Techmeme
November 2, 2019, 6:05 AM

Top News

Lauren Feiner / CNBC:
Google to acquire Fitbit at $7.35 per share in cash, valuing the company at about $2.1B  —  - The acquisition pits Alphabet against fellow tech giant Apple in the wearable fitness tracking space.  —  Google CEO Sundar Pichai speaks on stage during the annual Google I/O developers conference in Mountain View, California, May 8, 2018.
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David Ruddock / Android Police:
Google's Fitbit acquisition feels like a top-down decision of executives who found enough yes men to agree to the delusion that Fitbit can revive Wear OS  —  Google announced today that it would purchase Fitbit, the ailing manufacturer of fitness-focused wearables and smartwatches, for $2.1 billion.
Alex Heath / The Information:
Source: Facebook held talks to acquire Fitbit but wanted to pay roughly half of the $2.1B that Google eventually agreed to pay  —  Before Google reached a $2.1 billion deal to buy Fitbit, announced on Friday, Facebook held talks to acquire the smartwatch maker, according to two people familiar with the situation.
Swati Khandelwal / The Hacker News:
Google releases patch for a Chrome zero-day vulnerability being used in the wild that allows hackers to escape sandbox protections via malicious websites  —  Attention readers, if you are using Chrome on your Windows, Mac, and Linux computers, you need to update your web browsing software immediately …
Reuters:
Sources: CFIUS has launched a review of ByteDance's 2017 acquisition of Musical.ly, as TikTok didn't seek clearance from CFIUS during the acquisition  —  NEW YORK/BEIJING/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. government has launched a national security review of TikTok owner Beijing ByteDance …
Kyle Orland / Ars Technica:
Elizabeth Schulze / CNBC:
Russia's “sovereign internet” law, which aims to enable disconnecting the country's internet from the rest of the world, went into effect on Friday  —  - The law tightens Moscow's control over the country's internet infrastructure and aims to provide a way for Russia to disconnect its networks from the rest of the world.
Julia Carrie Wong / The Guardian:
The debate over Facebook's political ads policy has been too US-centric and the company hasn't explained how that policy will work in other countries  —  When Facebook wrote to Joe Biden's campaign to say it would not back down from its decision to exempt politicians from its ban …
Monica Nickelsburg / GeekWire:
Satya Nadella says Microsoft won Pentagon's JEDI contract by focusing on customer's needs and company's unique tech capabilities, and staying out of politics  —  Microsoft's surprise victory last week in a protracted competition to build the Pentagon's war cloud has some critics asking whether politics played any role in the outcome.

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