GSMA says it has canceled Mobile World Congress after the coronavirus made it “impossible” to hold the event
MWC 2020 is no more — The world's biggest phone show, Mobile World Congress, is no longer taking place this year. After coronavirus threatened to throw MWC into chaos …
Andy Rubin's Essential Products, which raised $330M to build smartphones and was valued at $1B, says it is ceasing operations
The smartphone company founded by Mr. Rubin, a former Google executive, struggled to win over customers. — SAN FRANCISCO — Essential Products …
Senator Gillibrand proposes creating a government agency to protect internet privacy, similar to a bill proposed by a pair of California House Democrats
- New York Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand just became the latest lawmaker to propose digital privacy legislation.
Larry Ellison is hosting a fundraiser for Donald Trump next week; while Ellison has consistently backed Republicans, he wasn't a major Trump donor until now
Larry Ellison risks blowback from his employees at Oracle. Phillip Faraone/Getty Images — It's the most significant endorsement …
Uber pilots booking rides with a phone call, not via the app, in Arizona, by dialing 1-833-USE-UBER and talking to a human operator
Uber is piloting a different way to order one of its cars beyond its apps or voice assistants, and it's one you might be familiar with if you ever had to order a cab before 2009 or so.
Snapchat is testing a redesign with a navigation bar, a top news section, and a more accessible Snap Map, three years after its last, widely panned redesign
A new home for the Snap Map and its original shows — plus a new test of news briefs — Snap is working on two significant tests …
Facebook says it has banned a network of two dozen fake pages and accounts linked to two Southeast Asian telecoms for using disinformation against rivals
South-east Asian providers said to have used fake accounts to discredit rivals — Facebook has alleged that one of south-east Asia's …
How teens are using Instagram to create eBay-like thrift shops, with the Story highlight area as a FAQ page, and comments for bidding
Carly Shipman, who hails from the suburbs of Chicago, lives the typical life of a high schooler. She goes to class every day, then to track practice in the afternoon. Tweets: @abcdedgar Tweets: Edgar...
Sources: Google's scattered health care projects unify under Google Health, which now has over 500 employees and is led by former Geisinger CEO David Feinberg
- More than 500 people now work at Google Health, mostly out of the Palo Alto offices formerly occupied by smart home group Nest.
The Bloomberg campaign is working with Meme 2020, whose lead strategist is the CEO of Jerry Media, to create sponsored posts on influential Instagram accounts
A campaign of sponsored content for the candidate flourished suddenly on Instagram. A new outfit, called Meme 2020, is behind it.
Alibaba Q3: total revenue of $23.1B, up 38% YoY; net income $7.49B, up 58% YoY; cloud revenue grows 62% YoY to hit $1.53B
Alibaba's cloud revenue exceeds 10 billion yuan for the first time in a single quarter, growing 62% to hit 10.72 billion yuan for its third quarter …
Intuition Robotics, which makes companion robots for elderly people, raises $36M Series B co-led by Sparx Group and OurCrowd
Israeli robotics startup Intuition Robotics has raised $36 million in a series B round of funding co-led by Sparx Group and OurCrowd, with participation from Samsung Next …
Broadcom unveils Wi-Fi 6E chip designed to deliver 2 Gbps+ speeds with better battery life, says it will also improve Bluetooth audio performance and range
With a Wi-Fi 6E processor called BCM4389, Broadcom is aiming to take advantage of new 6 GHz spectrum coming online through multiple devices.
Ireland's Data Protection Commission: Facebook has postponed launching Dating on Valentine's Day in Europe after DPC resorted to an inspection to procure docs
Data Protection Commission :
A bot called Lsjbot is responsible for 24M out of 29.5M edits and 99.2% of articles for Wikipedia Cebuano edition; all but 5 of the top 35 editors are also bots
Kyle Wilson is an administrator on the English Wikipedia and a global user renamer . He does not receive payment … Tweets: @motherboard and @motherboard Tweets: @motherboard : One bot is responsible ...
Cisco meets Q2 expectations with revenue of $12B, non-GAAP net income of $3.3B, flat YoY, stock down 4%+ after hours
Cisco Reports Second Quarter FY20 Earnings Stephanie Condon / ZDNet : Cisco beats Q2 expectations with growth in services Eric Jhonsa / TheStreet : Cisco Slides After Mixed Numbers: 6 Key Takeaways Mi...
Google rolls out Emoji Kitchen, which mashes up two emojis into a sticker, for Gboard on Android
Jon Porter / The Verge :
Google's Area 120 launches GameSnacks, which offers casual games for low memory devices on 2G and 3G, launching initially in Indonesia on Gojek's GoGames
A new project called GameSnacks is launching today from Google's in-house incubator, Area 120, with the goal of bringing fast-loading …
Consumer advocacy group DoNotPay launches Robo Revenge, an app that fights robocallers by giving them burner credit card info and then helping users sue them
Edward Ongweso Jr / VICE :
WhatsApp says it now has 2B users worldwide, up from the 1.5B it announced two years ago
Connecting the World Privately Isobel Asher Hamilton / Business Insider : WhatsApp seized on US allegations against Huawei to defend encryption against the government's demands for backdoors Nikhil Pa...
Crypto lending and borrowing service BlockFi raises $30M Series B led by Valar Ventures, bringing its total raised to over $100M
The latest funding round pushed BlockFi's total funding to over $100 million. — Ethereum — Crypto lending and borrowing service BlockFi today announced …
Astranis raises $90M Series B from a16z and others to launch its first commercial satellites through which it wants to provide broadband internet
YC-backed Astranis has raised $90 million of new combined debt and equity funding in a Series B round led Venrock, with a sizeable contribution …
Nextdoor launches new app for public agencies like police, fire departments, and city halls, allowing them to post updates and push out geotargeted alerts
Sarah Holder / CityLab : Tweets: @sarahsholder , @nextdoor , @citylab , @sarahsholder , @citylab , @math_rachel , @rickpaulas , @derektmead , and @hypervisible Tweets: Sarah Holder / @sarahsholder : ...
SEC filing: Spotify bought The Ringer for ~$141M to $196M in cash, some of it deferred and subject to closing adjustments
surprise — Airbnb U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission : FORM 20-F - Spotify Technology S.A. Tweets: Greg / @grage52 : Overpaying for Gimlet, worth it. For this? Mistake. https://twitter.com/... Se...
Coinbase launches margin trading for Coinbase Pro investors, working with up to 3x leverage, available now in select markets in the US and elsewhere
Romain Dillet / TechCrunch :
UK expands broadcast regulator Ofcom's role to include online content, giving it the ability to enforce content standards on social media
but punts all the hard decisions to either the companies or to later in the year https://www.politico.eu/... https://twitter.com/... ICO / @iconews : You can read our full statement regarding the gove...
Democratic senators propose the Ethical Use of Artificial Intelligence Act that would place a moratorium on facial recognition use by federal agencies, police
Khari Johnson / VentureBeat :
Reuters launches a new Reuters Fact Check business unit and blog and partners with Facebook to review news headlines, deepfakes, and user generated content
Josh Constine / TechCrunch :
GitHub launches a subsidiary in India, saying it's home to its third-largest community of developers and it saw 22% growth there over the past year
Paul Sawers / VentureBeat :
Shopify beats with Q4 revenue of $505.2M, up 47% YoY; sales on Shopify's platform from Black Friday through Cyber Monday rose 61% YoY to $2.9B+; stock up ~8%
Annie Palmer / CNBC :
A look at how Tala and other microfinance tech startups have exploded in Kenya, offering sky-high interest rates that have left some borrowers with nothing
1 in 10 adults—have defaulted on a digital loan. Others are trapped in a debt cycle, borrowing from one app to pay off another https://www.bloomberg.com/... Lydia DePillis / @lydiadepillis : This @Zek...
Q&A with McAfee CTO Steve Grobman on unusual types of ransomware, the state of AI in orchestrating and defending against cyberattacks, and deepfake detection
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat :
Habu, which offers analysis and management tools for marketing data, emerges from stealth with $15M Series A
Anthony Ha / TechCrunch : Thanks: @alexandrapaulv
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.