Tag: big tech

Still hiring: Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Meta layoffs give other sectors an opening
28Jun By adminNo Comments
Technology

Still hiring: Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Meta layoffs give other sectors an opening

[ad_1] For the thousands of workers who'd never experienced upheaval in the tech sector, the recent mass layoffs at companies like Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Meta came as a shock.Now they are being courted by long-established employers whose names aren't typically synonymous with tech work, including hotel chains, retailers, investment firms, railroad companies and even the Internal Revenue Service. All of those sectors have signaled on recruiting platforms that they are still hiring software engineers, data scientists and cybersecurity specialists despite the layoffs in Big Tech. It's a chance for them to level the playing field against tech giants that have long had their pick of the top talent with lucrative compensation, alluring perks and sheer name recognition. No employer is m...
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Is Twitter ready for Europe’s new Big Tech rules? EU official says it has work to do
24Jun By adminNo Comments
Technology

Is Twitter ready for Europe’s new Big Tech rules? EU official says it has work to do

[ad_1] Twitter needs to do more work to fall in line with the European Union's tough new digital rulebook, a top EU official said after overseeing a “stress test” of the company's systems in Silicon Valley.European Commissioner Thierry Breton said late Thursday that he noted the “strong commitment of Twitter to comply” with the Digital Services Act, sweeping new standards that the world's biggest online platforms all must obey in just two months. However, “work needs to continue,” he said in a statement after reviewing the results of the voluntary test at Twitter's San Francisco headquarters with owner Elon Musk and new CEO Linda Yaccarino. Breton, who oversees digital policy, is also meeting other tech bosses in California. He's the EU's point person working to get Big Tech ready for t...
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Unprecedented! Google must break up digital ad business, European watchdog says
14Jun By adminNo Comments
Technology

Unprecedented! Google must break up digital ad business, European watchdog says

[ad_1] European Union antitrust regulators took aim at Google's lucrative digital advertising business in an unprecedented decision, saying Wednesday that the tech giant must sell off some of its ad business to address competition concerns.The European Commission, the bloc's executive branch and top antitrust enforcer, said its preliminary view after an investigation is that “only the mandatory divestment by Google of part of its services” would satisfy the concerns. The 27-nation EU has led the global movement to crack down on Big Tech companies — including groundbreaking rules on artificial intelligence — but it has previously relied on issuing blockbuster fines, including three antitrust penalties for Google worth billions of euros (dollars). It's the first time the bloc has told a t...
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Terror fallout: YouTube, Twitter, Facebook face reckoning over killings
20Feb By adminNo Comments
Technology

Terror fallout: YouTube, Twitter, Facebook face reckoning over killings

[ad_1] Islamic State gunmen killed American college student Nohemi Gonzalez as she sat with friends in a Paris bistro in 2015, one of several attacks on a Friday night in the French capital that left 130 people dead. Her family's lawsuit claiming YouTube's recommendations helped the Islamic State group's recruitment is at the center of a closely watched Supreme Court case being argued Tuesday about how broadly a law written in 1996 shields tech companies from liability. The law, known as Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, is credited with helping create today's internet. A related case, set for arguments Wednesday, involves a terrorist attack at a nightclub in Istanbul, Turkey, in 2017 that killed 39 people and prompted a suit against Twitter, Facebook and Google, whic...
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Google Will Join the AI Wars, Pitting LaMDA Against ChatGPT
4Feb By adminNo Comments
Technology

Google Will Join the AI Wars, Pitting LaMDA Against ChatGPT

[ad_1] Of the world's large tech firms, Alphabet Inc. may be caught most deeply in the innovator's dilemma. The classic theory from Harvard Business School Professor Clayton Christensen says large companies struggle to innovate because they fear hurting an established business. Alphabet has been in that bind for the last few months, coming under tremendous pressure to respond to ChatGPT, the OpenAI tool that could reinvent internet searching with its remarkable conversational answers to any question. But Google has to be cautious: its $150 billion search business makes money every time we click on ads and links; single, synthesized answers to queries could draw those clicks away.Now Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai has decided he has little choice but to take that risk. On Thursday, as Picha...
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The EU is about to take a Bigger stick to Big Tech
31Jan By adminNo Comments
Technology

The EU is about to take a Bigger stick to Big Tech

[ad_1] A new auditing regime should make harder to give Meta, Google and Amazon an easy ride on data protection. It's well established that the European Union has some of the strictest privacy laws in the world, threatening fines of up to 4% of a company's annual turnover. A lesser-known fact, and one which large tech firms would like to keep quiet, is that the EU hasn't enforced those rules very strictly. Since introducing its landmark privacy law known as General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in 2018, the EU has delegated the job of policing Big Tech to the nations where the firms have their European headquarters. That puts enormous pressure on countries like Ireland, which hosts several large internet firms that have frequently been accused of flouting privacy law, including...
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Meta fined 390M euros in latest European privacy crackdown
5Jan By adminNo Comments
Technology

Meta fined 390M euros in latest European privacy crackdown

[ad_1] European Union regulators on Wednesday hit Facebook parent Meta with hundreds of millions in fines for privacy violations and banned the company from forcing users in the 27-nation bloc to agree to personalized ads based on their online activity. European Union regulators on Wednesday hit Facebook parent Meta with hundreds of millions in fines for privacy violations and banned the company from forcing users in the 27-nation bloc to agree to personalized ads based on their online activity. Ireland's Data Protection Commission imposed two fines totaling 390 million euros ($414 million) in its decision in two cases that could shake up Meta's business model of targeting users with ads based on what they do online. The company says it will appeal. A decision in a third case inv...
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Fed’s Slowdown Isn’t Getting Much Help From Big Tech
31Oct By adminNo Comments
Technology

Fed’s Slowdown Isn’t Getting Much Help From Big Tech

[ad_1] Companies are shielding their workforces from efforts to cool inflation, squeezing profit with the hope of a faster recovery later. All the tightening moves by the Federal Reserve this year to rein in inflation are supposed to lead to less hiring and spending by companies. But there is no law that says the biggest, most profitable companies have to cut back if they don't feel like it. And the cuts showing up in this quarter's earnings reports from the biggest tech companies amount to going from three scoops of ice cream to two.If you're wondering why employment growth has been robust despite the warning signs in financial markets, the structural change in Silicon Valley that's happened since the early 2000s dot-com bust is a big part of it. The employment numbers this quarter f...
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Amazon, Microsoft, and Alphabet’s Dirty Supply Chains Undercut Climate Promises From HQ
28Oct By adminNo Comments
Technology

Amazon, Microsoft, and Alphabet’s Dirty Supply Chains Undercut Climate Promises From HQ

[ad_1] Suppliers for major brands like Amazon, Microsoft, and Alphabet are still relying heavily on fossil fuels, Greenpeace finds. Amazon.com Inc., Microsoft Corp. and Alphabet Inc. have pledged to run their own operations on 100% clean power. But their suppliers — the lesser known companies that make the key components of hit products like the Kindle, the Xbox or Pixel mobiles — remain deeply reliant on fossil fuels. Twelve of the 14 top suppliers get on average 5.4% of their energy from renewable sources or don't disclose, data from a Greenpeace report released Friday showed. Their major clients, including HP Inc., Dell Technologies Inc., Lenovo Group, Sony Group Corp., LG Electronics Inc. and Samsung Electronics Co. share the blame, the organization said: Of 10 consumer electro...
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