Network Support Blog

Christine Hall / Crunchbase News: Lemonaid Health, which offers an on-demand service for accessing health care online, raises $33M Series B, bringing its total raised to $55M  —  Interest in telemedicine continues to increase, and Lemonaid Health raised an oversubscribed $33 million Series B round of funding to develop … https://bit.ly/2PgedsA

Tom Warren / The Verge: Cyrus Mistry, group product manager for Chrome OS, talks about how and why Windows apps are arriving on Chrome OS via a partnership with Parallels  —  Google revealed earlier this year that it's planning to support Windows applications on Chromebooks thanks to a partnership with Parallels. https://bit.ly/3hVoEy3

South China Morning Post: Chinese importers are ramping up chip imports through Hong Kong before US sanctions shut the route; chip imports to China through Hong King are up 11% YoY  —  Re-exports of semiconductors through Hong Kong to the mainland jumped by 11 per cent in the first half of the year from the same period … https://bit.ly/3fewHEn

Makena Kelly / The Verge: Emails from Jeff Bezos and other Amazon employees suggest the acquisition of Ring was for “market position - not technology”  —  ‘And that market position and momentum is very valuable’  —  On Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee held its last hearing as part … https://bit.ly/312WjiG

Nicole Carpenter / Polygon: Riot Games ends partnership with Saudi city Neom for a League of Legends tournament, after criticism of the deal due to the country's poor human rights record  —  The League of Legends developer has backed out of the partnership  —  League of Legends developer Riot Games has ended … https://bit.ly/3k3Kl15

Tiffany Hsu / New York Times: Research firm Forrester: US ad spending will decline by 25% this year and won't recover until 2023, and in 2020 and 2021, ad agencies will shed 52,000 jobs  —  The marketing business is going through a period of innovation as it sheds workers and tries to hold on to clients. https://bit.ly/2CTnVPm

Cho Mu-Hyun / ZDNet: Samsung reports Q2 earnings with sales of ~$44.5B, down 5.6% YoY, but an operating profit of ~$6.8B, up 23.5% YoY, as demand for memory chips increased  —  Samsung posted 8.15 trillion won in second quarter operating profit, with its semiconductor business contributing 5.43 trillion won of that. https://bit.ly/30VpJz8

Jonathan Shieber / TechCrunch: Connecticut-based Sema4, which uses aggregate patient data to help doctors improve care, raises $121M from BlackRock and others, valuing the company at $1.1B  —  Sema4, the Stamford, Conn.-based digital healthcare company now worth just over $1 billion, takes its name from the system of sending messages via code. https://bit.ly/30avz0e

Todd Spangler / Variety: Spotify reports Q2 revenue of €1.89B, up 13% YoY, with MAUs up 29% YoY to 299M, premium users up 27% to 138M, and ad-supported MAUs up 31% to 170M  —  In addition, ad revenue fell 21% — which Spotify blamed on the coronavirus pandemic — but the drop wasn't quite as bad as forecast. https://bit.ly/3hZgPYv

Mike Wheatley / SiliconANGLE: RangeForce raises $16M Series A led by Energy Impact Partners to help businesses train their cybersecurity teams  —  Cybersecurity training startup RangeForce said today it has armed itself with $16 million from an early-stage funding round led by Energy Impact Partners. https://bit.ly/3g7T2oE

The Amazon Blog: Bezos statement to US House underscores Amazon's job creation, investments in social causes, and its role in supporting small and medium-sized businesses  —  Testimony before the Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial, and Administrative Law  —  Statement by Jeffrey P. Bezos Founder & Chief … https://bit.ly/39FtNYb

BBC: Google announces plans to build a new undersea network cable connecting the US, UK, and Spain, expected to be completed by 2022  —  Google has announced plans to build a new undersea network cable connecting the US, UK and Spain.  —  The tech giant says it is incorporating new technology into the cable … https://bit.ly/2DdcBNA

Ionut Ilascu / BleepingComputer: Source code leaked from exposed repos of many companies including Nintendo, Daimler AG, Microsoft, Adobe, Lenovo, and AMD; unclear how much of it is proprietary  —  Source code from exposed repositories of dozens of companies across various fields of activity (tech, finance, retail, food … https://bit.ly/3jLJwcZ

Paul Sawers / VentureBeat: OpenSpace raises $15.9M Series B led by Menlo Ventures for its automated 360° photo documentation of construction sites and AI-powered tools like object search  —  OpenSpace, a platform that helps construction teams track the progress of building projects through capturing 360-degree photos … https://bit.ly/32ZuBpz

Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat: Seoul-based Riiid, which uses AI to offer personalized study plans to students in its test prep app Santa, raises $41.8M, bringing its total raised to $70.2M  —  Riiid, a Seoul, South Korea-based startup developing AI test prep solutions, today closed a $41.8 million pre-series D financing round … https://bit.ly/3f8AqTT

Chase / StreamElements: Arsenal.gg: in Q2 Facebook Gaming grew 75% QoQ and reached 334M hours watched in June 2020, up from 111M YoY; Twitch dominated with 5B+ hours watched in Q2  —  Livestreaming has been on the rise for years, but the pandemic definitely supersized the amount of streamers and content being watched. https://bit.ly/2CGJ6UH

Brian Krebs / Krebs on Security: A survey of 500+ cybersecurity pros sheds light on which skills they find most useful in cybersecurity job candidates, and which are most frequently lacking  —  Thousands of people graduate from colleges and universities each year with cybersecurity or computer science degrees only to find employers … https://bit.ly/2D4Bmvo

Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet: A vigilante hacker has been sabotaging the Emotet malware botnet, replacing a quarter of daily payloads with animated GIFs, stopping victims from being infected  —  Emotet botnet activity goes down as Emotet admins are wrestling with a vigilante for control over parts of their infrastructure. https://bit.ly/2X0U5iG

Alex Sherman / CNBC: Given TikTok's potential future value, ByteDance shouldn't sell its majority stake in it at the reported $25B-$40B valuation, despite the risk of a US ban  —  - ByteDance is evaluating new corporate structures for TikTok, including setting up an independent board and selling a stake in the company … https://bit.ly/2Eo4yhL

Ashley Gold / Axios: Source: the rescheduled House Judiciary antitrust subcommittee hearing featuring CEOs of Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google will take place this Wednesday  —  The CEOs of Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Google will now testify before the House Judiciary antitrust subcommittee on Wednesday … https://bit.ly/2ZXSdcc

Romain Dillet / TechCrunch: AB Tasty, a startup focused on improving UX on e-commerce sites, travel portals, fashion sites, and more, announces $40M Series C, bringing total raised to $64M  —  AB Tasty has raised a new $40 million funding round led by Credit Mutuel Innovation with existing investors Korelya Capital, Omnes, Partech and XAnge also participating. https://bit.ly/30KtvLM

Daisuke Wakabayashi / New York Times: Documents and sources: the Global Antitrust Institute, which trains regulators to take a hands-off approach to antitrust, is funded by Google, Amazon, Qualcomm  —  Google, Amazon and Qualcomm finance a George Mason University institute teaching a hands-off approach to antitrust regulators and judges. https://bit.ly/2ZXV8Sl

Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge: A companion app confirms Samsung's new bean-shaped earbuds will be called Galaxy Buds Live with support for active noise cancellation and other features  —  More details on Samsung's new headphones straight from its own app  —  We've seen plenty of pictures of Samsung's new bean-shaped earbuds … https://bit.ly/2D1eFZ8

Charles Rollet / IPVM: Hikvision says it began phasing out an automatic minority recognition feature in 2018, but declined to clarify status of their Uyghur recognition analytics  —  For the first time, Hikvision has directly addressed its minority recognition software, acknowledging that it offered this, but now claims to have removed it. https://bit.ly/2E8q3Tk

Rest of World: After content moderators in India and the Philippines missed out on Facebook's $52M settlement, several share stories of psychological consequences  —  Thousands of foreign moderators keep the worst content off Facebook but receive little support for the traumatic work.  Could that change? https://bit.ly/3hv5gI3

Alexandra Garrett / CNET: Steve Wozniak and 17 others sue Google, claiming YouTube repeatedly ignored requests to take down videos using their names and likeness to promote Bitcoin scams  —  The Apple co-founder says YouTube repeatedly ignored requests to take down a scam video.  —  Steve Wozniak, Apple co-founder … https://bit.ly/3hvXGNw

Timothy B. Lee / Ars Technica: As investors become skeptical about self-driving tech, startups can compete by focusing on commercializing the least demanding applications of self-driving tech  —  Slow progress is forcing self-driving startups to tighten their belts.  —  Progress on self-driving technology has been slower … https://bit.ly/3g0vO3O

Christine Hall / Crunchbase News: Fintech startup Meemo emerges from stealth with $10M seed investment from Greycroft and others and launches its social finance app  —  Fintech startup Meemo came out of a year-long stealth period Tuesday to launch its social finance app with a seed investment of $10 million. https://bit.ly/32Mo0P6

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch: Scalable Capital, a Munich-based service that manages investment portfolios for a €2.99 monthly fee, raises €50M Series D at a post-money valuation of €400M  —  Startups building tech-based platforms to help make investments continue to be in high demand … https://bit.ly/2BnJqHd

Nilesh Christopher / Rest of World: Bangladesh's economy relies heavily on Facebook, with ~300K stores offering “F-Commerce” amid an absence of global e-commerce players and online payment options  —  In Bangladesh, there is no Amazon.  There is no eBay.  If you want to buy a dress or a crested finch from the comfort of your home, you have to use Facebook. https://bit.ly/2BlNzLL

Yoolim Lee / Bloomberg: Taranis, an Israeli startup using aerial scouting and AI to identify crop issues, raises $30M Series C round from Singapore's Orion Fund and Vertex Growth  —  - Taranis raises $30 million from investors led by Vertex, Kuok  — Startup plans to expand into Asia after raising fresh capital https://bit.ly/39gCbx8

Neil Kumaran / Google Cloud Blog: Google unveils G Suite security features including support in Gmail for BIMI standard for brands, new controls for Meet hosts, and ability to block Chat Rooms  —  Director of Product Management, G Suite Security & Controls  —  Get G Suite Essentials  —  A simple and secure way for teams … https://bit.ly/30FQebU

Ranjan Roy / Margins: A deep dive into how Robinhood makes money and how its UX design and algorithmic nudges can lead some inexperienced investors to undertake riskier trades  —  Don't be the gravy … For someone who clearly has strong opinions they enjoy communicating with others, investing occupies a weird place for me. https://bit.ly/2CyhMrw

Macy Bayern / TechRepublic: Linux Foundation announces initiative to help public health officials in pandemic battle, launches two COVID-19 tracker apps using Google and Apple APIs  —  The project will use the Google Apple Exposure Notification system to support public health authority's testing, tracing, and isolation practices. https://bit.ly/3hlBVzP

Axios: Inside the FTC's Facebook probe, as sources detail disagreements between two units over how forcefully to apply existing competition standards  —  A low-key conflict inside the Federal Trade Commission has strengthened the likelihood the agency will toughen its stance with Facebook. https://bit.ly/2OE1Eaq

Wall Street Journal: Sources: eBay is in advanced talks to sell its classified ads business to Norway's Adevinta for ~$8B  —  Deal could value eBay unit at roughly $8 billion or more  —  EBay Inc. EBAY -0.89% is in advanced talks to sell its classified-ads business to Norway's Adevinta AS ADE -0.69% A … https://bit.ly/3hkgRd2

Emily Birnbaum / Protocol: SMBs make up 70% of the 5,384 companies certified under EU-US Privacy Shield and face the biggest challenges in complying with the decision that struck it down  —  Tech companies across the U.S. are scrambling to figure out how they can remain in compliance with international privacy laws … https://bit.ly/2CM74gO

Kira Tebbe / OneZero : In 2019, Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, and Google were collectively granted ~27,000 H-1B visas, over 30% of total visas available to private companies  —  Five tech companies use nearly 30,000 H1-B visas, while over 50% of graduate STEM degrees are earned by international students https://bit.ly/2OEJUM3

South China Morning Post: CloudMinds CEO, a Chinese engineer who started the cloud-based robotics company in SV, says he will not consider US listing after sanctions hurt the business  —  CloudMinds lost almost 75 per cent of orders in the US and cut 80 per cent of its US workforce after Washington imposed sanctions … https://bit.ly/3eL3wZv

Dave Furness / eSellerCafe: Amazon warns third party sellers it may separate Fulfillment by Amazon operations in UK from its EU network starting January 1  —  Unsurprising for some but surely a shock for others today as Amazon has announced that due to Brexit on the 1st January 2021 the UK's FBA operations will be separated from the rest of Europe. https://bit.ly/2CqFoye

Louise Matsakis / Wired: Some experts agree that TikTok may pose a threat to the US national security because of China, but blocking the app would be too drastic a measure  —  Concerns about the Chinese government shouldn't be dismissed, experts say.  But banning TikTok would be a drastic measure. https://bit.ly/3jfI0zr

Thomas Brewster / Forbes: The FBI is using Sabre, the biggest of three firms that store a majority of the world's travel info, to spy on suspects' movements through sealed court orders  —  American border patrol already has significant surveillance powers and collects vast amounts of data on who is flying into and out of the country. https://bit.ly/2Wy6Xwo

New York Times: A person involved in Twitter hack may have gained access to Twitter's internal dashboard using credentials pinned in one of the company's Slack channels  —  Several people involved in the events that took down Twitter this week spoke with The Times.  What might have been a pursuit of Bitcoin spun out of control. https://bit.ly/32tR5Pl

Dara Khosrowshahi / Uber Newsroom: Uber wants to become “actively anti-racist” by doubling Black leadership by 2025, tying exec compensation to diversity metrics, and supporting Black-owned SMBs  —  With a resurgence of cases, it can feel that our collective attention has moved back to the COVID-19 pandemic and away … https://bit.ly/2DX65Lv

Malathi Nayak / Bloomberg: US District Judge says WhatsApp's malware case against NSO Group can move forward, rejecting NSO's claim that it qualified for foreign official immunity  —  WhatsApp and its parent Facebook Inc. can press ahead with a lawsuit accusing Israeli spyware maker NSO Group of creating accounts … https://bit.ly/2BdEO6s

Brian Krebs / Krebs on Security: The Twitter attack may have been perpetrated by Joseph James Connor, a 21-year-old English SIM swapper linked to a group that hijacked @jack's account last year  —  Twitter was thrown into chaos on Wednesday after accounts for some of the world's most recognizable public figures … https://bit.ly/3jaevPF

Dave Lee / Financial Times: Instacart sues Uber-owned Cornershop, one of the largest delivery apps in Latin America, alleging theft of product images, descriptions, and pricing info  —  Grocery delivery app Cornershop stole intellectual property, lawsuit claims  —  Grocery delivery app Instacart is suing Cornershop … https://bit.ly/3fwYGAe

Elise Reuter / MedCity News: GoHealth, an online portal that lets users buy health insurance plans, closes at ~$19/share, after pricing at $21/share, raising $914M in its Nasdaq IPO  —  GoHealth, an online insurance broker focusing on Medicare Advantage plans, went public on Wednesday for $914 million. https://bit.ly/3h7iOJK

Steven Musil / CNET: Lawsuits filed Tuesday accuse Amazon, Alphabet, and Microsoft of training facial recognition tools with photos of people without consent, violating Illinois law  —  The plaintiffs allege that the tech giants used people's pictures obtained without permission to train their technologies. https://bit.ly/39ceG8F

Annie Palmer / CNBC: Amazon says it's telling staff that can work from home to do so until January 8, 2021, after pushing back the date to October 2 in May  —  - Amazon has told staff who can work from home to do so until Jan. 8.  — It comes after Amazon in May pushed back its return to work deadline to at least Oct. 2. https://bit.ly/2OsH0tF

Danish Khan / The Economic Times: Google says it will invest $4.5B in Jio Platforms for a 7.73% stake as part of the recently announced $10B India digitization fund  —  This investment will be part of Google's recently announced $10 billion India digitization fund  —  Internet major Google is buying a 7.73% stake … https://bit.ly/2DKSWF6