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Ferras Hamad, who used to be an engineer working with Meta’s machine learning team, has accused the company of firing him over his handling of Palestine-related Instagram posts in a lawsuit. According to Reuters, he is accusing the company of discrimination, wrongful termination and showing a pattern of bias against Palestinians. Hamad said he noted procedural irregularities on how the company handled restrictions on content from Palestinian Instagram personalities, which prevented them from appearing in feeds and searches. One particular case that involved a short video showing a destroyed building in Gaza seemingly led to his dismissal in February. 

Hamad discovered that the video, which was taken by Palestinian photojournalist Motaz Azaiza, was misclassified as pornographic. He said he received conflicting guidance on whether he was authorized to help resolve the issue but was eventually told in writing that helping troubleshoot it was part of his tasks. A month later, though, Hamad was reportedly notified that he was the subject of an investigation. He filed an internal discrimination complaint in response, but he was fired days later and was told that it was because he violated a policy that prohibits employees from working on issues involving accounts of people they personally know. Hamad, who is Palestinian-American, has denied that he personally knew Azaiza. 

In addition to detailing the events that led to his firing in the lawsuit, Hamad also accused the company of deleting internal communication between employees talking about deaths of their relatives in Gaza. Employees that use the Palestinian flag emoji were investigated, as well, whereas those who’ve previously posted the Israeli or the Ukrainian flags in similar contexts weren’t subjected to the same scrutiny. 

Meta has been accused of suppressing posts that support Palestine even before the October 7 Hamas attacks against Israel. Late last year, Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote Mark Zuckerberg a letter raising concerns about how numerous Instagram users were accusing the company of “shadowbanning” them for posting about the conditions in Gaza. Meta’s Oversight Board ruled last year that the company’s tools mistakenly removed a video posted on Instagram showing the aftermath of a strike on the Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza during Israel’s ground offensive. More recently, the board opened an investigation to review cases involving Facebook posts that used the phrase “from the river to the sea.” We’ve asked Meta for a statement on Hamad’s lawsuit, and we’ll update this post when we hear back.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ex-meta-engineer-sues-company-claiming-he-was-fired-over-handling-of-palestine-content-123057080.html?src=rss 

AT&T and Verizon customers found themselves unable to call contacts on other carriers for several hours on June 4. Based on people’s reports on Downdetector, the issue started at around 11AM ET for both carriers and peaked at approximately 5PM ET. Thousands of subscribers were affected. Most of the reports came from New York City, Chicago, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Indianapolis and Cleveland, among other locations. A much smaller number of T-Mobile and Cricket Wireless users also reported problems with their connection. 

The Federal Communications Commission tried to assuage people’s worries and announced that it was aware that subscribers from multiple states were “unable to make wireless calls.” It also said that it was “currently investigating” the problem. After 7PM ET, both Verizon and AT&T issued statements denying that they were experiencing nationwide outage. They both admitted that their customers were having difficulties calling or texting people on other carriers — Verizon reportedly told Gizmodo that outage reports for its network came from people trying to call AT&T subscribers — but neither one took responsibility. The root cause of the issue remains unknown at this time. AT&T told CNN, though, that 911 calls went through despite the outage.

An hour later, AT&T announced that the problem had been resolved. The company said it collaborated “with the other carrier” to find a solution. It didn’t name the other carrier, but it was most likely Verizon, seeing as most of the customers who were affected were subscribers of the two companies. Back in February, AT&T experienced a massive outage that affected over 70,000 subscribers’ cellular services and data connections, with customers noting that they couldn’t even contact 911. Verizon and T-Mobile said at the time that their subscribers couldn’t contact friends with AT&T numbers. 

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/att-verizon-services-restored-after-call-disruption-issues-across-multiple-states-035801520.html?src=rss 

The Sony WH-CH720N ANC headphones are on sale for $98 via Amazon. That’s a discount of 35 percent, which is nothing to sneeze at. We loved these headphones at the original price of $150, so we most definitely recommend them now.

In other words, the features here are stellar for the price. This is no surprise, as Sony has a fantastic track record when it comes to budget-friendly cans. The WH-CH720N headphones offer great sound quality, capable ANC, decent battery life and a comfortable fit. What else is there?

Specifically, the battery lasts around 35 hours per charge, which is a decent metric. It’s a pretty huge bummer to be in the middle of a walk, totally lost in a jam, when you hear that annoying “battery low” warning immediately followed by a shutdown. There are some physical controls, including a power/pairing button, volume buttons and a noise canceling button that cycles between ANC and transparency modes. These headphones also work with all of the major voice assistants.

We were especially impressed with the comfort and fit, saying that we could easily wear them for “hours at a time,” thanks to ample cushioning in the ear pads. The overall sound quality is, however, the standout feature. The bass is on-point and there’s great clarity in the other frequency ranges. It just sounds good.

On the downside, the plastic exterior isn’t going to be winning any design awards and it’s missing some of the advanced features found with pricier Sony headphones. There’s no automatic pausing when you take them off or when you start talking. Other than that, though, these are some dang good headphones.

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This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/these-sony-anc-headphones-are-even-better-for-98-185146475.html?src=rss