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Corporate Corruption News Articles
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Note: Explore our full index to revealing excerpts of key major media news articles on dozens of engaging topics. And read excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.


Ad agency tied to Purdue Pharma settles opioid claims for $350 million
2024-02-01, Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2024/02/01/opioids-oxycontin-purdue-pub...

An advertising agency that helped market the blockbuster painkiller OxyContin will pay $350 million to states ravaged by the nation's opioid crisis. Attorneys general from multiple states alleged that Publicis Health developed "unfair and deceptive" marketing campaigns aimed at persuading doctors to prescribe the addictive drug for longer periods of time and at higher doses. The company's client was Purdue Pharma, the Connecticut drugmaker accused in lawsuits of helping ignite the epidemic through aggressive marketing and sales of OxyContin. Publicis, a subsidiary of French ad giant Publicis Groupe, settled with 50 states and D.C. Under the agreements, Publicis Health will stop accepting work related to prescription opioids and must release thousands of internal documents chronicling its dealings with companies such as Purdue. It is the first settlement with an advertising agency connected to the opioid crisis, according to the New York attorney general's office. "Publicis was responsible for creating advertisements and materials, such as pamphlets and brochures that promoted OxyContin as safe and unable to be abused, even though this claim was not true," according to a news release from the office of New York Attorney General Letitia James. Drug overdoses killed nearly 110,000 people in the United States in 2022, a record high, according to federal death statistics.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on Big Pharma corruption from reliable major media sources.


DOJ's Healthcare Probes of AI Tools Rooted in Purdue Pharma Case
2024-01-29, Bloomberg
https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/dojs-healthcare-probes-of-ai-tools-...

Justice Department investigators are scrutinizing the healthcare industry's use of AI embedded in patient records that prompts doctors to recommend treatments. Prosecutors have started subpoenaing pharmaceuticals and digital health companies to learn more about generative technology's role in facilitating anti-kickback and false claims violations, said three sources familiar with the matter.. Two of the sources–speaking anonymously to discuss ongoing investigations–said DOJ attorneys are asking general questions suggesting they still may be formulating a strategy. "I have seen" civil investigative demands "that ask questions about algorithms and prompts that are being built into EMR systems that may be resulting in care that is either in excess of what would have otherwise been rendered, or may be medically unnecessary," said Jaime Jones, who co-leads the healthcare practice at Sidley Austin. DOJ attorneys want "to see what the result is of those tools being built into the system." The probes bring fresh relevance to a pair of 2020 criminal settlements with Purdue Pharma and its digital records contractor, Practice Fusion, over their collusion to design automated pop-up alerts pushing doctors to prescribe addictive painkillers. The kickback scheme ... led to a $145 million penalty for Practice Fusion. Marketers from Purdue ... worked in tandem with Practice Fusion to build clinical decision alerts relying on algorithms.

Note: Read how the US opioid industry operated like a drug cartel. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on AI and Big Pharma corruption from reliable major media sources.


How Wealthy Corporations Use Investment Agreements to Extract Millions From Developing Countries
2024-01-25, ScheerPost
https://scheerpost.com/2024/01/25/how-wealthy-corporations-use-investment-agr...

When Rafael Correa entered Ecuador's presidency in 2007, the nation faced an opportunity and a challenge. Ecuador's economy depended on oil, and global crude prices were near a record high. Much of the oil was extracted by foreign companies ... as prices surged more wealth began flowing overseas. Soon after taking office, Correa increased a recently enacted windfall tax on oil companies. The idea was to use the tax as leverage to extract better terms from the companies. Within months, two oil companies working as partners–the independent Anglo-French firm Perenco and Burlington Resources, a subsidiary of ConocoPhillips–ceased paying the tax and sued the government through a system of international tribunals known as investor state dispute settlements, or ISDS. The system allows foreign investors to sue governments before tribunals outside the jurisdiction of national courts. Perenco and Burlington [convinced] arbitrators in two separate tribunals to award the companies more than $800 million. Critics say the ISDS system gives corporations an exclusive, parallel justice system that elevates foreign interests above human rights and environmental concerns. The vast majority of cases have been brought by companies based in North America or Europe against governments in Latin America, Africa and Asia, prompting many critics to liken the ISDS system to a form of market-based colonialism that continues to extract wealth from the Global South.

Note: According to the analysis in the article, fossil fuel companies and investors filed one in five of 1,720 claims since the 1970s, and "have been awarded at least $82.8 billion in compensation from governments." For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on corporate corruption and income inequality from reliable major media sources.


Meet the Companies Profiting From Israel's War on Gaza
2023-12-21, ScheerPost
https://scheerpost.com/2023/12/21/meet-the-companies-profiting-from-israels-w...

As of Wednesday, a U.S.-based Quaker group's online database listed over two dozen companies profiting from the bloodshed in the Gaza Strip, where Israeli forces have spent the last 10 weeks waging what experts call a "genocidal" war that sent defense stocks soaring. Backed by $3.8 billion in annual military aid from the United States, Israel declared war on October 7 in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack that killed over 1,100 people. Since then, Israeli forces have killed over 20,000 Palestinians in Gaza. "The scale of destruction and war crimes in Gaza would not be possible without massive weapon transfers from the U.S.," said Noam Perry of the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC). Boeing, the world's fifth-largest weapon manufacturer, makes F-15 fighter jets and Apache AH-64 attack helicopters used by the Israeli forces, as well as "multiple types of unguided small diameter bombs (SDBs) and Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) kits" that have been used "extensively" during the war. Caterpillar's armored D9 bulldozers ... have been crucial in the Israeli military's ground invasion. Other companies on the list include weapons giants such as General Dynamics, General Electric, L3Harris Technologies, Leonardo, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and RTX–formerly Raytheon–as well as vehicle companies AM General, Ford, Oshkosh, Toyota, and drone manufacturers AeroVironment, Skydio, and XTEND.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on war and corporate corruption from reliable major media sources. Then explore the excellent, reliable resources provided in our Military-Intelligence Corruption Information Center.


Experts call for fewer antidepressants to be prescribed in UK
2023-12-05, The Guardian (One of the UK's Leading Newspapers)
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/dec/05/experts-call-for-fewer-antide...

Medical experts and politicians have called for the amount of antidepressants being prescribed to people across the UK to be reduced in an open letter to the government. The letter coincides with the launch of the all-party parliamentary group Beyond Pills, which aims to reduce what it calls the UK healthcare system's over-reliance on prescription medication. A total of 8.6 million patients in England were prescribed antidepressants in 2022-23, with the amount having almost doubled since 2011. Published in the British Medical Journal ... the letter says: "Rising antidepressant prescribing is not associated with an improvement in mental health outcomes at the population level, which, according to some measures, have worsened as antidepressant prescribing has risen." The letter goes on to say that reducing the rate of antidepressant prescriptions could be achieved through measures that includes stopping the prescribing of antidepressants for mild conditions, and funding and delivering a national 24-hour prescribed drug withdrawal helpline ... to help those experiencing withdrawal symptoms from prescription medication. [Former chief executive of NHS England, Nigel] Crisp said: "The high rate of prescribing of antidepressants over recent years is a clear example of over-medicalisation, where patients are often prescribed unnecessary and potentially harmful drugs instead of tackling the root causes of their suffering, such as loneliness, poverty or poor housing.

Note: Antidepressants are some of the most commonly prescribed medications, yet their significant risks are often withheld from public debate. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on health and Big Pharma corruption from reliable major media sources.


EU Commission to extend use of glyphosate for 10 more years after member countries fail to agree
2023-11-17, Nature
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-03589-z

The European Commission says it has decided to renew the license for the weedkiller compound glyphosate, approving its use in European Union countries for ten more years. Following the decision yesterday, the Commission released a statement saying that, on the basis of comprehensive safety assessments carried out by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA), it would renew the licence, "subject to certain new conditions and restrictions". These include a ban on the use of the chemical to dry crops before harvest, and "the need for certain measures to protect non-target organisms". Governments can still restrict the use of glyphosate in their own countries if they consider the risks too high. Glyphosate is the active ingredient in Roundup, the world's most widely used herbicide. Some studies point to a link between glyphosate and certain cancers. Robin Mesnage, a toxicologist at King's College London, welcomes the Commission's decision to continue to allow the use of glyphosate. Others have expressed disappointment. "It is unacceptable that the Commission still plans to go ahead with its proposal, considering the amount of scientific evidence of the substance's health impacts," says Natacha Cingotti, a campaigner at the Health and Environment Alliance. "While we can't undo the decades of exposure, the Commission can still seize the opportunity to turn the tide towards more sustainable agricultural practices."

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on corruption in government and in the food system from reliable major media sources.


‘Buying influence': top US nuclear board advisers are tied to arms business
2023-11-10, The Guardian (One of the UK's Leading Newspapers)
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/nov/10/us-congress-nuclear-weapon-comm...

Nine of the 12 members of a high-level congressional commission charged with advising on the US's nuclear weapons strategy have direct financial ties to contractors that would benefit from the report's recommendations or are employed at thinktanks that receive considerable funding from weapons manufacturers. While the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States (CCSPUS) purports to recommend steps to avoid nuclear conflict, it does nothing to disclose its own potential conflicts of interest with the weapons industry in its final report or at rollout events. "What we've consistently seen is the nuclear weapons industry buying influence and that means we cannot make serious decisions about our security when the industry is buying influence through thinktanks and commissioners that are skewing the debate," said Susi Snyder, program coordinator at the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons. "Instead of having a debate about the tools and materials we need to make ourselves safe," she added, "we're having a debate about which company should get the contracts." The most recognizable member of the CCSPUS is its vice-chair, Jon Kyl, who served as a senator. In 2017 Kyl, personally, was registered to lobby for Northrop Grumman, which manufactures the B-21 nuclear bomber that the commission recommends the US should purchase in greater numbers, at a cost to taxpayers of nearly $700m each.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on military corruption from reliable major media sources.


Under Biden, Prosecutions Of Corporate Wrongdoers Near A Historic Low
2023-10-30, Huffington Post
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/biden-corporate-accountability_n_653fe004e4b0a...

The number of corporate prosecutions under President Joe Biden's Department of Justice in 2022 hovered near the lowest level in decades, according to a new analysis published by the good government group Public Citizen. Federal prosecutors concluded just 99 criminal cases against corporations in 2022, the same number as Donald Trump's DOJ during his second year, and only a modest increase from the 90 cases the agency brought in 2021. As a consequence, the pace of new prosecutions is at its lowest point since the start of the Clinton administration. "The light-touch approach to enforcement creates opportunities for corporate scofflaws to push the limits of what is legally allowed – risking our health and safety, our environment, our finances, and our communities – in their efforts to maximize profits," the report warned. The slow pace of enforcement continues a two-decade decline that started after 2000, when there were three times as many corporate prosecutions as today. The Biden administration has also presided over a decline in deferred prosecution agreements and non-prosecution agreements, which the DOJ can use as an alternative to filing charges for corporate malfeasance. These more lenient agreements typically involve large multinational companies. In 2022, there were just 11. Biden's DOJ has also expanded a policy that allows corporations to self-report misconduct in exchange for the government's guarantee not to prosecute.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption from reliable major media sources.


Law enforcement eyes opioid settlement cash for squad cars and body scanners
2023-10-20, NPR
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2023/10/20/1206326239/law-enforceme...

Policing expenses mount quickly: $18,000 for technology to unlock cellphones in Southington, Conn.; $2,900 for surveillance cameras and to train officers and canines in New Lexington, Ohio. And in other communities around the country, hundreds of thousands for vehicles, body scanners, and other equipment. State and local governments are turning to a new means to pay those bills: opioid settlement cash. This money – totaling more than $50 billion across 18 years – comes from national settlements with more than a dozen companies that made, sold, or distributed opioid painkillers, including Johnson & Johnson, AmerisourceBergen, and Walmart, which were accused of fueling the epidemic that addicted and killed millions. In August, more than 200 researchers and clinicians delivered a call to action to government officials in charge of opioid settlement funds. "More policing is not the answer to the overdose crisis," they wrote. Years of research suggests law enforcement and criminal justice initiatives have exacerbated the problem. "Police activity is actually causing the very harms that police activity is supposed to be stemming," says Jennifer Carroll, an author of that study and an addiction policy researcher. In Louisiana ... 80% of settlement dollars are flowing to parish governments and 20% to sheriffs' departments. Over the lifetime of the settlements, sheriffs' offices in the state will receive more than $65 million – the largest direct allocation to law enforcement nationwide. And they do not have to account for how they spend it.

Note: Explore past news articles we've summarized on opioids, a crisis fueled by US drug companies and captured government agencies. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on police corruption from reliable major media sources.


JPMorgan allegedly processed more than $1bn for Epstein over 16 years
2023-08-31, The Guardian (One of the UK's Leading Newspapers)
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/aug/31/jeffrey-epstein-jpmorgan-1-bi...

JPMorgan Chase told US authorities it processed more than $1bn for Jeffrey Epstein over 16 years. JPMorgan reported the transactions as suspicious to the US treasury department following Epstein's suicide in 2019, Mimi Liu, a lawyer for the territory, said at a hearing concerning its lawsuit against the largest US bank. Epstein had been a JPMorgan client from 1998 to 2013, when the bank dropped him. The disgraced financier had been awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges at the time of his death. The US Virgin Islands, where Epstein owned two private islands, is suing JPMorgan for at least $190m and likely much more, saying it ignored red flags that Epstein was running a sex-trafficking operation because he was a lucrative client. Liu mentioned the $1bn amount, which had not been previously disclosed, in arguing that the US district judge Jed Rakoff in Manhattan should find before the case goes to trial that the bank participated in Epstein's sex trafficking. She said no reasonable juror could find that JPMorgan was in the dark about its jet-setting client. "JPMorgan was a full service bank for Jeffrey Epstein's sex trafficking," Liu said. Felicia Ellsworth, a lawyer for JPMorgan, said it was not appropriate for the judge to determine the question of the bank's knowledge before trial because current and former employees have testified that they were unaware of Epstein's sex trafficking. In June, Rakoff preliminarily approved JPMorgan's $290m settlement with women who say Epstein abused them.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on financial system corruption and Jeffrey Epstein from reliable major media sources.


'Verified human': Worldcoin users queue up for iris scans
2023-07-25, Reuters
https://www.reuters.com/technology/verified-human-worldcoin-users-queue-up-ir...

People around the world are getting their eyeballs scanned in exchange for a digital ID and the promise of free cryptocurrency. The Worldcoin project says it aims to create a new "identity and financial network" and that its digital ID will allow users to, among other things, prove online that they are human, not a bot. The project launched on Monday, with eyeball scans taking place in countries including Britain, Japan and India. At a crypto conference in Tokyo, people on Tuesday queued in front of a gleaming silver globe flanked by placards stating: "Orbs are here." Applicants lined up to have their irises scanned by the device, before waiting for the 25 free Worldcoin tokens the company says verified users can claim. Worldcoin's data-collection is a "potential privacy nightmare," said the Electronic Privacy Information Center. Worldcoin's privacy policy ... says that data may be passed to subcontractors and could be accessed by governments and authorities. UK privacy campaign group Big Brother Watch said there was a risk biometric data could be hacked or exploited. "Digital ID systems increase state and corporate control over individuals' lives and rarely live up to the extraordinary benefits technocrats tend to attribute to them," senior advocacy officer Madeleine Stone said. In a mall in Bengaluru, India, orb-operators approached passers-by on Tuesday and showed them how to sign up. Most interviewed by Reuters said they were not worried about privacy.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on corporate corruption and the disappearance of privacy from reliable major media sources.


The links between pollution and miscarriage: ‘This is the stuff nightmares are made of'
2023-03-28, The Guardian (One of the UK's Leading Newspapers)
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/mar/29/the-links-between-pollution-a...

The world we live in is slowly poisoning every single one of us. And the chemicals doing the most damage are byproducts of the fossil fuel industry, agribusiness and manufacturing. There doesn't seem to be the appetite at a regulatory or governmental level to stop it. In Australia, 50,000 agricultural, industrial and veterinary chemicals are being used; 1,500 are suspected to interfere with endocrine function, which is essential to the healthy working of our reproductive and hormonal systems. Only a very small number have been tested. Microplastics, which can cause inflammation in the body, is being found in our blood streams and also in the placentas of unborn fetuses. Walking down a major intersection during rush hour can expose you to as much particulate matter as a major bushfire event. Even if chemicals are tested, the testing regimen means that chemicals are only being tested in isolation and not in conjunction with others to see how compounds react. Also, they might be tested for carcinogenic effects ... but the test subjects aren't monitored for other ill-effects, such as endocrine disruption. Some effects take place long after the research has concluded. Some of these chemicals can stay in the body forever. Or affect the way our DNA functions. There's even an Australian website (not widely enough publicised) called yourfertility.org.au. It has an entire section on chemicals in our environment and what to avoid, stating that "avoiding these chemicals may increase the chance of having a baby".

Note: The above was written by Isabelle Oderberg, author of Hard to Bear: Investigating the science and silence of miscarriage. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on corporate corruption and health from reliable major media sources.


20 Years After Illegal US Invasion of Iraq, Its Architects Are Still Cashing In
2023-03-19, Truthout
https://truthout.org/articles/20-years-after-illegal-us-invasion-of-iraq-its-...

It had been 15 years since the U.S. invaded Iraq when, on March 19, 2018, the celebrated Iraqi novelist and poet Sinan Antoon published a blistering op-ed in The New York Times. He took readers through his observations of the steady deterioration of Iraqi society since the war began, but the most scathing words came toward the end. "No one knows for certain how many Iraqis have died as a result of the invasion 15 years ago," Antoon wrote. "Some credible estimates put the number at more than one million. You can read that sentence again. The invasion of Iraq is often spoken of in the United States as a ‘blunder,' or even a ‘colossal mistake.' It was a crime. Those who perpetrated it are still at large." That the invasion was not just a moral catastrophe but an egregious war crime has been echoed by everyone from United Nations heads to human rights leaders. With the 20th anniversary of the invasion now approaching, the sanitizing of the war's major culprits – or, at the very least, the soft forgetting of their crimes – continues. As the very top decision-makers faded into retirement, the next layer of war pushers, enablers and overseers – the top defense and national security officials and the celebrity generals – went on to profit immensely following their leadership of an illegal war, darting through the revolving door to snag coveted corporate board seats and prestigious university appointments. Many of them remain in these positions with defense industry giants, tech firms and Wall Street investors today.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on military corruption and war from reliable major media sources.


A world in which your boss spies on your brainwaves? That future is near
2023-02-09, The Guardian (One of the UK's Leading Newspapers)
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/feb/09/boss-spies-brainwaves-d...

The reptilian annual World Economic Forum at Davos, where the masters of the universe meet to congratulate themselves on their benevolent dictatorship, is home to many sinister ideas. This year, one of the creepiest discussions of all was delivered under the guise of progress and productivity. Nita Farahany, a Duke University professor and futurist, gave a presentation at Davos about neurotechnology that is creating "brain transparency." The new technologies, which Farahany says are being deployed in workplaces around the world ... include a variety of wearable sensors that read the brain's electrical impulses and can show how fatigued you are, whether you're focused on the task at hand or if your attention is wandering. According to Farahany, thousands of companies have hooked workers ranging from train drivers to miners up to these devices already, in the name of workplace safety. But what we are really discussing is workplace surveillance. Farahany paints a picture of a near future in which every office worker could be fitted with a small wearable that would constantly record brain activity, creating an omnipotent record of your thoughts, attention and energy that the boss could study at leisure. Farahany acknowledges that there could be drawbacks here: "Done poorly, it could become the most oppressive technology we've ever introduced on a wide scale." All of this raises the question: what exactly is your employer buying when they give you a paycheck? For bosses, the answer is simple: "Everything."

Note: Tune into a fascinating, 17 min. conversation about this issue that raises important questions about the overreliance on technology as a tool of control, under the guise of workplace safety. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on corporate corruption from reliable major media sources.


Sam Bankman-Fried's Lawyers ​Are Veterans of Ghislaine Maxwell and ‘El Chapo' Cases
2023-01-09, Wall Street Journal
https://www.wsj.com/articles/sam-bankman-frieds-defense-team-led-by-battle-te...

A pair of attorneys defending FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried against one of the biggest white-collar prosecutions in decades are veterans of high-profile cases, including ones involving drug lord "El Chapo" and disgraced socialite Ghislaine Maxwell. Mark Cohen and Christian Everdell, former federal prosecutors who are now partners in the New York-based boutique firm Cohen & Gresser ... are up against hard-charging Justice Department lawyers who moved quickly to indict Mr. Bankman-Fried after FTX's collapse and secured two of his former top lieutenants as cooperating witnesses. The Manhattan U.S. attorney's office this past month charged Mr. Bankman-Fried with stealing billions of dollars from FTX customers while misleading investors and lenders connected to his crypto-trading firm Alameda Research. He faces charges of fraud, conspiracy, money laundering and campaign-finance violations and pleaded not guilty last week. Messrs. Cohen, 59 years old, and Everdell, 48, have already navigated their client through a thorny extradition from the Bahamas, where Mr. Bankman-Fried had been jailed after the Justice Department requested that local police arrest him. The two lawyers worked with local counsel to secure his transfer to U.S. custody while negotiating with federal prosecutors his pretrial release under a $250 million bond. They are now tasked with combing through voluminous and technical discovery, including documents relating to FTX investors, debtors and political campaigns.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on financial industry corruption from reliable major media sources.


Facebook Wanted Out of Politics. It Was Messier Than Anyone Expected.
2023-01-05, Wall Street Journal
https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-politics-controls-zuckerberg-meta-11672...

A Journal article in 2021 cited internal [Facebook] research showing that steps to promote engagement had favored inflammatory material, with publishers and political parties reorienting their posts toward outrage and sensationalism. After the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc. said it wanted to scale back how much political content it showed users. [Chief Executive Mark] Zuckerberg and [Meta's] board chose the most drastic, instructing the company to demote posts on "sensitive" topics as much as possible ... an initiative that hasn't previously been reported. Depending on the mix of suppression features deployed, projected Facebook traffic to Fox News, MSNBC, the New York Times, Newsmax, the Atlantic and The Wall Street Journal would initially fall by as much as 40% to 60% beyond the already enacted reductions. Suppressing civic content didn't appear likely to convince users that Facebook wasn't politically toxic. According to internal research, the percentage of users who said they thought Facebook had a negative effect on politics didn't budge with the changes, staying consistently around 60% in the U.S. Ravi Iyer, a former Meta data-science manager ... said there should be more focus on the way platforms allow certain content to go viral, rather than subjective decisions about what to leave up or take down. “Having employees judge good vs. bad speech often creates more problems than it solves,” he said. “Our goal should be fewer judgment calls.”

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on corporate corruption and media manipulation from reliable sources.


Elon Musk, Matt Taibbi, and a Very Modern Media Maelstrom
2022-12-04, New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/04/business/media/elon-musk-twitter-matt-taib...

The so-called Twitter Files, released ... by the independent journalist Matt Taibbi, set off a firestorm among pundits, media ethicists and lawmakers in both parties. It also offered a window into the fractured modern landscape of news, where a story's reception is often shaped by readers' assumptions about the motivations of both reporters and subjects. Mr. Musk teased the release of internal documents that he said would reveal the story behind Twitter's 2020 decision to restrict posts linking to a report in the New York Post about Joseph R. Biden Jr.'s son, Hunter. Mr. Musk, who has accused tech companies of censorship ... pointed readers to the account of Mr. Taibbi, an iconoclast journalist. Published in the form of a lengthy Twitter thread, Mr. Taibbi's report included images of email exchanges among Twitter officials deliberating how to handle dissemination of the Post story on their platform. Skeptics of Mr. Taibbi seized on what appeared to be an orchestrated disclosure. "Imagine volunteering to do online PR work for the world's richest man on a Friday night, in service of nakedly and cynically right-wing narratives, and then pretending you're speaking truth to power," the MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan wrote in a Twitter post. Mr. Taibbi clapped back on Saturday, writing: "Looking forward to going through all the tweets complaining about ‘PR for the richest man on earth,' and seeing how many of them have run stories for anonymous sources at the FBI, CIA, the Pentagon, White House, etc."

Note: Matt Taibbi is one of the few journalists who reports it as he sees it and is willing to look far beneath the surface. We subscribe to his excellent reports as one very useful source of unraveling the jumble of news that comes our way. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on media manipulation from reliable sources.


Major funds exposed to companies allegedly engaged in Uyghur repression in China
2022-11-23, The Guardian (One of the UK's Leading Newspapers)
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/23/major-pension-funds-exposed-com...

Many of the world's largest asset managers and state pension funds are passively investing in companies that have allegedly engaged in the repression of Uyghur Muslims in China, according to a new report. The report, by UK-based group Hong Kong Watch and the Helena Kennedy Centre for International Justice at Sheffield Hallam University, found that three major stock indexes provided by MSCI include at least 13 companies that have allegedly used forced labour or been involved in the construction of the surveillance state in China's Xinjiang region. In recent years, China has come under increased scrutiny over what the UN has called "serious human rights violations" against Uyghur Muslims in the region, including systemic discrimination, mass arbitrary detention, torture, and sexual and gender-based violence. The report includes a list of major asset managers, including BlackRock, HSBC and Deutsche Bank among others, exposed to index funds that include companies accused of engaging in labour transfers and the construction of repressive infrastructure in the region. It found public pension funds across the UK, Canada and the US and funds in New Zealand and Japan exposed by the investments. "So many people's pensions, retirement funds and savings are invested passively because, as average consumers, we don't have time to investigate each and every investment," said Laura Murphy, one of the report's authors and professor of human rights and contemporary slavery at Sheffield Hallam University.

Note: Read an eye-opening article about the shocking human rights violations happening to the Uyghur people under the auspices of the Chinese government. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on financial system corruption from reliable major media sources.


For Sex Traffickers, Jack Dorsey's Cash App Is ‘King'
2022-11-03, Forbes
https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2022/11/03/cash-app-block-sex-tra...

Earlier this year, Kik Messenger user "heyyyydude1" was selling a stash of videos he'd amassed of child sexual abuse. One customer, who said he was a 35-year-old father of two, offered to buy 200 videos for $45. "How do I pay?" he asked. "Cash App," heyyyydude1 responded, sending over his payment details and a code for a Cash App referral fee. With each transaction, and many more disturbing videos sent, the seller was unknowingly providing a pile of evidence to an undercover agent with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement's child exploitation unit. Current and former police, as well as nonprofits working directly with cops to fight child exploitation, say that such crimes are often happening via Cash App, which brings in billions in gross profit every year for Block, Inc., the Jack Dorsey-run payments giant formerly known as Square. They say that whether it's to pay for sex with a minor, to send children funds in return for nude images or to traffic a young adult victim, Cash App is often the payment tool of choice. Though it recently launched a Cash App for Teens feature, the company is conspicuously absent from collaborative efforts to fight abuse, failing to provide any tips to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), America's national clearing house for sexual abuse material found on tech platforms. Hundreds of pages of court filings describe cases where law enforcement said Cash App was used to either pay for sexualized images or sex with minors and adults.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on corporate corruption and sexual abuse scandals from reliable major media sources.


US firms exploiting Trump-era loophole over toxic ‘forever chemicals'
2022-10-12, The Guardian (One of the UK's Leading Newspapers)
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/oct/12/pfas-toxic-forever-chemic...

Chemical companies are dodging a federal law designed to track how many PFAS "forever chemicals" their plants are discharging into the environment by exploiting a loophole created in the Trump administration's final months, a new analysis of federal records has found. The Fiscal Year 2020 National Defense Authorization Act put in place requirements that companies discharging over 100lb annually of the dangerous chemicals report the releases to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). But during the implementation process, Trump's EPA created an unusual loophole that at least five chemical companies have exploited. PFAS ... accumulate in humans and the environment. A growing body of evidence links them to serious health problems like cancer, birth defects, liver disease and autoimmune disorders. The Trump EPA gave PFAS an unusual exemption under the law that allows companies not to report discharges if the amounts are ... less than 1% of a total mixture. Companies discharging thousands of pounds of PFAS could have gotten their releases under the 1% threshold via several routes. Companies may have added water to PFAS to dilute it to the point that it is below 1%. However, the total amount of PFAS released is still high, and may present a threat once in the environment. Companies may also be using complex mixtures with multiple PFAS. If the companies keep any one PFAS compound below the 1% threshold, then they won't have to report it.

Note: Read more about the risks and dangers of these 'forever chemicals.' For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption from reliable major media sources.


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