Tech Roundup: E.U. Copyright Directive, Facebook's New Pitch & More

[A recurring feature on the latest in Science & Technology.]

• European Parliament gives final approval to the Copyright Directive, a controversial package of legislation designed to update copyright law in Europe for the internet age; implementation would require platforms to design systems that block internet users from sharing memes and other content containing copyright-protected material, and news aggregation services like Google's to negotiate commercial licenses with publishers in order to post snippets or links to articles.
• Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg calls for a "more active role for governments and regulators" to combat issues concerning data portability, election integrity, harmful content, and privacy. (This new pitch for internet regulation is no surprise given that Facebook is currently facing a torrent of public criticism for enabling electoral interference, failing to curb the spread of fake news and hate speech, and a string of privacy disasters that have eroded public trust in the platform. But by calling on the governments to draft new laws surrounding internet content, the tech giant has once again indulged in sly subterfuge, conveniently offloading the responsibility that should be the company's to begin with. Zuckerberg's latest statements, it appears, is a tacit admission that Facebook is incapable of regulating itself.)
• Facebook to fight Belgian court ruling that ordered the company to stop tracking local users' browsing habits, including those who aren't signed up to the social network; comes amid increased scrutiny of the company's data collection practices, including a recent German antitrust watchdog order that directed Facebook to stop combining data from different sources to fine-tune its advertising algorithms.
• Facebook gets charged with a civil complaint from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) over its discriminatory advertising practices following 2016 investigations by ProPublica that the social network's ad targeting system can be abused by marketers to exclude people of colour and users of Asian and Hispanic origin, and also by gender, from seeing specific ads; seeks damages for any person who was harmed by Facebook's targeted advertising policies. (It may be noted that the HUD is already investigating Google and Twitter for similar behaviour.)
• Facebook to update its terms of service agreement this week with a new anti-hate rule that bans any content that falls in the category of "white nationalism" or "white separatism”; phrases such as "I am a proud white nationalist" and "Immigration is tearing this country apart; white separatism is the only answer" to be banned, according to the company, while implicit and coded white nationalism and white separatism will not be banned immediately, in part because the company said it's harder to detect and remove.
• New internal emails reveal that Facebook knew about Cambridge Analytica's dubious data collection practices four months before they were exposed by The Observer and The New York Times last March.

Ride hailing startup Lyft officially begins trading on NASDAQ for US$ 72 a share

• Google removes gay conversion therapy app called Living Hope Ministries from the Play Store after uproar from human rights groups and gets suspended from Human Rights Campaign's Corporate Equality Index (which rates workplaces based on LGBTQ equality); move comes three months after Apple and Amazon removed the app from their respective app stores.
• India becomes the fourth country after the U.S., Russia and China to have successfully shot down a live satellite 300 kilometers away in space with an anti-satellite missile.
• A judge at U.S. International Trade Commission finds Apple guilty of infringing on two of Qualcomm's patents related to power management and data download speeds, effectively blocking the company from bringing infringing iPhones into the United States from China; new ruling comes weeks after a San Diego court (where Qualcomm is headquartered at) found Apple to violating three Qualcomm patents, ordering the tech giant to pay the chipmaker US$ 31 million for infringing on its technology.
• Popular Indian ride hailing startup Ola's license suspended for six months in Bengaluru after the company was found to be flouting the rules to illegally operate two-wheeler bike taxis in the city.
• Kazuo Hirai, the chief executive largely responsible for Japanese electronics conglomerate Sony's turnaround, steps down after 35 years of service starting 1984; to continue to act as occasional "senior advisor" for the company following request from Sony's management team.
• Apple releases iOS 12.2 update with patch for 51 security vulnerabilities, including ones that allowed apps to secretly eavesdrop on users, and lead to arbitrary code execution by simply clicking a malicious SMS link.
• Spotify acquires Parcast, a podcast network that specialises in crime, mystery, and science fiction shows, for an undisclosed amount as it ramps up its podcast efforts; move follows Spotify's recent acquisitions of Gimlet Media, another popular podcast network, and podcast creation app Anchor.
• Google expands hotel search to include vacation rentals as it continues to enhance its travel features across desktop, Android and iOS; adds new Events section to Google Maps that lets users add public events as it prepares to sunset Google+ and take on Facebook events.
• Popular chat app Telegram adds option to allow users delete any message in a private conversation from both sides, irrespective of who sent them or when they were sent.
• Google officially launches dynamic emails for Gmail that makes use of AMP to serve dynamic web page-like experiences (e.g. save pins to a board in Pinterest); announces Booking.com, Despegar, Doodle, Ecwid, Freshworks, Nexxt, OYO Rooms, Pinterest, and redBus as launch partners.
• Apple expands its mobile payments service Apple Pay to Austria, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Estonia, Greece, and Romania, days after it debuts Apple Pay-based credit card offering in partnership with Goldman Sachs; to shut down Texture, the magazine subscription service it acquired last year, on May 28 after its features are integrated into Apple News+. (But why shut down Texture apps for Android and Amazon Fire HD tablets? Is Apple planning Apple News apps for the other two platforms as well?)
• Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com debuts its online storefront Joybuy in the U.S. on Google Express (only in the U.S.), the search giant's online shopping service, months after the search giant invested US$ 550 million in the company.
• German consumer organisation Stiftung Warentest rates StartPage.com as the the best search engine, defeating rivals like Google, DuckDuckGo, Bing, Yahoo! and others, based on comparing 50 search queries, that in some cases included typos, vague descriptions, and other ambiguities, and reviewing the quality of the search results.
• Music streaming service Spotify rolls out new Duo streaming plan in Chile, Colombia, Denmark, Ireland and Poland tailored to two users; to include a Duo Mix playlist that blends the users' music tastes and listening habits into a unified list of songs.
• YouTube TV, Google's live cable bundle offering, becomes available in every television market (210 of them) in the U.S.
• Google reportedly reading support for Optical Character Recognition (OCR) in Gboard keyboard app; shuts down its URL shortening service goo.gl almost 9 years it was launched (Dec. 2009), and an year after it was turned off for new users last May.