The 👁👄👁 stunt, a hyped beta of a fake app, exploited Silicon Valley's fixation on shiny new things, but raised $200K for charities — Last weekend, the stunt aimed to use Silicon Valley's love of shiny new things for charity. The result left people wondering about the memeification of movements.
Elementary Robotics, which develops tools to automate industrial tasks, announces $12.7M Series A funding to deploy its automation products at scale — Elementary Robotics, a robotics company developing tools to automate industrial tasks, today announced it has raised a $12.7 million round.
The Pixel 4a saga continues. This affordable smartphone was initially rumored to make an appearance at the Google I/O conference in May, but then that got canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic. So we heard the launch was pushed to July, but apparently that's not happening anymore, with the handset inexplicably now being expected to see the light of day in October. That's weird, considering how much it's already leaked, but it's far from the weirdest thing Google's ever done. Regardless of when the Pixel 4a will actually become available, it's continuing its certification march. It was...
Facebook is banning a network of anti-government extremist "boogaloos" from its platform, calling the group "violent" and designating it as a "dangerous organization," the company announced Tuesday.
"This is the latest step in our commitment to ban people who proclaim a violent mission from using our platform," the company said, adding that it had banned "220 Facebook accounts, 95 Instagram accounts, 28 Pages and 106 groups that currently comprise the network."
But despite those claims, BuzzFeed News reported later Tuesday that, for several months before Facebook's crackdown, the advertising giant took money from boogaloo accounts that ran ads on Facebook and subsidiary Instagram that openly promoted violence.
One of the ads — some of which were still live as of Tuesday — said things like "join the militia, fight the state," and featured movie clips depicting police officers being shot and killed, according to BuzzFeed News.
A Facebook spokesperson told BuzzFeed News that the boogaloo ad content "does not sound good," adding that the ads would be reviewed and the Tuesday crackdown was "just the start of the impact" on the boogaloo network.
Facebook has been facing increasing pressure, including from prominent lawmakers, to take stronger action against hate speech on its platform, and critics have accused the company not just of amplifying racist content that's posted organically, but also of profiting off advertisers who pay to actively promote racism.
Earlier this month, civil rights groups called for advertisers to boycott Facebook following CEO Mark Zuckerberg's inaction on controversial posts by President Donald Trump. Since the campaign launched, more than 40 major brands, including Coca-Cola, Verizon, and Adidas, have pulled ads from the social media platform.
Facebook did not immediately respond to a request for comment on this story.
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Facebook on Tuesday announced that it was banning a network of Facebook accounts, groups, and pages associated with the far-right, anti-government "boogaloo" movement from its platform, calling it a "violent" and "dangerous organization."
"Today we are designating a violent US-based anti-government network as a dangerous organization and banning it from our platform," the company said in a statement.
"This network uses the term boogaloo but is distinct from the broader and loosely-affiliated boogaloo movement because it actively seeks to commit violence," Facebook continued. "For months, we have removed boogaloo content when there is a clear connection to violence or a credible threat to public safety, and today's designation will mean we remove more content going forward, including Facebook Groups and Pages."
As part of the designation, Facebook said that it removed 220 Facebook accounts, 95 Instagram accounts, 28 pages, and 106 groups linked to the boogaloo network it identified from its platform. Over 400 other groups and 100 pages were also removed from Facebook for hosting boogaloo-related content that violated the company's policies.
"We have always removed boogaloo content when we identify a clear call for violence," Facebook said, adding that it has removed over 800 posts connected to the ideology that violated its Violence and Incitement policy over the last two months.
Individuals and accounts associated with the far-right extremist movement have come into the spotlight in recent weeks, particularly in light of nationwide protests against police brutality after the Memorial Day death of 46-year-old George Floyd in police custody.
Politico reported on two new intelligence assessments earlier this month warning that boogaloo extremists may soon target Washington, DC.
One note, dated June 15 from the National Capital Region Threat Intelligence Consortium (NTIC), said that "the District is likely a target for violent adherents of the boogaloo ideology due to the significant presence of US law enforcement entities, and the wide range of First Amendment-Protected events hosted there."
"Recent events indicate violent adherents of the boogaloo ideology likely reside in the National Capital Region, and others may be willing to travel far distances to incite civil unrest of conduct violence encouraged in online forums associated with the movement," the NTIC's assessment said, according to Politico.
Another note, dated June 20 from the Department of Homeland Security, said that "domestic terrorists advocating for the boogaloo very likely will take advantage of any regional or national situation involving heightened fear and tensions to promote their violent extremist ideology and call supporters to action."
The primary goal of the DHS note is to provide information "regarding some domestic terrorists' exploitation of heightened tensions during First Amendment-protected activities in order to threaten or incite violence to start the 'boogaloo' — a colloquial term referring to a coming civil war or the fall of civilization."
On June 16, federal authorities said that a man charged with killing two officers in recent, separate attacks in California has ties to the "boogaloo" movement.
Air Force Staff Sgt. Steven Carrillo was charged with killing a federal service officer, 53-year-old David Patrick Underwood at an Oakland courthouse in a drive-by attack on May 29, the Justice Department announced. Carrillo also faces state charges in the killing of Santa Cruz County Sgt. Damon Gutzwiller on June 6.
Law enforcement officials said Carrillo and his accomplice, Robert Justus, Jr., went to Oakland to kill police officers and believed that the protests would facilitate their motives.
Earlier this month, three men who were self-proclaimed members of the "boogaloo" movement were arrested on domestic terrorism charges and accused of carrying unregistered firearms and trying to spark riots during the demonstrations.
The arrests come as President Donald Trump and his allies urge law enforcement officials to crack down on the protests and accuse "antifa" — a loosely organized far-left group of anti-fascism activists — of sparking violence during the Floyd demonstrations.
But a closer examination of court records, media reports, and social media posts shows little evidence of a widespread or organized antifa-led effort to infiltrate the protests.
In early June, The Nation reported that the FBI had "no intelligence indicating Antifa involvement/presence" in violence that took place on May 31 as protests following Floyd's death reached a climax. The report cited an internal situation report from the FBI's Washington, DC, field office.
But the FBI's report did warn that people associated with a right-wing social media group had "called for far-right provocateurs to attack federal agents" and "use automatic weapons against protesters."
Politico also reported in early June that a DHS intelligence note warned law-enforcement officials that a white supremacist channel on the encrypted messaging app Telegram encouraged its followers to incite violence to start a race war during the protests.
Citing the FBI, it said that two days after Floyd's death, the channel "incited followers to engage in violence and start the 'boogaloo.'"
One of the messages in the channel called for potential shooters to "frame the crowd around you" for the violence, the note said, according to Politico.
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The smart speaker has been a runaway success in the handful of years since it hit the market, catapulting from obscurity to the peak of sales lists and cementing itself in the public consciousness.
According to primary survey data from Business Insider Intelligence, as many as half of US respondents reported living in a home with a voice-enabled AI device.
The prevalence of smart speakers is changing how companies in a range of spaces — media, e-commerce, smart home, banking, and more — interact with consumers.
For companies looking to sell these speakers and brands looking to engage with their customers through the now-critical medium, it's important to understand how the voice ecosystem works in practice and how it's being used.
To learn more about adoption and habits, we surveyed 2,000 US consumers regarding factors like smart speaker ownership, what brands consumers use, and what they use the devices to do. Our survey data offers critical insights for key stakeholders at companies aiming to promote and use the smart speaker to reach customers.
In The Smart Speaker Report, Business Insider Intelligence examines the fast-evolving smart speaker market. First, we provide a glimpse into smart speaker adoption in the US, both overall and by particular demographics. Then, we look at the characteristics of device owners, including how many speakers they own, which types, how often they use them, and what they use them to do. We also break down the top smart speaker use cases and the reasons why they are or aren't resonating with consumers, and advise brands looking to reach their users via this medium how best to do so.
The companies mentioned in this report are: Amazon, American Express, Apple, Deezer, Google, Nest, Pandora, Samsung, Spotify, and TuneIn.
Here are some key takeaways from the report:
In full, the report:
Interested in getting the full report? Here's how to get access:
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NexHealth, which provides an automated online appointment system for small medical and dental practices, raises $15M Series A — I write about the future of science, technology, and culture. — I am a staff writer covering health care. Email me at kjennings@forbes.com.
The Australian government announces AU$1.35B will be used over the next decade to boost cyberdefense capabilities against a surge in state-backed cyberattacks — The Federal Government wants to create more than 500 new jobs in its highly secretive cyber intelligence agency as part …
You’ve likely heard the phrase Internet of Things, or IoT, at some point if you have been following any tech news in the last several years.
But at the same time, you might be scratching your head figuring out what it is or what it means past a flashy buzzword.
Simply put, the IoT refers to the connection of devices (other than typical fare such as computers and smartphones) to the Internet. Cars, refrigerators, juicers, wine racks, heart monitors, ovens, watches, and more are all candidates for connection.
A new report from Business Insider Intelligence, Business Insider's premium research service, called IoT 101: The Essential Guide to the Internet of Things, outlines the basics of the IoT and what this next wave of technology means to the everyday individual.
The report dives into key IoT terms, predictions and trends for the IoT in the next five years, the industries that the IoT will affect the most, and the biggest challenges facing the IoT.
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Sensor Tower reports that many mobile game publishers are hitting the $1M earnings milestone in 2021 -- though not as many as in 2016. Rea...
