U.S. Tech Companies to Stop Reviewing Hong Kong Requests for User Data

Internet giants including Facebook and Google said they will stop reviewing requests from Hong Kong for user data while the companies evaluate a new national security law imposed on the city by the Chinese government. The new national security law was revealed at the end of June and has already had a chilling effect on the city that has long been a haven for more open free speech and Internet access than mainland China.

Federal Officials Warn of Cyber Criminals Targeting U.S. Workers at Home

Federal officials and experts are warning that foreign cyber criminals are targeting U.S. businesses and Americans who are working from home on less-secure networks during the COVID-19 pandemic. Millions of Americans have shifted to working at home indefinitely to help halt the spread of COVID-19, placing them outside of more secure office networks and away from company IT professionals.

European Regulations Aim to Curb Tech Firms' Anticompetitive Behavior

Big tech companies including Google parent Alphabet Inc., Amazon.com Inc. and Facebook Inc. face a swath of proposed European regulations aimed at curbing their alleged anticompetitive behavior, making them pay more taxes and compelling them to shoulder more responsibility for illegal content on their platforms, said a top European Union official. Margrethe Vestager, the EU’s digital-policy and antitrust czar, detailed for the first time a comprehensive plan of how she aims to rein in U.S. tech giants, using a package of initiatives that the EU has begun to outline individually in recent weeks.

South Korean Court Won't Extradite Accused Child Porn Site Operator to U.S.

A South Korean court rejected an extradition request by the United States for a South Korean citizen convicted of running one of the world’s biggest child pornography websites on the dark web. The South Korean, Son Jong-woo, 24, completed an 18-month sentence in April for operating a child pornography site called “Welcome to Video,” which was inaccessible by regular web browsers and for which he collected fees paid in Bitcoin from the site’s users, officials said.

Facebook, Advertisers at Impasse Over Boycott for Hate Speech Policy

Facebook has spent the past few days in round-the-clock conversations with advertisers, trying to persuade them to come back to the platform with the promise of modest changes to address concerns that the social network profits from hate and outrage. But advertisers and the agencies they work with say they are still negotiating. And they say they are so far unimpressed with promises to better police hate speech, including labeling some politicians’ posts when they break the company’s policies.

U.S. Tech Firms May Face New Free-Speech Threats in Hong Kong

U.S. technology titans face a looming test of their free-speech credentials in Hong Kong as China’s new national-security law for the city demands local authorities take measures to supervise and regulate its uncensored internet. Facebook Inc. and its Instagram service, Twitter Inc. and YouTube, a unit of Alphabet Inc.’s Google, operate freely in the city even as they have been shut out or opted out of the mainland’s tightly controlled internet, which uses the “Great Firewall” to censor information.

Internet Freedom Community Worries About Changes at Open Technology Fund

When Michael Pack, a conservative filmmaker and ally of Stephen K. Bannon, recently fired the heads of four U.S. government-funded news outlets, many became alarmed that he would turn the independently operated organizations, as well as the Voice of America, into “Trump TV.” But Mr. Pack, the new chief executive of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, also cleaned house last month at the lesser-known Open Technology Fund, an internet freedom group overseen by the agency Mr. Pack now runs. Many worry that the move could have an even greater effect.

TikTok Says Chinese Government Hasn't Requested User Data

Social media app TikTok distanced itself from Beijing after India banned 59 Chinese apps in the country, according to a correspondence seen by Reuters. In a letter to the Indian government dated June 28th and seen by Reuters, TikTok Chief Executive Kevin Mayer said the Chinese government has never requested user data, nor would the company turn it over if asked.

DuckDuckGo Restored in India After Reports of Being Blocked by Government

Privacy-focused search engine DuckDuckGo has been restored in India after being unreachable for many users there since July 1st, Android Police reported. Reports about what was causing the outage have varied. Some users reported the Indian government appeared to be behind the block, and others said they were getting what appeared to be DNS lookup errors, according to Android Police.

Online Child Sex Abuse Bill Faces Amendment Over Privacy Concerns

U.S. legislation aimed at stopping online child sexual abuse material is likely to be amended to address concerns of platforms like Google and Facebook that the proposed law goes too far to weaken privacy protections for ordinary users, according to a draft of the bill seen by Reuters. In a new draft authored by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, The Eliminating Abuse and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies Act of 2019, or EARN IT Act, makes compliance with a set of controversial “best practices” voluntary instead of mandatory for companies such as for Facebook Inc and Alphabet Inc’s Google.

'Facebook Does Not Profit from Hate,' Company Says in Open Letter

Facebook published an open letter saying it does not benefit from hateful content as a campaign for advertisers to boycott the platform for its failure to moderate racist, sexist and otherwise objectionable content builds steam. "I want to be unambiguous: Facebook does not profit from hate," Nick Clegg, the company's vice president of global affairs and communications, wrote in the letter.

CEOs from Amazon, Facebook, Google, Apple to Testify in Antitrust Probe

The chief executives of the four U.S. tech giants — Amazon.com, Facebook, Alphabet’s Google and Apple — will testify before the U.S. Congress in late July as part of an ongoing antitrust probe into the companies, according to two sources familiar with the matter. Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Sundar Pichai of Google and Apple’s Tim Cook will appear as part of the probe by the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee’s antitrust panel, the sources said.

U.K. Watchdog Recommends Regulations for Online Advertising

Britain’s competition watchdog has set out recommendations for new regulations to tackle the dominance of Google and Facebook in the online advertising market. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said that it had proposed the creation of a “Digital Markets Unit” designed to rein in platforms with “a position of market power” when it comes to digital ads.

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Facebook Removes Hundreds of Accounts Linked to 'Boogaloo' Movement

Facebook removed hundreds of accounts and groups associated with a violent network of the far-right “boogaloo” movement whose followers have been linked to violence that disrupted mostly peaceful protests around the United States. Facebook said it was designating the faction of the boogaloo movement that advocates violence as a “dangerous organization” and had taken down 220 accounts, 28 pages, 106 groups and 95 accounts on Facebook-owned Instagram that were associated with it.

Biden Campaign Accuses Facebook of Haggling with Trump Over Hateful Posts

Joe Biden’s presidential campaign demanded in a letter to Facebook that the company prevent misuse of its platform by President Trump to spread “hateful content” and misleading claims about mail-in voting ahead of the November election. The letter, obtained by The Washington Post and addressed to Nick Clegg, Facebook’s vice president for global affairs and communications, is the latest in a series of complaints from the campaign about how Facebook enforces its rules for politicians.

FCC Designates Chinese Telecoms Huawei, ZTE as National Security Threats

The Federal Communications Commission designated the Chinese telecommunications firms Huawei and ZTE as national security threats, cutting them off from billions of dollars in federal broadband subsidies. The agency voted unanimously last year to bar telecommunications manufacturers it deemed to be threats from receiving money meant to expand internet access to underserved areas, including rural America.

Supreme Court Says Booking.com Entitled to Trademark Registration

The travel reservation company Booking.com, a unit of Booking Holdings Inc, deserves to be able to trademark its name, the U.S. Supreme Court decided, overruling a federal agency that found it too generic to merit protection. The court decided 8-1 that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office was incorrect when it denied the company’s application to trademark the name Booking.com, with the justices finding it distinctive enough that the agency should have approved it.

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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.