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Techmeme
December 20, 2019, 10:25 AM

Top News

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Sources: Apple has a secret team of ~12 engineers working on satellites and related wireless tech to beam data directly to its devices  —  Apple Inc. has a secret team working on satellites and related wireless technology, striving to find new ways to beam data such as internet connectivity directly …
Kim Lyons / The Verge:
Convenience store chain Wawa discloses a data breach across its 700 stores over the past nine months that may have exposed customer and credit card details  —  The breach may have affected all 700 stores over the past nine months.  —  If you used your credit card or debit card to buy gas …
Fortune:
Ripple raises $200M Series C led by global investment firm Tetragon at a $10B valuation  —  Ripple, a San Francisco-based company that uses cryptocurrency to move money across borders, announced a massive funding round on Thursday that values the company at $10 billion.
Drew Harwell / Washington Post:
Study of 189 facial recognition algorithms shows they misidentify people of color more often than white people, confirming facial recognition tech's racial bias  —  Facial-recognition systems misidentified people of color more often than white people, a landmark federal study released Thursday shows …
Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet:
Apple opens its bug bounty program to security researchers, publishes eligibility criteria, bounty categories, and report and payout guidelines  —  Apple opens its previously-closed bug bounty program to all security researchers.  —  Apple has formally opened its bug bounty program today …
Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
Report: Facebook has tasked a co-author of Windows NT with building an OS from scratch, in order to stop relying on Android for products like Oculus and Portal  —  Facebook doesn't want its hardware like Oculus and Portal to be at the mercy of Google because they rely on its Android operating system.
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Google acquires Montreal-based game development house Typhoon Studios as part of its plan to create exclusive content for Stadia  —  Google's Stadia cloud gaming division has acquired Typhoon Studio, a Montreal-based triple-A game development house.  —  The move is part of Stadia's plan …
Jay Peters / The Verge:
OnePlus unveils a bug bounty program with rewards from $50-$7,000 open to any security expert and a bug bounty partnership with HackerOne for select researchers  —  You can earn up to $7,000 for submitting a bug  —  OnePlus announced its second data breach in two years back in November …
Makena Kelly / The Verge:
Congress passes the TRACED Act, enabling fines of up to $10K per robocall and requiring carriers to deploy STIR/SHAKEN protocol to identify spoofed numbers  —  A holiday gift for anyone with a phone  —  After months of negotiations, Congress approved a landmark bill on Thursday to stop the flood of illegal robocalls.
Elly Cosgrove / CNBC:
IAC to buy online caregiver marketplace Care.com in a deal valued at nearly $500M; Care.com stock is up 13+%  —  - IAC's deal to buy Care.com comes one day after it detailed plans to spin off all of its shares of online dating company Match Group.  — Care.com soars more than 13% on the news …
More: Axios
Taylor Soper / GeekWire:
F5 Networks says it will acquire AI-powered fraud prevention platform Shape Security for around $1B in cash  —  F5 Networks will pay approximately $1 billion to acquire Shape Security, a Santa Clara, Calif.-based company that sells a fraud prevention platform to banks, airlines, retailers, government agencies, and more.
Andrew O'Hara / AppleInsider:
Apple open sources parts of its HomeKit Accessory Development Kit allowing anyone to prototype HomeKit devices  —  Apple has published an open-source version of its HomeKit Accessory Development Kit, allowing more users to experiment with the development of HomeKit accessories.

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Earlier Picks

Kim Lyons / The Verge:
Katie Paul / Reuters:
Tony Romm / Washington Post:
Todd Spangler / Variety:
New York Times: