Report from New York Times In Brief – A large coalition of French retailers and brand owners has filed a class action lawsuit against Chinese ecommerce platform Shein, accusing the company of engaging in systematic unfair competition. The plaintiffs are seeking up to...
Twitch Added to Australia’s New Social Media Age Threshold Regime
Report from New York Times In Brief – Twitch, a live-streaming platform that emerged primarily with video-game related content but now features a wide range of material, has been added to the list of digital platforms that must implement age verification and block...
Amazon Settles Gig Delivery Labor Investigation in Italy
Report from Reuters In Brief – Amazon’s Italian logistics business unit has resolved a major investigation brought by the Milan public prosecutor’s office into alleged tax evasion and unlawful labor practices by paying roughly €180 million ($210 million) to Italy’s...
Google Testing Paid Media Relationships Related to AI Answers
Report from TechCrunch In Brief – Google has announced a pilot program with news publishers to test AI-powered article overviews as part of the Google News pages. Participating outlets, including The Guardian, Der Spiegel, El País, and the Washington Post, will work...
India Withdraws Mandate for Smartphones to Include State Security App
Report from Guardian In Brief – India’s government has withdrawn a controversial directive requiring all smartphone manufacturers to pre-install the state-run Sanchar Saathi security app after intense public and political backlash. The Department of Telecommunications...
EU Parliament Backs Social Media and Chatbot Age Threshold of 16 Years
Report from Reuters In Brief – The European Parliament adopted a non-binding resolution calling for a harmonized minimum age of 16 across the EU for access to social media platforms, video-sharing sites, and AI-driven tools such as chatbots. EU member states currently...
Macron and Mertz Lead EU Digital Sovereignty Summit
Report from Courthouse News In Brief – German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and French President Emmanuel Macron headlined the Summit on European Digital Sovereignty in Berlin, signaling the commitment of the two largest EU member states to advance European digital and AI...
Spanish Court Orders Meta to Pay $550 million to Media Companies
Report from Courthouse News In Brief – A Spanish commercial court has ordered Meta to pay €479 million in damages to 87 Spanish media outlets for gaining an unlawful competitive advantage in advertising on its top platforms. The ruling follows a lawsuit brought in...
Japanese Court Orders Cloudflare to Pay $3m for Aiding Manga Piracy Site
Report from Torrent Freak In Brief – Cloudflare, a leading US-based online security service and content delivery network (CDN) provider, has been held legally liable in Japan for copyright infringement carried out by anonymous users of its platform. The ruling by...
RealPage Settles with the DOJ in Algorithmic Pricing Lawsuit
Report from the Wall Street Journal In Brief – The Justice Department (DOJ) announced that it will settle its antitrust lawsuit against RealPage, an apartment-pricing software provider accused of enabling landlords to coordinate rent increases. The case, filed in...
EU Businesses Warn Brussels of Risks of Digital Sovereignty Mandates
Report from the Financial Times In Brief – Influential European businesses are warning that an overzealous push for “tech sovereignty” by European policymakers trying to reduce dependence on major US tech companies could harm the profitability and competitiveness of...
Federal Court of Appeals Issues Mixed Ruling on California Design Code
Report from MediaPost In Brief – A three-judge panel of the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued a mixed ruling in the long-running litigation battle over the California Age-Appropriate Design Code, keeping some parts of the law blocked while allowing...
Amazon Wins Preliminary Injunction Over Perplexity’s Shopping Assistant
Report from Courthouse News In Brief – US District Judge Maxine Chesney has granted Amazon a preliminary injunction blocking the use of an AI-powered shopping assistant created by Perplexity AI on Amazon’s website. Chesney determined that Amazon is likely to succeed...
Utah Taxes Advertising Revenue of Big, Addictive Social Media Companies
Report from Utah News Dispatch In Brief – Utah’s legislature has passed SB287, a bill imposing a 4.7% tax on the targeted advertising revenues of the largest social media companies. The bill targets digital platforms that generate at least $1 million in targeted...
Microsoft Opposes Immediate Pentagon Blacklisting of Anthropic
Report from Reuters In Brief – Microsoft is backing Anthropic in its legal challenge to the US Department of Defense (DoD) labeling the AI developer a supply-chain risk and blocking the company’s AI services from being used on any defense contracts. The...
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