White House to Meet with Big Tech Companies to Discuss Coronavirus

The White House will meet large technology companies to coordinate efforts over the coronavirus outbreak, seeking to control a contagious respiratory illness that has infected almost 1,000 people in the United States and more than 100,000 globally. The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy confirmed to Reuters the meeting would include Facebook Inc, Alphabet Inc’s Google, Amazon.com Inc, Twitter Inc, Apple Inc and Microsoft Corp.

Security Researcher Removes Blog Post After Threat from Talkspace

A security researcher said he was forced to take down a blog post describing an apparent bug in Talkspace’s website that gave him a year’s subscription for free, after the company rejected his findings and sent the researcher a legal threat. John Jackson said he was able to sign up to Talkspace, a popular therapy app, as if he were an employee at one of the companies whose health insurance plans covers Talkspace’s services.

Streaming Service Quibi Denies Patent Infringement in Suit from Eko

Quibi Holdings LLC says it’s being wrongfully accused of infringing a patent for a key feature of a short-form streaming video service it plans to launch April 6 and asked a judge to block any pending lawsuits. Closely held Interlude US Inc., which goes by the name Eko, sent a letter to Quibi on Jan. 28 demanding that it “immediately stop the use of its Turnstyle technology,” which determines the orientation of a user’s phone and seamlessly switches content based on the way the phone is held.

Australia Files Privacy Suit Against Facebook Over Cambridge Analytica

The Australian privacy regulator filed a lawsuit against Facebook Inc., accusing the social media giant of sharing the personal details of more than 300,000 people with political consultant Cambridge Analytica without their knowledge. In the Federal Court lawsuit, the Australian Information Commissioner accused Facebook of breaching privacy law by disclosing 311,127 users’ information for political profiling via a survey product, “This Is Your Digital Life,” on its website.

Amazon Working with Attorneys General to Fight Coronavirus Price-Gouging

Amazon.com Inc said it is working with state attorneys general to identify and prosecute third-party sellers who are taking advantage of fears of the spreading coronavirus to engage in price-gouging on the Amazon website. In a letter to U.S. Senator Edward Markey, the company said it has removed more than 530,000 product offers over price-gouging concerns as well as “millions” of products that make unsupported claims about their ability to fight coronavirus.

DuckDuckGo to Share Data About Online Trackers to Enhance Privacy

DuckDuckGo, the maker of search engine and browser technology that doesn't track you online, is sharing data it's collected about online trackers with other companies so they can also protect your privacy. The company said it's started sharing a data set called Tracker Radar that details 5,326 internet domains used by 1,727 companies and organizations that track you online.

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Facebook Sues Registrar Namecheap for Selling Deceptive Domain Names

Facebook is suing Arizona domain name registrar Namecheap and its proxy service Whoisguard for allowing people to register domain names that “deceive people by pretending to be affiliated with Facebook apps,” the company said in a blog post. Whoisguard registered 45 domain names — including instagrambusinesshelp.com, facebo0k-login.com, and whatsappdownload.site — that infringe on Facebook’s trademarks, according to the post by Christen Dubois, Facebook’s director and associate general counsel of IP litigation.

Facebook Removes Misleading Trump Campaign Ads on Census

Facebook removed Trump campaign ads for violating its policy against misleading references to the U.S. census amid criticism that it has given politicians too much leeway to misinform users on its platform. The Trump ads urged Facebook users to “take the official 2020 Congressional District Census today,” but despite the look and language of the ad, they were not related to the once-a-decade national count of U.S. citizens happening this year.

State Department Blames Russia for Coronavirus Misinformation Online

A top State Department official said that Russia is behind “swarms of online, false personas” that sought to spread misinformation about coronavirus on social media sites, stressing the “entire ecosystem of Russian disinformation is at play.” The latest warning came from Lea Gabrielle, the coordinator of the government’s Global Engagement Center, in testimony to Congress.

Senate Bill Ends Protection for Websites That Allow Child Sex Abuse Content

A bipartisan group of U.S. senators on the powerful judiciary committee introduced a bill aimed at curbing online distribution of child sexual abuse material that technology and civil liberties groups said was an attack on strong encryption critical to billions of people. The bill by Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham and Democratic member Richard Blumenthal would end the civil immunity of platforms like Facebook and Alphabet’s Google for user-posted content if they do not follow a new commission’s “best practices” for detecting abusive images.

Judge Dismisses Gabbard's $50 Million Lawsuit Against Google

A federal judge dismissed a $50 million lawsuit filed by Representative Tulsi Gabbard, a Democratic presidential candidate, that accused Google of infringing on her free speech when it briefly suspended her advertising account last year. The judge, Stephen V. Wilson of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, granted Google’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit because the Gabbard campaign had failed to prove that the First Amendment clause that prohibits the government from curbing free speech applied to Google as a private company.

More Malicious Emails Mention Threats Related to Coronavirus

The number of malicious emails mentioning the coronavirus has increased significantly since the end of January, according to cybersecurity firm Proofpoint Inc., which is monitoring the activity. The company recently assigned an analyst to track coronavirus threats, something it hasn’t done for prior hacking campaigns related to disasters or major public events, said Sherrod DeGrippo, Proofpoint’s senior director of threat research and detection.

Senator Wants to Ban Federal Employees from Using TikTok

Republican Senator Josh Hawley said he will introduce legislation banning federal employees from using social media app TikTok on their devices and accused the company of sharing data with the Chinese government. Hawley said the proposed ban would apply to government-issued devices and his comments added to growing tensions between Washington and Beijing over trade and technology transfers.

Senators Planning Revisions to Section 230 Internet Protections

U.S. regulators are preparing to take fresh aim at Facebook, Google and other tech giants, unveiling new efforts to combat online content that harms or abuses children — and hold Silicon Valley responsible for its spread. The heightened activity in Washington reflects the government’s simmering frustration with Silicon Valley, along with a growing appetite to rethink decades-old federal laws that spare profitable, popular tech platforms from being held liable for dangerous content that goes viral on their services.

Senators Push Google for Answers on Health Data Collection Project

A bipartisan trio of U.S. senators pushed again for answers on Google’s controversial “Project Nightingale,” saying the search giant evaded requests for details on its far-reaching data tie-up with health giant Ascension. The senators, in a letter to St. Louis-based Ascension, said they were put off by the lack of substantive disclosure around the effort.

Researchers Find Mixed Results on YouTube's Efforts to Fight Conspiracies

YouTube’s efforts to curb conspiracy theories pose a major test of Silicon Valley’s ability to combat misinformation, particularly ahead of this year’s elections. A new study from researchers at University of California, Berkeley, which examined eight million recommendations over 15 months, provides one of the clearest pictures yet of that fight, and the mixed findings show how challenging the issue remains for tech companies like Google, Facebook and Twitter.

India's Supreme Court Overturns Decision on Cryptocurrency Exchanges

India’s Supreme Court overturned a central bank ban forbidding lenders to facilitate banking transactions for cryptocurrency exchanges and traders, removing a major hurdle for the development of the sector. In April 2018, the Reserve Bank of India gave entities it regulated three months to snap all banking relationships with individuals or businesses dealing in virtual currency.

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