Techmeme
December 15, 2023, 7:00 PM

Top News

David Gilbert / Wired:
Researchers: Microsoft Copilot answers some political queries in the US and other countries with conspiracies, misinformation, and out-of-date or incorrect info  —  Research shared exclusively with WIRED shows that Copilot, Microsoft's AI chatbot, often responds to questions about elections with lies and conspiracy theories.
Joseph Cox / 404 Media:
Cox Media Group claims it can listen to consumers' conversations through microphones in smartphones, smart TVs, and other devices and use the data to target ads  —  A marketing team within media giant Cox Media Group (CMG) claims it has the capability to listen to ambient conversations …
Forbes:
Google says it will no longer respond to geofence warrants after making changes to how Google Maps stores and accesses users' opt-in Location History  —  “Geofence warrants,” which allow law enforcement to get location data across a wide area, have become commonplace in recent years.
Financial Times:
Alex Heath / The Verge:
Docs: ByteDance used OpenAI's API to develop its own LLM, codenamed Project Seed; employees discussed “whitewashing” the evidence through “data desensitization”  —  TikTok's entrancing “For You” feed made its parent company, ByteDance, an AI leader on the world stage.
Stacy Elliott / Decrypt:
Crypto wallet maker Ledger updates Connect Kit to remove some malicious code, live for five hours, after a former employee “fell victim to a phishing attack”  —  Crypto wallet manufacturer Ledger has confirmed an exploit that led it to warn users to “stop using dapps” …
Ash Parrish / The Verge:
Glenn Fleishman / Retool:
A look back at Yahoo Pipes, which from 2007 to 2015 let users drag and drop elements in a browser to make data feeds, influencing a generation of UI designers  —  Want to know whether the latest logged earthquakes were near you?  Aggregate 100 top news sites, but only see items that mention cats?
Jesse Hamilton / CoinDesk:
The US SEC rejects Coinbase's petition for formal digital asset rules, because the “existing securities regime appropriately governs crypto asset securities”  —  The U.S. exchange had formally petitioned the agency to start writing comprehensive crypto rules, but after “careful” consideration, the SEC said no.
Jordan Pearson / VICE:
Some X users report seeing ads for apps that use AI to “undress” women in photos; TikTok and Meta have started to block search terms related to “nudify” apps  —  A week after TikTok and Meta blocked certain search terms related to so-called “nudify” apps, X has not taken the same measures, Motherboard found.
Nicholas Sutrich / Android Central:
Microsoft launches its basic Office suite on the Meta Quest store for free, letting all Quests run Word, Excel, and PowerPoint in a mixed reality environment  —  Now you can tweak spreadsheets while playing Xbox, all in VR.  —  What you need to know  — Meta Quest users can now use Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint in VR.

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Earlier Picks

Taylor Lorenz / Washington Post:
Will Knight / Wired:
Rohan Goswami / CNBC:
Will Douglas Heaven / MIT Technology Review:
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Aria Alamalhodaei / TechCrunch:
Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch: