Policy – Page 12

RedNote may wall off “TikTok refugees” to prevent US influence on Chinese users

censorship, china, Policy, rednote, social media censorship, tiktok, TikTok ban, Xiaohongshu / Rejus Almole / January 16, 2025

Whether TikTok will be banned in the US in three days is still up in the air. The Supreme Court has yet to announce its verdict on the constitutionality of a law requiring TikTok to either sell its US operations or shut down in the US. It’s possible that the Supreme Court could ask for more time to deliberate, potentially delaying enforcement of the law as TikTok has requested until after Donald Trump takes office.

While the divest-or-sell law had bipartisan support when it passed last year, momentum has seemingly shifted this week. Senator Ed Markey (D-Mass.) has introduced a bill to extend the deadline ahead of a potential TikTok ban, and a top Trump adviser, Congressman Mike Waltz, has said that Trump plans to stop the ban and “keep TikTok from going dark,” the BBC reported. Even the Biden administration, whose justice department just finished arguing why the US needed to enforce the law to SCOTUS, “is considering ways to keep TikTok available,” sources told NBC News.

Many US RedNote users quickly banned

For RedNote and China, the app’s sudden popularity as the US alternative to TikTok seems to have come as a surprise. A Beijing-based independent industry analyst, Liu Xingliang, told Reuters that RedNote was “caught unprepared” by the influx of users.

To keep restricted content off the app, RedNote allegedly has since been “scrambling to find ways to moderate English-language content and build English-Chinese translation tools,” two sources familiar with the company told Reuters. Time’s reporting echoed that, noting that “Red Note is urgently recruiting English content moderators [Chinese]” became a trending topic Wednesday on the Chinese social media app Weibo.

Many analysts have suggested that Americans’ fascination with RedNote will be short-lived. Liu told Reuters that “American netizens are in a dissatisfied mood, and wanting to find another Chinese app to use is a catharsis of short-term emotions and a rebellious gesture.” But unfortunately, “the experience on it is not very good for foreigners.”

On RedNote, Chinese users have warned Americans that China censors way more content than they’re used to on TikTok. Analysts told The Washington Post that RedNote’s “focus on shopping and entertainment means it is often even more active in blocking content seen as too serious for the app’s target audience.” Chinese users warned Americans not to post about “politics, religion, and drugs” or risk “account bans or legal repercussions, including jail time,” Rest of World reported. Meanwhile, on Reddit, Americans received additional warnings about common RedNote scams and reasons accounts could be banned. But Rest of World noted that many so-called “TikTok refugees” migrating to RedNote do not “seem to know, or care, about platform rules.”

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AT&T kills home Internet service in NY over law requiring $15 or $20 plans

AT&T, New York Affordable Broadband Act, Policy / Rejus Almole / January 16, 2025

AT&T has stopped offering its 5G home Internet service in New York instead of complying with a new state law that requires ISPs to offer $15 or $20 plans to people with low incomes.

The decision was reported yesterday by CNET and confirmed by AT&T in a statement provided to Ars today. “While we are committed to providing reliable and affordable Internet service to customers across the country, New York’s broadband law imposes harmful rate regulations that make it uneconomical for AT&T to invest in and expand our broadband infrastructure in the state,” AT&T said. “As a result, effective January 15, 2025, we will no longer be able to offer AT&T Internet Air, our fixed-wireless Internet service, to New York customers.”

New York started enforcing its Affordable Broadband Act yesterday after a legal battle of nearly four years. Broadband lobby groups convinced a federal judge to block the law in 2021, but a US appeals court reversed the ruling in April 2024, and the Supreme Court decided not to hear the case last month.

The law requires ISPs with over 20,000 customers in New York to offer $15 broadband plans with download speeds of at least 25Mbps, or $20-per-month service with 200Mbps speeds. The plans only have to be offered to households that meet income eligibility requirements, such as qualifying for the National School Lunch Program, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or Medicaid.

AT&T’s Internet Air was launched in some areas in 2023 and is now available in nearly every US state. The standard price for Internet Air is $60 a month plus taxes and fees, or $47 when bundled with an eligible mobile service. Nationwide, AT&T said it added 135,000 Internet Air customers in the most recent quarter.

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Texas defends requiring ID for porn to SCOTUS: “We’ve done this forever”

age verification law, age-gating, First Amendment, free speech rights, Policy, pornography, privacy online, SCOTUS, Supreme Court, texas / Paul Patrick / January 15, 2025

“You can use VPNs, the click of a button, to make it seem like you’re not in Texas,” Shaffer argued. “You can go through the search engines, you can go through social media, you can access the same content in the ways that kids are likeliest to do.”

Texas attorney Aaron Nielson argued that the problem of kids accessing porn online has only gotten “worse” in the decades since Texas has been attempting less restrictive and allegedly less effective means like content filtering. Now, age verification is Texas’ preferred solution, and strict scrutiny shouldn’t apply to a law that just asks someone to show ID to see adult content, Nielson argued.

“In our history we have always said kids can’t come and look at this stuff,” Nielson argued. “So it seems not correct to me as a historical matter to say, well actually it’s always been presumptively unconstitutional. … But we’ve done it forever. Strict scrutiny somehow has always been satisfied.”

Like groups suing, Texas also asked the Supreme Court to be very clear when writing guidance for the 5th Circuit should the court vacate and remand the case. But Texas wants justices to reiterate that just because the case was remanded, that doesn’t mean the 5th Circuit can’t reinstitute the stay on the preliminary injunction that was ordered following the 5th Circuit’s prior review.

On rebuttal, Shaffer told SCOTUS that out of “about 20 other laws that by some views may look a lot like Texas'” law, “this is the worst of them.” He described Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton as a “hostile regulator who’s saying to adults, you should not be here.”

“I strongly urge this court to stick with strict scrutiny as the applicable standard of review when we’re talking about content-based burdens on speakers,” Shaffer said.

In a press release, Vera Eidelman, a senior staff attorney with the ACLU Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, said that “efforts to childproof the Internet not only hurt everyone’s ability to access information, but often give the government far too much leeway to go after speech it doesn’t like—all while failing to actually protect children.”

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SEC sues Elon Musk, says he cheated Twitter investors out of $150 million

elon musk, Policy, sec elon musk / Rejus Almole / January 15, 2025

The lawsuit was filed in the waning days of the Biden administration, and the next administration is less likely to aggressively pursue a charge against Musk. President-elect Donald Trump picked Musk to lead a new Department of Government Efficiency, or “DOGE,” as part of a plan to eliminate regulations and restructure federal agencies.

New SEC leadership

SEC Chair Gary Gensler will be leaving the agency, and Trump’s pick to replace him, Paul Atkins, testified to Congress in 2019 that the SEC should reduce its disclosure requirements. With Gensler and one other Democrat leaving, Republicans will have a 2-1 majority on the SEC while the Senate considers Trump’s nominee, a Wall Street Journal article said.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that the lawsuit will be dismissed right away, according to the Journal. The disclosure rule is “routinely enforced,” the article said.

“The new claims against Musk might be hard for a friendlier administration to immediately dismiss,” the WSJ wrote. “That is because the measure Musk allegedly violated is what regulators call a strict-liability rule. Just as police officers don’t have to prove drivers intended to speed to issue a ticket, regulators don’t have to show an investor meant to violate [Rule] 13D to bring an enforcement action.”

The SEC has said it obtained thousands of documents as part of its investigation and that it was probing more than just the late disclosure. The SEC told a court in October 2023 that its investigation “pertains to considerably more than the timing and substance of a particular SEC filing; it also relates to all of Musk’s purchases of Twitter stock in 2022 and his 2022 statements and SEC filings.”

Musk’s lawyer said last month that the SEC threatened to bring “charges on numerous counts” if Musk didn’t agree to settle. But the lawsuit filed yesterday includes only the late-disclosure charge. Demanding a jury trial, the SEC seeks a civil penalty and disgorgement of Musk’s unjust enrichment, plus interest.

SEC sues Elon Musk, says he cheated Twitter investors out of $150 million Read More »

FBI forces Chinese malware to delete itself from thousands of US computers

chinese malware, plugx, Policy, Security / Paul Patrick / January 14, 2025

The FBI said today that it removed Chinese malware from 4,258 US-based computers and networks by sending commands that forced the malware to use its “self-delete” function.

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) government paid the Mustang Panda group to develop a version of PlugX malware used to infect, control, and steal information from victim computers, the FBI said. “Since at least 2014, Mustang Panda hackers then infiltrated thousands of computer systems in campaigns targeting US victims, as well as European and Asian governments and businesses, and Chinese dissident groups,” the FBI said.

The malware has been known for years but many Windows computers were still infected while their owners were unaware. The FBI learned of a method to remotely remove the malware from a French law enforcement agency, which had gained access to a command-and-control server that could send commands to infected computers.

“When a computer infected with this variant of PlugX malware is connected to the Internet, the PlugX malware can send a request to communicate with a command-and-control (‘C2’) server, whose IP address is hard-coded in the malware. In reply, the C2 server can send several possible commands to the PlugX malware on the victim computer,” stated an FBI affidavit that was made on December 20 and unsealed today.

As it turns out, the “PlugX malware variant’s native functionality includes a command from a C2 server to ‘self-delete.'” This deletes the application, files created by the malware, and registry keys used to automatically run the PlugX application when the victim computer is started.

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Meta to cut 5% of employees deemed unfit for Zuckerberg’s AI-fueled future

AI, augmented reality, facebook, Instagram, layoffs, mark zuckerberg, Meta, Policy, smart glasses / Kris Guyer / January 14, 2025

Anticipating that 2025 will be an “intense year” requiring rapid innovation, Mark Zuckerberg reportedly announced that Meta would be cutting 5 percent of its workforce—targeting “lowest performers.”

Bloomberg reviewed the internal memo explaining the cuts, which was posted to Meta’s internal Workplace forum Tuesday. In it, Zuckerberg confirmed that Meta was shifting its strategy to “move out low performers faster” so that Meta can hire new talent to fill those vacancies this year.

“I’ve decided to raise the bar on performance management,” Zuckerberg said. “We typically manage out people who aren’t meeting expectations over the course of a year, but now we’re going to do more extensive performance-based cuts during this cycle.”

Cuts will likely impact more than 3,600 employees, as Meta’s most recent headcount in September totaled about 72,000 employees. It may not be as straightforward as letting go anyone with an unsatisfactory performance review, as Zuckerberg said that any employee not currently meeting expectations could be spared if Meta is “optimistic about their future performance,” The Wall Street Journal reported.

Any employees affected will be notified by February 10 and receive “generous severance,” Zuckerberg’s memo promised.

This is the biggest round of cuts at Meta since 2023, when Meta laid off 10,000 employees during what Zuckerberg dubbed the “year of efficiency.” Those layoffs followed a prior round where 11,000 lost their jobs and Zuckerberg realized that “leaner is better.” He told employees in 2023 that a “surprising result” from reducing the workforce was “that many things have gone faster.”

“A leaner org will execute its highest priorities faster,” Zuckerberg wrote in 2023. “People will be more productive, and their work will be more fun and fulfilling. We will become an even greater magnet for the most talented people. That’s why in our Year of Efficiency, we are focused on canceling projects that are duplicative or lower priority and making every organization as lean as possible.”

Meta to cut 5% of employees deemed unfit for Zuckerberg’s AI-fueled future Read More »

Buyers of Razer’s bogus “N95” Zephyr masks get over $1 million in refunds

Policy, razer n95 mask, razer zephyr / Kris Guyer / January 14, 2025

“The Razer Zephyr was conceived to offer a different and innovative face covering option for the community,” the company said at the time. “The FTC’s claims against Razer concerned limited portions of some of the statements relating to the Zephyr. More than two years ago, Razer proactively notified customers that the Zephyr was not a N95 mask, stopped sales, and refunded customers.”

FTC: Only 6 percent of US purchases were refunded

The FTC lawsuit casts doubt on the earlier availability of refunds, saying that Razer “allegedly implemented” a refund policy. Razer provided refunds for less than 6 percent of Zephyr purchases in the US, the FTC said.

“While Defendants purport to have instituted a policy of fully refunding consumers concerned about the filters on January 9, 2022, Defendants did not promote that policy in its January emails to consumers or on its website,” the FTC said.

That’s a reference to a Razer email sent to mask buyers acknowledging that the mask “is not a medical device nor certified as an N95 mask.” The FTC said the Razer email to consumers “did not invite or otherwise indicate that consumers who believed they were purchasing an N95 mask when they purchased the Zephyr could request a refund from Razer.”

Razer customers who sought refunds ran into several kinds of problems, the FTC said. Some “were told that they could not receive a refund because they were outside of Razer’s standard 14-day return policy,” while others “were told that they could not receive a full refund because they had used the disposable filters provided with the Zephyr when they bought the Zephyr in October 2022 or because the Zephyr was no longer sealed and unused,” the lawsuit said.

“Numerous customers were deterred from, or confused regarding their ability to, obtain full refunds because of statements by Defendants’ customer service representatives that they were ineligible for full refunds,” the lawsuit said.

We contacted Razer today and will update this article if it provides further comment.

Buyers of Razer’s bogus “N95” Zephyr masks get over $1 million in refunds Read More »

Mastodon’s founder cedes control, refuses to become next Musk or Zuckerberg

decentralized social media, elon musk, European Union, facebook, Instagram, mark zuckerberg, mastodon, Meta, Policy, social networks / Rejus Almole / January 13, 2025

And perhaps in a nod to Meta’s recent changes, Mastodon also vowed to “invest deeply in trust and safety” and ensure “everyone, especially marginalized communities,” feels “safe” on the platform.

To become a more user-focused paradise of “resilient, governable, open and safe digital spaces,” Mastodon is going to need a lot more funding. The blog called for donations to help fund an annual operating budget of $5.1 million (5 million euros) in 2025. That’s a massive leap from the $152,476 (149,400 euros) total operating expenses Mastodon reported in 2023.

Other social networks wary of EU regulations

Mastodon has decided to continue basing its operations in Europe, while still maintaining a separate US-based nonprofit entity as a “fundraising hub,” the blog said.

It will take time, Mastodon said, to “select the appropriate jurisdiction and structure in Europe” before Mastodon can then “determine which other (subsidiary) legal structures are needed to support operations and sustainability.”

While Mastodon is carefully getting re-settled as a nonprofit in Europe, Zuckerberg this week went on Joe Rogan’s podcast to call on Donald Trump to help US tech companies fight European Union fines, Politico reported.

Some critics suggest the recent policy changes on Meta platforms were intended to win Trump’s favor, partly to get Trump on Meta’s side in the fight against the EU’s strict digital laws. According to France24, Musk’s recent combativeness with EU officials suggests Musk might team up with Zuckerberg in that fight (unlike that cage fight pitting the wealthy tech titans against each other that never happened).

Experts told France24 that EU officials may “perhaps wrongly” already be fearful about ruffling Trump’s feathers by targeting his tech allies and would likely need to use the “full legal arsenal” of EU digital laws to “stand up to Big Tech” once Trump’s next term starts.

As Big Tech prepares to continue battling EU regulators, Mastodon appears to be taking a different route, laying roots in Europe and “establishing the appropriate governance and leadership frameworks that reflect the nature and purpose of Mastodon as a whole” and “responsibly serve the community,” its blog said.

“Our core mission remains the same: to create the tools and digital spaces where people can build authentic, constructive online communities free from ads, data exploitation, manipulative algorithms, or corporate monopolies,” Mastodon’s blog said.

Mastodon’s founder cedes control, refuses to become next Musk or Zuckerberg Read More »

New York starts enforcing $15 broadband law that ISPs tried to kill

New York Affordable Broadband Act, Policy / Paul Patrick / January 13, 2025

1.7 million New York households lost FCC discount

The order said quick implementation of the law is important because of “developments at the federal level impacting the affordability of broadband service.” About 1.7 million New York households, and 23 million nationwide, used to receive a monthly discount through an FCC program that expired in mid-2024 after Congress failed to provide more funding.

“For this reason, consumer benefit programs assisting low-income households—such as the ABA—are even more critical to ensure that the digital divide for low-income New Yorkers is being addressed,” the New York order said.

New York ISPs can obtain an exemption from the low-cost broadband law if they “provide service to no more than 20,000 households and the Commission determines that compliance with such requirements would result in ‘unreasonable or unsustainable financial impact on the broadband service provider,'” the order said.

Over 40 small ISPs filed for exemptions in 2021 before the law was blocked by a judge. Those ISPs and potentially others will be given one-month exemptions if they file paperwork by Wednesday stating that they meet the subscriber threshold. ISPs must submit detailed financial information by February 15 to obtain longer-term exemptions.

“All other ISPs (i.e., those with more than 20,000 subscribers) must comply with the ABA by January 15, 2025,” the order said. Failure to comply can be punished with civil penalties of up to $1,000 per violation. The law applies to wireline, fixed wireless, and satellite providers.

Charter Spectrum currently advertises a $25-per-month plan with 50Mbps speeds for low-income households. Comcast and Optimum have $15 plans. Verizon has a low-income program reducing the cost of some home Internet plans to as low as $20 a month.

Disclosure: The Advance/Newhouse Partnership, which owns 12.3 percent of Charter, is part of Advance Publications, which also owns Ars Technica parent Condé Nast.

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Supreme Court lets Hawaii sue oil companies over climate change effects

climate change, fossil fuel companies, Hawaii, Honolulu, Policy, shell, Sunoco, Supreme Court / Kris Guyer / January 13, 2025

On Monday, the Supreme Court declined to decide whether to block lawsuits that Honolulu filed to seek billions in damages from oil and gas companies over allegedly deceptive marketing campaigns that hid the effects of climate change.

Now those lawsuits can proceed, surely frustrating the fossil fuel industry, which felt that SCOTUS should have weighed in on this key “recurring question of extraordinary importance to the energy industry” raised in lawsuits seeking similarly high damages in several states, CBS News reported.

Defendants Sunoco and Shell, along with 15 other energy companies, had asked the court to intervene and stop the Hawaii lawsuits from proceeding. They had hoped to move the cases out of Hawaii state courts by arguing that interstate pollution is governed by federal law and the Clean Air Act.

The oil and gas companies continue to argue that greenhouse gas emissions “flow from billions of daily choices, over more than a century, by governments, companies, and individuals about what types of fuels to use, and how to use them.” Because of this, the companies believe Honolulu was wrong to demand damages based on the “cumulative effect of worldwide emissions leading to global climate change.”

“In these cases, state and local governments are attempting to assert control over the nation’s energy policies by holding energy companies liable for worldwide conduct in ways that starkly conflict with the policies and priorities of the federal government,” oil and gas companies unsuccessfully argued in their attempt to persuade SCOTUS to grant review. “That flouts this court’s precedents and basic principles of federalism, and the court should put a stop to it.”

Supreme Court lets Hawaii sue oil companies over climate change effects Read More »

Elon Musk wants courts to force OpenAI to auction off a large ownership stake

AI, elon musk, grok, openai, Policy, syndication / Tim Belzer / January 11, 2025

Musk, who founded his own AI startup xAI in 2023, has recently stepped up efforts to derail OpenAI’s conversion.

In November, he sought to block the process with a request for a preliminary injunction filed in California. Meta has also thrown its weight behind the suit.

In legal filings from November, Musk’s team wrote: “OpenAI and Microsoft together exploiting Musk’s donations so they can build a for-profit monopoly, one now specifically targeting xAI, is just too much.”

Kathleen Jennings, attorney-general in Delaware—where OpenAI is incorporated—has since said her office was responsible for ensuring that OpenAI’s conversion was in the public interest and determining whether the transaction was at a fair price.

Members of Musk’s camp—wary of Delaware authorities after a state judge rejected a proposed $56 billion pay package for the Tesla boss last month—read that as a rebuke of his efforts to block the conversion, and worry it will be rushed through. They have also argued OpenAI’s PBC conversion should happen in California, where the company has its headquarters.

In a legal filing last week Musk’s attorneys said Delaware’s handling of the matter “does not inspire confidence.”

OpenAI committed to become a public benefit corporation within two years as part of a $6.6 billion funding round in October, which gave it a valuation of $157 billion. If it fails to do so, investors would be able to claw back their money.

There are a number of issues OpenAI is yet to resolve, including negotiating the value of Microsoft’s investment in the PBC. A conversion was not imminent and would be likely to take months, according to the person with knowledge of the company’s thinking.

A spokesperson for OpenAI said: “Elon is engaging in lawfare. We remain focused on our mission and work.” The California and Delaware attorneys-general did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Elon Musk wants courts to force OpenAI to auction off a large ownership stake Read More »

Microsoft sues service for creating illicit content with its AI platform

AI, Artificial Intelligence, Biz & IT, generative ai, microsoft, Policy, Security / Tim Belzer / January 10, 2025

Microsoft and others forbid using their generative AI systems to create various content. Content that is off limits includes materials that feature or promote sexual exploitation or abuse, is erotic or pornographic, or attacks, denigrates, or excludes people based on race, ethnicity, national origin, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, age, disability status, or similar traits. It also doesn’t allow the creation of content containing threats, intimidation, promotion of physical harm, or other abusive behavior.

Besides expressly banning such usage of its platform, Microsoft has also developed guardrails that inspect both prompts inputted by users and the resulting output for signs the content requested violates any of these terms. These code-based restrictions have been repeatedly bypassed in recent years through hacks, some benign and performed by researchers and others by malicious threat actors.

Microsoft didn’t outline precisely how the defendants’ software was allegedly designed to bypass the guardrails the company had created.

Masada wrote:

Microsoft’s AI services deploy strong safety measures, including built-in safety mitigations at the AI model, platform, and application levels. As alleged in our court filings unsealed today, Microsoft has observed a foreign-based threat–actor group develop sophisticated software that exploited exposed customer credentials scraped from public websites. In doing so, they sought to identify and unlawfully access accounts with certain generative AI services and purposely alter the capabilities of those services. Cybercriminals then used these services and resold access to other malicious actors with detailed instructions on how to use these custom tools to generate harmful and illicit content. Upon discovery, Microsoft revoked cybercriminal access, put in place countermeasures, and enhanced its safeguards to further block such malicious activity in the future.

The lawsuit alleges the defendants’ service violated the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the Lanham Act, and the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act and constitutes wire fraud, access device fraud, common law trespass, and tortious interference. The complaint seeks an injunction enjoining the defendants from engaging in “any activity herein.”

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