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New York Times: Sources: the US government launched an investigation into the Salt Typhoon hack after Microsoft alerted it and telecom companies about anomalies  —  Leaders of the big telecommunications companies were summoned to the White House to discuss strategies for overhauling the security …

Nicola M. White / Bloomberg: Around 56% of the $8.2B in financial remedies that the US SEC obtained in FY 2024 is attributable to a monetary judgment against Terraform Labs and Do Kwon  —  The agency's enforcement actions led to $8.2 billion in penalties and reimbursement to investors, though the number …

Wall Street Journal: Sources: TikTok CEO Shou Chew, who has known Elon Musk for several years, has sought Musk's counsel in recent weeks on the incoming Trump administration  —  Popular video app and Chinese parent ByteDance view rival social-media owner as conduit to the president-elect

Victoria Song / The Verge: Strava's new API rules for third parties will make it harder for users across dozens of fitness apps and wearables to integrate their fitness data in one place  —  It might seem odd for one app's users to fume over an API, but at the heart of the matter is the inherent messiness of fitness data.

Financial Times: A look at challenges facing Samsung Executive Chairman Lee Jae-yong, including the company falling behind in the AI chip race and discontent from employees  —  Chip woes and labour unrest test the mettle of third-generation leader of South Korea's most valuable company

Reuters: An investigation finds several women across the US were deceived, drugged, terrorized, and sexually enslaved by sex traffickers to make money from OnlyFans  —  OnlyFans gives women the chance to earn money by making porn.  Sex traffickers also use the platform to abuse and exploit them, say police and prosecutors.

Maxwell Zeff / TechCrunch: Texas AG opens a probe into the World Federation of Advertisers to determine if it conspired to boycott “certain social media platforms”; X sued WFA in August  —  Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced on Thursday he is opening an investigation into the World Federation of Advertisers …

Emily Nicolle / Bloomberg: The UK plans to draft a regulatory framework to oversee stablecoins and staking services as part of a single overarching regime for cryptoassets in early 2025  —  - Planned legislation pushed back due to change of government  — New administration to publish single overarching crypto regime

Bloomberg: Klarna's planned US IPO in H1 2025 could presage an uptick in IPOs by fintechs like Trustly, Chime, Zilch, Plaid, and Revolut after a relatively slow period  —  - Trustly, Chime, Zilch among candidates for a stock listing  — Sector stocks have bounced back after painful IPO losses

Aisha Malik / TechCrunch: Brave Search introduces AI chat to let users ask follow-up questions to initial queries, bringing together capabilities of chat-first and search-first tools  —  Brave announced on Thursday that it's introducing an AI chat mode for follow-up questions based on initial queries on Brave Search.

Lauren Feiner / The Verge: Snap files to dismiss New Mexico's lawsuit over Snap's alleged child safety issues with predators, saying the complaint misrepresents the state's investigation  —  Snap says the basis of a scathing lawsuit suggesting it systematically recommends teens' accounts to child predators is backwards …

Emma Roth / The Verge: SafeRent, an AI screening tool used by landlords, agrees to pay ~$2.3M to settle a discrimination lawsuit and will no longer display certain tenant scores  —  SafeRent, an AI screening tool used by landlords, will no longer use AI-powered “scores” to evaluate whether someone using housing vouchers would make a good tenant.

Mishaal Rahman / Android Authority: Source: Google has canceled the development of a second-generation Pixel Tablet, planned for release in 2025, due to concerns that it wouldn't sell very well  —  Google is pulling the plug on its next Pixel Tablet, citing fears the product wouldn't sell very well.  —  •  —  TL;DR

The Information: Sources: OpenAI considered making a browser, discussed deals to power AI features on Samsung devices and search on sites and apps from Condé Nast and others  —  OpenAI is preparing to launch a frontal assault on Google.  —  The ChatGPT owner recently considered developing a web browser …

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg: Sources: Apple is testing a more conversational version of Siri, dubbed “LLM Siri”, with plans to release it in spring 2026 as part of iOS 19 and macOS 16  —  - Company is working on overhaul that employees call ‘LLM Siri’  — Unveiling planned for next year, with rollout coming in 2026

Lauren Forristal / TechCrunch: Spotify adds new audiobook features for Premium users: video clips up to 30 seconds long, Author Pages, and visuals that appear while users listen  —  Spotify is enhancing the audiobook experience for premium users through three new experiments: video clips, author pages, and the ability to add visuals that appear while users listen.

Hannah Lang / Reuters: Sources: a16z, Ripple, Kraken, and Circle are jostling for a seat on Trump's promised crypto advisory council, which is expected to set up a bitcoin reserve  —  A slew of crypto companies including Ripple, Kraken and Circle are jostling for a seat on President-elect Donald Trump's promised …

Foo Yun Chee / Reuters: Sources: Amazon will likely face an EU investigation next year into whether it breaches the DMA by favoring its own brand products on its online marketplace  —  Amazon (AMZN.O) will likely face an EU investigation next year into whether it favours its own brand products on its online marketplace …

Lukas Knigge / Table.Media: The EU Parliament confirms Spain's Teresa Ribera as the next Competition Commissioner of the EU, replacing Margrethe Vestager  —  Teresa Ribera has been confirmed as the European Union's new Commissioner for Competition in the hearings of the EU Parliament.

James Reddick / The Record: In its latest security report, Meta says it removed 2M+ accounts this year connected to pig butchering scams conducted from Southeast Asia and the UAE  —  Meta has taken down more than 2 million accounts this year connected to pig butchering scams conducted from Southeast Asia and the United Arab Emirates, the company said Thursday.

Brady Dale / Axios: SEC chair Gary Gensler will step down on January 20; it has been traditional for SEC chairs to resign if the administration changes in the middle of their term  —  - “I thank President Biden for entrusting me with this incredible responsibility. … The agency had resisted launching exchange …

Michael Nuñez / VentureBeat: A look at OpenScholar, an LLM for scientific research built by the Allen Institute for AI and the University of Washington that outperforms GPT-4o on accuracy  —  Scientists are drowning in data.  With millions of research papers published every year, even the most dedicated experts struggle …

Leah Nylen / Bloomberg: Filing: the US DOJ's proposal requires Google to allow websites more ability to opt-out of its AI products and provide more ad placement controls to advertisers  —  - Antitrust officials propose options in historic lawsuit  — Google says government pushing ‘radical agenda’ beyond case

Brian Fung / CNN: As part of its proposed remedies, the US DOJ says Google should be required to syndicate its US search results to other rival search engines for the next decade  —  The US government formally proposed a partial breakup of Google on Wednesday, urging a federal judge to force a sale …