Techmeme
February 12, 2020, 10:50 PM

Top News

Tom Warren / The Verge:
GSMA says it has canceled Mobile World Congress after the coronavirus made it “impossible” to hold the event  —  MWC 2020 is no more  —  The world's biggest phone show, Mobile World Congress, is no longer taking place this year.  After coronavirus threatened to throw MWC into chaos …
New York Times:
Andy Rubin's Essential Products, which raised $330M to build smartphones and was valued at $1B, says it is ceasing operations  —  The smartphone company founded by Mr. Rubin, a former Google executive, struggled to win over customers.  —  SAN FRANCISCO — Essential Products …
Financial Times:
Facebook says it has banned a network of two dozen fake pages and accounts linked to two Southeast Asian telecoms for using disinformation against rivals  —  South-east Asian providers said to have used fake accounts to discredit rivals  —  Facebook has alleged that one of south-east Asia's …
Steven Levy / Wired:
Book excerpt from Steven Levy's Facebook: The Inside Story, with a look at Zuckerberg's lost handwritten journal, in which he noted plans for world domination  —  In the early days of Facebook, Zuck kept his plans for world domination in handwritten journals.  He destroyed them.
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
WhatsApp says it now has 2B users worldwide, up from the 1.5B it announced two years ago  —  WhatsApp, the most popular messaging service, revealed today just how big it has become.  The Facebook-owned app said it has amassed two billion users, up from 1.5 billion it revealed two years ago.
Edward Ongweso Jr / VICE:
Consumer advocacy group DoNotPay launches Robo Revenge, an app that fights robocallers by giving them burner credit card info and then helping users sue them  —  DoNotPay, the family of consumer advocacy services meant to protect people from corporate exploitation, is launching a new app aimed …
Data Protection Commission:
Ireland's Data Protection Commission: Facebook has postponed launching Dating on Valentine's Day in Europe after DPC resorted to an inspection to procure docs  —  Facebook Ireland first contacted the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) in relation to its intention to roll-out a new Dating feature in the EU on Monday 3 February.
Casey Newton / The Verge:
Snapchat is testing new redesign with navigation bar, more accessible Snap Map, and a new top news section; comes 3 years after last redesign was widely panned  —  A new home for the Snap Map and its original shows — plus a new test of news briefs  —  Snap is working on two significant tests …
Alex Hern / The Guardian:
UK expands broadcast regulator Ofcom's role to include online content, giving it the ability to enforce content standards on social media  —  Ministers unveil plans to block harmful content, while guaranteeing free speech  —  Ofcom will be put in charge of regulating the internet …
Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
Reuters launches a new Reuters Fact Check business unit and blog and partners with Facebook to review news headlines, deepfakes, and user generated content  —  Eye-witness photos and videos distributed by news wire Reuters already go through an exhaustive media verification process.
Todd Spangler / Variety:
SEC filing: Spotify bought The Ringer for ~$141M to $196M in cash, some of it deferred and subject to closing adjustments  —  Spotify disclosed that it will pay upwards of $196 million for The Ringer, the podcast and media company founded by Bill Simmons.  —  The streaming music and audio company …
John Detrixhe / Quartz:
Research: Apple Pay makes up about 5% of global card transactions and is on pace to double that share by 2025  —  Future of Finance  —  New technology is upending everything in finance.  —  Apple's mobile wallet is gobbling up a growing chunk of card payments around the world.
Khari Johnson / VentureBeat:
Democratic senators propose the Ethical Use of Artificial Intelligence Act that would place a moratorium on facial recognition use by federal agencies, police  —  Two Democratic U.S. Senators today proposed legislation that requires a moratorium on facial recognition use by federal agencies …
Jon Porter / The Verge:
Google rolls out Emoji Kitchen, which mashes up two emojis into a sticker, for Gboard on Android  —  Compatible with WhatsApp, Messenger, Telegram, and more  —  There are already hundreds of emoji available to cover every emotion from yawning to being a straight-up drunk weirdo.
Anthony Ha / TechCrunch:
Habu, which offers analysis and management tools for marketing data, emerges from stealth with $15M Series A  —  Marketing startup Habu is emerging from stealth today and announcing that it has already raised $15 million in Series A funding.  —  The company comes out of super{set} …
Sarah Holder / CityLab:
Nextdoor launches new app for public agencies like police, fire departments, and city halls, allowing them to post updates and push out geotargeted alerts  —  The neighborhood social network's new app is aimed at public agencies, and it lets local law enforcement more easily tap into the online community.
Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet:
FBI says it received 467,361 cybercrime complaints in 2019, with attacks involving business email compromise causing about half of the estimated $3.5B in losses  —  Average loss per BEC scam amounted to nearly $75,000, per complaint, on average.  —  The FBI received 467,361 internet …
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Q&A with McAfee CTO Steve Grobman on unusual types of ransomware, the state of AI in orchestrating and defending against cyberattacks, and deepfake detection  —  Artificial intelligence is sweeping through almost every industry, layering a new level of intelligence on the software used …
Zeke Faux / Bloomberg:
A look at how Tala and other microfinance tech startups have exploded in Kenya, offering sky-high interest rates that have left some borrowers with nothing  —  Patricia Lele waits for nightfall to go to work.  As the sun sets in Kitale, in western Kenya, she hikes up her 2-year-old daughter on her hip …
Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet:
Nominet survey of CISOs at large US and UK companies finds 88% are “moderately or tremendously stressed”, resulting in an average tenure of 26 months  —  Report: The vast majority of interviewed CISO executives (88%) report high levels of stress, a third report stress-caused …

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