Category: Uncategorized

Michael McSweeney / The Block: Beanstalk, a credit-focused stablecoin protocol using Ethereum, was exploited for ~$182M in various crypto assets by someone who had amassed governance tokens  —  Beanstalk, a credit-focused stablecoin protocol built on Ethereum, was exploited Sunday morning.

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg: The iPad needs a “pro” mode when the device is connected to a keyboard and a trackpad, with Mac-like multitasking, a proper desktop, and more for advanced users  —  Ahead of Apple’s developers conference, here’s how I suggest fixing its iPad software conundrum: a “pro mode” …

Reuters: Didi announces a shareholder meeting on May 23 to vote on delisting of its shares from the NYSE and reports Q4 2021 revenue of $6.4B, down about 12.6% YoY  —  Didi Global Inc (DIDI.N) will hold an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) on May 23 to vote on its delisting plans in the United States […]

Nathan Baschez / Every: Twitter should not only open source its algorithm but also create a marketplace where anyone can build their own algorithms, and use the ones created by others  —  You don’t have to be IN real estate to invest in it.  Fundrise is an easy-to-use platform that lets you build …

Jonathan Haidt / The Atlantic: Social media platforms have weakened major forces that bind democracies together, especially after 2009 when the virality of social media started to intensify  —  What would it have been like to live in Babel in the days after its destruction?  In the Book of Genesis, we are told …

Reed Albergotti / Washington Post: Workers at Apple’s flagship Grand Central Terminal store in Manhattan have begun to formally collect signatures to form a union  —  If successful, the effort would be the first time an Apple retail location has unionized  —  Workers at Apple’s flagship Grand Central Terminal retail location …

Mike Masnick / Techdirt: Musk’s free speech definition is utter nonsense and his suggestions for Twitter completely ignore decades of content moderation iteration on social platforms  —  from the not-how-any-of-this-works dept  —  Lots of talk yesterday as Elon Musk made a hostile takeover bid for all of Twitter.

Rebecca Szkutak / Forbes: A profile of Anna Fang, CEO of China-based ZhenFund, who has backed 30+ seed-stage startups that became unicorns and 90+ startups that had a successful exit  —  When ZhenFund CEO Anna Fang was new to venture investing, her mentor told her that the right entrepreneurs to back are the ones …

Sergiu Gatlan / BleepingComputer: GitHub says an attacker used stolen OAuth user tokens issued to Heroku and Travis-CI to download data from private repositories belonging to npm and other orgs  —  GitHub revealed today that an attacker is using stolen user tokens (issued to Heroku and Travis-CI OAuth) to download data from private repositories.

Bloomberg: At least seven crypto firms have suspended rupee deposits; CoinGecko: daily trading volumes on Indian crypto exchanges have fallen 88%-96% since peaking in 2021  —  When Surojit Chatterjee walked on stage at a Coinbase Global Inc. conference in Bengaluru, India, on April 7 …

Zack Whittaker / TechCrunch: An interview with a former Xinjiang prisoner, who details how China extensively uses tech like Hikvision surveillance cameras to facilitate human rights abuses  —  The rare firsthand account will help investigate human rights abuses  —  For 10 months in 2018, Ovalbek Turdakun was a prisoner …

Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat: Coda Payments, which offers cross-border payments for games, alternative app stores, and other digital products, raises $690M at a $2.5B valuation  —  Coda Payments has raised $690 million in funding to enable cross-border payments for games and other digital products, as well as alternative app stores.

Aliya Chaudhry / TechCrunch: Opera launches its Crypto Browser app on iOS, with a built-in crypto wallet, direct access to cryptocurrency and NFT exchanges, dApps, and more  —  Opera has launched the iOS version of their Crypto Browser, designed for accessing web3, with a non-custodial crypto wallet built-in.

Josh Kosman / New York Post: Sources: Elon Musk is speaking to investors, including Silver Lake, to partner with him on a bid for Twitter; a partnership could be announced within days  —  Elon Musk is speaking to investors who could partner with him on a bid for Twitter, sources close to the matter told […]

MIT students Bhav Jain and Liberty Ladd have been selected as 2022 Truman Scholars. Truman Scholars demonstrate outstanding leadership potential, a commitment to a career in government or the nonprofit sector, and academic excellence. Jain and Ladd join 56 other scholars who were selected from 705 candidates nominated by 275 colleges and universities. President L. […]

Reuters: China bans livestreaming of unauthorized video games, particularly of overseas games or competitions that have not been approved  —  China said on Friday the livestreaming of unauthorised video games was banned, signalling stricter enforcement of rules as part of its broad crackdown …

Joanna Ossinger / Bloomberg: Fasset, which lets users in emerging markets to buy and sell digital assets easily and conveniently, raises a $22M Series A led by Liberty City and Fatima Gobi  —  Fasset, a digital-asset gateway, is planning a major expansion in some areas of the Islamic world, as it seeks to boost the […]

Aiming lasers at the cameras used in driverless cars caused them to incorrectly interpret red traffic lights as green 30 per cent of the time

Manish Singh / TechCrunch: Rapido, whose bike taxi service is available in about 100 Indian cities, raises a $180M Series D led by Swiggy, at a $800M valuation  —  Swiggy has led a $180 million financing round into bike taxi startup Rapido as the Indian food delivery giant looks to broaden its fleet network across […]

Sam Kessler / CoinDesk: A lawsuit filed against OlympusDAO’s co-founders over $20M+ in the DAO’s native tokens could unmask their identities, testing the limits of pseudonymity in DAOs  —  An early Olympus investor alleges he was cheated out of millions of OHM tokens when key smart contracts were rendered inoperable.

Jay Fitzgerald / CRN: California-based Twingate, which offers zero-trust security tools for enterprise, raises a $42M Series B led by Bond Capital  —  ‘We think there’s a huge opportunity to work with channel members to help them solve the security problems of their clients,’ says CEO Tony Huie.

Bloomberg: Sources: Twitter’s board is considering a poison pill after Elon Musk’s bid; a source says another plan under consideration is saying that the offer is too low  —  Twitter Inc.’s board is considering adopting a measure that would protect the company from hostile acquisition bids …

Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch: Filevine, which offers tools to help with legal workflows such as document management and billing, raises a $108M Series D, bringing its total funding to $155M  —  Filevine, a startup offering a software-as-a-service product for legal case management, today announced that it closed …

Jasmine Hicks / The Verge: Reddit updates its search to index comments, available globally on the web but not its apps, and improves natural language searches  —  The new rollout also comes with a refined search experience for desktop users on the platform  —  Today, Reddit is updating its search feature to index comments.

Swetha Gopinath / Bloomberg: PitchBook: VCs invested $148B globally in Q1, down 25% from $191B in Q4 2021, as rising inflation and the war in Ukraine dampen investor appetites  —  Private companies globally are pulling back sharply on raising new funds, as pressure on public markets begins to weigh on the lofty valuations sought by […]

Saritha Rai / Bloomberg: India’s ban on Chinese apps, including TikTok, has allowed homegrown short-video apps like Josh to thrive; Josh has 150M+ MAUs and a $5B valuation as of April  —  Jiya Kiran Valambhia’s success story as a social media influencer is a familiar one in the age of TikTok.

Nicolle Liu / Wall Street Journal: After the pandemic forced employees to work from home, some neurodivergent people are thriving at remote cybersecurity jobs  —  The Covid-19 pandemic forced many employees to work from home, leveling the playing field for people with conditions such as autism, who might not fare as well in office settings

Callan Quinn / The Block: Context, an app that lets users follow and track other people’s crypto wallets and transactions, raises a $19.5M seed led by Variant Fund and Sam Altman  —  Quick Take  — The round was led by Variant Fund and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.  — The firm’s app lets users track on-chain […]

The sounds of cities can make it hard to discern the underground signals that indicate an earthquake is happening, but deep learning algorithms could filter out this noise

JD Shadel / Them: Analysis of Google search results for 50+ trans celebrities shows transphobic suggestions, such as “before surgery” or “as a guy”; Google says it fixed an issue  —  When the world has a question, we Google it.  Processing more than three billion searches a day …

Daniel Van Boom / CNET: Meta’s plan to take up to a 47.5% cut of each virtual transaction on Horizon Worlds draws criticism from NFT proponents; OpenSea takes a 2.5% cut  —  Meta, previously known as Facebook, is figuring out how to monetize the metaverse. … It’s been nearly six months since the company formerly […]

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch: Salsify, which helps e-commerce brands manage inventory, raises a $200M Series F led by TPG at a $2B valuation and says it has 1,200 customers  —  E-commerce is booming, but it’s become increasingly apparent over the years that the businesses that are able to capitalize on that trend …

New York Times: Many tech companies, eager to please employees returning to offices, are providing perks like concerts with pop stars, food trucks, and “appreciation events”  —  Tech companies really want their employees to be happy — or at least less annoyed — about returning.

Cheyenne Ligon / CoinDesk: Former Ethereum developer Virgil Griffith is sentenced to 5+ years in prison and fined $100K for helping North Koreans use cryptocurrencies to evade sanctions  —  Griffith previously pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to violate international sanctions for giving a talk at a crypto conference in Pyongyang in 2019.

Jonathan Greig / The Record: Ukrainian officials say they stopped an attack on an energy facility with help from ESET and Microsoft, and identified a new variant of the Industroyer malware  —  Ukrainian officials said they stopped an attack on an energy facility with the help of researchers from ESET and Microsoft.

Plant-based alternatives to sausages can sometimes lack the textures of meat products, and testing the mechanical properties of the foods explains why

Akshat Rathi / Bloomberg: A look at Stripe’s $925M Frontier initiative, which funds carbon-removal startups and has received funding from Alphabet, Shopify, Meta, and others  —  Some of the world’s largest companies will spend $925 million buying offsets from startups that remove carbon dioxide from the air.

Megan Graham / Wall Street Journal: IAB: US digital ad spend rose 35% YoY to $189B in 2021, the largest gain since 2006; 10 publishers and platforms took 78.6% of the total, up from 78.1% in 2020  —  Advertising has followed shopping online during the pandemic at a breathless rate.  The ad spend was concentrated—78.6% […]

Alex Konrad / Forbes: A profile of a16z’s Chris Dixon, whose early bets on crypto startups, including Coinbase, Uniswap, and Dapper Labs, have made him Forbes’ top VC in the space  —  The Andreessen Horowitz partner is the new no. 1 on Forbes’ 21st annual Midas List of top venture investors, thanks to savvy bets […]

Coco Feng / South China Morning Post: Sources: Meituan plans to lay off ~10%-20% of staff from its core business units after announcing that it added a net 17K jobs from July 2021 to mid-March 2022  —  Up to 20 per cent of Meituan’s staff in core business units, including food and grocery deliveries have […]

The Verge: Meta rolls out a test for a handful of creators to sell virtual items and effects in Horizon Worlds, with Meta taking a 25% cut after a platform fee in Horizon  —  Horizon Worlds will take a 25 percent cut of any sale after app store fees  —  Meta is testing new features […]

Maria Chutchian / Reuters: Cloud services provider Sungard files for bankruptcy with $424M in secured debt, its second bankruptcy filing in three years  —  (Reuters) – Technology company Sungard Availability Services returned to bankruptcy on Monday about three years after wrapping up its prior Chapter 11 case.

A 3D-printed robotic fingertip contains structures that allow it to touch and feel surfaces using the same principles seen in human skin

Zheping Huang / Bloomberg: Sources: China has approved the first batch of video game licenses since its freeze in July; it is unclear if games from Tencent and NetEase were approved  —  China has approved the first batch of new video game licenses since July, people familiar with the matter said …

A robot with thin magnetic plates at each end can be steered and compressed using external magnetic fields so it releases an accurate dose of medicine

Reuters: Sources and leaked docs: senior EU officials were targeted last year with Israeli spyware, including Belgian statesman Didier Reynders; NSO denies involvement  —  Senior officials at the European Commission were targeted last year with spy software designed by an Israeli surveillance firm …

Foo Yun Chee / Reuters: Source: Apple will face an additional EU antitrust charge in the coming weeks, in an investigation into music streaming triggered by a complaint from Spotify  —  Apple (AAPL.O) faces an additional EU antitrust charge in the coming weeks in an investigation triggered by a complaint from Spotify …

Mobile phones ping signals to nearby communications towers, allowing both Ukrainian and Russian soldiers to track the movement of opposition forces

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg: Sources: beta versions of iOS 16, codenamed Sydney, are “chock-full” of references to Apple’s mixed-reality headset and its interactions with the iPhone  —  Apple is set to hold its developers conference virtually for the third year in a row.  Expect major iOS and watchOS upgrades, and perhaps some new Macs.

Jackie Snow / Wall Street Journal: A look at the regulations cities like New York, Barcelona, Amsterdam, Helsinki, and others are adopting as they increasingly use AI to provide public services  —  A look at what New York, London, Barcelona and other places are doing to establish regulations that other cities—and countries—may want to copy