After years of moving fast and breaking things, governments around the world are waking up to the dangers of uncontrolled tech platforms and starting to think of ways to rein in those platforms. Sometimes, that means data privacy measures like the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) or more recent measures passed in the wake of Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica scandal. On the smaller side, it takes the form of specific ad restrictions, transparency measures, or anti-tracking protocols. With such a broad problem, nearly any solution is on the table. It’s still too early to say whether those measures will be focused on Facebook, Google, or the tech industry at large. At the same time, conservative lawmakers are eager to use accusations of bias as a way to influence moderation policy, making the specter of strong regulation all the more controversial. Whatever next steps Congress and the courts decide to take, you can track the latest updates here.
As Brendan Carr heads to Capitol Hill, newly released documents still don’t say much about what DOGE did at the FCC.
Europe wants to tax the flood of cheap packages from Chinese retailers like Shein and Temu, just like Trump did. From next July, a €3 charge will apply per item type to parcels below €150, a temporary fix while the bloc works on removing the exemption altogether.
Back in the mists of time, in ancient 2009, the European Union fined Intel €1.06 billion ($1.2 billion) for anticompetitive behaviors. The two have been in court ever since, and after Intel got the fine cut to €376 million, it’s now dropped again to €237.1 million ($275 million). How low can it go?
As Ted Sarandos and David Ellison play out a public spat over whose turn it is to play with Warner Bros., while trying to impress Trump and the regulators along the way, just remember that the real winners at the end will be HBO Max subscribers.
sam flynn:
It’s really fun how we all get to sit around and watch these idiots toss gold bars back and forth across Trump’s desk while waiting to see if an HBO Max subscription will be $80 or $100 a month this time next year.
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As Russia bans Roblox for spreading “LGBT propaganda” — now along with Snapchat and FaceTime too — it leaves homophobes with yet another thing to avoid, just in case.
sam flynn:
Fellas is it gay to play Roblox?
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UK regulator Ofcom announced it’s fined a porn provider £1 million (around $1.3 million) under the Online Safety Act because while it has age verification measures, they aren’t “highly effective.” That’s just a little more bite than the £20,000 ($27,000) fine it handed 4Chan earlier in the year.
President Trump is expected to announce a major rollback of Biden-era standards on Wednesday for 2022-2031 model-year vehicles, Reuters reports. Since stepping into office, his administration has worked to dismantle efficiency regulations meant to cut down pollution and save consumers money.
Is the promise of jobs worth all the water and chemicals it takes to manufacture chips in the Arizona desert?
After being fined $3.5 billion by the EU for ad tech abuse, the search giant is, begrudgingly, proposing changes:
For example, we are giving publishers the option to set different minimum prices for different bidders when using Google Ad Manager [... and] increasing the interoperability of our tools to give publishers and advertisers more choice and flexibility.
New industry-backed research shows how waste from deep-sea mining could have far-reaching effects on fish and their food.
“All these nuke bros who know nothing about operating a reactor, they just want a free pass,” Allison Macfarlane, former chairman of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, tells Bloomberg. “They can have their free pass, but then they will have an accident.”
Italian regulators announced an age verification system that will be rolled out on November 12th to prevent minors from accessing around 50 websites that host pornographic content. The UK and France introduced similar rules this year, both resulting in a significant spike in VPN downloads.
In the memo, Gates tries to make the case that there’s too much focus on cutting greenhouse gas emissions and not enough on public health and poverty. It’s a narrative that lets polluters off the hook and plays into Trump’s efforts to rollback environmental protections and spread disinformation about climate change.
Coal-fired power plants pumped out as much as 20 percent more particle pollution during the last federal government shutdown in 2018 and 2019 as the US Environmental Protection Agency froze inspections.
The current shutdown has lasted nearly a month now, inching closer to the 2018-2019 record for the longest in history.
After a ten-month investigation, the Competition and Markets Authority has designated Apple and Google’s mobile platforms with “strategic market status,” describing them as having “substantial, entrenched market power.” The companies now face extra anti-competition regulations in the UK, following a similar ruling for Google Search.
Luckily Brendan Carr is looking out for them, trying to waive onerous requirements like “telling customers what fees they’ll be paying” so that these plucky upstarts can soldier on.
desertsessions:
These poor burdened ISPs. Won’t someone think of the ISPs.
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With the government still shut down, the Trump administration announced more layoffs across the already decimated federal workforce. That includes EPA employees who worked on battery recycling and safety, plastics reduction, recycling and composting programs, and collecting solid waste data, according to the EPA union.
It only took nine months, but the Competition and Markets Authority has designated Google Search with “strategic market status,” meaning it’s eligible for extra UK regulation. AI Mode has been factored in, but not AI assistants like Gemini. Similar decisions on Android and iOS are due this month.
The Environmental Protection Agency wants to stop collecting data on greenhouse gas emissions from power plants and other polluting sites. The proposed rule change comes as the Trump administration attempts to get rid of the agency’s ability to regulate planet-heating pollution at all.
[The New York Times]
“They’re doing away with science,” Christine Todd Whitman, former Environmental Protection Agency administrator and former Republican governor of New Jersey, tells Bloomberg. That only makes it harder to prepare for the consequences of a warming world, from eroding coastlines to more devastating wildfires across the US.
