In Brief

After Meta signals end to publisher payouts, Australia plots Big Tech news tax

Social /

A few years ago, Australia passed legislation requiring platform giants including Facebook-owner Meta and YouTube’s parent Google to negotiate with news publishers to pay for journalism reshares. The News Media Bargaining Code forced Big Tech to cut deals with local news outlets. However, Meta has since moved away from promoting news on its platforms globally […]

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Bid to revive UK privacy damages suit against Google DeepMind fails to show class

Privacy /

Another attempt to get a class-action style privacy damages case to stick against Google has failed in the U.K. after the Court of Appeal refused to overturn an earlier dismissal. The lawsuit concerned the misuse of health records for some 1.6 million patients whose information was passed to Google’s AI division, DeepMind, back in 2015

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Apple reportedly developing AI server chip with Broadcom

AI /

Apple is working with semiconductor company Broadcom on its first server chip designed to handle AI applications, according to The Information, which cited three people with knowledge of the project.  Apple is known for designing its own chips — called Apple Silicon and primarily manufactured by TSMC — for its devices. But those chips weren’t

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Mozilla removes ‘Do Not Track’ from Firefox because it was useless

Privacy /

Most web browsers currently have a feature called “Do Not Track” hidden in settings. In the case of Mozilla’s Firefox browser, Windows Report has spotted a change in the upcoming version — the setting is gone. But this doesn’t mean what you think it means. As the name suggests, if you have “Do Not Track”

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EU’s data protection supervisor reviewing Microsoft 365 report

Privacy /

Back in March, the European Commission’s use of Microsoft 365 was found to have broken the bloc’s data protection rules. Since then, we haven’t heard much about this awkward situation. But Monday was the deadline for the EU’s executive to respond to the European Data Protection Supervisor’s (EDPS) order requiring it to suspend any infringing

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Meta’s Nick Clegg says Elon Musk has potential to be a political ‘puppet master’

Government & Policy /

On a podcast with BBC’s Nick Robinson, Meta’s president of global affairs, Nick Clegg, talked about how Elon Musk is “playing an outsized role in both the election and now the formation of the new U.S. administration.”  Clegg said he thinks that Elon Musk has a “choice” when it comes to his political future: to

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OpenAI considers ditching provision that would prevent AGI from being used for commercial gain

AI /

According to the Financial Times, OpenAI is considering ditching a provision that would shut Microsoft, a major partner and investor, out of its most advanced technology when OpenAI achieves artificial general intelligence (AGI). Exactly when OpenAI creates AGI, which the startup defines as “highly autonomous systems that outperform humans at most economically valuable work,” is

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GitLab names Bill Staples as its new CEO

Enterprise /

GitLab, the popular developer and security platform, has named a new CEO, Bill Staples, effective immediately. Staples, who’s also been appointed to the company’s board of directors, succeeds CEO Sid Sijbrandij, who’s battling a rare form of cancer. Sijbrandij will transition to executive chair of the board. “I believe [Bill’s] passion for software, commitment to

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Ex-PayPal COO David Sacks is Trump’s new crypto and AI ‘czar’

Government & Policy /

Incoming President Donald Trump has a new crypto and AI “czar”: ex-PayPal COO David Sacks. Trump announced Sacks’ appointment Thursday in a post on Truth Social, Trump’s social networking platform. “[Sacks] will work on a legal framework so the Crypto [sic] industry has the clarity it has been asking for, and can thrive in the

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Apple to shell out $1 billion on a manufacturing plant in Indonesia

Hardware /

Negotiating with one of the largest companies in the world doesn’t sound easy, but that’s precisely what Indonesia has been doing for the past few weeks with iPhone maker Apple. The backstory here is that after the country required smartphones which are sold domestically to be made of at least 40% locally manufactured parts, Indonesia

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