Techmeme: Source: Tencent acquired a 10% stake in Policybazaar, valuing the Indian online insurance aggregator at $1.5B (Saritha Rai/Bloomberg)

Top News

Jay Peters / The Verge:

Apple says it is working on a fix for a macOS bug that stored portions of encrypted emails sent via Mail app in an unencrypted form — Apple may have known for months — Apple stakes a lot of its reputation on how it protects the privacy of its users, as it wants to be the only tech company you trust.

More: ZDNet, Engadget, TechSpot, MacRumors, 9to5Mac, Cult of Mac, iDownloadBlog.com, TidBITS, and iPhone in Canada Blog

Tweets: @derekmizak, @jaypeters, and @campuscodi

Oliver Darcy / CNN:

Facebook and YouTube say they are removing content that mentions the possible name of the whistleblower whose complaint prompted Trump impeachment inquiry — New York (CNN)Facebook (FB) and YouTube said Friday that they were removing content that mentioned the potential name …

More: Associated Press, Washington Post, The Verge, and CNBC

Tweets: @oliverdarcy, @brianstelter, @kevinroose, @oliverdarcy, @slpng_giants, @sivavaid, and @pkafka

See also Mediagazer

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Blackstone buys majority stake in MagicLab, owner of dating apps Badoo and Bumble, valuing the company at $3B+; Whitney Wolfe Herd to become MagicLab's CEO — Bumble, the popular and profitable dating and networking app built around the ethos of women calling the shots on how connections …

More: Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, Forbes, PE Hub Blog, Reuters, Thinknum Media, and CNN

Tweets: @fruhlinger, @angelauyeung, @clare_oc, @ingridlunden, and @whitwolfeherd

Tony Romm / Washington Post:

Amid the ongoing probes of tech giants, DOJ's antitrust chief warns that amassing vast quantities of consumers' data could create competition concerns — CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — The Justice Department's top antitrust enforcer warned tech giants on Friday that amassing vast quantities …

Tweets: @tonyromm, @alexqgb, and @markseibel

Will Oremus / OneZero:

US safety investigators report: dilemma for self-driving cars is not saving one innocent victim over other; it's between caution and competitive advantage — It has nothing to do with the ‘trolley problem’ — he advent of self-driving cars revived the decades-old philosophical conundrum known as the “trolley problem.”

More: Android Central, The Verge, Axios, TechSpot, Ars Technica, and 9to5Google

Tweets: @meganmorrone, @alexhern, @willoremus, @mheadd, and @alexhern

Romain Dillet / TechCrunch:

Andreessen Horowitz is launching a free crypto startup school, with a seven-week program that starts in February 2020 — Last month, Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) general partner Chris Dixon announced at TechCrunch Disrupt that the VC firm would run a free crypto startup school.

More: Andreessen Horowitz, SludgeFeed, and Decrypt. Tweets: @a16z. Thanks:@ninasuthers

Alnoor Peermohamed / The Economic Times:

AngelList launches its VC and angel fund product in India, which will allow individuals to raise small blind pools of capital and deploy them within 6-12 months — AngelList will manage the legal and regulatory aspects of raising capital and investing it, while the byte-sized funds will be able …

More: Medium, Crowdfund Insider, Entrackr, and Inc42 Media

Tweets: @samidhas, @somani_utsav, and @svickram

Donie O'Sullivan / CNN:

YouTube has run the misleading Trump ad accusing Biden of corruption, which was seen 10M-30M times, but Google says it strives to ensure ads are “honest” — (CNN Business)You'd be forgiven for thinking that the only tech platform that allows politicians to run false ads is Facebook.

More: Wired, The Hill, and Business Insider

Tweets: @oliverdarcy, @ericboehlert, and @donie

Emily Glazer / Wall Street Journal:

Sources: Google has been holding internal meetings on changing its political ad policy, and plans to share more information with employees soon

More: The Hill, The Guardian, Politico, New York Times, CNBC, The Independent, Washington Post, Rude Baguette, MIT Technology Review, CNN, and Axios

Tweets: @glynmoody, @whotargetsme, @sivavaid, @emilyglazer, @jason_kint, @jason_kint, @dseetharaman, and @profcarroll

See also Mediagazer

Neil Mawston / Strategy Analytics:

Smartwatch shipments grew 42% YoY to 14.2M units in Q3, as Apple grew market share to 48% from 45% last year and Fitbit's market share dropped from 15% to 11% — According to new research from our Wearable Device Ecosystems (WDE) service, global smartwatch shipments grew an impressive +42% YoY …

More: 9to5Google, MacDailyNews, Philip Elmer‑DeWitt, Cult of Mac, TechSpot, MacRumors, iMore, iPhone in Canada Blog, 9to5Mac, iPhone Hacks, and Gizchina

Sarah Frier / Bloomberg:

Internal chats from 2012 and 2013 show Facebook staff lamenting its “unethical” practices, as Zuckerberg argued that the company's survival was more important — - New documents show dissent within Facebook's top ranks — Disclosures come as company faces multiple antitrust probes

More: Forbes, The Daily Dot, and Mashable

Tweets: @yoda, @sarahfrier, @campuscodi, @autiomaa, @yoda, @jasoncross00, @fmbutt, and @sarahfrier

Allison Cavin / Seen by Indeed:

Analysis shows job searches on Indeed.com for bitcoin, cryptocurrency, and blockchain roles fell 53% in 2019, while share of crypto job postings grew by 26% — A gold rush mentality surrounds bitcoin, cryptocurrency and blockchain. And despite drastic price fluctuations …

More: CryptoGlobe, CoinDesk, The Next Web, Forbes, Decrypt, VentureBeat, and Cointelegraph

Saritha Rai / Bloomberg:

Source: Tencent acquired a 10% stake in Policybazaar, valuing the Indian online insurance aggregator at $1.5B — - Purchase from Tiger Global values Policybazaar at $1.5 billion — Tencent's India portfolio already includes Ola, Byju's, Swiggy — Tencent Holdings Ltd. has acquired …

Tweets: @tim

Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:

Snapdocs, a platform that digitizes the mortgage closing process, raises $25M Series B led by F-Prime Capital — Real estate tech company Snapdocs today revealed that it has raised $25 million in series B funding to further develop its products and platform.

More: San Francisco Business Journal, HousingWire, Inman, National Mortgage News, Wall Street Journal, Crunchbase News, and FinSMEs

Bloomberg:

Sources: Alibaba is planning to launch a Hong Kong IPO next week with plans to raise as much as $15B — - It's said to proceed with listing hearing early next week — Alibaba's share sale comes after a U.S.-China agreement — Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is moving ahead with plans …

More: New York Times, Forbes, and New York Times

Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch:

Small-satellite startup Kepler achieves the world's first satellite broadband connection to the Arctic at over 100Mbps, used by a German icebreaker sea vessel — Small-satellite startup Kepler has done something never before accomplished with satellite-based broadband connectivity: providing a high-bandwidth to the Arctic.

More: Slashdot

Jane Zhang / South China Morning Post:

Alibaba invests $3.3B in its logistics arm Cainiao, raising its stake to 63% — Cainiao will use the money raised to invest in technologies and logistics infrastructure services Cainiao also offers solutions to Alibaba's international e-commerce business, including Tmall Global …

More: TechCrunch and PYMNTS.com

CNBC:

Bob Iger says Disney+ will be on Amazon's Fire TV when it launches on November 12 — - Analysts will be looking to see if Disney gives any color on expected subscriber numbers for Disney+. — Disney shares were up about 3% after the company reported an earnings beat for its fiscal fourth-quarter on Thursday.

More: Wall Street Journal, CNET, MacRumors, iLounge, CNET, The Mac Observer, BGR, Thurrott, iPhone in Canada Blog, Tor.com, Pocket-lint, GeekWire, AppleInsider, TechCrunch, Business Wire, The Streamable, The Verge, 9to5Mac, Seeking Alpha, Engadget, and Fast Company

Tweets: @discussingfilm, @cnbcnow, and @cnbcnow

Kris Holt / Engadget:

Disney says Disney+ will launch in UK, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain on March 31

More: TechCrunch, iPhone Hacks, iDownloadBlog.com, MSPoweruser, TalkAndroid.com, The Verge, Yahoo Finance, Tom's Guide, and CNET

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