Tag: CEO

FBI Investigating Alleged Hacking Attempt Into Mobile Voting App During 2018 Midterms

The FBI is investigating after someone allegedly tried to hack into West Virginia’s mobile voting app during the 2018 midterm elections. From a report: One or more people allegedly attempted to hack into Voatz, an experimental app that lets voters who are active military or registered to vote abroad cast their votes from their phones, Mike Stuart, the US attorney for…

Startup That Aims To 3D-Print Rockets Says It’s Fully Funded For Its First Commercial Missions

Aerospace startup Relativity Space — the company that aims to launch the first fully 3D-printed rocket to orbit — says it has raised all of the money it needs to launch its first mission and then enter commercial operations as early as 2021. After raising $140 million in its latest funding round, Relativity says its total funding now equals $185 million,…

Docker Is In Deep Trouble

An anonymous reader quotes a report from ZDNet: Docker, the technology, is the poster child for containers. But it appears Docker, the business, is in trouble. In a leaked memo, Docker CEO Rob Bearden praised workers — despite the “uncertainty [which] brings with it significant challenges” and “persevering in spite of the lack of clarity we’ve had these past few weeks.”…

US Dept of Education Has Big Payday For K-12 CS, Including Tech-Backed Code.org

theodp writes: On Friday, U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos announced $123 million in new Education Innovation and Research (EIR) grant awards to 41 school districts, nonprofits and state educational agencies. Over $78 million of that went to 29 grantees focused on Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) education, and more than 85% of the funded STEM projects include a specific…

Dog-Walking Startup Wag Raised $300 Million To Unleash Growth. Then Things Got Messy

At the start of 2018, Wag looked like tech’s next Big Thing. From a report: In January, the founders of the dog-walking startup announced they had landed a $300 million investment from SoftBank’s Vision Fund. The world’s largest tech investor, SoftBank had $93 billion at its disposal and a network of global connections second to none. Unlike almost any other venture…

Kickstarter Defends Firings As Not Anti-Union, But Strong Criticism Continues

“Kickstarter’s CEO Aziz Hasan sent an email to staff Friday, explaining why the company fired two staff members and laid off another who played an instrumental role in organizing a union at the company…” reports Motherboard:
Hasan insisted that the firings were related specifically to job performance issues, not union organizing. “We understood how these firings could be perceived, but it would…

Purism’s Librem 5 Phone Starts Shipping. It Can Run Linux Desktop Apps

On Tuesday Purism announced their first Librem 5 smartphones were rolling off the assembly line and heading to customers. “Seeing the amazing effort of the Purism team, and holding the first fully functioning Librem 5, has been the most inspirational moment of Purism’s five year history,” said their founder and CEO Todd Weaver. On Wednesday they posted a video announcing that…

MayPayrollHR CEO Arrested, Admits To $70 Million Fraud

After absconding with $35 million in payroll and tax deposits from customers, CEO of MyPayrollHR Michael T. Mann was arrested and charged with bank fraud. “On Monday, [Mann] allegedly confessed that the diversion was the last desperate gasp of a financial shell game that earned him $70 million over several years,” reports Krebs On Security. From the report: In court filings,…

Amazon Is Writing Its Own Facial Recognition Laws To Pitch To Lawmakers

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Vox: Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos says his company is developing a set of laws to regulate facial recognition technology that it plans to share with federal lawmakers. In February, the company, which has faced escalating scrutiny over its controversial facial recognition tech, called Amazon Rekognition, published guidelines it said it hoped lawmakers would consider…