CNN – Social Media/Technology

By Clare Duffy, CNN When Elon Musk first agreed to buy Twitter, he promised to make the company “better than ever,” with greater transparency, fewer bots, a stronger business and more of what he called “free speech.” But six months after Musk took control of Twitter, the future of the company and the platform have

By Brian Fung, CNN For years, Microsoft flew under the radar as policymakers around the world went after Amazon, Facebook and Google as some of the biggest alleged threats to fair competition. But now, more than two decades after its landmark court battle with the US government over browsers, Microsoft is firmly back in the

By Hanna Ziady, CNN The UK antitrust regulator has blocked Microsoft’s purchase of Activision Blizzard, threatening to thwart one of the tech industry’s biggest deals over concerns it will stifle competition in cloud gaming. The Competition and Markets Authority said in a statement Wednesday that it was worried the deal would lead to “reduced innovation

By Brian Fung, CNN A group of Republican senators on Tuesday urged the Biden administration to “use all available tools” to sanction cloud computing firms with links to China. The letter led by Sen. Bill Hagerty calls on the Departments of Commerce, State and Treasury to impose “sanctions, export restrictions, and investment bans” on companies

By Veronica Miracle, Cheri Mossburg and Phil Gast, CNN Nima Momeni, the man accused of killing Cash App founder Bob Lee in San Francisco, intends to plead not guilty next week, his attorney said. Momeni was to be arraigned on a murder charge Tuesday but that was put off until May 2 after defense attorney

By Michelle Toh, CNN Temu, an online shopping platform that has quickly become the most popular app in the United States, has crossed the Atlantic. The company is now operating in six European countries, including France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and the United Kingdom, according to its website. Temu is a Boston-based online retailer

By Brian Fung, CNN A federal appeals court largely sided with Apple on Monday in a closely watched case about its app store policies, a decision that could complicate future efforts to regulate app store operators and frustrate claims that Apple behaves monopolistically. The decision in the case involving Epic Games, maker of the hit

By Michelle Toh and Nathaniel Meyersohn, CNN Temu and Shein are taking off in the United States, topping app stores and creating a frenzy with consumers. But as the two online shopping platforms become hugely popular, they’re also facing questions over a litany of issues, including how they’re able to sell goods at such strikingly

By Brian Fung, CNN Lyft plans to “significantly reduce” its workforce, the company’s new CEO David Risher told employees on Friday, in another round of layoffs as it struggles to turn a profit and pull off a turnaround. In a company-wide memo, Risher said the cuts were aimed at making Lyft a “faster, flatter company

By Clare Duffy, CNN Elon Musk’s Twitter on Thursday began a purge of blue verification check marks from users who have not signed up for its subscription service, with the checks disappearing from the accounts of journalists, academics and celebrities. The blue checks even disappeared from the accounts of some of the most well-known and

By Samantha Kelly When Colin McEvoy, a father of two from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania and a self-described film fanatic, wants to watch a Bollywood film or an obscure independent movie, he often turns to Netflix — but not its popular streaming service. McEvoy, 39, said he’s been using Netflix’s DVD-by-mail service since 2001, just three years

By Manveena Suri and Michelle Toh, CNN Apple CEO Tim Cook met with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday, pledging to invest further in the fast-growing economy as his company ramps up retail and manufacturing activities. The visit underscores how the world’s most valuable company is continuing to pivot to India, eyeing its potential

By Samantha Kelly, CNN Snapchat is about to give new meaning to the “chat” part of its name. Snap, the company behind Snapchat, announced on Wednesday that its customizable My AI chatbot, is now accessible to all users within the app. The feature, which is powered by the viral AI chatbot ChatGPT, was previously only

By Clare Duffy, CNN Twitter appears to have quietly rolled back a portion of its hateful conduct policy that included specific protections for transgender people. The policy previously stated that Twitter prohibits “targeting others with repeated slurs, tropes or other content that intends to degrade or reinforce negative or harmful stereotypes about a protected category.

By Brian Fung, CNN Meta is forging ahead with plans to let teenagers onto its virtual reality app, Horizon Worlds, despite objections from lawmakers and civil society groups that the technology could have possible unintended consequences for mental health. On Tuesday, the social media giant said children as young as 13 in Canada and the

By Samantha Murphy Kelly, CNN One of the buzziest songs recently circulating on TikTok and climbing the Spotify charts featured the familiar voices of best-selling artists Drake and the Weeknd. But there’s a twist: Drake and The Weeknd appear to have had nothing to do with it. The viral track, “Heart on my Sleeve,” comes

By Brian Fung, CNN Artificial intelligence tools such as ChatGPT could lead to a “turbocharging” of consumer harms including fraud and scams, and the US government has substantial authority to crack down on AI-driven consumer harms under existing law, members of the Federal Trade Commission said Tuesday. Addressing House lawmakers, FTC chair Lina Khan said

By Vanessa Yurkevich, CNN Universal Music Group — the music company representing superstars including Sting, The Weeknd, Nicki Minaj and Ariana Grande — has a new Goliath to contend with: artificial intelligence. The music group sent urgent letters in April to streaming platforms, including Spotify and Apple Music, asking them to block artificial intelligence platforms

By Michelle Toh, CNN Apple’s CEO Tim Cook is in India this week to open its first physical stores in the country, marking a milestone for the iPhone maker in the world’s second largest smartphone market. Cook was seen personally welcoming customers as employees cheered and clapped at the company’s new outlet in Mumbai, which

By Clare Duffy and Ramishah Maruf, CNN Elon Musk warned in a new interview that artificial intelligence could lead to “civilization destruction,” even as he remains deeply involved in the growth of AI through his many companies, including a rumored new venture. “AI is more dangerous than, say, mismanaged aircraft design or production maintenance or

By Samantha Murphy Kelly, CNN In the future, when teenagers want to sign up for an account on Facebook or Instagram, they may first need to ask their parent or guardian to give their consent to the social media companies. That, at least, is the vision emerging from a growing number of states introducing —

By Veronica Miracle, Anna-Maja Rappard, Rebekah Riess, Taylor Romine and Ramishah Maruf, CNN Nima Momeni, the man accused of killing Cash App founder Bob Lee, appears to have gotten into an argument with Lee before his death, according to documents released by the San Francisco District Attorney’s office. A message from Momeni’s sister to Lee

By Catherine Thorbecke, CNN Amazon wants investors to know it won’t be left behind in the latest Big Tech arms race over artificial intelligence. In a letter to shareholders Thursday, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said the company is “investing heavily” in large language models (LLMs) and generative AI, the same technology that underpins ChatGPT and

By Brian Fung, CNN Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders has signed a sweeping bill imposing a minimum age limit for social media usage, in the latest example of states taking more aggressive steps intended to protect teens online. But even as Sanders signed the bill into law on Wednesday afternoon, the legislation appeared to contain

By Samantha Murphy Kelly, CNN Business When Elyse Nguyen was nearing her wedding date in February and still hadn’t started writing her vows, a friend suggested she try a new source of inspiration: ChatGPT. The AI chatbot, which was released publicly in late November, can generate compelling written responses to user prompts and offers the

By Michelle Toh and Juliana Liu, CNN Elon Musk has laid off more than 6,000 people at Twitter since taking over the company, he told the BBC in a rare interview late Tuesday. Musk was quoted as saying in the interview that the social media platform now has only 1,500 employees, down from under 8,000

By Juliana Liu, CNN Warren Buffett says geopolitical tensions were “a consideration” in the decision to sell most of Berkshire Hathaway’s shares in global chip giant TSMC, which is based in Taiwan. The 92-year-old “Oracle of Omaha” shed light on the investment call in a Tuesday interview with Japanese news agency Nikkei. He was quoted

By Jessie Yeung, CNN Across the United States, more than 150 million people are being faced with the possibility of a new reality: life without TikTok. The wildly popular short-form video app has been at the center of an ongoing battle, with lawmakers calling for an outright ban, and the company portraying itself as a

By Clare Duffy, CNN In the wake of the 2016 presidential election, as online platforms began facing greater scrutiny for their impacts on users, elections and society, many tech firms started investing in safeguards. Big Tech companies brought on employees focused on election safety, misinformation and online extremism. Some also formed ethical AI teams and

By Michelle Toh, CNN Apple is finally getting ready to open its first physical store in the country as it bets on India as a market and manufacturing base. The company teased the opening of its retail outlet in a brief statement Wednesday, saying it was preparing to greet customers in the financial and commercial

By Brian Fung, CNN After Twitter announced in February it would begin charging third parties to access its platform data, academic researchers warned that the vaguely worded plan could threaten important studies about how misinformation, harassment and other malicious activity spreads online. Now, as Twitter has released more pricing information, many of those same academics

By Catherine Thorbecke, CNN Bob Lee, the former chief technology officer of Square who helped launch Cash App, has died after an apparent stabbing attack in San Francisco. Lee’s death was confirmed by Josh Goldbard, the CEO of his current employer, MobileCoin. Lee joined MobileCoin, a cryptocurrency and digital payments startup, in 2021 as its

By Jennifer Korn Anyone using their iPhone to check the weather on Tuesday may have had better luck just looking out the window. Apple’s default Weather app briefly went down for many users on Tuesday morning, showing blank screens with no data. The result: many users felt clueless about what was happening outside. “The Apple

By Chris Lau, CNN Australia has joined other Western countries in banning the use of TikTok on government devices as the Chinese-owned video app comes under increasing pressure over claims it presents a security concern. Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus announced the ban on Tuesday after receiving advice from intelligence and security agencies, saying the directive would

By Clare Duffy, CNN Some VIP Twitter users woke up on Saturday expecting to have lost their coveted blue verification check marks in a previously announced purge by Elon Musk. Instead, Twitter appeared to target a single account from a major publication Musk dislikes and changed the language on its site in a way that

By Laura He, CNN China has launched a cybersecurity probe into Micron Technology, one of America’s largest memory chip makers, in apparent retaliation after US allies in Asia and Europe announced new restrictions on the sale of key technology to Beijing. The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) will review products sold by Micron in the

By Clare Duffy, CNN Pope Francis wearing a massive, white puffer coat. Elon Musk walking hand-in-hand with rival GM CEO Mary Barra. Former President Donald Trump being detained by police in dramatic fashion. None of these things actually happened, but AI-generated images depicting them did go viral online over the past week. The images ranged

By Catherine Thorbecke, CNN When the Amazon Labor Union shocked the world last April by successfully forming the first US union in the e-commerce giant’s history, Chris Smalls, the president and face of the organization, celebrated by making champagne rain on the street and thanking Jeff Bezos “for going to space” while workers organized. Smalls,

By Brian Fung, CNN Half of Americans support a US government ban on TikTok, while 22% oppose the idea and more than a quarter are unsure, according to a Pew Research Center survey released Friday. The survey results — collected in the days before and after TikTok CEO Shou Chew testified before Congress on March

By Michelle Toh and Junko Ogura, CNN Japan will restrict the overseas sale of chip manufacturing equipment, joining the United States and the Netherlands in curbing the export of key technology to China. The country announced Friday it would tighten exports of 23 types of advanced semiconductor manufacturing equipment. The rules will take effect in

By Brian Fung, CNN An AI policy think tank wants the US government to investigate OpenAI and its wildly popular GPT artificial intelligence product, claiming that algorithmic bias, privacy concerns and the technology’s tendency to produce sometimes inaccurate results may violate federal consumer protection law. The Federal Trade Commission should prohibit OpenAI from releasing future