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...
Kochava Settles Federal Trade Commission Location Privacy Lawsuit
Report from MediaPost In Brief – Data broker Kochava has reportedly negotiated a settlement with lawyers for the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) over allegations that the company improperly sold sensitive mobile device geolocation data. The terms of the deal have not...
Polish Antitrust Agency Investigating Allegro for Unfair Logistics Preferences
Report from TVP World In Brief – Poland’s competition authority (UOKik) is investigating Allegro, the country’s leading e-commerce platform, for allegedly breaching consumer protection and competition rules related to the platform’s logistics services. UOKiK said...
Indonesia Sets a 16-Year-Old Minimum Age for Social Media
Report from the New York Times In Brief – In line with a growing number of countries around the world, the Government of Indonesia announced it will ban teenagers under 16 from accessing social media, citing concerns about online harms and addiction. Indonesia is...
Google and Epic Games Modify Settlement Offer and Google Drops Fees
Report from TechCrunch In Brief – Google and Epic Games have proposed an alternative global settlement to end their antitrust dispute to Judge James Donato who was skeptical of the two companies’ first proposal to modify his remedy order. If approved by the judge,...
Google Market Testing Vertical Search Remedy to Satisfy EU Regulators
Report from Reuters In Brief – Google is rolling out changes to its general search engine result page in Europe that would give greater visibility to rival “vertical search” services. It is a market test of a plan addressing the preliminary determination of the...
US Department of Labor Releases New Business-Friendly Gig Worker Rules
Report from Bloomberg In Brief – The US Department of Labor (DoL) has proposed a new rule setting standards for employers and workers to determine if a worker is properly classified as an independent contractor or a company employee. The proposal, which has been...
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California Judge Rules That Jury Will Hear AG’s Amazon Antitrust Complaint
Report from Redheaded Blackbelt In Brief – San Francisco Superior Court Judge Ethan Schulman has ruled that there is sufficient evidence backing the state’s antitrust lawsuit targeting Amazon’s price-parity regime that a jury will hear the case. The...
EU Regulators Tell Google How to Share Search Data with AI Competitors
Report from Bloomberg In Brief – The European Commission announced that it sent preliminary findings to Google outlining measures the digital giant should take to allow third party search engines, including some AI chatbots, to access its store of search data to...
Telegram Investigated by UK Ofcom Over Child Sexual Abuse Material
Report from The Guardian In Brief – Ofcom, the UK online content moderation regulator under the Online Safety Act (OSA), has announced that it is investigating whether Telegram has failed to prevent the sharing of child sexual abuse material (CSAM). The probe follows...
Colorado House Passes Bill Banning Online “Surveillance” Pricing
Report from Colorado Newsline In Brief – The Colorado House of Representatives has passed House Bill 26-1210, a measure prohibiting companies from using personalized data and algorithms to offer individualized prices and wages. Approved 39 – 24, with all support...
Google Faces New Antitrust Lawsuit from Old Android App Store Rival
Report from Reuters In Brief – Aptoide, a Portuguese company that specializes in mobile games and claims the world's third-largest Android app store, filed an antitrust lawsuit in US federal court accusing Google of shutting out rival app stores by monopolizing app...
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