10 things in tech you need to know today
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- Facebook briefly prioritized established news sites. In the days after the US election, Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg signed off on an algorithm change to the platform's news feed in an effort to fight misinformation.
- Elon Musk is now richer than Bill Gates. The Tesla CEO saw his net worth rise by about $7 billion to $128 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, as Tesla's market value topped $500 billion.
- Facebook pages belonging to Trumpworld were major election misinformation culprits. Among the Facebook pages most responsible for spreading misinformation were Donald Trump Jr. and the conservative vloggers Diamond and Silk, according to new study.
- Facebook whitelisted thousands of politicians. Since 2018, over 110,000 government officials and candidates have been on a Facebook whitelist that prevented them from being fact-checked, per The Information.
- Amazon considers green organizations as threats. Climate change protests including Extinction Rebellion, Greenpeace, and Greta Thunberg's group Fridays for Future are all among the groups the e-commerce giant is tracking.
- Twitter is relaunching verification. The network will verify government officials, companies, non-profits, and influential individuals among other people.
- Exclusive: 'Dark store' startups are getting crazy valuations. Investors in Europe are piling money into new companies that promise to deliver groceries in as little as ten minutes.
- YouTube suspended conservative news site OANN. The social media giant banned the outlet from posting videos and monetizing its content for a week after it posted a video promoting a fake COVID-19 cure.
- Expensify's CEO justified emailing customers in support of Joe Biden. Last month, Expensify CEO David Barrett emailed 10 million of the company's customers, urging them to vote for Democratic nominee Joe Biden in the US presidential election.
- Exclusive: Alphabet is pulling its life sciences division out of China. Verily will be shutting its Shanghai office, insiders say.
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