From the ban on court reporting in Pakistan to the European Union (EU)’s monitoring of Meta’s measures to counter electoral disinformation, here’s everything we covered at Digital Rights Monitor (DRM) this week.
PAKISTAN: High courts issue notices to electronic media regulator over court reporting ban
The high courts have issued notices to the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) over its notification prohibiting news channels from airing court proceedings, according to a report by Geo News.
The notification directed the news channels to report only on written orders. The Islamabad and Lahore high courts have ordered PEMRA to respond to the notices by May 29, 2024. The orders arrived on Friday in response to the petitions filed against the PEMRA notifications, including one by a lawyer.
The notification regarding the court proceedings was issued on May 21, 2024. The electronic media regulator prohibited news channels and reporters from covering court proceedings, and directed them to report only on the written orders issued by the court. Following the PEMRA notification, developments regarding the petitions were not being taken up in the mainstream media.
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EU: Meta’s election disinformation measures under scrutiny
The European Commission is closely monitoring the measures taken by tech conglomerate Meta Platforms to tackle disinformation online as the election approaches.
The EU is set to hold its parliamentary elections from June 6 to 9, 2024. A European Commission spokesperson said on Tuesday that Meta has deployed “new functionalities” to control electoral disinformation. Meta’s containment measures include “27 real-time visual dashboards” for each EU member state, according to the spokesperson as quoted by Reuters.
The dashboards will allow third-party real-time civic discourse and election monitoring.
The development arrives after the European Commission launched a probe last month into Meta’s potential violation of EU’s online content regulations. The investigation suggested that Meta had failed to counter disinformation and deceptive advertising across its popular social media platforms, including Facebook and Instagram.
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Meta says it removed Israeli-linked inauthentic accounts peddling political propaganda
Meta Platforms says the company removed 510 Facebook accounts, 11 pages, one group, and 32 Instagram accounts from Israel for violating its policy against coordinated inauthentic behaviour (CIB). The removed content included “praise” for Israel’s continuing military brutalities in Gaza, which have killed over 36,000 people.
The disclosures arrive in Meta’s Adversarial Threat Report for the first quarter of 2024. The report highlights that Meta took down influence campaigns aimed at peddling political propaganda, including those supporting the Israeli government. The company says artificial intelligence (AI) was likely used in one of the influence operation.
The network originating from Israel primarily targeted audiences in the United States (US) and Canada, says Meta, adding that the “cross-internet operation targeted many services, including ours [Meta], X (formerly Twitter), and YouTube”. The network operated various “distinctly branded” websites and focused on Israel’s attacks on Gaza and Middle Eastern politics. “We found and removed this network early in its audience building efforts, before they were able to gain engagement among authentic communities,” Meta claims.
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