Techmeme
September 2, 2020, 8:10 AM

Top News

Donie O'Sullivan / CNN:
Facebook says, after an FBI tip, it took down several Pages and accounts pushing a fake left-wing news outlet made by people linked to Russian troll group IRA  —  New York (CNN Business)People associated with the infamous St. Petersburg troll group that was part of Russia's attempt to interfere …
Bryan Menegus / Gizmodo:
Amazon had job listings, now removed, for “intelligence analysts” who would assess “labor organizing threats” and contribute to filings like restraining orders  —  Jeff Bezos obviously doesn't want a union in his company.  Amazon's increasingly flippant statements …
Lauren Kaori Gurley / VICE:
Amazon is spying on private Facebook Groups for Flex drivers in US, UK, and Spain, monitoring for complaints and labor actions, per internal reports left online  —  The company is surveilling dozens of private Facebook groups in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Spain …
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Nvidia announces new RTX 3080 GPU, priced at $699 and launching Sept. 17, boasting up to two times the performance of the RTX 2080, as well as a $499 RTX 3070  —  Nvidia promises a PC gaming breakthrough  —  Nvidia is unveiling its new GeForce RTX 3000 series graphics cards today.
Matthew Buzzi / PCMag:
David Ingram / NBC News:
Twitter says it plans to add context to trending topics, including picking a “representative tweet” for trends, amid criticism that the feature amplifies hoaxes  —  Twitter announced Tuesday that it plans to make a series of small changes to its trending topics feature to try …
Microsoft on the Issues:
Microsoft unveils new tools to identify deepfake videos and launches an interactive quiz at SpotDeepfakes.org to combat disinformation  —  Today, we're announcing two new technologies to combat disinformation, new work to help educate the public about the problem, and partnerships to help advance …
Maria Armental / Wall Street Journal:
Patreon says it has raised $90M at a $1.2B+ pre-money valuation, nearly twice the $660M valuation it had prior to a funding round last year  —  New Enterprise Associates and Wellington Management led the $90 million funding round  —  Membership platform Patreon Inc., which enables musicians …
Wall Street Journal:
Bloomberg:
Sources: AT&T decides not to sell its Warner Bros. gaming division, deciding to abandon a potential ~$4B deal once it realized the division's growth potential  —  - Boom in gameplay takes unit off list of assets to jettison  — ‘No sacred cows,’ said Stankey, but this could be an exception
Nathan Munn / VICE:
Report: Canadian police are turning more to predictive policing algorithms, using tools like GeoDASH and Palantir's Gotham, raising civil liberty concerns  —  Police across Canada are increasingly adopting algorithmic technology to predict crime.  The authors of a new report say human rights are threatened by the practice.
Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
VoIP provider Dialpad has acquired video conferencing startup Highfive, which had raised $77.4M from Lightspeed Venture Partners, a16z, and others  —  VoIP provider Dialpad, the company behind the popular video conferencing service UberConference, today announced that it has acquired Highfive …
CNN:
Donald Trump, his campaign's “War Room” account, Steve Scalise, and Dan Scavino recently shared misleading videos; Twitter labeled three as “manipulated media”  —  (CNN Business)A series of deceptively edited and misleading videos shared by prominent Republicans …
Nathaniel Popper / New York Times:
Sources: US believes another teen, age 16, was involved in the July 15 Twitter hack and conducted a search of his home; warrant and other docs are under seal  —  On Tuesday, federal agents served a Massachusetts teenager with a search warrant.  He appears to have played a significant role …
Alex Barker / Financial Times:
Google says it will raise the price for ads 2% in UK and 5% in Turkey and Austria to cover the cost of digital services taxes in Europe, starting in November  —  US tech group to charge additional fees in the UK, Turkey and Austria  —  Google is to pass on the cost of digital services taxes …
The Verge:
Facebook could create much-needed goodwill by publishing reports into its high-profile missteps, like failing to remove posts inciting violence in Kenosha, WI  —  After moderators failed to remove a post that incited violence, the company should release a public report
Spencer Soper / Bloomberg:
Sources detail attempts by Amazon delivery drivers in Chicago to beat peers to new orders by hanging smartphones in trees near Amazon's delivery stations  —  - Scammers seem to have rigged Amazon system to get orders first  — Operation reflects ferocious rivalry for gigs in a bad economy

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More News

Makena Kelly / The Verge:
Oliver Reichenstein / iA:

Earlier Picks

Bloomberg:
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Ryne Hager / Android Police:
New York Times: