Journalist Kate Bartlett speaks with Elissa Nadworny about what Desmond Tutu meant to the people of South Africa and the fight for social justice more broadly.
Canada’s Public Health Agency has admitted to secretly tracking location data from at least 33 million mobile devices to analyze people’s movements during Covid-19 lockdowns.
The agency earlier this year collected data, including geolocation information from cell-towers, “due to the urgency of the pandemic,” a PHAC spokesperson told the National Post, essentially confirming a report by Blacklock’s Reporter. The tracking data was allegedly only used to evaluate the effectiveness of lockdown measures and identify possible links between the movement of people and the spread of Covid-19.
PHAC obtained the information, which was “de-identified and aggregated,” through an outside contractor, Canadian telecommunications giant Telus. The contract ran from last March to October, and PHAC said it no longer had access to the data after the deal expired.
However, the agency plans to similarly track the movements of citizens over the next five years toward such ends as preventing the spread of other infectious diseases and improving mental health. PHAC last week posted a notice to prospective contractors seeking anonymous mobile data dating as far back as January 2019 and running through at least May 2023.
Critics argued that government tracking of citizens is likely more extensive than has been revealed and may become more troublesome in the years ahead.
“I think that the Canadian public will find out about many other such unauthorized surveillance initiatives before the pandemic is over—and afterwards,” privacy advocate David Lyon told the Post. He noted, too, that “de-identified” data can easily be “re-identified.”
Author Julius Reuchel said the tracking initiative smacks of a surveillance state spying on citizens “for your safety.” Another author, Paul Alves, said that with its new contract, PHAC will have direct access to all mobile location data, and expressed fear that “contact tracing will no longer require permission or a warrant.”
Many migrant domestic workers in Lebanon are denied basic human rights, and suffered abuse at the hands of their employers. Since the worsening economic crisis in the country their plight has, if anything, worsened.
Somalia has been riven by decades of conflict and extreme weather events but, says Adam Abdelmoula, the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in the country, there are signs of progress amidst a host of ongoing challenges.
Desmond Tutu will be remembered for helping end apartheid. But also for his memorable laugh, an infectious, cackling, howl employed in the service of easing tensions in a very tense nation.
An anti-Semitism watchdog has reportedly ranked the BBC in third place – behind Iran and Hamas – on its annual list of the world’s worst offenders after it allowed anti-Jewish bias to “creep into its reporting” over the past year.
The Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center judged the British broadcaster to be “guilty of several incidences of anti-Semitism” when compiling its ‘Global Antisemitism Top Ten’ rankings for 2021, according to the Daily Mail. The list is due to be released on Tuesday.
The center’s founder and head, Rabbi Marvin Hier, told the paper that the decision to put the BBC on the list might be a “[surprise]” to some, but it “came after months of intense debate and discussion.”
“People might assume we would put neo-Nazi groups on our list but … when a globally recognized organization allows anti-Semitism to creep into its reporting, it makes it all the more insidious and dangerous,” he said.
Referencing its reputation for “truthful reporting,” Hier pointed to several cases covered by the BBC, which raised questions. For example, Alaa Daraghme, a journalist producing video for the BBC, tweeted a clip with the caption: ‘An Israeli settler ramming a Palestinian man near the Lions’ Gate’.
“In fact, the car drove onto the pavement after an attempt by Palestinians to lynch the Jewish driver who lost control of the vehicle,” Hier said. Daraghme later published another video to clarify the context.
Noting that “anti-Semitism is abhorrent,” an unnamed BBC spokesman told the Daily Mail that the corporation “strives to serve the Jewish community, and all communities across our country, fairly with accurate and impartial reporting.”
The list, which features Iran and Palestinian militant group Hamas in the top two spots, also reportedly includes “social media giants” (for permitting hate speech) and the Unilever corporation, whose Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream brand courted controversy after a sales boycott of East Jerusalem and the West Bank.
