Policy
Auto Added by WPeMatico
As Cook and Pichai leave China, Valley confronts rising internet tyranny in world’s second largest market
It’s been a bad few months for internet freedom in China (and really, a bad few decades, but who is counting?). The government brought into force a broad-ranging “cybersecurity law” earlier this year that empowers Beijing to take unilateral control over critical internet infrastructure, while also mandating that foreign companies keep all citizen data local inside China. Read More
Powered by WPeMatico
Net Neutrality advocates plan protests for December 7 at Verizon stores
On December 14, the FCC will vote on whether or not to roll back Obama-era policies protecting a free and open internet. In fact, during yesterday’s announcement of the upcoming vote, the FCC neglected to mention the historic 22 million comments on the issue, the majority of which were opposed to its rollback. Read More
Powered by WPeMatico
Senate plans disastrous tax on vesting that could kill stock compensation
A proposed tax that charges people as their startup equity vests instead of when they cash it out and actually have money to pay the taxes could wreck how tech companies recruit talent. And the industry doesn’t have much time to mobilize to get this tax changed. Facebook will teach the unemployed digital/social media skills in 30 cities
Facebook today announced Community Boost. Facebook tells me it’s investing tens of millions of dollars into the program that will travel to 30 cities around the U.S. in 2018. It will teach digital job skills to the unemployed, internet literacy to those just getting online, startup methodology to entrepreneurs and customer growth to small business owners. Read More
Powered by WPeMatico
120K Instagrams by Russian election attackers hit 20M Americans
Facebook detailed the extent of Russia’s election interference campaign on Instagram today during its second congressional hearing. Facebook general counsel Colin Stretch said that 120,000 posts by Russian election attackers reached 16 million Americans from October through the election, and the posts reached an additional 4 million Americans prior to October when Facebook has less… Read More
Powered by WPeMatico
Twitter bans ‘Hateful Display Names’ and shares Safety road map
Twitter has committed to a specific timeline for rolling out changes to its Safety features, and announced new policies, including a ban on hateful display names, and improvements for second-hand “witness reporting” of abuse. By January, Twitter plans to have implemented all the abuse changes outlined in the internal email published by Wired earlier this week, as well as the new… Read More
Powered by WPeMatico
WhatsApp blocked in China, though past bans proved temporary
WhatsApp has been widely blocked in mainland China by the country’s government, with text messaging as well as photo and video sharing not currently functional. However, WhatsApp had previously been blocked in the country and saw those blocks lifted within a few days, so it’s unclear how long the chat app may remain inaccessible. Read More
Powered by WPeMatico
The US Government must work with tech companies if it wants to remain competitive in AI
U.S. Secretary of Defense James Mattis is concluding his tech tour of the West Coast today with a visit to Google’s Mountain View campus. Mattis spent time at Amazon and the Defense Innovation Unit Experimental, earlier in the week. His key takeaway from all the socializing with tech leaders is that the Department of Defense needs to embrace technology coming out of the private sector… Read More
Powered by WPeMatico
Facebook bans ‘cloaking’ of spam sites that fool filters
“Cloaking” sounds sci-fi, but it’s actually a trick used today by spammers to show content moderators or search engine spiders an innocent-looking version of their site while real visitors just see ads and scams. The battle between hotels and Airbnb escalates in NYC
The war between Airbnb and the hotel industry rages on, and it’s reaching new lows here in New York. A campaign, backed by the Hotel Association of New York City Inc. and the union that represents hotel workers, launched a 10-day, 30-second ad that links Airbnb’s short-term rentals to public security threats. The ad sets the stage for fear-mongering, stating that NYC remains the… Read More
Powered by WPeMatico