Tag Archives: author_name|Karissa Bell

Meta blocks links to ICE List, a Wiki that names agents

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Meta has started blocking links to ICE List, a website that compiles information about incidents involving Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Border Patrol agents, and lists thousands of their employees' names. It seems that the latter detail is what caused Meta to take action in a move that was first reported by Wired. 

ICE List is a crowdsourced Wiki that describes itself as "an independently maintained public documentation project focused on immigration-enforcement activity" in the US. "Its purpose is to record, organize, and preserve verifiable information about enforcement actions, agents, facilities, vehicles, and related incidents that would otherwise remain fragmented, difficult to access, or undocumented," its website states.

Along with notable incidents, the website also lists the names of individual agents associated with ICE, CBP and other DHS agencies. According to Wired, the website's creators said much of that information had come from a "leak," though it appears to be based largely on public LinkedIn profiles. As Wired notes:

The site went viral earlier this month when it claimed to have uploaded a leaked list of 4,500 DHS employees to its site, but a WIRED analysis found that the list relied heavily on information the employees shared publicly about themselves on sites such as LinkedIn.

Links to ICE List have been spreading widely for several weeks, including on Meta's platforms. There are numerous links to the website on Threads, some of which go back several weeks. Now though, clicking on previously-shared links instead results in a message that the link can't be opened. Users who try to share new links on Threads or Facebook also see error messages. "Posts that look like spam according to our Community Guidelines are blocked on Facebook and can't be edited," the notice says.  

When reached for comment, a Meta spokesperson pointed to the company's privacy policy barring the disclosure of personally identifiable information (PII). The company didn't address why it chose to start blocking the website after several weeks, or whether it considers public LinkedIn profiles to be in violation of its rules against doxxing.

It is, however, not the first time Meta has opted to remove users' posts tracking information about ICE actions. The social network previously took down a Facebook group that tracked ICE sightings in Chicago after pressure from the Justice Department.

Have a tip for Karissa? You can reach her by email, on X, Bluesky, Threads, or send a message to @karissabe.51 to chat confidentially on Signal.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/meta-blocks-links-to-ice-list-a-wiki-that-names-agents-231410653.html?src=rss

TikTok settles to avoid major social media addiction lawsuit

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TikTok has reached a settlement in a closely-watched lawsuit over social media addiction, narrowly avoiding a trial that's scheduled to begin jury selection Tuesday. Terms of the deal, which was reported by The New York Times, weren't disclosed. 

TikTok's settlement comes about one week after Snap reached a settlement in the same case. The trial is expected to move forward in Los Angeles with Meta and YouTube as the only defendants. Mark Lanier, a lawyer for the plaintiff, said in a statement to NYT that they were "pleased" with the settlement and that it was "a good resolution." TikTok didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. 

The trial stems from a 2023 lawsuit brought by a California woman known in court documents as "K.G.M." She sued Meta, Snap, TikTok and YouTube and alleged that their platforms were addictive and had harmed her as a child. The judge in the case previously ordered the companies' executives, including Mark Zuckerberg and Adam Mosseri, to testify. YouTube's top exec, Neal Mohan, is also likely to testify, according to The New York Times. 

The lawsuit is the first among several high-profile cases against social media companies to go to trial this year. Meta is expected to head to court in New Mexico in early February in a case brought by the state's attorney general, who has alleged that Facebook and Instagram have facilitated harm to children. TikTok and Snap are collectively facing more than a dozen other trials in California courts this year.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/tiktok-settles-to-avoid-major-social-media-addiction-lawsuit-183943927.html?src=rss

People are uninstalling TikTok and downloading an indie competitor

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TikTok's newly formed US entity is off to a very bumpy start. As the app continues to face technical issues affecting the recommendation algorithm, view counts and other features, TikTok is also seeing a wave of frustrated users uninstalling it, according to new data.

Analytics firm Sensor Tower, which tracks downloads and other app store-related metrics, told CNBC that there has been a 150 percent rise in uninstalls of the TikTok app in the United States compared with the last three months. An analyst at Sensor Tower told Engadget that TikTok's US daily active users (DAUs) have increased about 2 percent in the same time period, and are flat week-over-week. TikTok has blamed a power outage at a data center for “multiple bugs,” including those affecting view counts and load times. The company hasn't said when users can expect a fix.

At the same time, an independent app called UpScrolled has seen a surge in interest over the last few days. The app is currently the ninth most-downloaded app in the US App Store and the second most popular social app (Meta's Threads is currently in the number one spot for social apps). The app has also reached the top five in the UK and Australian app stores. In the United States, its sudden popularity seems to be closely tied to recent changes at TikTok. 

UpScrolled has seen 41,000 total downloads between Thursday (the day the US joint venture was formalized) and Saturday, according to estimates from App Figures. The app, which was first released last June, has been downloaded about 140,000 times between Apple and Google's app stores, according to App Figures. Prior to last Thursday, the app was averaging less than 500 downloads a day, according to the company. The rapid increase in downloads has apparently caused some issues for the company which asked users to "bear with us" on Monday.

Created by an Australian developer, UpScrolled looks a bit like Instagram. Users can share photos and shortform videos. The app defaults to a chronological "following" feed, though it does also recommend content to users. The app is "privately funded by its founder, Issam Hijazi, together with a small group of individual investors who share our mission and values," according to an FAQ on UpScrolled's website. It currently has no ads, though the company says it "probably" will in the future. 

This isn't the first time turmoil at TikTok has benefitted a previously little-known app. Chinese app RedNote briefly became the top app in the United States early last year as TikTok faced a potential ban. RedNote's popularity proved to be short-lived, though, as the 2025 TikTok "ban" ended up lasting only a couple of hours. 

But with new owners at TikTok and growing frustration over technical issues with the app, there could be an opportunity for a new shortform video service that's not controlled by a huge corporation. And that's what UpScrolled seems to be betting on. "Too often, users are left uncertain about whether their voices will be heard or quietly suppressed," the company writes on its website. "UpScrolled changes that by ensuring every post has a fair chance to be seen, creating an environment that is authentic, unfiltered, and equitable for all."

Update, January 26, 2026, 4:28PM PT: This post was updated to reflect the latest details from TikTok about the ongoing issues affecting the US version of the app.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/people-are-uninstalling-tiktok-and-downloading-an-indie-competitor-233345222.html?src=rss

A TikTok US power outage caused a ‘cascading systems failure’ leading to multiple bugs

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If your TikTok feed has felt a little off lately, it's not just you. TikTok says is still working to fix its service in the US following a power outage at one of its data centers that's caused “multiple bugs” in the app. TikTok users have reported problems logging in and uploading videos, as well as strange behavior from the "for you" algorithm. Creators have also noticed that new uploads are seemingly getting o views or likes and that in-app earnings have disappeared.

"Since yesterday we’ve been working to restore our services following a power outage at a U.S. data center impacting TikTok and other apps we operate," the company wrote in a statement Monday. "We're working with our data center partner to stabilize our service. We're sorry for this disruption and hope to resolve it soon."

In a subsequent update several hours later, the company said that the power outage had caused a “cascading systems failure” that is still affecting the app and leading to “multiple bugs,” including those affecting view counts and load times. “Creators may temporarily see ‘0’ views or likes on videos, and your earnings may look like they're missing,” the company wrote in an update on X. “This is a display error caused by server timeouts; your actual data and engagement are safe.”

The statement didn’t directly address reported issues with the app’s recommendation algorithm. Since Sunday, users have reported seeing a wave of generic videos flood their feeds, which are typically hyper-personalized. Other users have reported seeing the same few videos repeated over and over again. 

About a day after the issues started, TikTok said that it had made “significant progress” in recovering from the issues it was facing, but that US users still may “have some technical issues,” specifically when posting new videos.

The issues come just days after TikTok finalized a deal to spin off its US business into a separate entity largely controlled by US investors. That timing hasn't gone unnoticed by users, many of whom are already suspicious of the company pushing a terms of service and privacy policy in the hours after the deal was finalized. The problems affecting the app's recommendation algorithm have also raised questions about TikTok USDS Joint Venture's plans to "retrain" TikTok's central feature.

Update, January 26, 2026, 7:18PM ET: This post has been updated to include additional information from TikTok about the outage and bugs affecting users.

Update, January 27, 2026, 11:22AM ET: Added TikTok’s latest statement about recovering from the issues that have hit US users.


This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/a-tiktok-us-power-outage-caused-a-cascading-systems-failure-leading-to-multiple-bugs-173426490.html?src=rss

Meta is temporarily pulling teens’ access from its AI chatbot characters

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Meta will no longer allow teens to chat with its AI chatbot characters in their present form. The company announced Friday that it will be "temporarily pausing teens’ access to existing AI characters globally."

The pause comes months after Meta had said it was working on chatbot-focused parental controls following reports that some of Meta's character chatbots had engaged in sexual conversations and other alarming interactions with teens. Reuters reported on an internal Meta policy document that said the chatbots were permitted to have "sensual" conversations with underage users, language Meta later said was "erroneous and inconsistent with our policies." The company announced in August that it was re-training its character chatbots to add "guardrails as an extra precaution" that would prevent teens from discussing self harm, disordered eating and suicide. 

Now, Meta says it will prevent teens from accessing any of its character chatbots until "the updated experience is ready." Those updates will include parental controls, according to a Meta spokesperson. The new restrictions, which will be starting "in the coming weeks," will apply to those with teen accounts, "as well as people who claim to be adults but who we suspect are teens based on our age prediction technology." Teens will still be able to access the official Meta AI chatbot, which the company says already has "age-appropriate protections in place." 

Meta and other AI companies that make "companion" characters have faced increasing scrutiny over the safety risks these chatbots could pose to young people. The FTC and the Texas attorney general have both kicked off investigations into Meta and other companies in recent months. The issue of chatbots has also come up in the context of a safety lawsuit brought by New Mexico's attorney general. A trial is scheduled to start early next month; Meta's lawyers have attempted to exclude testimony related to the company's AI chatbots, Wired reported this week.

Correction, January 23, 2026, 11:18AM PT: This post was updated to clarify that Meta’s planned chatbot parental control features have not yet rolled out.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/meta-is-temporarily-pulling-teens-access-from-its-ai-chatbot-characters-180626052.html?src=rss

Snapchat gives parents more info on who their kids are talking to

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Snapchat is updating its parental control features to give parents more detailed information about who their kids are connecting with in the app and which features they use the most. The app's Family Center already gives parents visibility into their child's friend list, but it will now surface contextual details when a new friend is added.

For example, the feature could highlight that the two share mutual friends or have each other's contact info saved in their phones. It could also indicate that they are classmates if both users have joined the same in-app “community.” If the two have no commonalities, then that could be a sign for a parent to "start a productive conversation," Snap says. 

The company has long been criticized for making it too easy for teenagers to talk to strangers. The issue has come up in safety-related lawsuits, including an ongoing case brought by New Mexico's Attorney General. Snap says that adding additional "trust signals" to its parental control features "make it easier for parents to understand new connections and have greater confidence that their teen is chatting with someone they know in real life."

The update is also adding more granular stats about how exactly teens are spending their time in the app. Family Center's screen time dashboard now includes a breakdown of how much of their time spent in the app is in its messaging, camera, map or shortform video features. It will still be up to parents to decide what, if any, limits they want to put on their teens. But at a time when there's increasing conversation around banning teens from social media entirely, having access to more stats could better help parents understand their kids' relationship with Snapchat.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/snapchat-gives-parents-more-info-on-who-their-kids-are-talking-to-120000077.html?src=rss

The FTC isn’t giving up on its antitrust case against Meta

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The Federal Trade Commission lost its antitrust case against Meta last year, but the regulator hasn't given up on its attempts to punish the social media company for its acquisitions of WhatsApp and Instagram. The FTC is appealing a ruling last year in which a federal judge found that the government hadn't proven that Meta is currently operating as a monopoly. 

"Meta has maintained its dominant position and record profits for well over a decade not through legitimate competition, but by buying its most significant competitive threats," the FTC's Bureau of Competition Director Daniel Guarnera said in a statement. "The Trump-Vance FTC will continue fighting its historic case against Meta to ensure that competition can thrive across the country to the benefit of all Americans and U.S. businesses.”

The FTC originally filed antitrust charges against Facebook in 2020 during President Donald Trump's first term in office. The government argued that by acquiring apps it once competed with, Instagram and WhatsApp, the company had depressed competition in the space and ultimately hurt consumers. A trial last year saw testimony from several current and former executives, including CEO Mark Zuckerberg and former COO Sheryl Sandberg, who spoke at length about the pressure to compete with TikTok. 

US District Judge James Boasberg was ultimately persuaded by Meta’s arguments, writing that the success of YouTube and TikTok prevented Meta from currently "holding a monopoly" even if the company had acted monopolistically in the past. If the FTC had won, it could have tried to force Meta to undo its acquisitions of WhatsApp and Instagram. Should it be successful in its appeal, that remedy could once again be on the table.

News of the FTC's plan to appeal is also a blow to Zuckerberg, who has spent the last year courting Trump and hyping Meta's plans to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on AI infrastructure in the United States. In a statement, Meta spokesperson Andy Stone said that the original ruling was "correct," and that "Meta will remain focused on innovating and investing in America."

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/the-ftc-isnt-giving-up-on-its-antitrust-case-against-meta-225020769.html?src=rss

X is fully online after going down for most of the morning

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X seems to be working again after struggling with an outage that took the service offline and made it slow to load for much of the morning. According to X’s developer platform page, there is an ongoing incident related to streaming endpoints that’s caused increased errors. The incident started at 7:39AM PT, according to the page.

That roughly coincides with a spike in reports at Down Detector. The issues seemed to be somewhat intermittent. At some points, X’s website loaded partially and only showed older posts. At other times, the app and website failed to load at all.

As of 9:30AM PT, X’s Explore and trending pages were loading, but the “following” tab wasn’t showing posts and instead suggested users “find some people and topic to follow” (as shown in the screenshot below).

Posts aren't loading.
Posts aren't loading.
X

As of 11:15AM PT, X’s developer site was still indicating ongoing issues, so there may still be some lingering problems even though the website seems to be functioning normally again. Reports on Down Detector have also dropped off considerably.

X didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the outage. As TechCrunch notes, this is the second time this week that X has experienced significant issues. The service also went down for many users around the world on Tuesday.

Bluesky changed its profile photo earlier in the week.
Bluesky changed its profile photo earlier in the week.
X

But while the latest issues were widespread, some posts are were still managing to go through. Rival Bluesky, which earlier in the week changed its profile picture on X to its butterfly logo in a bikini, took the opportunity to throw some shade.

At 1PM PT, X updated its status page to indicate the issue had been resolved after nearly six hours. It didn’t elaborate on the underlying cause.

Update, January 16, 2026, 2:09PM PT: Updated with the latest information from X’s status page.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/x-is-fully-online-after-going-down-for-most-of-the-morning-171843711.html?src=rss

X says Grok will no longer edit images of real people into bikinis

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X says it is changing its policies around Grok’s image-editing abilities following a multi-week outcry over the chatbot repeatedly being accused of generating sexualized images of children and nonconsensual nudity. In an update shared from the @Safety account on X, the company said it has “implemented technological measures to prevent the Grok account from allowing the editing of images of real people in revealing clothing such as bikinis.”

The new safeguards, according to X, will apply to all users regardless of whether they pay for Grok. xAI is also moving all of Grok’s image-generating features behind its subscriber paywall so that non-paying users will no longer be able to create images. And it will geoblock "the ability of all users to generate images of real people in bikinis, underwear, and similar attire via the Grok account and in Grok in X" in regions where it's illegal.

The company's statement comes hours after the state of California opened an investigation into xAI and Grok over its handling of AI-generated nudity and child exploitation material. A statement from California Attorney General Rob Bonta cited one analysis that found "more than half of the 20,000 images generated by xAI between Christmas and New Years depicted people in minimal clothing," including some that appeared to be children.

In its update, X said that it has "zero tolerance" for child exploitation and that it removes "high-priority violative content, including Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM) and non-consensual nudity" from its platform. Earlier in the day, Elon Musk said he was "not aware of any naked underage images generated by Grok." He later added that when its NSFW setting is enabled, "Grok is supposed [sic] allow upper body nudity of imaginary adult humans (not real ones) consistent with what can be seen in R-rated movies on Apple TV." He added that "this will vary in other regions" based on local laws.  

Malaysia and Indonesia both recently moved to block Grok citing safety concerns and its handling of sexually explicit AI-generated material. In the UK, where regulator Ofcom is also investigating xAI and Grok, officials have also said they would back a similar block of the chatbot. 

Have a tip for Karissa? You can reach her by email, on X, Bluesky, Threads, or send a message to @karissabe.51 to chat confidentially on Signal.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/x-says-grok-will-no-longer-edit-images-of-real-people-into-bikinis-231430257.html?src=rss

California is investigating Grok over AI-generated CSAM and nonconsensual deepfakes

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California authorities have launched an investigation into xAI following weeks of reports that the chatbot was generating sexualized images of children. "xAI appears to be facilitating the large-scale production of deepfake nonconsensual intimate images that are being used to harass women and girls across the internet, including via the social media platform X," California Attorney General Rob Bonta's office said in a statement. 

The statement cited a report that "more than half of the 20,000 images generated by xAI between Christmas and New Years depicted people in minimal clothing," including some that appeared to be children. "We have zero tolerance for the AI-based creation and dissemination of nonconsensual intimate images or of child sexual abuse material,” Bonta said. “Today, my office formally announces an investigation into xAI to determine whether and how xAI violated the law.

The investigation was announced as California Governor Gavin Newsom also called on Bonta to investigate xAI. "xAI’s decision to create and host a breeding ground for predators to spread nonconsensual sexually explicit AI deepfakes, including images that digitally undress children, is vile," Newsom wrote.

California authorities aren't the first to investigate the company following widespread reports of AI-generated child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and non-consensual intimate images of women. UK regulator Ofcom has also opened an official inquiry, and European Union officials have said they are also looking into  the issue. Malaysia and Indonesia have moved to block Grok. 

Last week, xAI began imposing rate limits on Grok's image generation abilities, but has so far declined to pull the plug entirely. When asked to comment on the California investigation, xAI responded with an automated email that said "Legacy Media Lies." 

Earlier on Wednesday, Elon Musk said he was "not aware of any naked underage images generated by Grok." Notably, that statement does not directly refute Bonta's allegation that Grok is being used "to alter images of children to depict them in minimal clothing and sexual situations." Musk said that "the operating principle for Grok is to obey the laws" and that the company works to address cases of "adversarial hacking of Grok prompts."

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/california-is-investigating-grok-over-ai-generated-csam-and-nonconsensual-deepfakes-202029635.html?src=rss