Twitter shares closed down 10.4 percent at $31.735 following comments by Israeli Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked, who criticized Twitter for not doing enough to counter messages that incite violence against Israel.

Shaked warned that the Israeli government was considering “legal action” against Twitter.

“Terrorist organizations have been running from Twitter instead of Facebook. Simple reason: Facebook responds effectively to our inquiries in the removal of terrorist content. Twitter ignores,” she tweeted.

“We are considering running legal measures against them,” she wrote in comments translated from Hebrew.

Twitter’s tumble came as social media stocks overall were under pressure following widespread criticism of Facebook over reports that a data analysis firm hired by Donald Trump’s presidential campaign misused the data of some 50 million users.

Facebook shares fell 2.6 percent following reports the Federal Trade Commission was investigating the company over the episode and whether it violated a 2011 consent decree over the handling of consumer data.

Shares of Facebook had already lost 6.8 percent on Monday.

“Facebook is unregulated and very profitable but concerns over future regulation are now at a fever pitch. Regulation would likely increase costs,” Briefing.com said in a note.

“Another risk is the increased potential for users to shun the company’s flagship social network.”

Two other social media companies also fell, with Snap losing 2.6 percent and Pandora Media giving up 1.9 percent.

The move to suspend CEO Alexander Nix came as recordings emerged in which he boasts his data company played an expansive role in Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign, doing all of its research, analytics as well as digital and television campaigns.

In undercover filming captured by Britain’s Channel 4 News, he is also seen boasting about entrapping politicians and secretly operating in elections around the world through shadowy front companies.

Lawmakers on both sides of the Atlantic have demanded answers after it was revealed at the weekend that Cambridge Analytica improperly harvested information from 50 million Facebook users.

Cambridge Analytica has denied using Facebook data for the Trump campaign, but the scandal has ratcheted up the pressure on the social media giant — already under fire for allowing fake news to proliferate on its platform during the US campaign.

On Tuesday Facebook said its top executives were “working around the clock to get all the facts.”

“The entire company is outraged we were deceived. We are committed to vigorously enforcing our policies to protect people’s information and will take whatever steps are required to see that this happens,” the firm said.

Cambridge Analytica’s board said meanwhile that Nix would stand aside immediately pending an investigation into the snowballing allegations against him.

“In the view of the Board, Mr. Nix’s recent comments secretly recorded by Channel 4 and other allegations do not represent the values or operations of the firm and his suspension reflects the seriousness with which we view this violation,” the company said.

In Channel 4’s recordings, Nix slights US representatives on the House Intelligence Committee to whom he gave evidence last year, claiming its Democrats are motivated by “sour grapes” and Republicans asked few questions.

“They’re politicians, they’re not technical. They don’t understand how it works,” he was caught on camera telling an undercover reporter.

He also outlines the use of a secret self-destructing email system.

“There’s no evidence, there’s no paper trail, there’s nothing,” he said of the tool, which deletes emails two hours after they have been read.

Investigations multiply

Channel 4 News broadcast an interview filmed in October last year with defeated presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, in which she said she had faced “a massive propaganda effort”.

“There was a new kind of campaign that was being run on the other side,” she said. “It affected the thought processes of voters.”

Facebook now faces investigations on both sides of the Atlantic, sending its share price tumbling another 2.6 percent after a 6.8 percent plunge Monday.

European Union officials have called for an urgent investigation while British lawmakers have asked Zuckerberg to give evidence to a UK parliamentary committee.

Zuckerberg has been asked to appear before the European Parliament.

“Facebook needs to clarify before the representatives of 500 million Europeans that personal data is not being used to manipulate democracy,” tweeted parliament president Antonio Tajani.

US lawmakers have also called on Zuckerberg to appear before Congress, along with the chief executives of Twitter and Google.

Officials in the US states of Massachusetts and New York announced they were sending a “demand letter” to Facebook for the facts of the case.

“Consumers have a right to know how their information is used — and companies like Facebook have a fundamental responsibility to protect their users’ personal information,” New York attorney general Eric Schneiderman said in a statement.

Thirteen US consumer and privacy organizations meanwhile released a letter to the Federal Trade Commission asking it to reopen a probe into Facebook, saying the firm’s admission so far “suggests a clear violation” of a 2011 consent decree.

Watchdog searches

A former Cambridge Analytica employee says it was able to create psychological profiles on 50 million Facebook users through the use of a personality prediction app that was downloaded by 270,000 people, but also scooped up data from friends — as was possible under Facebook’s rules at the time.

The end goal was to create software to predict and influence voters’ choices at the ballot box.

The company blames the academic who developed the app, University of Cambridge psychologist Aleksandr Kogan, for misusing the data, which it says was never used on the Trump campaign, and has in any event been deleted.

But the firm’s reputation took a severe hit on Monday, with the broadcast of a first batch of secret footage showing Nix saying it could entrap politicians in compromising situations with bribes and sex workers.

He also said the firm secretly campaigns in elections around the world, including by operating through a web of shadowy front companies, or by using sub-contractors, according to Channel 4 News.

A Cambridge Analytica spokesman told the news programme it does not use “untrue material for any purpose”.

Facebook, which says the data was taken without its knowledge, has launched its own investigation into Cambridge Analytica.

But it was forced to suspend its probe following a request from Britain’s information commissioner, Elizabeth Denham, who is making her own inquiries into both companies.

Denham’s office said it had yet to obtain a court warrant to search Cambridge Analytica’s servers, and was now expecting to secure it on Wednesday.

The Uber vehicle was in autonomous mode, with an operator behind the wheel, when it hit a woman walking in the street in the city of Tempe late Sunday, according to the San Francisco-based company.

The victim was hospitalized and later died from her injuries.

“Our hearts go out to the victim’s family,” an Uber spokesperson told AFP. “We are fully cooperating with local authorities in their investigation of this incident.”

Uber said it had temporarily halted its use of self-driving cars for testing or customer rides in Tempe, Pittsburgh, Toronto, and San Francisco.

Tempe is one of just two cities — along with Pittsburgh — where the ride-sharing firm has been using autonomous vehicles as part of its regular passenger.

The vehicle operator in the driver’s seat was the only person in the car when the accident occurred, Uber said. The car was in police hands on Monday.

Sunday’s accident was the first fatal self-driving car crash involving a pedestrian.

The first deadly self-driving car accident was reported in mid-2016, and involved a Tesla.

Sheriff needed?

The Tesla Model S, cruising on “Autopilot,” failed to detect a crossing tractor-trailer against a bright sky, killing the driver — who it later emerged had kept his hands off the wheel for extended periods of time despite automated warnings not to do so.

Investigators at the US National Transportation Safety Board determined the probable cause of the Tesla crash was the combination of “a truck driver’s failure to yield the right of way and a car driver’s inattention due to overreliance on vehicle automation.”

Autonomous-vehicle technology has been touted as having potential to save fuel, ease congestion, and to save thousands of lives by avoiding accidents due to human error.

As with the fatal Tesla crash, however, the deadly Uber accident is likely to stoke concerns that the industry is moving too fast.

Google-owned Waymo this month began using its self-driving trucks to haul cargo bound for the internet giant’s data centers in Georgia, while rival Uber announced the use of self-driving semi trucks as part of an on-demand trucking service in Arizona.

In September, US Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao released new guidelines that permit more testing of self-driving cars.

But America’s non-profit Consumer Watchdog has warned that roads are being turned “into private laboratories for robot cars with no regard for our safety.”

The group on Monday called for a nationwide moratorium on testing self-driving cars on public roads while investigators figure out what went wrong in the Uber accident.

“Arizona has been the wild west of robot car testing with virtually no regulations in place,” Watchdog technology project director John Simpson said in a statement.

“When there’s no sheriff in town, people get killed.”

Car vision tests?

US states set their own rules for roads, and a handful have passed laws allowing self-driving vehicles.

California and Arizona have been particularly encouraging, hoping that companies developing autonomous technology in those states will create local jobs and facilities devoted to a promising new industry.

Duke University robotics professor Missy Cummings is among the advocates of slowing down introduction of autonomous vehicles to avoid risk and get proper regulations in place.

While machines are better at staying vigilant and reacting to routine situations, human drivers have proven superior at handling unusual or unexpected situations, according to the professor.

Cummings reasoned that if people need to pass vision exams in order to get driving licenses, so should self-driving cars.

She noted a case in which putting stickers on a stop sign could fool autonomous car sensors into seeing it as a sign indicating a speed limit.

“If we are still learning at this rate, and still uncovering major problems, it begs the question of why we are trying to put this technology into widespread use,” Cummings told AFP.

“I am a big fan of the technology, but it is very unproven and experimental.”

The road to Thailand’s first “unicorn” (a start-up worth US$1 billion) is still very long. Currently, the top 10 start-ups in Thailand combined are worth less than a single unicorn, although there are already a few start-ups worth that much in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia. Thailand needs to go beyond the PR and the hype of digital entrepreneurship and get real about building businesses with the potential to go global.

dtac Accelerate nurtures digitally minded entrepreneurs from concept to global growth. Since we launched in 2014, up to 70 per cent of the start-ups we mentored were at the very beginning of that journey, which is called the incubation phase. At that point, entrepreneurs usually have an idea on a PowerPoint, a team and a lot of passion.

Our job is to get them from 100 fans to 10,000 or 100,000 real customers in 12 to 18 months. But our focus is now increasingly on the next phase – acceleration.

Acceleration is a growth phase by another multiple of 10, to 500,000 or even 1 million customers. It used to represent 30-40 per cent of the start-ups we mentored. It will now be 60-70 per cent. These start-ups are under tremendous pressure to vastly increase their customer base. And with our bootcamp, we are able to do this in four months rather than the 15 months it would usually take.

As start-ups must start small and scale gradually, we are looking for start-ups that think globally yet start locally. A start-up that executes in Thailand with only the Thai market in mind will hit a brick wall as it tries to scale to 1 million customers and beyond. With Batch 6 of dtac Accelerate now open for submissions, we are prioritising passionate teams who can think globally from day one.

To support them, our Global Expansion Track offers access to the Telenor’s group customers in a dozen markets throughout the world. This is similar to the support dtac can offer, but we’re taking it worldwide.

A single Line message from dtac to its customers was able to acquire 50,000 new customers for one of our start-ups. Now imagine reaching out to Telenor’s over 200,000 customers.

It’s also very important to connect with global digital giants. Line has over 200 million active users and we’re currently the first and only accelerator they’ve partnered with in Thailand. Similarly, Google has an exclusive partnership with dtac Accelerate, where we will select Thai start-ups for their famous Launchpad programme, the most coveted accelerator in the world. They’re also sending us some of their best mentors, such as Jacob Greenspan, perhaps the leading expert on user interfaces and user experience design.

dtac Accelerate will still have start-ups in the seed-rounds of their funding growth, but Series A funding is becoming increasingly common for our alumni. Last year alone, we had three such investments. Including seed rounds, we raised a total US$9.5 million – a new record. It’s one more sign that while unicorns remain a stretch goal for Thai start-ups, our alumni are steadily moving from buzz-worthy ideas to real, sustained growth.

Sompoat Chansomboon is head of dtac Accelerate.

Universities are now engaged in grooming students to keep pace with a rapid global evolution. Their tasks include student development and enhancement of greater quality in learning/teaching, research works and educational staff, as well as the creation of an environment that better accommodates digital lifestyles.

Students are a part of the new generation and they are in search of knowledge. As they advance in life, they must cope with rapid changes in future technologies that will also reshape the processes through which they learn to live their lives, to work and to maximise their potential. To transform a university into a portal of linkage between different fields of knowledge, which will facilitate future ways of living, a cooperative educational network between that university and other organisations will be crucial. This portal must have “ecosystem” compatible with the digital world.

The CU NEX Project is a cooperative effort between Chulalongkorn University and KBank that aims to integrate all disciplines of knowledge within the university, as well as that of their partners and the surrounding community, all linked via digital technology. Kasikorn Business-Technology Group (KBTG) serves as a cornerstone for innovation and systems development to create solutions for the management of campus infrastructure, including its students, lecturers and other personnel, as well as communities nearby. This initiative is intended to make Chulalongkorn University a “Digital Lifestyle University”.

CU NEX is a prototype collaboration whose purpose is to upgrade the capabilities of leading Thai universities to achieve international levels of performance. Digital technologies will be adopted across all disciplines of study, as well as facilitate personal lifestyles in the digital era. The project emphasises development in the following three major dimensions:

Every aspect of student lifestyles will be linked via virtual IDs connected to the “CU NEX” mobile app that allows students to search for information about Chulalongkorn University, and it even includes registration, the library, internal transportation and other facility services around campus. To help students brace for the looming cashless society, they will be able to make QR code payments via the app or use their student ID cards to perform those transactions, accumulate reward points and redeem privileges from merchants on campus. The project will make use of the spaces around campus and create “PLEARN Space” as an open area for students to do activities outside their lecture halls such as socialise, conduct research or exchange information.

The capabilities of students and personnel at Chulalongkorn University will be enhanced to better blend with digital lifestyles via varying forms of incubational activities related to digital technology. New areas of investigation will be created to promote innovation between Chulalongkorn University and other institutions via such activities as “TechJam”, “MAPS” and “ChAMP”, with opportunities for students to gain even more knowledge from world-class tech hubs such as Silicon Valley. Such activities are imperative to helping students improve on what they have learned in lecture halls and labs and may even help them to set up their own business start-ups in the global marketplace. KBank will be collaborating with Chulalongkorn University to conduct R&D on Thai “natural language processing”, which will help students to further improve their use of Thai language on and beyond the campus.

A massive volume of Chulalongkorn University’s information will be used to create an individualised learning format. “Data Hub” using Machine Learning Technology will collect a broad array of information on students’ behaviour, interests and special talents. Business Intelligence (BI) algorithms will analyse that information to create the most efficient curricula and activities to match each group of students, and even to each individual, to achieve higher excellence in graduates.

Authorised access restrictions in the Data Hub will provide multiple layers of data protection. Moreover, blockchain technology is another key tool that will be applied to manage important collegiate documentation and optimise efficiency.

The CU NEX project is under constant development with the ultimate goal of not only serving over 50,000 students, lecturers and staff on campus, but also the more than 500,000 “Chula Citizens” in surrounding communities. The CU NEX project will eventually lead to the expansion of the “Digital Lifestyle University” program nationwide with Chulalongkorn University as its core model.

Patchara Samalapa is senior executive vice president, Kasikornbank

At the launch of KADE, the latest innovation by Kasikorn Business Technology Group (KBTG) last week, what caught everyone’s eye was not only Kasikornbank’s big step forward in using new technology to sustain and explore its financing products and services, but their success in reversing the country’s brain drain phenomenon.

KBTG presented its dream team – young, ambitious Thais, who had walked away from lucrative overseas assignments to bring their skills to their homeland.

The K Plus AI-Driven Experience (KADE) aims to serve the bank’s vision to move from digital to intelligent (banking service). It is targeting 20 million users on its own life- and financial-related platform called K PLUS Intelligent Platform within the next five years.

KADE is expected to help KBank enhance its financial services with service, design, and machine intelligence to develop new services that will serve both its existing customers and unbanked people.

There are three principal visionary architects who lead the three main intelligence teams: Chetaphan Siridanupath, Joe – service intelligence; Apirut Vancha-Am, aka Art – design intelligence; and Thadpong Pongthawornkamol, aka Team – machine intelligence.

All of them worked abroad for some years but decided to return to their homeland to use their skills and experience in developing products and services that would improve Thais’ lives.

Thadpong – machine learning team lead:

Also known as Team, he worked at Google’s headquarters for many years before moving back to his home country a couple of years ago. His role at KBTG is to utilise machine learning technology, which he has explored while working at Google in Mountain View, California.

Thadpong was a scholarship student who graduated and then worked in the United States for many years. He has never worked in Thailand.

He met KBTG chairman Somkid Jiranuntarat, who persuaded him to work at KBTG after visiting Google two years ago. Once Team decided to return home with the passion to use his skill and experience to create products/services for Thais, he chose to join KBTG.

He said at KBTG there are a lot of jobs to be done and there is an “excellent team who speak the same language”. He desired to create “value” and to explore new technology for Thais.

“It is good there are problems that need to be tackled and it is good we can solve them for Thais. For example, Machine Lending, a lending service driven by machine learning technology, aims to give many more Thais the chance to access personal loans easily and conveniently. It is very beneficial to Thais,” said Thadpong.

Apart from utilising machine learning in new product/service development, Thadpong said he also enjoys setting up a developer community culture, including working, learning and experiment culture to get the team to move fast.

“I love working here where a lot of talent are closely working together. We are not a data-science company or a mobile developer, but we blend the cross-functional teams to help KBank smoothly do the digital transformation.

“KADE is our attempt to understand customers and know indepth who they are and what they want in order to address their needs effectively. We know how customers feel about our service UX/UI (user experience/ user interface). We blend data, machine and human beings to get product and service developers to understand customers; it is the big role of KADE,” said Thadpong.

Chetaphan – service intelligence team lead:

Chetaphan won a Japanese government student scholarship, graduated, and worked in the financial sector in Japan and Hong Kong for many years. He felt bored working in the comfort zone and wanted to move back to his home country, but he had no idea where. He was not sure which company could utilise his experience and competence until he met KBTG.

He joined KBTG because he believed in the company’s vision and soon realised that there were many jobs still needing to be done and he could still make an impact for Thais.

“The impact is not from the money perspective but the value a product can give to Thais. For example, KPlus driven by KADE will make the lives of 20 million Thais better, more comfortable, and easier, and that why this job is very interesting and challenging for me,” said Chetaphan.

“Now, KBank has 8 million digital banking users (KPLus users). We are number one in digital banking, but there is still huge room to grow. We have 8 million users, while Thailand’s population is 70 million, and Vietnam’s 90 million. We are not eyeing only the Thai market. In the next five to 10 years, there are a lot of challenges ahead of us,” said Chetaphan.

His role is to oversee the overall strategy for services. He leads the service intelligence team. He said service intelligence is “what”, design intelligence is “how”, and machine intelligence is “who, when and where”.

“The three teams will work closely together to create products/services with features and functions that serve and address customers’ needs and pain points,” said Chetaphan.

Apirut Vancha-Am — design intelligence team leader

Apirut worked as a consultant and was involved in research and development on artificial intelligence and machine learning abroad for many years. He moved back to Thailand and worked at IBM Thailand as consultant, taking care of KBank for seven years. When KBank set up its new company, KBTG, in 2016 he moved from IBM Thailand and now heads KBTG’s design intelligence team.

“KBTG gives me a chance to work on my core expertise – AI and machine learning – to create products/services that make Thai users happy and offer them more convenience. When they use it, it gives me happiness as well.” said Apirut.

He said now is a golden period for technology people like him to spend the rest of their lives creating innovations that benefit people.

“It is the first time that IT has changed from cost-centred back office to benefit-centred front office. It is the first time that IT is everywhere, in every business segment, and in people’s hands,” said Apirut.

Apirut said he joined KBTG as it is a technology company that is not led by technology. Technology is just a tool. The important thing is to understand how to make people’s lives better through technology.

“My personal mission is to balance the business sustainability of the bank and bring the benefit of technology to people. We have the same passion, which is to create value for people. Working with Joe and Team is a joy. We are the dream team driving the dream,” said Apirut.

Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and tech start-ups could more easily access funding sources thanks to a rating system developed by the Thailand Technology Rating System (TTRS) and initiated by the National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA).

A successful business-rating system from Korea’s Technology Finance Corporation (KOTEC) has been tailored for Thailand, thanks to the NSTDA joining forces with the Thai Credit Guarantee Corporation (TCG). The Thailand Technology Rating System (TTRS) will aim to help SMEs and start-ups to more easily get funding.

KOTEC is a quasi-governmental institution providing guarantees, based on technology appraisals, to SMEs that are technologically competent but lack collateral.

Narong Sirilertworakul, president of the National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA) said that the organisation on March 1 launched the Thai technology rating system after a successful trial period in which they evaluated some companies.

With the launch of TTRS, which incorporates the KOTEC rating system, tech start-ups and SMEs will be evaluated for their suitability for funding.

TTRS will consider four pillars – founders, technology, market opportunity, and company finances. Some 40 factors are evaluated under the four pillars. Those that excel in the evaluation will be given TTRS certification valid for a year.

“Companies can use TTRS certification to more easily do fundraising. TTRS will help the country’s tech start-ups be more complete,” said Narong.

“Bankers will be also benefit since they will have us as an assistant helping them to evaluate products and services as well as the business end of tech-based SMEs and start-ups, while SMEs and start-ups can more easily access additional sources of funds.”

Meanwhile, the Thai Credit Guarantee Corporation (TCG) has prepared to submit the TTRS proposal to the government, along with a budget request of Bt500 million. Their contribution will be to give a “guarantee rating”, along with a credit guarantee of Bt10 million, for companies winning TTRS certification.

The credit guarantee corporation aims to help up to 50 SMEs and start-ups get the credit guarantee within the next 12 months.

Under the collaboration, NSTDA will utilise its researchers and resources to evaluate technology and market potential while TCG will evaluate the financial pillar.

“We are talking with The Thai Bankers’ Association about further collaboration with TTRS,” said Narong. Once banks accept TTRS certification, SMEs and start-ups will be more likely to seek the TTRS certification, which will in turn help them get funding.

Eventually, it helps the whole ecosystem,” he said.

He said NSTDA hopes to see TTRS succeed as a key driver helping tech companies in Thailand, in parallel to KOTEC’s success in South Korea. KOTEC evaluates 400 to 1,000 companies yearly, with the studies ranging from simple to complex technology.

“KOTEC spend only one week for the whole evaluation,” said Narong. “For TTRS, we will spend two weeks to get SMEs and start-ups certified. With our strength, we have multidisciplinary technology knowledge with over 600 PhDs. We really hope to be a key driver for Thailand’s technology industry moving forwards and become the key industry driving the country’s economy.”

He added that their multidisciplinary technologies knowledge allows for evaluating a wide range of technologies, including biotechnology, materials technology, nanotechnology, and others. They will not be limited to evaluating only computer technology companies.

“In fact, TTRS can help not only SMEs and start-ups. The system has been developed and tested to evaluate the enterprise as well,” said Narong.

TTRS will help draw investment money into the country’s tech industry, Narong said, because many non-bank investors will feel more confident in tech companies and will move their money to invest in the TTRS-certified tech companies.

“TTRS will be the key mechanism to fill in the [knowledge] gap between tech companies – both SMEs and start-ups – and investment. We hope TTRS will help open more investment opportunities for the investors while help creates more numbers of investors,” said Narong.

The new phone features dual front cameras (16- and 2-megapixel resolutions) and dual rear cameras (13- and 2-megapixel resolutions).

It also has a 4,000 mAh battery matching those of much more expensive flagship smartphones, a 5.93-inch Huawei FullView Display with 18:9 aspect ratio, Face Unlock and Fingerprint screen unlock features, dual SIM support, external storage support for up to 256GB, Kirin 659 Octa-core processor, and the AndroidTM 8.0 operating system with EMUI 8.0 user interface.

Huawei is offering a Body Fat Scale worth Bt2,990 as a gift for customers who pre-order a Y9 2018 through March 29 at any Huawei Brand Shop or dealer nationwide, as well as at participating online stores.

Sales will officially start on March 30.

ฺThe convenience store chain will use the technology in a number of different ways, including to help identify loyal customers, analyse customer traffic and monitor stock levels of products.

Facial recognition will also be used to suggest products to customers and even monitor their emotions while customers are in store, as well as being used to keep tabs on employees.

The company has said it is using the technology developed by American firm Remark Holdings, which claims its facial recognition software has a 96 percent accuracy rate. Last year, Remark Holdings announced a $10 million investment in CP Group, which operates 7-Eleven in Thailand.

Speaking to the Financial Times, Kai-Shing Tao, Remark’s chief executive said: “Artificial intelligence has the power to completely transform business in every industry.

“CP Group recognised this right away and is making it a very high priority to adopt and implement AI technologies.” With facial recognition still somewhat in its infancy, the technology raises a lot of questions with regards to privacy.

However, Remark has said that no images of faces will be stored permanently on servers and that only images of facial features are recorded on secure and encrypted servers.

“No human faces or images ever leaves the KanKan system or goes on the public network,” the company said.

And no facial images will be linked to consumers customer data such as names, addresses or telephone numbers. It is not known exactly when 7-Eleven stores in Thailand will start implementing the facial recognition technology.