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A24 TECHNOLOGY
Friday 3 May 2019
'Privacy-focused' Facebook puts the spotlight on groups

By BARBARA ORTUTAY cure app — the company
SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) — is making status updates
Facebook is launching a more private. Only people
major redesign of its app in each other's contact
and website built around books will be able to see
letting people connect such updates.
with groups that share their The privacy changes ex-
interests — an attempt to tend to Instagram as well.
shift its focus away from Facebook executives say
the untrammeled public the company is starting to
sharing that has helped test new features that hide
spread hate speech, ex- "likes" from photos. Users
tremism, misinformation will still be able to see how
and livestreamed video of many likes their photos get,
massacres. but the number won't ap-
The new features, an- pear at the bottom of each
nounced Tuesday at the post.
company's annual F8 de- Facebook's dating service
veloper conference, are will come to U.S. users later
part of CEO Mark Zucker- this year. Facebook also
berg's broader strategy announced a way to date
for countering Facebook's Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg makes the keynote speech at F8, the Facebook's developer friends — but only if each
growing array of critics, conference, Tuesday, April 30, 2019, in San Jose, Calif. user separately adds the
emboldened regulators other to his or her own "se-
and competitors. ers in a single quarter ; ana- with individual friends, he is live for U.S. users now, cret crush" list.
Zuckerberg, who at one lysts think it still hasn't recov- said. while the desktop version is Zuckerberg said last week
point stood in front of a gi- ered. The groups cover a wide coming later this year. This is that Facebook's focus on
ant display reading "The Zuckerberg and his chief range of interests and top- Facebook's fifth major mo- private communications
future is private," acknowl- lieutenant, Sheryl Sand- ics — hiking, hair care, par- bile app redesign since it will be built out over the
edged widespread skep- berg, have apologized enting, rare diseases. Rec- launched more than a de- next five years or more.
ticism of his plan to turn repeatedly over the past ommended groups will ap- cade ago. A few years ago, the com-
Facebook into a "privacy- year for Facebook's ever- pear on users' homepages. A desktop app for Mes- pany probably would have
focused" social network. expanding list of mishaps (The redesign will also do senger is also coming later rolled out these changes
"Look, I get that a lot of over privacy, data misuse away with Facebook's sig- this year. And Messenger right away and dealt with
people aren't sure that we and security problems. Last nature blue banner.) will eventually make end- problems as they came up,
are serious about this," he week, the company said it Groups have also caused to-end encryption the Zuckerberg said. But no lon-
said to laughter from the is setting aside $3 billion to controversy for the com- default setting for all mes- ger. "We have to change a
crowd. "We are committed cover a possible fine from pany, especially as com- sages, rather than an opt- lot of the ways we run this
to doing this well and to the Federal Trade Commis- munities pop up around ex- in choice. End-to-end en- company," he said.
starting a new chapter for sion over privacy violations. tremist topics. Facebook is cryption protects messages Last year's F8 conference
our products." Amid all that, Zuckerberg is working to remove groups as they travel between took place weeks after
The redesign isn't with- encouraging Facebook us- that have "harmful con- people, making it impos- the Cambridge Analytica
out risks of its own. When ers to rely more on private tent," Zuckerberg said, and sible to see them unless you scandal, in which a po-
Snapchat rolled out major messaging and "communi- to de-emphasize those that are on the sending or re- litical data-mining firm ac-
changes in late 2017, peo- ties." The redesign is struc- share misleading informa- ceiving end. cessed personal data on
ple hated them so much tured to make it as easy to tion. Inside WhatsApp — by tens of millions of Facebook
the service lost 3 million us- connect with groups as it is The redesigned mobile app far Facebook's most se- users without their consent.

Girls outscore boys on tech, engineering, even without class

SEATTLE (AP) — Though less girls and boys is also grow- suggest the decade-long
likely to study in a formal ing wider as compared to effort to champion more
technology or engineer- the last time the federal opportunities for girls and
ing course, America’s girls government compiled women in the fields of sci-
are showing more mastery technology and engineer- ence, technology, engi-
of those subjects than their ing literacy data among a neering and math is gain-
boy classmates, according representative sample of ing ground. The campaign
to newly released national students and public schools to nurture the budding in-
education data. Known across the country. terest of those girls to meet
as “The Nation’s Report The assessment made its the corporate world’s
Card,” the latest findings debut in 2014, which also seemingly insatiable de-
made public Tuesday from showed girls outscoring mand for high-skilled work-
the National Assessment of boys but by a smaller mar- ers in related well-paying
Educational Progress also gin. In 2018, girls on aver- jobs has drawn the money
shows U.S. eighth-graders in age scored five points high- and attention from a wide
2018 did significantly better er than boys on a 300-point spectrum of influencers,
In this file photo taken Feb. 21, 2019, seventh grade students overall compared to 2014′s scale, due to the fact that from tech giant Microsoft’s
from Grace Academy in Hartford, Conn., work together on a test results, particularly girls made gains between philanthropic research and
robot using plans on a computer at the Connecticut Science
Center in Hartford. among students who are 2014 and 2018 while boys’ initiatives to supermodel
Associated Press white, black, Asian or low- scores stayed about the Karlie Kloss’ hands-on com-
income. The gap between same. The latest findings puter coding camp.q