Posts Tagged: passes
The Morning After: Senate passes the bill that could ban TikTok
The Senate approved a measure that will require ByteDance to sell TikTok or face a ban, in a vote of 79 to 18. The Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act next goes to President Biden. The president has already said he’ll sign the bill into law. (Yes, as predicted, I'm writing about this again.)
TikTok has faced the ire of US politicians for a few years now, but this bill has picked up support across both political parties. It sailed through the House of Representatives before being approved (bundled with a package for foreign aid) by the Senate on Tuesday.
The bill states that TikTok would have up to 12 months to divest from its parent company ByteDance, or face a ban in US app stores and web hosting services. The company, naturally, has protested this push, calling the bill unconstitutional and vowing to mount a legal challenge if the bill is signed into law. If it does so, it could bounce around courts for years before any eventual ban, if the company declines to sell. A few years is a long time in social media. Ask Snap, or worse, Vine.
And who would buy TikTok? While many major tech companies might love to grab the social network’s engaged young audience, many politicians would balk at making a Big Tech company even bigger. Steve Mnuchin, who was Treasury secretary in the Trump administration, told CNBC he was putting together an investor group. What could go wrong?
— Mat Smith
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Microsoft’s new lightweight AI model can run on smartphones
It can supposedly respond similarly to models 10 times its size.
Microsoft has unveiled its latest light AI model, called the Phi-3 Mini, for smartphones and other local devices. The aim is to provide a cheaper alternative to cloud-powered large language models (LLMs), allowing smaller organizations to adopt AI, with presumably lower energy burdens and without heady processing costs. According to Microsoft, the new model handily outperforms its previous Phi-2 small model and is on par with larger models like Llama 2. In fact, the company says the Phi-3 Mini responds close to the level of a model 10 times its size. The trick is apparently in the data Microsoft used to train its tiny model.
Tesla teases its ride-hailing app ahead of robotaxi unveiling
The feature would be available in the Tesla app ‘in the future.’
Tesla teased ride-hailing features coming to its app ahead of an August robotaxi unveiling. The company released mock-ups of the upcoming feature, which showed the ability to “summon” a ride from the Tesla app. The company has been promising self-driving taxi services for years. Tesla didn’t offer many details, but it seems to have Uber-like functionality and the ability to remotely set the car’s temperature before arrival.
Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses get improved AI smarts that don’t require a subscription
Take that, Humane.
After a few months of testing, Meta is bringing multimodal AI to its smart glasses. Multimodal AI means the system can process multiple types of information, including photos, videos, text and audio. You might have seen feature showcases of AI-connected devices that can view what a device is looking at and offer extra information — that kind of thing. Meta also announced hands-free video call integration with WhatsApp and Messenger and a few more frame designs.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-morning-after-senate-passes-the-bill-that-could-ban-tiktok-111556543.html?src=rss
Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics
House passes bill that would bar data brokers from selling Americans’ personal information to ‘adversary’ countries
The House of Representatives approved a measure targeting data brokers’ ability to sell Americans’ personal data to “adversary” countries, like Russia, China, Iran and North Korea. The Protecting Americans’ Data from Foreign Adversaries Act passed with a unanimous 414 – 0 vote.
The bill, which was introduced alongside a measure that could force a ban or sale of TikTok, would prohibit data brokers from selling Americans’ “sensitive” data to people or entities in “adversary” countries. Much like a recent executive order from President Joe Biden targeting data brokers, the bill specifically covers geolocation, financial, health, and biometric data, as well as other private information like text logs and phone call history.
If passed — the bill will need Senate approval before landing on Biden’s desk — it would represent a significant check on the relatively unregulated data broker industry. US officials have previously warned that China and other geopolitical rivals of the United States have already acquired vast troves of Americans’ information from brokers and privacy advocates have long urged lawmakers to regulate the multibillion-dollar industry.
The bill is the second major piece of bipartisan legislation to come out of the House Energy and Commerce this month. The committee previously introduced the “Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act,” which would require TikTok to divest itself from parent company ByteDance or face a ban in the US. In a statement, Representatives Frank Pallone and Cathy McMorris Rodgers, said that the latest bill “builds” on their work to pass the measure targeting TikTok. “Today’s overwhelming vote sends a clear message that we will not allow our adversaries to undermine American national security and individual privacy by purchasing people’s personally identifiable sensitive information from data brokers,” they said.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/house-passes-bill-that-would-bar-data-brokers-from-selling-americans-personal-information-to-adversary-countries-004735748.html?src=rss
Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics
House passes bill that could ban TikTok
A bill that could force a sale or outright ban on TikTok passed the House just days after it was first introduced. The House of Representatives approved the measure Wednesday, in a vote of 352 – 65, in a rare showing of bipartisan support. It now goes to the Senate.
If passed into law, the legislation would give parent company ByteDance a six-month window to sell TikTok or face a ban from US app stores and web hosting services. While the “Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act” is far from the first effort to force a ban or sale of TikTok, it’s been able to draw more support far more quickly than previous bills.
The measure cleared its first procedural vote in the House last week, just two days after it was introduced. The bill will now move onto the Senate, where its future is less certain. Senator Rand Paul has said he would block the bill, while other lawmakers have also been hesitant to publicly back the bill.
TikTok has called the bill unconstitutional, saying it would “strip 170 million Americans of their Constitutional right to free expression” and hurt creators and businesses that rely on the service. Last week, the company sent a wave of push notifications to users, urging them to ask their representatives to oppose the bill. Congressional staffers reported that offices were overwhelmed with calls, many of which came from confused teenagers. Lawmakers later accused the company of trying to “interfere” with the legislative process.
Free speech and digital rights groups also oppose the bill, with many noting that comprehensive privacy laws would be more effective at protecting Americans’ user data rather than a measure that primarily targets one app. Former President Donald Trump, who once also tried to force ByteDance to sell TikTok, has also said he is against the bill, claiming it would strengthen Meta.
In a letter to lawmakers, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Fight for the Future and the Center for Democracy and Technology argued that the bill would “set an alarming global precedent for excessive government control over social media platforms” and would likely “invite copycat measures by other countries … with significant consequences for free expression globally.”
If the bill were to muster enough votes to pass the Senate, President Joe Biden says he would sign the bill into law. His administration has previously pressured ByteDance to sell TikTok. Officials maintain the app poses a national security risk due to its ties to ByteDance, a Chinese company. TikTok has repeatedly refuted these claims.
If the law was passed, the company would likely mount a legal challenge like it did in Montana, which passed a statewide ban last year. A federal judge temporarily blocked the ban in November before it could go into effect.
Developing…
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/house-passes-bill-that-could-ban-tiktok-144805114.html?src=rss
Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics
Google Wallet can now automatically add your movie tickets and boarding passes
An update to Google Wallet has further simplified the process of getting all your passes in one place. Per this week’s release notes for Wallet, spotted by Android reporter Mishaal Rahman, Google says movie tickets and boarding passes will now be surfaced automatically after purchase, as long as the confirmation email has made it to the user’s Gmail inbox. It might not work for every theater chain or airline just yet, but Google says the feature is live for “some” and more should be added in time.
Google little by little has been tweaking Wallet to make it more useful. The company last month expanded Wallet passes to WearOS so Android smartwatch users could have easy access to their tickets from their wrist. That includes boarding passes, event tickets, gym memberships, loyalty cards and more. Per the latest release notes, Google has also added a way for users to manually archive most of their passes from either their smartphone or smartwatch. These will be moved to a section called Archived Passes, where users will be able to undo the action if they’ve made a mistake or need to refer to an old pass.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-wallet-can-now-automatically-add-your-movie-tickets-and-boarding-passes-214241833.html?src=rss
Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics
Good news baseball fans! T-Mobile confirms it will offer free Season Passes to MLB TV through 2028
It’s good news for baseball fans (at least those that subscribe to T-Mobile) today with the announcement that the Magenta carrier has signed a new, long-term deal with Major League Baseball which, among other things, will continue the offer of free MLB TV subscriptions via the T-Mobile Tuesdays app. “T-Mobile and MLB are embarking on […]
Come comment on this article: Good news baseball fans! T-Mobile confirms it will offer free Season Passes to MLB TV through 2028
House passes contentious anti-online sex trafficking bill
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India passes US to become second largest smartphone market
The US is now the third largest smartphone market in the world, according to a new report by global technology market analyst firm Canalys. The number of smartphone shipments to India grew 23 percent in the third quarter of this year, reaching just o…
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