Schlagwort: 039

Mark Zuckerberg Cancels His Lawsuits Forcing Hawaii Families To Sell Land

Chad / Via Flickr: supercooper; Manu Fernandez / AP

Mark Zuckerberg will drop his lawsuits over Hawaiian land, he writes in an op-ed for the Hawaiian newspaper The Garden Island. He said he did not previously understand the “quiet title” process but has reconsidered his legal actions after learning more about it.

The billionaire CEO of Facebook bought 700 acres of land on Kauai for $100 million in 2014, though he did not receive exclusive rights to the land with the purchase. In seeking those rights, he began what's called a “quiet title” process, which allows for ownership of land to be decided by a judge.

The question of land ownership stems from the privatization of Hawaiian land by The Kuleana Act of 1850 and the ensuing controversy. Prior to the act, Hawaiians did not have private land ownership. The pieces of land in dispute became known as “kuleana lands.”

He writes, “Our intention is to achieve an outcome that preserves the environment, respects local traditions, and is fair to those with Kuleana lands.” He pledged to “work with the community on a new approach.”

Zuckerberg&039;s quiet title lawsuits named hundreds of Hawaiians with small claims on parcels of land that may have conflicted with his own, sparking a backlash from the community he sought to join. To critics, his actions reeked of the white conquest of indigenous lands that brought Hawaii into the United States in 1893.

In an effort to smooth over the tension, Zuckerberg wrote in The Garden Island, “The right path is to sit down and discuss how to best move forward. We will continue to speak with community leaders that represent different groups, including native Hawaiians and environmentalists, to find the best path.”

Quelle: <a href="Mark Zuckerberg Cancels His Lawsuits Forcing Hawaii Families To Sell Land“>BuzzFeed

No, Signatures On The White House Petition Site Aren't Intentionally Frozen

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You may have seen stories going around questioning whether the Trump administration has frozen the signatures on certain initiatives on the We The People petition platform. That&#039;s likely not the case.

President Obama&039;s administration created We The People in 2011 as a way for citizens to communicate with the White House about issues that mattered to them. The platform allows anyone to start a petition that others can digitally sign to show their support, and Obama&039;s White House said it would respond to any petition that received 100,000 signatures within 30 days. That clause is still part of the “about” page on We The People, though whether the Trump administration will respond to petitions is unconfirmed. On the day of his inauguration, Trump&039;s administration archived all existing petitions on the platform.

Right now, though, We The People seems to be barely registering some signatures. A petition titled “Preserve the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities” only had 96 signatures at press time, despite accruing hundreds of shares on Twitter alone. (The president is expected to cut funding for the NEA and NEH dramatically.) Another petition for a similar cause has showed a relatively static number of signatures, despite a continuing high volume of social shares. It is possible that the similarity of these petitions is spreading signatures thinly between them, though another petition about something entirely different shared widely on Twitter also has only one signature.

Trump&039;s administration seemed to acknowledge that something was wrong with the website, but denied it had intentionally stalled the platform. A spokesperson for the White House told BuzzFeed News, “It&039;s a question of high volume at the end of the day, but the signatures are being captured. Because of high volume they&039;re having to change how they’re being captured.” The spokesperson did not elaborate on what that change would entail.

Some of the shortened URLs that appear in shared social media posts for petitions have recently been leading to broken webpages, which also may be affecting the petitions&039; signature counts.

Macon Phillips, who served as Obama&039;s coordinator of International Information Programs, oversaw the creation We The People. In response to questions about how slowly the site seems to be counting signatures, he told BuzzFeed News he didn&039;t think it was intentional interference by Trump&039;s administration. “The system doesn&039;t really allow you to make it behave that way. It seems like more of a caching issue. I think the team there is still trying to get their heads around how it works,” he said. President Trump has appointed a new acting director of International Information Programs, Jonathan Henick, who did not immediately respond to request for comment.

The number of signatures on a few other petitions also indicate that the administration is not suppressing signature counts on We The People. Two petitions on the site, “Immediately release Donald Trump&039;s full tax returns, with all information needed to verify emoluments clause compliance,” and “Divest or put in a blind trust all of the President&039;s business and financial assets,” have reached 372,520 and 114,924 signatures, respectively, at press time. White House spokesperson Kellyanne Conway responded to the tax returns petition on TV recently, at least indirectly — at first, she refused to release the returns, but then later walked back on that refusal.

This is the latest development in the Trump administration&039;s tech struggles. Earlier this week, it was discovered that the @POTUS official Twitter account was tied to a Gmail address. The account registration was changed after journalists flagged the registration on Twitter.

Adrian Carrasquillo contributed to this report.

Quelle: <a href="No, Signatures On The White House Petition Site Aren&039;t Intentionally Frozen“>BuzzFeed

President Trump's Official Twitter Account Was Registered To A Personal Gmail Address

Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images

Until Thursday afternoon, Donald Trump&#039;s official @POTUS Twitter was registered to a private, non-government email address, raising concerns about the security of the White House&039;s primary social media account. The account registration was changed after journalists flagged the registration on Twitter.

The registration was first noticed by TV Guide Managing Editor, Alex Zalben:

Others have confirmed that the password reset link directs to what appears to be White House Social Media Director, Dan Scavino&039;s personal Gmail account.

The White House press office has not yet responded to a request for comment. White House Director of Social Media, Dan Scavino has not yet responded to BuzzFeed News query asking if the account will be transferred to a different, government address in the future.

The registration to a personal account rekindles concerns about the security of the Trump administration&039;s social media accounts, especially Trump&039;s Twitter accounts, arguably the President&039;s most important communications&039; tools. The account, which changed hands from the Obama administration just moments after Trump was sworn into office last Friday, has quickly amassed 14.3 million followers and is obsessively tracked by journalists and even financial trading algorithms. Though Trump has opted to use his personal, @realDonaldTrump account as his primary method of personal communication, the @POTUS account is largely seen as the official Twitter account of the administration.

This week a hacker who identifies himself as as WauchulaGhost told CNN that he had been able to easily find the emails associated with the @POTUS, @FLOTUS, and @VP accounts and suggested the White House update security settings. WauchulaGhost told CNN that the accounts, “haven&039;t selected a basic security feature on Twitter that requires you to provide a phone number or email address to reset your password.”

And just this morning, White House Press Secretary, Sean Spicer appeared to accidentally tweet out the password to one of his accounts. Some have suggested that Spicer was trying to log-in to his Twitter account using two-factor authentication, and accidentally copied in his password.

BuzzFeed News reported earlier this month that the @POTUS account has special security protocols. The security tools, according to the White House Communications Agency include multiple password layers as well as limiting the number of encrypted devices that can post to the official account.

“It’s a small handful of devices that are under significant security and handled with extreme care,” a former director of online engagement told BuzzFeed News this month about the account. The new registration under Scavino&039;s email would suggest this protocol has changed when the account was transferred.

Quelle: <a href="President Trump&039;s Official Twitter Account Was Registered To A Personal Gmail Address“>BuzzFeed

The White House Denies That Alex Jones Has Been Offered Press Credentials

Alex Jones will likely won&#039;t be attending any upcoming White House press briefings, according to the Trump adminstration&039;s press office.

Yesterday Alex Jones told viewers on his popular YouTube channel that his conspiracy news site, Infowars has been offered White House press credentials by the new administration to cover the Trump White House. But on Thursday White House press officials tell BuzzFeed News that Jones and Infowars have not been offered a spot in the briefing room. “He is not credentialed for the White House,” a White Deputy Press Secretary said. “The White House Press office has not offered him credentials.”

Jones, an ardent Trump supporter has been called “America’s leading conspiracy theorist” and is a prominent 9/11 and Sandy Hook truther. His false suggestion that he&039;s been offered White House press credentials comes on the heels of reports that the Trump administration is planning to open the briefing room to alternative outlets. The far right-leaning outlet, Gateway Pundit, for example has also suggested it will receive a spot in the briefing room and has already hired a White House correspondent. Currently though, the administration has only announced it will open up four “virtual press seats” for local press outlets more than 50 miles outside Washington D.C.

Here&039;s Jones&039; full statement from his YouTube page on the White House credentials, via Media Matters:

The statement contradicts Jones&039; video”Here&039;s the deal, I know I get White House credentials, we&039;ve already been offered them, we&039;re going to get them, but I&039;ve just got to spend the money to send somebody there. I want to make sure it&039;s even worth it. I don&039;t want to just sit there up there like “I&039;m in the media, look our people are there.” People don&039;t understand this paradigm, we&039;re devolving in a good way, power from the federal government back to the people, back from the centralized MSM [mainstream media] to the people, just like Trump said in his speech.

But there is investigative journalism, or people to interview in DC. Might be good to put a few reporters there, it&039;s just all a money issue. That&039;s why it&039;s important for people who are watching us to know, you are our sponsors. You&039;re the reason we&039;re able to do this. You&039;re the reason we&039;re able to have the crew and do what we do and change the world.

Quelle: <a href="The White House Denies That Alex Jones Has Been Offered Press Credentials“>BuzzFeed