James Farrell
Latest from James Farrell
Sundar Pichai tells Congress Chinese search engine isn’t coming soon
Google LLC Chief Executive Sundar Pichai met with the House judiciary committee Tuesday, three months after the company failed to turn up for a date with Congress with other tech giants. One of the more contentious issues discussed and one that is currently causing internal discord at the company was that of “Project Dragonfly,” a ...
Torrent of criticism pelts Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey for his Myanmar comments
Twitter Inc. Chief Executive Jack Dorsey has found himself in deep water after going on a 10-day meditation retreat in Myanmar and promoting the country as a tourist destination. “The people are full of joy and the food is amazing,” Dorsey (pictured) told his 4 million-plus followers, a comment some people thought crude seeing as though ...
Australia passes controversial encryption bill
The Australian Parliament passed a bill Thursday that will require all technology companies to hand over encrypted data to law enforcement if asked to do so. Privacy advocates decry such a law, but the government has said that such a law is necessary to fight organized crime and terrorism, making Australia a safer place. Critics ...
Leaked Facebook emails reveal determination to rule the digital world
The U.K. Parliament Wednesday released a huge cache of documents that might vindicate hardline Facebook Inc. critics that charge the company is willing to sideline ethics to focus on the bottom line. More than 250 pages of internal correspondence from 2012 to 2015 were released by U.K. lawmakers. The emails were originally sealed for a lawsuit that was ...
Hackers got into Republican campaign aides’ emails during 2018 election
A number of House Republicans’ campaign aides were hacked during this years’ midterms, according to a report first published Tuesday by Politico. Four senior aides of the National Republican Congressional Committee had their emails hacked, and this went on for several months, according to the report. An NRCC vendor spotted an attack in April, and ...
Amazon is reportedly testing its cashierless technology in larger stores
Amazon.com Inc. is now testing its cashierless checkout technology in bigger stores, according to a report published Sunday by The Wall Street Journal. Although there have been some bumps along the road, the Journal reported that the tech now works well in smaller places that look more like grocery stores. Apparently, things ran less smooth when ...
How Google tried to keep ‘Project Dragonfly’ under wraps
Google LLC has reluctantly become more open regarding its censored Chinese search engine, “Project Dragonfly,” but it turns out the company wanted to keep the project low-key for as long as it could. According to a report by The Intercept published on Thursday, when the project was announced last year at the Google offices in Mountain View, California, some ...
Facebook launches Today In feature, a place to read local news
Facebook Inc. said it’s expanding its “Today In” feature, which provides users with local news and announcements. In a blog post Wednesday, the company said the feature is available in 400 U.S. cities, while the first test of Today In has also begun in Australia. One of the reasons for the expansion, according to the ...
Google employees join Amnesty International to oppose Chinese search engine
Hundreds of Google LLC employees are doubling down on their efforts to discourage the company from developing a censored search engine for the Chinese market. On Tuesday, more than 290 Google staff signed an open letter stating in no uncertain terms that the search engine, codenamed “Project Dragonfly,” was not in line with their ethics, ...
Facebook’s War Room may have lost some of its soldiers, for now
On the run-up to the U.S. midterm elections, Facebook Inc. showed off its War Room to reporters, a place within the company where certain employees would try to stamp out misinformation on the platform, among other nefarious activities. According to a report by Bloomberg Monday, in spite of its promised usefulness in spotting misinformation before ...