Monthly Archives: January 2020

Facebook appears to be backing away from plans to sell ads that would run in WhatsApp, a messaging service that's popular throughout Europe.

The Wall Street Journal claimed the team behind the effort has been broken up in recent months, and all their work so far has been effectively deleted from WhatsApps code". However, Facebook still wants to bring ads into WhatsApps Status feature as part of a goal to monetise the app.

We've known for months now thatFacebook-owned WhatsApp wouldsoon followits chat and social app peers in offering ads. The company confirmed in 2018 they would appear in the Status feature (which is like Facebook or Instagrams Stories), but it didn't reveal when they would start. Then, last May, Facebook quietly announced ads would arrive by 2020.

But it looks like WhatsApp will now remain ad-free. There's no word on when plans to integrate ads will resume. We're hoping for a comment.

Facebook acquired the service for $22 billion in 2014. Since then, WhatsApp's co-founders, Jan Koum and Brian Acton, have both left the company. Acton even criticised Facebook's handling of the app, user privacy, and its targeted advertising policies. Koum and Acton were reportedly worried about Facebook watering down WhatsApp's end-to-end encryption, too.

Nevertheless, Facebook is plowing ahead, doing what it wants with WhatsApp. Most recently, CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed Facebook wants to merge Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram messaging. Perhaps that dream is interfering with WhatsApp's rollout of ads? Or maybe it found it difficult to maintain encryption while also delivering ads? It's too early to say.

For more about WhatsApp, including the top tips and tricks, see our guide.

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Is Facebook having second thoughts about putting ads in WhatsApp? - Pocket-lint

Spending in early nominating states Share of each candidates total Facebook ad spending in the 90 days ending Jan. 11. Charts are ordered by share spent in Iowa.

Note: The nine Democratic candidates who spent the most on Facebook ads are shown. | Sources: Acronym, Facebook

With just over two weeks left until the Iowa caucuses, Facebook ad data offers a lens into the primary strategies of the Democratic presidential candidates.

Since October, Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Ind. who has built his campaign around a potential victory in Iowa has spent about a fifth of his overall Facebook budget in the state. Andrew Yang, a political newcomer, has spent more than 85 percent of his Facebook budget in Iowa and New Hampshire, a clear sign of how critical strong performances in those states are for him to be taken seriously in the elections and caucuses that follow.

While the three leading Democrats former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts spent a significant share of their Facebook budget in early states, they are taking a more national approach on Facebook than they are on other paid mediums, like television, in part to attract small dollar donors in a broader universe.

Mr. Yangs campaign highlighted an article about him by The Gazette, a newspaper in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

Mr. Buttigiegs campaign ran ads like this one encouraging people to turn out for the Iowa caucuses.

Source: Facebook

Over the past 90 days, the Democratic field has spent more than $31 million on Facebook ads, $6.4 million of that on ads in the first four states: Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina. In that time, President Trump has spent about $7.5 million on Facebook ads, though a lot of his efforts are also focused on combating the impeachment narrative.

Though digital campaigning has been a part of presidential politics since 2008, it has taken on an especially central role in nearly every campaign in 2020. Last year, Mr. Trump and the top four Democrats spent more on digital advertising than on television advertising, according to data from Acronym, a progressive nonprofit group, and Advertising Analytics, an ad tracking firm.

With the ability to target voters in a much more sophisticated way, generating direct responses or donations, Facebook has become the go-to platform for digital messaging.

The ability to see exactly where campaigns are spending their money online, and with what messages theyre driving to which voters, gives us an unprecedented window into a campaign strategy, said Tara McGowan, the founder of Acronym, which provided the Facebook ad data. We can see exactly what voters campaigns are prioritizing and where they see their path to victory.

While its likely that voters reached in a given state were geographically targeted by a political campaign, it is also possible that they overlapped with other target audiences in the same area. For example, if a campaign ran an ad to a custom list of its most dedicated supporters, and some of those people lived in Iowa, it could look as if Iowans were specifically targeted, when in fact the ad was meant for a different audience.

Tom Steyers campaign ran ads encouraging voters to make $1 donations to his campaign.Source: Facebook

The Facebook data also shows how a candidate was able to break through debate qualification thresholds set by the Democratic National Committee. Tom Steyer, the self-funding billionaire with no political experience, has been ubiquitous on the early state airwaves, spending more than $51 million on television, which has helped him climb up the national and early state polling ladder, one of the debate criteria.

But the debate qualifications also require a significant amount of individual small-dollar donors, which a television ad cant provide. So Mr. Steyer has blanketed Facebook with ads asking people to donate to his campaign, spending more than $10 million nationally since October. That effort appears to have paid off he has qualified for the past four debates.

Similarly, Mr. Yang, who has spent on Facebook ads extensively in the first two states, had strong showings in early-state polling, earning him a spot even on the winnowed debate stage in December.

Perhaps even more important than the first four states are the 14 states with primaries on March 3 Super Tuesday.

Note: The nine Democratic candidates who spent the most on Facebook ads are shown. | Sources: Acronym, Facebook

The Democratic candidates have spent nearly $12 million in those states, and six of them have spent at least 10 percent of their total Facebook ad budget in California the biggest Super Tuesday prize.

Among them, Michael R. Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor who is self-funding his campaign, has poured more than half of his Facebook ad budget into Super Tuesday states, while barely spending anything in the first four states. He spent 17 percent in California alone.

His unorthodox campaign strategy is to skip the first four states and try to make a major splash in the Super Tuesday delegate scramble. The decision was made in part because he began his campaign much later than other candidates, and a target of Super Tuesday seemed more in reach, especially with his vast resources, rather than competing with established ground games in Iowa and New Hampshire.

Mr. Sanders has also had an outsize focus on California, spending 16 percent of his recent Facebook advertising on the state.

His Facebook strategy mirrors the rest of his campaign apparatus in California. He also has 80 staff members in the state among the most of any candidate as of last month and has held the most public events there.

This, Ms. McGowan notes, could be in part because California is home to a wide array of liberal activists and donors, and is among the most fertile grounds for campaigns like Mr. Sanderss to build out lists and donor bases. That is often why campaigns advertise aggressively in California and New York, two very liberal states with huge populations.

While running TV ads in large cities like Los Angeles is almost prohibitively expensive if a candidate is simultaneously running a ground game in Iowa, Facebook offers a relatively low-cost alternative to begin to look beyond the early states.

If you have to buy TV in a place like Los Angeles, youre committing to a really expensive move, and its less targeted because its such a huge, diverse city, said Kenneth Pennington, a founder of Middle Seat, a Democratic digital strategy group and the former digital director for Mr. Sanderss 2016 campaign. On Facebook, youre hitting people that you know are in your persuasion or Get Out the Vote audience, and youre not having to pay for it being a big city.

Throughout any campaign, Facebook ads allow campaigns to react much more quickly than they could on television, radio or direct mail.

Sources: Acronym, Facebook

Take again Mr. Sanders, and his effort in Nevada. In most polls, Mr. Sanders leads the field in appeal with Hispanic voters. Back in November, when he was trailing Mr. Buttigieg and Mr. Biden in Iowa polling, his campaign began spending more in Nevada, up to $19,000 per week in the two weeks before Thanksgiving. The ads were focused mostly on his Medicare for all plan, and included ads in Spanish.

Similarly, Mr. Steyer has focused increasingly on South Carolina as a state where he could make a surprisingly strong stand. At the beginning of December, Mr. Steyers Facebook ads made up a quarter of all political ads running in the state, but other candidates still had a noticeable presence, including Ms. Warren with 12 percent.

Midway through the month, Mr. Steyer more than tripled his Facebook ad spending, and by early January was spending $177,000 per week, or 80 percent of the overall money spent on Facebook in South Carolina. The television airwaves were similarly clogged by Mr. Steyer in South Carolina. A recent Fox News poll put Mr. Steyer at 15 percent in the state, a surprising result to some Democrats and good enough for second behind Mr. Biden.

This election is the sea change thats making digital the core component of a modern campaign, Ms. McGowan said. Campaigns now recognize the real power of digital advertising to not only grow their email lists and their support bases, but also their ability to drive event attendance and volunteer recruitment and really driving narrative in a competitive primary.

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Facebook Political Ads: Which States Are 2020 Democrats Betting On? - The New York Times

Image: Facebook

Facebook launched a new feature this week that will notify users whenever they (or somebody else) logs into a third-party app or website using their Facebook account.

This new Facebook feature is called Facebook Notifications and was added to Facebook Login.

Facebook Login is a system through which users can use their Facebook account to log into third-party apps and websites, instead of creating a new account on that service.

Starting this week, Facebook users will get a notification in their Facebook app, on the Facebook website, and via email whenever they log into a third-party app or website via the Facebook Login feature.

The notification is meant to help users detect unauthorized access or use of their credentials, but will also help educate users about the data they're sharing with these apps.

Facebook says it specifically designed these notifications to also list the type of data a third-party app or website is harvesting from the user's Facebook account.

The idea is to allow users to understand what data is shared, limit a third-party app's access to some of their data, or stop using that app entirely.

"The design and content of the Login Notifications remind users that they have full control over the information they share with 3rd party apps, with a clear path to edit those settings," said Puxuan Qi, a Software Engineer at Facebook.

To help users take immediate action against any abuse, Facebook has added an Edit button in these notifications that will let users revoke any app/website's permission to access their data.

The feature is already live and Qi said Facebook will continue to improve it throughout the year.

This new feature is just the latest improvement Facebook is rolling out to its service following a series of privacy scandals over the past three years. Many of those incidents have been caused by third-party apps that mass-collected data on Facebook accounts and then abused the data for political campaigns, accidentally leaked it online, and mismanaged it, in general.

One way through which Facebook has fought back against misbehaving third-party apps has been by expanding its bug bounty program and allowing security researchers to hunt down misbehaving apps.

The login notifications feature rolled out this week is just another measure that passively reminds users about the data some of these apps are currently having access to.

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Facebook to notify users of third-party app logins - ZDNet

Last summer, a video of Mark Zuckerberg circulated on Instagram in which the Facebook CEO appeared to claim he had total control of billions of peoples stolen data, all their secrets, their lives, their futures. It turned out to be an art project rather than a deliberate attempt at misinformation, but Facebook allowed it to stay on the platform. According to the company, it didnt violate any of its policies.

For some, this showed how big tech companies arent prepared to deal with the onslaught of AI-generated fake media known as deepfakes. But it isnt necessarily Facebooks fault. Deepfakes are incredibly hard to moderate, not because theyre difficult to spot (though they can be), but because the category is so broad that any attempt to clamp down on AI-edited photos and videos would end up affecting a whole swath of harmless content.

Banning deepfakes altogether would mean removing popular jokes like gender-swapped Snapchat selfies and artificially aged faces. Banning politically misleading deepfakes just leads back to the same political moderation problems tech companies have faced for years. And given theres no simple algorithm that can automatically spot AI-edited content, whatever ban they do enact would mean creating even more work for beleaguered human moderators. For companies like Facebook, theres just no easy option.

If you take deepfake to mean any video or image thats edited by machine learning then it applies to such a huge category of thing that its unclear if it means anything at all, Tim Hwang, former director of the Harvard-MIT Ethics and Governance of AI Initiative, tells The Verge. If I had my druthers, which Im not sure if I do, I would say that the way we should think about deepfakes is as a matter of intent. What are you trying to accomplish at the sort of media that youre creating?

Notably, this seems to be the direction that big platforms are actually taking. Facebook and Reddit both announced moderation policies that covered deepfakes last week, and rather than trying to stamp out the format altogether, they took a narrower focus.

Facebook said it will remove manipulated misleading media which has been edited or synthesized using AI or machine learning in ways that arent apparent to an average person and would likely mislead someone into thinking that a subject of the video said words that they did not actually say. But the company noted that this does not cover parody or satire or misleading edits made using traditional means, like last years viral video of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi supposedly slurring her words.

Reddit, meanwhile, didnt mention AI at all, but instead said it will remove media that impersonates individuals or entities in a misleading or deceptive manner. Its also created an exemption for satire and parody, and added that it will always take into account the context of any particular content a broad caveat that gives its mods a lot of leeway.

As many have pointed out, these policies are full of loopholes. Writing at OneZero, Will Oremus notes that Facebooks only covers edited media which includes speech, for example. This means that a deepfake video that makes it look like a politician burned the

American flag, participated in a white nationalist rally, or shook hands with a terrorist would not be prohibited something Facebook confirmed to Oremus.

These are glaring omissions, but they highlight the difficulty separating deepfakes from the underlying problems of platform moderation. Although many reports in recent years have treated deepfake as synonymous with political misinformation, the actual definition is far more broad. And the problem will only get worse in 2020.

While earlier versions of deepfake software took some patience and technical skill to use, the next generation will make creating deepfakes as easy as posting. Apps that use AI to edit video (the standard definition of a deepfake) will become commonplace, and as they spread used for in-jokes, brand tweets, bullying, harassment, and everything in between the idea of the deepfake as a unique threat to truth online will fade away.

Just this week, an app named Doublicat launched on iOS and Android that uses machine learning to paste users faces onto popular reaction GIFs. Right now it only works with preselected GIFs, but the companys CEO told The Verge itll allow users to insert faces into any content they like in future, powered by a type of machine learning method known as a GAN.

Does all this make Doublicat a deepfake app? Yep. And will it undermine democracy? Probably not.

Just look at the quality of its output, as demonstrated by the GIF below, which shows my face pasted onto Chris Pratts in Parks and Recreation. Technologically, its impressive. The app made the GIF in a few seconds from just a single photo. But its never going to be mistaken for the real thing. Meanwhile, the creator of TikTok, ByteDance, has been experimenting with deepfake features (though it says they wont be incorporated into its wildly popular app) and Snapchat recently introduced its own face-swapping tools.

Hwang argues that the dilution of the term deepfakes could actually have benefits in the long run. I think the great irony of people saying that all of these consumer features are also deepfakes, is that it in some ways commoditizes what deepfake means, says Hwang. If deepfakes become commonplace and unremarkable, then people will get comfortable with the notion of what this technology can do, he says. Then, hopefully, we can understand it better and focus on the underlying problems of misinformation and political propaganda.

Its possible to argue that the problem of moderating deepfakes on social media has been mostly a distraction from the start. AI-edited political propaganda has failed to materialize in a meaningful way, and studies show that the vast majority of deepfakes are nonconsensual porn (making up 96 percent of online deepfake videos).

Social media platforms have happily engaged in the debate over deepfake moderation, but as Facebook and Reddits recent announcements show, these efforts are mostly a sideshow. The core issues have not changed: who gets to lie on the internet, and who decides if theyre lying? Once deepfakes cease to be believable as an existential threat to truth, well be left with the same, unchanging questions, more pressing than ever before.

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Facebooks problems moderating deepfakes will only get worse in 2020 - The Verge

The man killed in the Blaine Target parking lot Wednesday was run over while trying to get back items that were stolen from his St. Paul auto repair shop and being sold on Facebook Marketplace, according to charges filed Friday against the alleged hit-and-run driver.

Pierre Jerel Anderson, 30, of St. Paul, was charged in Anoka County District Court with second-degree murder (while committing a felony) and accused of running over Kenneth Alan Niesen, 58, of Brooklyn Park.Anderson was being held at Anoka County jail on Friday in lieu of $500,000 bail.

On Wednesday morning, Niesen discovered that someone had broken into Bonded Transmission Specialists, a University Avenue family business that his father, Walt, started in 1983.

Niesen reported the burglary to St. Paul police, telling an officer that the burglary happened either late Tuesday or early Wednesday and that several items were stolen.

Later, Niesen learned a number of them were for sale on Facebook Marketplace. Niesen and others arranged to meet up with the seller at the Target parking lot in Blaine at 1500 109th Ave. N.E., according to the criminal complaint.

Surveillance video shows Niesen and others arrived in two vehicles around 9:30 p.m. One car was parked in a back row. Anderson then arrived in a white GMC Yukon and parked next to the car, prompting one person to get out and look inside the SUV and see items they believed had been taken in the burglary, the complaint read.

Niesen and others pulled up in the second vehicle and partially blocked Andersons SUV. Several people approached the SUV, including Niesen, but Anderson drove around Niesens vehicle and rapidly accelerated, striking Niesen, who was standing in front of the drivers side headlight, and running him over, the complaint alleges.

Niesen appeared to be run over by the front and rear tires of the SUV, charges say.

Witnesses gave police a description of the SUV and Anderson. Officers put out the description and a firefighter spotted the SUV headed north of the Target store.

Officers found the SUV at the Speedway on Constance Boulevard in Ham Lake and saw Anderson running from the store. With help from a police dog, officers found Anderson and took him into custody.

Anderson has a lengthy criminal record in Minnesota that dates back to 2007 and includes felony convictions for auto theft, simple robbery, possession of a pistol/assault weapon, possession of burglary/theft tools, theft and fleeing police in a motor vehicle. He has been convicted of driving after revocation 20 times.

Niesen died of his injuries Wednesday at Mercy Hospital in Coon Rapids.

In a Friday statement, Niesens family described him as a wonderful son, brother, husband, father, and friend to everyone he met. Ken was a dedicated family man.

Niesen, who graduated from Park High School, enjoyed drag racing motorcycles, eventually competing several years on the National Hot Rod Association circuit. His two boys, Wyatt and Max, recently took up the sport.

He cherished spending time watching his boys drag race at the same tracks where he raced, the familys statement read. Ken loved motorcycle runs with his wife in the summer and snowmobile weekends in the winter with his family and friends.

Niesen took pride in working alongside his father and brother, Korey, at the transmission shop, the family said.

Words cannot express our grief, the statement read. The family is moved by all love and support they have received in the last few days especially from the racing community.

A GoFundMe page was set up Friday by friends to help the family pay for funeral expenses.

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St. Paul shop owner spots stolen items on Facebook; is run over while meeting seller to get them back, charges say - St. Paul Pioneer Press

WAUSAU A video posted to Facebook shows the moment officers shot and killed someone in Wausau Thursday night but does not show the circumstances leading up to the fatal gunfire.

One person died in the shooting, which involved officers from the Wausau Police Department and the Marathon County Sheriff's Office, police said in a statement Thursday. No officers were injured.

The statement called the person who was shot a "suspect" but did not clarify.

The shooting happened in the area ofNorth 12th Avenue and Arctic Lane, near the Urban West apartment complex and Northcentral Technical College on the city's west side.

The video, which had been shared across Facebook by more than 1,700 people as of 4 p.mFriday,shows officers kneeling behind their squad cars, guns drawn, and a person dressed in dark clothes lying on the ground near a tall wall covered in wood panels. Officers are yelling something at the person on the ground, although it's not clear what they are saying.

A USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin reporter spoke to the creator of the video who did not give the news organization permission to publish it and said he did not approve of its posting to Facebook. A neighbor posted a recording of the video without his permission.

RELATED:One dead following officer-involved shooting on Wausau's west side Thursday night

UPDATE:DOJ: Person shot by police in Wausau was trying to steal vehicles, fired at officers, bystander

A video posted to Facebook showing police shooting a person in Wausau shows the shooting took place behind the Urban West apartment building(Photo: Txer Kha/USA TODAY NETWORK - Wisconsin)

In the video, the personis initially lying still, but then begins waving something in the air. It's not clear from the video if it's a gun. Officers then begin firing at the personmore than a dozen times, and it appears the person is hit multiple times. The person's body jerks as if he or she has been shot.

Officers continue to kneel behind their vehiclewith their guns drawn after firing. The person does not move. The entire video is just over a minute long. The Facebook post containing the video attractedmore than 1,500 comments from viewers, ranging from criticism of the police to suggestions that the post should be removed.

The recording doesn't show the whole picture, said Wisconsin Professional Police Association Executive Director Jim Palmer, who said he haswatched the video on Facebook.

"I think it's clear that the video is incomplete and theres a lot of things that arent shown on the video, especially what transpired before that video was taken," Palmer said.

Palmer did not elaborate on the circumstances prior to the shooting, only saying that officers previously exchanged gunfire with the person and there were officers not shown on camera who were in that person'sline of fire. Palmer said the person did have a gun.

Friday afternoon, the Department of Justice released more information about the incident. The person shot and killed by police had previously been trying to steal vehicles in the area, according to a statement from the Justice Department.

Officers confronted the person, who was armed and shot at police and at a vehicle with a person inside. Police exchanged gunfire with the person, who "fell to the ground and remained armed."The person did not comply with repeated orders from police and "pointed the firearm at law enforcement," according to the Justice Department. Police shot again at the person, who died at the scene.

Palmer himself did not go to the scene, but other Wisconsin Professional Police Association staff members were there and spoke with officers involved.

Based on preliminary evidence from the shooting, Palmer said the police association is "very confident the officers acted lawfully in response to a deadly threat and we are also very confident the investigation will bear that out."

The shooting is under investigation by theWisconsin Department of JusticeDivision of Criminal Investigation, as is protocol when a police officer is involved in a shooting.

Palmer said the state agentswill review body camera footage and any other video evidence available. He believes the investigation will show that "officers acted appropriately in response to a deadly and harrowing threat."

The investigation will take time though, Palmer said. He said Wisconsin's officer-involved shooting procedure is one of the strongest in the nation and Wisconsin was the first state to mandate an independent investigation from an outside agency after police shootings.

"Unfortunately, investigations do take some amount of time because we want to make sure theyre thorough, transparentand ultimately, that we get it right," Palmer said.

Regardless of the circumstances, Palmer said this is a tragic incident, for the community, the family and loved ones of the person who was killedand the officers involved. He encourages the community to "reserve judgement until all the facts are before them."

Wausau Police Chief Ben Bliven will hold a press conference at 4:30 p.m. Friday at the Wausau Police Department to give a statement.

Authorities are asking anyone with recordings of the shooting tocall the Divisionof Criminal Investigations at 608-266-1671 so that investigators may review the them.

Contact Natalie Brophy at (715) 216-5452 or nbrophy@gannett.com. Followher on Twitter @brophy_natalie or Facebook at facebook.com/bynataliebrophy.

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Video shows person lying on ground before Wausau police shooting. It doesn't show the entire story, police representative says. - Wausau Daily Herald

Rep. Jim Kasper, R-Fargo, said Tuesday, Jan. 14, he is not sure how two posts condemning Islam appeared on his Facebook page Monday. One of the posts shared from Kasper's account reads "The whole world has one common problem(:) Islam." Another article shared from the account just seven minutes before said "Minnesota's Twin Cities are lost" to "the Islamic Movement." Kasper later deleted the posts from his page, which is private.

A post calling Islam a "problem" was shared from Rep. Jim Kasper's Facebook account on Monday, Jan. 13. The lawmaker said he did not post it. Facebook photo

In a subsequent post, Kasper apologized to anyone who was offended and said he is the not the kind of person who would share that sort of content. However, anti-Islam posts have been shared from the longtime lawmaker's Facebook page dating back at least several years.

One post from September 2016 includes an article from a right-wing blog site which says Islam "has brought violence, pain, suffering and death" to America. The article also accuses former U.S. President Barack Obama of being a "fake Christian and pro-Islamofascist advocate." Another post from July 2018 lists restrictions on Muslims that "keep Islam at bay" in Japan. The fact-checking website PolitiFact determined the viral graphic was be based completely on false information.

Anti-Islam posts have appeared steadily throughout the last several years on Rep. Jim Kasper's Facebook page. Facebook photos

Kasper said he does not recall sharing the posts and maintains he is not against Islam. He added that he does not think the U.S. government should put legal restrictions on Muslims as the graphic suggests.

"I respect all religions, and I respect all people," Kasper told Forum News Service on Friday. "If I see something that might be interesting, I share it, but I don't focus on any faith or religion."

Another post shared from Kasper's account in September 2019 asks why Muslims "insist on moving to non-Muslim countries" and suggests Muslims should "remain in MUSLIM countries." Kasper said he does not recall sharing the post.

This post from Facebook user Ken Lindsay was shared from Kasper's account in September 2019. It suggests Muslims should return to "Muslim countries." Facebook photo

The history of anti-Islam posts on Kasper's page has some state lawmakers questioning whether their colleague was really hacked by political opponents.

House Minority Leader Josh Boschee, D-Fargo, said he has worked with Kasper on several issues and has found him to be someone who "tries to do the right thing." However, Boschee said a "long pattern" of incendiary posts about religion suggests Kasper's explanation is unlikely.

"I find it hard to believe that it was a hack based on the previous posts," Boschee said. "There may be evidence that shows the contrary, but up until now, there seems to be a fact pattern of what type of posts are being made based on what has been shared previously."

Boschee also described it as improbable that Kasper was the only one hacked out of all the state legislators. The Democratic lawmaker said Kasper should take responsibility for the posts and help bring people together instead of further dividing them.

"I hope this at least changes the behavior (toward) being more cautious about what we put out there (on social media)," Boschee said.

North Dakota Republican Party chairman Rick Berg said he didn't want to draw conclusions on the controversial episode without all the information but that he takes Kasper at his word. Berg added that the party stands for inclusion and does not support the types of posts that appeared on Kasper's page.

Berg said the party "encourages (Republican lawmakers) to make sure that what they post online is what they're intending to post." The former U.S. representative mentioned that public officials are responsible to the voters and issues of misconduct on social media are usually handled internally by party leadership in the Legislature. House Majority Leader Chet Pollert, R-Carrington, was out of the state Friday and unavailable for comment.

State legislators on both sides of the aisle were criticized last year for making inflammatory posts on Facebook. First-term Democratic Rep. Mary Adams shared multiple posts in 2019 comparing President Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler. The Grand Forks lawmaker also insinuated that she hoped something bad would happen to Trump and Vice President Mike Pence so that Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would become president.

Republican State Sen. Oley Larsen shared a photo that mislabeled U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., as an Al Qaida-affiliated terrorist. Larsen later apologized for "spreading fake news" but said he would not apologize to Omar or cede his position as interim president pro tempore.

Kasper has served in the North Dakota House of Representatives since 2001 and announced his bid for reelection last week. Kasper's district includes much of south Fargo along the state border with Minnesota.

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ND Rep. Jim Kasper's Facebook page has a history of anti-Islam posts - Grand Forks Herald

With official December gaming revenue numbers for PA due out later this week, one key number has been released. Officials at Wednesdays Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board (PGCB) meeting shared the unofficial number of $3.27 billion for total brick and mortar slot and table game revenuefor 2019.

Initial reports stated that this number also included revenue from new forms of gaming, like online casinos and sports betting. However, this number only accounts for slots and table games.

Growth is certainly good. It also flies in the face of the notion that expanded gambling would eat into existing casino revenue streams.

The overall revenue numbers for PA casinos are even more promising. Thanks to the launch of online casino and retail and online sports betting, casinos took in $3.41 billion. That is a bump of almost 4.5% from 2018.

With the addition of so many verticals and operators to PA online gambling in 2019, an increase in revenues was mostly a given. The real question was by how much would they beat the previous years totals.

In 2018, gross slots revenue came out to $2.37 billion while gross table games revenue was $878.8 million. Pennsylvania sports betting launched in November of 2018 and brought in $2.5 million in revenue during its first two months. Combined, GGR for 2018 was $3.25 billion.

All told, there was a $16 million bump in overall revenues from 2018 to 2019, looking at slots, table games and the start of retail sports betting.

Looking at revenue change over the five years prior to 2019, the increase from 2018-19 seems on par. While it is only a one-year sample size, it seems to indicate that these new markets are not growing at the expense of existing casinos.

A lot happened in terms of growing PAs gambling industry in 2019. Sports betting growth exploded with the addition of PA online betting apps beginning in May. The addition of online casinos in July also added to the states gaming revenue flows.

For 2019, PA sports betting revenue came in at $84 million. Total handle trailed only New Jersey and Nevada, with $1.49 billion in bets.

Online casinos contributed as well, but not at the same scale of sports betting. Between slots, table games, and the newly launched online poker, the sites produced $33.6 million in revenue.

Combined, that means, of the $3.4 billion in casino revenue, 3% (roughly $117 million) came from expanded gaming. That does not include revenue generated by non-casino products like video gambling terminals and daily fantasy sports. Those took in $2.3 million and $25.9 million, respectively.

For PGCB director of communications Doug Harbach, the steady overall growth PA gaming has experienced in recent years is a good sign. Harbach told Play Pennsylvania:

We continue to see growth within the brick-and-mortar casinos and some of that has to do with bringing in new customers for types of gambling specifically sports wagering in almost all the casinos. Weve seen a continued ramp-up of the numbers over the past few years. There continues to be a build up of the customer base at brick-and-mortar casinos and I think with the interjection of online games its spurring more individuals to participate in whatever form of gambling they like, whether its online or at the casinos.

The growing number of gambling options in the state should continue to drive increased revenues. The complete numbers, once available, should give a more clear picture of the breakdown.

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PA Casino Revenue Up 4.5% In 2019, Thanks Largely To Sports Betting And Online Gambling - Play Pennsylvania

Michigan got its first pair of sports betting partnership deals just over a week into the new year.

OnJan. 6, bothPointsBetandThe Stars Groupannounced partnerships. They will create entries into theMichigan sports bettingand general gaming market.

With the two heavy hitters breaking the mold, the race for the remaining24 land-based partnershas begun. And as a result, it would appear as though Michigan bettors will have no shortage of retail and online sports betting options.

The holiday celebration in Michiganincluded a signature fromGov. Gretchen Whitmer. The bill legalized retail and online sports betting, online casinos and online poker. As such, it joinedDelaware,New JerseyandPennsylvaniaas the only states to offer all three verticals.

Quick to get in on the ground floor, PointsBetannounced a20-year access dealwith theLac Vieux Desert Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians.

Per the release, PointsBet will work alongside the tribe to create a betting app as well as an online casino. To boot, the two parties remain in negotiations to bring in PointsBet to power the retail sportsbook at the tribesNorthern Waters Casino ResortinWatersmeet.

The Stars Group, meanwhile,teamed with theLittle Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians. It is providing the operator an avenue into another state for itsFox Betsports betting brand.

With first skin market access, The Stars Group will have the right to operate and brand online betting, casino and poker in Michigan.

PointsBet and Fox Bet both already operate in New Jersey. In addition, PointsBet has expanded intoIowa, while Fox Bet has done the same to Pennsylvania.

These two partnerships serve as the starting gun. Surely many more similar deals will come across the wire in short order. That means only good things for Michigan bettors, as the state will likely boast a plethora of brands.

After all, consider how many land-based properties remain. Whitmers signature in late 2019 allowed for Michigansthree commercial and 23 tribal casinosto incorporate sports betting, online casinos and online poker. There will be one skin for each vertical.

Indeed, gambling real estate abounds. As for which brands one might see, that is a picture without a clear image at this point.

That said,MGM Resortsoperates out ofDetroit, creating an opportunity forRoar Digitalto step into the gaming environs.Penn National, meanwhile, recently acquired a Detroit casino that could become part of Penns aggressive gaming expansion.

No doubt,DraftKings SportsbookandFanDuel Sportsbookwill work toward Michigan market access. Where one goes, the other seems to follow.

Michigan boasts fertile ground, which is why the state will assuredly see ample interest from an array of operators. And soon.

Excerpt from:

Michigan Online Gambling Scores Its First Partnerships. Who Will Follow? - PlayUSA

The tax rates for online gambling are literally and figuratively all over the map as jurisdictions across the United States move to approve, regulate and profit from mobile/online wagering.

As 2020 begins, there are only three states Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey with regulated online betting on slots, poker, and table games. Nine states across the country, including PA and NJ, have online sports betting.

Here, we break down the various state tax rates for online gambling and discuss the implications of the vast range that exists across markets.

Tax rates for online casino operations run from as low as 15% in New Jersey, the top revenue generator, to the 62.5% found in Delaware. That number comes from totaling the states cut, referred to as revenue sharing in DE, plus a 12.5% state vendor fee.

Pennsylvania took a different approach, varying tax rates depending on the vertical. PAs rates are 54% for online slots, but 16% for online poker and online table games.

*These rates apply after the initial $3.75 million in revenue all goes to the state.

**50% goes to revenue sharing with the state and an additional 12.5% to the state vendor.

Online sportsbook rates vary even more widely across the nine states with mobile sports wagering operational. Those states are:

The lowest tax rate among the online sportsbook jurisdictions is 6.75%, the rate employed in Nevada and Iowa.

The highest, Rhode Island, comes in at a staggering 83% when adding the 51% revenue sharing amount and the 32% cut for the states vendor.

Delaware comes in second-highest with its 62.5% tax rate set for online casino.

*Includes 50% revenue share with the state plus 12.5% to the state vendor

**Includes 51% revenue share with the state plus 32% to the state vendor

Nevada was the lone state with full-fledged sports betting prior to the 2018 overturning of PASPA that opened the way for other states to join in. Their reasonable 6.75% tax rate across the board has stood the test of time.

While states like New Jersey, Iowa, and Indiana have followed suit with operator-friendly tax rates, others have clearly opted for a different strategy to their detriment.

The American Gaming Association (AGA) believes setting tax rates too high to foster competition in the market makes it difficult to compete against illegal gambling operations. The AGA tracks tax rates across the country in the organizations annual State of the States report.

To compete with the illegal market, states must implement sensible policies including tax rates and licensing fees that enable a seamless shift to safer alternatives for consumers, said Casey Clark, the AGAs senior vice president, strategic communications.

There is a longstanding tendency by governments to treat gambling taxation as an elastic cash cow, shifting program funding from a states voting constituents to outsider companies.

That may have worked when gambling was relatively new, but with the increasing competition in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic gambling markets, high taxation in certain states has caused issues.

The high online tax rates in Pennsylvania come up when discussing the slowed rate of gambling market growth in the state. The huge 54% slot rate likely in large part explains why there are still just five online slot operators in a state as large and populous as Pennsylvania, with its nearly 13 million residents.

The other factor holding back expansion is likely PAs decision to require computer servers to be housed within the borders of the Keystone State. This regulation stems from an early 2019 DOJ Wire Act opinion that has been taken at face value by the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board, even as other states attribute little weight to the interpretation.

With online casino growth left wanting, PAs online sportsbook market has proven more appealing for operators, despite the hefty 36% tax rate on revenue.

There are currently eight online sportsbooks in PA with more expected to launch in the near future.

Pennsylvanias online sports betting market has several factors working to their benefit.

Joe Bertolone, the executive director of the International Center for Gaming at the University of Nevada Las Vegas, said online sportsbook growth, even in high tax jurisdictions such as PA, will continue to drive expansion and innovation simply because that niche is considered hot.

Despite the high tax rate, the PA market is a must for operators due to the size of the states population of close to 13 million, added Bertolone.

Youve got to be there, he said of PA.

Smaller markets like Delaware and Rhode Island dont carry the same draw for potential operators. The impact of high tax rates is magnified in these states, which can be further constrained by local law.

While The First State was indeed the first in the country to offer a form of legal online casino, revenues from online gambling have underwhelmed to date. In addition to a small population of around 1 million, Delaware is constrained by a law that allows for just three online casino operators, one for each land-based casino.

All three brands operate on one single platform run by 888 Holdings. Competition in the DE market, therefore, is lacking.

The first state (besides Nevada) to launch legal retail sports betting, Delaware is still limited to land-based wagering at their three casinos plus state lottery retailers which can accept parlays of three teams or more.

The state lottery runs Rhode Islands only legal online sportsbook, and it has limited features and offers no bonus incentives.

Both states have traditionally treated gambling operations like a goose with limitless gold eggs. But they may soon be forced to change with the times.

After being out ahead of the curve when it comes to offering legal gambling, Delaware seems to be falling behind in adjusting to the post-PASPA era of online wagering.

Between its three casino sportsbooks and lottery retailers, DE brought in $132.5 million in handle for the year 2019, $19.5 million being revenue.

A look at year-on-year figures from 2018 to 2019 in the popular betting month of November, Delaware saw a significant 46% drop in handle while revenue was stagnant at $1.3 million.

With competition in surrounding states increasing, gambling revenues in Rhode Island have also disappointed of late. The Providence Journal reported in November that the state would claim less than $10 million in revenue for sports betting for 2019. Thats less than half of the $22.7 million projected in profit.

The state also now expects only $105 million in handle via the states new mobile app, just a fraction of the $595 million assumed in prior projections.

Bertolone has cautioned that expansion is dynamic, and markets will continue to feel the ripple as saturation is reached.

And yet, just like Delaware, Rhode Islands tax rate remains in the stratosphere. PAs rates likewise leave something to be desired, especially for potential online casino operators.

Whether states will make changes to online gambling tax rates perceived by many to be unsustainable or stunting growth of the market remains to be seen.

Read more from the original source:

Taxes for Online Casinos and Sportsbooks All Over the Map - PA Online Casino