SA’s top 10 super rich men

These are the top 10 wealthiest men in the country according to the Business Times Rich List 2016.

Cyber Security Bill gets Cabinet nod

Cabinet has approved the introduction of the wildly criticised Cyber Crimes and Cyber Security Bill (Cyber Security Bill)… defenceweb.co.za/

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Brazil’s austerity package decried by UN as attack on poor people

Despite violent street protests against budget cuts, President Michel Temer – who came to power after engineering the impeachment of his former running mate, Dilma Rousseff – is pushing through a 20-year social spending freeze that will be locked into the constitution…theguardian.com/

SYRIA
The vanishing civilians of Aleppo

Did it cross your mind occasionally, in the past week, to wonder where all of the “250,000 civilians trapped in eastern Aleppo” have gone? As the area of the city under rebel control dwindled — by Wednesday morning the Syrian regime’s troops had recaptured three-quarters of it — did you see massive columns of fleeing civilians, or mounds of civilian dead?… bangkokpost.com/

Game over for the US in Syria

With Aleppo on the brink of liberation from US-supported ‘moderate’ jihadi rebels, Barack Obama’s White House is in damage control mode — but it’s about time they admit it’s game over…www.rt.com/

Vietnam cancels nuclear reactor deal: a lesson for South Africa

Vietnam recently announced that it would be cancelling its contract to buy two nuclear reactors from Rosatom, the Russian nuclear vendor. The decision was subsequently ratified by the Vietnamese National Assembly in Hanoi. The vice-chair of the parliamentary committee on science, technology and environment, Le Hong Tinh, has stated clearly that the nuclear programme would not be continued… theconversation.com/

Frightened by Donald Trump? You don’t know the half of it

Yes, Donald Trump’s politics are incoherent. But those who surround him know just what they want, and his lack of clarity enhances their power. To understand what is coming, we need to understand who they are. I know all too well, because I have spent the past 15 years fighting them… theguardian.com/

US Tops List of Arms Spending with $622-Billion in 2016

Global arms spending totaled US$1.57 trillion in 2016 alone, with the U.S. dwarfing all other nations with its military budget equalling 40 percent of the world’s total… telesurtv.net/

Internet Governance Forum: Embarking On Post-IANA Transition And Taking On Trade

The renewed Internet Governance Forum (IGF) last week tried its all not to become just another internet governance conference, with new formats and the taking on of one big topic that so far had evaded the “multi-stakeholder” approach: trade negotiations. But it also angered some by making its big dinner an invitation-only event, for governments and friends… ip-watch.org/

A Clinton Fan Manufactured Fake News

The phrase “Fake News” has exploded in usage since the election, but the term is similar to other malleable political labels such as “terrorism” and “hate speech”; because the phrase lacks any clear definition, it is essentially useless except as an instrument of propaganda and censorship. The most important fact to realize about this new term: Those who most loudly denounce Fake News are typically those most aggressively disseminating it… theintercept.com/

Twitter Has the Right to Suspend Donald Trump. But It Shouldn’t

After the president-elect used Twitter last week to criticize Chuck Jones, an Indiana union leader who represents workers at the Carrier company, Mr. Jones reported receiving a series of threatening phone calls from Mr. Trump’s supporters… nytimes.com/

Tech workers vow not to build database to track Muslims

More than 200 engineers, designers and executives pledge not to build a database for the Trump administration to track Muslims in the US… cnet.com/

Information Overload Is a Workers’ Rights Issue

Do you feel like you’re currently being inundated with too much information? People have been warning about the threat of “information overload” for decades. But a new poll by Pew Research Center shows that most Americans don’t feel overloaded at all. Unless you’re elderly or make very little money. Which, at the end of the day, makes the threat of information overload a workers’ rights issue…gizmodo.com/

Human Rights Groups Say Facebook’s Internet.org ‘Exacerbates the Digital Divide’

A global coalition of civil rights groups told Mark Zuckerberg Monday that Internet.org, a free platform he’s created to provide internet access to the developing world, has serious problems with security, privacy, and violates net neutrality principles… motherboard.vice.com

Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Twitter Become the Gatekeepers

News that Google, Microsoft, and Facebook will collaborate to censor their definition of terrorism on their collective networks signals Orwellian times to come … globalresearch.ca/

Lessons From James Boggs: Capitalist Automation in the 21st Century

Black American revolutionary worker James Boggs “asserted that the only effective counter offensive to automation’s assault on labor would be for workers to make ‘politics’ instead of ‘things'” – that is, to create a more humane social system… truth-out.org/