James Farrell
Latest from James Farrell
Tech firms might have to pay big fines under UK’s amendment to Online Safety Bill
The U.K. government announced yesterday that it will be making some changes to its Online Safety Bill, something that could leave tech companies looking at huge fines if they haven’t deployed new technologies to police their products. The government will give more power to the U.K.’s communications regulator, Ofcom. The new tools should help the ...
Twitter is suing the Indian government over far-reaching content removal orders
Twitter Inc. said today that it has just begun a lawsuit against the Indian government over what the company sees as unfair standards regarding speech laws. The lawsuit was filed at the Karnataka High Court in Bangalore, a consequence of a recent spat Twitter had with the Indian government over its aggressive speech laws. The ...
The British Army just had its Twitter and YouTube accounts hacked by crypto scammers
The British Army is currently recovering from embarrassment after it acknowledged on Sunday that its Twitter and YouTube accounts were hacked to promote cryptocurrency scams. The scammer, or scammers, changed the bio of the accounts, as well as the cover photos and profile pictures. At first, on Twitter, the profile picture was replaced to look ...
Citing security concerns, FCC commissioner asks Apple and Google to remove TikTok from app stores
The Federal Communications Commission’s Brendan Carr today told Apple Inc. and Google LLC that they should remove the TikTok from their app stores, warning that there are security concerns with the app’s parent company, ByteDance Ltd. Carr, who’s a Republican commissioner, said he believes the Chinese company is violating the standards of Apple and Google ...
Pinterest CEO steps down as company focuses on e-commerce drive
The longtime chief executive and co-founder of Pinterest Inc., Ben Silbermann stepped down today as the company revs up its efforts in the e-commerce business. Bill Ready, who was recently the boss of Google’s commerce business, will take over from Silbermann. Ready had been at Google just three years, and before that was the vice ...
Instagram is now testing an AI system that will scan people’s faces for their age
Instagram said today that it’s testing some new technologies to help it verify people’s age, including an artificial intelligence tool that might be able to tell folks how old they are. People who use Instagram should be at least 13 years of age, but this has not always been the case. It wasn’t until 2019 ...
Twitter now testing long-form content with a new feature: Twitter Notes
Twitter Inc. today announced that it’s finally starting to test a new feature, Twitter Notes, that will allow publishers on the platform to write long-form content. The company has been talking about such a feature for a while, something that is for all intents and purposes a way to blog on Twitter. Publishers will have ...
Meta settles lawsuit over discrimination in targeted housing advertisements
Meta Platforms Inc. settled a lawsuit with the Department of Justice today over allegations that its algorithm for targeting people with housing ads discriminated against certain people. The company paid $115,054 after allegations emerged that under Facebook’s “Special Ad Audience” advertising certain users based on their race, color, nationality, zip code, disability, familial status and ...
Elon Musk doubles down on ‘freedom of speech’ in first meeting with Twitter employees
Elon Musk had his first online chat with Twitter Inc. employees today, and not surprisingly one thing he wanted to talk about was free speech. Since his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter, a deal still not completely ironed out, he has caused a bit of controversy – as usual – with some of his remarks. ...
Meta is planning some big changes so it might better compete with TikTok
For some time now, Meta Platforms Inc. has been caught in a battle with the immensely popular TikTok app, and today Meta essentially provided confirmation. A leaked memo from April, sent by executives at Meta and viewed by The Verge, told staff that the Facebook app was going to see a major redesign to make ...