Tech Roundup: China Deepfake Regulation, TikTok Scrutiny & More

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

1. New regulations that require buyers of SIM cards and people registering for mobile phone services to have their faces scanned, in addition to providing a national identification card, come in to force in China effective December 1, as adoption of facial-recognition technology across the country become widespread.
2. China's Cyberspace Administration announce new rules (effective January 1) governing video and audio content online, including a ban on the publishing and distribution of "fake news" created with technologies such as artificial intelligence and virtual reality such as hyper-realistic deepfake videos; mandates that any use of AI or virtual reality be clearly marked in a prominent manner, and makes distribution of deepfakes a possible criminal offence.
3. Singapore's "fake news" law is invoked for the first time in response to a Facebook post from an opposition politician that accused the government of responsibility for a failing investment in Turkish restaurant chain Salt Bae.
4. Apple accedes to Russia's demands to show Crimea as part of the country for Apple Maps users in Russia. (Apple Maps does not show it as part of any country when viewed elsewhere, nor does Google Maps, which doesn't show Crimea as belonging to either Russia or Ukraine.)
5. E.U. antitrust regulators open a preliminary investigation into Google's data collection practices related to local search services, online advertising, login services, and web browsers, as regulators across the world step up their scrutiny into how dominant tech companies use and monetise data.
6. ByteDance-owned popular short video app TikTok apologises to a user, who identifies herself as Feroza Aziz, for removing a video that criticised China's treatment of Muslims, blaming it on a "human moderation error"; says the video had been restored within less than an hour, as the China-headquartered company, which also runs a domestic version of TikTok called Douyin, comes under spotlight for abetting censorship, casting doubts over the company's global ambitions. (Despite the fact that TikTok and Douyin are two separate apps, their similar interface, functions and content notwithstanding, the Chinese version of the app has been found to disseminate state propaganda and promptly delete protest videos from Uygurs Muslim minorities.)
7. Amazon's surveillance camera subsidiary Ring reportedly working on facial recognition software that leverages its ever-expanding network of home security cameras to create an AI-enabled neighbourhood "watch lists" to notify users of individuals deemed suspicious.
8. Facebook and Twitter disclose that personal data of hundreds of users may have been improperly accessed after they used their accounts to log in to third-party Android apps downloaded from the Google Play store such as Giant Square and Photofy; say software development kits from MobiBurn and OneAudience contained features allowing developers to harvest personal user information from their accounts without authorisation as the SDK makers claim they only provided the tools but were not involved in the data collection in any way — shifting blame to the mobile app developers who abused their SDKs. (The development comes the wake of big tech companies facing heightened investigation from regulators, lawmakers and users for the ways that personal data is used by outside developers to track and target consumers.)
9. Egypt launches Tiba-1, the country's first communication satellite, into orbit, days after it was indefinitely postponed due to technical reasons.
10. Indian law enforcement arrests 45 people and shuts down a scam call center in Noida, alleging they used illicitly obtained customer info of ecommerce biggies Flipkart and Myntra to scam them by luring users with the promise of cashbacks, huge discounts and reward points.
11. Documents show California's Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) to be making US$ 50 million a year selling drivers' personal information at least since 2013.
12. Google fires four employees, citing data-security violations and what it calls a "recent increase in information being shared outside the company," amid rising tension between senior management and staff; employees accuse the company of "ramping up its illegal retaliation against workers engaging in protected organising."
13. Facebook launches Viewpoints, a market research app that pays users (US$ 5 for every 1,000 points accrued) for completing surveys, research, and other tasks, for users in the U.S. a year after running into hot water for stealthily collecting user information in exchange for US$ 20 a month through its controversial now-discontinued Facebook Research VPN app.
14. Online marketplace eBay to sell StubHub to Swiss ticket resale platform Viagogo in an US$ 4.05 billion all-cash deal.
15. Sir Tim Berners-Lee launches Contract for the Web, backed by 150+ organisations including Microsoft, Google, Facebook, and EFF to safeguard user privacy and the web from abuse; mandates companies to simplify privacy settings by providing control panels where individuals can access their data and manage their privacy options in one place.
16. Apple to expand its operations in India, with the iPhone maker's supplier Salcomp to make chargers and other components at a plant near Chennai in a move that's expected to create 10,000 jobs.
17. Ride hailing service Uber loses its license to operate in London for the second time in over two years, one of its biggest markets globally with more than 3.5 million riders, after the city's transport regulator, Transport for London, said Uber was not "fit and proper" and that it had identified a "pattern of failures" by the company, including scenarios where drivers who had been suspended from the platform were still able to create an account and start driving again, and unauthorised drivers used the accounts of real, approved Uber drivers and picked up passengers using vehicles they weren't registered to drive — for a total of 14,000 trips — thereby putting passengers' safety at risk.
18. Facebook gets sued by NSO Group employees who claim their private Facebook and Instagram accounts were unfairly blocked following WhatsApp's lawsuit against the Israeli company for allegedly exploiting a vulnerability in the video calling feature to install spyware.
19. Twitter pauses its initial plan to delete inactive accounts that have not been logged into for six months starting December 11, after concerns were raised about deceased users, until it creates a way to memorialise accounts.
20. Amazon to shut down Product Sampling in 2020, a controversial program that uses AI and data insights to send shoppers free samples based on their buying habits.
21. Ride-hailing firm Grab launches pilot program for motorbike hailing in Malaysia, barely a month after regional rival Gojek was given the green light to begin limited operations in the country.
22. Amazon reveals the names of companies that make its branded products for the first time; publishes a list of names and locations of manufacturers all over the world that produce official Amazon apparel, consumer electronics, and housewares.
23. Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi posts its slowest-ever quarterly revenue growth as demand for smartphones eases in China with consumers holding on to devices for longer, and the country's smartphone market faces tough competition from Huawei, which the U.S. has added to a trade blacklist for national security reasons.
24. Google Photos starts rolling out manual face tagging, allowing users tag faces that Google's algorithm detects but doesn't recognise.