Bill Gates defends Big Tech, says firms shouldn't be broken up
Bill Gates, who knows a thing or two about antitrust investigations, doesn't think it's a good idea to break up the biggest U.S. tech companies, as some politicians have suggested. The Microsoft Corp. co-founder and former chief executive officer battled the Justice Department for years ...
The European Union's competition chief is getting a new term — with expanded powers — in a move that underlines how the bloc's battle to regulate big tech companies is only just beginning. Margrethe Vestager, who angered the Trump administration by imposing multibillion-dollar penalties on ...
Facebook and Microsoft launch contest to detect 'deepfake' videos ahead of U.S. election
Facebook Inc. is teaming up with Microsoft Corp., the Partnership on AI coalition and academics from several universities to launch a contest to better detect deepfakes, the company said in a blog post ai.facebook.com/blog/deepfake-detection-challenge on Thursday. The social media giant is putting $10 million into ...
'Sense of urgency' as top tech players seek AI ethical rules
Top players in global tech companies kicked off work Monday to draw up global ethical standards related to data and artificial intelligence, with Microsoft's president voicing a "sense of urgency. Some two dozen high-ranking representatives of the global and Swiss economies, as well as scientists ...
U.S. tech industry becomes hotbed for ethics-centered employee activism
When Liz O'Sullivan was hired at the New York City-based artificial intelligence company Clarifai in 2017, she felt lucky to find work at the intersection of two of her main interests: technology and ethics. Two years later, she found herself facing a moral dilemma. Clarifai ...
Amazon and Microsoft are putting world at risk with killer AI, study says
Amazon, Microsoft and Intel are among leading tech companies putting the world at risk through killer robot development, according to a report that surveyed major players from the sector about their stance on lethal autonomous weapons. Dutch NGO Pax ranked 50 companies by three criteria: ...
Pentagon's auditor probing disputed JEDI cloud computing contract
The Pentagon's independent auditor is conducting a broad review of the handling of a cloud computing project potentially worth $10 billion, officials said Tuesday. The probe includes an investigation of potential misconduct by current or former Defense Department officials involved in the project, which is ...
New U.S. defense chief insists he wasn't told to review $10 billion JEDI cloud-computing contract
Defense Secretary Mark Esper said he heard questions from people in the White House about a Pentagon cloud-computing contract valued at as much as $10 billion, but wasn't directed to order the review that's under way. President Donald Trump stunned technology companies, the Defense Department ...
SoftBank Group's $108 billion Vision Fund 2 draws in Microsoft and Apple
SoftBank Group Corp. has secured pledges from Microsoft Corp. and other investors of around $108 billion for a second Vision Fund aimed at investing in technology firms. The Japanese conglomerate itself plans to invest $38 billion in the fund, it said in a statement. Others ...
SoftBank to be top investor in $108 billion second Vision Fund, with CEO Son silent on Saudi role
The conglomerate aims to raise $108 billion for a second Vision Fund, replacing Saudi Arabia as the largest investor as its targets opportunities in cutting-edge technologies.
Microsoft on Monday announced a $1 billion investment in an OpenAI ethical artificial intelligence project backed by Tesla's Elon Musk and Amazon. The partnership will be devoted to developing advanced AI models on Microsoft's Azure cloud computing platform while adhering to "shared principles on ethics ...
Japanese antimonopoly watchdog drafts guidelines to regulate IT giants
The Fair Trade Commission has drafted guidelines stipulating that it can consider cases where information technology giants obtain personal data without consent as violations of the country's antimonopoly law, it was learned Tuesday. The antimonopoly watchdog will shortly compile a final draft of the guidelines ...
