Techmeme
August 19, 2019, 4:40 PM

Top News

Twitter:
Twitter says it proactively suspended ~200K “spammy” accounts, before they became “substantially active”, alongside its initial ban of 936 China-linked accounts  —  We are disclosing a significant state-backed information operation focused on the situation in Hong Kong …
CNBC:
Twitter accuses China of running a disinformation campaign against Hong Kong protesters, attempting to “sow political discord”, suspends 936 associated accounts  —  KEY POINTS  — Twitter said Monday it suspended hundreds of accounts that are believed to be tied to a …
@pinboard:
Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai / VICE:
The first public jailbreak in years for up-to-date iPhones has been posted online, researchers say, after a bug that was patched in iOS 12.3 was reintroduced  —  Apple accidentally unpatched a vulnerability it had already fixed, making current versions of iOS vulnerable to hackers.
Chris Welch / The Verge:
Disney+ to launch in Canada, the Netherlands, Australia, and New Zealand along with the US in November, will stream on all major platforms except Fire TV  —  Disney today confirmed its first global launches for the company's upcoming Disney+ subscription service, and it outlined which devices …
Steve Dent / Engadget:
Spotify's Premium Family Plan is getting parental controls with an explicit content filter and a Family Mix personalized playlist for the whole family  —  Spotify is rolling out a new Premium Family Plan with a much-awaited setting.  Parents will now have the ability to filter out songs with swearing …
Reuters:
Google shuts down its free service to show carriers weak spots in their coverage, sources say to avoid potential scrutiny over sharing data from its users  —  NEW YORK/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Alphabet Inc's Google has shut down a service it provided to wireless carriers globally that showed …
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Nvidia says that its GeForce Now game streaming service, which is in public beta for Mac, PC, and Shield TV, will be coming to Android later this year  —  Ahead of the next Stadia Connect livestream where Google will announce more games, Nvidia revealed that its competing GeForce Now streaming service will be coming to Android.
Yogita Khatri / The Block:
Binance says it plans to launch Venus, an “independent regional version of Libra”, which will develop “localized” stablecoins pegged to fiat currencies  —  The world's largest cryptocurrency exchange Binance is planning to launch “Venus,” calling it an …
Olga Kharif / Bloomberg:
Report: 650K+ tests in the US from early 2018 to early 2019 show that carrier throttling on mobile for Netflix, YouTube, and Amazon Prime Video, is pervasive  —  - New research finds location, time of day play no role  — Netflix, YouTube, Amazon Prime Video targeted for slowdowns
Sam Byford / The Verge:
Xiaomi, Oppo, and Vivo are working on an AirDrop-style wireless file transfer protocol that will work between their devices with speeds of up to 20MB/s  —  Three of China's biggest smartphone makers are working together on a new wireless file transfer protocol that will work between their respective devices.
Tiernan Ray / Fortune:
Cerebras Systems unveils the world's biggest semiconductor chip that is the size of a large mousepad, with 400K cores, 1.2T transistors, and 18GB of SRAM memory  —  Tucked in the Los Altos hills near the Stanford University campus, in a low-slung bunker of offices across from a coffee shop …
Elizabeth Schulze / CNBC:
Amazon raises seller fees by 3% for thousands of SMBs in France, blaming the country's new digital tax  —  KEY POINTS  — Amazon is raising seller fees by 3% for thousands of small and medium-sized businesses in France because of a new digital tax passed by the French government.
Ron Miller / TechCrunch:
Simon Data, a platform to leverage customer data for marketing, used by companies like Venmo, raises $30M Series C led by Polaris, bringing total raised to $59M  —  As businesses use an increasing variety of marketing software solutions, the goal around collecting all of that data is to improve customer experience.
More: FinSMEs and PE Hub Blog
Bloomberg:
Trump says that at a recent dinner Tim Cook made a “very compelling argument” that Apple might lose its edge to Samsung due to tariffs on goods from China  —  - Many made-in-China Apple products to be hit soon with tariffs  — Apple CEO made ‘good case’ about tariffs at dinner: Trump

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David Nield / TechRadar.com:
Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet: