Business

Meta Platforms Inc., the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, is engaging Hollywood celebrities to lend their voices for its artificial intelligence initiatives. Sources close to the discussions reveal that Meta is offering multimillion-dollar deals to stars like Judi Dench, Awkwafina, and Keegan-Michael Key. Meta aims to finalize these agreements before its Connect 2024 event in September, where it plans …

The US Justice Department filed a lawsuit on Friday against TikTok, accusing the app of failing to prevent children from joining and unlawfully collecting their personal data. The lawsuit alleges that TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) by allowing children to create accounts without parental knowledge or consent. It claims that TikTok …

Jeff Bezos, the billionaire founder of Amazon, saw a significant drop in his net worth by $15.2 billion, bringing his total to $191.5 billion, as reported by the Bloomberg Billionaire Index. This sharp decline is part of a broader downturn affecting the tech sector. The Nasdaq 100 Index fell by 2.4%, impacting the fortunes of several tech billionaires. Elon Musk’s …

Temu, an online shopping platform owned by Chinese e-commerce titan PDD, is facing mounting challenges as it pursues global expansion. Recently, the platform sparked a protest by hundreds of its independent Chinese merchants in Guangzhou, who are disgruntled over what they describe as unfair fines and withheld payments. These merchants, who contribute to Temu’s diverse offering of inexpensive products, rallied …

A ransomware attack on Wednesday, July 31, disrupted services at nearly 300 small Indian local banks. The attack targeted C-Edge Technologies, a company providing tech support to small banks across India. C-Edge Technologies is a joint venture between the State Bank of India (SBI) and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS). The attack caused significant service outages, preventing bank customers from withdrawing …

Earlier this year, OpenAI amazed users by unveiling an enhanced voice mode for the latest version of ChatGPT. Unlike the robotic voices of digital assistants like Alexa or Siri, this new ChatGPT voice mode sounds incredibly lifelike. It can respond in real-time, handle interruptions, make giggling sounds when users joke, and assess a speaker’s emotional state based on their tone. …

The United Nations has sounded the alarm over a drastic population decline in China by the end of this century, predicting that the country could lose more than half of its population. According to the 2024 World Population Prospects summary from the United Nations, China’s population could shrink by 786 million people between 2024 and 2054, returning to a size …

Apple and the union representing workers at its Towson, Maryland store reached a tentative labor agreement late Friday. This marks the first-ever labor deal for any Apple store and for the tech giant’s US employees. In June 2022, workers at the Towson Apple store voted to join the International Association of Machinists union, seeking their first contract since then. In …