General
Mayor Pete Enlists a Silicon Valley Vet to Bring in The Money
Caitlin Kelly, Wired
Presidential campaigns get compared to a lot of things: a marathon, a film. Or a battleship. An iceberg. An “MRI of the soul.”
Amazon responds to Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that it pays workers ‘starvation wages’
Mallika Mitra, CNBC
Amazon responded Monday to a comment by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., that it pays warehouse workers “starvation wages,” saying in a tweet that it pays workers at least $15 per hour plus full benefits.
Elon Musk still on Twitter hours after saying he deleted account
Harper Neidig, The Hill
Elon Musk said early Monday morning that he had deleted his Twitter account, but the Tesla CEO’s account was still active hours later. “Just deleted my Twitter account,” Musk posted shortly before 1 a.m.
Domino’s will start delivering pizzas via an autonomous robot this fall
Peter Holley, The Washington Post
For months now, the robotics company Nuro has been using electric, self-driving vehicles to deliver groceries to Kroger customers in Phoenix and Houston. Now the Silicon Valley start-up’s autonomous, unmanned vehicles — which resemble a giant pill bug on wheels and can reach 25 mph as they operate on major roadways alongside cars — have announced plans for a new mission: delivering Domino’s pizzas to customers.
What Bird Brains Can Teach Self-Driving Cars
Sarah McBride and Ashlee Vance, Bloomberg
Apple, Google, and Facebook are luring animal kingdom neuroscience experts with seven-figure salaries.
Inside Backpage.Com’s Vicious Battle With The Feds
Christine Biederman, Wired
In Michael Lacey’s younger and more vulnerable years, his father gave him this advice: “Whenever someone pokes a finger in your chest, you grab that finger and you break it off at the knuckle.” Lacey grew up in the 1950s as a bright, bookish boy.
Stocks, Bonds Climb as Draghi Fuels Stimulus Hopes: Markets Wrap
Todd White, Bloomberg
Stocks climbed and bonds rallied on Tuesday as comments from the president of the ECB added fuel to investors’ hopes for easier monetary policies from the world’s biggest central banks.
Intellectual Property and Antitrust
Sprint and T-Mobile merger is about to clear its biggest hurdle
Brian Fung et al., CNN
Sprint and T-Mobile’s on-again-off-again $26 billion merger appears to be on again, leaving the combined company poised to become the second-largest wireless provider in the country. The US Department of Justice is prepared to approve the deal within days, CNN Business has learned.
Senator Rubio targets Huawei over patents
Patricia Zengerle, Reuters
U.S. Senator Marco Rubio filed legislation on Monday that would prevent Huawei Technologies Co Ltd from seeking damages in U.S. patent courts, after the Chinese firm demanded that Verizon Communications Inc pay $1 billion to license the rights to patented technology.
Five TV Station Owners Settle Justice Department Antitrust Allegations
Lillian Rizzo, The Wall Street Journal
A group of five television station owners on Monday agreed to settle Justice Department charges that they used third-party firms to illegally coordinate on sales of local advertising spots. CBS Corp., Cox Enterprises Inc., E.W. Scripps Co., Fox Corp., and Tegna Inc. all agreed to consent decrees barring them from sharing certain competitively sensitive information for the next seven years, according to court documents filed Monday.
Telecom, Wireless and TV
Robocalls are overwhelming hospitals and patients, threatening a new kind of health crisis
Tony Romm, The Washington Post
In the heart of Boston, Tufts Medical Center treats scores of health conditions, administering measles vaccines for children and pioneering next-generation tools that can eradicate the rarest of cancers. But doctors, administrators and other hospital staff struggled to contain a much different kind of epidemic one April morning last year: a wave of thousands of robocalls that spread like a virus from one phone line to the next, disrupting communications for hours.
Huawei laptops return to Microsoft’s online store after mysteriously disappearing
Tom Warren, The Verge
Microsoft removed Huawei’s laptop lineup from its online store last month, following a new executive order to crack down on the Chinese tech company. While the software giant has remained silent over whether Huawei will still be able to obtain Windows licenses for its range of laptops, the devices are now starting to return to online stores this week.
AT&T cuts another 1,800 jobs as it finishes fiber-Internet buildout
Jon Brodkin, Ars Technica
AT&T has informed employees of plans to cut another 1,800 jobs from its wireline division, an AT&T workers’ union told Ars today. Last week, AT&T declared more than 1,800 jobs nationwide as “surplus,” meaning they are slated to be eliminated in August or September, the Communications Workers of America (CWA) told Ars.
Mobile Technology and Social Media
First Amendment constraints don’t apply to private platforms, Supreme Court affirms
Colin Lecher, The Verge
In a case closely watched for its potential implications for social media, the Supreme Court has ruled that a nonprofit running public access channels isn’t bound by governmental constraints on speech. The case, which the conservative wing of the court decided in a split 5–4 ruling, centered around a Manhattan-based nonprofit tasked by New York City with operating public access channels in the area.
A missing backpacker’s father is begging WhatsApp for help
Liz Weber, The Washington Post
An 18-year-old backpacker from Belgium walked out of his hostel in an Australian coastal town in New South Wales and disappeared. Almost two weeks later, his father made an emotional appeal to WhatsApp, saying his son’s encrypted messages could provide a crucial clue into his whereabouts.
Sudan and the Instagram Tragedy Hustle
Taylor Lorenz, The Atlantic
As the political crisis in Sudan deepens, Instagram users are flocking to accounts that claim to be helping. @SudanMealProject, the largest of these accounts, racked up nearly 400,000 followers in less than a week; it is joined by hundreds of similar accounts with copycat names such as @SudanMealProjectOfficial, @SudanMealOfficial, @sudan.meals.project, @mealsforsudan, and @Sudanmealprojec.t, each of which has amassed tens of thousands of followers.
Cybersecurity and Privacy
GDPR Has Been a Boon for Google and Facebook
Nick Kostov and Sam Schechner, The Wall Street Journal
Europe’s new privacy law appears to be helping tech giants—for now. The General Data Protection Regulation, or GDPR, which went into effect across the European Union last year, has pushed marketers to spend more of their ad dollars with the biggest players, in particular Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Facebook Inc., ad-tech companies and media buyers say.
House Homeland Security Republicans to introduce slew of cybersecurity bills
Maggie Miller, The Hill
Republicans on the House Homeland Security Committee are gearing up to introduce a bevy of bills aimed at enhancing the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) cybersecurity capabilities. The bills are the first glimpse into the new “American Security Agenda” that committee Republicans plan to pursue this Congress.
Russia warns on signs of US ‘cyber military activity’
Max Seddon, Financial Times
Russia says reports the US has infiltrated its power grid in preparation for future cyber operations show Washington is preparing “a cyber war [and] cyber military activity against” Moscow.
DHS looking to evolve biometrics systems
Dave Nyczepir, FedScoop
The Department of Homeland Security announced Monday it’s looking for biometric vendors and solutions able to build upon its next-generation identity management system. DHS’s Office of Biometric Identity Management currently links digital fingerprint, iris scan and photographic data with biographic information to enroll and later verify everyone from immigration violators to criminals to known or suspected terrorists.
Exposed database reveals personal information of 1.6 million job seekers
Laura Hautala, CNET
An unsecured database of personal information, including phone numbers, salary expectations and openness to new job opportunities, of about 1.6 million job seekers from around the world has been discovered online, according to research published Monday. The database, found by independent researcher Anurag Sen in May, includes information on professionals from the US, Australia, Japan and several other countries.
Opinions, Editorials and Perspectives
Just one agency should enforce antitrust law
Sen. Mike Lee, Washington Examiner
Anonymous individuals at the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division and the Federal Trade Commission have recently taken it upon themselves to leak to the media that their respective agencies will soon open investigations of the largest U.S. tech companies. Policing markets with the antitrust laws is key to ensuring that competition benefits consumers.
The U.S. Has Its Eye on Big Tech. Will Criminal Inquiries Result?
Peter J. Henning, The New York Times
With the federal government ramping up scrutiny of the power, influence and market dominance of the world’s largest technology companies, one interesting question will be whether any of the inquiries develops into a criminal investigation.
Tech giants head down ‘dangerous’ censorship path
Jeffrey M. McCall, The Hill
Social media giants have responded to mounting pressure from politicians and activist groups. These social media firms are now refereeing content of the angry, polarizing and downright crazy public space those giants themselves created.
Research Reports
What the Evidence Shows About the Impact of the GDPR After One Year
Eline Chivot and Daniel Castro, Information Technology & Innovation Foundation
One year later, there is mounting evidence that the law has not produced its intended outcomes; moreover, the unintended consequences are severe and widespread.
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