Facebook data scandal widens as Canadian company accused of helping target U.S. voters

A scandal engulfing Facebook over the use of its data by political consultants widened on Tuesday when a whistleblower said Canadian company AggregateIQ had developed a program to target Republican voters in the 2016 U.S. election.

Christopher Wylie, who previously revealed that consultancy Cambridge Analytica had accessed the data of 50 million Facebook users to build voter profiles on behalf of Donald Trump’s campaign, said AggregateIQ (AIQ) had built software called Ripon to profile voters.

Wylie was giving evidence to a British parliamentary committee over the scandal, minutes after Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg declined to appear before the legislators to discuss what went wrong.

The head of the committee called Zuckerberg’s decision “astonishing” and urged him to think again. read more »

Pink-haired whistleblower at heart of Facebook scandal

Instantly recognisable with his pink hair and nose ring, Christopher Wylie claims to have helped create data analysis company Cambridge Analytica before turning whistleblower and becoming "the face" of the crisis engulfing Facebook.

Carole Cadwalladr, the Guardian journalist who worked with Wylie for a year on the story, described him as "clever, funny, bitchy, profound, intellectually ravenous, compelling. A master storyteller. A politicker. A data science nerd."

The bespectacled 28-year-old describes himself as "the gay Canadian vegan who somehow ended up creating Steve Bannon's psychological warfare tool," read more »

Remington Has a $500 Million Question Hanging Over Its Bankruptcy

Litigation over a gun defect will likely be delayed. How those claims will ultimately be resolved is unclear.

Remington Outdoor Co.’s decision to seek court protection was a long-anticipated move by one of America’s oldest gun-makers. It was in part the result of a maelstrom that’s buffeted the industry since the election of Donald Trump, one also fueled by mass shootings and protests such as this weekend’s nationwide march for gun regulation. Hundreds of millions in leveraged-buyout debt didn’t help, either.

But in Remington’s reorganization, the question remains whether people with pre-existing legal claims against the company will be made whole. Lawsuits over firearms defects and the use of its weapons in the Sandy Hook attack were pending when the company filed for bankruptcy Sunday. The company has moved to suspend those cases.

As much as $500 million could hang in the balance. Remington, which is owned by Cerberus Capital Management, is embroiled in litigation over trigger defects on guns such as its iconic Model 700 rifle, as well as another lawsuit by survivors of the children and teachers killed in the 2012 elementary school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut. Bushmaster, owned by Remington, manufactured the firearm used in that massacre, which left 26 dead. read more »

The naturopath whistleblower: ‘It is surprisingly easy to sell snake oil’

Britt Maria Hermes was a committed practitioner in America’s multi-billion-dollar complementary medicine industry. Then she found her clinic’s herbal treatment for cancer was potentially illegal – and overnight became a highly vocal sceptic

Globally, one market analysis last year projected that the complementary medicine market would expand to have a revenue of nearly $200bn (£143bn) by 2025. read more »