Techmeme
February 17, 2023, 1:10 PM

Top News

Bloomberg:
The SEC sues Terraform Labs and Do Kwon, accusing them of selling unregistered securities and perpetrating a fraudulent scheme that lost $40B+ in market value  —  The US Securities and Exchange Commission is preparing to sue the company behind TerraUSD, a crypto stablecoin whose collapse …
Suvashree Ghosh / Bloomberg:
The SEC says Do Kwon and Terraform Labs have withdrawn $100M+ in fiat currency from a Swiss bank since June 2022, after moving 10K+ Bitcoin out of a cold wallet  —  Crypto fugitive Do Kwon and the firm he founded transferred over 10,000 Bitcoin out of their doomed project and turned …
New York Times:
Microsoft says it is looking at limiting Bing chatbot conversation length and adding tools to let users restart conversations or get more control over tone  —  The company knew the new technology had issues like occasional accuracy problems.  But users have prodded surprising and unnerving interactions.
Sheila Dang / Reuters:
Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Meta gave ~10% of staff subpar ratings in recent performance reviews, a sign of more workforce reductions, and cut a bonus metric to 85% of its target  —  The performance-review process is expected to set the stage for more workforce reductions this year  —  Why Tech Layoffs Don't Reflect the Job Market
Yueqi Yang / Bloomberg:
Source: Binance is considering de-listing USDC and other tokens and ending relationships with US partners, including VC investments, amid regulatory scrutiny  —  Crypto giant Binance Holdings Ltd. is considering ending relationships with US business partners as regulators turn up the heat.
Reuters:
Josh Ye / Reuters:
Sources: Tencent cuts its 300-strong metaverse unit and drops VR hardware plans due to trouble achieving quick profitability and the need for a big investment  —  Tencent Holdings (0700.HK) is abandoning plans to venture into virtual reality hardware, as a sobering economic outlook prompts …
Clothilde Goujard / Politico:
Under the Digital Services Act, online platforms disclose their MAUs in the EU: YouTube has 401M+, Facebook ~255M, Instagram ~250M, TikTok 150M, Twitter 100.9M  —  TikTok, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram have now confirmed they will face the strictest rules under the EU's content-moderation law, the Digital Services Act (DSA).
OpenAI:
OpenAI aims to improve ChatGPT's behavior by reducing biases, allowing more user customization, and getting more public input into the company's decision-making  —  We're clarifying how ChatGPT's behavior is shaped and our plans for improving that behavior, allowing more user customization …
Kris Holt / Engadget:
Samsung says the Message Guard feature in Galaxy S23 series will prevent zero-click exploits via messaging apps by detecting malware hidden in image attachments  —  Zero-click attacks, which can install malware onto a device without the user clicking or tapping on anything, have been on the rise in recent years.
Victoria Song / The Verge:
Fitbit plans to remove adventures, challenges, and open groups on March 27 and replace Studio with an SDK; Google says the app's features were of “limited use”  —  Fitbit users: better one-up your friends in challenges while you still can.  Starting March 27th …
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Apple's iOS 16.4 and iPadOS 16.4 betas add support for Safari web apps on the homescreen to send push notifications and show notification badges  —  Apple's new iOS and iPadOS 16.4 betas will let Safari web apps on your homescreen send you push notifications, according to a new post on the WebKit blog.
Cristiano Lima / Washington Post:
The FTC launches an Office of Technology, increasing the number of technologists on staff from 10 to ~22 ahead of legal battles with Amazon, Microsoft, and Meta  —  Happy Friday!  A quick programming note: The newsletter will be off Monday for the holiday, but back in your inboxes Tuesday.
Sergiu Gatlan / BleepingComputer:
GoDaddy says it discovered a multi-year security breach in early December 2022 where unknown attackers stole source code and installed malware on its servers  —  Web hosting giant GoDaddy says they suffered a breach where unknown attackers have stolen source code and installed malware …

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Earlier Picks

Janko Roettgers / Lowpass:
Jennifer Elias / CNBC:
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Aisha Malik / TechCrunch:
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch: