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In theory, philanthropic fund Luminate's decision to focus its financial might on taking on the likes of Facebook and Google should cheer up digital activists.

With Facebook facing a global backlash over claims that it prioritizes profits over user safety, and Brussels in the midst of drafting sprawling digital rulebooks, it's trendy to go after Silicon Valley luminaries.

But critics of the move, including five senior figures at digital nonprofits who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to their dealings with Luminate, say that while harm at the hands of Facebook and Google matters, other issues like government surveillance, algorithmic management and discrimination matter too and crucially, could end up being shortchanged.

Further, they argue the fund's move to focus on "international" issues fails to properly assess the global effects that ostensibly national issues could have.

Nonprofits already rely heavily on funds like Luminate, and generally have to adapt their work pitch to meet the conditions the funders attach to the money they put up.

With the George Soros-backed Open Society Foundation announcing in September that it would focus on fewer key priorities, NGOs fear a funding shortfall across the ecosystem, which could mean fights over a shrinking pot of money. That could mean nonprofits will focus on the work they can get paid for, rather than the work which they may think is most needed.

As a result of Luminate's decision, Western European NGOs could lose $6 million of annual financial backing (of which over $2 million goes towards digital issues) over the next three years. That means campaigns against British school grading fiasco and the one that got an invasive Dutch fraud detection system banned will find it harder to secure financing.

If you combine it with changes at OSF, the Luminate announcement puts European civil society and especially civil society working on digital rights on unsure footing," said one digital rights activist.

In a statement, Luminate rejected the notion that it is "prioritizing one set of work on digital rights over the other," saying that it is taking different approaches to tackle issues globally and in the different regions where it operates.

Luminates Big Tech plan coincides with cuts for digital rights campaigners across Europe and the United States, leading to accusations that the funder, which is backed by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, is prioritizing a headline-grabbing project over scores of other digital rights issues.

Its an understandable strategy, but it may also mean Luminate misses opportunities to meet its goals because some of the direct examples of harm may be abuse of data in the insurance industry, for example, said a senior NGO official on a condition on anonymity because Luminate is a backer.

Campaigners told POLITICO that Luminate has been receptive to hearing NGOs' concerns, but that it has so far been noncommittal and vague in its responses.

While details on its plans are still being finalized, Luminate plans to significantly step up its fight against the major tech platforms, earmarking tens of millions of dollars annually for the fight, according to its managing director Martin Tisn.

I think the house is on fire when it comes to Big Tech accountability, Tisn said in an interview. In order for us to have impact as a philanthropic organization, we need to focus.

Alluding to the rush of tech legislation coming from Brussels, including rules on content moderation, digital competition and a ramp-up of privacy enforcement, Tisn said there is a window of opportunity to fight the tech platforms.

Luminates five-year strategy to tackle the biggest tech companies revolves around taking them to court, publicly campaigning against their practices and lobbying governments to strictly regulate them. Our focus will be around the impact of digital media platforms on democracy, Tisn said, such as how platforms use data in order to amplify harmful or illegal content online.

But one digital rights activist argued that platform power is only a tiny tip of the iceberg.

Luminate plans to cut money for campaigns which it deems purely national, while maintaining funding for projects that it believes have global effects. Though the fund is still working through what that would mean in practice, critics have slammed the move, arguing that many national projects indirectly have global ramifications.

"Luminate's decision to exit domestic work in Europe appears out of touch with the realities of regulatory developments and civil society needs in the region where key digital policies with global impact are decided," said Claire Fernandez, the executive director of EU digital rights group EDRi.

Take Britains plans to reform its data protection rulebook, which campaigners have dubbed a bonfire of information rights. Though the reform is strictly a national issue, many believe it could have a ripple effect elsewhere.

The U.K. could influence lawmakers across Asia, Africa and Latin America, who are crafting their own data protection rulebooks. There are even fears that the U.K.'s reform could lead to a watering down of privacy standards in Europe, which is currently the global standard setter in privacy, one activist said.

Luminate said that it was well aware that national work can have global ramifications.

"We seek to identify and support actions the impact of which are of a scale and significance to tackle these pressing, complex, global issues. This means we will work globally as well as in support of partners in specific regions or countries that can deliver the global actions and impacts necessary to tackle the rising ride of hate, disinformation, and division," the funder said in a statement.

Campaigners also question Luminates strategy to play a bigger operational role in the nonprofit sector, rather than maintaining its traditional role as behind-the-scenes funder.That's a problem for NGOs that operate in the same space as Luminate.

The funder said it would continue to work with "the many civil society groups and others working to address the harms to public health, child safety, election integrity and democracy perpetrated by the big tech companies and social media platforms."

Luminate added that it has long played the dual roles of behind-the-scenes funder and on-the-ground operational organization.

But campaigners question whether the funder will back outfits that have viewpoints on key issues like hate speech, microtargeted advertising and content moderation that dont match its own.

Its dangerous to build another big initiative without knowing what you're doing because it can backfire, like massively, said one campaigner.

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This fund wants to fight Big Tech. NGOs fear the worst. - POLITICO.eu

Federal Trade Commission chair Lina Khan signaled changes are on the way in how the agency scrutinizes acquisitions after revealing the results of a study of a decade's worth of Big Tech company deals that weren't reported to the agency. From a report: Tech's business ecosystem is built on giant companies buying up small startups, but the message from the antitrust agency this week could chill mergers and acquisitions in the sector. The FTC reviewed 616 transactions valued at $1 million or more between 2010 and 2019 that were not reported to antitrust authorities by Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft. 94 of the transactions actually exceeded the dollar size threshold that would require companies to report a deal. The deals may have qualified for other regulatory exemptions.79% of transactions used deferred or contingent compensation to founders and key employees, and nearly 77% involved non-compete clauses. 36% of the transactions involved assuming some amount of debt or liabilities. In a statement, Khan said the report shows that loopholes may be "unjustifiably enabling deals to fly under the radar."

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FTC Releases Findings on How Big Tech Eats Little Tech ...

Large companies engaging in anticompetitive practices will typically do anything to distract us from their monopolistic behavior. Historically, they have shifted the argument to highlight the activities of other global powers under the guise of patriotism. Today, as in days before, these mega-corporations wave the Red, White and Blue, but only care about the green in their overstuffed pockets.

With increasingly questionable business behavior, Big Tech giants like Google and Facebook, which view themselves as key assets for America, have been attempting to shift the focus of lawmakers and regulators on America's biggest economic and political rival: China.

Big Tech monopolists are arguing that this is a zero-sum game; breaking up Big Tech will only strengthen Chinese companies, they claim. Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, facing political heat back in 2018, wrote in his Senate testimony notes, "Break up [Facebook]? U.S. tech companies [are a] key asset for America; break up strengthens Chinese companies." And last month, 12 former national security advisors parroted the same argument, urging Congress to halt its package of antitrust bills.

Is Big Tech too small to take on China, or is Big Tech attempting to divert attention away from their own monopolistic practices?

These former national security advisors are gaslighting the American people on antitrust. They failed to disclose in their letter to Congress that all 12 signatories have financial ties to major tech companies, either from working with them directly or serving with organizations that receive funding from them. It's one thing to get paid by Big Tech, but to then turn around and echo their talking points without disclosing relevant relationship with these companies is unacceptable.

Monopolistic behavior in fact harms our national security. After all, a lack of competition leads to a decline in innovation. Support for reining in Big Tech is bipartisan and growing. When asked about potential legislation, Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), who chairs the Senate Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee, issued this shot across the bow when she said, "I think we can get this done. There's bipartisan support to move, and time is ticking." Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) is working with her to achieve exactly that. Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) even invoked Big Tobacco to blast Facebook as a dangerous company in a recent hearing. This should tell you that the walls are closing in on Big Tech.

When it comes to national security, Big Tech would have you believe that what is good for them is good for America. They argue Big Tech will always answer the call of duty when America needs them the most, but the historical record proves otherwise.

In 2018, Google abandoned its drone contract with the United States government, leaving the status of the project in complete suspension, with no company yet able to fill the void of Google's market dominance.

These companies may claim to have an interest in protecting our national security, but you can count on them to retreat when a partnership doesn't serve their financial interests. Our country accomplished so much when Big Tech was not in the picture, from winning the Second World War to the Cold War. To now argue that we need them to maintain our position in the world is implausible and historically ignorant.

Big Tech giants like Facebook boast that their size makes them impenetrable and impervious to cyber attacks and that we therefore must celebrate their strength and resist antitrust enforcement; otherwise, they claim, we'd open ourselves up to attacks from our enemies. But can you imagine what would have happened if our national defense system went down for six hours, like Facebook and its other properties did last week, all because we were so reliant on a single system?

From trust-busting to enacting data privacy standards, China is finally getting tough with its own Big Tech problem. Are we now going to say that China doesn't care about its own national security? While China's move is more about exercising government control than encouraging economic competition, China certainly still doesn't view unregulated Big Tech as strictly necessary for success.

Big Tech's collusion with America's adversaries, like China and Russia, is the most troubling fact of all. The same year that Google canceled its drone contract with the United States, the company was willing to play ball with the Chinese Communist Party to develop a censored search engine. Just last month, under pressure from the Russian government, Google and Apple removed a voting app created by allies of opposition leader Alexei Navalny. A person familiar with Google's decision declined to be identified "for fear of angering the Russian government," while Apple refused to respond to repeated attempts for comment.

How can we reasonably expect Big Tech to be part of the solution to protect our national security interests when they submit to these adversarial governments in fear of economic retribution? Congressman Ken Buck (R-CO) blasted Google and Apple for this move, tweeting, "Does anyone honestly believe breaking up Big Tech is somehow bad for America's national security? Apple and Google are literally siding with the Putin regime now. Who needs enemies when America has 'friends' like these two?"

Breaking up Big Tech is not a national security risk for our country. The opposite is true. Big Tech is actively empowering our enemies.

America is built on the ideas of free market capitalism. The creation of an "open internet" spurred Big Tech to reach unimaginable heights. But now, the trillion-dollar Big Tech monopolists are working to end anything that comes close to a free market in tech, and by any means necessarycrush competition, shutter small businesses and silence political opponents.

Congress must end Big Tech's antitrust amnesty. Big Tech has gotten away with too much for too long. Meaningful reforms that put our country's interest first are coming. The Big Tech foundation is already crumbling. Now, let's knock it down.

Mike Davis is president and founder of the Internet Accountability Project. He is a former top attorney for the United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary and previously served in the United States Department of Justice. Davis also clerked for Justice Neil Gorsuch, both on the Tenth Circuit and on the Supreme Court.

The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.

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Unchecked Big Tech Endangers U.S. National Security | Opinion

Could Congresss antitrust campaign against Big Tech derail Americas strategic competition with China? A bipartisan collection of senior national security leaders including a former Secretary of Defense, former Director of National Intelligence, former CIA executives, and a former White House Homeland Security adviser think so, and we would do well to listen.

In a letter written to Congress last month, this diverse group of notables warned that more deliberate analysis is needed to examine the detrimental impact that a slew of proposed antitrust laws targeting Big Tech could have on American power.

Their misgivings are well-founded: One of these proposals, for example, would amend legislation on anti-competitive monopolies such that any company with a market cap of more than $100 billion would be prevented from making any merger or acquisition.

Though this particular proposal thankfully has not gained much traction, it is representative of the kinds of poorly considered, far-reaching bills that should have us all concerned. For their proponents, the term Big Tech is often invoked as an accusation, implying that the scale of these companies alone means they need to be broken up. This approach breaks with American precedent, bucks antitrust law, and endangers American security.

The reality is that the technologies that are essential for securing the people and interests of the United States are overwhelmingly being developed in the private sector, which now accounts for about 75 percent of total U.S. research and development spending. Hamstringing these industries will make the nation less safe as the effects of years of insufficient national security funding, training and planning catch up with us and embolden authoritarian regimes in Beijing, Moscow and elsewhere.

Reversing these trends requires ongoing innovation in areas such as artificial intelligence (AI), quantum computing and robotics. But advancing these technologies is resource-intensive and decisively enabled by companies who are able to operate at scale.

Last year, Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Intel and Microsoft alone spent a combined $140 billion on research and development (R&D), not including acquisitions. The Pentagons R&D budget for the same year was $109 billion.

Why were six U.S. companies able to outspend and out-innovate the U.S. government? Because they are profitable. And they are profitable because they are big.

Pushing the frontiers of science and pioneering game-changing technologies is expensive. The resources and talent to do these things are highly valuable and desperately scarce. It is no coincidence, then, that the companies that have found ways to attract billions of customers and the profits that come with them are the ones at the center of these innovations.

Instead of railing against these companies because of their size, we instead should be thankful that our free-market economy has produced an alignment of interests where private-sector actors can generate wealth and jobs while also developing capabilities that will provide for the common defense. This uniquely American advantage may well be decisive in an era of escalating geopolitical competition. It would be reckless to give it away.

That is not to say that these companies should be legally immune simply for being important to national security. If a serious investigation demonstrates that any of these companies have violated antitrust, or any other law, by all means they should be held accountable.

Nor is it to deny other consequential issues related to these companies that still need to be addressed, such as their disproportionate power to bend public discourse, or their previous reticence to collaborate with the U.S. government (though all of the companies mentioned here are now actively pursuing U.S. defense contracts).

Their disturbing support of the Peoples Republic of China is particularly ripe for remediation: Microsofts Beijing-based Research Asia Lab is the companys largest outside of the U.S. and is heralded as the single most important institution in the birth and growth of the Chinese AI ecosystem over the past two decades. Likewise, Apples near-total capitulation to Chinas surveillance and data access demands justifiably invites public skepticism and congressional scrutiny.

These potent criticisms, however, do not justify blowing up an industry that constitutes 10.5 percent of our national GDP particularly when its innovations are at the heart of our current and future national security requirements.

The truth is that big is not bad. In fact, when it comes to tech, it may be a critical advantage.

Klon Kitchen is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a former national security adviser to Sen. Ben SasseBen SasseBiden slips further back to failed China policies The Memo: Generals' testimony on Afghanistan hurts Biden's credibility No. 2 Senate Democrat: Raising debt limit under reconciliation a 'non-starter' MORE (R-Neb.), and a 15-year veteran of the United States Intelligence Community. Read his weekly technology and national security newsletter at thekitchensync.tech and follow him on Twitter @klonkitchen.

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Invoking 'Big Tech' as an accusation can endanger American security | TheHill - The Hill

The limits of my language mean the limits of my world. Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, 1922

TheBritish philosopher Wittgenstein wrote those words as a philosophical foundation for his larger belief in freedom of speech. His meaning: He who controls the language also controls reality, something that todays left understands brilliantly, even devilishly. America historically hasnt limited freedom of thought and speech, and the resulting clash of ideas has improved our national discourse. The language police make us weaker intellectually by limiting the world in which we live.

The language around climate change is one more area the left wants to control, especially given that trillions of dollars in spending are on the line. Big Tech is now doing its part to protect the Green New Deal and radical green ideology from dissenting views.

Googles and YouTubes recent announcement that they now prohibit climate deniers from monetizing their platforms would have caused Wittgenstein to ask: What is a climate denier?

This includes content referring to climate change as a hoax or a scam, the announcement answers. And surely there is no hoax about the climate: Data show that since the 1880s, the global temperature has risen 1 Fahrenheit.

But what else can we measure? In that same period, the world population jumped sevenfold, and food production increased even more. Remarkably, the number of people not living in extreme poverty increased at the same rate. The infant-mortality rate fell from 165 per 100,000 to seven. In 1880, more than 80 percent of the global population was illiterate. Today, that number is around 13 percent.

The question is: Why? The answer is simple: fossil fuels.

Inexpensive, abundant, reliable fossil fuels have turned 10,000 years of stagnant human existence into flourishing and prosperity. Illnesses that took the lives of kings and peasants alike are nearly eradicated thanks to medicine and refrigeration and electricity. All of this growth for 1 F of temperature increase. Thats quite the bargain.

Without fossil fuels, humanity would still be mired in misery and darkness. Do we really want to ban that miracle? Do we want to keep it in the ground, as the green movements cry? Thats a conversation we need to have.

It is thus curious that Google in its announcement calls denying the scientific consensus around the existence and causes of climate change reason enough to get de-platformed.

The evidence of the causes of climate change are far weaker than the evidence of fossil fuels causing the past 200 years of human flourishing, but neither is scientific fact. Could there be any intellectual framework less scientific than consensus?

This discussion now cant take place on the platforms of the Big Tech thought police, and we are all worse for it.

Google also says that claims denying that long-term trends show the global climate is warming will not be allowed. Who is making that claim? The data once again show that the earths temperature indeed warming, but Wittgenstein might ask for a clarification on long-term. One hundred years isnt a very long time. If you look at the last 500 million years, the current trend still has us in a very cool period. The earth spent millions of years 30 to 40 warmer than the current average temperature, and that doesnt come close to covering the earths entire 4.5 billion years of age.

So why did the earth heat and cool so dramatically when there were no humans to cause the warming? After all, the tech language police tell of unequivocal evidence showing that human emissions of greenhouse gases are causing global warming. The firms failure to answer that question shows it has no idea what the word unequivocal means.

Darn. Now Im the language police.

Stifling speech doesnt make us a better nation. It doesnt make any truths truer or any falsehoods falser. It does eliminate competing or unwanted ideas from the conversation, which is the real goal here.

Those afraid of language arent looking for a better world. Wittgenstein understood that. Lets hope America does, too.

Daniel Turner is founder and executive director of Power the Future, a nonprofit that advocates for American energy jobs.

Twitter: @DanielTurnerPTF

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Big Tech censorship on climate change only hurts the nation - New York Post

Foxgloves are among the most poisonous plants found in nature. Theyre also the basis for a lot of heart medications a duality that has earned the plant the description kill or cure. That ability to kill or cure is what led a group of lawyers to choose the name for their new project: a charity dedicated to taking on algorithmic injustice, data harvesting and the ever-growing dominance of Big Tech.

We want to make the use of technology fair for everyone, not just for a privileged and powerful few, explains Cori Crider, one of Foxgloves founders and directors, in a smooth Texas drawl. The scale and nature of the way states and companies use data power over all of us needed to be exposed and some people, actually, just needed to be sued.

Crider and fellow directors Rosa Curling and Martha Dark joke that they begin almost every interview with the same line; that theyre not interested in technology, but power. And that cuts to the core of how they see this as a societal problem, not a technical one. Foxglove aims to prove that tech giants like Facebook, Uber and Google arent different from other corporations and need to face the same regulations, and maybe pay some tax too, Crider says.

Sometimes, it feels that holding global technology giants to account is a nearly impossible endeavour. Whats implicit is that the law doesnt apply to these giant companies. But that isnt so, says Crider. Actually, the cases weve brought demonstrate that there's a lot of good old standard 'beef and liberty parts of the British common law that have been a really important part of [reining in Big Techs power].

Despite having just five employees, Foxglove has been making some huge strides in its battle. They filed a court case that helped force a government U-turn on last summers A-Level results algorithm. They also managed to use lawsuits to force the government to abandon a planned 23m contract to handle NHS patient data to big data giant Palantir. Theyre also in the process of taking Facebook to court over its treatment of outsourced content moderators, who they say are often underpaid and given no support as they filter through everything from child pornography to graphic violence, with many reporting suffering from PTSD.

The way these workers are treated means Facebook doesnt have to recognise the true cost of moderating their platform, because they dont do it properly, explains Dark. Well, we have been working to clean up the digital sweatshops factory floor. By being a non-profit reliant on donations from the public, Foxglove says its able to take on more consequential, and thus risky, cases than those pursued by profit-driven law firms and to win them, too. We never seem to get to court anymore, the government keeps giving in to what we ask, says Curling.

Interestingly, the trio were first brought together by the War on Terror, as they fought against the shady technology underpinning drone strikes, or for the rights of detainees illegally sent to Guantanamo Bay. Years later, over a rainy wine in Brixton, Dark and Crider decided to pick their next fight with the misuse of technology by government and unaccountable corporations. In June 2019, Foxglove was born; Curling, who worked with Crider while a solicitor for Leigh Day, joined soon after.

If you ask what the Guantanamo detainee has got in common with the Facebook content moderator, on one answer it's not a lot, explains Crider. On another answer it's that theyre at the absolute bottom trying to deal with a giant, impervious system that has decided for its own political imperatives to squash them.

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This charity wants to cure or kill Big Tech - Wired.co.uk

Jamie Irving is Chair and Paul Deegan is President and CEO of News Media Canada.

Canadas news publishers, who employ 3,000 journalists from coast to coast to coast, believe that free speech, journalistic freedom, and a strong, healthy, commercially viable, and fiercely independent media ecosystem are all vital to our democracy.

Canadians rely on their newspapers and news media to be their trusted sources of information, helping them make informed choices and holding people and institutions, including governments and corporations, accountable.

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We hope that parliamentarians will come together and take meaningful action to combat hate speech and other kinds of harmful content online, while ensuring that freedom of expression and free debate are recognized, preserved, and protected.

We are among the countrys leading defenders of freedom of speech. At the same time, as employers, we strive to provide a safe, healthy, and inclusive work environment for our journalists. As businesses who supply news and analysis, we also strive to protect our customers: the public who read our news and engage with us and their fellow readers. We listen to our customers. We take our responsibilities to them and the broader public seriously. We try to build a better common future for all. And we are accountable for both our actions and inaction.

As a business, the news publishing industry remains under threat from unregulated and unchecked social media and online communication service providers. At the same, our journalists and readers face online harm constantly. Ask any journalist, and theyll tell you that criticism comes with the job. And rightly so.

But hate, harassment, and online and physical harm shouldnt. It comes from the right, the left, and everywhere in between, and its victims are all too often women and racialized journalists.

We are united in supporting our journalists and newsrooms against those who seek to silence them and threaten their safety. Together, we will continue to advocate for industry-wide responses to end this behaviour.

Across the globe, journalists face physical, judicial, and online harm. In addition to harassment from individuals, journalists face sophisticated defamation campaigns to discredit them. These threats, and their potential impact on journalistic freedom of expression, have detrimental implications for society at large.

The findings of a survey conducted by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization and the International Center for Journalists about online violence against women journalists are alarming: 73 per cent of women respondents said they had experienced online violence; 20 per cent said they had been attacked or abused offline in incidents seeded online; and 41 per cent said they had been the targets of online attacks that appeared to be linked to orchestrated disinformation campaigns.

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The impact of this violence on mental health is sobering: 38 per cent missed work; 11 per cent quit their jobs; and two per cent abandoned journalism altogether. It also impacts journalistic practices and audience engagement: 30 per cent self-censor on social media; 20 per cent only broadcast and avoid all interaction; and 10 per cent avoid pursuing particular stories.

Like news publishers, online platforms curate content. They reap all the benefits of being a publisher, albeit on much more commercially favourable terms. At present, however, they do not have the same responsibilities and are not held accountable in the many ways that news publishers are in Canada. Indeed, they have allowed fake news and disinformation to proliferate around the globe, and they have profited from it handsomely.

Big Tech has a societal obligation to moderate these activities, just as any news publisher does. In the United States, section 230 of the U.S. Communications Decency Act exempts them from liability over hosting user-generated content and from liability when they choose to remove that content. However, global companies operating in Canada are subject to Canadian law and should conduct themselves accordingly.

As advertisers know, these firms have enormous and extremely sophisticated technical prowess. Why then have they failed in their duty as content moderators and allowed harmful content targeted at journalists to be amplified on their platforms?

As a matter of principle, our journalists should be afforded the same protections in the online world as they are in the offline world. Accordingly, we recommend that the Government of Canada explicitly recognize online threats to journalists directly in legislation.

At the same time, online platforms should act responsibly. First, they should act upon reports of harassment from news publishers and journalists within 24 hours. Second, they should invest in technology to detect online hate against journalists. Third, they should detail online harm against journalists in their transparency reports. Fourth, they should be held accountable through Canadas libel, defamation, and hate laws, just as Canadas news publishers are. Fifth, they should face economic penalties when they fail to comply with Canadian laws. Finally, they should make it hard for internet trolls to profit from the monetization of content that harms journalists.

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As a society, we need to do everything we can to protect democratic expression, but that doesnt mean that we cant protect journalists. All publishers, including internet intermediaries, should be held accountable for harmful content. Canadas publishers stand with our journalists, who wont be silenced, and readers, who want to be informed.

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Government and Big Tech must tackle online harassment against journalists - The Globe and Mail

Sen. Richard Blumenthals (D-CT) mention of a finsta, or fake Instagram account, during a recent Senate hearing on childrens online safety immediately became fodder for discussion across social media. The clip went viral and sparked debate over Blumenthals misunderstanding and Congress ability to understand how tech companies work and how consumers use technology. One thing remains clear: There is a problematic gap between some lawmakers understanding of the tech sector and their relentless desire to regulate it.

Enter Sen. Marsha Blackburns (R-TN) contradictory comment from the same hearing, further highlighting the dangers of lawmakers conflicting and sometimes illogical attitudes toward tech companies often based on an incomplete understanding of how society uses technologies like Instagram or Facebook. Citing a Facebook internal report, Blackburn told a company witness, Facebook knew about content devoted to coercing women into domestic servitude. Yet they chose to do nothing to stop it, until Apple threatened to pull Facebook from the App Store. Blackburn seemingly cheered Apples strict App Store policies that allowed Apple to police Facebook in response to harmful content on the Facebook app, even when the social media company was reluctant to do so itself. Apples ability to control access to its App Store what the aforementioned Facebook report referred to only as Apple escalation prevents malicious or misleading software applications from reaching 1.65 billion active Apple devices. The threat of being removed from the App Store and losing access to Apples global customer base motivates developers to adhere to security and privacy guidelines that protect those customers as Blackburns Facebook example proves.

Blackburn doesnt seem to understand that one of her legislative proposals would ban the exact practice she praised Apple for employing ensuring Facebook cant track iOS users thanks to Apples control over its App Store ecosystem. Along with Blumenthal and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Blackburn is a cosponsor of the Open App Markets Act, which would effectively block platforms like Apple from prohibiting user downloads of unvetted and potentially harmful apps from third-party app stores and web browsers through a process known as sideloading. The law clearly targets Apple and Google but seems to forget Facebook entirely, including that the company owns four of the App Stores top ten apps: Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp. If this law were passed, Facebook would be allowed to bundle its applications for these services and bypass existing security and privacy measures imposed by app-store operators.

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Blackburns cognitive dissonance reflects a dangerous trend of lawmakers saying one thing and doing another when it comes to digital platforms. This year, the Senate passed the United States Innovation and Competition Act, a $110 billion investment in technology research. Its disconcerting to see the Senate pass legislation to boost Americas technology industry with funding toward research and development, then come forward with a handful of proposals that would devastate American tech companies in the name of competition. The Open App Markets Act and the House Judiciary Committees antitrust legislative package specifically target Apple, Amazon, Facebook, and Google companies that have made the United States the world leader in digital innovation.

Data collection is the real issue driving the concerns of many in Congress. If Congress wants to help consumers have a more secure digital experience, they should focus on passing a federal privacy law. Having a clear set of guidelines around how companies collect, maintain, share, and dispose of consumer data would be the best guidance Congress could give tech companies to help consumers. By confusing consumer safety with competition, Congress is going down an inconsistent legislative path that limits American technological innovation but does not promote policies that could help consumers make more informed choices.

Currently, American consumers are living under European regulations by default, due to our lack of comprehensive federal privacy laws. Europes General Data Protection Regulation has taken a commanding lead in dictating how global companies manage their data flows or face major financial consequences. Americas lead in the global technology race is ultimately threatened by its own lack of a national privacy law that encompasses data-collection transparency and clear cybersecurity standards. How US-based companies have changed their data-collection processes to appease European regulators is a fact we must consider as Europes regulations shape how the rest of the world uses the internet for both commerce and communications.

Lawmakers should focus on giving consumers much-deserved clarity and security around the collection of their data. Measures that enable better data protection would be the best regulatory guidance Congress could provide. Contradictory legislative proposals, however, wont help protect American consumers or give American companies guidance on how to conduct and secure information flow a core driver of technological innovation.

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Original Location: The dangers of lawmakers contradiction and confusion on Big Tech

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The dangers of lawmakers contradiction and confusion on Big Tech - Yahoo News

Few could have predicted a pandemic that had long-promised one of the worst economic recessions in modern memory would instead lead to waves of workers leaving their jobs voluntarily en masse.

Dubbed by some as the "Great Resignation", staffers have been intensely re-evaluating their working lives in record numbers. In the US around 242,000 people quit in August, bringing the total up to 4.3 million for the year, according to figures from the Labor Department.

Tech companies are far from immune from the phenomenon as workers go in search of more flexibility, a dedication to remote work, and more dynamic and challenging jobs.

For some, startups plush with VC cash and offering the prospect of listed shares have proven alluring enough to get them to give up their corporate tech jobs.

Insider spoke with seven people who made the switch from Big Tech to either join or launch a startup. Each offered insights into what it's like to join a startup, and what you should consider before making the move.

The speed and the pace of change in startups compared with large corporations was widely cited.

Colm O'Cuinneainworked at LinkedIn and Oracle before joining recruiting software company Greenhouse Software as general manager of EMEA.

"You have to build your agility," he told Insider, noting that larger companies may be more restricted.

Eshchar Ben-Shitrit, CEO and cofounder of food technology company Redefine Meat, experienced this first hand. Defined processes and long-term strategies help order and clarity, he said, but it can make large businesses slow and unaccommodating to change.

"In the first month of working in a small company, I saw projects begin, end, change, and get cancelled so quickly I felt that I gained more experience in that year, when compared to a year in a large company," he added.

Madhu Sridharan, VP of product management at alternative protein company Eat Just known for its plant-based egg had reservations about this at first.

"Decisions are made very quickly and things are able to move forward," she said. "Initially, I was worried that there wasn't enough thought given to something, or someone would not be aligned but with swift decisions, we're able to move projects along faster and work more efficiently."

Not only does the pace undergo substantial change, so too does the weight of day-to-day decisions. Vivek Sharma, who heads up Eat Just's process development, said that critical decisions were needed on a "weekly basis".

"Teams are looking at you to make the calls in a timely manner," the former DuPont Nutrition scientist said. "It is intense but I love every minute of it."

Ann-Marie Smith, head of people at payroll operations provider Payslip, has 15 years of experience within HR and recruiting, including at telecommunications and insurance companies.

Despite having to focus on current needs and provide recommendations quickly, she said there were additional chances to be creative and have meaningful input at a startup.

"Where else can an intern ask a CEO a question about their work?" Payslip's Smith said about startups. "It's a fantastic opportunity for those starting out in their careers to have immediate access and openness to all levels of management."

Workplace relationships and culture also benefits from this. "I'd have to say the energy, the freedom and the freshness was exhilarating," she added. "The lack of corporate politics meant we could really gel as a team and pursue our shared goals."

Eat Just's Sridharan reiterated both points. "I was shocked by how willing the team was to test out new ideas, validate them and scale up at fast pace," she said. "This felt new, exciting, and impactful."

Ben-Shitrit, the Redefine Meat cofounder, acknowledged that the "comfort, status, and ability to see a future laid out for you" at a large corporation makes it hard to leave.

"However, the thrill, excitement, stress, and opportunity of a small company is something one must experience," he said. "Waiting too long in a big company means you lose the opportunity to learn the true nature of yourself and your ability."

The boss urges anyone thinking of making the move to assume the large company will always be there, and will rehire an employee after they gain "the equivalent of a decade of work experience" in three to four years at a startup.

Jos Martn Quesada, who moved from Google and McKinsey before founding fitness startup Krew, told Insider roles are shaped by the person in them.

"Working on customer success? You can learn how to build a product by advocating for your customers' feedback and seeing it turned into features," he said. "Working in product development? You can move from opinion to fact by learning some data analysis to make sense of the flurry of usage data."

While an "ambitious" person has freedom and room to grow,the flip side of the coin is that must be ready to deal with uncertainty, Quesada added.

That experience will be across a range of roles not just what someone was hired for.

"In a startup environment, it's often all hands on deck, and sometimes you need to pitch in where you can be most useful, even if it's outside of your expertise," Madhu said.

Smith agreed and added that people in the industry must move as fast as it does.

"Be prepared to be involved in absolutely everything," she said. "You must maintain your priorities and avoid becoming fixated on any one task. Although things change and adapt so quickly, just go with the flow and pace of those around you."

No matter the role, an employee's level of input is likely to be significant compared with a larger company, according to O'Cuinneain. "You know, you've the opportunities to provide ideas and strategy and critical customer success at every level," he said. "For somebody new, you know, coming out of college, that's a massive opportunity just to be able to build that breadth and skill set."

Many startups won't have polished processes or "plug and play" workflow.

Sridharan, who previously worked at Mattel and IBM, is "constantly challenged" to be creative and solutions-orientated in her current role. "I wish I'd implemented this entrepreneurial thinking and problem solving from dayone at Eat Just, instead of seeking out existing processes or systems that may not always be the most efficientprocedure," she said.

Some people may be held back by confidence.

"You need to be braver in a smaller organization to be more vocal in your opinions," O'Cuinneain said. "In large organizations, often you're doing what you're told versus coming up with the answer. In a startup, the opportunity is is massive and really is about being brave and which bets you're going to place."

Startups are "more centered on survival than the normal way of doing business," according to Ben-Shitrit, who added that teams are expected to do more with less.

"Understanding that success is the only option, and that lack of experience, resources and even people isn't a reason," he said. "However, once you get used to it, it becomes a sort of superpower."

Sharma described being part of a startup as being "a member of a Formula 1 pit crew" not a small cog in a big machine. "When the team is small, your contribution to the company's success is evident and easily measured," he said. "Early on, it had dawned on me how impactful my work was going to be, and I was ready to contribute."

Startups may look exciting, have good PR and great career prospects, but they are inherently risky and many fail.

Holly Stephens moved from Google to a number of smaller startups before founding transcription startup Subly. She advises anyone to "take the emotion away from the opportunity" and to ask the right questions to recruiters or founders.

Before joining a startup, Stephens said a candidate should ask how it makes money, what its revenue projections are, how much investment or grants it has received, and what its runway and growth plans are like.

"Don't be afraid to meet the team as part of your interview process and decision," she added.

"Make sure that the risk you are taking with joining a startup will help you achieve your goals such as; career growth, learning or knowledge building."

O'Cuinneain recommended asking for data, financial performance, and exploring the product-market fit to get a sense of the business' future. When joining Greenhouse Software, O'Cuinneain looked at who the company was working with and researched individuals, such as the founders.

"I listened to what they where saying, whether it's podcasts in the media and interviews," he said. "I looked at what people were saying about them on social media, what customers were saying about them, what potential candidates and former employees were saying about them on Glassdoor."

O'Cuinneain described joining a startup as a "leap of faith" where you end up putting a "lot of trust in the individuals with whom you work with."

Original post:

Leaving Big Tech for a Startup? These 7 Staffers Have Done Just That. - Business Insider

There is also a desire to improve diversity, he said, by establishing a presence in cities, like Atlanta, Miami and Washington, that have large populations of Black and Hispanic people, who are underrepresented in technology. For example, Chicago had few tech jobs, and college students who wanted to work in the industry had to move to other cities after graduation, Mr. Yasukochi said. But that is changing; Google, Facebook and Amazon now have offices there.

Tech companies are going to where the talent is, rather than making people move to a handful of cities, said Dianne Crocker, the principal analyst of LightBox, which provides data and software for the real estate industry.

Still, the Seattle area, home to Amazon, Expedia, Microsoft and Zillow, has been the biggest beneficiary. Most of the areas new leases are in the nearby cities of Redmond, Kirkland and Bellevue, just east of Seattle across Lake Washington.

Downtown Seattle is closer to capacity build-out, said Mr. Yasukochi, but the so-called Eastside has room for companies to expand. Some businesses are creating mini-campuses, and others are flocking to new developments like Bellevues Spring District.

Oct. 13, 2021, 3:44 p.m. ET

Microsoft is adding 17 buildings and 8,000 employees to its headquarters in Redmond, about 15 miles northeast of Seattle. Amazon is planning to add 25,000 workers in Bellevue.

The growth also stems from emerging technology sectors like the commercial space industry, which has boomed thanks to an increase in the production and launch of satellites for communication and observation by companies like Elon Musks SpaceX and successful spaceflights by Jeff Bezos Blue Origin. About 40 space-related businesses such as satellite manufacturers employ more than 6,000 people in the Seattle area; in August, they listed more than 1,000 open jobs, said Stan Shull, managing director of Alliance Velocity, an aerospace advisory firm.

Theres a real space cluster of big companies, start-ups and venture capitalists growing here, he said.

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As Big Tech Grows in the Pandemic, Seattle Grows With It - The New York Times