James Farrell
Latest from James Farrell
A new cryptocurrency bill would treat digital assets as commodities under CFTC oversight
Two senators today introduced bipartisan legislation aimed at reining in the “Wild West” of cryptocurrency trading, putting the Commodity Futures Trading Commission as the key regulator. The bill’s sponsors are Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand and Republican Senator Cynthia Lummis, who sit on the Senate Agriculture Committee and Banking Committee, respectively. The “Responsible Financial Innovation Act,” ...
Axon to halt taser drone project after ethics board resigns in protest
The Arizona-based weapons company Axon Enterprise Inc. said on Sunday that it’s no longer going ahead with the development of a taser-equipped drone after most of its ethics board resigned over the matter. The company, which sells weapons technology for the military and the police, had announced the idea of developing such a machine, saying ...
Microsoft says it will offer its support to worker unionization efforts
As talk of unionizing grows among people working in the tech industry, Microsoft Corp. today said it will not stand in the way if its employees go down that road. In a blog post, Microsoft President Brad Smith acknowledged that in some countries some employees may want to join a union, adding that if that ...
After 14 years, Sheryl Sandberg bids adieu to Meta
Meta Platforms Inc. Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg announced today that she’s leaving the company she helped turn into a global phenomenon. When Mark Zuckerberg started Facebook, he was just 23 years old, and Sandberg (pictured) was 38. She explained in a Facebook post today that back then Zuckerberg approached her at a party and ...
Lawsuit charges Elon Musk manipulated Twitter stock during his takeover bid
Twitter Inc. shareholders filed a lawsuit late Wednesday in a federal district court in San Francisco, accusing Elon Musk of manipulating Twitter’s stock price and benefiting from that during his takeover bid. The lawsuit claims that prior to making the bid, Musk (pictured) failed to reveal that he already had a 5% stake in Twitter. ...
Twitter agrees to pay a $150M fine for deceptive ad targeting
Twitter Inc. settled a lawsuit today with the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission, paying a fine that set the social media giant back $150 million. The lawsuit claims that Twitter acted deceptively between 2013 and 2019 when it used users’ phone numbers and emails as a means to target advertising. The information should ...
Walmart is expanding its drone deliveries to reach 4M people in the US
Walmart Inc. announced today that it’s ratcheting up drone deliveries in the U.S., opening a slew of new sites from where packages can be taken by air to customers. The retail giant has been promising drone deliveries for several years, but getting the service off the ground, literally, has been a slow process. Late in 2021, ...
Clearview AI hit with fine in the UK for illegally storing images
The embattled facial recognition firm Clearview AI Inc. has been fined £7.5 million ($9.4 million) by the U.K.’s privacy watchdog for illegally storing images of people. The company, which has its headquarters in New York City, has faced mounting criticism since its database containing billions of images was breached in 2020. Privacy advocates in the ...
New bipartisan bill could make a big dent in big tech’s ad revenue
A group of Republican and Democratic senators introduced a bill today that targets the ads business of companies such as Google LLC, Meta Platforms Inc and Amazon.com Inc. “The Competition and Transparency in Digital Advertising Act” introduced by senators Ken Buck (R-Colorado), Burgess Owens (R-Utah), Pramila Jayapal (D-Washington), David Cicilline (D-Rhode Island), and Matt Gaetz ...
Senators are asking the FTC to investigate a facial recognition firm for deceiving Americans
Yet another company that creates facial recognition software is now under the spotlight, as four Democratic senators asked the Federal Trade Commission today to investigate the Virginia-based American online identity network company ID.me. Just last week, Clearview AI Inc. reached a settlement in court and agreed to stop selling its facial recognition technology. Such technology ...