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Italy's data protection authority Garante plans to review other artificial intelligence platforms and hire AI experts, a top official said, as it ramps up scrutiny of the powerful technology after temporarily banning ChatGPT in March. Garante is among the most proactive of the 31 national data protection authorities which oversee Europe's data privacy regime known as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). The agency was the first to ban AI chatbot company Replika , to impose fines on facial recognition software maker Clearview AI , and to restrict TikTok in Europe. In March, it temporarily banned Microsoft -backed OpenAI 's bot ChatGPT and launched a probe over the application's suspected breach of privacy rules. "We plan to kick off a wide-scope review of generative and machine learning AI applications which are available online because we want to understand if these new tools are addressing issues linked to data protection and privacy laws complian

A team led by Jeff Bezos' space company Blue Origin won a coveted NASA contract to build a spacecraft that will send astronauts to and from the moon 's surface, NASA's chief announced on Friday, capping a high-stakes contest. NASA's decision will give the agency a second ride to the moon under its Artemis program, after it awarded Elon Musk 's SpaceX $3 billion (nearly Rs. 24,850 crore) in 2021 to land astronauts on the moon for the first time since the final Apollo mission in 1972. Those initial missions using SpaceX's Starship system are slated for later this decade. The Blue Origin contract is valued roughly $3.4 billion (nearly Rs. 28,150 crore), NASA's exploration chief Jim Free said, with Blue Origin privately contributing "well north" of that amount, Blue Origin's lunar lander head John Couluris said. "Honored to be on this journey with @NASA to land astronauts on the Moon — this time to stay," Amazon .com billionaire

Meta Platforms ' Instagram is planning to release a text-based app that will compete with Twitter and may debut as soon as June, Bloomberg News reported on Friday, citing people familiar with the matter. The Facebook parent is testing the product with influencers and some creators, according to the report . The company did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Meta has been contacting talent agencies and celebrities to gauge their interest in trying an early version of the app, which will be integrated with Instagram, said Alex Heath in a newsletter. "The decentralized app is built on the back of Instagram but will be compatible with some other apps like Mastodon ," according to a newsletter by Lia Haberman, who teaches social and influencer marketing at UCLA in California. The report also mentions that the parent company Meta has made the new app secretly available to select creators for months. It is said to be separate from Instagram yet al

EU telecoms regulators' group BEREC on Friday warned the European Commission against proposing legislation pushed by the sector to get Big Tech 's help to pay for the rollout of 5G and broadband, saying it did not see a competition problem or a market failure. The comments from The Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC) to the European Commission which is now looking into the issue underscores the high-stakes battle between Big Tech and Europe's major telecoms operators. "There is no evidence of a competition problem or a market failure to the detriment of end-users regarding IP-interconnection," the group said. Echoing Big Tech's arguments, BEREC said it has its doubts about a mandatory network fee levied on the companies. "It is questionable that mandatory payments from CAPs (content and application providers) to ISPs (internet service providers) would lead to member states meeting the connectivity targets," BEREC

Meta Platforms on Thursday shared new details on projects it was pursuing to make its data centers better suited to supporting artificial intelligence work, including a custom chip "family" that it said it was developing in-house. The Facebook and Instagram owner said in a series of blog posts that it designed a first-generation chip in 2020 as part of the Meta Training and Inference Accelerator (MTIA) program, which was aimed at improving efficiency for the recommendations models it uses to serve ads and other content in news feeds. Reuters previously reported that the company was not planning to deploy its first in-house AI chip widely and was already working on a successor. The blog posts portrayed the first MTIA chip as a learning opportunity. "From this initial program, we have learned invaluable lessons that we are incorporating into our roadmap," it wrote. The first MTIA chip was focused exclusively on an AI process called inference, in which algorith

HTC U23 , HTC U23 Pro were launched in Taiwan on Thursday. The HTC U23 series was teased earlier by the company. The official teaser also suggested that the phones will be compatible with the company's Viverse VR platform. With the launch of the smartphones, we will soon see how exactly it will work together. The phones are powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 chipsets. Both handsets come with IP67 ratings. The base model sports a triple-rear camera unit, while the pro model features a quad-rear camera system. HTC U23, HTC U23 Pro price, availability Offered in Aqua Blue and Roland Violet colour options, the base HTC U23 model is available in a single storage variant of 8GB + 128GB. The company has not yet revealed the price and availability details of the phone. Meanwhile, the HTC U23 Pro is available for purchase through the online HTC Taiwan store . The 8GB + 256GB is priced at TWD 16,990 (roughly Rs. 45,500) and the 12GB + 256GB variant is marked at TWD 17,990 (roughly Rs

Crypto lender Voyager Digital said Wednesday that customers will recover about 35 percent of their cryptocurrency deposits as the company winds down its operations after a failed buyout attempt by crypto exchange Binance.US . US Bankruptcy Judge Michael Wiles approved Voyager's proposed liquidation plan at a court hearing in Manhattan on Wednesday, allowing the company to return about $1.33 billion (nearly Rs. 11,000 crore) in crypto assets to customers and end its efforts to reorganize under Chapter 11. Voyager filed for bankruptcy protection in July, citing volatility in cryptocurrency markets and a default on a large loan made to crypto hedge fund Three Arrows Capital (3AC) . Voyager suffered through two failed sale attempts during its bankruptcy. It initially sought to sell its assets for $1.42 billion (nearly Rs. 11,700 crore) to FTX , a deal that failed when FTX imploded in November. Binance.US stepped in with a $1.3 billion offer, but called off the deal on April 25, ci

Google on Wednesday said its Google Play 's payments policy is compliant with the anti-trust watchdog CCI 's order and it is pushing ahead with plans to enforce the policy in the country. "In 2020, we clarified the requirements of our payments policy, and developers in India have had considerable time to make the necessary changes to their apps," it said in a blog post. "We're respectfully following the CCI's October 2022 order, and in compliance with that order, we expanded user choice billing to all developers in India and updated our policy that went into effect starting April 26, 2023." Google said as the deadline of April 26 had now passed, it would be taking "necessary steps" to get developers to implement one of the billing options it offers. Three routes are available for app developers — using Google Play's billing system, an alternative billing system called the user choice billing system alongside Google Play's billing

WhatsApp has rolled out new Chat Lock feature to help its users keep their messages and conversations private and secure. While WhatsApp already provide an end-to-end encryption on the app , the new feature act as an added layer by letting users select the conversations that they want to keep hidden from access to anyone else. One can open these conversation only through correct passcode, fingerprint, or Face ID authentication. The feature has been globally launched and will be rolling out to all WhatsApp users on Android as well as iOS . In a blog post on Monday, Meta announced rolling out a new security layer for WhatsApp chats with the new 'Chat Lock' feature. Using this feature will move locked chat threads to a different folder. Any notifications regarding these chats will neither show the sender's name, nor the message preview. Moreover, the media files shared in these chats will not be saved in the phone's gallery automatically. These chats can be locked us

Regulator TRAI on Friday directed telecom operators to take action against misuse of telemarketing messages templates within 30 days to curb pesky messages. The regulator in the direction said that it has noticed some telemarketers are misusing headers and content templates of enterprises. "Unsolicited Commercial Communication (UCC) is a major source of inconvenience to the public and impinges on the privacy of individuals and TRAI has been taking various steps to curb it. Today, Trai has issued a direction to stop misuse of message templates under Telecom Commercial Communication Customer Preference Regulations, 2018 (TCCCPR-2018)," the regulator said. Instead of mobile numbers, the authorised telemarketing messages display headers which is indicative of the company from which it has come. The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has directed telecom operators to make changes in the code of practices (CoPs) around headers and content templates of telemarketing m

US lawmakers will ask regulators to investigate whether the make-up of a panel overseeing animal testing at Elon Musk 's brain-chip startup Neuralink contributed to botched and rushed experiments. US House Representatives Earl Francis Blumenauer and Adam Schiff, both Democrats, have signed a draft letter to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) requesting a probe into how Neuralink oversaw its experiments, Blumenauer's office said. The lawmakers have shared the draft with peers to gather more signatures and plan to send it to the USDA on Monday. The draft states that they are responding to a May 4 Reuters story which revealed that Neuralink filled its oversight board with company employees who stand to benefit financially from the start-up securing regulatory approval for its novel brain chip. The panel approved experiments that resulted in the unnecessary deaths and suffering of animals, Reuters showed in a December 5 story. A spokesperson for Blumenauer said the USDA di

A Russian court fined Alphabet 's Google RUB 3 million (nearly Rs. 31 lakh) on Thursday for failing to delete YouTube videos it said promoted "LGBT propaganda" and "false information" about Russia's military campaign in Ukraine, Russian news agencies reported. Over the last year Moscow has levied dozens of fines against Western tech companies as part of a drive to ramp up control over what Russian internet users see online. As well as passing strict censorship laws shortly after it dispatched troops into Ukraine, Russia also last year strengthened its laws against what it calls the "promotion of LGBT propaganda". Under the new law, which widens Russia's interpretation of what qualifies as "LGBT propaganda" and has been heavily criticised by independent human rights groups, any action or the spreading of any information that is considered an attempt to promote homosexuality in public, online, or in films, books or advertising, cou

The Indian government's open e-commerce network ONDC has expanded its operations into 236 cities in the country while adding more than 36,000 merchants, a senior company official said on Thursday. The government launched the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) last year to give small businesses and retailers access to processes and technologies usually provided by big e-commerce platforms such as Amazon and Walmart . The non-profit company's network currently displays products and services from all participating e-commerce platforms in search results across all apps on its network.  "ONDC is handholding small merchants while aiming to make e-commerce more inclusive and accessible for consumers," T Koshy, CEO of the company, told reporters.  The network is slowly and steadily recording an uptick in transactions, he said.  The government has said existing platforms are tightly controlled, keeping out many small players. It expects ONDC to increase competit

WhatsApp has responded to the Indian Government's call to send notice to the Meta 's messaging platform regarding an increase in international scam calls. Promising to safeguard user's privacy and security, WhatsApp says it provides options like 'Block' and 'Report' for users to avoid any unwanted calls or messages. It also ensured to have ramped up its AI and ML system, which is expected to bring down the current calling rate by at least 50 percent.  "Our users are at the heart of everything we do and we are fully aligned with the Government's goal of keeping users safe. WhatsApp is a leader among end-to-end encrypted services in protecting user safety," stated WhatsApp spokesperson in response to report regarding IT Ministry's decision to send a notice.  "We have quickly ramped up our AI & ML systems to bring down such incidents significantly. Our new enforcement will reduce the current calling rate by at least 50 percent and

Google's Pixel ‘A' series is designed to target the budget smartphone segment globally, but that doesn't aways line up with the "budget" segment in India. For example, the Pixel 3a  was launched in India at Rs. 39,999 and it offered segment-leading camera quality (with just one camera), but also fell short in terms of processing power, lack of waterproofing, etc. The Pixel 6a was the first smartphone in the series to come close to justifying its Rs. 43,999 launch price. But in our  review , we found that it still lacked that premium oomph compared to the competition, and fell behind on some basic features. With the launch of the Pixel 7a , Google seems to have taken a big leap forward and has gone all-guns blazing, whether it's specs, design, or premium features. Let's take a closer look at what's new and different about it. The Google Pixel 7a is available in a sole 8GB RAM and 128GB storage option, but it comes in three colours – Charcoal, Snow

Microsoft will not raise salaries for full-time employees this year and is reducing budget for bonuses and stock awards, Insider reported on Wednesday, citing an internal email by CEO Satya Nadella. The tech giant did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. "Last year, we made a significant investment in compensation driven by market conditions and company performance, nearly doubling our global merit budget...this year the economic conditions are very different across many dimensions" the report quoted Nadella saying. In January, Microsoft said it would let go of 10,000 workers, adding to the tens of thousands layoffs announced before that across the technology sector as it deals with slowing growth in a turbulent economy. Microsoft has now squarely placed its focus on generative AI , an area the industry sees as a bright spot. In collaboration with ChatGPT maker OpenAI , which also has received billions of dollars in funding from Microsoft, the tec

India Post on Tuesday inked a pact with the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) and Tripta Technologies for providing logistics support to small traders, and outlined plans to onboard the ONDC platform as a logistics service provider. India Post signed an MoU with the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) and Tripta Technologies in the presence of Minister of State for Communications Devusinh Chauhan on Tuesday. The pact facilitates the operationalisation of the 'Bharat EMart' portal, which will provide the facility of pick-up of consignments from the premises of traders and ensure delivery at the doorsteps of the consignees across the country. An estimated eight crore traders associated with CAIT will be benefitted from the agreement, an official release said. India Post in the recent past has entered into similar agreements with the Government e-Marketplace (GeM) and Regional Centers of Tribal Cooperative Marketing Development Federation of India Limited (TRIFE

Bankrupt crypto exchange FTX received US bankruptcy court permission on Thursday to sell its LedgerX business for $50 million (nearly Rs. 408 crore), raising additional funds to repay creditors. At a hearing in Wilmington, Delaware, US Bankruptcy Judge John Dorsey signed off on FTX's sale of LedgerX, its non-bankrupt crypto derivatives trading platform, to an affiliate of Miami International Holdings. Miami International Holdings owns the Bermuda Stock Exchange and several US-registered securities exchanges, including the Miami International Securities Exchange. FTX is attempting to repay an estimated $11 billion (nearly Rs. 89,850 crore) to customers through a combination of asset sales and clawback actions. Since filing for bankruptcy in November, FTX has recovered more than $7.3 billion (nearly Rs. 59,630 crore) in cash and liquid crypto assets, the company reported in April. As part of that broader effort, FTX on Wednesday said it would seek repayment of nearly $4 billio

US chipmaker Broadcom 's Chief Executive Hock Tan on Friday will try to convince EU antitrust enforcers that his proposed $61 billion (nearly Rs. 4,98,300 crore) bid for cloud computing firm VMware , which has triggered scrutiny on both sides of the Atlantic, is pro-competitive. Tan, flanked by his executives and lawyers, arrived early Friday morning in Brussels for a closed hearing on one of the biggest tie-ups in the history of the technology sector. He declined to comment as he headed into the hearing. Tan will present his arguments to senior European Commission officials, including its deputy director general for mergers Guillaume Loriot, and their counterparts from national competition agencies as well as lawyers from the EU executive. VMware President Sumit Dhawan will appear remotely at the hearing. There are no other third parties at the hearing. Broadcom's request for the hearing came after the Commission last month warned the deal may restrict competition in the

Elon Musk's brain-implant venture has filled an animal-research oversight board with company insiders who may stand to benefit financially as the firm reaches development goals, according to company documents and interviews with six current and former employees. Such oversight boards are required by federal law for organizations experimenting on certain types of animals. The panels are charged with ensuring proper animal care, high research standards, and the reliability of data that helps regulators decide whether drugs or medical devices are safe for human testing. The membership of the panel at Musk 's company, Neuralink , raises questions about potential violations of conflict-of-interest regulations aimed at protecting research integrity, a dozen animal-research and bioethics experts told Reuters. Neuralink is conducting animal experiments as it seeks regulatory approval for human trials of a brain chip intended to help paralyzed people type with their minds, among other