Techmeme: New milestone: Amazon stock surpass $400 for first time ever (Taylor Soper/GeekWire)

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December 20, 2013, 10:25 PM

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Joseph Menn / Reuters:

RSA received $10 million to use backdoored NSA algorithm by default in crypto software BSafe — Exclusive: Secret contract tied NSA and security industry pioneer — (Reuters) - As a key part of a campaign to embed encryption software that it could crack into widely used computer products …

More: Ars Technica, Digits, GeekWire, The Verge, The Register, CNET, Techdirt, TechCrunch, Gizmodo, Daring Fireball, SlashGear, Electronista and Gigaom

Tweets: @mccrory, @declanm, @e3i5, @csoghoian and @dhh

Thanks:@joeross

Brian Krebs / Krebs on Security:

Cards Stolen in Target Breach Flood Underground Markets — Credit and debit card accounts stolen in a recent data breach at retail giant Target have been flooding underground black markets in recent weeks, selling in batches of one million cards and going for anywhere from $20 to more than $100 per card, KrebsOnSecurity has learned.

New York Times:

N.S.A. Dragnet Included Allies, Aid Groups and Business Elite — Secret documents reveal more than 1,000 targets of American and British surveillance in recent years, including the office of an Israeli prime minister, heads of international aid organizations, foreign energy companies …

More: Guardian, Spiegel Online, Ars Technica, The Verge, CNET, ZDNet, The CIO Report, Computerworld, TheHill, Quartz, RT, Techdirt, Daily Dot, Gawker, BBC, Nieman Journalism Lab and Softpedia News

Tweets: @virusbtn, @csoghoian, @declanm, @thomas_drake1, @koenrh, @dhh, @barakravid, @froomkin, @ggreenwald, @ggreenwald and @ggreenwald

Miguel Helft / Fortune:

Square's Dorsey returns 10% of his shares — Exclusive: The founder and CEO makes an uncommon move to expand the company's pool of shares for compensation and acquisitions. — FORTUNE — Jack Dorsey, the founder and CEO of Square, has voluntarily given 10% of his shares in the company back to Square.

More: Digits, Business Insider, The Next Web, Gigaom, bizjournals and AllThingsD

Tweets: @shuvster, @noah_weiss, @stevecheney, @om and @anildash

Ina Fried / AllThingsD:

T-Mobile Plans to Talk “Un-Carrier” 4.0 at CES — T-Mobile is ready to make another big move, announcing plans for a media event at January's CES to discuss the next step in its “un-carrier” strategy. — “This one you aren't going to believe,” T-Mobile says in an invitation to journalists.

More: TmoNews, PhoneArena, Computerworld, The Droid Guy, IntoMobile, AndroidHeadlines.com, 9to5Google and Pocketables

Josh Ong / The Next Web:

Snapchat for iOS gets a replay option, front camera flash, filters and up to 7 best friends — Ephemeral messaging service Snapchat just got an interesting update that adds the ability to replay a message once per day, “flash” your front camera by whiting-out the screen …

More: The Verge, TechCrunch, TechCrunch, iMore, AppleInsider and 9to5Mac

John Biggs / TechCrunch:

Alleged Top Moderators Of Silk Road 2 Forums Arrested In Ireland, U.S. In International Sweep — At least two moderators of the Silk Road 2 user forums have been arrested by authorities in the U.S. and Ireland. A source claiming to have inside knowledge of the arrests said that Libertas …

More: Forbes, Deep Dot Web, The United States Department …, The Register, The Verge, Daily Dot, Mashable and NYT Bits

Taylor Soper / GeekWire:

Microsoft appoints Jim DuBois as new CIO — Microsoft this afternoon announced Jim DuBois as the company's chief information officer. — DuBois had served as the interim CIO for the past six months and replaced Tony Scott, who left after five years with the company to be CIO of VMWare.

More: Microsoft Corporation, WinBeta and Seattle Times blogs

USA Today:

Protesters vandalize Google bus, block Apple shuttle — Gentrification backlash targeting tech firms escalates in San Francisco and Oakland. — SAN FRANCISCO — As tech-driven housing costs and evictions soar, anti-gentrification protesters in San Francisco and Oakland …

More: CNET, KQED News Fix, SFGate Blog, Los Angeles Times, NYT Bits, Mission Loc@l, Business Insider, PandoDaily, San Francisco Examiner …, Valleywag and SlashGear

Beth Kowitt / Fortune:

Warby Parker raises $60 million — Exclusive: The fashionable eyeglasses purveyor more than doubles its total investment. — FORTUNE — Warby Parker has raised $60 million in its latest round of venture capital funding, led by its biggest investor, Tiger Global Management.

More: VentureBeat, TechCrunch, StrictlyVC, VatorNews, Mashable and AllThingsD. Tweets: @lererventures

Taylor Soper / GeekWire:

New milestone: Amazon stock surpass $400 for first time ever — This summer, Amazon.com's stock hit $300 for the first time. — Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos with the Kindle Fire HDX 8.9″. — Now, five months later, it has reached a new milestone: $400.

More: VentureBeat. Tweets: @sdkstl

Brad Molen / Engadget:

BlackBerry CEO hoping to avoid future layoffs, expects to be profitable by 2016 — This morning's earnings report may not have been BlackBerry's brightest moment, but John Chen seems confident in the company's future — and his ability to turn things around.

More: New York Times, CNET, CrackBerry.com and PhoneArena. Tweets: @parislemon

Lance Ulanoff / Mashable:

Walt Mossberg: The Exit Interview — At an age when some may consider spending more time practicing their golf swing or perfecting their poker face, tech journalist Walt Mossberg is about to embark on what may be his biggest adventure yet. After 22 years as The Wall Street Journal's personal …

Tweets: @stevesi, @markgurman, @mashable, @stuartdredge, @pkafka and @velocitywong. See also Mediagazer

Steve Dent / Engadget:

BlackBerry teams up with Foxconn for budget smartphones as sales continue to plunge — Blackberry's new interim chief John Chen has got a rude awakening to his new job: it sold only 1.9 million smartphones in Q1 compared to 3.7 million last quarter and lost $4.4 billion.

Sean Silcoff / Globe and Mail:

BlackBerry posts massive $4.4-billion quarterly loss, revenue plunges

More: Quartz, Globe and Mail, The Verge, Business Insider, Gigaom Research and Ars Technica

Tweets: @charlesarthur and @iainmarlow

Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch:

BlackBerry's First Foxconn Partnership Phone Will Be 3G BB10 Device, Coming March Or April 2014

More: BGR and MobileSyrup.com. Thanks:@romaindillet

Lance Whitney / CNET:

iPad, Surface, Kindle owners reveal their top gripes — Got a beef about your iPad, Surface, or Kindle tablet? Join the club. — The new holiday report from Q&A site FixYa sifted through thousands of problems reported by its Web site users to determine the most common grievances.

More: Yahoo! News, eWeek and ZDNet

Fred Vogelstein / The Atlantic Online:

The Day Google Had to ‘Start Over’ on Android — Google was building a secret mobile product to fend off chief rival Microsoft. Then Apple announced the iPhone, and everything changed. — In 2005, on Google's sprawling, college-like campus, the most secret and ambitious of many …

More: BGR, PhoneArena, MacRumors, iPhone Hacks, Global Nerdy, pocketnow.com, AmongTech, InvestorPlace, Mashable, The Verge, TechSpot, 9to5Google, Business Insider, iMore, iPhone, Fortune, Daring Fireball, Ubergizmo, Gizmodo, AppleInsider, iPhone in Canada Blog, Yahoo! News, MacDailyNews, Cult of Mac and The Loop. Tweets: @whatthebit

Gabriela Vatu / Softpedia News:

Google Changes Policy for Chrome Extensions, Seeks to Kill Multi-Purpose Tools — Google is cracking down on extensions that are slowing down your browser experience as it updates the Chrome Web Store policy to dictate that extensions must have a single purpose.

More: Engadget, CNET and ZDNet

Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac:

Apple seeds first OS X Mavericks 10.9.2 beta, brings FaceTime Audio to Macs — Just days after the first public release of OS X 10.9.1, Apple has seeded the first beta of OS X 10.9.2 to developers. The update is available in the Mac App Store for registered developers …

Barb Darrow / Gigaom:

“Backbreaking” OpenStack migrations hinder enterprise upgrades — Technology updates are never a day at the beach, but customers trying to upgrade to the latest release of OpenStack from its predecessor are often encountering bigger-than-expected problems. That is definitely not good news …

More: ZDNet and The VAR Guy. Tweets: @martenmickos and @jomaitlandsf. Thanks:@gigabarb

David Ruddock / Android Police:

The Oppo N1 Is Officially The First Google CTS-Certified CyanogenMod Phone, Can Run Google Apps Suite Legitimately — It's officially official: the Oppo N1 is the first Google-approved CyanogenMod phone. After passing through Google's CTS (compatibility test suite), CDD …

More: Engadget, CNET, Droid Life, Gizmodo, 9to5Google, The Next Web, Android Central, Geeky Gadgets and Softpedia News

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