Government & Policy

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff apologizes for saying National Guard troops needed in San Francisco

Marc Benioff, co-founder and CEO of Salesforce, appears to be walking back comments calling for the National Guard to patrol San Francisco. “Having listened closely to my fellow San Franciscans and our local officials, and after the largest and safest Dreamforce in our history, I do not believe the National Guard is needed to address […]

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Senate Republicans deepfaked Chuck Schumer, and X hasn’t taken it down 

Senate Republicans shared a deepfake video of Chuck Schumer, the Senate minority leader, designed to make it seem like Democrats are celebrating the ongoing government shutdown, which has lasted 16 days.   In the deepfake, an AI-generated Schumer repeats the phrase “every day gets better for us,” an actual quote taken out of context from

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Should AI do everything? OpenAI thinks so

Silicon Valley’s rule? It’s not cool to be cautious. As OpenAI removes guardrails and VCs criticize companies like Anthropic for supporting AI safety regulations, it’s becoming clearer who the industry thinks should shape AI development.  On this episode of Equity, Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Max Zeff discuss how the line between innovation and responsibility

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EFF, unions sue Trump administration over alleged mass social media surveillance of legal residents

Digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed a lawsuit on Thursday against the Trump administration over the government’s alleged social media monitoring of people who are lawfully living in the United States. The suit contends that the government is using AI and other methods to watch the social media posts of virtually every

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Seoul weighs approval for Google, Apple high-resolution map requests

South Korea is nearing a decision on whether to allow Google and Apple to export high-resolution geographic map data to servers outside the country. The detailed maps, which use a 1:5,000 scale, would show streets, buildings, and alleyways in far greater detail than currently available on these platforms. However, several regulatory and security hurdles remain

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Cyber giant F5 Networks says government hackers had ‘long-term’ access to its systems, stole code and customer data

Cybersecurity firm F5 Networks says government-backed hackers had “long-term, persistent access” to its network, which allowed them to steal the company’s source code and customer information. In a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday, F5 said it now “believes its containment actions have been successful,” after first discovering the hackers in

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California becomes first state to regulate AI companion chatbots

California Governor Gavin Newsom signed a landmark bill on Monday that regulates AI companion chatbots, making it the first state in the nation to require AI chatbot operators to implement safety protocols for AI companions. The law, SB 243, is designed to protect children and vulnerable users from some of the harms associated with AI

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Salesforce CEO says National Guard should patrol San Francisco — stunning his own PR team

Marc Benioff has long been San Francisco’s liberal-leaning billionaire, the tech executive who funded homeless services, donated to the city’s public schools, and hosted Hillary Clinton fundraisers. But in a new, wide-ranging phone interview with the New York Times from his private plane, Benioff revealed a political transformation that seemed to surprise even his own

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Former UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to advise Microsoft and Anthropic 

Rishi Sunak, who served as the United Kingdom’s prime minister from 2022 to 2024, has taken on senior advisory roles as Microsoft and Anthropic, The Guardian reports.   Letters from the Parliament’s office of the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (Acoba) disclosing Sunak’s appointments revealed concerns that the ex-Conservative PM’s privileged information could “grant Microsoft an unfair advantage.”  

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UK slaps Google Search with special market status, making way for stricter regulations

The United Kingdom’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) on Friday designated Google with a special status in the market for online search that would enable the regulator to enforce stricter regulations. The CMA has designated Google as having “strategic market status” in the search and search advertising markets, which means the company has such “a

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