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Facebook Releases May 2020 Community Standards Enforcement Report

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Facebook has published the fifth edition of its Community Standards Enforcement Report, providing metrics on how well it enforced its policies from October 2019 through March 2020.

Announcing the report in a Facebook Newsroom post, Guy Rosen, Vice President, Integrity said the company has in the last few years built tools, teams and technologies to help protect elections from interference, prevent misinformation from spreading on its apps and keep people safe from harmful content.

“So when the COVID-19 crisis emerged, we had the tools and processes in place to move quickly and we were able to continue finding and removing content that violates our policies.

“When we temporarily sent our content reviewers home due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we increased our reliance on these automated systems and prioritized high-severity content for our teams to review in order to continue to keep our apps safe during this time,” he said.

The report, he said, includes data only through March 2020, so it does not reflect the full impact of the changes the company made during the pandemic.

“We anticipate we’ll see the impact of those changes in our next report, and possibly beyond, and we will be transparent about them.

“For example, for the past seven weeks we couldn’t always offer the option to appeal content decisions and account removals, so we expect the number of appeals to be much lower in our next report.

“We also prioritized removing harmful content over measuring our efforts, so we may not be able to calculate the prevalence of violating content during this time. Today’s report shows the impact of advancements we’ve made in the technology we use to proactively find and remove violating content,” Rosen said.

For the first time, the report includes metrics across 12 policies on Facebook and metrics across 10 policies on Instagram. The report introduces Instagram data in four issue areas, namely: Hate Speech, Adult Nudity and Sexual Activity, Violent and Graphic Content, and Bullying and Harassment.

Also for the first time, the report shared data on the number of appeals people make on content the company took action against on Instagram, and the number of decisions overturned either based on those appeals or when it identifies the issue on its own. The report also contains data on Facebook’s efforts to combat organized hate on Facebook and Instagram.

Highlights the progress the company has made so far in finding and removing violating content, Rosen said Facebook has improved its technology that proactively finds violating content, which helped in the removal of more violating content so fewer people saw it.

Said Rosen: “On Facebook, we continued to expand our proactive detection technology for hate speech to more languages, and improved our existing detection systems.

“Our proactive detection rate for hate speech increased by more than 8 points over the past two quarters totalling almost a 20-point increase in just one year.

“As a result, we are able to find more content and can now detect almost 90% of the content we remove before anyone reports it to us. In addition, thanks to other improvements we made to our detection technology, we doubled the amount of drug content we removed in Q4 2019, removing 8.8 million pieces of content.

“On Instagram, we made improvements to our text and image matching technology to help us find more suicide and self-injury content. As a result, we increased the amount of content we took action on by 40% and increased our proactive detection rate by more than 12 points since the last report.

“We also made progress in our work combating online bullying by introducing several new features to help people manage their experience and limit unwanted interactions, and we announced new Instagram controls today. We are sharing enforcement data for bullying on Instagram for the first time in this report, including taking action on 1.5 million pieces of content in both Q4 2019 and Q1 2020.”

Lastly, improvements to Facebook’s technology for finding and removing content similar to existing violations in our databases helped the company take down more child nudity and sexual exploitative content on Facebook and Instagram, Rosen disclosed.

Over the last six months, he said, Facebook has started to use technology more to prioritize content for its teams to review based on factors like virality and severity among others.

Going forward, it plans to leverage technology to also take action on content, including removing more posts automatically. This will enable our content reviewers to focus their time on other types of content where more nuance and context are needed to make a decision.

The Community Standards Enforcement Report is published in conjunction with Facebook’s bi-annual Transparency Report that shares numbers on government requests for user data, content restrictions based on local law, intellectual property take-downs and internet disruptions.

“In the future we’ll share Community Standards Enforcement Reports quarterly, so our next report will be released in August,” he said.


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E-Business

OADC Lagos Reinforces Commitment to Local Data Hosting and Digital Transformation @ NDPC’s National Privacy Week Summit

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Open Access Data Centres (OADC) Lagos has reaffirmed its commitment to Nigeria’s data protection and digital transformation agenda through its sponsorship and active participation in the Nigeria Data Protection Commission’s (NDPC) National Privacy Week Summit.

The National Privacy Week Summit, organised by the NDPC, convened policymakers, regulators, technology providers, and industry stakeholders to promote data privacy awareness, strengthen compliance with the Nigeria Data Protection Act (NDPA), and advance conversations around data security, sovereignty, and responsible data governance.

As a sponsor of the event, OADC Lagos demonstrated its continued support for the Federal Government’s drive toward local data hosting and data domiciliation, which are increasingly critical to safeguarding sensitive information, enhancing regulatory compliance, and building trust in Nigeria’s digital economy.

Through its carrier-neutral, Tier III Design certified data centre in Lekki, Lagos, OADC provides secure, resilient, and compliant infrastructure that enables government institutions and private sector organisations to host and manage data locally while meeting international best practices.

Commenting on the engagement, Adesola Adesugba, Country Marketing Manager, Open Access Data Centres Nigeria, said: “We are proud to have supported the Nigeria Data Protection Commission through the National Privacy Week Summit and to stand alongside the government in advancing Nigeria’s digital transformation objectives.

“Strengthening local data hosting and domiciliation is fundamental to national data sovereignty, improved security, and sustainable digital growth, and OADC Lagos remains committed to enabling this future.”

OADC’s participation at National Privacy Week Summit underscores its role as a trusted digital infrastructure partner to government and enterprise, supporting secure cloud connectivity, regulatory compliance, and the long-term development of Nigeria’s digital ecosystem.

Open Access Data Centres is part of the WIOCC Group and operates open-access, world-class data centres across Africa, serving cloud providers, network operators, enterprises, and public sector institutions.


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Kaspersky Launches OT Calculator to Align Cybersecurity Investments with Business Goals

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Kaspersky’s new online tool has been specially developed for industrial organisations to assess the potential costs associated with insufficient operational technology (OT) security.

By offering detailed financial forecasts, the calculator empowers senior management to make well-informed decisions regarding security investments.

Industrial organisations increasingly depend on interconnected systems, elevating cybersecurity to a critical factor in business resilience and profitability.

According to VDC Research, over 60% of industrial companies last year reported that cybersecurity breaches had led to significant costs. Despite this, a persistent disconnect remains between security teams and executive leadership as security professionals focus on minimising risk, while executives must balance cybersecurity concerns with broader business objectives. This misalignment often results in competing priorities and underfunded security initiatives.

To bridge this gap, Kaspersky has launched the OT Cybersecurity Savings Calculator, an innovative online tool designed specifically for industrial organisations to assess the potential costs of inadequate operational technology (OT) security¹.

The primary aim of this tool is to translate cyber risks into tangible financial metrics and support strategic discussions around priorities and budget allocation. By entering details such as their sector, sub-sector, region, company size, breach history, and existing cybersecurity measures, organisations can estimate their potential cost savings and receive customised, actionable recommendations.

The calculator benchmarks performance against industry peers and highlights the company’s position within the current threat landscape.

“We believe this calculator is a powerful resource for transforming complex cyber risk data into straightforward financial insights. It enables OT leaders, security professionals, and executive teams to develop clear, data-driven business cases and recognise the value of cybersecurity investments. With actionable guidance, it promotes a comprehensive approach to resource management and strengthens overall organisational resilience,” comments Andrey Strelkov, Head of Industrial Cybersecurity Product line at Kaspersky.


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Local App Developers Rake $1m in Sales in 2025- NOTAP

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National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP) has said Nigerian software developers have reached significant milestones with locally made applications generating over one million Dollar in sales across domestic and regional markets.

Local App Developers Rake $1m in Sales in 2025- NOTAP

Dr Obiageli Amadiobi, director-general of NOTAP, said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), on Thursday in Abuja.

Amadiobi said the development signified the growing strength of Nigeria’s digital innovation ecosystem and how local innovation powers digital growth.

She said it was also a direct outcome of targeted support initiatives led by NOTAP.

She added that the initiative helped to build capacity, protect intellectual property, and connect developers to market opportunities.

According to the NOTAP boss, the journey from concept to impact started with understanding and securing intellectual property (IP) rights, a step many local innovators missed.

“Whether it’s a literary work, a laboratory invention, or a creative digital product, the process of bringing an idea to life demands immense time, skill, and dedication.

“An innovator might wake up with a solution to a pressing problem; spend months testing and refining it and achieve remarkable results; so it is their fundamental right to patent that creation and claim ownership.

“Without this protection, someone else could easily replicate their work; patent it in their name; and legally control what was built with Nigerian brainpower,” she said.

Amadiobi said that the challenge was compounded by widespread digital piracy and counterfeiting, which hit the ICT sector hardest.

“From copied software applications to replicated content on social platforms like TikTok, unauthorised duplication has become a major barrier to growth.

“We see talented young creators develop unique digital content or tools, only to watch others rebrand and profit from their work within weeks,” she said.

The DG noted that most popular online personalities with distinctive styles often don’t realise they could protect their original contributions through IP registration.

She said that to address these gaps and unlock the value of Nigerian innovation, NOTAP implemented a multi-pronged strategy,- a cornerstone initiative – which is the Local Vendor Policy.

“The Local Vendor Policy mandates that foreign technology firms entering Nigeria partner with domestic counterparts,’’ she said.

Amadiobi said that among the performing apps are solutions addressing critical local challenges such as a mobile health platform that now serves 750,000 users across six states.

“There is also the agricultural marketplace connecting smallholder farmers to buyers; and an educational tool that has been adopted by 200 schools to improve learning outcomes,” she said.

She added that the apps were developed by teams that gained skills and resources through NOTAP’s Local Vendor Policy.

According to her, the policy requires foreign technology firms operating in Nigeria to allocate a portion of their technical service fees to local partners.

“Three years ago, many of these developers were only providing support services to foreign companies.

“But today, they are building their own products that compete globally. 60 per cent of last year’s sales came from other African countries, showing our developers can lead on the continent,” she said.

The D-G explained that the one million dollar figure represented sales from over 50 locally developed apps, with individual developers earning between 5,000 dollars and 80,000 dollars from their products.

“Looking ahead, NOTAP aims to double these sales figures by 2027, with plans to expand support to developers focusing on fintech, renewable energy management, and climate adaptation tools.

“These are the sectors identified as high-growth opportunities for Nigerian innovation,’’ Amadiobi said


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