In today’s Bulldog update of tech and science news:

  • Judge orders LinkedIn to stop blocking data-scraping firm
  • Facebook bans white nationalist’s accounts over hate speech
  • Atlanta airport’s Uber, Lyft passengers discover long walk to new pick-up area
  • Protests at Google offices over worker’s firing are canceled
  • SpaceX Dragon delivers scientific bounty to space station

The details:

  • Judge orders LinkedIn to stop blocking data-scraping firm

A federal judge in San Francisco has ordered LinkedIn to stop blocking a startup company from scraping LinkedIn personal profiles for data.

U.S. District Judge Edward Chen has sided with hiQ Labs, a San Francisco company that analyzes workforce data scraped from public profiles.

LinkedIn invoked a federal anti-hacking law in telling hiQ to stop. LinkedIn also installed technical blocks to prevent hiQ from accessing otherwise publicly available information on LinkedIn users. Chen’s preliminary injunction Monday gives LinkedIn a day to remove those blocks.

LinkedIn, which is a part of Microsoft, says it may challenge the ruling.

LinkedIn spokeswoman Nicole Leverich says “we will continue to fight to protect our members’ ability to control the information they make available on LinkedIn.”

Many companies also oppose data scrapping in favor of licensing data for a fee.

In a statement, hiQ said the company “believes that public data must remain public” and that big companies shouldn’t stifle innovation by hoarding public data.

  • Facebook bans white nationalist’s accounts over hate speech

Facebook has banned the Facebook and Instagram accounts of a white nationalist who attended the rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, that ended in deadly violence.

Facebook spokeswoman Ruchika Budhraja tells The Associated Press that the profile pages of Christopher Cantwell have been removed as well as a page connected to his podcast. Cantwell was featured in a Vice News documentary about the rally and its aftermath.

Facebook has also removed at least eight pages connected to the white nationalist movement over what Budhraja says were violations on the company’s polices on hate speech and organizations.

Cantwell, of Keene, New Hampshire, was listed on rally flyers and labeled an extremist by the Southern Poverty Law Center. A former information technology worker who moved to New Hampshire from New York in 2012, the 36-year-old Cantwell describes himself as a white nationalist and said he voted for President Donald Trump. He has a podcast and blog that promote his views.

Cantwell says Facebook shut down his account in an attempt to silence him for his views. He also said his PayPal account had been closed. The company wouldn’t confirm that because it has a policy of not commenting on the status of accounts.

“I’m not surprised by almost any of this because the whole thing we are complaining about here is that we are trying to express our views, and everybody is going through extraordinary lengths to make sure we are not heard,” Cantwell said in a phone interview from an undisclosed location.

  • Atlanta airport’s Uber, Lyft passengers discover long walk to new pick-up area

Atlanta’s airport rolled out its temporary ride-sharing pickup/drop-off area Wednesday, adding an extra three to five minutes of walking time for Uber and Lyft passengers.

“That’s my exercise for today,” said Atlanta resident Bruce Rivas, who just returned from a trip with his father.

Business traveler Ashley Rogers said she, too, felt like she got a workout after picking up her luggage from baggage claim.

“The walk was long,” said Rogers. “I wasn’t expecting it to be that long with all this stuff I have.”

Until today, ride-sharing passengers were picked up in the same location as everyone else — curbside outside the terminals. Construction of a new curbside canopy, however, prompted airport officials to temporarily move the ride-sharing area to the economy lots of both the North and South terminals, just beyond the parking garages.

Airport workers were on hand Wednesday to help guide confused Uber and Lyft drivers to the new pickup/drop-off areas.

Passengers told CBS46 News the walk from baggage claim to the new ride-sharing area was clearly marked. Some worried the distance might be a problem for people with mobility issues.

“Maybe they’ll make some type of exception for that,” said Uber driver Tammy Tanner. “I’m sure they’ll work that plan out so they don’t have to travel so far.”

  • Protests at Google offices over worker’s firing are canceled

Protests planned at Google offices around the country over the firing of an employee who questioned company diversity efforts have been postponed.

A statement Wednesday on the “March on Google” website said Saturday’s protests were being canceled because of threats from what it called “alt left terrorist groups.”

The planned events in Pittsburgh and eight other locations were in reaction to Google’s firing of a software engineer who argued that biological differences helped explain why women are underrepresented at the company.

Protest organizers didn’t respond to requests for information about the alleged threats. A Pittsburgh public safety spokeswoman said organizers had informed them “of plans to cancel and why they were cancelling,” but she wouldn’t elaborate.

Police departments in Mountain View, California, where Google is headquartered, and Cambridge, Massachusetts, where the company has an office, said the organizers hadn’t sought a permit after announcing planned events there.

Jeremy Warnick, a spokesman for the Cambridge Police Department, said the department knew of no possible threats. “Through our various public safety partners, there were no known threats made against the March on Google here in Cambridge,” he said.

  • SpaceX Dragon delivers scientific bounty to space station

A SpaceX shipment arrived at the International Space Station on Wednesday, delivering a bonanza of science experiments.

The SpaceX Dragon capsule pulled up following a two-day flight from Cape Canaveral. NASA astronaut Jack Fischer used the space station’s hefty robot arm to grab the Dragon 250 miles (400 kilometers) above the Pacific, near New Zealand.

The Dragon holds 3 tons of cargo, mostly research. The extra-large science load includes a cosmic ray monitor, a mini satellite with cheap, off-the-shelf scopes for potential military viewing, and 20 mice for an eye and brain study.

Lucky for the station’s six-person crew, a big variety of ice cream is also stashed away in freezers, including birthday cake flavor. U.S. astronaut Randolph Bresnik turns 50 next month.

“Congratulations on a job well done,” Mission Control radioed from Houston. “You guys have just won yourselves some fresh food.”

It was 13th supply shipment by SpaceX.