James Farrell
Latest from James Farrell
FCC to approve T-Mobile/Sprint merger, but DOJ might kill it
Things were looking good for the T-Mobile U.S. Inc. and Sprint Corp. merger on Monday after Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai gave it the green light. Then the Department of Justice weighed in and suddenly it didn’t look so good after all. Pai said in a statement that he believed the merger would be in ...
To catch a thief, NYPD uses facial recognition on Hollywood celebrity photo
After the New York Police Department was at a loss when its facial recognition software didn’t turn up any matches, the department decided to get creative with celebrity photos. According to a report published by Georgetown Law Thursday, in one case police had a partially obscured image of a suspect, but after running it through ...
Tech giants sign ‘Christchurch Call to Action’ on online extremism, but Trump declines
Some of the world’s leading tech firms have pledged to fight online extremism after signing an agreement today dubbed the “Christchurch Call to Action.” Spearheaded by New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, the plan was introduced at a summit in Paris Wednesday where governments and industry leaders met. Countries and companies agreed to combat the ...
San Francisco bans government use of facial recognition technology
Amid growing fears of facial recognition technology becoming an oppressive tool of surveillance down the line, the city of San Francisco voted today to ban the use of it by police and other official agencies. The city’s Board of Supervisors voted 8-1 in support of a proposal to ban facial recognition by agencies to be ...
Amazon’s new automated packing machines are much faster than humans
Amazon.com Inc. is embracing automation again, this time by rolling out packing machines for customer orders. As first reported by Reuters today, the machines scan the items as they move along a conveyor belt and after this small inspection, a custom-made box will be wrapped around those items. Of course, this has always been a ...
Time to break up Facebook, says co-founder Chris Hughes
“It is time to break up Facebook,” company co-founder Chris Hughes wrote in an explosive and lengthy op-ed published by the New York Times on Thursday. In the first few paragraphs, Hughes (pictured, center) talks about his friend and co-founder Mark Zuckerberg, seeming to want to humanize him in contrast to the Facebook chief executive’s Zuckerborg ...
In pay protest, drivers at Lyft and IPO-bound Uber take to the streets
Drivers working for Uber Technologies Inc. and Lyft Inc. are on strike today over pay conditions, which comes on the brink of Uber’s blockbuster initial public offering of stock this week. The protest is global, with hundreds of Uber and Lyft drivers taking to the streets of San Francisco, New York City, Washington D.C. and ...
Google unveils a smarter kind of home device, the Nest Hub Max
Google LLC today announced an updated home device at its annual I/O conference, which combines the previous Google Home Hub and the Nest Camera into what’s now called the Nest Hub Max. “The smart home of today is frustrating and fragmented,” Rick Osterloh, Google’s senior vice president of devices, said onstage today. What the Nest Hub ...
Facebook opens European War Room ahead of elections
As the elections for a European Parliament approach, Facebook Inc. has opened a War Room in Dublin, Ireland, in an effort to combat the spread of disinformation on the platform. Just as with the room by the same name that was set up in the U.S. in 2018, a number of the social network’s employees will ...
Facebook and Instagram ban a number of ‘dangerous individuals’
Facebook Inc. today announced a cull of people the company said are “dangerous individuals” who disseminate extremist content. “We’ve always banned individuals or organizations that promote or engage in violence and hate, regardless of ideology,” Facebook said in a statement. “The process for evaluating potential violators is extensive and it is what led us to ...