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A whale etched with a razor on a teenager's arm. Source: thesun.co.uk

In March, two Belarusian youngsters attempted to commit suicide while playing a 'game' on the popular Russian social network VK.

Belarusian law enforcement services have initiated two criminal cases, connecting the suicides with a game called blue whale, especially popular in Russia and Ukraine.

The game consists of 50 dangerous quests which youngsters, threatened by the game's administrators, have to perform in reality.

In other countries, such as Russia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan, even more children have committed suicide playing the game. The Main Internal Affairs Directorate has revealed that thousands of Belarusian youngsters have already registered in the dangerous groups and informed schools and parents of the danger.

Nevertheless, a direct correlation between teen suicides and the game remains difficult to draw. The overhyping of the game in the media is not evidence of the game's existence in real life. Under such circumstances, it is important that control of social media does not turn into censorship.

'Blue whale has become the code name for a range of dangerous internet pages on the Russian social network VK. These pages and groups appeared on VK in 2015 in Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan under the names blue whale, wake me up at 4:30, and silent house.

Allegedly, the groups target youngsters by enticing them to play a game which later involves risky and dangerous tasks which must be performed in reality. The last task is suicide. The game consists of 50 tasks, such as drawing a whale on your arm using a blade or listening to psychedelic music. The game can last from 50 to 57 days and involves personal threats and psychological pressure on youngsters.

The scenario of the game is always similar. Moderators threaten youngsters and demand that they follow their instructions. If the child wants to quit the game, moderators threaten to kidnap their relatives. The media has reported many cases in which parents or friends found children's last note and managed to prevent suicides. Recently, a student from Vitsebsk saved the life of her 17-year old friend, who was playing the game and left her last note on her VK page.

Even though the Russian Investigative Committee uncovered the identity of the man who created the game, the popularity of the blue whale only seems to be growing. In 2016, Filipp Budejkin, a Russian national, was accused of inciting 15 young people to suicide over the internet via death groups. At the same time, media in Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and Russia are still reporting an increased number of suicides connected with the game.

The number of players in Belarus is on the rise and has already led to several dangerous incidents. TUT.by reports that thousands of Belarusian youths have registered in death group on VK. During the last month, investigative committees initiated two criminal cases after two young people in Vitsebsk and Minsk intended to commit suicide playing the game. Two 14 and 15-year old girls in Hrodna ended up in psychiatric care after their participation in the game came to light.

Although the media in Belarus has reacted to the popularity of the death games, the Belarusian government and security services remain silent. Belarusian rescue services recently encouraged parents to be on the look out due to the increasing number of suicides. However, on the next day, the Ministry of Internal Affairs stated that the suicide rate among young people caused by social media has not risen.

Public awareness about the dangerous game in Belarus is growing. Some schools have sent text messages to parents informing them of the possible danger. Meanwhile, the media aim to conduct their own investigation and gather more information from officials. More and more psychologists are recommending that parents keep track of their children's activities on social media. Several weeks ago, local officials in Hrodna distributed information to all schools and encouraged teachers to conduct parent meetings discussing the possible danger. An investigative committee in Minsk is currently attempting to identify the real identities of the groups administrators.

Although many Belarusians are alarmed about the danger of death groups on VK, some parts of society doubt whether the danger exists at all. An investigation of the influence of social media groups on youth suicides first appeared in the Russian publication Novaya Gazeta. Meanwhile, following a wave of heated discussion, some media outlets believe that the phenomenon is a myth created by the Russian government as an excuse to control social media and the internet. In Kyrgyzstan, authorities have already announced their intention to increase control of the internet.

On 20 March, the vice-speaker of the Russian Duma announced that youth suicide had increased by 57% since last year. However, according to sociologist Evgenii Andreev, the number is most likely fake, as it was announced two months before an annual UNICEF report on suicide statistics. Suicide in Belarus has been falling over the last several years, to 13 suicides among 10-17 year-olds in 2016. The decreasing number of suicides in Belarus provides weak evidence of the existence of death groups.

The number of 'death group' members on VK also calls the real threat of the game into question. The investigation by Novaya Gazeta has provoked a wave of discussion which could unintentionally widen the popularity of groups with names such as blue whale or 4:20. The Belarusian Investigative Committee stated to TUT.by that youngsters themselves are becoming moderators, employing psychological pressure to persuade their peers to commit suicide.

Although the existence of death groups is still under question, law enforcement agencies are attempting to control the situation in Belarus. Recently, the Main Internal Affairs Directorate submitted a list of children registered in dangerous groups to the Ministry of Education. Teachers and school psychologists aim to reach parents to prevent possible suicides. Nevertheless, the investigative committee has yet to clarify any measures taken against moderators and administrators of such groups.

More young people are now becoming active users of social media. There is therefore an urgent need to teach children internet safety. Despite heated debates surrounding the dangerous games, it remains important to maintain a balance between control and censorship. Extended control of social media activity could easily turn into restriction of freedom of speech and intrusion into private life. The precedent was set in 2009 when the government of China restricted access to Facebook and Youtube as a safety measure.

Alesia Rudnik is an analyst at the Ostrogorski Centre and and MA student at Stockholm University.

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Killing children on social media - Belarus Digest

The Karnataka Legislature, on the last day of its budget session on Tuesday, formed a joint legislature committee to "study" the impact, the adverse impact and ways to control the quality of reportage by both print and electronic media.

The committee was found necessary, after nearly four hours of discussions in the Assembly last week where MLAs from all parties complained to the Speaker about how they were "misrepresented" by the media and wanted to put an end to this.

The debate included speeches and comments from MLAs who have been facing the heat from the public after visuals of their deeds (or misdeeds, as the case may be) went viral on mainstream and social media over the past month. It's another matter that this debate preceded the debates on budget, drought, water scarcity or the salaries of anganwadi workers - all issues that had been matters of major debate outside the Assembly, among the common men.

"I have been repeatedly portrayed as a Rowdy MLA," screamed Tumkur Rural MLA Suresh Gowda, whose images caught slapping a toll booth manager on CCTV just two weeks before had been given much time on regional and national channels.

Another BJP MLA, Bharamagouda Kage, who had been arrested (after CCTV footage emerged) for allegedly assaulting a Congress worker in his constituency in Belagavi, said, "Channels have run shows after shows, for days together, repeatedly asking 'Where is Kage, where is Kage,' despite my assuring them that I am here, that I have not run away anywhere."

Incidentally, Kage and his family members were picked up from a resort in Maharashtra after being on the run for nearly ten days, while facing attempt to murder charges. Gowda, Kage and a few other MLAs thus did not take too kindly with the way they were "portrayed as guilty" before the public, they complained to the Speaker.

The legislature committee, formed rather hastily as its terms and reference is yet to be finalised, will be headed by Minister K R Ramesh Kumar, will have among its honourable participants, such members as Gowda, Kage, and B R Yavagal, the MLA who had faced flak three years back for leading a House panel on a "study trip" to Australia. The Congress' Chief Whip Ashok Pathan is also a member, while three members are yet to be nominated from the Legislative Council.

The committee is likely to give its recommendations in three months. Incidentally, the media was also blamed for being irresponsible four years back and more controls along the lines of Lok Sabha TV were sought -- that was when members had raised concerns about how channels had zoomed in on images of three Ministers in the (then) Sadananda Gowda cabinet watching porn.

While Speaker K B Koliwad signed up ten MLAs to the committee on Tuesday, one Minister questioned the need for such a committee. Higher Education Minister Basavaraj Rayareddi wrote a strongly-worded four-page letter that freedom of the press is the life-line of a democracy.

"If the MLAs had issues, the Speaker could always call editors for a meeting, explain to them what the concerns are -- maybe sensationalism. But why do we need to form a committee like this, it's against the principles of democracy," Rayareddi told News18.

Quoting specific Constitutional provisions that bat for freedom of the press, Rayareddi has asked the Speaker to either convene a meeting or hold a seminar with editors of all news channels, so that they could together come up with guidelines that ensure the highest standards of journalism.

"I don't say that the pain, helplessness and anguish expressed by the MLAs during the debate was wrong. I have often felt disappointed when I see news that is inaccurate and sensationalised... but I hope you take this advice proactively, to uphold both the values of journalism and the honour of this House," he said in his letter.

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Karnataka Legislature Forms Committee to Control Media - News18

Details Latest News 29 March 2017

Virgin Media has signed a managed services deal with Netcracker as it looks to overhaul its BSS.

Financial terms of the multiyear deal were not disclosed.

The NEC-owned vendor said it would create new opportunities for Virgin to deliver customised services for its business customers and improve scalability in terms of meeting increasingly complex customer demands.

It has also promised to reduce opex.

The deal builds on a longstanding relationship between the two companies, according to a statement.

It comes as Virgins rivals have been hit by a string of billing-related fines from the UK regulator.

BT-owned Plusnet was handed a 880,000 fine last week for continuing to charge a group of customers after they had cancelled their contract.

In January, EE got a 2.7 million fine for overcharging tens of thousands of customers in 2014 and 2015.

Last year, Vodafone was fined almost 5 million for serious and sustained breaches of consumer protection rules.

Operators in the UK could be forced to automatically compensate customers for delays to repairs and other services under new proposals put forward by Ofcom.

Robin Laliberte, General Manager of EMEA at Netcracker, said: Service providers are constantly evolving to meet new customer needs, which create complexities that can be mitigated through the use of managed services.

Last week, Telefnicas enterprise arm tapped Netcracker to supply an end-to-end BSS/OSS stack.

Including its operations in Ireland, revenues at Virgin Media grew 2.6 percent to 4.8 billion last year.

Read more from the original source:
Virgin Media hands control of revenue management to Netcracker - European Communications (press release) (registration)

The Inter-American Press Association (IAPA) qualified a Peruvian bill that seeks to control who can hold executive positions in media outlets a tool for direct censorship of the press.

Article 2 of the bill, Law to protect the informational freedoms and rights of the people, proposes that any person who is sentenced, or who is being investigated by the Public Ministry for corruption offenses against the State is disqualified from occupying any managerial position in a media outlet.

They would also be prevented, under this bill, from holding positions as presidents or board members, shareholders, general managers or attorneys.

This initiative is alarming, which becomes a legal instrument for an authoritarian government to accuse, name and prosecute a journalist or the editor of a media outlet with the intention of moving aside and silencing him or her, said IAPA President Matt Sanders.

Roberto Rock, president of the IAPAs Committee on Freedom of the Press and Information, also said that the bill sets out as the objective to guarantee the right to impartial, truthful, plural and timely information, which was the same proposal used by Presidents Hugo Chvez and Nicols Maduro of Venezuela and Rafael Correa of Ecuador to adopt communication laws with clauses aimed at creating a strategy of legal and legitimate censorship.

This legislative proposal was presented on March 7 by two congressmen of the Fujimorista party Fuerza Popular, rsula Letona and Alejandra Aramayo.

Sanders and Rock said they hoped that the Peruvian Congress would not take up the bill on the grounds that approving it would be returning to dark times in Peru, where press freedom was "hijacked by the Alberto Fujimori government.

In Peru, voices against the Fuerza Popular bill were not long in coming. The president of the Peruvian Press Council (CPP for its initials in Spanish), Bernardo Roca Rey, said that it is inadmissible that a newspaper director could be disabled with only one lawsuit, newspaper La Repblica published.

"You can not imagine that there are people who support this type of censorship of the press. But history shows that the majority of countries that are heading toward the dictatorship of ideas hinder freedom of expression. In Peru, we need a large and broad press freedom," Roca Rey said.

Augusto lvarez Rodrich, the former president of the newspaper Peru.21 and current president of the Press and Society Institute (IPYS) of Peru, told La Repblica that this bill is "one more monstrosity invented by the Fujimorismo to limit freedom of expression."

He added: "Fuerza Popular is creating conditions to bring judgments to media executives and have them manipulated, which has been the fujimorista custom."

Likewise, Claudio Paolillo, former president of IAPAs Committee on Freedom of the Press and Information, told newspaper El Comercio that the project represents a direct attack on freedom of expression (...) It is an old story that politicians in Latin America have applied to determine what is objective and truthful, he said.

For Gonzalo Zegarra, former president of CPP, this is the ideal rule that Alberto Fujimoris former presidential adviser, Vladimiro Montesinos, would have wanted. He controlled the Judiciary during the decade Fujimori was in power in order to neutralize the media, he told El Comercio.

One of the authors of the bill, rsula Letona, told El Comercio that what is wanted with this law is to protect the right to information.

Peruvian President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski signed the Declaration of Chapultepec on May 3 before an international delegation of IAPA, in celebration of World Press Freedom Day.

Read the original:
IAPA rejects Peruvian bill that aims to control management positions in media outlets - Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas (blog)

Xbox One is getting an update starting today, echoing some of the major changes coming to Windows in its forthcoming Creators Update. The big new additions include streaming via Microsofts own Twitch competitor Beam, as well as a brand new Xbox user experience made up of a new design for Guide, improvements to Home and more.

The new features are designed around encouraging gamers to stream more often, providing easier access to those aspects of the UI. The overhaul can be seen as a push for Beam in this way, which it acquired last year. Beam is a Twitch competitor designed around offering more ways for audiences to interact with streamers, and Microsoft clearly sees it as a way to bringthe popularity of game streaming back within its own domain. It highlights that the new Beam integration means you dont have to download or activate any additional software or accounts Beam is fully native in Xbox.

Other big new features include the new Home design, which is designed for improved performance, and which puts content related to the games youre currently playing front and center. This is part of the ongoing evolution of the platform back to being primarily a gaming device, though at the Xbox Ones outset it was positioned more as a media hub for all types of content.

The Guide is also reconfigured, providing quick access to media controls and your most used content in a menu you can access via the Xbox button on your controller. Theres also improved multitasking, including in-game Achievement tracking via an overlaid UI element. Cortana will also be available on top of whatever else youre doing, so you dont need to jump entirely out of the action to control music, set reminders and do more via voice controls.

Beam broadcast and the new Beam viewing app, which is rolling out to all users, are again a big focal point here. Other additions like new accessibility features, screen time limits for parents of younger kids and Blu-ray bitstream passthrough for native audio decoding on home theatre setups are also nice additions. however.

The nice thing about consoles and their long shelf life is the extremely iterative approach their makers take to their core software. The centrality of Beam to this new Xbox experience seems like it could be more of a distraction for a large number of users, but otherwise these changes feel like a clear win.

The rest is here:
Xbox One gets Beam streaming, a new guide and more starting today - TechCrunch