Did X censor an NPR article?

Plus: Traveling through an offline airport

View this email online in your browser By Rebecca Szkutak Thursday, August 29, 2024 Welcome to TC PM! Today we are looking into some suspicious behavior by X related to an alleged censorship of an NPR article; we've got a fun firsthand account on traveling through an airport that's in the middle of a cyberattack; and we look at a big-ticket funding round for an AI startup. It's go time. TechCrunch Top 3 Image Credits: Bryce Durbin/TechCrunch 😏 Sus behavior: This morning, X users discovered that the platform was flagging a link to an NPR story about Donald Trump as potentially unsafe, a warning generally given to posts that link to sites with malware or spam. People are, of course, speculating on the many reasons why this happened. Read more ✈️ Offline airport: What is it like to travel through an airport that's dealing with a potential cyberattack? Devin Coldewey found out while traveling through Seattle's airport on Sunday. He walks through what was and wasn't working and notes that this situation should be a cautionary tale about taking cybersecurity more seriously. Read more  🪄 Magic money: Magic, an AI startup that creates models that automate software development tasks, was rumored in July to be raising $200 million at a $1.5 billion valuation. The startup announced its round today, and it's, um, quite a lot bigger than that. Read more    TechCrunch Disrupt Partnerships Be the Exclusive Sponsor of the Women in Tech Reception  Join TechCrunch in co-hosting this invite-only, highly curated networking reception for the women making a lasting impact on the future of technology and venture. Branding and content are encouraged. Learn More   Afternoon must-reads Image Credits: Landian 🖥️ A whole new world: Meta announced that it's opening up its Horizon Worlds virtual reality platform to preteens. Parents approve which worlds preteens can access, and Meta is rolling out features to help them decide ones that are kid friendly. Read more  ☁️ Chip away: Intel has landed a large customer for its Gaudi 3 accelerator chip: IBM Cloud. Intel announced its Gaudi 3 chip last year and has a long way to go to catch up to rivals like Nvidia and AMD, which both had a big head start in this area. Read more  🏡 Cutting commission: In 2019, Josh Sitzer sued the National Association of Realtors because he didn't think he should be forced to pay a 3% commission to a buyer's agent. He won. Now he's launched a startup targeting a similar area. Read more  🤪 Vybe check: More memes, please. Two Oxford PhD graduates built a platform called Vybe to make it easier for people to upload photos into meme templates. The startup recently raised $4.75 million and is building a social network for its users. Read more  📱 Apple event: Apple's iPhone 16 event is less than two weeks away. We've got an update for you on how to watch, as well as what we expect to be announced. Read more  🔊 Turn it up: For some reason, Apple recently decided that iOS users should no longer be able to control the volume on Spotify using an iPhone's volume buttons. Spotify claims that this goes against the Digital Markets Act. Read more  🏈 Apple Sports: In our last piece of Apple news for the day, the company announced new features for Apple Sports, its free sports-focused app, ahead of the upcoming NFL and college football seasons. The app originally launched in February. Read more  📧 Email questions, answered: Have you ever wanted to talk to someone about your inbox? Now you can. Today Google announced that it's rolling out Gmail Q&A, a new feature that allows Android users to chat with Google's Gemini about their inbox. They should've fixed Gmail search first, though, I think. Read more  Around the web 🎶 Algorithm hell: Spotify has been facing a lot of warranted scrutiny over the fact that its algorithms have made it harder lately for people to find new music. The Washington Post dives into some alternative apps people can use to discover tunes. Read more  🥰 Very demure: If you haven't been living in a cave, you are probably aware of the recent trends of calling things "very mindful, very demure." The Verge wrote a great piece today about the very dramatic battle to trademark the phrase. Read more Featured jobs from Crunchboard Senior Data Scientist, IEEE (Piscataway, NJ) IT Director, the Quaker School at Horsham (Horsham, PA) General Manager, airSlate (Brookline, MA) Support Services Supervisor, Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (Middletown, PA) Director of Marketing and Communications, AidKit (Remote) See more jobs on CrunchBoard Post your tech jobs and reach millions of TechCrunch readers for only $349 per month.   Check out some of our other newsletters: Startups Weekly TechCrunch AI TechCrunch Mobility Got a tip? tips@techcrunch.com Want to advertise on TechCrunch? advertise@techcrunch.com Has this been forwarded to you? Click here to subscribe to this newsletter. Update your preferences here at any time Copyright © 2024 TechCrunch, All rights reserved.Yahoo Inc. 110 5th St,San Francisco,CA Privacy Policy

How Russian state hackers used exploits from spyware makers

Russian hackers are using exploits developed by Intellexa, NSO Group

View this email online in your browser By Rebecca Bellan Thursday, August 29, 2024 Welcome to TechCrunch AM! This morning, we're looking at how Russian state hackers are borrowing exploits; Bluesky's anti-abuse features; and France's charges against Telegram CEO Pavel Durov. We've also got notes on the secrecy around one of OpenAI's funds; the continued secondaries trend; Signal's ethical core; another Uber autonomous vehicle partnership, and more. Let's go! — Rebecca TechCrunch Top 3 Image Credits: Bryce Durbin / TechCrunch 1. From Russia with love: Google has found evidence that Russian state hackers are using exploits that are similar to those developed by other spyware makers, Intellexa and NSO Group. In this case, the hackers used flaws in iPhone's Safari and Android's Google Chrome browsers to target Mongolian government workers. Read More 2. Bluesky limits ability to dunk on others: Decentralized social networking startup Bluesky wants to break the cycle of toxic and combative social media posting. The company has now introduced a handful of anti-abuse features and ways to detach your original post from someone's quote post. Read More 3. Pavel formally charged: Pavel Durov, CEO of Telegram, has been formally charged by French authorities for running a company that's been complicit in sharing child porn, facilitating drug trafficking and facilitating organized fraud. Read More   TechCrunch Disrupt Partnerships Be the Exclusive Sponsor of the Women of Disrupt Breakfast Join TechCrunch in co-hosting this highly popular breakfast for Disrupt women attendees eager to network, engage, and empower. Contact us today to explore sponsorship opportunities and help us create a future where everyone has a seat at the table. Learn More   Morning must-reads Image Credits: Bryce Durbin / TechCrunch 🤐 What's up with OpenAI's accelerator program? The ChatGPT maker last December said it was taking applications for the second cohort of its accelerator program, as part of the OpenAI Startup Fund. It's only been crickets since then. Did the Converge 2 program even happen? Why wasn't OpenAI sharing news about it? TechCrunch took a look. Read More 🔎 London Lies? The London Fund is supposedly going to provide contentious fintech Bolt with up to $250 million in "marketing credits." But something fishy is going on at that firm. Namely, it's claiming investments that it didn't actually make. Read More 🥈 A second chance: Investing in secondary funds is hot right now, with 2024 already on track to surpass last year's $1.1 billion trading volume total. The latest example? Silicon Valley-based VC NEA has quietly raised more than $468 million from more than 60 LPs for a secondary fund. Read More 📸 Apple is coming for Photoshop: More AI features from Apple are coming in hot, with the latest being the ability to remove objects from photos without affecting the rest of the image. Apple uses AI to generate the background when you remove an object. Welcome to the era of Not Trusting Anything You See. Read More 🚗 Uber invests in Wayve: Uber is very bullish on autonomous vehicles. It just struck a partnership with U.K.-based Wayve, and the two will work together to find OEMs for Wayve's self-driving AI, with the end goal of putting those cars on Uber's app one day. Read More 💸 OpenAI needs cash: The ChatGPT creator is reportedly in talks to raise a big chunk of change from an existing investor. The company definitely needs the money, as it's on track to lose nearly $5 billion by the year's end. That's on top of the $8.5 billion OpenAI has already burned. Read More   A Message from Lumin Fighting Technostress: Does Tech Help or Hinder? One in four people feel overwhelmed by technology. But can technology solve its own problem? Cutting out digital middlemen is a priority. Lumin's new Chrome extension is designed to tackle this issue head-on: open, edit and manage PDFs without opening a new tab. Learn More   Around the Web 🧿 Why Signal could be the antidote to Surveillance Capitalism: This deep dive and interview with Signal's CEO Meredith Whittaker by Wired details how the startup is much more than an encrypted messaging app. It's a nonprofit that's never taken any investment, offers a free product with no ads, and collects no info on users. Read More 📉 Nvidia shares fall on diminished outlook: The chipmaker's revenue more than doubled in the last quarter, but that didn't appear to assuage investors who wanted to see more ambitious forecasts, per The Financial Times. Read More 🇨🇳 If the FDI doesn't come to you, go to the FDI: Chinese tech companies and VCs are finding it more difficult to secure foreign investment amid geopolitical tensions. So they're heading to Silicon Valley to chase capital. However, they're finding that their Chinese ties are getting in the way, reports The New York Times. Read More Before You Go Image Credits: Jagmeet Singh / TechCrunch ⚠️ Protecting against STDs, but not data theft: Durex India has exposed customer data, including full names, order details, phone numbers, shipping addresses and more. "For a brand dealing with intimate products, ensuring privacy is crucial," Sourajeet Majumder, the security researcher who found the leak, said. Read More Featured jobs from Crunchboard Senior Data Scientist, IEEE (Piscataway, NJ) IT Director, the Quaker School at Horsham (Horsham, PA) General Manager, airSlate (Brookline, MA) Support Services Supervisor, Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (Middletown, PA) Director of Marketing and Communications, AidKit (Remote) See more jobs on CrunchBoard Post your tech jobs and reach millions of TechCrunch readers for only $349 per month.   Check out some of our other newsletters: Startups Weekly TechCrunch AI TechCrunch Mobility Got a tip? tips@techcrunch.com Want to advertise on TechCrunch? advertise@techcrunch.com Has this been forwarded to you? Click here to subscribe to this newsletter. Update your preferences here at any time Copyright © 2024 TechCrunch, All rights reserved.Yahoo Inc. 110 5th St,San Francisco,CA Privacy Policy