danish – Tech Today w/ Ken May

Facebook is no stranger to notifying police when there’s clear evidence of a crime, but its latest action has had consequences on a much larger scale than usual. Danish police have charged 1, 004 young people (some under 18) after Facebook notified authorities that Messenger users were sharing a video of two teens under 15 years old having sex, violating laws against the distribution of indecent images of children. Many of those who shared the video did so ‘just’ a few times, police said , but others shared it hundreds of times — they knew what they were doing, even if they didn’t realize it was illegal. Anyone found guilty would face no more than 20 days in prison, but they’d also be added to an offender registry for the next 10 years. The last messages were shared in the fall of 2017, but charges are only coming now because it’s a “very large and complex case, ” according to police. The investigation included four Danish police bureaus, and came after US authorities relayed Facebook’s warning to Europol. It can be tricky to catch ad hoc sharing of illegal videos on messaging services like this, both because of the private nature of the messages and because some users are bound to have end-to-end encryption turned on. Ultimately, it relies on someone in the sharing chain deciding to report the offending material — and in this case, it’s clear that it took a while before someone came forward. Privacy concerns are going to rule out active monitoring, but this does suggest that Facebook and others might want to do more to encourage voluntary reports. Via: BBC Source: The Local

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Danish police charge 1,000 people following Facebook sex video

Cash is expensive to manufacture. As we saw in our article on The U.S. Mint’s Production Materials Problem , a penny costs 2.4 cents to make, while a nickel costs more than double its actual value. But governments continue to manufacture physical currency because previously, that was the only way to enable commerce and hence, economic growth. Cash is also expensive (and time-consuming) to use. A 2013 Tufts University study found that using cash costs American citizens and businesses some $200 billion annually, which boils down to $1, 739 per household. And sadly, those costs are disproportionately borne by the poor. Theft ($40 billion from businesses and $500 million from individuals) and ATM fees of $8 billion make up a portion of these overall costs. But the majority of these costs come in terms of time: the average American spends 28 minutes per month traveling to get cash. It probably comes as no surprise that the cost of cash is higher for the poor and unbanked Americans. The unbanked pay on average about $3.66 per month more than banked consumers. Poor Americans carry larger amounts in cash and pay more fees for cash transactions than wealthier Americans. Those without bank accounts use greater amounts of cash in a month than those with bank accounts. One obvious solution would be to create affordable banking methods for the poor. Once we accomplish that, we can take the radical step that Denmark is taking: Ending cash, period. The country has announced that next year they’ll stop printing the stuff altogether , meaning there’s going to be some sweet printing presses for sale on Danish eBay. And the Danish government has announced a new proposal that will allow merchants—gas stations, restaurants, clothing stores, et cetera—to refuse cash transactions. According to Reuters , a financial institution lobbyist says that “going cashless would save shops money on security and time on managing change from the cash register.” What this won’t end, of course, is theft; it will simply shift to a different arena, less ski-mask-and-gun, more keyboard-and-mouse. But if Denmark’s cashless society works on balance, it’s not inconceivable to think other countries will follow suit. As Fusion’s Kevin Roose puts it, “It’s time to take a lesson from the Danes…and admit that the 5, 000-year reign of physical currency has run its course.”

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Denmark Leads the Way Towards Ending Cash