Natasha Lomas
TechCrunch
Philippines
Contact Natasha
Discover and connect with journalists and influencers around the world, save time on email research, monitor the news, and more.
| Recent: |
|
| Past: |
|
Past articles by Natasha:
Europe adopts US data adequacy decision
The European Union has adopted a new transatlantic data adequacy agreement with the U.S. The much anticipated decision means there’s an immediate resolution to legal uncertainty around exports of EU users’ personal data by U.S. companies — a problem that’s affected thousands of businesses in recent years, big and small, including the likes of Meta […] → Read More
Martin Lewis warns over 'first' deepfake video scam ad circulating on Facebook
UK consumer finance champion Martin Lewis has warned over yet another scam ad bearing his likeness that's circulating on Facebook -- but this time it's a deepfake video... → Read More
EU's competition unit takes a deeper look at Amazon's iRobot acquisition
Amazon's planned acquisition of iRobot is now under in-depth antitrust scrutiny in the European Union. → Read More
Fairphone’s repairable smartphone goes on sale in US for the first time — in a ‘deGoogled’ Murena e/OS variant
European sustainable smartphone brand Fairphone is dipping a toe in the US market by making its flagship repairable handset available to buy there for the first time via another collaboration with e/OS, a French privacy-focused not-for-profit open source OS maker that offers a “deGoogled” mobile operating system. The Dutch ethical electronics social enterprise remains focused […] → Read More
Meta’s Threads app is a privacy nightmare that won’t launch in EU yet
Meta’s planned Twitter killer, Threads, isn’t yet publicly available but it already looks like a privacy nightmare. Information provided about the app’s privacy via mandatory disclosures required on iOS shows the app may collect highly sensitive information about users in order to profile their digital activity — including health and financial data, precise location, browsing […] → Read More
Security researchers latest to blast UK’s Online Safety Bill as encryption risk
Nearly 70 IT security and privacy experts have added to the clamour of alarm over the damage the UK's Online Safety Bill could wreak to strong encryption. → Read More
Konux gears up to scale its AI + IoT play for optimizing the railways
Meet Konux: a Munch-based deep tech AI scale-up, which has been trucking along building an AI-powered predictive maintenance SaaS for rail operators by and is now gearing up for a major expansion with Deutsche Bahn. → Read More
CJEU ruling on Meta referral could close the chapter on surveillance capitalism
A long-anticipated judgement today by the Court of Justice of the European Union looks to have comprehensively crushed Meta's ability to deny European users a free choice over its tracking and profiling. → Read More
'GAFAM' tech giants, ByteDance and Samsung expect to face EU's rebooted antitrust regime
Seven tech giants have informed the European Union that its rebooted antitrust regime -- the Digital Markets Act -- will apply to them. → Read More
Stop using Google Analytics, warns Sweden’s privacy watchdog, as it issues over $1M in fines
Sweden's data protection watchdog has issued a couple of fines in relation to exports of European users' data via Google Analytics. → Read More
Make way for a new vegan protein on the menu
Finnish startup Solar Foods' novel alternative protein, Solein, is now on the menu of a restaurant in Singapore where it's been blended into a custom (vegan) chocolate gelato. → Read More
Don’t rush generative AI apps to market without tackling privacy risks, warns UK watchdog
The UK's data protection watchdog has fired its most explicit warning shot yet at generative AI developers -- saying it expects them to address privacy risks before bringing their products to market. → Read More
Europe takes another big step towards agreeing an AI rulebook
The European Parliament has voted to confirm its negotiating mandate for the AI Act -- hitting a major milestone which unlocks the next stage of negotiations toward a pan-EU rule-book for artificial intelligence. → Read More
Europe warns it might break up Google's adtech empire
The European Commission has signalled it could be preparing to break up Google’s adtech business. Speaking during a press conference this afternoon, EU EVP Margrethe Vestager, the bloc’s competition chief and head of digital strategy, announced it has sent a formal statement of objections to Google for suspected anti-competitive conduct in its adtech business. If […] → Read More
Google delays EU launch of its AI chatbot after privacy regulator raises concerns
Google has delayed a planned launch of its generative AI chatbot, Bard, in the European Union this week, according to the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) -- the tech giant's lead data protection authority in the region. → Read More
Spotify fined in Sweden over GDPR data access complaint
Music streaming giant Spotify has fined around €5 million ($5.4M) years after it was accused of breaching the data access rights of users in the European Union. → Read More
OpenAI, DeepMind and Anthropic to give UK early access to foundational models for AI safety research
UK prime minister Rishi Sunak has kicked off London Tech Week by telling conference goers that OpenAI, Google DeepMind and Anthropic have committed to provide "early or priority access" to their AI models to support safety research. → Read More
Meta warned it faces ‘heavy sanctions’ in EU if it fails to fix child protection issues on Instagram
The European Union has fired a blunt warning at Meta, saying it must quickly clean up its act on child protection or face the risk of "heavy sanctions". → Read More
UK’s AI safety summit gets thumbs up from tech giants
Make way for another forum on AI safety. The UK government has announced it will convene a “global” AI summit this fall with the aim of agreeing “safety measures to evaluate and monitor the most significant risks from AI”, as its PR puts it. There’s no word on who will attend as yet — but […] → Read More
Meta to let users refuse its cross-site tracking following German antitrust intervention
The German Federal Cartel Office (FCO) has announced Meta will roll out a new account center incoming that will see it provide users of its social networking services with a greater degree of choice over whether they allow it to combine data on their activity across its services or not. → Read More