Biden Expected to Maintain Strong Approach with China on Tech Security

President Trump set the United States on a new course with his years-long fight against Chinese technology, which he labeled a security threat and a tool for spreading Chinese influence. President-elect Joe Biden will probably tweak that approach, but Beijing shouldn’t anticipate a significant softening, foreign affairs and technology experts say.

Twitter Appoints Well-Known Hacker 'Mudge' as Head of Security

Social media giant Twitter Inc, under increased threat of regulation and plagued by serious security breaches, is appointing one of the world's best-regarded hackers to tackle everything from engineering missteps to misinformation. The company named Peiter Zatko, widely known by his hacker handle Mudge, to the new position of head of security, giving him a broad mandate to recommend changes in structure and practices.

Google, Justice Department Fail to Agree on Protective Order

Alphabet Inc’s Google and the U.S. Justice Department have failed to reach agreement over a protective order for third parties like Microsoft that provided data to the government for its lawsuit against the search and advertising giant. Google is pressing for two in-house attorneys to have access to the confidential data while the Justice Department and state attorneys general involved in the lawsuit have disagreed, Google said in a court filing.

EU Drafting New Rules to Curb Tech Companies' Anti-Competitive Behavior

Technology companies’ services could be banned from the European market if they do not heed EU regulation, Europe’s industry chief Thierry Breton told German weekly Welt am Sonntag, as the European Commission finalizes rules on internet companies. Breton will announce new draft rules known as the Digital Services Act and the Digital Markets Act together with European Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager on Dec. 2.

Trump Administration Gives ByteDance Two-Week Extension to Sell TikTok

The Trump administration gave TikTok’s Chinese owner more time to reach a deal to sell the app, after demanding that it divest its interest in the social media service over national security concerns. President Trump had signed an executive order in August requiring that TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, sell any assets that allowed it to operate the app in the United States by November 12.

Commerce Department Says It Won't Enforce Order Banning TikTok

The Commerce Department said that it won’t enforce its order that would have effectively forced the Chinese-owned TikTok video-sharing app to shut down, citing a federal court ruling in Philadelphia. The department’s action delays implementation of a regulation, set to take effect Thursday, that would have barred U.S. companies such as Apple Inc. from offering TikTok as a mobile app, and companies including Amazon.com Inc. and Alphabet Inc. from offering web-hosting service for TikTok — moves that would effectively make it inoperable.

Twitter Says It Labeled 300,000 Presidential Election Tweets as Disputed

Twitter said that it labeled as disputed 300,000 tweets related to the presidential election, or 0.2 percent of the total number of messages about the event, even as some users continued sharing misleading information about the outcome. The disclosure made Twitter the first major social media platform to publicly evaluate its performance during the 2020 election.

Top U.S. Cybersecurity Official Tells Associates He Expects to be Fired

Top U.S. cybersecurity official Christopher Krebs, who worked on protecting the election from hackers but drew the ire of the Trump White House over efforts to debunk disinformation, has told associates he expects to be fired, three sources familiar with the matter told Reuters. Separately, Bryan Ware, assistant director for cybersecurity at CISA, confirmed to Reuters that he had handed in his resignation.

ByteDance Asks Court to Extend Deadline on U.S. Effort to Ban TikTok

TikTok’s parent company ByteDance filed a petition asking the courts to extend a deadline for the company to divest the popular video-sharing app as outlined in an executive order from President Trump, a TikTok spokesperson confirmed to The Hill. In the petition filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, Beijing-based ByteDance asks for an extension since a proposed deal tentatively approved by Trump in September has yet to be finalized, according to reports.

Facebook Extends Ban on Political Advertising for One More Month

Facebook said that it plans to continue a moratorium on political advertising for another month, a move that may affect Democrats and Republicans as they continue vying against each other in key Senate races in Georgia. “The temporary pause for ads about politics and social issues in the U.S. continues to be in place as part of our ongoing efforts to protect the election,” Facebook said in an update to its government and policy blog.

Judge Dismisses Some of Apple's Claims Against Epic Games

A federal judge in California dismissed some of Apple Inc's counterclaims against Epic Games, Bloomberg News reported, narrowing the scope of a dispute that has seen the online game maker's "Fortnite" game removed from the iPhone maker's App Store. Apple and Epic have been in a legal battle since August, when the maker of the popular game launched its own in-app payment system to circumvent what it called Apple’s monopolistic practices.

China Releases Draft Antimonopoly Rules for Online Platforms

China has released new draft antimonopoly rules for its online platforms, signaling an increased appetite by Beijing authorities to rein in its dominant technology companies. China’s State Administration for Market Regulation said it would seek feedback on rules covering a host of potential anti-monopolistic practices on the country’s digital platforms, including offering different prices to different consumers for the same product.

Cryptocurrency-Related Losses Decline Thanks to Security Procedures

Losses from cryptocurrency thefts, hacks, and fraud declined to $1.8 billion for the first 10 months of the year compared with last year, but crime in the hot “decentralized finance” sector rose, according to a report from crypto intelligence company CipherTrace. “What we have seen is that exchanges and other cryptocurrency players have implemented more security procedures,” Dave Jevans, CipherTrace’s chief executive officer, told Reuters.

EU Regulators File Antitrust Charges Against Amazon for 'Dual Role Platforms'

European Union regulators brought antitrust charges against Amazon, saying the online retail giant broke competition laws by unfairly using its size and access to data to harm smaller merchants that rely on the company to reach customers. The European Commission, the executive branch of the 27-nation bloc, said Amazon had abused its dual role as both a store used by scores of vendors and a merchant that sells its own competing goods on the platform.

Zoom Agrees to New Security Program in Settlement with FTC

Zoom Video Communications Inc. must implement a new information security program as part of its proposed settlement with U.S. regulators over user privacy issues, the Federal Trade Commission said. The resolution did not have any financial component but the agency said Zoom would face fines of up to $43,280 for each future violation under the agreement.

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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.