Ivory

Latest

  • RIP Tweetbot

    Tapbots shuts down Tweetbot as it pivots to Mastodon

    by 
    Jon Fingas
    Jon Fingas
    01.20.2023

    Tweetbot has shut down due to Twitter's ban on third-party apps, but a Mastodon client is taking its place.

  • Simon Dawson / Reuters

    Tech giants like Google and Alibaba are working to save endangered species

    by 
    Brian Mastroianni
    Brian Mastroianni
    03.15.2018

    Google, eBay and other technology leaders are aiming to protect the world's animals. Why? In a widely unregulated social-media world, many tech platforms have become a haven for the wildlife black market, a $20 billion industry. The sale of illegal animal goods -- from ivory to exotic pets -- is the fourth-largest criminal global trade industry behind narcotics, counterfeiting and human trafficking, according to TRAFFIC, a wildlife-trade-monitoring network. In the past decade, the sale of these goods and species has moved from illicit backroom dealings in stores to apps and online shopping ads.

  • Ng Han Guan / AP Photo

    Ebay, Etsy, Microsoft and others vow to ban illegal wildlife trading

    by 
    David Lumb
    David Lumb
    08.12.2016

    A smattering of internet merchants, services and tech titans have spoken: no trading of live animals or their illegally-sourced body parts, like rhino horns or turtle meat, on their watch. Etsy, eBay, Gumtree, Microsoft, Yahoo and Tencent have all signed a compact to standardize practices across social media and ecommerce platforms. Ideally, these uniform practices will tighten up loopholes that permit trading of illicit wildlife goods.