Apple Inc. and its Asian contract manufacturers are hitting back at Qualcomm Inc. with legal claims that try to undermine the chipmaker’s attempt to force them to pay licensing fees. Qualcomm is asking for payments in excess of what it would normally receive, Apple, Compal Electronics Inc., Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. and others said in court filings.
The White House offered support for the Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) proposal to roll back the Obama-era net neutrality internet rules. “We support the FCC chair’s efforts to review and consider rolling back these rules and believe that the best way to get fair rules for everyone is for Congress to take action and create regulatory and economic certainty,” deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.
Facebook Inc., Alphabet Inc.'s Google, Apple Inc. and other major technology firms are largely absent from a debate over the renewal of a broad U.S. internet surveillance law, weakening prospects for privacy reforms that would further protect customer data, according to sources familiar with the matter. While tech companies often lobby Washington on privacy issues, the major firms have been hesitant to enter a fray over a controversial portion of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), industry lobbyists, congressional aides and civil liberties advocates said.
China’s already formidable internet censors have demonstrated a new strength -- the ability to delete images in one-on-one chats as they are being transmitted, making them disappear before receivers see them. The ability is part of a broader technology push by Beijing’s censors to step up surveillance and get ahead of activists and others communicating online in China.
Saudi Arabian Airlines, which is also known as Saudia, became the final of nine carriers to be removed from the March laptop ban for carry-on bags aboard flights heading to the U.S. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security adopted the ban because of intelligence about terrorists getting better at hiding explosives in electronics.
U.S. chipmaker Qualcomm faces the threat of a daily fine of 580,000 euros ($665,000) for failing to provide EU antitrust regulators with information after losing an appeal against the penalty in a European Union court. Qualcomm, which was charged by the European Commission for using anti-competitive methods to squeeze out British phone software maker Icera, last month asked the Luxembourg-based General Court to suspend the order.
People in the UK will have to prove they are 18 before being allowed to access pornography websites from next year, the government is to announce. Websites will be legally required to install age verification controls by April 2018 as part of a move to make the internet safer for children.
A group representing major technology firms including Alphabet Inc. and Facebook Inc. urged the U.S. Federal Communications Commission to abandon plans to reverse the landmark 2015 rules barring Internet service providers from blocking or slowing consumer access to web content. The Internet Association said in its filing with the FCC that dismantling the net neutrality rules "will create significant uncertainty in the market and upset the careful balance that has led to the current virtuous circle of innovation in the broadband ecosystem."
Encrypted messaging service Telegram will shut down "terrorist-related" public channels, its founder said, after Indonesia's government blocked access to the platform citing security concerns. Indonesia, home to the world's largest Muslim population, has seen a resurgence in home-grown radicalism, and has stepped up cooperation with its neighbors to stem a growing presence in Southeast Asia of extremist group Islamic State.
The owner of the Ashley Madison adultery website said it will pay $11.2 million to settle U.S. litigation brought on behalf of roughly 37 million users whose personal details were exposed in a July 2015 data breach. Ruby Corp, formerly known as Avid Life Media Inc, denied wrongdoing in agreeing to the preliminary class-action settlement, which requires approval by a federal judge in St. Louis.
The Australian government proposed a new cybersecurity law to force global technology companies such as Facebook and Google to help police by unscrambling encrypted messages sent by suspected extremists and other criminals. But some experts, as well as Facebook, warned that weakening end-to-end encryption services so that police could eavesdrop would leave communications vulnerable to hackers.
Noted legal aid chatbot DoNotPay announced a massive expansion, which will help users tackle issues in 1,000 legal areas entirely for free. While the bot will still help drivers contest parking tickets and refugees apply for asylum, the service will now also help those who want to report harassment in the workplace or who simply want a refund on a busted toaster.
U.S. border officers aren't allowed to look at any data stored only in the "cloud" — including social media data — when they search U.S. travelers' phones, Customs and Border Protection acknowledged in a letter obtained Wednesday by NBC News. The letter, sent in response to inquiries by Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and verified by Wyden's office, not only states that CBP doesn't search data stored only with remote cloud services, but also — apparently for the first time — declares that it doesn't have that authority in the first place.
Read the article: NBC News
An online marketplace that sold illegal goods on the so-called Dark Web was shut following action by international authorities, according to people familiar with the matter. The closing of AlphaBay, an anonymous marketplace that listed for sale drugs, counterfeit credit cards and other illegal goods, came after coordinated action by the U.S., Canada and Thailand, the people said.
The French government said it would appeal against a court ruling in Google's favour with regard to 1.1 billion euros ($1.25 billion) in tax.
FanDuel and DraftKings have decided to scrap their merger rather than fight the U.S. government, which had sought to block the combination of the country’s two top daily fantasy sports sites on grounds that it threatened competition and consumers. In a statement, FanDuel CEO Nigel Eccles said the companies believed — even until the end — that the merger would have aided both companies’ growth.
Guests at 14 Trump properties, including hotels in Washington, D.C., New York and Las Vegas, have had their credit card information exposed, marking the third time in as many years that a months-long security breach has affected customers of the chain of luxury hotels. The latest instance occurred between August 2016 and March 2017, according to a notice on the company's website, and included guest names, addresses and phone numbers, as well as credit card numbers and expiration dates.
Read the article: Los Angeles Times
Google won its fight against a 1.12 billion-euro ($1.3 billion) French tax bill after a court rejected claims the search-engine giant abused loopholes to avoid paying its fair share. Google didn’t illegally dodge French taxes by routing sales in the country out of Ireland, the Paris administrative court decided.
Apple has set up its first data center in China, setting the tone for how foreign companies will handle a strict new law requiring them to store Chinese users’ information in the country. Apple said in a statement that the new center would keep “strong data privacy and security protections in place,” adding that no back doors would be created in its systems.
The Trump administration removed Moscow-based Kaspersky Lab from two lists of approved vendors used by government agencies to purchase technology equipment, amid concerns the cyber security firm's products could be used by the Kremlin to gain entry into U.S. networks. The delisting represents the most concrete action taken against Kaspersky following months of mounting suspicion among intelligence officials and lawmakers that the company may be too closely connected to hostile Russian intelligence agencies accused of cyber attacks on the United States.
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