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Big tech companies tend to make a lot of enemies — but there are none more powerful than the US government. Apple, Google, Amazon, and Meta are regularly called in front of Congress to fend off monopoly accusations — and lawmakers bring up bills to rein in the companies just as often. The Federal Trade Commission has taken a particularly central role, leading a lawsuit to sever Facebook and Instagram while blocking new acquisitions for Oculus and the company’s virtual reality wing. Like it or not, these regulatory fights will play a huge role in deciding the future of tech — and neither side is playing nice.

How the House revived the TikTok ban before most of us noticed

TikTok mobilized users to lobby Congress, and it backfired spectacularly.

Supreme Court to hear case on how the government talks to social media companies

Murthy v. Missouri could change how platforms deal with covid misinfo, election threats, and more.

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TikTok faces a $10.9 million fine in Italy over child safety concerns.

Italian regulators imposed the fine after finding that TikTok “failed to implement appropriate mechanisms” to monitor content on its platform, “particularly those that may threaten the safety of minors.”

It cites the “French scar” challenge as one of the “potentially dangerous” types of content disseminated by TikTok’s algorithm, which involves users pinching their face so hard it leaves a mark.


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Steven Mnuchin is working to create a buyer for TikTok.

The former Treasury Secretary said on CNBC Thursday that he’s “going to put together a group to buy TikTok.” Such a group would need to have massive buying power, since the app boasts 170 million US users, and has an estimated value in the tens of billions of dollars.

The House passed a bill Wednesday that could force TikTok’s Chinese parent ByteDance to sell it, or be banned from the US.


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Now AliExpress is on the EU’s naughty list.

The European Commission says it’s opened formal proceedings against AliExpress because it may have breached the Digital Services Act’s rules. For example, the Commission says AliExpress may not be enforcing its terms of service properly, and is allowing the sale of “certain products posing risks for consumers’ health (such as fake medicines and food as well as dietary supplements).” Similar investigations have already been opened into TikTok and X.


Why the Kate Middleton scandal just won’t die

How a bad Photoshop job turned into an existential crisis for the British monarchy.

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Nancy Pelosi is playing TikTok-toe.

The former House Speaker said passing a new bill that incentivizes China-based ByteDance to sell TikTok “is not an attempt to ban TikTok. It’s an attempt to make TikTok better. Tic-tac-toe. A winner.”

After the bill passed out of the House with 352 votes, it now must clear the Senate to reach the president’s desk.


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The EU has officially adopted its sweeping AI law.

After two years of debate and revisions, European Parliament members gave the Artificial Intelligence Act their final approval on Wednesday.

While the law officially comes into force 20 days after it’s published in the Official Journal (likely happening in May), some rules — like those impacting general-purpose AI systems like chatbots — will take effect 12 months later to give AI providers time to comply.


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Brave choice.

Brave says its browser is having a hockey stick moment after the release of Apple’s DMA-compliant iOS 17.4 last week, which immediately nags users to choose their default browser from a randomized list upon startup.


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Masimo jailbroke iPhones to try to keep the Apple Watch banned.

That’s according to the US Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) recently-published January 12th ruling that approved Apple’s modification meant to lift the Apple Watch ban.

CBP chief Dax Terrill wrote that Masimo installed “otherwise restricted software that, but for the jailbreaking, would not have been feasible.” He concluded that the software change “would appear to resolve the issue of infringement.”


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Boeing’s door plug incident is under criminal investigation.

The US Department of Justice’s (DOJ) investigation will consider whether Boeing complied with its 2021 settlement with the DOJ in light of an Alaska Boeing 737 Max that recently lost a chunk of fuselage mid-flight, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Alaska Airlines reportedly called such investigations “normal.” In February, an investigation revealed that four bolts were missing from the door plug when it left Boeing’s factory.


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Election officials are freaking out about AI.

First there was the Joe Biden robocall, where a deepfake of the president’s voice told New Hampshire voters to stay home during the primary. Now election officials worry they, too, will be impersonated during this election cycle.

“It has the potential to do a lot of damage,” Arizona’s secretary of state, who tested out a deepfake of himself last year, told Politico.


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Donald Trump has even more to say about the TikTok ban.

Appearing on CNBC’s Squawk Box, Trump explained, again, why he no longer supports the push to ban TikTok. “...without TikTok, you can make Facebook bigger and I consider Facebook to be an enemy of the people along with a lot of the media.”

And as for his own unsuccessful push to ban the ByteDance-owned app, he now claims “I had it banned just about, I could have gotten it done. But I said, ‘You know what, but I’ll leave it up to you.”


President Biden says he’ll sign a TikTok ban, if passed.

The President said so while addressing reporters in this video from The Associated Press.

The push to ban TikTok was revived this week as House congressional lawmakers introduced a bill to make it illegal to distribute ByteDance apps. TikTok has been prompting users to protest the ban, which House Republicans will vote on despite Trump’s objections.


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Republicans ignore Trump criticism, and plan to vote next week on a bill that could ban TikTok.

The Republican-controlled House is planning a speedy vote on a new bill that could ban TikTok unless it separates from its Chinese parent company. House leaders plan to bring the bill to a vote on Wednesday in an accelerated process that requires a two-thirds vote to pass, according to Semafor.

That says a lot about how much House Republicans care about this bill, considering that former President Donald Trump posted this on Truth Social after the committee vote to advance it:

If you get rid of TikTok, Facebook and Zuckerschmuck will double their business. I don’t want Facebook, who cheated in the last Election, doing better. They are a true Enemy of the People!


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Biden wants to “ban AI voice impersonation.”

He said it in the State of the Union address last night, without elaborating. Robocalls using an AI voice clone of the President recently tried to persuade New Hampshire voters not to vote, causing the FCC to issue a ban on such calls. But is Biden now alluding to something broader? The entertainment industry which is grappling with cloned musiciansactors, and comedians will certainly be interested if so.


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Google supports a list of child safety bills — but still not KOSA.

The series of bills Google endorsed would do things like fund investigations of child exploitation and make it easier for victims to request child abuse images to be removed from social media.

So far only Microsoft, Snap, and X have come out in favor of the Kids Online Safety Act. Groups like the American Civil Liberties Union and Fight for the Future say they still have serious concerns about KOSA.


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The TikTokers are revolting.

Apparently TikTok’s push notification warning is working, because congressional staffers say they’re flooded with calls protesting a new play to make Chinese owner ByteDance sell the app:

“It’s so so bad. Our phones have not stopped ringing. They’re teenagers and old people saying they spend their whole day on the app and we can’t take it away,” one House GOP staffer told POLITICO, granted anonymity to speak candidly.


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DMA celebrations overlook Epic disappointment.

This post from the European Commissioner responsible for competition feels a little premature considering, just yesterday, Apple terminated the developer account that Fortnite maker Epic was using to create its own app marketplace for iOS.

The EU is currently chasing Apple to explain its actions, but Vestager seems confident about the outcome.


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Facebook and Instagram account takeovers are skyrocketing and Meta needs to fix it, AGs say.

41 attorneys general sent a letter to Meta’s chief legal officer Tuesday demanding the company invest more in stopping scam account takeovers that threaten users’ privacy and “drain” AG resources.

The problem has gotten significantly worse over the past few years, the AGs said. In New York, Meta account takeover complaints spiked from 73 in 2019 to 783 by the end of 2023.


Apple kills Epic’s iOS game store plans over App Store criticism

After Epic CEO Tim Sweeney criticized how Apple is rolling out alternative app stores on iOS in the EU, Apple terminated its developer account and called the company ‘verifiably untrustworthy.’