Good morning. The drumbeat of layoffs in Silicon Valley is partly a result of how the pandemic upended the economy.
Amazon’s lobby in Midtown Manhattan last year.Karsten Moran for The New York Times
Future barometer
The layoff announcements dropped one after another, accelerating throughout the second half of 2022. Amazon began laying off what will be 18,000 employees. Lyft, the ride-share company, said it would dismiss 700 of its workers, or 13 percent of its staff. The technology giants Meta and Twitter announced that they were cutting thousands of employees.
Samsung’s plant in Thai Nguyen Province, northern Vietnam. Photo: Samsung
The CEO of Samsung Electronics met with Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and announced a US$850 million investment to manufacture semiconductor components in Thai Nguyen province on August 5, 2022.
The investment will make Vietnam one of only four countries – alongside South Korea, China and the United States – that produce semiconductors for the world’s largest memory chipmaker. Vietnam’s selection over more developed locations speaks volumes about the country’s rising importance in the semiconductor value chain.
DT – Các báo cáo mới nhất cho biết Việt Nam hiện có gần 70 triệu người dùng sử dụng Internet trên khắp lãnh thổ. Con số này tương đương với hơn 70,3% trên tổng dân số và cao hơn mức trung bình của thế giới (62,5%).
Đối với thế hệ trẻ hiện nay, Internet đã trở thành một phần quen thuộc, không thể thiếu trong đời sống. Không ai có thể phủ nhận được vai trò và tầm quan trọng của Internet đối với cuộc sống hiện đại ngày nay. Dù vậy, không phải ai cũng có thể biết được quá trình mà Internet “bước chân” vào Việt Nam và dần trở nên phổ biến như hiện tại.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under Creative Commons licence.
Not long ago, FTX was one of the world’s largest trading platforms for cryptocurrencies. Founded in 2019, the Bahamas-based crypto exchange had a meteoric rise to prominence, and was valued at more than US$30 billion earlier this year.
A few days later, rival firm Binance (the biggest crypto exchange) announced it would sell its holdings of FTT tokens, a crypto that reportedly comprises much of Alameda’s assets.
Panicked customers rushed to withdraw funds from FTX, and the company is now on the brink of collapse, with a banner message on its website announcing it is “currently unable to process withdrawals”.
Chừng nào vẫn còn khoảng trống chính sách về quyền kiểm soát dữ liệu, chừng đó các cơ quan nhà nước vẫn chưa chú trọng nghĩa vụ – trách nhiệm của mình đối với dữ liệu cá nhân của người dân.
Người dân làm các thủ tục qua cổng dịch vụ công ở TP. Hồ Chí Minh. Ảnh: Thành ủy TP. Hồ Chí Minh.
Vào năm 2020, tỉnh Đồng Tháp thông báo rằng có hiện tượng sử dụng không đúng mục đích thông tin cá nhân của người dân phản ánh kiến nghị qua tổng đài 1022 – nơi để người dân phản ánh, góp ý, kiến nghị về hiệu quả dịch vụ công, tiếp cận thông tin, chính sách của tỉnh. Điều này không chỉ ảnh hưởng đến người dân phản ánh, kiến nghị mà còn cả quá trình tương tác với người dân của tỉnh.
Trong khi Chính phủ Việt Nam nỗ lực ngăn ngừa các đơn vị tư nhân lạm dụng khai thác dữ liệu cá nhân thì dường như lại quên nhìn lại chính mình – các đơn vị nhà nước trong việc sử dụng và quản lý các dữ liệu cá nhân của người dân. Tiếp tục đọc “Bảo vệ dữ liệu cá nhân: Cơ quan nhà nước cần làm gương”→
Các quy định pháp luật hiện hành chủ yếu tập trung quản lý rất chặt các mạng xã hội trong nước. Một số quy định đã trở nên lạc hậu, bất cập, khiến cho các mạng xã hội trong nước gặp nhiều khó khăn. Các dịch vụ mạng xã hội nước ngoài chi phối đến gần 70% thị phần doanh thu quảng cáo trực tuyến.
Bộ trưởng Bộ TT-TT Nguyễn Mạnh Hùng
Báo cáo trả lời chất vấn vừa được Bộ trưởng Bộ TT-TT Nguyễn Mạnh Hùng gửi đến ĐBQH nêu nhận định, các quy định pháp luật hiện hành chủ yếu tập trung quản lý rất chặt các mạng xã hội trong nước. Một số quy định đã trở nên lạc hậu, bất cập trước sự phát triển rất nhanh của Internet và công nghệ, khiến cho các mạng xã hội trong nước gặp nhiều khó khăn trong việc thu hút người dùng, phát triển kinh doanh.
An incoming call with an unknown caller from outside of Vietnam. Photo by VnExpress/Luu QuyMinh Huy, a university student in Ho Chi Minh City, said he and his family have been terrorized by phone calls demanding repayment of loans he never took.
Someone has been calling Huy repeatedly over the past month, saying he owed money with high interest that will balloon to tens of millions of dong (VND10 million= $427.26) if it is not paid back quickly. When he denied ever using the service, the caller brought out a screenshot of an apparent contract with accurate personal information like ID card numbers, phone numbers and email addresses, even relevant information on Huy’s family members.
“This is information I’ve shared with multiple services online when I signed up for various accounts, but I have never submitted them to any credit service,” Huy said.
Illicit industry traffics thousands of victims from China through Southeast Asia
“The videos provide a window into the dark world run by transnational criminal networks able to smuggle people from China, through Vietnam and into Cambodia and Myanmar”
PHNOM PENH — The first punch lands on the left side of the young man’s face, the second on the right.
Several more follow. Knees strike his stomach. He cannot defend himself, his hands are cuffed. His attacker, face outside the frame, has his fist wrapped in cloth.
He drags his victim by the lapels into the middle of the frame, faces him to the camera and tells him to speak.
“Dad, I’m in Cambodia, I’m not inside of China,” says the young man, through tears, his voice breaking and blood streaming from his nose. “I beg you, please send money.”
The ransom video, which was sent to the victim’s parents, was one of several shown to Nikkei Asia by Li*, a person who helps rescue human trafficking victims in Cambodia.
This ransom video supplied to Nikkei shows a handcuffed man being beaten with a stick while other victims watch in horror.
Another video shows a shirtless man cuffed on the ground being beaten with a stick while two more captives, handcuffed to a nearby window grill, watch on in terror. In a third, a grounded man, a foot on his neck, writhes in pain as he is electrocuted with a Taser.
The videos provide a window into the dark world run by transnational criminal networks able to smuggle people from China, through Vietnam and into Cambodia and Myanmar.
Chinese cyber-scam operations are stealing tens of billions of dollars from victims around the world.
But few realise that thousands of those perpetrating these frauds are victims too.
Young men and women are enslaved, tortured and forced to scam in countries like Cambodia.
In an exclusive report, 101 East investigates Chinese cyber-slave syndicates operating in Cambodia and exposes the powerful and politically connected people protecting them.
Forced to Scam: Cambodia’s Cyber Slaves | 101 East Documentary
The most advanced category of mass-produced semiconductors — used in smartphones, military technology and much more — is known as 5 nm. A single company in Taiwan, known as TSMC, makes about 90 percent of them. U.S. factories make none.
The U.S.’s struggles to keep pace in semiconductor manufacturing have already had economic downsides: Many jobs in the industry pay more than $100,000 a year, and the U.S. has lost out on them. Longer term, the situation also has the potential to cause a national security crisis: If China were to invade Taiwan and cut off exports of semiconductors, the American military would be at risk of being overmatched by its main rival for global supremacy.
Hannah J. Dawson, Senior Researcher, Southern Centre for Inequality Studies, University of the Witwatersrand
Disclosure statement
The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under Creative Commons licence.
Technological innovation can indeed be beneficial for the working class. Photo by JNS/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images
Narrative frames are fundamental to unifying ideologies. They frame what is possible and impossible, which ideas can be accepted and which must be rejected. In her book, Digital Democracy, Analogue Politics, storyteller and political analyst Nanjala Nyabola examines the framing of the Fourth Industrial Revolution narrative in this light.
“We need to examine the full details of today’s ruling to better understand how it impacts our viewers and the platform,” a YouTube spokesperson told EURACTIV. [Michael Vi/Shutterstock]
Online video sharing platforms such as YouTube could be liable for content uploads that infringe copyrights if they fail to act immediately, according to a ruling from Germany’s top court on Thursday (2 June).
The ruling is part of a larger fight of the creative and entertainment industry against illegally uploaded material, where large online platforms play an important role. Even if third parties posted the uploads, online platforms could find themselves in court.
“We need to examine the full details of today’s ruling to better understand how it impacts our viewers and the platform,” a YouTube spokesperson told EURACTIV.
According to Germany’s Federal Court of Justice, this would also apply to shared hosting services that stored data and provided access to online users.
A bot — short for robot and also called an internet bot — is a computer program that operates as an agent for a user or other program or to simulate a human activity. Bots are normally used to automate certain tasks, meaning they can run without specific instructions from humans.
An organization or individual can use a bot to replace a repetitive task that a human would otherwise have to perform. Bots are also much faster at these tasks than humans. Although bots can carry out useful functions, they can also be malicious and come in the form of malware.
It’s a Wild West out there for artificial intelligence. AI applications are increasingly used to make important decisions about humans’ lives with little to no oversight or accountability. This can have devastating consequences: wrongful arrests, incorrect grades for students, and even financial ruin. Women, marginalized groups, and people of color often bear the brunt of AI’s propensity for error and overreach.
The European Union thinks it has a solution: the mother of all AI laws, called the AI Act. It is the first law that aims to curb these harms by regulating the whole sector. If the EU succeeds, it could set a new global standard for AI oversight around the world.
But the world of EU legislation can be complicated and opaque. Here’s a quick guide to everything you need to know about the EU’s AI Act. The bill is currently being amended by members of the European Parliament and EU countries.
What’s the big deal?
The AI Act is hugely ambitious. It would require extra checks for “high risk” uses of AI that have the most potential to harm people. This could include systems used for grading exams, recruiting employees, or helping judges make decisions about law and justice. The first draft of the bill also includes bans on uses of AI deemed “unacceptable,” such as scoring people on the basis of their perceived trustworthiness.
[TĐH: I still can’t understand why the governments of the world still haven’t banned criptocurencies completely. They are a huge threat to the world’s financial stability.]
London (CNN Business)Investors in stocks, bonds and commodities are all on edge right now. But in the market for cryptocurrencies, unease has morphed into full-on panic, catching the attention of regulators in Washington tasked with maintaining financial stability.
What’s happening: As of last Friday, the price of bitcoin had plunged almost 50% from its all-time high as traders — concerned about whether the Federal Reserve’s bid to fight inflation could tip the economy into a recession — dumped riskier investments. >
This ransom video supplied to Nikkei shows a handcuffed man being beaten with a stick while other victims watch in horror. 
CVD 