Daily beast: Day after travel ban , google staff discussed adjusting search function

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Google employees discussed ways they could adjust the company’s search function to “show users how to contribute to pro-immigration organizations and contact lawmakers and government agencies” days after the Trump administration enacted its travel ban, according to internal company emails obtained by The Wall Street Journal. The newspaper reports employees suggested ways to “leverage” search functions and counter “islamophobic, algorithmically biased results from search terms ‘Islam,’ ‘Muslim,’ ‘Iran,’ etc.” and “prejudiced, algorithmically biased search results from search terms ‘Mexico,’ ‘Hispanic,’ ‘Latino,’ etc.” The January 2017 emails had “cautionary notes about engaging in political activity” in them but indicated that employees considered using Google’s “vast influence on the internet” to take some sort of action. Google told the newspaper that none of the ideas were implemented. “These emails were just a brainstorm of ideas,” a Google spokeswoman told the newspaper. “Google has never manipulated its search results or modified any of its products to promote a particular political ideology—not in the current campaign season, not during the 2016 election, and not in the aftermath of President Trump’s executive order on immigration.” The report comes as Attorney General Jeff Sessions is scheduled to meet with state attorneys general to discuss companies that are “intentionally stifling the free exchange of ideas on their platforms.”

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