An anonymous reader quotes a report from TorrentFreak: The High Court of Justice has issued a permanent injunction to stop a man filing copyright complaints against a rival's YouTube channels. As part of a fraudulent campaign against "the music mafia," the singer used copyright strikes and YouTube's repeat infringer policy to have a music publisher's channels suspended. The background to the dispute is nothing short of extraordinary. [...] The background to the dispute is an extraordinary maze of claims, counterclaims, and bitterness spread out over several years, during which documents were forensically examined and fingerprints subjected to professional scrutiny.

A US court has ruled (PDF) that "gig" economy giants including Uber and Lyft can continue treating their workers as independent contractors in the state of California. The BBC reports: The California appeals court found that a labor measure, known as Proposition 22, was largely constitutional. Labour groups and some workers had opposed the measure, saying it robbed them of rights like sick leave. The firms say the proposition protects other benefits such as flexibility.

The latest ruling overturns a decision made by a lower court in California in 2021, which found that Proposition 22 affected lawmakers' powers to set standards at the workplace. The state of California and a group representing Uber, Lyft and other firms appealed against the decision. On Monday, a three-judge panel at the appeals court ruled that workers could be treated as independent contractors. However it removed a clause, which put restrictions on collective bargaining by workers, from Proposition 22.

The U.S. Justice Department is probing last year's collapse of the TerraUSD stablecoin, raising the possibility of criminal charges being filed against the stablecoin's creator, Do Kwon, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing sources familiar with the matter. CoinDesk reports: The FBI and the Southern District of New York have interviewed former employees of Terraform Labs, the company behind TerraUSD, and sought to interview others, according to the Journal. Manhattan federal prosecutors are also examining chat-group discussions among prominent trading firms Jump Trading Group, Jane Street Group and failed FTX affiliate Alameda Research involving a potential bailout of TerraUSD, according to a separate report from Bloomberg, citing a person familiar with the matter.

Such a bailout never took place, but the investigation is seeking to determine whether the firms were involved in possible market manipulation. TerraUSD and its sister token, Luna, both eventually collapsed, setting off a series of high-profile failures of prominent crypto firms, including hedge fund Three Arrows capital, Voyager Digital and FTX. The Department of Justice previously alleged that an unnamed crypto firm -- believed to be Jump -- had bailed out TerraUSD once before, in an indictment against FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried. In February, the SEC filed a civil fraud lawsuit against Kwon and Terraform Labs, accusing them of misleading investors about TerraUSD's risks.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TorrentFreak: In January, a month before Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania was released in theaters, a link to a leaked script was posted on the Marvel Studios Spoilers subreddit. Last Friday, a Marvel Studios affiliate filed DMCA subpoena applications to compel Reddit and Google to expose the leakers. One named user account is shared among the subreddit's moderator team. Court documents indicate the plan is to force Reddit to expose them all. [...]

When information about the script/subtitle file was posted on Reddit mid-January, leak-loving Marvel fans were both excited and impressed. "Yeah this is some next level leak" and "This legit might be the biggest leak in this subs history" set the tone, but the fun didn't last. A moderator of the subreddit commented that since the information was receiving copyright notices, any "future sharing of the material will result in a ban." The thread is still live today and there's no doubt that Marvel is aware of it.

The DMCA subpoena application specifically mentions the thread alongside an email from Reddit's legal team, which had previously agreed to take the infringing content down. In common with the takedown notice sent to Google, the allegedly infringing content may have been deleted before Reddit could remove it. There's no mention of a copyright complaint, instead the post notes, "Sorry, this post was deleted by the person who originally posted it." At this point concern shifts to the rest of the thread, which talks about the document hosted by Google and how the mod team "took the google doc down" to ensure that existing links to the file would no longer lead to it. As a result, Marvel now wants Reddit to hand over "All Identifying Information for the user 'u/MSSmods'," which throws another unpredictable element into the mix. The DMCA subpoena applications can be found here (G1/G2, R1/R2)

Discord updated their privacy policy to quietly drop their promise to alert users "in advance" if the company ever started storing contents of video calls, voice calls, or channels. Naturally, this alarmed some users who wondered if the company plans to start retaining call recordings. According to a Discord spokesperson, the answer is no. Ars Technica reports: "There has not been a change in Discord's position on how we store or record the contents of video or voice channels," a Discord spokesperson told Ars. "We recognize that when we recently issued adjusted language in our privacy policy, we inadvertently caused confusion among our users. To be clear, nothing has changed and we have reinserted the language back into our privacy policy, along with some additional clarifying information."

Before users began complaining, the policy was going to be updated to say that Discord would be collecting information on "any content that you upload to the service. For example, you may write messages or posts (including drafts), send voice messages, create custom emojis, create short recordings of GoLive activity, or upload and share files through the services. This also includes your profile information and the information you provide when you create servers."

As users raised concerns on Reddit, Discord staffers seemed to rush to assuage fears, saying, "We understand that the wording of the new privacy policy is broad and can be misunderstood" and promising, "We are going to fix this." Since then, Discord added back in the missing language, word for word: "We generally do not store the contents of video or voice calls or channels. If we were to change that in the future (for example, to facilitate content moderation), we would disclose that to you in advance." A Reddit user identifying as a Discord staffer told Redditors that Discord won't "regularly" collect this type of content. That doesn't mean it will never happen though. "In response to user outrage, the policy's new updated language now also specifies that Discord may collect some of this type of content in the future," adds Ars.

"We may build features that help users engage with voice and video content, like create or send short recordings," Discord's new policy states.

DoNotPay, which describes itself as "the world's first robot lawyer," has been accused of practicing law without a license. From a report: It's facing a proposed class action lawsuit filed by Chicago-based law firm Edelson on March 3 and published Thursday on the website of the Superior Court of the State of California for the County of San Francisco. The complaint argues: "Unfortunately for its customers, DoNotPay is not actually a robot, a lawyer, nor a law firm. DoNotPay does not have a law degree, is not barred in any jurisdiction, and is not supervised by any lawyer." The lawsuit was filed on behalf of Jonathan Faridian, who said he'd used DoNotPay to draft various legal documents including demand letters, a small claims court filing, and a job discrimination complaint.

Per the complaint, Faridian believed he'd purchased legal documents "from a lawyer that was competent to provide them," but got "substandard" results. DoNotPay claims to use artificial intelligence to help customers handle an array of legal services without needing to hire a lawyer. It was founded in 2015 as an app to help customers fight parking tickets, but has since expanded its services. DoNotPay's website claims that it can help customers fight corporations, beat bureaucracy, find hidden money, and "sue anyone." DoNotPay told Insider: "DoNotPay respectfully denies the false allegations." It added: "We will defend ourselves vigorously."

Last month, a declassified FBI report revealed that the bureau had used Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to conduct multiple unlawful searches of a sitting Congress member's personal communications.

From a report by Ars Technica: Wired was the first to report the abuse, but for weeks, no one knew exactly which lawmaker was targeted by the FBI. That changed this week when Rep. Darin LaHood (R-Ill.) revealed during an annual House Intelligence Committee hearing on world threats that the FBI's abuse of 702 was "in fact" aimed at him. "This careless abuse by the FBI is unfortunate," LaHood said at the hearing, suggesting that the searches of his name not only "degrades trust in FISA" but was a "threat to separation of powers" in the United States. Calling the FBI's past abuses of Section 702 "egregious," the congressman -- who is leading the House Intelligence Committee's working group pushing to reauthorize Section 702 amid a steeply divided Congress -- said that "ironically," being targeted by the FBI gives him a "unique perspective" on "what's wrong with the FBI."

LaHood has said that having his own Fourth Amendment rights violated in ways others consider "frightening" positions him well to oversee the working group charged with implementing bipartisan reforms and safeguards that would prevent any such abuses in the future. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Mike Turner (R-Ohio) said that LaHood "personifies the fears and mistrust many in America have about the FBI's leadership," noting that "too many Americans are worried it could be them" next. FBI director Christopher Wray said that he "completely" understood LaHood's concerns, while emphasizing that the FBI has already implemented reforms and safeguards to prevent similar abuses in the future. An FBI spokesperson told Ars that "extensive changes" to address 702 compliance issues include "a whole new Office of Internal Audit currently focused on FISA compliance" and new policies requiring "enhanced pre-approval requirements before certain 'sensitive' US person queries can be run." The spokesperson provided an example, saying that for any sensitive queries involving elected officials, the FBI's deputy director must sign off. Wray said at the hearing that queries of the Section 702 database on US persons have dropped by 93 percent since last year. He also confirmed that the FBI launched "all sorts of mandatory enhanced training" initiatives on 702 compliance.
UPDATE: "At the same time, [LaHood] made clear that he still believes that Congress must reauthorize Section 702," reports the New York Times, "which he praised as a vital tool for combating a broad range of foreign threats."

Breaking news from CNN: Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Sunday instructed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to guarantee Silicon Valley Bank customers will have access to all of their money starting Monday.

By guaranteeing all deposits — even the uninsured money customers kept with the failed SVB bank — the government can ensure public confidence in America's banking system, said Yellen, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell and FDIC Chairman Martin J. Gruenberg in a joint statement....

The FDIC opened an auction Sunday for bids to acquire the bank, the Treasury Department said in a briefing with lawmakers in the California delegation, two sources familiar with the briefing told CNN.... Under Secretary for Domestic Finance Nellie Liang and Assistant Secretary for Legislative Affairs Jonathan Davidson led the briefing, during which they told members that the FDIC is prepared "to operate the institution" to ensure depositors can maintain payroll for their employees and that more operations will emerge in coming days, one of the sources said.
The treasury secretary's statement clarified that "No losses associated with the resolution of Silicon Valley Bank will be borne by the taxpayer." We are also announcing a similar systemic risk exception for Signature Bank, New York, New York, which was closed today by its state chartering authority. All depositors of this institution will be made whole. As with the resolution of Silicon Valley Bank, no losses will be borne by the taxpayer. Shareholders and certain unsecured debtholders will not be protected. Senior management has also been removed. Any losses to the Deposit Insurance Fund to support uninsured depositors will be recovered by a special assessment on banks, as required by law.

Finally, the Federal Reserve Board on Sunday announced it will make available additional funding to eligible depository institutions to help assure banks have the ability to meet the needs of all their depositors.
Meanwhile, congresswoman Nancy Pelosi said there are multiple potential buyers for SVB, and "What we would hope to see by tomorrow morning is for some other bank to buy the bank." The UK arm of the bank has already received a bid from the Bank of London.

From the treasury secretary's statement: The U.S. banking system remains resilient and on a solid foundation, in large part due to reforms that were made after the financial crisis that ensured better safeguards for the banking industry.

Those reforms combined with today's actions demonstrate our commitment to take the necessary steps to ensure that depositors' savings remain safe.

Long-time Slashdot reader theodp shares a fresh perspective on how the "pause" announced for building Amazon's HQ2 headquarters could impact the local community: The Falls Church News-Press notes that Amazon's pause announcement came just days after a 12-page glossy mass mailing entitled Capital Region Community Impact Report went out to thousands in the region.

Beginning with a statement from Amazon CEO Andy Jassy, the report spelled out "Amazon's philanthropic commitments in the Capital Region," including $32M donated to 150+ local organizations in 2021, $990M+ committed to create and preserve 6,245 affordable housing units. 13,700 people supported by Amazon-funded affordable housing investments and 23,000 students who received food, clothing, school supplies, hygiene items and other urgent support through Amazon's Right Now Needs Fund.

According to the report, the commitments also included benefits to 75,000+ students across 343 schools who received computer science education through the Amazon Future Engineer program, to 166,000+ students who participated in the CodeVA K-12 CS education program during the 2021-22 academic year, the 5.3 million free meals delivered to underserved families in partnership with Northern Virginia food banks, 10,000 meals purchased from local restaurants and donated to support Covid-19 first responders, $350,000 contributed to local community theaters and arts-focused non-profits, to 6,000 students who explored cloud computing solutions at the Wakefield H.S. Think Big in the 2021-22 academic year, the 200,000 children and families from underserved communities who received free access to the National Children's Museum through a $250,000 gift from Amazon, and the 16,700+ students served by Amazon's support for local youth sports leagues.

Not to look an Amazon philanthropy gift horse in the mouth, but should politicians be reliant on Amazon philanthropy to meet their communities' basic needs? Amazon's 2022 income taxes, by the way, were -$3.217B.

Today U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Silicon Valley Bank would not be bailed out by the federal government. But the government is working on helping depositors, Yellen said on the CBS News show Face the Nation.

The Associated Press reports that deposits insured by the federal government are supposed to be available by Monday morning... The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation insures deposits up to $250,000, but many of the companies and wealthy people who used the bank — known for its relationships with technology startups and venture capital — had more than that amount in their account. There are fears that some workers across the country won't receive their paychecks....

[Yellen] emphasized that the situation was much different from the financial crisis almost 15 years ago, which led to bank bailouts to protect the industry. "We're not going to do that again," she said. "But we are concerned about depositors, and we're focused on trying to meet their needs...."

Silicon Valley Bank is the nation's 16th-largest bank. It was the second biggest bank failure in U.S. history after the collapse of Washington Mutual in 2008. The bank served mostly technology workers and venture capital-backed companies, including some of the industry's best-known brands.... Yellen said she expected regulators to consider "a wide range of available options," including the acquisition of Silicon Valley Bank by another institution. So far, however, no buyer has stepped forward.
CNBC reports that just hours before regulators seized the failing bank — employees were paid their annual bonuses, "according to people with knowledge of the payments."

And the Intercept reports that earlier the bank had successfully lobbied for the rollback of protective rules established in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis. "The lobbying effort managed to exempt banks the size of Silicon Valley Bank from more stringent regulations, including stress tests aimed at uncovering the type of weaknesses that led to the bank's implosion Friday."

But the Washington Post reported that as dramatic as the seizure is, "one thing it doesn't seem likely to do — at least for now — is trigger a wider financial meltdown, banking experts said." Unlike the giant banks that ignited a global crisis in 2008, SVB was heavily dependent upon a single risky sector of the economy for both its depositors and its customers. That concentrated bet proved to be very bad news for the ambitious start-ups that dominate the high-technology world. But it means that the tech-friendly bank lacked the sophisticated financial entanglements with other institutions that can turn one bank's losses into a threat to the entire industry.

"Crypto firms should do their work within the bounds of the law, or they shouldn't do it at all," says the head of America's Securities and Exchange Commission, which regulates US. investment markets.

In an editorial published in The Hill, SEC chair Gary Gensler warns that instead cryptocurrency has many "trusted" intermediaries that are in fact non-compliant with U.S. securities law. Today, crypto is dominated by a handful of trading, lending, staking, and other financial intermediaries. The investing public is trusting these entities to be responsible with investors' assets. According to some data, the three largest crypto trading platforms purportedly account for almost three quarters of all trading volume. Crypto entrepreneurs might claim, in their own marketing materials, that they're transparent and regulated. But make no mistake: Very few, if any, are actually registered with the SEC and fully compliant with the federal securities laws.

The lack of compliance puts investors' hard-earned assets at risk. Investors lack fundamental disclosures about the crypto assets themselves and the firms who execute their trades and custody their assets: What are firms doing with customer assets? How are they funding their promised returns? Are they putting their hands in investors' pockets? When you buy or sell a token, are you trading against the house? What are the rules to protect against manipulation and fraud? Without disclosure and other investor protections, we simply don't know.

In essence, these firms are saying, "trust us." What's more, when firms go bankrupt (as many have of late), they turn to bankruptcy courts to sort out their mess.
"[B]ased upon how crypto platforms generally operate, investment advisers cannot rely on them today as qualified custodians," the editorial concludes. Rather than comply with the relevant laws, "it has felt like some have sought a stamp of approval for noncompliant activity, rather than changing a fundamentally non-compliant business model rife with conflicts." Of course, another tool in our toolbox is rooting out noncompliance through investigations and enforcement actions. The SEC has successfully brought or settled more than 100 cases against crypto intermediaries and token issuers, including some who operated Ponzi or pyramid schemes, engaged in unlawful touting, or committed other forms of fraud....

Some have said that we should let the innovation flourish or risk it going overseas. But forsaking investor protection puts real people's life savings at risk.
"It's a basic bargain in finance: If you want to raise money from the public, disclose certain facts and figures," Gensler told Politico this week. Their article notes "crypto giants are threatening to move their businesses across the Atlantic" from America to Europe, but with Gensler responding "We lose more if investors get harmed here." Crypto lobbyists have framed Gensler's push to force their industry to comply with 90-year-old securities laws as a war against financial innovation. Whatever changes brought by crypto markets will pale compared to what could come as brokerages and financial data aggregators move to incorporate artificial intelligence into their offerings, Gensler said.

"The much more transformative technology right now of our times is predictive data analytics and everything underlying artificial intelligence," he said, adding that he looked forward to working with lawmakers on how those tools could be regulated.

Though Kia and Hyundai represent a tenth of U.S. auto sales, the New York Times reports that "Of the nearly 11,000 cars stolen in Memphis last year — about twice as many as in 2021 — roughly a third were late-model Kias and Hyundais, according to the police."

"It doesn't take much to rip them off: just a screwdriver, a USB cord and hot-wiring know-how found in videos proliferating on social media." Many of the culprits are teenagers or young adults stealing cars for kicks or to use them for other crimes, such as robberies, the police say. More than half of the 175 people arrested and accused of car theft this year in Memphis were teenagers, who often abandon the vehicles after a joyride.... [A]uto thefts have continued to rise, even as other forms of lawbreaking have leveled out or fallen....

[T]he surge has continued, fueled in part by social media videos that show, step by step, how to steal Kias and Hyundais that are not equipped with an engine immobilizer — an electronic security device that keeps a car from being started without a key.... [Kia and Hyundai] recently issued statements saying they had fixed the problem that makes their vehicles relatively easy to steal in their latest models, and were introducing free software upgrades for vulnerable cars — about 4.5 million Kias and 3.8 million Hyundais, the federal government estimated. At the same time, the companies have shipped steering wheel locks to police departments across the country, to be provided free of charge to car owners who drive at-risk models. And executives say they are constantly monitoring TikTok and YouTube for new videos that show how to steal their vehicles, and then alerting the social media companies so those videos can be removed....

Officials say the social media-driven rise in Kia and Hyundai thefts began about two years ago in Milwaukee, and then spread nationwide. City attorneys for Seattle and Columbus recently sued the automakers for not installing anti-theft technology, and other cities, including Cleveland, Milwaukee and St. Louis, have threatened litigation.

As millions set their clocks forward one hour, there's pockets of resistance, according to this local news report:

- "According to a March 2022 CBS News poll, 46% of Americans prefer permanent daylight saving time, while 33% prefer permanent standard time. The remaining 21% simply favor the status quo."

- "Exceptions to this adopted norm include residents of Hawaii and most of Arizona, where standard time is permanent throughout the year."


But The Hill notes that America appears to be stuck halfway toward repealing daylight saving time: Earlier this month, Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) introduced the Sunshine Protection Act of 2023, which would make daylight saving time permanent. So far, the bill has received bipartisan support in the Senate and has been referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. If passed, the March 12 changing of the clocks would be the final such event — we wouldn't "fall back" in November.

A similar bill introduced by Rubio last year passed with unanimous support in the Senate, but it wasn't as well-received in the House.
So before America can end daylight saving time, that bill would need approval from the U.S. House of Representatives — and then the president's signature.

Meanwhile at least U.S. at least 19 states have already enacted legislation or resolutions to make daylight saving time permanent, the article points out. "But these states can't make the change without congressional approval, or their neighboring states enacting similar legislation."

An anonymous reader shares this report from Dark Reading: In recent weeks, hackers have been deploying the "IceFire" ransomware against Linux enterprise networks, a noted shift for what was once a Windows-only malware.

A report from SentinelOne suggests that this may represent a budding trend. Ransomware actors have been targeting Linux systems more than ever in cyberattacks in recent weeks and months, notable not least because "in comparison to Windows, Linux is more difficult to deploy ransomware against, particularly at scale," Alex Delamotte, security researcher at SentinelOne, tells Dark Reading....

"[M]any Linux systems are servers," Delamotte points out, "so typical infection vectors like phishing or drive-by download are less effective." So instead, recent IceFire attacks have exploited CVE-2022-47986 — a critical remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability in the IBM Aspera data transfer service, with a CVSS rating of 9.8.

Delamotte posits a few reasons for why more ransomware actors are choosing Linux as of late. For one thing, she says, "Linux-based systems are frequently utilized in enterprise settings to perform crucial tasks such as hosting databases, Web servers, and other mission-critical applications. Consequently, these systems are often more valuable targets for ransomware actors due to the possibility of a larger payout resulting from a successful attack, compared to a typical Windows user."

A second factor, she guesses, "is that some ransomware actors may perceive Linux as an unexploited market that could yield a higher return on investment."
While previous reports had IceFire targetting tech companies, SentinelLabs says they've seen recent attacks against organizations "in the media and entertainment sector," impacting victims "in Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, and the United Arab Emirates, which are typically not a focus for organized ransomware actors."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Gizmodo: A former TikTok employee turned whistleblower has reportedly met with multiple U.S. senators expressing concerns TikTok's plan to secure U.S. user data won't go far enough to stop possible Chinese espionage. The whistleblower told The Washington Post in an interview that the company's policy plan, dubbed Project Texas, doesn't go far enough and that properly ensuring U.S. data is secured from Chinese employees requires nothing short of a "complete re-engineering" of the way the app works. Those allegations come just days after another whistleblower raised concerns regarding TikTok's U.S. user controls. Combined, the comments could fan the flames for what looks like growing bipartisan support for a full-on nationwide TikTok ban.

The former TikTok employee turned whistleblower told the Post he worked at the company for around six months ending in early 2022 as a risk manager and head of a unit in TikTok's Safety Operations team. Part of that job, he claims, put him in charge of knowing which employees had access to certain tools and user data. He claims he was fired after speaking up about his data privacy concerns. Though he left TikTok prior to its finalization of the so-called Project Texas policy, he maintains he saw enough evidence to suggest the guardrails put in place to placate U.S. regulators fearful of Chinese employees viewing U.S. user data were insufficient. The whistleblower has reportedly already met with staffers from Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley and Virginia Sen. Mark Warner's offices.

Specifically, the whistleblower shared a snippet of code with the Post which they say shows TikTok's code connecting with Toutiao, a Chinese news app also run by TikTok's parent company, ByteDance. The whistleblower alleges that connection could let Chinese employees intercept and potentially view U.S. user data. Gizmodo could not independently confirm those claims. The whistleblower, meanwhile reportedly did not advocate for an outright nationwide ban. Instead, he said the problems could be solved but would require further steps than what is included in the Project Texas proposal. Another alleged whistleblower came forward just days before the Post interview, alleging TikTok's access controls on U.S. data were "superficial" at best. "TikTok and ByteDance employees, he alleged, possess the ability to 'switch between Chinese and U.S. data with nothing more than the click of a button,'" reports Gizmodo.

The whistleblower alleged in a letter sent to ByteDance by Republican Missouri Rep. Josh Hawley: "I have seen first-hand China-based engineers flipping over to non-China datasets and creating scheduled tasks to backup, aggregate, and analyze data. TikTok and ByteDance are functionally the same company."

Chronic pain patients were implanted with "dummy" pieces of plastic and told it would ease their pain, according to an indictment charging the former CEO of the firm that made the fake devices with fraud. Motherboard reports: Laura Perryman, the former CEO of Stimwave LLC, was arrested in Florida on Thursday. According to an FBI press release, Perryman was indicted "in connection with a scheme to create and sell a non-functioning dummy medical device for implantation into patients suffering from chronic pain, resulting in millions of dollars in losses to federal healthcare programs." According to the indictment, patients underwent unnecessary implanting procedures as a result of the fraud. Perryman was charged with one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and health care fraud, and one count of healthcare fraud. Stimwave received FDA approval in 2014, according to Engadget, and was positioned as an alternative to opioids for pain relief.

The Stimwave "Pink Stylet" system consisted of an implantable electrode array for stimulating the target nerve, a battery worn externally that powered it, and a separate, 9-inch long implantable receiver. When doctors told Stimwave that the long receiver was difficult to place in some patients, Perryman allegedly created the "White Stylet," a receiver that doctors could cut to be smaller and easier to implant -- but was actually just a piece of plastic that did nothing. "To perpetuate the lie that the White Stylet was functional, Perryman oversaw training that suggested to doctors that the White Stylet was a 'receiver,' when, in fact, it was made entirely of plastic, contained no copper, and therefore had no conductivity," the FBI stated. "In addition, Perryman directed other Stimwave employees to vouch for the efficacy of the White Stylet, when she knew that the White Stylet was actually non-functional." Stimwave charged doctors and medical providers approximately $16,000 for the device, which medical insurance providers, including Medicare, would reimburse the doctors' offices for.

The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation has acknowledged for the first time that it purchased US location data rather than obtaining a warrant. Wired reports: While the practice of buying people's location data has grown increasingly common since the US Supreme Court reined in the government's ability to warrantlessly track Americans' phones nearly five years ago, the FBI had not previously revealed ever making such purchases. The disclosure came [Wednesday] during a US Senate hearing on global threats attended by five of the nation's intelligence chiefs.

Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, put the question of the bureau's use of commercial data to its director, Christopher Wray: "Does the FBI purchase US phone-geolocation information?" Wray said his agency was not currently doing so, but he acknowledged that it had in the past. He also limited his response to data companies gathered specifically for advertising purposes. To my knowledge, we do not currently purchase commercial database information that includes location data derived from internet advertising," Wray said. "I understand that we previously -- as in the past -- purchased some such information for a specific national security pilot project. But that's not been active for some time." He added that the bureau now relies on a "court-authorized process" to obtain location data from companies."

It's not immediately clear whether Wray was referring to a warrant -- that is, an order signed by a judge who is reasonably convinced that a crime has occurred -- or another legal device. Nor did Wray indicate what motivated the FBI to end the practice. In its landmark Carpenter v. United States decision, the Supreme Court held that government agencies accessing historical location data without a warrant were violating the Fourth Amendment's guarantee against unreasonable searches. But the ruling was narrowly construed. Privacy advocates say the decision left open a glaring loophole that allows the government to simply purchase whatever it cannot otherwise legally obtain. [...] Asked during the Senate hearing whether the FBI would pick up the practice of purchasing location data again, Wray replied: "We have no plans to change that, at the current time."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNBC: Rep. Mark Takano, who represents California's 39th district, has reintroduced his 32-hour Workweek Act to Congress, which, if passed, would officially reduce the standard definition of the workweek from 40 hours to 32 hours by amending the Fair Labor Standards Act. His proposal would mandate overtime pay for any work done after 32 hours, which would encourage business to either pay workers more for longer hours, or shorten their week and hire more people.

The bill applies to non-exempt workers, who typically work hourly jobs across leisure and hospitality, transportation, construction, manufacturing, wholesale, and retail trade. This is by design, Takano tells CNBC Make It. "The serious conversations about the reduced workweek are happening for white-collar professions. What my bill will do is spur conversation about how we democratize this norm to other sectors of the workforce so everybody benefits."

Takano says he's passionate about the 32-hour workweek to bring about "a significant change which will increase the happiness of humankind. That's a very big statement. But it was a big deal 100 years ago when we gave people the weekend by passing the Fair Labor Standards Act," which established a 40-hour workweek and created other worker protections. "These are all part of the social justice discourse," he says. Supporters say a shortened week would push businesses to hire more people, increase labor market participation, and create "healthier competition in the workplace that empowers workers to negotiate for better wages and working conditions," according to a release (PDF) from Takano's team. The report notes that Takano first introduced the legislation in 2021, but it "ultimately failed to advanced in Congress."

The Federal Trade Commission has voted to sue to block Intercontinental Exchange from completing its $11.7 billion acquisition of mortgage software provider Black Knight. From a report: The antitrust agency said the deal would lead to higher prices for software that lenders use to generate mortgages. Higher prices would be passed on to home buyers, the FTC said. The FTC's lawsuit, filed in its administrative court, is a setback for Intercontinental Exchange's efforts to become a big player in the technical infrastructure behind home loans. Best known as the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange, the company has increasingly pushed to digitize the mortgage business and made a series of deals to expand its role in home-loan finance.

Intercontinental Exchange -- known as ICE for short -- said it strongly disagreed with the FTC's decision. "ICE is fully confident in our position and look forward to presenting it in court," the company said in a statement. ICE and Black Knight currently compete to offer loan-origination systems -- used by lenders to initiate mortgage loans. Earlier this week, ICE said it had agreed to divest Black Knight's loan-origination system business to address any concerns about the deal hurting competition. The divestment would reduce the price tag of ICE's acquisition of Black Knight to $11.7 billion, from the original $13.1 billion when the deal was unveiled in May of last year. The FTC said it didn't believe that selling off Black Knight's product would fix the competitive harm caused by combining the two largest mortgage-loan technology providers. The agency also claimed the deal would undermine competition for another service that ICE and Black Knight provide that helps lenders get the best interest rates for home buyers.

Cerebral has revealed it shared the private health information, including mental health assessments, of more than 3.1 million patients in the United States with advertisers and social media giants like Facebook, Google, and TikTok. From a report: The telehealth startup, which exploded in popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic after rolling lockdowns and a surge in online-only virtual health services, disclosed the security lapse in a filing with the federal government that it shared patients' personal and health information who used the app to search for therapy or other mental health care services. Cerebral said that it collected and shared names, phone numbers, email addresses, dates of birth, IP addresses and other demographics, as well as data collected from Cerebral's online mental health self-assessment, which may have also included the services that the patient selected, assessment responses, and other associated health information.