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California bill would force Twitter and Facebook to identify bots
Facebook and Twitter are plenty aware that Russian-backed actors have been using troll accounts to manipulate online discourse. Despite introducing transparency tools and purging lists of bots, California lawmakers don't think the companies are doing enough to safeguard consumers. Legislators proposed a bill that would force social media platforms to identify automated accounts and deal with them within three days.
New York AG will investigate firm selling fake followers to stars
Twitter bots are bad enough by themselves, but it's worse when they're built using real info -- and New York wants to clamp down. State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has opened an investigation into Devumi, a company that sold over 3.5 million fake social network followers (primarily on Twitter) to celebrities and politicians. While bots by themselves aren't automatically illegal, the company also offered "at least" 55,000 accounts using the personal details of real people, some of whom live in New York. That's "impersonation and deception," Schneiderman said, and it's made all the worse when some of those people aren't legal adults.
How the 'Grinch bots' stole Christmas
Resellers have existed since way before the internet. But with the surge of online shopping, they have found the perfect weapon to aid their business: bots, automated software that can add products to a virtual cart and purchase them faster than any human. Even if your browser autofills personal information, like your address and credit card, and it only took you one minute to get to the checkout page -- that's too slow. Bots can buy almost anything in a matter of seconds, which is why they've become the ideal tool for people who make money by snatching up coveted items and selling them on eBay, Amazon and Craigslist for a profit.
Pinterest makes it easy to share pins on Facebook Messenger
Has it been while since you've chatted with a Messenger bot? If you use Pinterest religiously, you might be tempted pick up the habit again. The visual discovery social network has launched a Messenger bot and a chat extension that make it easier to share pins with friends. With the chat extension, you'll be able to share pins from Pinterest within the Messenger app itself. And if you receive a pin from your friend, you'll be able to expand that pin to show the full image and browse related pins without even leaving the chat application. Pinterest says it built the extension to load fast, since it expects people to use it on the go.
Over half of FCC net neutrality comments may be fake, study says
The FCC's proposal to roll back net neutrality protections was up for public comment between April 27th and August 30th and while nearly 22 million comments were submitted, there's been a bit of discussion surrounding who or what registered those comments and how accurately they reflect the public opinion of the plan. The Pew Research Center looked into those millions of comments and it published its findings today. Overall, the center found that very few comments were unique, more than half came from temporary or duplicate email addresses and on multiple occasions, tens of thousands of comments were filed at the exact same time, suggesting use of bot campaigns.
Over 1.3 million anti-net neutrality FCC comments are likely fakes
It's no secret that bots flooded the FCC with comments supporting its plans to kill net neutrality. But just how many comments were fraudulent? All too many, according to data scientist Jeff Kao. He recently conducted a study that used natural language processing to conclude that "at least" 1.3 million of the anti-net neutrality comments were fakes originating from a central source. They appear to have come from a giant mail merge that made the messages appear superficially unique, but was really just swapping in synonyms for what was clearly the same core statement. The language sounds familiar, too, mimicking that of a giant telecom or lobbying group than everyday people.
Live Nation’s Messenger bot finds concerts you won’t want to miss
Entertainment company Live Nation is making it easier to find concerts you'll actually be interested in with a tailor-made gig-finding experience that learns your location and musical preferences. Open the Concert Finder bot through Messenger, search your favorite artists or musical genre and over time it'll learn your preferences, so you can consult the bot about upcoming shows that you might actually want to go to, rather than sifting through thousands of maybes. The more you use it, the smarter it gets. And once you've found a show you're interested in you can pull friends into the interface to chat about logistics and tickets, which you can then purchase directly through Messenger (if you've already got a Live Nation account you can link it up for faster check out). There are dozens of Facebook Messenger bots out there that claim to make your life easier, but if you're a live-music fan, this one could prove genuinely useful.
'Hamilton' battles ticket bots with a hand from Ticketmaster
The people behind Hamilton aren't just counting on laws to combat ticket bots -- they're enlisting the help of the ticket providers as well. Ticketmaster has revealed that it will use its recent Verified Fan feature to give you a better chance of seeing Hamilton, the Schuyler sisters and Burr strut on a Broadway stage between March and August 2018. As with other Verified Fan plays, like Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, the process has fans registering on a website to signal their interest -- Ticketmaster then combs over registrations based on data and sends codes via text message to those who pass scrutiny.
Propaganda bots dominate social networks in some countries
It won't shock you to hear that governments and shady political groups will use social network bots in a bit to control the flow of information. But just how prevalent are they? Depending on where you live, they might just dictate the social media landscape. Oxford University researchers have published a study showing that "computational propaganda" (bots and other coordinated campaigns) is practically par for the course in some countries. In Russia, for instance, 45 percent of Twitter activity stems from "highly automated" accounts. And Ukraine is a "frontline" for just about everyone -- Russia, Ukrainian nationalists and civil society groups are all using digital propaganda systems in a bid to sway public opinion.
Twitter porn bots drew in over 30 million clicks
For the past few months ZeroFOX, a social media-focused digital security company, has been looking into a massive pornography botnet targeting Twitter. Dubbed SIREN, after the mythical Greek creatures said to lure sailors to their deaths with song, the botnet campaign reportedly included around 90,000 accounts that produced over 8.5 million tweets.
Microsoft's "Zo" chatbot picked up some offensive habits
It seems that creating well-behaved chatbots isn't easy. Over a year after Microsoft's "Tay" bot went full-on racist on Twitter, its successor "Zo" is suffering a similar affliction.
Facebook made a bot that can lie for better bargains
Chatbots can help you order pizza, accept payments and be super racist, but their usefulness has been pretty limited. However, Facebook announced today that it has created a much more capable bot by giving it the ability to negotiate, strategize, and plan ahead in a conversation.
Anti-net neutrality bots are swarming the FCC's comments
It's not just proponents of net neutrality that are flocking to the FCC's website -- opponents are there as well... in a manner of speaking. Reports from ZDNet and elsewhere have revealed that one or more bots are posting thousands of identical comments (at least 128,000) in favor of the FCC's proposal to gut net neutrality rules. The automated code cycles alphabetically through a list of real names and addresses, pretending to support the FCC on their behalf. The agency declined to comment on the bot attack citing a policy where it doesn't discuss specific filings.
There's a slackbot for people who like to shit where they eat
Online dating and work chat apps have been separate entities for entirely logical, productive and HR-compliant reasons. But a dating app-maker has decided that the line dividing office life and love life should be blurred with the help of a chatbot for the reigning king of productivity services, Slack. If you think company-sanctioned flirting through work messaging is a good idea, you should probably talk to your human resources department. Because this is playing with fire in a way that gets people fired.
Twitter @support is testing a bot that handles complaints
Twitter launched a handful of features in recent months meant to cement its new role as a customer service platform. Now it's putting some of those features to use: the social network has begun testing a bot to handle your questions and complaints. The company's @support account can now serve automated replies to basic inquiries, so long as they fall under one of the five available topics, through direct messaging. Based on Buzzfeed News' experience engaging the bot, it can help you regain access to your account, deal with users impersonating you and report abuse or harmful behavior. You can also hit it up for tips and tricks and to send the company feedback.
Building your own chatbot is a lot easier than you'd expect
Three of the undisputed kings of technology -- Microsoft, Facebook and Google -- all bet big on bots in 2016. It's too early to say whether that was a good move, but if nothing else it's clear that bots haven't seen mainstream adoption yet. If you're a believer in the technology and want to start building your own bots before everyone is doing the same, the just-launched Dexter platform might be worth checking out. I'm no coder, but a quick demo had me building some very simple and pointless bots -- but nonetheless, I was building within minutes.
Contact your Senator with a fax-sending bot
The rallying cry to contact your member of Congress is louder than ever these days, but actually reaching them isn't very easy. Even if they accept email, they're far more likely to acknowledge a faxed message -- but who actually has a fax machine in the 21st Century? Thankfully, you no longer need one to get your point across. A volunteer group has launched Resistbot, an automated system that turns your cellphone's text messages into faxes to your representatives and senators. Once you've offered your name and ZIP code, you just have to type in a message to send it to the appropriate officials. Your first message will go to your senators, but the bot will eventually collect info that helps you reach the House.
Google is ready to take over your office chat with Hangouts
Google's work of transitioning Hangouts from being its default chat app to a more business focus is nearly complete. First up is the formally announced Hangouts Meet. Sound familiar? That's because it semi-officially arrived at the first of the month. Now Google is ready to take it wide. At its core, Meet is all about making video conferencing faster and easier. That comes down to not needing any special software or logins for video chat -- just a shared link. No WiFi? No problem because people can dial in with a dedicated phone number too. So long as their organization is a G Suite Enterprise customer, of course. Meet will support video calls with up to 30 people.
'Counter-Strike' is facing a chat bot invasion
The Counter-Strike community has faced numerous challenges in the years since launch, ranging from cheating to gambling, but there's one more to add to the pile: a flood of chat bots. At least one intruder is taking advantage of a Counter-Strike: Global Offensive exploit to flood lobbies (even private ones) with text from chat bots that can't be kicked. From early indications, the attacker is trying to draw attention to security issues -- Valve supposedly doesn't care about cheaters and needs to be taught a lesson, if you believe the harasser.
PayPal's Slack bot makes recouping the office bar tab easy
Slack is a popular way for teams to communicate in the office and bots make the app a lot more helpful with a number of tasks. Thanks to PayPal, there's a simple way for you to send money to a colleague or friend if they grab your coffee or pick up a bar tab after work. With the PayPal Slack bot, all you have to do is type "/PayPal send $5 to (insert username here)" and the funds will be on their way.
