Tech Roundup: Microsoft Copilot Apps, OpenAI Copyright Infringement & More

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

• Microsoft tests a feature that lets Windows 11 users reinstall the operating system using Windows Update, a method that preserves files, settings and installed apps; launches Microsoft Copilot for Android, iOS and iPadOS, a free ChatGPT-like app that supports GPT-4 and DALL-E 3, as GitHub makes available GPT-4-powered Copilot Chat for all users.
• Amazon announces plans to start injecting ads on movies and TV shows for Prime Video starting January 29, 2024.
• X rival social network Bluesky rolls out a new in-app video and music player for YouTube, SoundCloud, Spotify and Twitch embeds, along with a new hide post feature "if there’s something you don't want to see again."
• Apple scores a victory after a U.S. appeals court temporarily pauses International Trade Commission's import ban on Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2; comes after finding that Apple infringed on blood oxygen saturation technology patented by a company called Masimo.
• The New York Times sues OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement, alleging the companies used millions of its articles to train AI; says the large language models (LLMs), which power ChatGPT and Copilot, "can generate output that recites Times content verbatim, closely summarizes it, and mimics its expressive style," which it claims deprives it of "subscription, licensing, advertising, and affiliate revenue."
• India seeks to block the URLs of nine offshore crypto exchanges, including Binance, Kraken, KuCoin, Huobi, Bittrex and Bitstamp, for not complying with anti-money laundering laws.
• A new report from the Finanical Times reveals that the rise of AI-created virtual influencers has "led to worry from human influencers their income is being cannibalized and under threat from digital rivals."
• Google reaches a preliminary settlement in a 2020 class action lawsuit seeking at least US$ 5 billion in damages over allegations that the tech giant had misled consumers about their privacy protections when using incognito mode on the Chrome web browser and that users' online activity was tracked even when they set Chrome to incognito and other browsers to private mode in order to serve tailored ads. (While incognito/private mode within a web browser gives users the choice to search the internet without their activity being saved to the browser or device, the websites visited can use tools such as Google Analytics to track usage.