TikTok suing Trump administration over executive order

App says in blogpost it strongly disagrees with White House position that it is a national security threat

TikTok, the fast-growing video sharing app, announced it was suing the US government on Monday over an executive order banning transactions with the Chinese company in the US.

In a blogpost, TikTok said it strongly disagreed with the White House’s position that the company was a national security threat, saying it had “taken extraordinary measures to protect the privacy and security of TikTok’s US user data”.

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Microsoft joins court battle between Apple and Fortnite maker Epic

Dispute over in-app purchases is seen as proxy war over future of App Store

Microsoft has joined the court battle between Apple and Epic Games, filing a legal brief supporting the Fortnite developer’s right to carry on developing software for Mac and iOS while the case continues.

The submission, signed by Kevin Gammill, the executive in charge of supporting developers on Microsoft’s Xbox console, is further evidence that the lawsuit over in-app purchases in Fortnite is set to become a proxy war over the future of the App Store.

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UK to drop ‘Facebook tax’ in favour of post-Brexit trade deal

Recently introduced tax would have raised £500m, helping to reduce Britain’s huge Covid bill

The UK government is preparing to drop a recently introduced tax on global technology companies such as Facebook, Google and Amazon, due to fears that the so-called “Facebook tax” could jeopardise a post-Brexit trade deal.

Rishi Sunak is reportedly planning to ditch the digital services tax which was expected to generate about £500m to help pay towards the huge cost of the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic.

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Your data is not destined for China, assures TikTok’s UK boss

The controversial app’s users are ignoring geopolitical battle over its digital security, says Richard Waterworth

TikTok’s UK chief has strenuously denied the video-sharing app, which Donald Trump has threatened to ban, shares data with China.

Richard Waterworth told the Observer that the UK and European arm of TikTok was growing quickly, despite the “turbulent” geopolitical battle in which the Chinese-born app has found itself.

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Facebook restricts more than 10,000 QAnon and US militia groups

Move is part of a broad Facebook policy shift toward movements with links to violence such as baseless internet conspiracy Qanon

Facebook has taken down or restricted more than 10,000 groups, pages and Instagram accounts associated with QAnon, US-based militia groups, and organizations that promote violent acts at protests. The moves are the result of a shift in the company’s policy toward movements with links to violence that do not meet the criteria for an outright ban.

Facebook will still allow people to post content that supports these movements, but “will restrict their ability to organize” on the platform by removing them from recommendation algorithms, reducing their ranking in news feed and search results, and prohibiting them from using features such as fundraising and advertising, the company said. Facebook will also remove pages, groups and accounts that discuss violence, and said it will study the terminology and symbolism that groups typically use to disguise their intent.

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Elon Musk becomes world’s fourth richest man on Tesla boom

Inventor now worth $90bn, trailing Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos

Elon Musk has soared through the global wealth league this year and become the world’s fourth richest person, after a boom in the share price of the Tesla car company he co-founded and part-owns increased his wealth by more than $13.3bn (£10bn) in two days of trading.

The Silicon Valley inventor and entrepreneur is now worth more than $90bn and has overtaken France’s richest person, the luxury goods tycoon Bernard Arnault, chairman of Louis Vuitton, cementing the place of American tech plutocrats at the top of the world’s rich list.

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Google Maps gets worldwide visual overhaul

Updated version promises ‘more vibrant’ representation of natural features and built environment

Google Maps is getting a visual overhaul worldwide, finally letting users distinguish forest from floodplain, and desert from snowfield, at a glance.

Alongside the changes to natural environments, a new set of maps will be rolling out in major cities, beginning with London, New York City and San Francisco, aiming to more accurately represent the built-up environment to help pedestrians and cyclists navigate.

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Loo with a view: transparent public toilets installed in Tokyo parks

Amenities designed so prospective users can inspect their cleanliness from the outside

It sounds like the worst kind of anxiety dream – a public toilet cubicle that appears to offer the promise of blessed relief, but which on closer inspection turns out to be entirely see-through.

That, though, is the design feature behind several toilets that recently opened in public parks in Tokyo.

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Google giving far-right users’ data to law enforcement, documents reveal

Exclusive: in some cases Google did not necessarily ban users who were often threatening violence or expressing extremist views

A little-known investigative unit inside search giant Google regularly forwarded detailed personal information on the company’s users to members of a counter-terrorist fusion center in California’s Bay Area, according to leaked documents reviewed by the Guardian.

But checking the documents against Google’s platforms reveals that in some cases Google did not necessarily ban the users they reported to the authorities, and some still have accounts on YouTube, Gmail and other services.

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Apple and Google remove Fortnite video game from app stores

Move over payment guideline violations prompts maker Epic Games to take legal action

Apple and Google have removed the enormously popular video game Fortnite from their app stores for violating their in-app payment guidelines, prompting the maker, Epic Games, to take legal action challenging the tech giants’ iron grip over the industry.

Its removal from Apple’s App Store and Google’s Play Store came after Fortnite circumvented the companies’ in-app payment system and hefty fees, encouraging users to pay the gaming company directly.

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Facebook and other tech giants ‘too big to fail’

Researchers call for new regulations to protect users, and society, in case of collapse

Like banks in the 2008 financial crisis, Facebook and other tech giants are “too big to fail”, according to research from Oxford University that calls for new regulations to protect users, and society, in the event of a possible collapse.

In their paper, published in the Internet Policy Review journal on Tuesday, Carl Öhmana and Nikita Aggarwal argue that the world’s biggest technology companies are unlikely to suddenly go out of business – but the world is unprepared for what would happen if they did.

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Powerhouses: nanotechnology turns bricks into batteries

Research could pave way for cheap supercapacitor storage of renewable energy

The humble house brick has been turned into a battery that can store electricity, raising the possibility that buildings could one day become literal powerhouses.

The new technology exploits the porous nature of fired red bricks by filling the pores with tiny nanofibres of a conducting plastic that can store charge. The first bricks store enough electricity to power small lights. But if their capacity can be increased, they may become a low-cost alternative to the lithium-ion batteries currently used.

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Revealed: QAnon Facebook groups are growing at a rapid pace around the world

Guardian investigation finds the Facebook communities are gaining followers as Twitter cracks down on QAnon content

New and established QAnon groups on Facebook are growing at a rapid pace and helping to spread the baseless and dangerous conspiracy theory to new countries around the world, a Guardian investigation has found.

The Guardian has documented more than 170 QAnon groups, pages and accounts across Facebook and Instagram with more than 4.5 million aggregate followers. The Guardian has also documented dedicated communities for QAnon followers in at least 15 countries on Facebook.

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Uber and Lyft must classify drivers as employees, judge rules, in blow to gig economy

Preliminary injunction in California follows state’s lawsuit against companies over new labor law

A California judge has issued a preliminary injunction that would block Uber and Lyft from classifying their drivers as independent contractors rather than employees.

The move on Monday came in response to a May lawsuit filed by the state of California against the companies, which alleged they are misclassifying their drivers under the state’s new labor law.

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Prince Harry hits out at social media for creating ‘crisis of hate’

Duke of Sussex urges advertisers to demand companies do more to curb hate speech online

Prince Harry has hit out at social media companies for creating a “crisis of hate” and called for “meaningful digital reform” after an unprecedented advertiser boycott of Facebook.

In an opinion piece for the US business magazine Fast Company, the Duke of Sussex revealed that he and his wife, Meghan, had begun campaigning for change in social media “a little over four weeks ago”.

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Trump bans US transactions with Chinese-owned TikTok and WeChat

Executive order comes as TikTok faces scrutiny from US lawmakers and Trump administration over national security concerns

Donald Trump has issued a pair of executive orders that would ban any US transactions with the Chinese companies that own TikTok and WeChat, saying the US must take “aggressive action” in the interest of national security.

Executive orders issued late on Thursday would prohibit “any transaction by any person, or with respect to any property, subject to the jurisdiction of the United States,” with the companies, beginning in 45 days.

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Facebook removes Trump post for spreading false information on Covid

Post included video in which Trump wrongly said that children were ‘almost immune’ from illness

Facebook has removed a post from Donald Trump’s page for spreading false information about the coronavirus, a first for the social company that has been harshly criticized for repeatedly allowing the president to break its content rules.

The post included video of Trump falsely asserting that children were “almost immune from Covid-19” during an appearance on Fox News. There is evidence to suggest that children who contract Covid-19 generally experience milder symptoms than adults do. However, they are not immune, and some children have become severely ill or died from the disease.

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New York unveils landmark antitrust bill that makes it easier to sue tech giants

The legislation comes as a federal panel is investigating the market power of Facebook, Amazon, Apple and Google

New York state is introducing a bill that would make it easier to sue big tech companies for alleged abuses of their monopoly powers.

New York is America’s financial center and one of its most important tech hubs. If successfully passed, the law could serve as a model for future legislation across the country. It also comes as a federal committee is conducting an anti-trust investigation into tech giants amid concerns that their unmatched market power is suppressing competition.

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TikTok row: China hits out at US ‘smash and grab’ as tech dispute deepens

Foreign affairs spokesman accuses US of hypocrisy and editorial in state-run newspaper decries choice between submission at ‘mortal combat’

The US has offered China the “choice of submission or mortal combat in the tech realm”, state media in Beijing have said, as the two rival powers manoeuvred on the thorny issue of splitting up TikTok.

The popular video-sharing app has joined Huawei to become a technology flashpoint, with Chinese officials and media rushing to defend it following Donald Trump’s threat of a US ban.

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WhatsApp spyware attack: senior clergymen in Togo among activists targeted

Bishop from Togo among 1,400 individuals alerted by WhatsApp to malware attack

A prominent Catholic bishop and a priest in Togo have been told they were targeted by spyware made by the private surveillance firm NSO Group, in the first known case of its kind involving members of the clergy.

A joint investigation by the Guardian and the French newspaper Le Monde can reveal that Bishop Benoît Alowonou and five other critics of Togo’s repressive government were alerted by WhatsApp last year that their mobile phones had been targeted with the spying technology.

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