After years of moving fast and breaking things, governments around the world are waking up to the dangers of uncontrolled tech platforms and starting to think of ways to rein in those platforms. Sometimes, that means data privacy measures like the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) or more recent measures passed in the wake of Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica scandal. On the smaller side, it takes the form of specific ad restrictions, transparency measures, or anti-tracking protocols. With such a broad problem, nearly any solution is on the table. It’s still too early to say whether those measures will be focused on Facebook, Google, or the tech industry at large. At the same time, conservative lawmakers are eager to use accusations of bias as a way to influence moderation policy, making the specter of strong regulation all the more controversial. Whatever next steps Congress and the courts decide to take, you can track the latest updates here.
New industry-backed research shows how waste from deep-sea mining could have far-reaching effects on fish and their food.
“All these nuke bros who know nothing about operating a reactor, they just want a free pass,” Allison Macfarlane, former chairman of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, tells Bloomberg. “They can have their free pass, but then they will have an accident.”
Italian regulators announced an age verification system that will be rolled out on November 12th to prevent minors from accessing around 50 websites that host pornographic content. The UK and France introduced similar rules this year, both resulting in a significant spike in VPN downloads.
In the memo, Gates tries to make the case that there’s too much focus on cutting greenhouse gas emissions and not enough on public health and poverty. It’s a narrative that lets polluters off the hook and plays into Trump’s efforts to rollback environmental protections and spread disinformation about climate change.
Coal-fired power plants pumped out as much as 20 percent more particle pollution during the last federal government shutdown in 2018 and 2019 as the US Environmental Protection Agency froze inspections.
The current shutdown has lasted nearly a month now, inching closer to the 2018-2019 record for the longest in history.
After a ten-month investigation, the Competition and Markets Authority has designated Apple and Google’s mobile platforms with “strategic market status,” describing them as having “substantial, entrenched market power.” The companies now face extra anti-competition regulations in the UK, following a similar ruling for Google Search.
Luckily Brendan Carr is looking out for them, trying to waive onerous requirements like “telling customers what fees they’ll be paying” so that these plucky upstarts can soldier on.
desertsessions:
These poor burdened ISPs. Won’t someone think of the ISPs.
Get the day’s best comment and more in my free newsletter, The Verge Daily.
With the government still shut down, the Trump administration announced more layoffs across the already decimated federal workforce. That includes EPA employees who worked on battery recycling and safety, plastics reduction, recycling and composting programs, and collecting solid waste data, according to the EPA union.
It only took nine months, but the Competition and Markets Authority has designated Google Search with “strategic market status,” meaning it’s eligible for extra UK regulation. AI Mode has been factored in, but not AI assistants like Gemini. Similar decisions on Android and iOS are due this month.
The Environmental Protection Agency wants to stop collecting data on greenhouse gas emissions from power plants and other polluting sites. The proposed rule change comes as the Trump administration attempts to get rid of the agency’s ability to regulate planet-heating pollution at all.
[The New York Times]
“They’re doing away with science,” Christine Todd Whitman, former Environmental Protection Agency administrator and former Republican governor of New Jersey, tells Bloomberg. That only makes it harder to prepare for the consequences of a warming world, from eroding coastlines to more devastating wildfires across the US.
“If they overturn this, it would leave the public responsible for cleaning up, not the companies that knowingly polluted the land,” University of California, San Francisco professor Tracey Woodruff tells The New York Times, which first reported on the proposal.
In a split decision, the DC Circuit Court lifted a preliminary injunction preventing the administration from continuing mass layoffs at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The union suing the administration still has seven days to file a petition for the case to be reheard before the injunction is lifted.
Ofcom is now investigating whether four companies that collectively run 34 pornography sites are complying with new Online Safety Act (OSA) rules that require them to have “highly effective age checks” in place — the same rules that are widely restricting parts of the internet across the UK. Other OSA investigations were already underway, but these are the first to fall under the age verification requirements.
The search giant has followed OpenAI in signing the EU’s voluntary AI code of practice, after Meta snubbed the agreement over “legal uncertainties.” Google also has its complaints despite signing, saying in a statement:
“We remain concerned that the AI Act and Code risk slowing Europe’s development and deployment of AI. In particular, departures from EU copyright law, steps that slow approvals, or requirements that expose trade secrets could chill European model development and deployment.”
[blog.google]
The Trump administration wants to build data center projects on Superfund sites, and with as little oversight as possible.
