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 TikTok’s Chinese parent company ByteDance has agreed to pay $92 million (roughly Rs. 670 crore) in a settlement to US users who are part of a class-action lawsuit alleging that the video-sharing app failed to get their consent to collect data in violation of a strict Illinois privacy law. The federal lawsuit alleged that TikTok

TikTok received over 100 legal requests for information from Indian law enforcement in the second half of 2020, despite being banned in India since June 30, 2020. In fact, it was the second highest number of requests TikTok got from any country, after only the US, despite not being accessible in the country during this

Twitter seems to have started labelling tweets with its “hacked materials” warning that contain links to news stories based on hacked or leaked documents. The update isn’t brand new as the microblogging network briefly blocked links to a New York Post story in October last year that was allegedly based on the material obtained from

Gab instead of Twitter, MeWe over Facebook, Telegram for messaging and Discord for insiders – banned from mainstream platforms, US conspiracy and supremacist movements, many of which support Donald Trump, have shifted to networks that are more confidential, and harder to regulate. “The most extreme Trump supporters were already on alternative platforms,” said Nick Backovic,

Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI), the country’s self-regulatory voluntary organisation for advertising, has issued a set of draft guidelines that directs that all social media influencers must prominently label content that promotes products and services on digital platforms. The guidelines come at a time when leading brands are gradually leaning more on influencers on

WhatsApp is perhaps the most popular app in India, but there’s one useful feature that’s a little hard to find – the ability to make notes to yourself. Other messaging apps like Signal come with this feature, which is helpful for making lists, saving links, and more. WhatsApp is used to share text messages, photos, videos,

Facebook has started blocking sensitive health information that third-party apps had been sharing with the social network in violation of its own rules, said New York officials who investigated the situation. Data fed into a Facebook analytics tool by app makers included medical diagnoses and whether users were pregnant, according to a report shared by

Elon Musk called cash “dumb” when compared to Bitcoin. The Tesla CEO, who’s known for not holding back when it comes to his posts on social media, tweeted on Friday that Bitcoin “is simply a less dumb form of liquidity than cash.” He also suggested that fiat currency (government-issued currency) has “negative real interest” and

Thailand warned users of Clubhouse on Wednesday not to break the law after the audio social media app emerged almost overnight as a platform for discussion of the monarchy, the latest example of the fast-growing app drawing the ire of governments in Asia. Digital minister Puttipong Punnakanta said the Thai authorities were watching Clubhouse users,

Facebook was fined EUR 7 million (roughly Rs. 61 crore) by an Italian watchdog for not complying with a request by the regulator to correct improper commercial practices in the group’s treatment of user data. Facebook was not immediately available for comment. In November 2018, the antitrust body ruled that Facebook had not informed users

Accused by the Trump administration of being a front for the Chinese government, TikTok’s advertisement business looked bleak last July. Big brands backed off on spending even as TikTok executives offered refunds to advertisers in the event the hot social media platform were to be banned from operating in the United States. But after it

The Bank of Italy said on Monday a set of experimental indicators it created from the content of millions of tweets accurately tracked consumer mood on price, offering scope for a powerful new monetary policy tool. The effort comes as economists and policy-makers around the world increasingly turn to social media and other unconventional sources

One of the most popular features of WhatsApp is the ability to send stickers. If you have migrated to Signal have after WhatsApp’s privacy policy changes, you might have been taken aback by the sparsity of default sticker packs. So here’s a quick guide to downloading some extra stickers and even creating some of your

TikTok paret China’s ByteDance is said to be exploring the sale of the India operations of TikTok to rival unicorn Glance, Bloomberg News reported on Saturday. The discussions, initiated by Japan’s SoftBank Group Corp, are private, early and complex, the report said, citing people familiar with the matter. Glance’s parent, mobile advertising technology firm InMobi,

Twitter has withheld the account of Rajya Sabha member Sukhram Singh Yadav, as first reported by MediaNama. This move follows updates provided by the social media platform on its response to the government’s orders to block accounts that allegedly spread misinformation about the farmers’ protest against new farm laws. Twitter mentioned in its response that

Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella said social-media services like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube need clearer laws and rules to govern whether controversial accounts, like former US President Donald Trump’s, have a place on their services, rather than being asked to make free-speech decisions themselves. “Unilateral action by individual companies in democracies like ours is

Canadian e-commerce company Shopify said on Tuesday it would expand its payment option, “Shop Pay,” to all users choosing to sell on Facebook and Instagram. The move marks the first time the feature will be available outside Shopify’s platform and will help the company tap into the rise of shopping through social media platforms during

Union Minister Piyush Goyal on Tuesday tweeted about joining homegrown Twitter alternative Koo. The new development comes in the midst of a tussle between the government and Twitter over content censorship during the ongoing farmers’ protest in India. Launched in March last year, Koo is a Twitter-like microblogging experience in Indian languages. The app won