Featured video: L. Rafael Reif on the power of education

MIT President L. Rafael Reif recently joined Raúl Rodríguez, associate vice president of internationalization at Tecnológico de Monterrey, for a wide-ranging fireside chat about the power of education and its impact in addressing global issues, even more so in a post pandemic world.  “When I was younger, my parents used to always tell me and my […]

Analysis: majority of the most-viewed Reels on Meta’s platforms are anonymous or reposted; Meta says Reels is Instagram’s biggest engagement growth contributor (Shirin Ghaffary/Vox)

Shirin Ghaffary / Vox: Analysis: majority of the most-viewed Reels on Meta’s platforms are anonymous or reposted; Meta says Reels is Instagram’s biggest engagement growth contributor  —  Facebook’s pivot back to video shows how badly it needs young people.  —  Meta, the parent company of Facebook, needs to stay relevant.

Avalanche is now the fourth largest blockchain for DeFi protocols by “total value locked”, at $10B+, ahead of Solana, with its AVAX token rising 2,800% in 2021 (Tracy Wang/CoinDesk)

Tracy Wang / CoinDesk: Avalanche is now the fourth largest blockchain for DeFi protocols by “total value locked”, at $10B+, ahead of Solana, with its AVAX token rising 2,800% in 2021  —  To the crypto-conscious, blockchain industry conferences have become annual pilgrimages of sorts …

A look at 3C, a “grassroots” group of SMBs against Big Tech regulation, financed by Google and Amazon, which claims support from SMBs that haven’t heard of it (CNBC)

CNBC: A look at 3C, a “grassroots” group of SMBs against Big Tech regulation, financed by Google and Amazon, which claims support from SMBs that haven’t heard of it  —  – The Connected Commerce Council, which pitches itself as a grassroots movement representing small business owners …

With new industry, a new era for cities

Kista Science City, just north of Stockholm, is Sweden’s version of Silicon Valley. Anchored by a few big firms and a university, it has become northern Europe’s main high-tech center, with housing mixed in so that people live and work in the same general area. Around the globe, a similar pattern is visible in many […]

Solving the challenges of robotic pizza-making

Imagine a pizza maker working with a ball of dough. She might use a spatula to lift the dough onto a cutting board then use a rolling pin to flatten it into a circle. Easy, right? Not if this pizza maker is a robot. For a robot, working with a deformable object like dough is […]

A judge invalidates Massachusetts’ fiduciary duty rule against Robinhood that underlies a 2020 suit accusing the firm of encouraging users to place risky trades (Nate Raymond/Reuters)

Nate Raymond / Reuters: A judge invalidates Massachusetts’ fiduciary duty rule against Robinhood that underlies a 2020 suit accusing the firm of encouraging users to place risky trades  —  A Massachusetts judge on Wednesday dealt state securities regulators a major setback in their enforcement action …

Chainalysis: $1B+ in crypto was stolen from bridge-related exploits in a little over a year across seven incidents; Dune: $21B+ is locked on Ethereum bridges (Olga Kharif/Bloomberg)

Olga Kharif / Bloomberg: Chainalysis: $1B+ in crypto was stolen from bridge-related exploits in a little over a year across seven incidents; Dune: $21B+ is locked on Ethereum bridges  —  The hack of a so-called bridge supporting Axie Infinity’s play-to-earn game revealed this week highlights the increasingly problematic nature …

India-based social commerce startup Citymall, which targets consumers in Tier 2, 3, and 4 towns, raises a $75M Series C led by Norwest Venture Partners (Kul Bhushan/Tech in Asia)

Kul Bhushan / Tech in Asia: India-based social commerce startup Citymall, which targets consumers in Tier 2, 3, and 4 towns, raises a $75M Series C led by Norwest Venture Partners  —  Citymall, an India-based social commerce startup, has raised US$75 million in a series C round led by Norwest Venture Partners.

Cyberpion, which helps companies secure outside-facing assets and infrastructure, raises a $27M Series A led by U.S. Venture Partners (Frederic Lardinois/TechCrunch)

Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch: Cyberpion, which helps companies secure outside-facing assets and infrastructure, raises a $27M Series A led by U.S. Venture Partners  —  It’s no secret that digital supply chains are increasingly under attack as hackers look to use this vector to get access to company networks and confidential information.

The UK’s FCA extends a key deadline, set for Thursday, for approving crypto companies; the FCA has so far approved 33 companies (Emily Nicolle/Bloomberg)

Emily Nicolle / Bloomberg: The UK’s FCA extends a key deadline, set for Thursday, for approving crypto companies; the FCA has so far approved 33 companies  —  The U.K.’s financial regulator is extending a Thursday deadline for its approval of crypto operations, giving a dozen firms more time to get their applications or affairs in […]

Meta paid Republican consulting firm Targeted Victory to orchestrate a campaign against TikTok in the US, including placing op-eps in regional news outlets (Washington Post)

Washington Post: Meta paid Republican consulting firm Targeted Victory to orchestrate a campaign against TikTok in the US, including placing op-eps in regional news outlets  —  Facebook parent company Meta is paying one of the biggest Republican consulting firms in the country to orchestrate a nationwide campaign seeking …

Fighting discrimination in mortgage lending

Although the U.S. Equal Credit Opportunity Act prohibits discrimination in mortgage lending, biases still impact many borrowers. One 2021 Journal of Financial Economics study found that borrowers from minority groups were charged interest rates that were nearly 8 percent higher and were rejected for loans 14 percent more often than those from privileged groups. When […]

Chinese AR glasses maker Nreal raises a $60M Series C extension led by Alibaba, bringing its total funding to $200M in the past 12 months (Rita Liao/TechCrunch)

Rita Liao / TechCrunch: Chinese AR glasses maker Nreal raises a $60M Series C extension led by Alibaba, bringing its total funding to $200M in the past 12 months  —  China’s augmented reality startup Nreal is on a roll.  The company, which hopes to bring AR to the masses by making bright-color, lightweight smart glasses […]

Counterpoint: Motorola was the third largest smartphone OEM in the US in 2021, with a 10% market share, up 131% YoY, filling the void left by LG’s exit (Michail/GSMArena.com)

Michail / GSMArena.com: Counterpoint: Motorola was the third largest smartphone OEM in the US in 2021, with a 10% market share, up 131% YoY, filling the void left by LG’s exit  —  LG officially shut down its mobile division last April which left a sizeable hole in the US smartphone market and based …

Meta updates Messenger with Slack-like shortcuts, /silent to reply without a notification and @everyone to notify all, and plans to add more, like /pay and /gif (Jay Peters/The Verge)

Jay Peters / The Verge: Meta updates Messenger with Slack-like shortcuts, /silent to reply without a notification and @everyone to notify all, and plans to add more, like /pay and /gif  —  There’s also one that pings everyone, so please use it responsibly  —  Meta, the parent company of Facebook …

Steven Mnuchin’s Liberty Strategic Capital acquires a majority stake in enterprise security company Zimperium for $525M; SoftBank will retain a minority stake (Krystal Hu/Reuters)

Krystal Hu / Reuters: Steven Mnuchin’s Liberty Strategic Capital acquires a majority stake in enterprise security company Zimperium for $525M; SoftBank will retain a minority stake  —  Liberty Strategic Capital, a Washington D.C.-based private equity fund founded by former U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin …

Spotify is testing a vertically scrolling feed for podcasts in its main app, featuring an automatically selected 60-second audio preview (Sarah Perez/TechCrunch)

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch: Spotify is testing a vertically scrolling feed for podcasts in its main app, featuring an automatically selected 60-second audio preview  —  Spotify acquired podcast discovery platform Podz last summer for roughly $49.4 million, per a Securities and Exchange Commission filing …

Enterprise software company Celonis acquires German startup Process Analytics Factory, which makes tools for Microsoft apps, for $100M in cash and stock (Ivan Levingston/Bloomberg)

Ivan Levingston / Bloomberg: Enterprise software company Celonis acquires German startup Process Analytics Factory, which makes tools for Microsoft apps, for $100M in cash and stock  —  Software startup Celonis, currently valued at $11 billion, has purchased Process Analytics Factory GmbH in order to expand its offering across Microsoft Corp. products.

MIT graduate engineering, business, science programs ranked highly by U.S. News for 2023

MIT’s graduate program in engineering has again topped the list of U.S. News and World Report’s annual rankings, released today. The program has held the No. 1 spot since 1990, when the magazine first published these rankings. The MIT Sloan School of Management also placed highly, landing in the No. 5 spot for the best […]

Reversing hearing loss with regenerative therapy

Most of us know someone affected by hearing loss, but we may not fully appreciate the hardships that lack of hearing can bring. Hearing loss can lead to isolation, frustration, and a debilitating ringing in the ears known as tinnitus. It is also closely correlated with dementia. The biotechnology company Frequency Therapeutics is seeking to […]

Leaked documents show Okta’s contractor Sitel first sent a Lapsus$ breach notification to Okta on January 25, and a detailed “Intrusion Timeline” on March 17 (Lily Hay Newman/Wired)

Lily Hay Newman / Wired: Leaked documents show Okta’s contractor Sitel first sent a Lapsus$ breach notification to Okta on January 25, and a detailed “Intrusion Timeline” on March 17  —  Documents shed some light on how Okta and its subprocessor Sitel reacted to a breach, but they don’t explain the apparent lack of urgency.

Spotify rolls out an advisory for content that mentions COVID-19, two months after promising the feature amid controversy over Joe Rogan’s podcast (Jessica Bursztynsky/CNBC)

Jessica Bursztynsky / CNBC: Spotify rolls out an advisory for content that mentions COVID-19, two months after promising the feature amid controversy over Joe Rogan’s podcast  —  – Spotify is rolling out a Covid content advisory tab on podcasts and other content that mentions the coronavirus.

HR and payroll platform Papaya Global is acquiring Azimo, a London-based money transfer service; source: the deal is worth between $150M and $200M (Ingrid Lunden/TechCrunch)

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch: HR and payroll platform Papaya Global is acquiring Azimo, a London-based money transfer service; source: the deal is worth between $150M and $200M  —  Six months after raising $250 million, Papaya Global is making a key acquisition to expand its cloud-based HR and payroll platform globally on the heels of major […]