Techmeme: As China ramps up scrutiny of its tech companies, experts say its antitrust regulator SAMR lacks resources; SAMR only had a staff of about 50 people as of March (Yuan Yang/Financial Times)

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June 19, 2021, 3:30 AM

Top News

Mercury News:

California launches a digital vaccine verification system built using the open-source SMART Health Card Framework, with QR codes to show COVID-19 vaccine status — Vaccinated Californians now have a new way to show they are inoculated against the coronavirus without carrying around a flimsy paper card.

Source: State of California and State of California. More: Engadget, SFGATE, San Francisco Chronicle, Los Angeles Times, KNSD-TV, ABC7, Los Angeles Times, Yahoo News, San Francisco Business Journal, dot.LA, SlashGear, Reuters, and Bloomberg

Tweets: @rklau, @sundeep, @rstephens, @rklau, @sacca, @rklau, @rklau, @aneeshchopra, @mpflowersnyc, @boltyboy, @rschooley, @dlthings, @mikeolson, @erickschonfeld, and @reillystyley

Sami Fathi / MacRumors:

YouTube says it is rolling out picture-in-picture support for YouTube Premium users on iOS and plans to launch the feature for all iOS users in the US — After a long wait, YouTube for iOS is officially gaining picture-in-picture support, allowing all users, non-premium and premium subscribers …

More: The Verge, 9to5Google, mobilesyrup.com, Gizmodo, iThinkDifferent, Redmond Pie, phonearena.com, SlashGear, Trusted Reviews, iMore, iPhone Hacks, Engadget, Neowin, iPhone in Canada Blog, MSPoweruser, AppleInsider, iClarified, and AppleTrack

Tweets: @samifathi_, @steipete, and @reneritchie

See also Mediagazer

Kara Swisher / New York Times:

Interview with Rep. Cicilline on his bipartisan package taking on Big Tech, Apple's DOJ subpoena, Facebook's platform lock-in, and acquisition and merger reform — Representative David Cicilline's bipartisan package takes aim at tech companies and would be the biggest antitrust reform in decades.

More: New York Times, New York Times, and Philip Elmer‑DeWitt

Tweets: @ashleyrgold, @kantrowitz, @migueldeicaza, @sarthakgh, @benedictevans, @benedictevans, @sally_hubbard, @greg_speicher, @greg_speicher, @stevesi, and @karaswisher

Alex Kantrowitz / Big Technology:

The Platform Competition and Opportunity Act, which ends Big Tech acquisitions, could backfire in several ways, like discouraging startups' productive behavior — Congress wants to stop most Big Tech acquisitions. But that won't neccesarily increase competition. — 5 hr ago

More: BIG by Matt Stoller, Financial Times, Centre for Economic Policy Research, Politico, Philip Elmer‑DeWitt, Axios, and TechCrunch

Tweets: @repkenbuck, @tomcottonar, @politico, @birnbaum_e, @ggreenwald, @repkenbuck, @kantrowitz, @matthewstoller, @scottros, @kantrowitz, @ppatel, and @repkenbuck

Dade Hayes / Deadline:

Roku says from May 20 to June 3, more Roku viewers streamed a Roku Original than Quibi users who streamed Quibi shows during the nine months of Quibi's lifetime — Roku has revealed viewership data for its original programming, much of which was powered by the acquisition of Quibi's library last January.

More: Roku, Variety, Hollywood Reporter, Vanity Fair, MarketWatch, MobileSyrup, The Streamable, Cord Cutters News, New York Post, and GameSpot

Tweets: @richlightshed, @caseynewton, @davezatz, @epro, and @backlon

Brandon Kochkodin / Bloomberg:

PitchBook: $17B have been invested in crypto startups this year, including $10B of digital assets from Block.one to capitalize crypto exchange Bullish Global — - VC funds already eclipsed annual amount for crypto investments — $10 billion Bullish Global raise largest in industry history

More: The Information

Reuters:

PayPal will increase US sellers' costs to 3.49% plus $0.49 per transaction on its payment products starting Aug. 2, up from 2.9% plus $0.30 on most transactions — NEW YORK (Reuters) -PayPal Holdings Inc will lift merchant costs for its branded payment products while cutting those for behind …

Source: PayPal Newsroom. More: PYMNTS.com and Bloomberg

Tweets: @jasuja and @quinnypig

Margaret Harding McGill / Axios:

WH unveils new US broadband map that uses data from FCC, Ookla, Microsoft, and more, showing a greater gap in internet access, as it pushes for more spending — The Biden administration Thursday unveiled a new mapping tool that shows much greater gaps in use of high-speed internet service across …

More: CNET, Input, The Daily Dot, FierceTelecom, govtech.com, Gizmodo, and Maps Mania

Tweets: @bharatramamurti, @superwuster, and @esri

Hugh Son / CNBC:

Goldman Sachs has begun trading bitcoin futures in partnership with Mike Novogratz's merchant bank Galaxy Digital — - The bank has begun trading bitcoin futures with Galaxy Digital, the crypto investment firm founded by Mike Novogratz, CNBC has learned exclusively.

More: The Record, The Block, NewsBTC, Bitcoin News, PYMNTS.com, Blockworks, Decrypt, CoinDesk, Cointelegraph, Bitcoin Magazine, and BitcoinExchangeGuide

Tweets: @novogratz and @hugh_son

Yuan Yang / Financial Times:

As China ramps up scrutiny of its tech companies, experts say its antitrust regulator SAMR lacks resources; SAMR only had a staff of about 50 people as of March — The country's previously dormant antitrust regulators are fighting for power to discipline the sector

Tweets: @martijnrasser, @angelazhanghk, @financialtimes, and @yuanfenyang

Rest of World:

Koo, the Indian microblogging app that has positioned itself as a government-friendly alternative to Twitter in India, is taking a similar approach in Nigeria — The Indian microblogging app has built a partisan audience in India by supporting government restrictions on social platforms.

Tweets: @anirvan, @architmeta, @peterguest, @cengizyar, @nilchristopher, @iatalkspace, @yinkawrites, and @evelyndouek

Michiel Willems / City A.M.:

Dealroom and Tech Nation: UK becomes the third country, after the US and China, to have 100 or more tech unicorns; 34% of UK unicorns are fintech companies — The UK tech sector has now 100 UK tech companies valued at $1bn or more, according to new data from Dealroom and Tech Nation, shared with City A.M. today.

More: IT PRO, channelweb.co.uk, and PYMNTS.com

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From Mediagazer

Kaitlan Collins / @kaitlancollins:

Email: Bryan Boughton, who runs Fox News' DC bureau and is the current TV pool chair, says the TV pool will not be covering President Trump's events today

Bloomberg:

Paramount reaches a settlement with the US states suing to block its WBD acquisition, after four states that opposed a deal conceded over the weekend

Dave Barry / Dave Barry's Substack:

Dave Barry posts a tribute and lament for his wife, Michelle Kaufman, who covered sports for four decades before McClatchy layoffs, and her laid-off colleagues

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More News

Jeff Clabaugh / WTOP:

Booz Allen Hamilton acquires Liberty IT Solutions for $725M; Liberty IT's work includes IT modernization projects for govt. agencies and the healthcare industry

Source: Business Wire. More: Orlando Business Journal, Washington Technology, ExecutiveBiz, and Consulting.us

Laurel Brubaker Calkins / Bloomberg:

US appeals court rules Huawei can't subsidize the sale of its 5G tech with federal funds earmarked for US broadband development, upholding a 2019 FCC order

More: Associated Press

Ryan Browne / CNBC:

Dealroom: European startups have raised €43.8B in the first six months of 2021, surpassing the record €38.5B raised in 2020

More: PYMNTS.com

Jonathan Vanian / Fortune:

Fiddler AI, which makes tools to help engineers monitor machine learning systems, raises $32M Series B led by Insight Partners

More: EnterpriseAI, SiliconANGLE, PR Newswire, and SiliconANGLE

Tweets: @fiddlerlabs and @bznotes

Andrew Asmakov / Decrypt:

Two major Chinese banks now allow customers to exchange digital yuan for cash at 3,000+ ATMs in Beijing, in an expansion of China's digital currency experiment

More: Bitcoin News, Forkast, Cointelegraph, Crypto Briefing, Coinspeaker, CoinDesk, and The Block. Tweets: @johnkoetsier

Foo Yun Chee / Reuters:

Sources: EU antitrust regulators plan to open a formal investigation into Google's digital advertising business before the end of the year

More: Android Central, PYMNTS.com, The Economic Times, and New York Post. Tweets: @reutersindia

Earlier Picks

VentureBeat:

Study: 80% of organizations that paid a ransom were hit by a second ransomware attack; 66% orgs cited revenue losses after the attack and 53% cited brand damage

More: NPR, The Record, and PYMNTS.com

Tweets: @artemr, @lanceulanoff, @nixcraft, and @johndcook

Hannah Murphy / Financial Times:

Ukrainian police arrest members of ransomware gang Clop, the first time that a national law enforcement agency has carried out mass arrests of such a gang

Bert Hubert's writings:

European companies' reluctance to offer free software and services has resulted in the region being over-dependent on US and others for communication platforms

Tweets: @philippbohn, @chrisnahr, and @nickdothutton

Sam Byford / The Verge:

OnePlus CEO Pete Lau says OnePlus and Oppo will have more integrations moving forward, further hinting at a possible merger

Amanda Silberling / TechCrunch:

Spotify has acquired Podz, a podcast discovery startup whose tech helps podcasters promote their show using ML to select 60-second clips of key moments

John Koblin / New York Times:

Nielsen announces a new metric, The Gauge, to measure streaming viewing in ~14,000 US homes via hardware that watches internet traffic passing through a router