You’re reading Significant Digits, a daily digest of the numbers tucked inside the news.
67 percent
According to new FBI statistics, hate crimes in the U.S. rose by 6.8 percent last year, with attacks against Muslims increasing by 67 percent. [Quartz]
69 percent
Percentage of South Africans who agree that jobs go only to “people with connections” and that that’s “a very important reason” why many other people in South Africa don’t have jobs. That figure was similarly high in other major African nations: 63 percent in Nigeria and 64 percent in Kenya. [Pew Research Center]
659 asteroids
Number of asteroids listed by the NASA Center for Near-Earth Object Studies as having some chance of hitting Earth. If it’s any consolation, the organizers of an event called “Asteroid Day” maintain that there are 1 million asteroids that could potentially strike the planet, and that we have only found a very, very small portion of them. [The New York Times]
100,000 beavers
… are doomed to die at the hands of the Argentine government. They were released into the province of Tierra del Fuego to spur the fur trade, but the beavers began reproducing and — with no natural predators — got out of hand. Argentina plans to eradicate the entire population. [BBC]
600,000 people
Over 600,000 people are directly employed in jobs related to alternative energy in the U.S., with a further 1.9 million employed in the energy efficiency industry. [FiveThirtyEight]
412 million accounts
Friend Finder Networks, which owns Cams.com, Penthouse, Stripshow, iCams and Adult Friend Finder, has been hacked. (I assume those sites are related to, respectively, climbing equipment, real estate, Broadway plays based on Sunday morning newspaper comics, Apple-compatible climbing equipment and finding acquaintances in adulthood.) More than 412 million accounts have reportedly been exposed. [The Guardian]
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