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...
White House Kills Some Utah AI Bills but Several Reach Governor Cox
Report from the Transparency Coalition In Brief – Efforts by officials in Republican-dominated Utah to position the state as a leader in regulating AI faced resistance from the Trump White House, which labeled one AI safety proposal “unfixable” and warned that some...
Meta to Add Digital Services Tax Surcharge to Ad Buys in Six Countries
Report from MediaPost In Brief – Meta has announced that it will soon add a “location fee” to advertising purchases targeting users in several countries to offset the cost of national digital services taxes (DSTs). The policy will begin in May, with full billing...
AI Fears are Powering Bills Regulating “Surveillance Pricing” in US States
Report from Gizmodo In Brief – Democratic state lawmakers are increasingly proposing legislation to curb so-called “surveillance pricing,” a practice in which retailers use data and technology to help set prices, claiming that AI will be used to rapidly change prices...
Meta Proposes Allowing AI Chatbots on WhatsApp in Europe for a Fee
Report from the Wall Street Journal In Brief – Meta has announced that it will allow third-party AI chatbots to communicate with users on its WhatsApp messaging platform for a per-message fee in response to pressure from the European Commission. The Commission...
UK Government Vexed About How to Apply Copyright Law to AI Training
Report from the Financial Times In Brief – The UK government is reconsidering a proposal that would allow AI developers, including giants like OpenAI and Google, to train AI models on copyrighted materials without obtaining prior consent from rightsholders. After a...
Final Big 6 Ads Firm Settles with FTC on Ideological Content Moderation
Report from MediaPost In Brief – The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has announced that Havas Media Group has agreed to a proposed order that it will not participate in unlawful collusion related to digital advertising “brand safety” standards that the regulator says...
Yelp Wins Legal Ruling in Antitrust Battle with Google
Report from Courthouse News Service In Brief – Federal Magistrate Judge Susan Van Keulen has ruled that Yelp, a leading internet company critic of Google’s search practices, can rely on District Judge Amit Mehta’s 2024 decision in the Justice Department’s landmark...
Illinois Governor Signs Robust AI “Safety” Law
Report from CBS News In Brief – Illinois Governor JB Pritzker (D) has signed the AI Safety Measures Act into law pushing the state to the forefront of AI regulation. The law imposes “safety” requirements on companies developing so-called frontier AI models, including...
Japan Moving to Regulate Social Media and AI in Election Campaigns
Report from Nippon.com In Brief – Japan's House of Representatives, the lower chamber of the Diet, has approved two bills by a majority vote that are intended to address the misuse of social media during election campaigns. The bills, which must next be considered by...
New Jersey Joins Blue States Regulating Grocery Store Pricing Practices
Report from the Shelby Report In Brief – The New Jersey legislature has approved the Fair Price Protection Act and sent it to Governor Mikie Sherrill (D), who has indicated she will sign the measure into law. Once enacted, New Jersey will become the third state to...
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