Two Men Plead Guilty to Using Grindr to Lure Gay Men for Violent Crimes

Two Texas men pleaded guilty to federal hate crime and other charges for using the dating app Grindr to target gay men for violent crimes. According to court documents filed in connection with the two men’s guilty pleas, Daryl Henry and Pablo Ceniceros-Deleon admitted they used Grindr to target and lure gay men to a vacant apartment and other locations around Dallas to commit hate crimes, including robbing, carjacking or kidnapping their victims.

Mozilla Joins Other Tech Firms Asking Judges to Rehear Net Neutrality Case

The maker of the Firefox Web browser joined other tech firms and public-interest advocates to fire their latest salvo: They asked a panel of judges to rehear a case that upheld a Federal Communications Commission decision to repeal the government’s open-Internet rules. In October, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit determined that the FCC acted lawfully when it voted in 2017 to unwind the protections that had required AT&T, Comcast, Verizon and other telecom giants to treat all Web traffic equally.

Lawmaker Asks Google, Apple About Disclosing Apps Created Overseas

The chair of a U.S. congressional panel wrote to Alphabet’s Google and to Apple to ask what if any disclosures mobile apps are required to make regarding overseas ties, a concern that follows reports of Chinese investment in popular apps such as TikTok and Grindr. Rep. Stephen Lynch, chairman of a subcommittee of the House of Representatives Oversight Committee, said in a statement that he had asked both Google and Apple to tell Congress whether they required app developers to disclose any non-U.S. ties.

New Orleans Officials Shut Down Government Computers to Thwart Cyber Attack

Computers were offline, offices were closed and city government's website was down as New Orleans officials sought to contain a cyber attack against its network that started in the early morning. By late afternoon, the city had found no sign that any passwords were compromised or data lost in the attack, though an influx of suspicious emails meant city systems would be kept offline temporarily out of what Chief Information Officer Kim LaGrue described as an abundance of caution.

Facebook to Spend $130 Million on Independent Oversight Board

Facebook said it will commit $130 million to support the efforts of its independent oversight board, but that the board itself will not start its work until sometime in 2020. In a company blog post, Brent Harris, Facebook’s director of governance and global affairs, said the company has been going through the process of creating “a new organization with independent oversight over how Facebook makes decisions on content” since Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg outlined his vision for the board in November 2018.

Twitter to Start Verifying Accounts for Top Congressional Candidates

Twitter announced it will begin verifying congressional candidates who qualify for primaries, a reversal from its previous policy that only offered the coveted "blue check" to candidates who qualified in general elections. The company said it will now verify all candidates running for the House, Senate or governor's mansion across the country in an effort to level the playing field between incumbents and little-known challengers.

FTC Considers Injunction Over How Facebook's Products Interact

Federal officials are considering seeking a preliminary injunction against Facebook Inc. over antitrust concerns related to how its products interact, according to people familiar with the matter. If it materializes, the action by the Federal Trade Commission would focus on Facebook’s policies concerning it how it integrates its apps or allows them to work with potential rivals, these people said.

YouTube Expands Definition of Banned Speech to Include More Threats

Google’s YouTube video service expanded its definition of banned speech after months of criticism, saying it will now remove clips and comments that make “veiled or implied threats” against individuals or insult people based on attributes such as race and sexual orientation. The new harassment guidelines are part of YouTube’s efforts to clean up its platform, which has been plagued by videos that advertisers, users and regulators find toxic.

N.Y. Financial Services Regulator Proposes New Rules for Virtual Currency Firms

New York State’s financial regulator proposed a plan that would allow licensed virtual currency firms that have already received approval for coin listings to introduce new coins without additional permission. The New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) is asking for the public’s input about the plan, which the regulator said stems from a review of its current virtual currency framework.

Three Men Charged with Running $722 Million Cryptocurrency Fraud

Three men were charged by U.S. prosecutors with helping run a $722 million cryptocurrency fraud that amounted to a “high-tech Ponzi scheme.” From 2014 until this month, the men operated BitClub Network, which solicited money from investors in exchange for shares in purported cryptocurrency mining pools and rewarded them for recruiting new investors, according to prosecutors.

Apple Sues Ex-Architect of iPhone Microprocessors for Breach of Contract

Apple is suing Gerard Williams, its former chief architect of iPhone and iPad microprocessors, for breach of contract on the grounds that he started his own chip-design company while still working at Apple. Williams officially left Apple in February 2019 to launch Nuvia, a chip designer for data centers. In November, Nuvia said it had accumulated $53 million in funding.

Barr Says Justice Dep't Exploring 'Widespread Concerns' About Tech Firms

Attorney General William P. Barr signaled that the Justice Department plans to step up its scrutiny of Silicon Valley, exploring new legal tools to probe companies for their privacy abuses and the way they police content online. Barr didn’t mention companies such as Amazon, Facebook and Google by name, but his speech — delivered to state law enforcement officials in Washington — amounted to the latest high-profile warning for Silicon Valley at a moment when major tech companies already are under investigation for their business practices.

India Says Google Not Liable for Defamatory Content on Its Platforms

Alphabet Inc.’s Google isn’t liable for defamatory content posted on its platforms after 2009, India’s top court ruled, reaffirming immunity for Internet companies in the world’s second-most populous nation. The verdict, which reiterates a 2015 ruling, comes as a relief for social media companies, online retailers and service providers who are facing increasing pressure from the Indian government to regulate online content.

Justice Department Plans Antitrust Review of Google's Fitbit Acquisition

The U.S. Justice Department will review plans by Alphabet Inc-owned Google to buy fitness tracker maker Fitbit Inc for possible antitrust issues, a source told Reuters. The $2.1 billion deal will give search and advertising giant Google the capability to take on Apple and Samsung in the crowded market for fitness trackers and smart watches.

Facebook Executives Say They Won't Provide Access to Encrypted Messages

Facebook executives told Attorney General William Barr that the company would not provide law enforcement with investigative access to its encrypted messaging products ahead of a senate hearing on encryption. In a letter, WhatsApp and Messenger heads Will Cathcart and Stan Chudnovsky, respectively, said that any “backdoor” access into Facebook’s products created for law enforcement could be used by bad actors for nefarious purposes.

Man Gets 14-Year Prison Sentence for Trying to Steal Domain at Gunpoint

A social media influencer from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, has been sentenced to more than a decade in prison after he enlisted his cousin to hold an Iowa man at gunpoint in exchange for his Internet domain, officials said. Rossi Lorathio Adams II, also known as Polo, founded the social media company "State Snaps" in 2015 while he was a student at Iowa State University, according to a news release from the U.S. Department of Justice.

YouTube Asks FTC for Clarification on Children's Privacy Settlement

YouTube is asking the U.S. Federal Trade Commission for further clarification and better guidance to help video creators understand how to comply with the FTC’s guidelines set forth as part of YouTube’s settlement with the regulator over its violations of children’s privacy laws. The FTC in September imposed a historic fine of $170 million for YouTube’s violations of COPPA (the U.S. Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act).

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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.