social media news

On Wednesday, the UK’s Home Secretary Suella Braverman unveiled a new campaign against Meta, urging the tech giant to rethink its plan to roll out end-to-end encryption (E2EE) on Facebook Messenger and Instagram. The company aims to finalise the encryption rollout later this year, but the British government is worried that the move will hinder the detection of child sexual abuse. According to the Home Office, 800 predators are currently arrested per month and up to 1,200 children are prot

Apple is having a rough time of it in France as of late. As if mandated updates to the iPhone 12 due to radiation concerns weren’t enough, Apple customers in the country may now struggle to get their mitts on the latest model when it’s released.  French Apple store workers have voted to strike at the end of the week — coinciding with the launch of the iPhone 15. Apple unions including CGT, Unsa, CFDT and Cidre-CFTC, are asking for better pay and working conditions, or the

The computer systems of the International Criminal Court (ICC), the world’s most high-profile war tribunal, were hacked last week, according to a statement released by the court yesterday. The tribunal said that its services detected “anomalous activity” affecting its information systems and that “immediate measures” were adopted to respond to this cybersecurity incident and to mitigate its impact.  The ICC, headquartered in The Hague, Netherlands, is the only

3D printing, also known as additive manufacturing, has seen exponential growth over the past decade, analysis by the European Patent Office (EPO) reveals. In its latest study, the EPO found that international patent families (IPFs) in 3D printing tech increased at an average rate of 26.3% each year between 2013 and 2020. Notably, this growth rate is nearly eight times faster than the average of all other technology sectors combined (3.3%). According to the findings, Europe and the US are leadin

Google DeepMind has unveiled its novel AI tool that can predict whether DNA mutations are likely to cause genetic diseases. The ambition is that it will  facilitate faster diagnosis and development of life-saving treatments. The new AI model, called AlphaMissense, makes predictions about missense mutations, which occur when a single letter is substituted in the DNA code. The letters correspond to four nucleotides: adenine (A), cytosine (C), guanine (G), and thymine (T). This results in a d

Berlin’s corporate carbon accounting platform Plan A has just received a fresh boost of capita in the form of $27mn from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Visa, and others. The ESG reporting SaaS startup will use the money to double its headcount to 240+ employees and expand market presence across Europe, particularly in Scandinavia, France, and the UK.  Greentech software provider Plan A was founded in 2017 by Lubomila Jordanova and Nathan Bonnisseau. Its platform offers companies &mdash

Munich-based autonomous trucking startup Fernride has closed a further $19mn in its Series A funding round, neatly pushing the total amount raised in the round to $50mn.  Founded in 2019, Fernride has developed autonomous vehicle software that converts trucks into self-driving machines. These haulers operate at Level 4 autonomy which means the vehicle can drive itself within a specific area — albeit with a bit of supervision from a remote driver.    There is a current

Britain’s controversial Online Safety Bill will soon become law after passing through parliament on Tuesday. The sweeping legislation places strict news content moderation rules on social media companies. Platforms will become legally responsible for the material they host. Under the new rules, platforms will have to quickly remove any illegal content — or stop it from appearing in the first place. They also must prevent children from accessing harmful and age-inappropriate content,

French car battery startup Verkor has secured €2bn to build its first manufacturing plant in France, at a time when Chinese competitors are rapidly gaining market share in Europe.   The funding round includes €650mn in French subsidies, a sizeable level of state support indicative of the government’s commitment to boosting local production of lithium-ion batteries — the beating hearts of electric cars.   Construction of the mega-factory will kick off ne

French car battery startup Verkor has secured €2bn to build its first manufacturing plant in France, at a time when Chinese competitors are rapidly gaining market share in Europe.   The funding round includes €650mn in French subsidies, a sizeable level of state support indicative of the government’s commitment to boosting local production of lithium-ion batteries — the beating hearts of electric cars.   Construction of the mega-factory will kick off ne

The fight against “fake news” appears to have overwhelming support in the EU. According to a new study, 85% of the bloc’s citizens want policymakers to take more action against disinformation, while 89% want increased efforts from platform operators. Just 7% do not feel that stronger responses are required. The findings emerged from surveys by Bertelsmann Stiftung, a pro-business German think tank with close ties to the EU. Across the EU, 54% of respondents said they were &ldq

When it comes to saving the world — or, let’s face it, civilisation, the planet will recover — there is no silver bullet. Rather, it is going to take a holistic approach of caring for the Earth and each other.  A technological revolution got us into this pickle. Ironically, technology might just be the Hail Mary that will pull us, if not entirely out of it, then at least away from the brink of total disaster. But in order for that to happen, it is us humans who need to se

Britain has expanded its principles-based approach to AI regulation, which aims to create a pro-innovation edge over the EU. In an announcement yesterday, the UK government unveiled seven new principles for so-called foundation models (FMs), which underpin applications such as ChatGPT, Google’s Bard, and Midjourney. Trained on immense datasets and adaptable to various applications, these systems are at the epicentre of the AI boom. Their power has also sparked alarm. Critics warn that FMs

Dutch packaging and materials manufacturer Avery Dennison has opened what it claims to be Europe’s largest concentrated solar thermal platform and storage unit at its factory in Turnhout, Belgium.   The new thermal solar energy plant comprises 2,240 surface mirrors, with a peak energy yield of 2.7GWh thermal power. It also contains six thermal modules that store energy for when the sun isn’t shining.   Concentrated thermal solar power harnesses sunlight by using

“Should I bother going for this job at all? I’ve never managed anyone.” Clients regularly ask this and my answer tends to be, “Yes, of course you should.” A quick glance at a job spec will tell you why. You may not have headed up a team of software engineers but you have most likely done something along the way that proves you could. Good managers are, first and foremost, good communicators. They manage the performance of each team member—whether that’s

ZeroAvia, one of the leading zero-emission aviation companies in the world, just announced its largest financing round to date. The funding round was co-led by Airbus, Barclays Sustainable Impact Capital, and NEOM. Other participants included Bill Gates’ Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Alaska Airlines, and the Amazon Climate Pledge Fund. No exact funding amount has been disclosed due to legal reasons, but a spokesperson for the startup confirmed to TNW that it is ZeroAvia’s largest to

Europe’s dawdling on the Ariane 6 is becoming increasingly costly as the new era of space race exploration — and exploitation — heats up. The Exploration Company, based in Bordeaux and Munich, has just signed an agreement with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), in service of its aim of making it to the Moon by 2028.  The startup will partner with ISRO’s commercial arm, New Space India Limited (NSIL), for launch services using ISRO’s medium-lif

European startups got just $1bn of the €22bn that VCs have invested in generative AI since 2019, according to data from Dealroom. Unsurprisingly, American companies attracted the bulk of the money. A whopping $20bn — 89% of the global total — went to US startups. Their Asian counterparts raised only $790mn, while the rest of the world combined bagged just $454mn. Dealroom’s data collection ended on July 10, 2023. US startups have raised 89% of globally GenAI investment &#

Two spacecraft have taken a giant leap towards revealing why the Sun’s atmosphere is so damn not. The collaboration between NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) explored an enduring mystery. In theory, the sun’s atmosphere — the corona — should be cooler than its surface. This is because the Sun’s energy comes from the nuclear furnace in its core. As the corona is further away from this heat source, logic should dictate that it’s cooler. In reality,