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Facebook Defies Government Crackdown on Egypt’s Online Activity

October 19, 2015

Facebook has rolled out a new feature that will let you know if the social media company suspects your account is being hacked into by the government. Users will receive a notification stating the suspicion that their account ‘may be the target of attacks from state-sponsored actors’ urging the user to secure their account by using Facebook’s security measures. “We do this because these types of attacks tend to be more advanced and dangerous than others,” a statement released by Facebook reads. “We strongly encourage affected people to take the actions necessary to secure all of their online accounts.” The social media website is not willing to disclose how it knows a Facebook account is under attack on orders of a government, and not by a ‘regular’ hacker, claiming it has to “protect the integrity of our methods and processes”. Social media in Egypt has long been believed to be under strict security surveillance by the government. Only last week, an Egyptian Facebook user was sentenced to three years in prison by a military court for sharing a Photoshopped picture of president Abdelfattah el-Sisi with Mickey Mouse ears. He was…


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