Oct 16, 2018

Report: Twitter suspended 1,500 for spreading wrong election date

Photo: Aytug Can Sencar/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

Over the weekend Twitter suspended 1,500 fake accounts a pro-Trump group created to mock liberals because the accounts had been spreading false information about Election Day, such as saying that Election Day is November 7, when in fact it is on Tuesday, November 6, per The New York Times.

Why it matters: Reddit’s largest pro-Trump forum,"r/the_donald," likely created the trolling campaign as a joke, but spreading false information about the midterms can keep voters from casting ballots. "Similar types of disinformation spread on social media in 2016, which makes companies like Twitter nervous," as the NYT’s Kevin Roose writes.

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Axios

Updated 42 mins ago - Politics & Policy

Coronavirus dashboard

Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

Global: Total confirmed cases as of 2 p.m. ET: 6,325,303 — Total deaths: 377,460 — Total recoveries — 2,727,679 — Map.
U.S.: Total confirmed cases as of 2 p.m. ET: 1,820,523 — Total deaths: 105,644 — Total recoveries: 458,231 — Total tested: 17,340,682 — Map.
Public health: Protests against police brutality threaten coronavirus response — Controlling the virus in nursing homes won't be easy.
Business: More than 1 in 6 black workers lost jobs between February and April.
Climate: The alarm over climate financial risk gets louder because of coronavirus.
Media: Interest in the George Floyd protests has soared past the coronavirus.

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Rebecca Falconer

Updated 1 hour ago - Politics & Policy

Updates: George Floyd protests nationwide

Police officers wearing riot gear push back demonstrators outside of the White House on Monday. Photo: Jose Luis Magana/AFP via Getty Images

Protests over the death of George Floyd and other police-related killings of black people continued across the U.S., inciting a federal response from President Trump, the National Guard, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection.

The latest: Immigration agents have been deployed to assist federal, state and local law enforcement. The U.S. Secret Service closed the streets immediately on all four sides of the White House Tuesday, until "riots become peaceful, or stop."

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Miriam Kramer

1 hour ago - Science

NASA passes the torch

Illustration: Eniola Odetunde/Axios

With the historic crewed SpaceX launch last weekend, NASA passed the torch to private companies that will need to step up to build the economy the space agency envisions in orbit.

Why it matters: This new era of spaceflight will likely be marked by new conflicts — possibly including product placement (like the Tesla that drove the astronauts to the pad on Saturday), safety concerns and cultural differences between companies, the space agencies and people they serve.

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