Apple Concedes on ‘Anticompetitive’ Restrictions in App Store
By: The Guardian September 2, 2021 Apple has made a significant concession in its battle for control of the App Store, after the Japanese trade commission ruled that the company’s restrictions on apps such as Spotify, Netflix and Kindle were anticompetitive. Those “reader apps”, which allow users to view, read or listen to content purchased […]
Amazon, Google, Microsoft Compete for Work on ICE RAVEn Data-Mining Tool
By: Business Insider September 2, 2021 Representatives from Google, Amazon and Microsoft showed up for ICE’s RAVEn technology on a busy industry day. The tool uses thousands of sources, including surveillance footage, biometrics, and social media data. Contracts for the program are worth up to $300 million, according to documents obtained by Insider. […]
China Plans to Ban U.S. IPOs for Data-Heavy Tech Firms
By: The Wall Street Journal August 27, 2021 SINGAPORE—China plans to propose new rules that would ban companies with large amounts of sensitive consumer data from going public in the U.S., people familiar with the matter said, a move that is likely to thwart the ambitions of the country’s tech firms to list abroad. […]
The Secret Bias Hidden in Mortgage-Approval Algorithms
By: ABC News August 25, 2021 The new four-bedroom house in Charlotte, North Carolina, was Crystal Marie and Eskias McDaniels’ personal American dream, the reason they had moved to this Southern town from pricey Los Angeles a few years ago. A lush, long lawn, 2,700 square feet of living space, a neighborhood pool […]
Ethiopia Starts Building Local Rival to Facebook
By: The Guardian August 23, 2021 Ethiopia has begun developing its own social media platform to rival Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp, though it does not plan to block the global services, the state communications security agency has said. For the past year Ethiopia has been engulfed in an armed conflict between the federal government and the […]
The Party’s Over: China Clamps Down on its Tech Billionaires
By: The Guardian August 21, 2021 In a Politburo group study session on 23 November 2015, China’s president, Xi Jinping, recommended the book Capital in the Twenty-First Century by the French economist Thomas Piketty. “The rich data he used demonstrated that … unrestrained capitalism accelerates wealth inequality … [His] conclusion is worth us pondering on.” Back then, […]
How AI-Powered Tech Landed Man In Jail With Scant Evidence
By: AP News August 20, 2021 CHICAGO (AP) — Michael Williams’ wife pleaded with him to remember their fishing trips with the grandchildren, how he used to braid her hair, anything to jar him back to his world outside the concrete walls of Cook County Jail. His three daily calls to her had […]
New Chinese Law Tightens Control Over Company Data on Users
By: AP News August 20, 2020 BEIJING (AP) — China is tightening control over information gathered by companies about the public under a law approved Friday by its ceremonial legislature, expanding the ruling Communist Party’s crackdown on internet industries. The law would impose some of the world’s strictest controls on private sector handling […]
Chinese President Vows to ‘Adjust Excessive Incomes’ of Super Rich
By: The Guardian August 18, 2021 China’s president has vowed to “adjust excessive incomes” in a warning to the country’s super-rich that the state plans to redistribute wealth to tackle widening inequality. According to reports in state media, Xi Jinping told officials at a meeting of the Chinese Communist party’s central financial and economic affairs […]