Senators Seek 'Resounding Precedent' Against Facebook for Privacy Woes

Two top Senate lawmakers expressed frustration with a federal probe into Facebook’s privacy practices, urging the government to move more swiftly and consider imposing tough punishments that target the company’s top executives. The message — delivered by Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal (Conn.) and Republican Sen. Josh Hawley (Mo.) — reflects the mounting political pressure on the Federal Trade Commission to deliver a strong rebuke of the tech giant while sending a message to the rest of Silicon Valley that Washington has started taking privacy violations more seriously.

Ukrainian Man Arrested in Netherlands for Creating 'Malvertising' Campaigns

A Ukrainian man has been arrested in the Netherlands and extradited to the U.S., where he was arraigned in front of a New Jersey judge to face charges of orchestrating malvertising campaigns for almost five years. According to court documents, Oleksii Ivanov, 31, has been behind multiple fake companies that operated from October 2013 through May 2018 and shipped over 100 million bad ads to users all across the world.

Facebook Deletes More Misleading Accounts Linked to Russia

Facebook Inc. said it had removed multiple pages, groups and accounts linked mostly to Russia that were used to spread misleading information on the social network and its Instagram service. The company deleted 97 accounts from Russia that focused on Ukraine and another 21 that focused on Austria, the Baltics, Germany, Spain, Ukraine and the United Kingdom, Facebook said in a blog post.

European Council President Warns About Rise of U.S. Tech Companies

The world needs to be wary of the rise of tech giants such as Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon, comparing their powers to those of countries such as China, European Council President Donald Tusk said in Warsaw. “In the East, we see the rise of those capable of controlling everyone’s behavior, and in the West we’ve seen the rise of an uncontrolled, spontaneous empire,” Tusk said in Warsaw in reference to the companies during a speech marking Constitution Day.

EU Pushing WTO for Improved Protections for Online Transactions

The European Union began a push for improved protection for traders and consumers involved in online transactions, as it published proposals launching what are likely to be long and hard WTO negotiations on regulating e-commerce. The World Trade Organization rulebook was largely written in the 1980s and 1990s before the Internet revolution, and major trading powers have conflicting red lines over e-commerce.

EU Officials Expected to Seek Large Penalties for GDPR Violations

Companies can expect large penalties from the European Union this summer, more than a year after the sweeping General Data Protection Regulation took effect last May. Officials from Ireland and the U.K. said they are investigating major GDPR cases and plan to announce enforcement actions in the next few months, adding that the cases took time to build.

After Bans, Trump Threatens to 'Monitor' Social Media Sites for Censorship

President Trump threatened to “monitor" social-media sites for their “censorship of AMERICAN CITIZENS,” a day after Facebook permanently banned far-right figures and organizations including the conspiracy theory site InfoWars. Trump’s subtle threat -- delivered in a series of tweets -- marked the president’s latest broadside against Silicon Valley, which he has repeatedly accused of unfairly targeting and removing conservative users and their views.

California Anti-Eavesdropping Act Would Restrict Smart Home Speakers

A bill making its way through the California Legislature would prohibit makers of smart home speakers from saving or storing recordings without users’ explicit consent. The Anti-Eavesdropping Act, which cleared its first committee, would also ban smart speaker device manufacturers from sharing with third parties recordings of verbal commands or requests heard by the devices.

Google Says It Spends Hundreds of Millions of Dollars Annually Reviewing Content

Alphabet Inc’s Google unit told a U.S. House panel it spends hundreds of millions of dollars annually on content review and said it manually reviewed more than 1 million suspected “terrorist videos” on YouTube in the first three months of 2019. Google disclosed in a April 24 letter that the manual review found 90,000 videos violated its terrorism policy.

Facebook Discussing Settlement with FTC to Include U.S.-Approved Privacy Officer

Facebook and the Federal Trade Commission are negotiating a possible settlement that would require the company to place privacy-minded executives at the company's highest levels, a source close to the talks told said — in addition to paying the expected multibillion-dollar fine it disclosed. The steps, which are subject to change until a deal is final, would include appointing a federally approved privacy official at the social network and creating an "independent" privacy oversight committee that may include Facebook board members, said the person, who requested anonymity because the discussions are ongoing.

Facebook Bans Far-Right Leaders Including Farrakhan, Alex Jones

Facebook said it has permanently banned several far-right and anti-Semitic figures and organizations, including Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, Infowars host Alex Jones, Milo Yiannopoulos and Laura Loomer, for being “dangerous,” a sign that the social network is more aggressively enforcing its hate speech policies under pressure from civil rights groups. Facebook had removed the accounts, fan pages, and groups affiliated with these individuals after it reevaluated the content that they had posted previously, or had reexamined their activities outside of Facebook, the company said.

Online Advertising Fraud Expected to Cost Marketers $5.8 Billion

Marketers are expected to waste $5.8 billion this year on buying online ads that will be viewed by bots instead of humans, a study found — an 11% decline from the amount the group estimated was lost to fraud in 2017. But ad-fraud schemes on other platforms have quickly risen and been much more difficult to measure, according to the study, which was conducted by the Association of National Advertisers and fraud-detection company White Ops Inc.

Qualcomm to Receive at Least $4.5B in Patent Settlement with Apple

Qualcomm Inc. will receive at least $4.5 billion as part of a legal settlement with Apple Inc. that ended more than two years of wrangling over the chip maker’s patent-licensing fees, the company said. The payment — part of a three-pronged settlement between the companies last month — would range from $4.5 billion to $4.7 billion, based on how the accounting ultimately works out, Qualcomm Chief Executive Steve Mollenkopf said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal.

Facebook Debuts Product Changes to Address Privacy Concerns

Facebook debuted an overhaul of its core social network, taking its first concrete steps to refashion itself into a private messaging and e-commerce company as it tries to move past a stream of scandals while tapping new revenue sources. Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg unveiled a fresh design for the world’s biggest social network that de-emphasized its News Feed and showcased its messaging app, online marketplace and video-on-demand site.

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The GigaLaw Firm helps companies of all sizes protect their brands online, using domain name dispute policies – such as the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) – and other legal tools available to copyright and trademark owners on the Internet.