schwit1 shares a report: The embrace between China’s intelligence services and Chinese businesses has gotten tighter, U.S. officials say. In 2017, under Xi’s intensifying authoritarianism, Beijing promulgated a new national intelligence law that compels Chinese businesses to work with Chinese intelligence and security agencies whenever they are requested to do so — a move that codified “what was pretty much what…
Tag: Obama
Will America’s Next President Break Up Facebook?
With 25 days until Joe Biden becomes America’s next president, Politico writes that throughout the US government, “From lawmakers on Capitol Hill to antitrust enforcers at the Federal Trade Commission, Washington is training its sights on the world’s largest social network like never before.” Biden’s antitrust enforcers will take ownership of a lawsuit the FTC filed this month threatening to dismantle…
Russia Breached Update Server Used by 300,000 Organizations, Including the NSA
Sunday Reuters reported that “a sophisticated hacking group” backed by “a foreign government” has stolen information from America’s Treasury Department, and also from “a U.S. agency responsible for deciding policy around the internet and telecommunications.” The Washington Post has since attributed the breach to “Russian government hackers,” and discovered it’s “part of a global espionage campaign that stretches back months, according…
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai Will Step Down on January 20
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai has announced plans to depart the commission when President-elect Joe Biden is inaugurated on January 20th. Pai has served on the FCC since 2012. From a report: “It has been the honor of a lifetime to serve at the Federal Communications Commission, including as Chairman of the FCC over the past four years,” Pai said in a…
Obama Says Social Media Companies ‘Are Making Editorial Choices, Whether They’ve Buried Them in Algorithms or Not’
Former U.S. President Barack Obama said that the extent to which social media companies claim they “are more like a phone company than they are like The Atlantic” is not “tenable,” he told the publication in an interview published Monday. From a report “They are making editorial choices, whether they’ve buried them in algorithms or not,” the former president said in…
Spotify To Buy Podcast Ad Company Megaphone for $235 Million
Spotify’s making another big podcasting acquisition. The company said on Tuesday it has entered into an agreement to acquire ad tech company Megaphone in a $235 million deal. The companies declined to say whether the deal was in cash, stock or a mix of both. From a report: Megaphone offers technology for podcast publishers and advertisers seeking targeted slots on podcasts….
Should Retraining Programs for Laid-Off Retail Workers Include Computer Programming?
Appearing on ABC, former Chicago Mayor and Obama White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel on Friday volunteered some suggestions for an economic recovery plan that America’s next president could implement. “One of the things we’ve got to do to rebuild, mainly on infrastructure,” he begins, before switching to additional ideas for also offering a more promising future to laid-off retail…
What Biden’s Victory Means For Net Neutrality – and for Ajit Pai
“A victory by Joe Biden in the Nov. 3 election could usher in an abrupt change in the nation’s telecommunications policy, restoring so-called net neutrality regulation,” Bloomberg recently reported: Biden hasn’t talked much about the FCC during the campaign, but his party’s platform is specific. It calls for restoring net neutrality rules put in place under then-President Barack Obama when Biden…
US Formally Withdraws From Paris Climate Agreement
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Intercept: The United States officially withdrew from the Paris Agreement on Wednesday, casting the stakes of the still-undecided presidential election in planetary terms. With the completion of the formal withdrawal process, which Trump began in June 2017, the U.S. became the only country in the world not to participate in the global effort…
FCC Votes To Maintain 2017 Repeal of Net Neutrality Rules
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission voted 3-2 on Tuesday to maintain its 2017 repeal of Obama-era net neutrality rules, even after a federal court directed a review of some provisions of the repeal. From a report: The 2015 net neutrality rules barred internet service providers (ISPs) from blocking or slowing internet content or offering paid “fast lanes.” Under President Donald Trump,…