTV, according to media reports.

The Israeli army said the strike, which hit a compound housing 18 journalists from multiple media outlets, targeted Hezbollah militants; however, many believe it was a planned attack on journalists.

Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati said the attack was deliberate and both he and Information Minister Ziad Makary labelled it a war crime.

“The Israeli enemy waited for the journalists’ nighttime break to betray them in their sleep ... This is an assassination, after monitoring and tracking, with prior planning and design, as there were 18 journalists there representing seven media institutions. This is a war crime,” Makary said in a post on X.

 

The Committee to Protect Journalists said it was appalled by the attack, and called for an independent investigation and for the perpetrators to be held to account.

The CPJ is “deeply outraged by yet another deadly Israeli airstrike on journalists,” said its program director Carlos Martinez de la Serna, adding that “deliberately targeting journalists is a war crime under international law.”

“I used to go to conflict zones in the past and journalists were received by all parties with open arms,” said Mohamad Chebaro, a British-Lebanese journalist with over 25 years of experience covering war, terrorism, defense, current affairs and diplomacy.

But “I have been increasingly witnessing the polarization of journalism” by companies or political parties wherein journalists are seen as being “with or against” entities — whether that is a corporation or a country, he told Arab News.

Chebaro explained that “warring parties” feel the need to have their own “media machine,” which makes independent journalism a rare concept. And so “killing the messenger has become easy for every party trying to control the narrative of every conflict.”

He added: “Lebanon is no different than Gaza. Gaza is no different than Syria. And Syria is no different than Iran before it.”

On Monday, Lebanon submitted a complaint to the Security Council “regarding the latest Israeli attacks that targeted journalists and media facilities in Hasbaya in south Lebanon, and the Ouzai area” in Beirut’s southern suburbs, according to the Foreign Ministry on X.

“The repeated Israeli targeting of media crews is a war crime,” and Israel must be “held to account and punished,” the statement added.

Over 400 media workers and journalists from international news organizations have condemned Israel’s attacks on Palestinian journalists in Gaza in a letter released on Oct. 30.

The letter also addresses the escalation of attacks on journalists in Lebanon. It called for the immediate medical evacuations of all injured journalists, protection of those who remain, and fair reporting on Gaza and the condition of Palestinian media workers there.

“We affirm that no one is more qualified to report and deliver the news from Gaza than local journalists, and it is the professional and personal duty of all journalists and media institutions to ensure their protection,” the letter added.

The attack on journalists is in many ways an attack on journalism and the truth, Chebaro said.

He added: “Human beings are not respected in the theater of war anymore. There is a breakdown of the respect and the sanctity of the job of a journalist.

“And unfortunately, we have gone away from the old ethos of looking at a journalist as an independent informing voice.”

As of Oct. 31, the CPJ’s preliminary investigations showed at least 134 journalists and media workers were among those killed in Gaza, the West Bank, Israel, and Lebanon since Oct. 7, 2023.

This makes it the deadliest period for journalists since the CPJ began gathering data in 1992.

Topics: Hamas-Israel war Lebanon Journalists in Gaza

Related

Lebanon complains to UN over latest deadly Israel strike on journalists
Media
Lebanon complains to UN over latest deadly Israel strike on journalists
Israel army says strike that killed journalists in Lebanon ‘under review’
Middle-East
Israel army says strike that killed journalists in Lebanon ‘under review’

Deceptive ‘bait-and-switch’ Facebook groups snare US voters: study

Deceptive ‘bait-and-switch’ Facebook groups snare US voters: study
Updated 01 November 2024
AFP
Follow

Deceptive ‘bait-and-switch’ Facebook groups snare US voters: study

Deceptive ‘bait-and-switch’ Facebook groups snare US voters: study
  • Over 300 groups found masquerading as pro-Harris pages while misleading the Democratic contender’s supporters with abusive, hateful posts or capitalize on her popularity to promote merchandise
  • The “bait-and-switch” tactic appears to target actors across the political spectrum, including Trump, but does not appear to be an organized effort, says the study by American Sunlight Project
Updated 01 November 2024
AFP

WASHINGTON: Dozens of Facebook groups bill themselves as Kamala Harris fan pages but mount racist attacks, criticize her record on immigration and promote her rival Donald Trump, in what disinformation researchers call a “bait-and-switch” tactic aimed at deceiving voters in a tight US election race.
The Washington-based American Sunlight Project analyzed over 300 groups on the Meta-owned platform that masquerade as pro-Harris pages while misleading the Democratic contender’s supporters with abusive, hateful posts or capitalize on her popularity to promote merchandise.
The proliferation of such Facebook groups, which typically bring together communities with shared interests, does not appear to be an organized effort and illustrates a sophisticated tactic to seed false election narratives in trusted online spaces.
“These are usually places where there is a high level of trust between members, making them more likely to believe what is being shared there, whether that is election disinformation, miracle cures or memes,” Nina Jankowicz, ASP’s co-founder and chief executive, told AFP.
The “bait-and-switch” tactic appears to target actors across the political spectrum, including Trump.
But Jankowicz, the former Department of Homeland Security disinformation chief, said her research outfit noticed an “explosion” of such groups focused on Harris since she entered the presidential race over the summer.
One group purports to be a space for “Kamala Harris fans,” with its “about” section hailing her as a “trailblazer, a symbol of diversity, and a champion for justice and equality.”
But inside the group, posts seek to undermine Harris, including one with a photo of a brown woman smearing her face with black paint alongside the caption: “Kamala getting ready to talk to Black people.”
The post echoed Trump’s false claim that Harris “turned Black” and that she was exploiting her race to woo African-American voters.
Harris is the first Black, South Asian and woman vice president in US history.

Promoting Trump rhetoric

Another group that calls itself “Democratic voices for President Kamala Harris 2024” posted messages in support of “Make America Great Again” — the political movement and slogan popularized by Trump.
One video posted in the group showed Charlie Kirk — a conservative influencer whose political organization is focused on getting Trump reelected — promoting the Republican’s anti-immigrant rhetoric.
A similar group savaged Harris as a “border czar” who has failed to curb undocumented migration into the United States — an attack line constantly repeated by Trump and his supporters.
One other group calling itself “Kamala Harris 2024” posted a sexist meme mocking the preference of some voters for a “female president” in the face of what it depicted as pressing issues confronting the country.
Many of the “Harris” groups analyzed by ASP were run by lone actors, including some non-US moderators in Africa or Eastern Europe.
Some groups posted about topics unrelated to the vice president, including religious cult-like content, and were hotbeds for spam and merchandise sales. Many were not started from scratch, having changed their names several times to capitalize on trending issues to gain traction, ASP said.

Violation of Meta policies
In a statement to AFP, a Meta spokesman said: “Protecting the election on our platforms is one of our top priorities, and we continue to enforce our policies when we find violating content or behavior.”
Meta has previously extolled Facebook groups in commercials for their power to bring people together.
The so-called bait-and-switch strategy appears to violate Meta’s policies regarding inauthentic behavior or “complex deception,” which among other things forbids the use of its platforms to deceive users about the purpose of content.
ASP said the groups it analyzed were a representative sample and it was unable to get a fulsome picture of the scale of the abuse after Meta in August shut down CrowdTangle — a digital tool researchers hailed as vital in monitoring falsehoods.
Meta has replaced it with a Content Library, a technology that has similar functionality but is still under development.
ASP shared samples of a handful of similar “bait-and-switch” groups dedicated to Trump.
“This phenomenon isn’t unique to Harris — groups are used and abused this way across the political spectrum and across topics,” Jankowicz said.
“As we get closer to Election Day and during what is likely to be a tumultuous transition period to follow, it’s important that people slow down and try to be more deliberate when consuming content online,” she added.
 

Topics: US Election 2024 Facebook American Sunlight Project

Related

New body to handle disputes between EU users and Facebook, TikTok, YouTube
Media
New body to handle disputes between EU users and Facebook, TikTok, YouTube
Facebook seeks to attract young adults with new community, video features
Media
Facebook seeks to attract young adults with new community, video features

Russia fines Google $20 decillion, a record-breaking penalty

Russia fines Google $20 decillion, a record-breaking penalty
Updated 31 October 2024
Arab News
Follow

Russia fines Google $20 decillion, a record-breaking penalty

Russia fines Google $20 decillion, a record-breaking penalty
  • The amount — 20 followed by 33 zeros — exceeds the estimated total global GDP of $110 trillion, a figure with a mere 13 zeros
  • Unpaid fine dates back to 2020 when Google began banning Russian YouTube channels, and has grown exponentially due to compound penalties
Updated 31 October 2024
Arab News

LONDON: A Russian court has fined Google a staggering $20 decillion, the largest financial penalty ever issued.

In fact, $20 decillion (20 followed by 33 zeros), which in Russia’s own currency is equivalent to 2 undecillion rubles (a 37-digit figure), far exceeds the combined gross domestic product of every country in the world, which is estimated to be about $110 trillion (a figure with a mere 13 zeros).

The amount dwarfs the $206 billion paid by tobacco companies to the US government in 1998, which remains the largest civil lawsuit settlement.

Google said: “We have ongoing legal matters relating to Russia. For example, civil judgments that include compounding penalties have been imposed upon us in connection with disputes regarding the termination of accounts, including those of sanctioned parties. We do not believe these ongoing legal matters will have a material adverse effect.”

The fine, which a judge said contained “many, many zeros,” relates to a dispute that began in 2020 when Google-owned YouTube banned Tsargrad, a Russian ultra-nationalist, pro-Kremlin channel, from the platform in compliance with US sanctions.

Since then, Google has blocked more than 1,000 YouTube channels and more than 5.5 million videos from Russia, halted advertising services in the country in March 2022, and paused monetization of content that supports Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In response, a number of relatively small fines were imposed by Russian courts but they went unpaid and Russian business newspaper RBC reported that the amounts owed have grown immensely as result of compound penalties initially set at $1,025 a day and doubling each week.

Details of the current total of the fine emerged on Tuesday, as Google reported quarterly earnings of $88.3 billion for the three months to September. Based on that amount, it would take the company more than 56 septillion (a figure with 24 zeros) years to pay off the fine, which is more than 4 trillion times the age of the universe.

Dmitry Peskov, a spokesperson for the Kremlin, urged Google parent company Alphabet to stop blocking Russian YouTube channels. However, he conceded that the massive fine, which he said he cannot even pronounce, is purely symbolic.

“These demands, they simply demonstrate the essence of our channels’ claims against Google,” Peskov said. “Google should not restrict the activities of our broadcasters, but Google is doing this.

“Probably, this (growing fine) should be a reason for Google’s management to take notice and rectify the situation. It’s the best thing the company can do.”

Topics: Russia Google Alphabet US Youtube

Related

PIF partners with Google Cloud to create AI hub in Saudi Arabia 
Business & Economy
PIF partners with Google Cloud to create AI hub in Saudi Arabia 
US considers breakup of Google in landmark search case
Media
US considers breakup of Google in landmark search case

Palestinian student wins appeal after UK Home Office revoked visa over Gaza remarks

Palestinian student wins appeal after UK Home Office revoked visa over Gaza remarks
Updated 31 October 2024
Arab News
Follow

Palestinian student wins appeal after UK Home Office revoked visa over Gaza remarks

Palestinian student wins appeal after UK Home Office revoked visa over Gaza remarks
  • Tribunal found Dana Abu Qamar’a comments did not constitute extremism, align with views of human rights organizations
  • Qamar had her visa revoked in December after a speech at Palestinian rally that prompted intervention of the then-immigration minister, Robert Jenrick
Updated 31 October 2024
Arab News

LONDON: A Palestinian student has won an appeal against the UK government after her student visa was revoked in 2023 due to statements on the Gaza situation that the Home Office deemed “not conducive to the public good.”

The Home Office had stripped Dana Abu Qamar, a dual Jordanian-Canadian citizen of Palestinian origin and University of Manchester student, of her visa after concluding that her remarks on Gaza’s resistance to Israel posed a risk to public safety.

However, a tribunal overturned the ruling on Wednesday, declaring that her comments did not constitute extremism.

Court documents show that her visa was revoked after the then-immigration minister, Robert Jenrick, intervened in the case. Qamar, who leads the Friends of Palestine society at the university, stated that his involvement “sends a chilling message to activists,” calling it part of a “brutal crackdown.”

The tribunal’s judgment also concluded that Abu Qamar’s reference to Israel as an “apartheid” state aligned with views held by multiple human rights organizations and found her language around “actively resisting” and “breaking free” to be consistent with lawful expressions of Palestinian resistance. The court also determined she was “not an extremist.”

Commenting on her legal victory, Qamar said “justice has prevailed” and that she was happy with the result.

“This ruling validates the right to voice support for human rights for the plight of Palestinians and the right to resist occupation,” she said on Wednesday.

Her statements, which initially attracted government scrutiny, came during a speech at a pro-Palestine rally in Manchester, in which she remarked, “We are full of pride, we are really, full of joy at what has happened,” referencing the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attacks on Israel.

Later, in a BBC interview, she clarified her stance, saying: “The death of any innocent civilian should not be condoned ever, and we don’t condone it at all.”

Abu Qamar, who has lost 22 relatives in Gaza during Israel’s ongoing campaign and whose paternal grandparents were displaced by the 1948 Nakba, reiterated her opposition to harm against civilians, adding: “I’ve always been of the position that I never have or never will condone harm to innocent civilians. It doesn’t align with who I am as a person, with my character and with my views. I’ve made that explicitly clear throughout and I’m glad that the court has seen that.”

Topics: War on Gaza UK Robert Jenrick

Related

‘Pakistan is your second home,’ says PM Sharif after welcoming Palestinian students video
Pakistan
‘Pakistan is your second home,’ says PM Sharif after welcoming Palestinian students
Ex-UK minister requested cancelation of Palestinian student’s visa
World
Ex-UK minister requested cancelation of Palestinian student’s visa

Report says crowd-sourced fact checks on X fail to address flood of US election misinformation

Report says crowd-sourced fact checks on X fail to address flood of US election misinformation
Updated 31 October 2024
AP
Follow

Report says crowd-sourced fact checks on X fail to address flood of US election misinformation

Report says crowd-sourced fact checks on X fail to address flood of US election misinformation
Updated 31 October 2024
AP

SAN FRANCISCO, California: X’s crowd-sourced fact-checking program, called Community Notes, isn’t addressing the flood of US election misinformation on Elon Musk’s social media platform, according to a report published Wednesday by a group that tracks online speech.
The nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate analyzed the Community Notes feature and found that accurate notes correcting false and misleading claims about the US elections were not displayed on 209 out of a sample of 283 posts deemed misleading — or 74 percent.
Misleading posts that did not display Community Notes even when they were available included false claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen and that voting systems are unreliable, CCDH said.

From a page of the "Rated Note Helpful" report of the Center for Countering Digital Hate

In the cases where Community Notes were displayed, the original misleading posts received 13 times more views than their accompanying notes, the group added.
Community Notes lets X users write fact checks on posts after the users are accepted as contributors to the program. The checks are then rated by other users based on their accuracy, sources, how easily they are to understand, and whether they use neutral language. The program was launched in 2021 by the previous leadership of the site — then known as Twitter — and was called Birdwatch. Musk renamed it Community Notes after he took over the site in 2022.

Formerly known as Birdwatch under the old Twitter, the program was renamed Community Notes after Elon Musk took over the popular social media platform in 2022 and renamed it X. (Image courtesy of X)

Last year, X sued CCDH, blaming the group for the loss of “tens of millions of dollars” in advertising revenue after it documented an increase in hate speech on the site. The lawsuit was dismissed by a federal judge in March.
Keith Coleman, a vice president of product at X who oversees Community Notes, said in a statement that the program “maintains a high bar to make notes effective and maintain trust across perspectives, and thousands of election and politics related notes have cleared that bar in 2024. In the last month alone, hundreds of such notes have been shown on thousands of posts and have been seen tens of millions of times. It is because of their quality that notes are so effective.”
San Francisco-based X also pointed to external academic research that has shown Community Notes to be trustworthy and effective.
Imran Ahmed, the CEO of CCDH, however, said the group’s research “suggests that X’s Community Notes are little more than a Band Aid on a torrent of hate and disinformation that undermines our democracy and further polarizes our communities.”

Topics: US Election 2024 misinformation X Community Notes Center for Countering Digital

Related

Twitter rolls out new feature to protect fact-checking tool participants 
Media
Twitter rolls out new feature to protect fact-checking tool participants 
Twitter launches crowd-sourced fact-checking project
Media
Twitter launches crowd-sourced fact-checking project

Latest updates

Saudi designer Nouf Al-Rashed launches latest collection in London
Saudi designer Nouf Al-Rashed launches latest collection in London
North Korea says record test was new Hwasong-19 intercontinental ballistic missile
North Korea says record test was new Hwasong-19 intercontinental ballistic missile
We’ll be Al-Nassr fans for a weekend, says Al-Ittihad’s Fabinho
We’ll be Al-Nassr fans for a weekend, says Al-Ittihad’s Fabinho
‘Polarization of journalism’ rising amid Israel attacking, killing media workers
‘Polarization of journalism’ rising amid Israel attacking, killing media workers
Harris warns Trump will slash Obamacare; Trump says he never mentioned it
Harris warns Trump will slash Obamacare; Trump says he never mentioned it

Search form

Print Edition
Read pdf version Subscribe now
© 2024 SAUDI RESEARCH & PUBLISHING COMPANY, All Rights Reserved And subject to Terms of Use Agreement.