When Iranian-born German academic Erfan Kasraie received an email from The Wall Street Journal requesting an interview, he sensed something was amiss.The Nov. 12 note purportedly came from Farnaz Fassihi, a veteran Iranian-American journalist
who covers the Middle East. Yet it read more like a fan letter, asking Kasraie to share his
“important achievements” to “motivate the youth of our beloved country.””This interview is a great honor for me,” the note gushed.Another red flag: the follow-up email that instructed Kasraie to enter his Google password
to see the interview questions.The phony request was, in reality, an attempt to break into Kasraie’s email account. The
incident is part of a wider effort to impersonate journalists in hacking attempts that three cybersecurity firms said they have tied to the Iranian government, which rejected the claim.The incidents come to light at a time when the U.S. government has warned of Iranian cyber threats in the wake of the U.S. airstrike that killed Iran’s second most powerful official,
Major-General Qassem Soleimani.In a report published Wednesday, London-based cybersecurity company Certfa tied the impersonation of Fassihi to a hacking group nicknamed Charming Kitten, which has long been associated with Iran.Israeli firm ClearSky Cyber Security provided Reuters with documentation of similar
impersonations of two media figures at CNN and Deutsche Welle, a German public broadcaster.ClearSky also linked the hacking attempts to Charming Kitten, describing the individuals
targeted as Israeli academics or researchers who study Iran. ClearSky declined to give the
specific number of people targeted or to name them, citing client confidentiality.FILE – Erfan Kasraie, an Iranian science journalist from Kassel, is pictured in Berlin, Germany, Jan. 30, 2020.Digital threatIran denies operating or supporting any hacking operation. Alireza Miryousefi, the spokesman for the Islamic Republic’s mission to the United Nations, said that firms claiming otherwise “are merely participants in the disinformation campaign against Iran.”Reuters uncovered similar hacking attempts on two other targets, which the two cybersecurity firms, along with a third firm, Atlanta-based Secureworks, said also appeared to be the work of Charming Kitten. Azadeh Shafiee, an anchor for London-based satellite broadcaster Iran International, was impersonated by hackers in attempts to break into the accounts of a relative of hers in London and Prague-based Iranian filmmaker Hassan Sarbakhshian.Sarbakhshian — who fled the Islamic Republic amid a crackdown that saw the arrest of several fellow photojournalists in 2009 — was also targeted with an email that claimed to be from Fassihi. The message asked him to sign a contract to sell some of his pictures to The Wall
Street Journal. Sarbakhshian said in an interview that he was suspicious of the message and
didn’t respond.Neither did the ruse fool Kasraie, an academic who frequently appears on television
criticizing Iran’s government.”I understood 100 percent that it was a trap,” he said in an interview.That’s not surprising given the hackers’ sloppy tactics. For instance, they missed the fact
that Fassihi had left the Journal last year for a new job at The New York Times.The Journal declined to comment. Fassihi referred questions to The Times, which in a
statement called the impersonation “a vivid example of the challenges journalists are facing
around the globe.”U.S. officials and cybersecurity experts see Iran as a digital threat. Earlier this month,
the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) issued alerts about the threat of Iranian cyberattacks following the controversial U.S. attack that killed Soleimani. Microsoft, which tracks attempts to undermine election security, in October accused Charming Kitten of targeting a U.S. presidential campaign; sources told Reuters at the time that the campaign was Donald Trump’s.FILE – Iranian cybersecurity experts and members of Certfa Nariman Gharib, left, and Amin Sabeti check their messages as they work from their office in London, Britain, Jan. 7, 2020.Links to Charming KittenHomeland Security and FBI spokespeople declined to comment on the recent impersonations
identified by Reuters. Certfa, ClearSky, and Secureworks said they could be tied to Charming
Kitten through a study of the tactics, targets, and digital infrastructure involved — including
servers, link shortening services, and domain registration patterns.”This activity does align with prior Iranian cyber operations,” said Allison Wikoff, a Secureworks researcher who has tracked Charming Kitten for years.In early 2019, the United States indicted Behzad Mesri — who ClearSky has linked to Charming Kitten through emails and social media activity — on charges of recruiting a former U.S. Air Force intelligence officer to spy on behalf of Iran. Mesri remains at large and could not be reached for comment.Other impersonated journalists included CNN national security analyst Samantha Vinograd,
whose identity was stolen in August and used in attempts to break into email accounts in Israel, ClearSky said. Another was Michael Hartlep, a Berlin-based videojournalist who has done freelance assignments for Deutsche Welle and Reuters. ClearSky found his name on an email inviting recipients to a bogus Deutsche Welle webinar on Iran’s role in the Middle East. The firm did not find evidence that the Reuters name was used in hacking attempts.In another case, the hackers appear to have invented a journalist — “Keyarash Navidpour” —
to send out a phony invitation on Jan. 4 to an online seminar that it claimed Deutsche Welle
would hold about the killing of Soleimani the day before. No such journalist works for Deutsche Welle, said the news organization’s spokesman Christoph Jumpelt.Vinograd referred questions to CNN, which did not return messages seeking comment. Hartlep told Reuters he worried such stunts might give sources second thoughts about answering a reporter’s queries.”If this becomes the usual way of tricking people,” he said, “definitely it makes our work
very hard.”
 
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Twitter said on Monday that it had discovered attempts by possible state actors to access the phone numbers associated with user accounts, after a security researcher unearthed a flaw in the company’s “contacts upload” feature.In a statement published on its privacy blog, Twitter said it had identified a “high volume of requests” to use the feature coming from IP addresses in Iran, Israel and Malaysia. It said, without elaborating, that “some of these IP addresses may have ties to state-sponsored actors.”A company spokeswoman declined to say how many user phone numbers had been exposed, saying Twitter was unable to identify all of the accounts that may have been impacted.She said Twitter suspected a possible connection to state-backed actors because the attackers in Iran appeared to have had unrestricted access to Twitter, even though the network is banned there.Tech publication TechCrunch reported on Dec. 24 that a security researcher, Ibrahim Balic, had managed to match 17 million phone numbers to specific Twitter user accounts by exploiting a flaw in the contacts feature of its Android app. TechCrunch said it was able to identify a senior Israeli politician by matching a phone number through the tool.The feature, which allows people with a user’s phone number to find and connect with that user on Twitter, is off by default for users in the European Union where stringent privacy rules are in place. It is switched on by default for all other users globally, the spokeswoman said.Twitter said in its statement that it has changed the feature so it no longer reveals specific account names in response to requests. It has also suspended any accounts believed to have been abusing the tool.However, the company is not sending individual notifications to users whose phone numbers were accessed in the data leak, which information security experts consider a best practice.
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YouTube is making clear there will be no “birtherism” on its platform during this year’s U.S. presidential election.Also banned: Election-related “deepfake” videos and anything that aims to mislead viewers about voting procedures and how to participate in the 2020 census.The Google-owned video service clarified its rules ahead of the Iowa caucuses Monday. The company is mostly reiterating content guidelines that is has been putting in place since the last presidential election in 2016.Google said that it will remove any videos that advance false claims about whether political candidates and elected officials are eligible to serve in office.The company’s announcement comes about nine years after celebrity businessman Donald Trump began to get notice for claiming that Barack Obama, the nation’s first African American president, was not born in the United States.Trump repeatedly voiced citizenship doubts even after Obama produced his long-form birth certificate. Trump only fully backed off from the idea in the final stages of his 2016 presidential campaign.YouTube said it will also crack down on any attempts to artificially increase the number of views, likes and comments on videos. It changed its systems for recommending what videos users watch last year in a push to curb harmful misinformation. 
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A federal jury Wednesday decided that Apple Inc. and Broadcom Inc. must pay $1.1 billion to the California Institute of Technology for infringing on patents.Apple was on the hook for nearly $838 million of the damages awarded in a lawsuit that said Broadcom used its patented Wi-Fi data transmission technology in computer chips that went into iPhones, iPads, Apple Watches and other Apple devices.Caltech, the superstar tech school based in Pasadena, said it was pleased by the verdict of the Los Angeles jury.“As a nonprofit institution of higher education, Caltech is committed to protecting its intellectual property in furtherance of its mission to expand human knowledge and benefit society through research integrated with education,” a school statement said.Emails seeking comment from Cupertino-based Apple and Broadcom weren’t immediately returned Wednesday night but they are expected to appeal.Last week, San Jose-based Broadcom announced it had reached agreements to supply components to Apple devices released for the next three years.It wasn’t immediately clear what impact the lawsuit award would have on those deals, which Broadcom said could generate $15 billion in revenues.
 
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U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has warned that the United States will only pass information across what he termed “trusted networks” and criticized close ally Britain over its decision to allow the Chinese firm Huawei to build parts of the country’s 5G mobile network.  Speaking to reporters Wednesday en route to London, where he is due to meet Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, Pompeo said putting Huawei into the British system “creates a real risk.”The top U.S. diplomat described Huawei as an extension of China’s communist party that is obligated to hand over information to the party, adding that the Trump administration will evaluate Britain’s decision. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speaks to reporters aboard his plane en route to London, Jan. 29, 2020.”We will make sure that when American information passes across a network, we are confident that that network is a trusted one. We’ll work with the United Kingdom. We were urging them to make a decision that was different than the one they made and we’ll have a conversation about how to proceed,” Pompeo said.Britain had been agonizing over whether to allow Huawei to be part of its 5G rollout, twice postponing the decision since July last year. In the end, the government said it would allow the Chinese firm restricted access to a 35 percent market share of the periphery of the network, rather than the core elements.  Johnson told lawmakers Wednesday the decision offered the best of both worlds.Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson leaves 10 Downing Street to attend the weekly session of Prime Ministers Questions in Parliament in London, Jan. 29, 2020.”I think it is absolutely vital that people in this country do have access to the best technology available. But that we also do absolutely nothing to imperil our relationship with the United States, to do anything to compromise our critical national security infrastructure,” Johnson said at the weekly Prime Minister’s Questions in Parliament.The announcement comes just days before Britain is set to formally leave the European Union on Jan. 31. Some lawmakers fear the Huawei decision could compromise the transatlantic relationship just as Britain seeks to build on its links beyond Europe after Brexit, with a group of Conservative MPs threatening to vote against the government’s 5G plans.”Certainly, U.S. politicians have made some bold threats over the last couple of weeks, but I think this storm will blow over,” said James Sullivan, head of cybersecurity at the London-based Royal United Services Institute. “From the UK’s perspective, this has been a risk-management decision based on technical assessments.”However, in Washington, Democratic U.S. Senator Mark Warner says there is bipartisan agreement that Britain has made the wrong choice.FILE – Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., talks to reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington, Jan. 28, 2020.”Huawei has been and will continue to be a national security threat,” Warner said. “The Brits are our strongest allies. We’ve got to find a way to work through this. I do recognize as well that in Huawei we’ve got an equipment vendor that while as a national security threat is also a lot cheaper than any of the other Western alternatives.”Those Western alternatives are lagging behind, notes cyber industry expert Mark Skilton of Britain’s Warwick Business School.”The issue just in a nutshell is whether you want to continue the economic growth 5G can create because of the speed and power of it, versus the national interests of the U.S., particularly over the Chinese dominating the market,” Skilton said. “5G networks promise to transform our lives through the so-called ‘internet of things.’ Everything from domestic refrigerators to critical national infrastructure will be connected through near-instantaneous networks. That presents many more ‘attack points.'”There is a threat of potentially embedding ‘Trojans’ or malware into these devices,” he added. “Now, if Huawei is the choice of hardware, then they could embed — and I’m not saying they are, but they could — embed this kind of surveillance technology or stealth technology.”  The European Union on Wednesday adopted similar guidelines to Britain, stopping short of banning Huawei but imposing strict security rules.For its part, Huawei welcomed the British decision Wednesday and insisted it does not “take orders” from the Chinese government.
 
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Barbara Birungi Mutabazi has a vision: Train Ugandan women to code and do other technology work.”The beauty of this is that even if there are not enough jobs in Uganda, if you have the right skills, you can work for any organization around the world,” said Mutabazi, who runs Women in Technology, a skills-training organization in Uganda.Mutabazi recently attended the African Diaspora Investment Symposium to find investors and possible employers for the young women she trains. The event brought together entrepreneurs, investors and businesses to talk about the future of Africa business.”The African Diaspora Network is trying to bring Africans and friends of Africa together to collaborate, create and to imagine possibilities for the continent,” said Almaz Negash, the founder and executive director of the African Diaspora Network and the event’s organizer.One theme of the symposium was money — how to tap into the African diaspora to fund small, medium and large companies on the continent.’Scaling’ remittancesRemittances — money sent by people living in the U.S. to family in Africa — has long been a key way to support people. More than $40 billion in remittances goes to sub-Sahara Africa, mostly to Nigeria, Negash said. This is a powerful source of support for families, but some speakers wondered if there are other ways to help spur growth.”How do we scale remittances so that it can also be invested in other people than our family,” Negash said. “Supporting startups.”Another area of support could be to create a fund to help African entrepreneurs and businesses protect their intellectual property, said Joseph Mucheru, Google’s first sub-Sahara Africa lead and now a minister in the Kenyan government.An IP fundAfrican leaders need to find ways to attract investors and businesses “to invest and come in and work with our startups, protect our startups, ensure that the intellectual property that they build can be retained in the continent,” he said.   For the roughly 50 African entrepreneurs attending the event, this was an opportunity to pitch their businesses. The kinds of businesses varied widely.Aboubacar Komara, an architect from Guinea, is working on a housing startup.
“We’re implicating people in the process of actually building their homes. You know, we want to change the concept of what is architecture, because architecture has a lot to do with your identity,” he said.
 
Neile Nkholise is the chief executive of 3DIMO, a sports technology company in South Africa. Sensors are sewn into sports garments, which send data that indicates whether an athlete is at risk of an injury. At the moment, she is focused on football, rugby and basketball.She is raising her seed round of investment but is also looking for investors who can be partners, “people who unlock access to networks” and expertise “that enable us to scale much faster,” she said.For many of the attendees, the event was a welcomed chance to talk about Africa successes. Thelma Ekiyor runs a Nigeria-based business accelerator and an investment fund for women-run businesses.There is no doubt there are problems in Africa, she said, but “for the diaspora, the lens through which you look at these problems must be different. For the diaspora, these problems are opportunities. For the diaspora, they are entry points.”Women in ‘the box’ of micro-lendingShe said one of the challenges has been that the structure of financing women entrepreneurs in Africa and other developing regions has been “micro.””Most of the funds available to women are micro-lending, as if women don’t know what to do with big money,” she told the attendees. “And so the first thing that I knew we had to do was change that and ensure that how we finance women was aspirational. We would start them at them micro-level and support them to grow.”The power of the symposium doesn’t stop after everyone goes home, said Negash of the African Diaspora Network.Over the coming months, connections made may turn into something else — a new business, a customer or partnership — all with a focus on the African continent.
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In a 2017 episode of the TV show “The Good Wife,” a doctor in Chicago is seen advising a dental surgery in Syria, over Skype. Such remote operations, part of an emerging sector known as telemedicine, is not only the stuff of televised fiction, but a real technology that is attracting increasing attention from business and government. That includes Singapore, which has introduced telemedicine legislation in a nation whose medical research and development already has impacts across borders.Telemedicine lawSingapore will regulate telemedicine businesses as part of its upcoming Healthcare Services Act 2020.These services already “have become increasingly popular and are poised to become a key feature of Singapore’s health care system,” said Marian Ho, a senior partner in the corporate division of Dentons Rodyk Singapore, a law firm.Regulate medical services not premisesShe said in a legal briefing that what makes the new law significant is that Singapore will focus on the types of medical services provided, rather than on the premises where they’re provided. For instance, if a patient only needs to refill his painkiller prescription, it is less important that he is on the premises of a hospital, and more important that he is receiving consultation services from a doctor, even if it is over Skype.Citizens of Singapore are readySingaporeans have already started using smartphone apps for simple check-ins with their doctors, using text messages and video calls. The apps range from Doctor Anywhere to MaNaDr. However the new law will be the overarching framework that the island nation uses to regulate this business, including to authorize the Ministry of Health to issue licenses for new services.As businesses develop new ways to provide health services over the internet, the impacts are likely to spread beyond Singapore. The rich micro-state is already a world leader in biomedical science, manufacturing four out of the world’s top 10 drugs, for instance, according to a 2019 report from consulting firm TMF Group and Singapore’s Economic Development Board, a government board.RisksHowever the new technology also comes with risks, such as a doctor’s accuracy rate over a video call versus in person, whether personal data will be protected as it is handed over to apps, and insurance and liability questions in case of malpractice.“My understanding is that out of 10 startups, maybe one survives,” gastroenterologist Desmond Wai told Singapore’s Business Times. “When the rest close down, who will be keeping the patient records?”Large part of the Singapore economyThe Healthcare Services Act, approved by parliament this month, will regulate one of Singapore’s biggest sectors.  National manufacturing decreased overall from December to January, yet biomedical production increased 10.3% annualized, including a 20% increase in medical technology production, according to research from Singapore’s OCBC Bank.That makes medtech a significant part of the Southeast Asian economy, one that will see even more telemedicine in the future.“Singapore’s strong digital capabilities and vibrant research ecosystem aided by close collaboration between the public, private and academic sectors make it the region’s leading center for biomedical sciences,” the TMF-EDB report said. “Over 30 of the world’s major biomedical science and pharmaceutical companies have established their regional clinical trial centers in Singapore.”   
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Britain will allow China’s Huawei Technologies Co. to help build the country’s next-generation cellular network, dealing a blow to a U.S. campaign to launch a worldwide boycott of the telecom equipment giant.The British government said Tuesday it would permit Huawei to build less critical parts of the country’s new high-speed 5G wireless network.The U.S. has campaigned against Huawei for more than a year, noting concerns about national security and the Chinese firm’s relations with the country’s Communist Party.“The United States is disappointed by the U.K.’s decision,” said a senior Trump administration official Tuesday. “There is no safe option for untrusted vendors to control any part of a 5G network.”The U.S. official said the U.S. is willing to work with Britain to exclude “untrusted vendor components from 5G networks.”Mobile network phone masts are visible in front of St. Paul’s Cathedral in the City of London, Jan. 28, 2020. The Chinese tech firm Huawei will be given the opportunity to build non-core elements of Britain’s 5G network, the government announced.Without mentioning any companies, Britain said it would exclude “high-risk” companies from providing “core” components of the new network. It also said it would permit high risk suppliers to supply up to 35-percent of new network’s less risky parts of its infrastructure.Britain’s announcement comes a day before U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is scheduled to meet in London with Prime Minister Boris Johnson. The announcement puts Johnson in an awkward position, as he needs the Trump administration to quickly reach a trade agreement after Brexit.The 5G rollout is particularly critical for Britain, as it leaves the European Union with hopes of positioning its economy as a beneficiary of technological innovation.  In a Friday phone call with Johnson, U.S. President Donald Trump told the British prime minister that giving Huawei the go-ahead would cause a major rift in transatlantic relations and jeopardize intelligence-sharing between Washington and London.U.S. officials have also voiced frustration with decisions by some European nations to grant Huawei some access in the rollout of their 5G network.  Under the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020, the U.S. defense secretary should brief Congressional defense committees by March 15 on the implementation of plan for fifth generation information and communications technologies, including steps to work with U.S. allies and partners to protect critical networks and supply chains. 
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Hundreds of employees are openly criticizing Amazon’s record on climate change despite what they say is a company policy that puts their jobs at risk for speaking out.On Sunday, more than 300 employees of the online retail giant signed their names and job titles to statements on blog post on Medium. The online protest was organized by a group called Amazon Employees For Climate Justice, an advocacy group founded by Amazon workers that earlier this month said the company had sent letters to its members threatening to fire them if they continued to speak to the press.   “It’s our moral responsibility to speak up, and the changes to the communications policy are censoring us from exercising that responsibility,” said Sarah Tracy, a software development engineer at Amazon, in a statement.   Amazon said that its policy on external communications is not new and is in keeping with other large companies. It said the policy applies to all Amazon employees and is not directed at any specific group.”While all employees are welcome to engage constructively with any of the many teams inside Amazon that work on sustainability and other topics, we do enforce our external communications policy and will not allow employees to publicly disparage or misrepresent the company or the hard work of their colleagues who are developing solutions to these hard problems,” according to an Amazon spokesperson.   Amazon, which relies on fossil fuels to power the planes, trucks and vans that ship packages all over the world, has an enormous carbon footprint. And its workers have been vocal in criticizing some of the company’s practices.Last year, more than 8,000 staffers signed an open letter to CEO and founder Jeff Bezos demanding that Amazon cut its carbon emissions, end its use of fossil fuels and stop its work with oil companies that use Amazon’s technology to locate fossil fuel deposits.Amazon said in a statement that it is passionate about climate change issues and has already pledged to become net zero carbon by 2040 and use 100% renewable energy by 2030. 
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The U.S. Federal Communications Commission estimates that about 19 million Americans still don’t have access to broadband internet. Most of those people live in rural parts of the country. But little by little, individuals, companies and the government are changing that. VOA’s Calla Yu reports.
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Despite the U.S.-China trade deal signed last week, the two countries appear headed for more confrontation, especially over high tech.One of China’s highest-profile tech executives, Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei, told the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos on Tuesday that he expects the U.S. to escalate its crackdown on Huawei. But he vowed that the world leader in building 5G networks is prepared to withstand further restrictions on its foreign markets and suppliers.Analysts say his remarks suggest that the Chinese may be ready to directly confront Americans in the global competition for high-tech advancements, which are seen at the core of trade frictions.Tech war is on”He [Ren] is fully aware that the tech competition between the U.S. and China will escalate. The U.S. has no plan to cut China some slack simply because they have just signed the Phase 1 deal. Both are now entering the battleground of their tech disputes,” said Lin Tsung-nan, professor of electrical engineering at National Taiwan University in Taipei.Beijing’s critics say Huawei acts as a virtual arm of the Chinese government, benefitting from favorable policies and funding that have sped its expansion around the world. They warn countries that allow Huawei to build their new wireless data networks that they are giving Beijing’s authoritarian government enormous influence over their security. Instead, U.S. officials argue, countries should trust American, European, Korean and other companies.Ren Zhengfei, founder and chief executive officer of Huawei Technologies, gestures during a session at the 50th World Economic Forum (WEF) annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, Jan. 21, 2020.Provisions in the U.S.-China Phase 1 trade agreement aim to root out Chinese state policies that encourage intellectual property theft and forced technology transfers. However the deal leaves open questions about enforcement. Many, including Huawei chief Ren, remain skeptical that the countries will reach an agreement on such issues.Speaking to the audience in Davos, Ren said he believes the United States will escalate its crackdown on Huawei, but that the impact will be minimal as the company has adapted to restrictions imposed since last year.Huawei and its 46 affiliates were targeted in 2019 after the U.S. government concluded that the company has long engaged in activities contrary to U.S. national security. Ren’s daughter, Huawei Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou, is fighting an extradition case in Canada stemming from allegations she committed fraud by lying about Huawei’s relationship with an affiliate doing business in Iran.Huawei’s Plan BAnalysts have mixed views about the long-term impact of the blacklisting on Huawei. Ren said he is optimistic because Huawei has invested hundreds of billions of dollars in its own core technology over the past few years, including chips and software. Last year, the company released its own operating system, called HarmonyOS, though, so far, it hasn’t been installed in any of the company’s smartphones.It has also released a flagship smartphone, the Mate 30, without licensed Google Android software. Sales in China have been in line with expectations, although its global sales target of 20 million units is yet to be met.FILE – Richard Yu, head of Huawei’s consumer business group, speaks on stage during a presentation to reveal Huawei’s latest smartphones Mate 30 and Mate 30 Pro in Munich, Germany, Sept. 19, 2019.But Professor Lin said the ultimate challenge facing Huawei lies ahead.”The real test will come after the U.S. completely cuts off [Huawei’s] access to American technology and relevant exchanges. Huawei will then have to prove if its products, manufactured based on its so-called plan B, will continue to be competitive in overseas markets,” the professor said.More tech restrictionsAfter having restricted Huawei’s access to American technology, the United States is reportedly looking to introduce a stricter rule that could block Huawei’s access to an increased number of foreign-made goods.Media reports said the United States plans, among other things, to force Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, to limit its supplies of 14 nanometer chips to Huawei.  Washington is also lobbying other countries, such as Britain and Germany, to bar Huawei — which it accuses of spying for the Chinese government — from the buildup of their next-generation mobile networks known as 5G.  Whether U.S. allies will be persuaded to block Huawei from building their 5G networks remains uncertain, but Lin said the stakes in the standoff are clear.”If China succeeds in using Huawei to dominate [the global 5G network], the free world will gradually fall into China’s high-tech iron curtain. That’s why the U.S. has turned aggressive in blocking Huawei, which has strived after having had copied code from Cisco’s [router software] technology a decade ago,” Lin said.Escalating tensionsSong Hong at the Institute of World Economics and Politics under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences said he’s worried the U.S. may widen its target to include more Chinese tech firms.But he said Beijing is adapting to the new reality by gradually cutting its dependence on the U.S. technology.”China has greatly strengthened its tech capabilities. I think Huawei’s [Ren] speaks on behalf of most Chinese businesses. That is, if you try to block me, I have no choice but to work to find other solutions,” he said.An executive from China’s tech sector, who spoke to VOA on the condition of anonymity, said he’s not worried that the U.S.-China tech war will escalate. But he said China should respond to U.S. concerns.”The U.S. has made a great contribution [to the world’s tech development] and now come up with some requests. I find that reasonable, right? I think China, as a responsible country, should respect and communicate well [with the U.S.] on a reasonable basis,” he said.  Huawei chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou leaves her Vancouver home with her security detail for an extradition hearing in British Columbia Supreme Court in Vancouver, British Colombia, Jan. 21, 2020.Warning from Meng’s caseWhile tech executives look at how the long-term competition between the two countries will play out, the fate of Meng — the daughter of Huawei’s founder — will impact relations in the short term. Canada has begun week-long court hearings to determine whether to extradite Meng to the United States to stand trial on fraud charges linked to the alleged violation of U.S. sanctions against Iran.Meng, who was arrested in late 2018 in Canada, denies any wrongdoing.Regardless of the outcome of the case, said Lin of National Taiwan University, the United States has succeeded in sending a warning to those who have harmed or plan to go against U.S. tech interests.  
 
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An immersive art installation in New York City has visitors captivated. The team behind the popular attraction? It’s part human and part machine-learning algorithms. VOA’s Tina Trinh looks at what happens when artificial intelligence becomes part of the creative process
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The new U.S.-China trade agreement includes provisions that are aimed at curbing forced technology transfers, in which companies hand over technical know-how to foreign partners. For many high-tech businesses, the intellectual property behind their products represents the bulk of their companies’ value.  To learn more about the risks of IP theft, Elizabeth Lee recently visited the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, where companies talked about the risks to their technology secrets.
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A legal adviser at the European Union’s highest court said Wednesday that the bloc’s data protection rules should prevent member states from indiscriminately holding personal data seized from Internet and phone companies, even when intelligence agencies claim that national security is at stake.
In a non-binding opinion on how the European Court of Justice, or ECJ, should rule on issues relating to access by security and intelligence agencies to communications data retained by telecommunications providers, advocate general Campos Sanchez-Bordona said “the means and methods of combating terrorism must be compatible with the requirements of the rule of law.”
Commenting on a series of cases from France, the U.K. and Belgium — three countries that have been hit by extremist attacks in recent years and have reinforced surveillance — Sanchez-Bordona said that the ECJ’s case law should be upheld. He cited a case in which the court ruled that general and indiscriminate retention of communications “is disproportionate” and inconsistent with EU privacy directives.
The advocate general recommended limited access to the data, and only when it is essential “for the effective prevention and control of crime and the safeguarding of national security.”
The initial case was brought by Privacy International, a charity promoting the right to privacy. Referring to the ECJ’s case law, it said that the acquisition, use, retention, disclosure, storage and deletion of bulk personal data sets and bulk communications data by the U.K. security and intelligence agencies were unlawful under EU law.
The U.K.’s Investigatory Powers Tribunal referred the case to the ECJ, which held a joint hearing with two similar cases from France and another one from Belgium.
“We welcome today’s opinion from the advocate general and hope it will be persuasive to the Court,” said Caroline Wilson Palow, the Legal Director of Privacy International. “The opinion is a win for privacy. We all benefit when robust rights schemes, like the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, are applied and followed.”
The ECJ’s legal opinions aren’t legally binding, but are often followed by the court. The ECJ press service said a ruling is expected within two months.
“Should the court decide to follow the opinion of the advocate general, ‘metadata’ such as traffic and location data will remain subject to a high level of protection in the European Union, even when they are accessed for national security purposes,” said Luca Tosoni, a researcher at the Norwegian Research Center for Computers and Law. “This would require several member states — including Belgium, France, the U.K. and others — to amend their domestic legislation.”
  
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The National Security Agency has discovered a major security flaw in Microsoft’s Windows operating system and tipped off the company so that it can fix it.Microsoft made a software patch to fix it available Tuesday and credited the agency as the flaw’s discoverer.The company said it has not seen any evidence that hackers have used the technique discovered by the NSA.”Customers who have already applied the update, or have automatic updates enabled, are already protected,” said Jeff Jones, a senior director at Microsoft, in a statement.Priscilla Moriuchi, who retired from the NSA in 2017 after running its East Asia and Pacific operations, said this is a good example of the “constructive role” that the NSA can play in improving global information security. Moriuchi, now an analyst at the U.S. cybersecurity firm Recorded Future, said it’s likely a reflection of changes made in 2017 to how the U.S. determines whether to disclose a major vulnerability or exploit it for intelligence purposes.The revamping of what’s known as the “Vulnerability Equities Process” put more emphasis on disclosing unpatched vulnerabilities whenever possible to protect core internet systems and the U.S. economy and general public.Those changes happened after a group calling itself “Shadow Brokers” released a trove of high-level hacking tools stolen from the NSA.
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It sounds like science fiction, but a number of tech wearables are letting users control devices with their thoughts. The implications for consumers and businesses are significant. But to start out, the goal of two developers is to simply enable more productivity. Tina Trinh meets the Brooklyn team behind a thought-powered headset.
 
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China says its diplomats and government officials will fully exploit foreign social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter that are blocked off to its own citizens.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang on Monday likened the government to “diplomatic agencies and diplomats of other countries” in embracing such platforms to provide “better communication with the people outside and to better introduce China’s situation and policies.”
Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms have tried for years without success to be allowed into the lucrative Chinese market, where Beijing has helped create politically reliable analogues such as Weichat and Weibo. Their content is carefully monitored by the companies and by government censors.
Despite that, Geng said China is “willing to strengthen communication with the outside world through social media such as Twitter to enhance mutual understanding.” He also insisted that the Chinese internet remained open and said the country has the largest number of users of any nation, adding, “we have always managed the internet in accordance with laws and regulations.”
The canny use of social media by pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong has further deepened China’s concern over the use of such platforms, prompting further crackdowns on the mainland, including on the use of virtual private networks.  
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U.S. government officials are watching and waiting, with many believing it is only a matter of time before Iran lashes out in cyberspace for the U.S. drone strike that killed Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani last week.According to the latest advisory from the Department of Homeland Security, there are still “no specific, credible threats” to the United States. But officials say Iran’s public assurances that it is done retaliating mean little.“Iran has been one of the most malicious actors out there,” a senior State Department official said Thursday. “We’re very concerned about Iran’s capabilities and activities.”U.S. government officials have been hesitant to comment in any detail on what Iranian cyber actors have been up to in recent days, though they note Iran’s capabilities are on par with Russia, China and North Korea when it comes to using cyber to target industrial control systems or physical infrastructure.“DHS [Department of Homeland Security] is operating under an enhanced posture to improve coordination and situational awareness should any specific threats emerge,” a department spokesperson told VOA.The spokesperson added DHS is coordinating with U.S. intelligence agencies, key private sector companies and organizations, and is ready to “implement enhanced security measures, as needed.”Iranian Cyber ActivityBracing for a ‘significant’ attackIntelligence officials say much of Iran’s cyber activity is driven by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), sometimes using front companies or sometimes carrying out cyberattacks themselves.Past Iranian cyberattacks have ranged from distributed denial of service attacks (DDoS), which block access to websites by overwhelming the server hosting the site with internet traffic, to efforts to deface websites or attempts to steal personal data.An alert this week from the FILE – The Twitter and Facebook logos, Nov. 26, 2019.Ramping up disinformation campaignsAnd once the U.S. airstrike took out Soleimani, the Iranian disinformation machinery went into action.“As that news came out, we saw them ramp their program and start pushing that stuff out,” Hultquist said.The disinformation from Iran’s proxy forces in the Middle East further increased Tuesday during Iran’s retaliatory missile strike on Iraqi bases hosting U.S. and coalition forces — “in terms of reports coming in about certain hits that happened and numbers of casualties from the Iranian response,” said Phillip Smyth, an analyst with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who has been tracking social media activity by the Iranian-backed militias.But Iran-linked cyber actors have also eyed more ambitious campaigns.In October 2018, for example, Facebook and Instagram removed 82 accounts, pages and groups from their platforms.The posts, Facebook said, focused on “politically charged topics such as race relations, opposition to the [U.S.] president and immigration.”Facebook Removes 82 Iranian-Linked Accounts

        Facebook announced Friday that it has removed 82 accounts, pages or groups from its site and Instagram that originated in Iran, with some of the account owners posing as residents of the United States or Britain and tweeting about liberal politics.At least one of the Facebook pages had more than one million followers, the firm said. The company said it did not know if the coordinated behavior was tied to the Iranian government. 

Analysts said while those Iranian disinformation efforts paled in comparison to the campaign run by Russia in the run-up to the 2016 U.S. presidential elections, the effort showed signs of increasing sophistication, which has continued to this day.Some former U.S. officials and analysts also suspect Iran may be targeting news outlets.The Kuwaiti government Wednesday said the Kuwait News Agency’s Twitter account was hacked after it posted false reports that the U.S. was withdrawing all troops based in the country.Separately, hackers claiming to be working on behalf of Iran defaced the website of the U.S. Federal Depository Library Program.Despite suspicions and concerns, though, officials have yet to definitely attribute either attack to Iran. And there is a risk that such attacks are actually the work of other cyber actors.For example, former officials said there have been instances in the past where Russian cyber operatives hijacked Iranian infrastructure or malware to launch intrusions of their own.Targeting AmericansIran, though, has other tools it can use to strike the U.S. and the West. “Iranian cyber actors are targeting U.S. government officials, government organizations and companies to gain intelligence and position themselves for future cyber operations,” U.S. intelligence agencies warned in their most recent threat assessment.Iran’s Cyber Spies Looking to Get Personal

        Iran appears to be broadening its presence in cyberspace, stealing information that would allow its cyber spies to monitor and track key political and business officials, including some in the United States.A new, U.S. intelligence report released Tuesday warned Iranian cyber actors "are targeting U.S. Government officials, government organizations, and companies to gain intelligence and position themselves for future cyber operations."The latest Worldwide Threat Assessment also said Tehran has been…

The U.S.-based cybersecurity firms FireEye and Symantec have said their research shows Iranian-linked cyber actors have paid particular attention to telecommunications and travel companies, mining them for personal data that could prove useful in such cyber campaigns.Not everyone, however, is convinced Iran is positioned to launch a major cyber offensive.“A lot of the doom and gloom headlines that are out there right now, I think, are overblowing or overhyping the immediate cyberthreat coming from Iran,” Hoover Institution Fellow Jacquelyn Schneider said.“The reality is that Iranians have been conducting these cyberattacks over the last year, if not longer,” she said, adding that while there may well be an uptick in attacks, “they’ve been trying this entire time.”Still, a former U.S. National Security Agency threat manager cautions even a small cyberattack can inadvertently do widespread damage.“There’s always the potential that an attack or an intrusion, which is physically or strategically designed to only impact a certain geography or certain network, creeps to other parts of the network,” said Priscilla Moriuchi, now head of nation-state research at the cybersecurity firm Recorded Future.
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Vietnamese startups are heading into the new year looking to avoid the mistakes of such companies as Uber and WeWork, which disappointed investors in 2019 for failing to turn a profit after so much buildup.Investors and entrepreneurs in the communist nation are taking a more critical look at their businesses after seeing others get burned overseas. WeWork, which rents out shared workspaces, was seen as a cautionary tale of a startup that did not live up to expectations and was not profitable.For years, investors were willing to back losing businesses to gain market share. But now, there is more scrutiny of new investments.Benchmarks setThe Vietnam Innovative Startup Accelerator (VIISA) requires its technology startups to meet a list of benchmarks throughout their time in the program.“Apart from very intuitive selection criteria that all applying startups have to go through, the program has introduced a new development measurement method, which helps us to capture the progress of startups that are accepted into VIISA,” Hieu Vo, a board member and chief financial officer at VIISA, said. “I think this process will bring out the best in each person for the particular business they have founded and committed to.”Vo said his colleagues sit down with startups when they join the accelerator to discuss key performance indicators, or KPI, that will be set as goals. VIISA also does training for the young businesses so they have quantifiable skills, such as how to structure a business deal, or how to set up their accounting system.Having metrics and ratings, Vo said, supports “both business performance, as well as personal transformation of founders.”Founder scrutinyThe founder as an individual has become a point of scrutiny for investors, who used to be more forgiving of an eccentric or aggressive founder, seen as part of the package to have a tech genius head an innovative business. But there has been a backlash among those who think too much permissiveness can damage a business, from the sexual misconduct amid the workplace culture of Uber, to the conflicts of interest in business decisions at WeWork.It helps to not just think short term and to have an outside perspective, according to Pham Manh Ha, founder and chief executive officer of Beekrowd, an investment platform in Ho Chi Minh City.“As a first-time founder, it seems impossible for us to look beyond the first six months to a year of our business,” he said, adding that experienced third parties can help businesses take the long view. “They stand outside the trees that are blocking us from seeing the forest.”To see the forest, Vietnamese businesses like his are taking a more measured approach. Vietnam has seen an escalation of tech startups, as investors have rushed to put their money to work and take advantage of the economy’s fast growth.They also remember the dot-com bubble in the United States, and the more recent global tech bubble, two reminders for caution.
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Building a tech startup is not easy, especially in countries with less-established tech industries. Nevertheless, many global entrepreneurs are determined to succeed, and the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas is their chance to prove themselves to the rest of the industry. VOA’s Tina Trinh met with startup founders from Senegal, Ukraine and Thailand.
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Despite escalating pressure ahead of the 2020 presidential election, Facebook reaffirmed its freewheeling policy on political ads Thursday, saying it won’t ban them, won’t fact-check them and won’t limit how they can be targeted to specific groups of people.Instead, Facebook said it will offer users slightly more control over how many political ads they see and make its online library of political ads easier to use.These steps appear unlikely to assuage critics — including politicians, activists, tech competitors and some of the company’s own rank-and-file employees — who say that Facebook has too much power and that social media is warping democracy and undermining elections.And Facebook’s stance stands in contrast to what its rivals are doing. Google has decided to limit targeting of political ads, while Twitter is banning them outright.Facebook Ads Show Russian Effort to Stoke Political Division

        Democrats on the House intelligence committee have released more than 3,500 Facebook ads that were created or promoted by a Russian internet agency, providing the fullest picture yet of Russia's attempt to sow racial and political division in the United States before and after the 2016 election.

Most of the ads are issue-based, pushing arguments for and against immigration, LGBT issues and gun rights, among other issues. A large number of them attempt to stoke racial divisions by mentioning police…
Since last fall, Facebook has insisted that it won’t fact-check political ads, a move that critics say gives politicians license to lie. CEO Mark Zuckerberg has repeatedly argued that “political speech is important” and that Facebook doesn’t want to interfere with it.Google, the digital ads leader, is limiting political-ad targeting to broad categories such as sex, age and postal code.Facebook said in a blog post Thursday that it considered limiting custom audience targeting, known as microtargeting, for political ads. But it said it learned about the importance of such practices for “reaching key audiences” after talking with political campaigns from both major parties in the U.S., political groups and nonprofits.The company said it was guided by the principle that “people should be able to hear from those who wish to lead them, warts and all, and that what they say should be scrutinized and debated in public.”Facebook does plan to let users choose to see fewer political and social-issue ads, although it won’t let people exclude them entirely. It’s also going to let people choose whether or not to see ads, political or otherwise, from advertisers targeting them using their contact details, such as email address or phone number.US House Panel to Publicly Release Russia Facebook Ads

        The leaders of the U.S. 

The company is also tweaking its ad library so people can search for exact phrases and limit results using filters such as dates and regions reached.Facebook’s ad library currently lets anyone find out how much was spent on an ad, how many times it was seen, and the age, gender and location of the people who saw it.Sam Jeffers, co-founder of Who Targets Me, an advocacy group researching political advertising, said Facebook is wise to permit microtargeting for political ads, despite calls for a ban.He said it is better to provide more background information on ads because it can give more insight into the actors behind them and their strategies. Facebook has made a start in that direction by adding information on an ad’s audience size, but he said it should give much more explanation about targeted ads.“By making it easier for you to understand what data’s in there, you can also understand what the advertiser’s intent was,” Jeffers said.The changes related to ad disclosures will go into effect over the next three months in the U.S. and other countries where Facebook puts the “paid for by” disclaimers on political ads. The political-ad controls won’t roll out in the U.S. until early summer.
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Facebook has decided not to limit how political ads can be targeted to specific groups of people, as its main digital-ad rival Google did in November to fight misinformation. Neither will it ban political ads outright, as Twitter did last October. And Facebook still won’t fact check them, as it’s faced pressure to do.Instead, it is announcing much more limited “transparency features” that aim to give users slightly more control over how many political ads they see and to make its online library of political ads easier to use.Facebook Ads Show Russian Effort to Stoke Political Division

        Democrats on the House intelligence committee have released more than 3,500 Facebook ads that were created or promoted by a Russian internet agency, providing the fullest picture yet of Russia's attempt to sow racial and political division in the United States before and after the 2016 election.

Most of the ads are issue-based, pushing arguments for and against immigration, LGBT issues and gun rights, among other issues. A large number of them attempt to stoke racial divisions by mentioning police…
These steps appear unlikely to assuage critics — including some of the company’s rank and file employees — who say Facebook has too much power and not enough limits when it comes to its effects on elections and democracy itself.Since last fall, Facebook has insisted that it won’t fact-check political ads, a move that critics say gives politicians license to lie in ads that can’t be easily monitored by outsiders. CEO Mark Zuckerberg has repeatedly argued that “political speech is important” and that Facebook doesn’t want to interfere with it.Google, the digital ads leader, is limiting political-ad targeting to broad categories such as sex, age and postal code.Facebook said in a blog post Thursday that it considered limiting custom audience targeting, known as microtargeting, for political ads. But the social network said it learned about their importance for “reaching key audiences” after conducting outreach with political campaigns from both major parties in the U.S., political groups and nonprofits.US House Panel to Publicly Release Russia Facebook Ads

        The leaders of the U.S. 

The company said it was guided by the principle that “people should be able to hear from those who wish to lead them, warts and all, and that what they say should be scrutinized and debated in public.”Facebook does plan to let users choose to see “fewer” political and social-issue ads, although it won’t let people exclude them entirely. It’s also going to let people choose whether or not to see ads, political or otherwise, from advertisers targeting them using their contact details such as email address or phone number.The company is also tweaking its ad library so people can search for exact phrases and limit results using filters such as ad-audience size, dates and regions reached.Facebook’s ad library currently lets anyone find out how much was spent on an ad, how many times it was seen, and the age, gender and location of the people who saw it.Sam Jeffers, co-founder of Who Targets Me, an advocacy group researching political advertising, said Facebook was wise to permit microtargeting for political ads, despite some calls for a ban.He said it was better to provide more information on ads because it would give more insight into the actors behind them and their strategies. Facebook has made a start in that direction by adding information on an ad’s audience size, but it should give much more explanation about targeted ads, which he said are based on databases cross-referencing people’s emails with, for example, their voting history and credit scores.“By making it easier for you to understand what data’s in there, you can also understand what the advertiser’s intent was,” Jeffers said.Facebook says 85% of targeted advertising campaigns by U.S. presidential candidates are aimed at audiences of more than 250,000 people. But given that the 2016 election was effectively decided by roughly 100,000 voters in three or four states, Jeffers said, Facebook should do more to let people monitor political campaigns and their advertising in real time.Jeffers also said he welcomed the improvements to the ad library, “assuming that people actually bother to use it.”The changes related to ad disclosures will go into effect over the next three months in the U.S. and other countries where Facebook puts the “paid for by” disclaimers on political ads. The political-ad controls won’t roll out in the U.S. until early summer; the company will “eventually” expand them to other regions.
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A startup heavily backed  by Hollywood is wagering that you’re ready to set aside YouTube and TikTok to watch star-studded short videos on your phone — for a price.The company behind this billion-dollar bet is Quibi, which is preparing to offer movies, shows and other short-form video designed for viewing in short bursts on mobile devices. It’s an enormous gamble, especially considering that several earlier efforts in mobile entertainment — most notably Verizon’s ill-fated Go90 service — fell flat.Founded by former Disney studios chief and DreamWorks co-founder Jeffrey Katzenberg and helmed by former Hewlett Packard Enterprise CEO Meg Whitman, Quibi is heavy on big ideas and Hollywood muscle. It has backing from all the major movie studios and entertainment companies, $1 billion invested in original programming, and star power in the form of creators and producers from Steven Spielberg to Chrissy Teigen.Quibi plans to launch April 6. It will charge $5 a month for an ad-supported service, and $8 a month for an ad-free version.Company executives argued at CES that Quibi will offer the first entertainment platform designed exclusively for the phone. In an interview at CES, Katzenberg said it represents the first time “professional storytellers” have tackled the problem of delivering a high-quality viewing experience on mobile.Quibi founder Jeffrey Katzenberg speaks during a Quibi keynote address at the 2020 CES in Las Vegas, Nevada, Jan. 8, 2020.But the big question is whether a subscription service like Quibi can attract mobile viewers — particularly younger ones — already immersed in an ocean of free-to-watch short video on YouTube and other social-media services. It will also go up against roughly a half-dozen other paid streaming platforms from Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and Hulu to Disney Plus and upcoming services from WarnerMedia and NBC Universal.Upcoming showsDuring the keynote, Quibi previewed shows including “Don’t Look Deeper,” a sci-fi show starring Don Cheadle and Emily Mortimer, and “#Freerayshawn” a crime thriller starring Laurence Fishburne as a cop and executive produced by “Training Day” director Antoine Fuqua. Shows and movies, as well as other material like news and weather, are designed to be watched in “quick bites” of 10 minutes or less.”‘Paid premium short form (video)’ has never been in the same sentence, it has never really been proven,” said Seth Shapiro, managing partner at Pacific Strategy Partners. “That’s the challenge.” Among other things, he noted, it’s already possible for people to watch those other services in the same quick bites Quibi plans.Quibi executives at the CES gadget show in Las Vegas showed off technology on Wednesday designed to make video viewing on the phone easier. For instance, it will let you watch full-screen video whether you hold the phone upright or sideways.Filmmakers deliver two edits to the company, one vertical, one horizontal, and Quibi stitches them together with one audio track. Some creators have incorporated that feature into their productions, as in one show in which horizontal viewing delivers a traditional picture — but turning the phone upright displays a view from the main character’s phone camera.AdvertisingAdvertisers, at least, are on board. Quibi said it has sold out its $150 million first-year advertising slots to blue-chip companies including Procter & Gamble, Anheuser Busch, General Mills, Google, T-Mobile and Walmart. Ads will appear before shows and aren’t skippable.Jeff Wlodarczak, principal analyst at Pivotal Research Group, says he understands why advertisers are flocking to the product. Millennials can be hard to reach, he said, and when a brand places ads on YouTube or Snapchat, they never quite know what kind of video they might end up next to.Quibi offers a safe place for advertisers by delivering a known quantity “as opposed to people doing something stupid on YouTube,” he said.That advertising model will stick around, Whitman said. Quibi guarantees that all creators own their own intellectual property, and can repackage it and take it wherever else they want after seven years. It brought creators in, but it also means that Quibi needs both subscriber dollars and advertising revenue to stay afloat.The company just closed on another $400 million equity funding round from investors, Whitman said, and has a plan to be profitable “soon.”Others have tried short-form content, mostly in ad-supported form. Facebook Watch features original shows with episodes as short as 12 or 13 minutes, but none have garnered much buzz or mainstream attention so far. Verizon pulled the plug on Go90 in 2018, roughly three years after it launched; several concurrent efforts have also shut down. Meanwhile, Netflix, Amazon and Hulu have all been experimenting with short-form offerings,  many of them in comedy.Quibi is “either brilliant or tone deaf,” said Tim Hanlon, CEO of Vertere Group. “I just don’t know what the answer is and I don’t think anybody does.”
 
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When the nation’s largest electric utility preemptively shut off power last fall to prevent wildfires in California, customers lost more than just their lights — some lost their phones, too.Data from the Federal Communications Commission shows 874 cellphone towers were offline during an Oct. 27 power shutoff that affected millions of people. That included more than half of the cell towers in Marin County alone.
The outages mean people who depend solely on cellphones couldn’t call 911 or receive emergency notifications, compounding the dangers associated with an unprecedented power outage in an era dominated by wireless communication.
On Wednesday, some Democratic lawmakers introduced legislation that would require telecommunication companies to have at least 72 hours of back-up power for all cell phone towers in high-risk fire areas. Telecom companies would have to pay for it.
Sen. Mike McGuire said he wrote the bill after meeting with telecom company officials last summer, where he said they assured him they had plans to prevent widespread outages during a power shutoff.
“As we all know, this wasn’t true. They were wrong. And, candidly, lives were put at risk,” McGuire said.
The federal government has tried to mandate backup power for cell phone towers in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. But the industry successfully fought it.
“Do I believe we are in for a fight? Hell yes,” McGuire said, adding: “This is no longer a discussion about cost.”
McGuire announced his bill on the same day representatives from AT&T and Verizon were scheduled to testify before state lawmakers about the outages and ways to prevent them.  It’s the second time lawmakers will have hauled in private companies to account for the effects surrounding the widespread blackouts in the fall, the largest planned power outages in state history.
In November, lawmakers questioned executives from the state’s largest investor-owned utilities, including the leadership of troubled Pacific Gas & Electric, whose equipment has been blamed for sparking the 2018 Camp Fire that killed 85 people and destroyed roughly 19,000 buildings. The company filed for bankruptcy last year.
Telecommunications outages have worsened as wildfires have become more common and more destructive. A report from the California Public Utilities Commission found 85,000 wireless customers and 160,000 wired customers lost service during the 2017 North Bay Fires.
Most recently, the FCC says up to 27% of Sonoma County’s wireless cell sites were offline during a fire in October.
 In advance comments to the legislative committee, California’s four largest wireless companies — AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon — say they generally make sure their major telecommunication hubs have at least between 48 hours and 72 hours of on-site backup power. They use mobile generators at other sites, but said the generators don’t work at every cell tower.
Also, the companies said the electric company warns them about blackouts just two hours ahead of time, making it hard for them to get their mobile generators in place and to keep them fueled.
AT&T spokesman Steven Maviglio said the company is experienced in managing large-scale outages, but noted “the power companies’ decision to shut off power to millions of Californians in October was the largest event our state had ever seen.”
 “Today, we are investing hundreds of millions of dollars in our network resiliency to address these new challenges and will continue to work to ensure our customers have the connectivity they need,” Maviglio said.
Last year, the Legislature passed a law requiring telecommunications companies to report large outages to the Office of Emergency Services within one hour of discovering them. Officials are still developing regulations for that law.  
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