good morning As I write this, the price of Bitcoin is flirting with $100,000 for perhaps the third time in the last week.
That’s about 40% higher than before Election Day in the US and 120% higher than the year before.
Why mention it? Oh, no reason. Today’s news below. —Andrew Nusca
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US authorities say Chinese hackers are mobilizing
A top US cyber security official says hackers linked to China are preparing for a major conflict with the US.
Morgan Adamski, executive director of the Defense Department’s US Cyber Command, said on Friday at an industry conference that hackers have gained access to critical information technology networks with the intention of launching disruptive attacks against the conflict between the two nations.
Hackers can tamper with HVAC systems in server rooms or shut off power and water in data centers.
Federal agencies are, of course, working on potential targets to alleviate the problem. Adamski said the US government is “laser focused on disrupting and disrupting PRC cyber operations worldwide.” China, for its part, officially denies the operations aimed at the US.
One of the most prominent such operations was the Salt Typhoon attack, which this year breached several US telecommunications companies to steal call logs, obtain information requested by law enforcement and listen to communications working for both US presidential candidates in the past election.
Senator Mark Warner, Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, he said to him Washington Post last week The incident was “far and away the worst telecommunications hack in our nation’s history.”
The TikTok CEO asked Trump for guidance from Musk
His close relationship with Elon Musk and President-elect Donald Trump is seen as a boon for TikTok CEO Shou Chew, who has reportedly reached out to the Tesla boss.
Both have known each other for several years. So despite owning rival social media platform X, Musk was asked for his opinions on a variety of topics, including the incoming Trump administration and potential tech policy, after Chew began tweeting in recent weeks, according to a The Wall Street Journal the report.
While there is a Jan. 19 deadline for parent company ByteDance to sell TikTok or face a US ban, Musk and Chew did not appear to have discussed specific options for TikTok to continue operating here. But Chew has been updating ByteDance executives on the discussions, and they are said to be cautiously optimistic about the U.S. outlook.
The lines of communication between Musk and Chew could be critical as ByteDance navigates the coming months. While Trump tried to ban TikTok in his first term, he opposed the law that was signed this year. the sources he said to him Washington Post this month Trump will try to block the US ban, but Congress would have to pass another law that Trump then signs to completely change the law. —Jason Ma
Amazon will invest $4 billion in Anthropic
Amazon will invest $4 billion in Anthropic, doubling the amount the Seattle tech giant has invested in the AI startup since last year.
Amazon will remain a minority investor in Anthropic. The startup will make Amazon Web Services its “main training partner” and use Tranium chips from Amazon’s Annapurna Labs to train and run its models.
San Francisco-based Anthropic was founded in 2021 by siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei, former OpenAI executives (now Microsoft owns 49%) and five colleagues. September report he set the company’s current valuation at $40 billion.
Regulators have paid close attention to deepening the ties between Big Tech and the budding leaders of today’s AI wave. This includes Amazon and Anthropic. Two months ago, UK regulators determined their financial relationship was insufficient to warrant a formal investigation.
Meta can’t let go of the Cambridge Analytica scandal
Meta has failed definitively to avoid a shareholder lawsuit over the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
About six years ago, a data firm called Cambridge Analytica — which boasted Trump aide Steve Bannon as a board member — was found to have misused Facebook data to build voter profiles.
Although Facebook’s rules forbade such things, the episode showed how poor the company’s controls were over what happened to data accessible to many partners.
Meta’s shareholders sued over its failure to disclose the risk of data misuse, and the stock price took a hammering when the scandal emerged.
A federal appeals court allowed the case to go forward, so the company went to the Supreme Court, which rejected the appeal friday So the case will go forward that Meta won’t be able to move on from this damaging scandal as soon as they want. —David Meyer
Saudi Aramco to invest $1 billion in US telecommunications manufacturer Mavenir
The digital arm of state oil and gas company Saudi Aramco is said to be in talks to acquire a minority stake in US telecommunications software maker Mavenir.
A Reuters report published on Friday says that an agreement, although not guaranteed, “is likely to be signed before the end of the year”. It would be the first major telecommunications deal for Aramco Digital, as the subsidiary is known, as part of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 technology-forward plan to diversify its economy.
Mavenir, based in Richardson, Texas, makes software called Open RAN (radio access network) that allows telecommunications companies that support a mobile network to reduce costs with the help of a wide range of hardware. It was created in 2017 by the merger of three companies – Mitel Mobile, Ranzur and Xura – and is said to have raised around 800 million dollars.
The Trump and Biden administrations have pushed for Open RAN technology as a way to ease reliance on Chinese suppliers like Huawei. An Aramco-Mavenir deal would pass a US national security review.
More data
—Kia, Hyundai, Genesis recall 208,000 electric vehicles due to loss of power while driving.
—SEC fines reach record $8.2 billion in 2024. Half is from the Terraform Labs-Do Kwon crypto fraud case.
—Northvolt CEO resigns after US bankruptcy. The Swedish battery maker laid off 1,600 people two months ago.
—Germany’s Bosch cuts worker hours in soft economy. The majority of the conglomerate’s income comes from auto supply.
—HarperCollins lands AI deal. The book publisher will receive $2,500 for each selected book to train an LLM for three years.
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