Zuckerberg gives up annual personal challenges, shares his goals for the next decade including a new private social platform, AR/VR, and new forms of governance
Every new year of the last decade I set a personal challenge. My goal was to grow in new ways outside my day-to-day work running Facebook.
Facebook says it won't back down from allowing lies in political ads but will give users the option to see fewer political ads in their feed and in Instagram
The company was under intense pressure to adjust its policies. But in this presidential election year, no big changes are planned.
Mozilla patches an actively exploited Firefox zero-day flaw that could allow attackers to take control of computers by accessing sensitive memory locations
Flaw allows attackers to access sensitive memory locations that are normally off-limits. — Mozilla has released a new version …
Source: Microsoft contractors vetting Skype audio worked from home in China with “no security measures”; company says it now uses secure facilities not in China
Exclusive: former Microsoft contractor says he was emailed login after minimal vetting
Facebook starts testing a desktop redesign, announced last April, with a small set of users, plans to offer the new look more broadly sometime before the spring
Facebook 's begun giving some users access to its redesigned desktop experience, first announced in April, that's less cluttered and uses brighter icons.
A look at sexual health and wellness companies at CES 2020, where they were allowed to exhibit their products for the first time
Sexual health and wellness companies were allowed to exhibit their wares for the first time this year. — If there was ever a metaphor for the newfound …
Medical technology company Masimo sues Apple, claims it infringes on 10 patents and has stolen its tech related to blood oxygen level and heart rate monitoring
- Medical technology company says Watch uses stolen secrets — Apple accused of stealing technology for non-invasive monitors
Amazon warned holiday shoppers that Honey, a browser extension for comparison shopping and rewards acquired by Paypal for $4B in November, was a “security risk”
The retail giant warned holiday shoppers that Honey, a popular browser extension, was a “security risk.” Honey denies the claim.
India's Supreme Court says the indefinite shutdown of the internet in Kashmir is illegal, rebuking the government for the communications lockdown
Sankalp Phartiyal, Fayaz Bukhari — NEW DELHI/SRINAGAR (Reuters) - India's Supreme Court said on Friday that an indefinite shutdown …
Microsoft releases “Project Artemis”, a tool that scans online chats for patterns that may indicate a predator is grooming children for sexual abuse
Microsoft released a new tool Thursday that scans online chats for people seeking to sexually exploit children.
Sources: SoftBank-backed Oyo has let go of 1,800 staff: 5% of its 12K employees in China and 12% of its 10K staff in India, plans to cut 1,200 more in India
- Oyo's ructions present yet another headache for SoftBank — Oyo Hotels is firing thousands of staff across China and India …
Nielsen: US music streams on services like Spotify, Apple Music grew 30% in 2019 to reach one trillion; streaming accounted for 82% of all US music consumption
Anne Steele / Wall Street Journal :
Source: Tiger Global invests $200M in Bangalore-based education app Byju's at a $8B valuation, up from ~$5.7B in July 2019; Byju's says it has 40M users
Biswarup Gooptu / The Economic Times :
Microsoft announces a Walkie Talkie feature and off-shift access controls for Teams, SMS sign-in for Azure Active Directory, shared device sign-out, more
Emma Williams / Microsoft 365 Blog :
Just Eat investors holding 80.4% of shares approve Takeaway's $8B all-stock bid, ending the bidding war with Prosus to take over UK-based food delivery startup
- Investors with about 80.4% of Just Eat stock back Takeaway — Announcement ends months-long battle to take over U.K. firm Tweets: @bloombergasia Tweets: Bloomberg Asia / @bloombergasia : http://ta...
MalwareBytes: an Android phone offered free by Assurance Wireless as part of the US Lifeline Assistance program comes pre-installed with Chinese malware
With help from John Hendel and Eric Geller Paul Wagenseil / Tom's Guide : ‘Obamaphones’ come preloaded with malware Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet : Unremovable malware found preinstalled on low-end smartpho...
Brochure shows a surveillance vendor is offering spying capabilities to local police via hidden cameras in tombstones, vacuum cleaners, and baby car seats
Joseph Cox / VICE :
Chinese court rules that a work generated by Tencent's automated news writing program, Dreamwriter, qualifies for copyright protection
A Chinese court has ruled that AI-generated works are entitled to copyright protection, in a win for tech giant Tencent. See also Mediagazer
Lime says it is laying off about 14% of its workforce, roughly 100 employees, and shuttering operations in 12 markets as it seeks to become profitable this year
Kia Kokalitcheva / Axios :
Facebook updates its hate speech policy to ban statements denying the existence of marginalized groups and an additional eight specific dehumanizing comparisons
Shoshana Wodinsky / Gizmodo : Tweets: @sirsteven , @joshconstine , @swodinsky , @joshconstine , @caseynewton , @gizmodo , @joshconstine , @liz_shepherd , @yoda , @caseynewton , @yoda , and @caseynewt...
Researchers estimate streaming companies lost about $9.1B to password piracy and sharing in 2019 and say losses will rise to $12.5B in 2024
Alex Weprin / Hollywood Reporter :
Cardiologs, whose clinical decision support system uses AI to help detect heart conditions, raises $15M Series A
Cardiologs, a French medical technology startup that's leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to help detect heart conditions, has raised $15 million in series A funding.
Reddit bans the impersonation of an individual or entity in a misleading or deceptive manner, but impersonation that's satire will still be allowed
Jay Peters / The Verge :
SoftBank-backed Rappi, an on-demand delivery startup operating in Latin America, says it is laying off around 6% of its workforce, or around 300 people
Dan Primack / Axios :
Verizon eliminates bundles and contracts for Fios line of TV, broadband, and phone services, will now sell them as standalone products via “Mix & Match on Fios”
Todd Spangler / Variety :
Government data shows iPhone sales in China rose by 18.7% YoY to ~3.18M units in December while overall smartphone shipments were ~30M, down 13.7% YoY
Bloomberg :
Research: more VC deals were struck around the world in 2019 than in any other year, though the total dollar volume of deals dropped slightly from 2018
Jason D. Rowley / Crunchbase News : Thanks: @bayareawriter
Report: Facebook Gaming's market share rose to 8.5% of all streaming hours watched last month, up from 3.1% in Dec 2018, while Twitch dropped to 61% from 67.1%
Olga Kharif / Bloomberg :
dot.LA, a tech news site by former Zillow CEO Spencer Rascoff raises a $4M seed round from Comcast Ventures, Snap, others, will launch news coverage on Jan. 27
Kurt Schlosser / GeekWire :
Docs: Lyft has offered to pay NY ride-share drivers about $100-$600 each to settle a lawsuit alleging it misclassified them as contractors instead of employees
Bloomberg Law :
Shopify's new AI commerce stack
Their VP of Product digs into just-launched products to help entrepreneurs and developers build with the latest AI and tech.
Email fatigue is real: Here's how smart email tools help you regain control
Picture this: It's Monday morning. You walk into the office feeling energized and ready to take on the week.
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data
Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.