The Morning Wire: Fallout Of Afghanistan Troop Withdrawal, Apple’s New Privacy Concerns, The Return To In-Person Schooling
It’s Monday, August 9th, and this is your Morning Wire. Listen to the full podcast here.
1) Fallout Of Afghanistan Troop Withdrawal
The Topline: As Western forces continue their withdrawal from Afghanistan, the situation has devolved rapidly, with the Taliban quickly seizing control of large portions of the war torn country.
Deborah Haynes, foreign affairs editor at Sky News, joined Morning Wire to discuss the situation.
The Latest
According to Haynes, experts continue to hope that Afghan government forces will be able to stand their ground.
She said warlords are coming together in an attempt to push back against the Taliban, but the momentum seems to be with the radical militants.
Joe Raedle/Getty Images
Can The Afghan Military Hold Back The Taliban?
Haynes said there hasn’t been a complete collapse within the country. There’s fighting around key cities like Kandahar in the south and the capital, Kabul, is still under government control.
The U.S. military has ramped up its airstrikes, but following the withdrawal of the vast majority of troops on the ground, their ability to support the Afghans is significantly diminished.
Haynes said that the Afghans’ success depends on whether they have the ability and supplies to continue.
Countries Offering Refuge To Interpreters
According to Haynes, the British government — and other Western allies — have become increasingly generous in terms of offering refuge to former staff, including interpreters who are now under threat.
CHRISTOF STACHE/AFP via Getty Images
2) Apple’s New Policy Raises Privacy Concerns
The Topline: Apple has announced plans to scan photos on user cell phones for child pornography and other illicit content. While some activists are celebrating the move, others are expressing concern regarding user privacy.
The Details
Apple’s system, known as “Neural Hash,” would scan all images on a person’s iPhone before they’re uploaded to iCloud.
If the program finds a possible match with existing elicit photos in a database, the image will be reviewed manually. If the match is confirmed, the user’s Apple account will be disabled and law enforcement — via the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children — will be notified.
Apple will also scan users’ text messages and warn parents if their children — who are 13 years old or less — send or view images containing sexually explicit content.
The program is set to roll out later this year.
What Is “Hashing”?
Hashing is a mathematical fingerprint of an image, so a “match” would be an image whose fingerprint is either identical or similar enough to another image — in this case images containing child porn.
The program will reportedly only match images which are already stored in the center’s database.
A match would theoretically only be flagged if the image was already known to be child pornography. Family photos at the beach, for example, wouldn’t be flagged, according to Apple.
Supporters Of The Decision
Some advocates are celebrating the move. They describe the system as an excellent tool against the dissemination of these images online. They add that Apple already scans images in some capacity after they are stored on iCloud.
Privacy Concerns
Will Cathcart, the head of WhatsApp, said that while child sexual abuse material and abusers who share it are repugnant, he thinks that Apple is taking the wrong approach.
Cathcart said that Apple should focus on making it easy for people to report content that’s shared with them, that scanning all private photos on your phone is “not privacy,” and this is “not how technology built in free countries works.”
Other Fallout
Apple has worked closely with the Chinese government in the past, and some have raised concerns that the communist state could demand that Apple scan for other files, such as evidence of political dissent.
Maja Hitij/Getty Images
3) Schools Open For First Time Since COVID
The Topline: This month, schools around America will open up their doors for a new school year. While some students will return to a traditional pre-pandemic experience, others will still be required to wear masks and social distance.
Back To School
Even though mask mandates have been mostly scaled back across the country, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is still urging schools to require masks for all students and faculty, regardless of vaccination status.
Washington, California and Illinois have issued statewide mask mandates for all public school students and staff, and increased social distancing measures in the classroom. Other states have stepped up their efforts to get young people vaccinated, following a push from the White House to increase the number of 12-18 year olds getting the shot.
Pushing Back On Mask Mandates In Schools
Governors in Arizona, Texas, and Florida have taken steps to ban school districts from requiring masks.
In Florida, Governor Ron DeSantis (R) issued an executive order banning mask requirements in schools and threatening to withdraw funding from school districts that defied the order. The State Board of Education is even offering vouchers to parents who feel their children are the victims of “COVID-19 Harassment.” This would allow parents to transfer their children to a private school or other district.
The Pushback
In Florida, two lawsuits have been filed against DeSantis. They allege that the order is unconstitutional because, in their words, the state promises a safe schooling environment. In addition, at least four school districts have defied the order and implemented mandates of their own. In Arkansas, a state judge has placed a hold on an order banning schools from mandating masks.
Impact Of Closure On Kids
Experts from across the political spectrum have agreed that remote learning for students has been a massive failure.
In Newark, New Jersey, only 11% of second to eighth graders met the state’s minimum reading standards with only 9% meeting the math standards — almost a 400% decrease in the number of students passing standardized tests since shutdowns began.
In Baltimore, 41% of high schoolers earned below a 1.0 GPA during the shutdown. In Tennessee, only 29% of K-12 students are at grade level for reading, and just 25% are there in math.
Other Stories We’re Tracking
Wrapping Up The Olympics: The Tokyo Olympics came to a close on Sunday, and the United States took home the most medals of any country — winning 113 — and edging out China with the most gold medals. On the final day of competition, the U.S. women’s basketball and volleyball teams won gold, as well as women’s track cyclist Jennifer Valente.
Clive Rose/Getty Images
Obama’s Birthday Party Causes A Stir: Former President Obama’s planned birthday bash was originally set to include more than 400 guests and 200 staff, but a spokeswoman said Wednesday that Obama had decided to “significantly scale back the event” to include only “family and close friends.” However, photos and video of the party posted, then deleted, on social media showed a large number of attendees. Among the celebrities reportedly at the event were Alicia Keys, John Legend and Chrissy Teigen.
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