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BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg vowed Monday to press on with his 3-year-old effort to bring the developing world online, even after Indian regulators banned one of the pillars of the campaign.
He said the banned service, Free Basics, was only one program in his Internet.org campaign, so he could proceed with other initiatives. Indian regulators banned Free Basics this month because it provided access only to certain pre-approved services — including Facebook — rather than the full Internet.
"Facebook isn't a company that hits a roadblock and gives up," Zuckerberg said at the Mobile World Congress wireless show in Barcelona, Spain. "We take the hits and try to get better."
Though Zuckerberg termed the regulatory defeat "disappointing for the mission and a major setback," he said every country was different, and "the model that has worked in one country may not work in another."
This was his third appearance at the Barcelona show to promote Internet access to everyone in the world. He has argued that online connections can improve lives and fuel economic development.
To achieve that goal, Zuckerberg has high-flying dreams for someday providing Internet connections through a network of drones, satellites and lasers. Zuckerberg said Monday that Internet.org would launch its first satellite over Africa this year and "we are about to test flying Internet drone solar planes that can fly three months a year."
While the drones may someday connect people in areas too remote for cables or cell towers, Free Basics is intended for people who live in areas with Internet service but still can't afford it. Facebook works with wireless carriers in poorer nations to let people use streamlined versions of Facebook and certain other online services, without paying data charges.
A low-income resident of urban Manila, for example, can use Free Basics to view the Philippines' GMA News site. "He can be informed. He can research. He can read the news," Ederic Eder of GMA News said.
The program varies by country, in offerings and effectiveness.
In South Africa, for instance, Facebook partnered with the third-largest wireless carrier, Cell C. But Johannesburg resident Priscilla de Klerk said she couldn't get Free Basics to work on her phone.
"Cell C is much cheaper as far as everything else is concerned, but their free Facebook is not a reality," she said.
Last fall, Facebook announced a major expansion in Africa, where another regional carrier, Bharti Airtel, said it will offer Free Basics in 17 countries.
"They're getting a lot of traction in Africa," said Danson Njue, a Kenya-based telecom analyst with the Ovum research firm. Tech rivals Google and Microsoft also have programs to expand Internet access, he noted, but their approaches are content neutral and involve extending networks to underserved areas.
Facebook doesn't pay wireless companies for the cost of Free Basics. Carriers make money if new users eventually move to a paid data plan. Facebook also says it makes no money, as it doesn't show ads, though Zuckerberg has conceded it benefits from gaining users in the long run.
While the company hasn't released detailed usage figures, Facebook says Free Basics has brought more than 19 million people online for the first time. That counts any user who didn't have Internet access before, regardless of whether they're currently active.
On the Internet.org website, mixed in with videos about impoverished students using Free Basics to study and laborers starting small businesses, Facebook boasts more than 1 billion people "have access" to the service. That's the combined population of regions where it's available, not the number of users.
Free Basics is now in 36 countries. It was suspended last year in Egypt, on the anniversary of anti-government protests that were organized partly on Facebook. An earlier version of Free Basics, known as Facebook Zero, was shuttered three years ago in Chile, after authorities said Internet providers couldn't offer discounts for accessing some content but not others.
Similar concerns turned India into the program's biggest battleground.
Free Basics enrolled more than 1 million Indians in its first year, according to Facebook's wireless partner, Reliance Communications. But critics, including many in the country's growing tech community, complained it was a predatory scheme: If low-income users couldn't afford anything besides Free Basics, opponents said, that meant Facebook was deciding which online services the nation's poor could use.
"The government should not allow big players to monopolize the Internet," said Manu Sharma, who runs a software development company in New Delhi.
Facebook responded last fall by announcing it would open Free Basics to any app that met its technical requirements for systems with limited capacity. Zuckerberg also changed the program's name to Free Basics, after critics complained "Internet.org" sounded like a nonprofit, when it's part of a for-profit company (the overall campaign is still called Internet.org).
But opponents still worry that Facebook could change requirements at any time, force competitors to pay higher rates to get into the program, or even block services that run afoul of powerful politicians.
"The fact that it could decide what apps could be hosted ... was a huge problem for me," said Basit Zaidi, a New Delhi attorney.
As Indian regulators began studying the issue, Facebook drew more resentment with a public-relations blitz that critics called heavy-handed and patronizing. The regulators effectively banned Free Basics after concluding Internet providers shouldn't be allowed to charge different rates for certain services, because that discriminates against other content.
U.S. regulators have endorsed the concept of "net neutrality," which says all websites and apps should be treated equally by Internet providers. They're now studying whether "zero rating" programs, which offer some content for free, should be allowed. Net neutrality supporters are hoping India's decision will influence other nations.
Facebook has also launched a program that helps Internet providers offer reliable Wi-Fi service in underserved areas at affordable rates and without limits on content. The program's been limited to tests in a few countries.
The giant tech company could use its resources and clout with carriers to offer a similar wireless service, perhaps at limited speeds or volume, but without any restrictions on content, said Josh Levy of Access Now, a nonprofit that supports net neutrality. Zuckerberg has suggested in the past that such a service would be too expensive and difficult to offer.
Some Indians, meanwhile, say their country could have benefited from Free Basics.
"Ultimately, something is better than nothing, even if that something is flawed," said Uday Singh Tomar, a software engineer in New Delhi. "If a person is hungry and getting nothing, a free meal is good enough."
WASHINGTON (AP) — Some victims and affected families in the mass shootings in southern California will file court papers in support of a U.S. magistrate judge's order that Apple Inc. help the FBI hack into a locked iPhone as part of the terrorism investigation, a lawyer and others said Monday.
A Los Angeles attorney, Stephen Larson, said he represents at least several families of victims and other employees he declined to identify but who were affected by the shootings. He said the U.S. attorney in the case, Eileen Decker, sought his help. Larson said he will file a brief supporting the Justice Department before March 3.
The victims "have questions that go simply beyond the criminal investigation ... in terms of why this happened, how this happened, why they were targeted, is there anything about them on the iPhone — things that are more of a personal victim" view, Larson said.
George Valasco, whose 27-year-old niece Yvette Velasco was killed in the shooting, said his brother — Yvette's father — agreed to be named in the brief.
"Frankly it's difficult to understand why Apple would not jump at the opportunity to help uncover whatever information the phone may contain," according to a family statement. "We're not talking about an ordinary case here — this is an act of terrorism, where 14 Americans lost their lives, and many more were seriously injured. It's potentially a matter of national security, where other Americans' safety could be at risk."
An appeal by victims in the case gives the Justice Department additional support in a case that has sparked a national debate over digital privacy rights and national security interests. Magistrate Judge Sheri Pym in California ordered Apple last week to assist investigators by creating specialized software that would let the FBI rapidly test random passcode combinations to try to unlock the iPhone and view data stored on it.
The county-issued iPhone 5C was used by Syed Farook, who with his wife, Tashfeen Malik, killed 14 people at an office holiday party in December before they died in a gun battle with police. The government said they had been at least partly inspired by the Islamic State.
The couple physically destroyed two personal phones so completely that the FBI has been unable to recover information from them.
Farook had worked as a county health inspector. Larson said the government has a strong case because of Farook's diminished privacy interests as a "dead, murderous terrorist" and because the phone was owned by his employer, the county government. "You're weighing that against the interest of enforcement in an investigation and the victims and their interest in obtaining this knowledge," he said.
Gregory Clayborn, whose 27-year-old daughter, Sierra, died in the attack, said he hasn't been asked to join the case but believes Apple is obligated to unlock the phone.
"This makes me a little bit angry with Apple," Clayborn said. "It makes me question their interest in the safety of this country."
Clayborn said he owns Apple products and understands why the company wouldn't want the FBI to have the software to access anyone's phones. But unlocking one for the FBI, he said, is "as simple as it gets."
Larson, a former U.S. district judge, said he knew Pym, the magistrate, and described her as an "extraordinary jurist" when she argued in his courtroom as a then-federal prosecutor.
Apple Inc. CEO Tim Cook acknowledged in a letter to employees earlier Monday that that "it does not feel right" to refuse to help the FBI, but he said to do so would threaten data security for millions by creating essentially a master key that could later be duplicated and used against other phones.
"We have no tolerance or sympathy for terrorists," Cook wrote in an early morning email. "When they commit unspeakable acts like the tragic attacks in San Bernardino, we work to help the authorities pursue justice for the victims."
Cook's email came hours after FBI director James Comey said in an online post that Apple owes it to the San Bernardino victims to cooperate and the FBI "can't look the survivors in the eye, or ourselves in the mirror, if we don't follow this lead."
Apple's supporters planned to protest the FBI's demands on Tuesday evening outside Apple's stories in about 50 cities in the U.S., the U.K., Germany and Hong Kong. In Washington, people were being asked to protest outside the FBI's headquarters.
According to a new survey by the Pew Research Center, 51 percent of Americans said Apple should unlock the iPhone to assist the ongoing FBI investigation, while 38 percent said Apple should not to ensure the security of other users' information. Eleven percent gave no opinion. The telephone survey was conducted Feb. 18 through Feb. 21 among 1,002 adults.
FOUNTAIN, Fla. (AP) — The death of a 10-year-old girl, allegedly at the hands of her 15-year-old brother, stunned employees of a Florida sheriff's office who had tried to help the family in the past, an authority with the office said Monday.
"About three or four years ago, one of our deputies discovered the family living in basically a pole barn with walls that were covered with tarps," said Maj. Tommy Ford of the Bay County Sheriff's office. "We went out there and helped to put walls up and brought some food and Christmas presents for the kids."
Deputies arrested the 15-year-old boy on Sunday afternoon after finding his sister's body in a field near the home. The girl was reported missing Sunday morning. The Associated Press does not generally name juveniles accused of crimes.
Ford said the boy became a suspect during the search and that he later confessed to killing his sister. In an arrest affidavit released by the department Monday afternoon, an officer who interviewed the boy wrote that he first told investigators that he shot his sister about 3 a.m. Sunday after mistaking her for a deer. The boy later said he saw someone attack his sister and he accidentally hit her while trying to fire at the attacker. The boy changed his story a third time and said that he accidentally shot his sister while trying to teach her how to shoot his rifle.
The boy also told investigators that he cleaned his sister's body, changed her clothing and moved her to the field where the body was later found.
Ford said prosecutors could charge the 15-year-old as an adult.
Earlier Monday, Sheriff Frank McKeithen described the boy in a news conference as "hardcore," saying he acted much older than 15 when confronted by authorities.