Techmeme
March 18, 2025, 12:50 PM

Top News

The Verge:
Alphabet acquires NYC-based cybersecurity startup Wiz for $32B cash, its largest acquisition yet, pending approval; antitrust fears stalled a $23B deal in 2024  —  The acquisition is Alphabet's biggest yet, after a $23 billion takeover attempt stalled last year.
More: The Keyword, Wiz Blog, Bloomberg, The Guardian, Business Insider, 9to5Google, Tech Monitor, Financial Times, The Standard, The Economic Times, Thurrott, PYMNTS.com, Financial Times, SC Media, CSO, SiliconANGLE, Reuters, New York Times, Neowin, Associated Press, UPI, CTech, Pocketables, Analytics India Magazine, The Information, Reuters, TechCrunch, Infosecurity, Wall Street Pit, Security Boulevard, TechCrunch, Constellation Research, TechRadar, TheCable, CNBC, Jerusalem Post, Reuters, Channel NewsAsia, Yahoo Finance, CSO, Proactive, BusinessLIVE, StrictlyVC, Verdict, Patently Apple, TipRanks Financial, The Cyber Express, en.ain.ua, Fortune, Barron's Online, CRN, The Times, Silicon Valley Business …, Capital Brief, Ynetnews, The Verge, Investor's Business Daily, CTech, TipRanks Financial, Tech in Asia, Financial Express, Benzinga, PYMNTS.com, Moneycontrol, Wall Street Journal, JD Supra, and Columbian
Andrew Martin / Bloomberg:
David Pierce / The Verge:
Eric Migicovsky unveils two Pebble smartwatches, the $149 Core 2 Duo shipping July 2025 and $225 Core Time 2 shipping December 2025, running its open-source OS  —  Pebble's creator now runs a company called Core Devices, and it's getting ready to sell two new watches soon.
Rajesh Pandey / Android Police:
Ahead of the Pixel 9a's rumored March 19 debut, a YouTuber posts a video of the alleged phone, showing a flat rear panel, minimal camera bump, and large bezels  —  - Detailed Pixel 9a unboxing and hands-on videos have been published on YouTube.  — One YouTuber has put the phone through its paces …
New York Times:
Starlink is now accessible across the White House campus, which already has fiber cables, after SpaceX “donated” the service, as some cite security concerns  —  Trump administration officials said the company donated the internet service, saying the gift had been vetted …
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Mark Zuckerberg says Meta's Llama models have been downloaded 1B times since their 2023 debut, up from 650M downloads in early December 2024  —  In a brief message Tuesday morning on Threads, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the company's “open” AI model family, Llama, hit 1 billion downloads.
Scharon Harding / Ars Technica:
Some owners of smart TVs and streaming sticks with Roku OS report seeing autoplaying video ads before they can use the home screen; Roku says it is just a test  —  Now, Roku is testing what it might look like if it took things a step further and forced people to watch a video ad play before getting to the Roku OS home screen.
Timmy Shen / The Block:
Solana deletes a social media video ad promoting its NYC conference in May 2025 after the crypto community criticized it for insensitivity towards gender issues  —  - Solana posted a video ad on social media on Monday to promote its upcoming conference, but it was removed hours later.
Bill Toulas / BleepingComputer:
Attackers are actively exploiting a critical Apache Tomcat RCE flaw to take over servers with a PUT request; Wallarm: the attack “requires no authentication”  —  A critical remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability in Apache Tomcat tracked as CVE-2025-24813 is actively exploited in the wild …
Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch:
Google debuts new Search and Android health care features, including medical records APIs, and plans to release open AI models for drug discovery called TxGemma  —  Google on Tuesday announced new products and features aimed at healthcare use cases, including improved overviews in Google Search …
Todd Spangler / Variety:
In an open letter to the OSTP, Ben Stiller and 400+ Hollywood creatives urge President Trump to not let Google, OpenAI, and others “exploit” copyrighted works  —  More than 400 Hollywood creative leaders signed an open letter to the Trump White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy …
Bloomberg:
Sources: Oracle is weighing a TikTok proposal that would have it provide security assurances and take a small stake while leaving the algorithm in Chinese hands  —  - Plan emerges as deadline nears for deal to save TikTok in US  — Oracle would offer security guarantee if China keeps algorithm
Bloomberg:
Tencent releases five AI tools that turn text or images into 3D visuals and graphics, based on Hunyuan3D-2.0, and plans to integrate DeepSeek's R1 into WeChat  —  Tencent's five new 3D-content generators are built atop its Hunyuan3D-2.0 model, all of which it intends to open-source to users, the company said in a statement.
More: Reuters
New York Times:
Since Xi Jinping met DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng in February, Chinese officials have been racing to show they use its tech, like in courthouses and hospitals  —  Government bodies nationwide have been eager to show they are using DeepSeek's A.I. technology since the company's founder met with Xi Jinping, China's leader.
Bluesky: @hargreaves-s

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