Tag: Google

Justice Dept. Files Landmark Antitrust Case Against Google

The Associated Press

The Justice Department on Tuesday sued Google for antitrust violations, alleging that it abused its dominance in online search and advertising to stifle competition and harm consumers.

The lawsuit marks the government’s most significant attempt to protect competition since its groundbreaking case against Microsoft more than 20 years ago. It could be an opening salvo ahead of other major government antitrust actions, given ongoing investigations of major tech companies including Apple, Amazon and Facebook at both the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission.

Read the full story

Supremes Hear Google, Oracle Case of Copyright Clash

The Associated Press

The topic was high tech: the code behind smartphones.

But on Wednesday the Supreme Court looked to more low tech examples, from the typewriter keyboard to restaurant menus, try to resolve an $8 billion-plus copyright dispute between tech giants Google and Oracle.

The case, which the justices heard by phone because of the coronavirus pandemic, has to do with Google’s creation of the Android operating system now used on the vast majority of smartphones worldwide. In developing Android, Google used some of Oracle’s computer code.

Read the full story

‘Oil Barons and Railroad Tycoons’: Big Tech Must Be Restructured, House Report Says

Admin

Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google have abused their monopoly power and must undergo significant restructuring, according to a House report released Tuesday.

Lawmakers who wrote the report said the four tech companies had grown into monopolies akin to “oil barons and railroad tycoons” and suggested an overhaul to U.S. antitrust laws, according to The New York Times. The lengthy report, spearheaded by Democratic Reps. Jerrold Nadler and David Cicilline, is the result of a 15-month House Judiciary Committee investigation into the companies collectively known as Big Tech.

Read the full story

More Than Half of American Voters Support Breaking up Big Tech Companies, a New Poll Finds

Admin

More than half of American voters strongly or somewhat support breaking up Silicon Valley tech giants to promote competition, according to a poll published Thursday.

Only 26% of voters oppose or strongly oppose splitting up the country’s largest tech companies, while 19% of those surveyed didn’t offer a view, a poll from progressive think tank Data for Progress showed. The poll, which surveyed 1,200 likely voters in September, comes as the House lawmakers conclude their nearly yearlong probe into the industry’s supposed anticompetitive behavior.

Read the full story

Google Removes Autocomplete for Candidates and Voting

Admin

Ahead of the U.S. presidential election Google said that it will now remove any autocomplete predictions that seem to endorse or oppose a candidate or a political party and claims about voting or the electoral process, according to a CNN report. 

Google executives outlined these changes at an online press event Thursday, as well as in a blog post. Google’s autocomplete feature offers recommendations for queries once a user begins typing.

Read the full story

Commentary: The Google v. Oracle Supreme Court Case Could Have Lasting Effects on the Music Business and Tennessee’s Economy

Admin

With the COVID-19 pandemic, racial justice protests and the looming presidential election dominating the headlines, the upcoming Supreme Court case, Google v. Oracle, has been all but forgotten.

It may seem like an inconsequential lawsuit between two Silicon Valley rivals fighting over a coveted piece of technology. But that analysis is wrong. The case has enormous potential consequences, not just for the two companies in dispute, but for countless Tennesseans and the state’s economy.

Read the full story

Virginia First to Roll Out Pandemic App from Apple, Google

The Associated Press

Virginia has rolled out a smartphone app to automatically notify people if they might have been exposed to the coronavirus, becoming the first U.S. state to use new pandemic technology created by Apple and Google.

But hopes for a nationwide app that can work seamlessly across state borders remain unrealized, and there are no known federal plans to create one. State officials say their new app won’t work as well outside Virginia, at least until a group of coordinating public health agencies gets a national server up and running and other states join in.

Read the full story

Google Deliberately Alters Search Results for Breitbart News

Admin

As the 2020 election draws nearer, search engine and tech giant Google is being exposed as engaging in election interference by artificially altering search results to negatively impact right-wing sites, as reported by Breitbart.

Breitbart reports that its own visibility on Google search results has been reduced by as much as 99.7 percent of its previous performance since the 2016 election. In contrast to its performance in April of 2016, when it was among the top ten search results for 355 key search terms, it now ranks in the top ten of only one such search term in the month of July of this year.

Read the full story

ANALYSIS: DOJ Investigators Involved in Antitrust Probe Don’t Appear to be Scrutinizing Claims of Bias in Google’s Search

Admin

by Peter Hasson and Chris White   Department of Justice investigators who are conducting an antitrust probe targeting Google do not appear to be scrutinizing claims that the tech giant manipulates its search function, leaks about the probe and a source familiar with it indicate. Google critics argue that Google Search must be a focus of the investigation, pointing to the company’s sheer dominance in the market: Google consistently accounts for roughly 90% of online information searches, and company employees have expressed a willingness to artificially manipulate search results on the platform. Google did not comment on allegations of search bias, or on the pending antitrust investigation. “We continue to engage with the ongoing investigations led by the Department of Justice and Attorney General Paxton, and we don’t have any updates or comments on speculation,” Google spokeswoman Julie McAlister told the Daily Caller News Foundation. The company’s goal is focusing on the kind of products that serve customers and support businesses, she added. Google’s search feature can potentially skew a major national election toward one candidate over another, according to Robert Epstein, a research psychologist at the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology. Research he published in 2017 suggests Google’s bias affected the vote in the 2016 election.…

Read the full story

Massive Plot Stole Data from Google Users Who Downloaded Free Add-Ons to Chrome Web Browsers: Report

Admin

A massive spyware effort targeted users of Google’s Chrome web browser extensions downloaded tens of millions of times, Reuters reported Thursday.

The people responsible for the spyware attacked users through 32 million downloads of extensions to Google’s web browser, and collected browsing history and other user data, researchers at Awake Security told Reuters. Google removed more than 70 malicious extensions after researchers alerted the company of the attack in May, the company said.

Read the full story

Hawley Announces Bill Targeting Bad-Acting Tech Companies Hours After Google, NBC Demonetization Dispute Over the Federalist

Admin

Republican Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley announced Wednesday that he is introducing a bill aimed at fighting bad-acting tech companies hours after Google threatened a conservative publication with demonetization.

The Limiting Section 230 Immunity to Good Samaritans Act, cosponsored by Republican Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida, Mike Braun of Indiana and Tom Cotton of Arkansas, would prevent big tech companies from receiving Section 230 immunities unless the companies updated their terms of service, promised to operate in good faith and promised to pay a $5,000 fine if they violated their promise.

Read the full story

Google Bans Ads on the Federalist After NBC News Raises Concerns About George Floyd Protest Articles

Admin

Google is planning to ban The Federalist and Zero Hedge from its ad platform, Google Ads, after NBC News raised concerns to the tech giant about articles that the conservative websites published regarding rioting and looting that occurred alongside the protests over the death of George Floyd.

According to the NBC report, Google notified The Federalist that it will block the site from using Google Ads because of concerns raised over an article related to the protests over Floyd’s death.

Read the full story

Censorship, Antitrust Probes: Big Tech Is Back to Fighting Familiar Foes After Taking on Coronavirus

Admin

Amazon, Twitter, and other major tech companies are facing intense criticism on antitrust issues and censorship claims in the months since government officials reportedly began asking for help from Silicon Valley on ways to tackle the coronavirus pandemic.

The president and lawmakers have turned their sights on Twitter and Amazon, respectively, while Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and other attorneys general are reportedly ratcheting up their antitrust investigation targeting Google’s business model. The White House asked them in March to fight coronavirus disinformation while also assisting the government in its virus response.

Read the full story

Commentary: Trump Executive Order Strikes at the Heart of Social Media’s Leftist Censorship

Admin

President Trump’s long-hoped-for Executive Order on social media censorship is a good first step in dismantling the Left’s dangerous influence over these 21st-century communications vehicles. (You can read the draft that was available online when this article was posted through this link to The National Pulse, edited by Raheem Kassam.)

We particularly agree with this part of the EO’s statement of principles, “In a country that has long cherished the freedom of expression, we cannot allow a limited number of online platforms to hand-pick the speech that Americans may access and convey online. This practice is fundamentally un-American and anti-democratic. When large, powerful social media companies censor opinions with which they disagree, they exercise a dangerous power.”

Read the full story

President Trump Reportedly Considering Forming Panel to Review Anti-Conservative Bias in Big Tech

Admin

President Donald Trump is considering forming a commission to review anti-conservative bias on social media platforms, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the idea.

A potential White House-created commission would examine allegations of online bias and censorship, according to the report. The administration will also encourage the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Election Commission to conduct similar reviews, the sources told the WSJ.

Read the full story

Google Employees Blame Conservative Backlash for Canceled Racial Justice Program

Admin

Google acknowledged nixing an internal racial justice program Wednesday, and some employees believe the company did it fearing lawsuits from “right-wing employees,” according to an NBC News report.

The company ended Sojourn in 2019, claiming the program designed to teach about racial injustice was too difficult to expand beyond the United States, NBC News reported Wednesday. Current and former employees, however, told NBC the program ended because Google feared backlash in the wake of former software engineer James Damore’s 2018 lawsuit that accused the company of ideological discrimination.

Read the full story

Commentary: Big Tech, Privacy, and Power

Admin

The ground is shifting quickly beneath our feet when it comes to tech, privacy, and power. And, although tech companies, their advocates, and even some policymakers, would like us to imagine these issues are cut and dried, they are not.

In their book The Sovereign Individual, published on the eve of the year 2000, James Dale Davidson and William Rees-Mogg attempt to grapple with the forthcoming technological changes that the new millennium inevitably would bring. “As technology revolutionizes the tools we use,” they wrote, “it also antiquates our laws, reshapes our morals, and alters our perceptions.”

This is the dynamic that has been unfolding slowly over the last 20 years, as Google, Facebook, Twitter, and other social media platforms have transformed how we engage with communications, culture, commerce, and one another.

Read the full story

Commentary: Big Tech’s Toadying to Chinese Communists Demands Action

Admin

As the world grapples with the coronavirus pandemic, China has become infamous for its role in allowing the virus to spread. From misleading the World Health Organization about the virus’s contagious elements, restricting the access of global investigators to infected sites, and lying about their infection numbers, China single-handedly stole months of preparation from other countries that have been savaged by the disease.

China has also hoarded masks and personal protective equipment from desperate countries and threatened to withhold critical medicines relied upon by millions of Americans.

Read the full story

Attorneys General Give Conflicting Views on Future of Antitrust Probe Targeting Google as States Respond to Virus Spread

Admin

The attorneys general who are involved in an antitrust investigation targeting Google are weighing whether to press the accelerator on the probe or focus resources on the coronavirus response.

Google is doing everything it can to protect not only its employees, but also Americans, Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry told the Daily Caller News Foundation. He is referring to what he said was the company’s work to help the Trump administration on the virus response.

Landry is one of the 33 attorneys general who is helping to spearhead the probe.

Read the full story

Apple’s Digital Assistant Siri Told Users Israel’s Reuvin Rivlin Was the ‘President of the Zionist Occupation State’

Admin

by Chris White   Apple’s voice-controlled assistant told the big tech company’s customers Saturday night that Israel President Reuvin Rivlin is the leader of the Zionist occupation state.” Someone changed Rivlin’s Wikipedia page to describe Israel’s president as the “main child of Israel,” Israel’s i24 News reported Saturday. Apple and Google often rely on Wikipedia to answer customer questions about politicians, historical events, and people who are in the public eye. Rivlin is the 10th president of Israel and was elected in 2014 having previously served as the speaker of the Israeli parliament, the Knesset. Rivlin’s Wikipedia page no longer refers to Israel’s leader as the “president of the Zionist occupation state.” Israel’s enemies frequently refer to the country as the “Zionist occupation state,” a term many Israelis and Jews around the world view as promoting anti-Semitic ideology. “Anti-Zionism is a prejudice against the Jewish movement for self-determination and the right of the Jewish people to a homeland in the State of Israel,” the Anti-Defamation League notes on its website. Twitter users posted tweets explaining what happens when they asked Siri about Rivlin. Got the same response https://t.co/UMM8VwqziA pic.twitter.com/Y7QxicQUeQ — Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) January 19, 2020 Another Twitter user told his followers: “Not doctored, this…

Read the full story

Commentary: The Tricky Ethics of Google’s Project Nightingale

Admin

The nation’s second-largest health system, Ascension, has agreed to allow the software behemoth Google access to tens of millions of patient records. The partnership, called Project Nightingale, aims to improve how information is used for patient care. Specifically, Ascension and Google are trying to build tools, including artificial intelligence and machine learning, “to make health records more useful, more accessible and more searchable” for doctors.

Read the full story

Commentary: Google’s Algorithms Threaten Free and Fair Elections

Admin

In the wake of the dumpster fire that was the Mueller hearings this week, Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s reputation was left in ashes, the Democrats are covered in soot, and the Russian collusion fairytale is toast. The Democrats’ impeachment hopes are also dead, whether they choose to believe it or not. But the question of election meddling remains very much a vital topic of discussion, just not in the way Democrats and the leftist corporate media would like.

Read the full story

Commentary: The Banality of Google’s Wokeness

Admin

by Emina Melonic   Although many people don’t see it or refuse to acknowledge it, we are living in a mangled version of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World and George Orwell’s 1984. There are technological and morally dubious (at best!) forces that control the flow of information we see and can release into the world. Facebook, Twitter, and Google – our current rendition of “The Big Three” – rightfully have been accused of censorship, as example after example comes to light. Yet, even as more is revealed with each new example, nothing seems to be done to change the situation. The rest of the population – i.e., the users – are powerless to do anything about it because the structure of all social media companies allows rhem to operate under the guise of privatization. If the company is private, then logically it would follow that we have no right to criticize their company policies. Add to that the fact that their services, mainly, are free to users, and complaints are often met with dismissive charges of ingratitude. And yet, users have no genuine choice because these are the platforms that amount to today’s public square. We have no choice because the primary way of…

Read the full story