Technology makes our everyday lives much easier and the owners of many technologies counts billions of dollars anually. There are billions of users on the social media space and social media brands make a lot of money. However, these brands are also under a lot of pressure to get things right. In other to ensure the privacy of users communication, Facebook is working on a new feature. The company already uses this feature on its WhatsApp platform but not on Facebook. This feature is the end-to-end encryption which ensures that nobody , not even Facebook have access to the communiction between the two users. Facebook is currently testing this feature as the default setting for Messenger chats.
British government kicks against end-to-end encryption
The company also plans to encrypt all chats and calls on the platform in 2023. However, it is already facing stiff opposition from the British government. No doubt, the British government just like any other government “loves” to spy on citizens. The government has a very difficult job to do because they have to keep the citizens safe. Unfortunately, in many cases, to do this, the government need access to certain information. In response to Facebook’s plan for end-to-end encryption, British Home Secretary Priti Patel said in an op-ed this week that if the company rolls out “end-to-end” encryption without considering the privacy of children would be a “ridiculous betrayal”.
It is understood that “end-to-end” encryption is a secure communication method that ensures that only the users participating in the chat can see the content of their messages. Meta has been trying to add this feature to Messenger for years. Previously, Facebook launched a test announcement for the “end-to-end” encryption function after it was strongly opposed by netizens for providing the police with the Facebook news and related activity information of the abortion party. Patel wrote in the article that there are currently criminals using social platforms such as Facebook to spread nude or abused images of children. She belives that law enforcement needs to obtain relevant information to identify the children in the images and protect them from harm.
Meta fires 60 labor dispatchers ‘randomly’ with algorithm
In another report, Meta, Facebook parent company seems to be going thorugh a rough time. In fact, we can safely say that this is a very wrong time to work for Meta. There is absolutely no job security as workers can wake up to their dismisal letters at any time. Two days ago, Meta used an algorithm to “randomly” fire 60 labor dispatch workers from Accenture. This sounds really “scary” or weird. It feels more like Zuckerberg just closing his eyes and choosing people at random to be fired.
Gizchina News of the week
Previously, Meta and Accenture signed a contract of nearly $500 million US dollars. However, the labor that Accenture is offering to work in Meta’s office in Austin, mainly engage in content review and business integrity. Meta informed the 60 laid off employees via a video conference call. The company told the sacked employees that the layoffs will officially take effect on September 2. However, these employees will officially be removed from the payroll of the company on October 3. Meta did not give a specific reason for the layoffs, other than an explicit “random” selection.
Accenture did not immediately offer other job opportunities to the dispatchers. However, there appears to be some sort of good news with the dismissal. The company also give the employees the opportunity to reapply for new positions within the next two weeks. Nevertheless, there is no indication that these employees will enjoy any priviledges. In fact, there is no indication that Meta is willing to re-employ any of the employees.
Meta CEO sternly warns employees
At an all-hands meeting at the company on June 30, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg warned employees that the recent market downturn “could be one of the toughest challenges we’ve seen in recent years. Thus, there is a need for us to weed out underperforming employees through “positive performance reviews”. Judging by Zuckerberg’s words, the layoffs may not come as a surprise. However, the recent layoffs of 60 employees did not seem to consider performance review.
In fact, Mark Zuckerberg believes that Meta has some “baggages” that should be out the door. He said “Actually, there are probably a lot of people in the company that shouldn’t be here,”
Zuckerberg added: “By mentioning raising expectations, setting more aggressive goals, and increasing the pressure a little bit, I think it might make some of you feel like this place isn’t the right place for you. I think this kind of Self-selection is fine.”
At the time of the all-hands meeting, Meta had already implemented hiring freezes and other cost-cutting measures , largely because the company’s stock had more than halved this year. Just days before Meta’s layoffs of dispatch workers, Apple fired 100 personnel officers responsible for recruiting new employees. Apple did previously warn that the company would rein in spending and slow hiring. Last August, Xsolla, a payment processing company for the gaming industry, also used an algorithm to lay off 150 employees. Thus, it appears that having bots laying off workers could be a future trend.
Over the past few months, tech workers in the U.S. have been getting sack letters for different reasons. The likes of PayPal, Netflix, Rivian, Tesla, and Coinbase have all laid off some staff. However, it appears that more American workers in the technology industry will lose their jobs. The different technology companies have different reasons for laying off staff.
