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A group of six Republican senators on Friday asked the US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen about an ongoing Biden administration national security review of social media platform TikTok. The US government’s Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), which reviews deals by foreign acquirers for potential national security risks, in 2020 ordered Chinese

Social media personality Khaby Lame has achieved a new record of garnering 142.8 million followers on the short-form video hosting service, TikTok. Lame, has surged past popular TikTok video creator Charli D’Amelio who currently has 142.3 million followers, reported Variety. The 22-year-old’s video content includes reacting to absurd life-hack videos and recreating the video himself

Alphabet’s Google may face a fine of 5-10 percent of its turnover in Russia for what the state communications regulator said on Wednesday was a repeated failure to delete banned content, including “misleading information” on YouTube about events in Ukraine. This is the second fine based on a percentage of turnover that Google could face

The Telegram messaging app, used by a wide range of Russian and Ukrainian officials during the war, only needs a small number of paid subscribers to cover its costs, founder Pavel Durov said on Tuesday. Telegram Premium service users will get a higher limit for chats, media and file uploads, Durov said on June 10,

China’s Tencent announced to its staff on Monday the official formation of an ‘extended reality’ (XR) unit, three people familiar with the matter said, formally placing its bets on the metaverse concept of virtual worlds. The unit is tasked with building up the extended reality business for Tencent including both software and hardware, the sources

TikTok said it has completed migrating information on its US users to servers at Oracle, in a move that could address US regulatory concerns over data integrity on the popular short video app. The move, which was first reported by Reuters, comes nearly two years after a US national security panel ordered parent company ByteDance

Facebook-owner Meta Platforms is launching a digital clothing store where users can purchase designer outfits for their avatars, Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said on Friday. Initial fashion brands participating in the store launch will be Balenciaga, Prada, and Thom Browne, but Meta aims to make the store an open marketplace where developers can create and

YouTube on Friday pulled a video posted by the congressional committee probing last year’s attack on the US Capitol because it contained election misinformation spread by then president Donald Trump. “Our election integrity policy prohibits content advancing false claims that widespread fraud, errors or glitches changed the outcome of the 2020 US presidential election, if

Meta, Alphabet unit Google, Twitter and Microsoft on Thursday, June 16 agreed to take a tougher line against disinformation including deep fakes and fake accounts under an updated EU code of practice or face hefty fines. More than 30 signatories including advertising bodies have signed up to the updated Code of Practice on disinformation, the

YouTube is getting a new feature called Corrections that allows creators to fix errors or add updates to their already published videos. With the latest functionality, creators can edit the errors in the descriptions of their video and they will be able to provide a written correction based on the change. A corrections info card

WhatsApp users are finally getting the option to switch from an Android phone to an iPhone after much anticipation. The instant messaging app on Tuesday announced the new capability in beta. The update has enabled users to transfer their WhatsApp account information, profile photo, individual and group chats, chat history, media, and settings from an

Elon Musk will speak to Twitter Inc employees this week for the first time at a company-wide meeting since launching his $44 billion (roughly Rs. 3,43,500 crore) bid in April, a source said on Monday, citing an email from Twitter Chief Executive Parag Agrawal to staff. The meeting is scheduled for Thursday, and Musk will take questions

Facebook’s parent company Meta and a French digital training firm will launch a “metaverse academy” in France for the new academic year, the two organisations said on Sunday. Seen as the internet’s next great technological development, the metaverse refers to an immersive digital world that aims to recreate real life via augmented or virtual reality

Meta on Friday said that it is adding the ability to easily socialise in virtual reality with an update to its Quest 2 headsets in another step toward the metaverse. The tweak heading for the latest model Quest from Meta-owned Oculus will let wearers hop into virtual settings with friends, chief Mark Zuckerberg said in

Lawyers are investigating Meta Platforms’ outgoing operations chief Sheryl Sandberg’s use of company resources over several years, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing people familiar with the matter. Several employees have been interviewed in connection with the investigation by Facebook-parent Meta, the WSJ reported, adding that the probe has been underway since at least

Mark Zuckerberg’s presence at the helm of Facebook parent Meta for “many, many years” would be perfectly natural, his global affairs director has told AFP, even as the founders of many tech companies hand off to fresh blood. Succession at the mega company has been in the headlines in recent weeks with the announcement of

Twitter anticipates a shareholder vote on its $44 billion (roughly Rs. 3,42,070 crore) sale to Elon Musk could come by early August, as it continues to work constructively to complete the deal with the world’s richest person, the social media company’s top executives told employees on Wednesday. Musk’s lawyers warned Twitter on Monday that he might

Twitter is gearing up for its most ambitious quarter of user growth, leaders of the social media company’s consumer products division told staff on Tuesday. Twitter is aiming to grow its monetizable daily active users, or users who see advertising, by 13 million this quarter, according to an internal meeting that was heard by Reuters.