Techmeme
December 15, 2020, 7:35 PM

Top News

Mary Jo Foley / ZDNet:
Microsoft is rolling out native M1 support for many Microsoft 365 for Mac apps, iCloud account integration in Outlook, and updated collaboration capabilities  —  Microsoft's new ‘Universal’ Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote apps for Mac will work on both Apple's M1 Arm silicon and Intel processors.
Periscope:
Twitter says it will discontinue Periscope as a separate mobile app by March 2021, saying it's brought most of the core capabilities of Periscope into Twitter  —  Today, we're sharing that we have made the difficult decision to discontinue Periscope as a separate mobile app by March 2021.
Sam Schechner / Wall Street Journal:
EU proposes two bills governing tech giants, focused on illegal content and anticompetitive behavior, to empower regulators to levy large fines or break them up  —  Proposed bills would be the bloc's most ambitious internet laws since GDPR  —  European officials want new powers …
Nikkei Asia:
Sources: Apple plans to produce up to 96M iPhones for H1 2021, a nearly 30% YoY increase, and is also working on a new Apple TV for next year  —  Robust orders come as smartphone industry faces severe parts shortages  —  TAIPEI — Apple plans to produce up to 96 million iPhones for the first half of 2021 …
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Neverware, which helps schools and enterprises resurrect old PCs with its Chromium-based CloudReady OS, gets acquired by Google, which invested in its Series B  —  Neverware lets you turn old PCs and Macs into Chromebook-esque devices through its CloudReady OS.
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Google Photos expands Memories, adding new collage designs and 3D Cinematic photos that simulate depth in a scene by adding a smooth panning effect  —  Google Photos is rolling out a series of updates to its Memories feature, which surfaces your best photos from years past.
Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet:
Sources: Microsoft and industry partners seize key command and control domain used in SolarWinds hack  —  By seizing the domain, Microsoft and its partners hope to identify all victims, but are also preventing attackers from escalating intrusions in currently infected networks.
The Verge:
Google has restored service after a significant number of Gmail users saw “error messages, high latency, and/or other unexpected behavior” for a few hours  —  Stadia was experiencing issues, too  —  Google says that a “significant subset” of Gmail users ran into errors with the service Tuesday afternoon.
Craig Timberg / Washington Post:
Facebook says people linked to France's military used fake accounts to meddle in African politics, tangling with similar efforts by Russia's IRA in some nations  —  It's the first time Facebook has identified people affiliated with a Western government for sanction
Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
AWS launches CloudShell, a fully featured web-based shell, based on Amazon Linux 2, for command-line access to AWS  —  AWS today launched CloudShell, a new, fully featured web-based shell environment, based on Amazon Linux 2, for developers who want to be able to use some of their favorite command-line tools …
Dan Goodin / Ars Technica:
Volexity researchers say they noticed SolarWinds hackers bypass MFA protections at a think tank previously but were subsequently undetected for several years  —  Hackers who hit SolarWinds compromised a think tank three separate times.  —  The hackers behind the supply chain attack …
Reuters:
Sara Fischer / Axios:
Facebook will allow ads targeting Georgia voters about the Jan. 5 runoffs, starting at 9am PT on Dec. 16, even as its broader political ad ban remains  —  Facebook said Tuesday it will begin letting advertisers run ads targeting Georgia voters about the state's Jan. 5 runoff elections …
Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch:
Ireland's Data Protection Commission fines Twitter €450K for failing to promptly declare and document a data breach, in the DPC's 1st cross-border GDPR decision  —  Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) has issued Twitter with a fine of €450,000 (~$547k) for failing …
Bloomberg:
Twitter says it has signed a multiyear deal to use AWS to power Twitter timelines, shifting away from its own infrastructure  —  - Deal may help speed service in certain parts of the world  — Twitter also relies on its own data centers and Google's cloud
Theodore Schleifer / Vox:
Alloy, a Reid Hoffman-backed political data startup for Democrats, imploded after four senior employees, who had all complained about a colleague, were fired  —  Alloy was once seen as Democrats' next great hope.  But chaos awaited.  —  Just two weeks after Election Day …
Financial Times:
Jason Nelson / Decrypt:
Pornhub appears to be only accepting cryptocurrency for its premium service after Visa and Mastercard cut off payments to the website last week  —  It appears that Pornhub, the world's largest adult website, is only accepting crypto for its premium service.
Taylor Lorenz / New York Times:
Celebrity blogger Perez Hilton says TikTok banned him without warning, thinks it was after pressure from TikTok stars, with whom he's feuded; TikTok denies this  —  The celebrity blogger was banned from TikTok on Saturday in a move he said was influenced by the app's biggest stars.

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Daisuke Wakabayashi / New York Times:
Wall Street Journal: