Year: 2020

French research institute Inria has released a small portion of the source code that is going to power France’s contact-tracing app StopCovid. It is available on several GitLab repositories under the Mozilla Public License 2.0. While the French government announced that everything would be open source, it’s going to bit more complicated than that.

As Inria wrote in the announcement, the project is now divided in three parts. Critical elements of the infrastructure are not going to be available on the GitLab repositories. Instead, Inria will only release documentation on the security implementations, as ANSSI and France’s data protection watchdog CNIL recommended some level of transparency on this front.

A second part is going to be released publicly but Inria is not looking for external contributions or, as developers would say, pull/merge requests. You can expect front-facing work here and things that don’t interact directly with the contact-tracing protocol.

The third part consists of the contact-tracing protocol and its implementation. This time, Inria and the community of companies and research teams working on StopCovid are looking for external contributions. The idea here is to improve the protocol itself when it comes to privacy and security.

France is moving forward with its centralized contact-tracing protocol called ROBERT. I analyzed the pros and cons of the protocol when Inria and Fraunhofer released the specifications.

It’s very different from Apple and Google’s contact-tracing API as ROBERT relies on a central server to assign a permanent ID as well as a bunch of ephemeral IDs attached to this permanent ID. Your phone collects the ephemeral IDs of other app users around you. When somebody is diagnosed COVID-positive, the server receives all the ephemeral IDs associated with people they’ve interacted with. If one or several of your ephemeral IDs get flagged, you receive a notification.

By choosing a pseudonymous system, you have to trust your government that its implementation is rock-solid. For instance, if the app sends too much information when it communicates with the server, it would become possible to put names on permanent IDs.

Inria says that StopCovid could be released in early June, if everything goes well. France’s digital minister, Cédric O, said in a TV interview that the government wanted to release StopCovid on June 2.

Uber says it has committed $50 million to procure and providing safety supplies to drivers. Those supplies will include things like face masks, sanitizer, gloves and disinfectant, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi announced on a press call today.

Uber says it has secured more than 23 million masks for drivers and delivery people throughout the world. So far, Uber says it has shipped some supplies directly to people’s homes and is also offering reimbursements to people in certain countries. Earlier this month, Uber said it would begin requiring drivers and riders to wear masks or face coverings during rides.

This comes after drivers have been demanding the company does more to support them during the COVID-19 pandemic. On Monday, about 100 drivers staged a caravan protest to Uber’s headquarters in San Francisco to demand the company comply with gig worker protections law AB-5. Drivers I spoke with ahead of the protest also said they wanted Uber to spend more money to protect them.

Instead of spending millions on the anti-AB-5 ballot initiative, driver Mekela Edwards told me she wished Uber would use that money to better support drivers during the pandemic. Uber has spent at least $30 million on the initiative, while Lyft and DoorDash have also spent at least $30 million.

“That’s money they could be spending to support us,” she said. “We enjoy the work we do. We just want to be respected and appreciated like any worker should be.”

Developing…

Now here’s an interesting GDPR complaint: Is Google illegally tracking Android users in Europe via a unique, device-assigned advertising ID?

First, what is the Android advertising ID? Per Google’s description to developers building apps for its smartphone platform it’s — [emphasis added by us]

The advertising ID is a unique, user-resettable ID for advertising, provided by Google Play services. It gives users better controls and provides developers with a simple, standard system to continue to monetize their apps. It enables users to reset their identifier or opt out of personalized ads (formerly known as interest-based ads) within Google Play apps.

Not so fast, says noyb — a European not-for-profit privacy advocacy group that campaigns to get regulators to enforce existing rules around how people’s data can be used — the problem with offering a tracking ID that can only be reset is that there’s no way for an Android user to not be tracked.

Simply put, resetting a tracker is not the same thing as being able to not be tracked at all.

noyb has now filed a formal complaint against Google under Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), accusing it of tracking Android users via the ad ID without legally valid consent.

As we’ve said many, many, many times before, GDPR applies a particular standard if you’re relying on consent — as Google appears to be here, since Android users are asked to consent to its terms on device set up, yet must agree to a resettable but not disable-able advertising ID.

Yet, under the EU data protection framework, for consent to be legally valid it must be informed, purpose limited and freely given.

Freely given means there must be a choice (which must also be free).

Thus the question arises, if an Android user can’t say no to an ad ID tracker — they can merely keep resetting it (with no user control over any previously gathered data) — where’s their free choice to not be tracked by Google?

“In essence, you buy a new Android phone, but by adding a tracking ID they ship you a tracking device,” said Stefano Rossetti, privacy lawyer at noyb.eu, in a statement on the complaint.

noyb’s contention is that Google’s ‘choice’ is “between tracking or more tracking” — which isn’t, therefore, a genuine choice to not be tracked at all.

“Google claims that users can control the processing of their data, but when put to the test Android does not allow deleting the tracking ID,” it writes. “It only allows users to generate a new tracking ID to replace the existing one. This neither deletes the data that was collected before, nor stops tracking going forward.”

“It is grotesque,” continued Rossetti. “Google claims that if you want them to stop tracking you, you have to agree to new tracking. It is like cancelling a contract only under the condition that you sign a new one. Google’s system seems to structurally deny the exercise of users’ rights.”

We reached out to Google for comment on noyb’s complaint. At the time of writing the company had not responded but we’ll update this report if it provides any remarks.

The tech giant is under active GDPR investigation related to a number of other issues — including its location tracking of users; and its use of personal data for online advertising.

The latest formal complaint over its Android ad ID has been lodged with Austria’s data protection authority on behalf of an Austrian citizen. (GDPR contains provisions that allow for third parties to file complaints on behalf of individuals.)

noyb says the complaint is partially based on a recent report by the Norwegian Consumer Council — which analyzed how popular apps are rampantly sharing user data with the behavioral ad industry.

In terms of process, it notes that the Austrian DPA may involve other European data watchdogs in the case.

This is under a ‘one-stop-shop’ mechanism in the GDPR whereby interested watchdogs liaise on cross-border investigations, with one typically taking a lead investigator role (likely to be the Irish Data Protection Commission in any complaint against Google).

Under Europe’s GDPR, data regulators have major penalty powers — with fines that can scale as high as 4% of global annual turnover, which in Google’s case could amount to up to €5BN. And the ability to order data processing is suspended or stopped. (An outcome that would likely be far more expensive to a tech giant like Google.)

However there has been a dearth of major fines since the regulation began being applied, almost two years ago (exception: France’s data watchdog hit Google with a $57M fine last year). So pressure is continuing to pile up over enforcement — especially on Ireland’s Data Protection Commission which handles many cross-border complaints but has yet to issue any decisions in a raft of cross-border cases involving a number of tech giants.

Space bus company Momentus has signed a new contract that will see it provide in-space transportation and deployment for Sen, the UK company that’s building a 4K real-time video streaming service providing live, high-quality views of Earth, both free for individuals and via an ope source data platform for developers and service creators.

Santa Clara-based Momentus is an in-space transportation startup that provides services to satellite companies looking to move payloads after launch. They can do things like alter the orbits of satellites, and can provide that last-mile transportation leg for payloads going up on other rockets, like the SpaceX Falcon 9, which is providing the ride for the Sen satellites to their drop-off points.

From there, Momentus will use its Vigoride orbital transfer vehicles to take the Sen satellites the rest of the way. The Vigoride is a water plasma–based propulsion vehicle that will get its first test flight later this year, and the goal is to get it to operational status by 2021. The mission on behalf of Sen is set to take place in 2022.

Sen’s technology will provide imaging from small satellites equipped with multiple cameras, and ultimately it’ll operate an entire constellation built on the foundation of the first five to be launched by Momentus. The video will be available for invidiuals to view via web and smartphone app for free, and Momentus plans to offer premium services to businesses as its go to market plan.

Once it has Vigoride up and running in an operational capacity, Momentus plans to develop a new version called Ardoride that will follow in 2022 or 2023, providing more capacity for bigger payloads and transportation to higher orbits – as well as trips as far as the Moon.

Despite the economic disruptions associated with the coronavirus pandemic, cloud vendors are holding up well as many client companies and their employees work from home.

With stores closed, it’s natural that e-commerce would also perform strongly — after all, it’s also cloud-based, and folks working from home are shifting their shopping from brick-and-mortar to digital. (You can look at the pre-COVID-19 trend here; it has since become an even steeper curve.)

If you track Shopify’s stock price over the last six months, the argument appears to hold up; the cloud’s pandemic boom isn’t confined to remote-work tooling like Slack and Zoom.

The Canadian phenom helps businesses large and small build online storefronts, offering a reasonable alternative in the midst of a sinking traditional economy. As more businesses must close their stores, a sturdy online presence could be the difference between surviving and going under.

Going beyond online

The public company doesn’t stop with just digital storefronts; Shopify also offers a point-of-sale system for businesses that lets owners track sales wherever they happen. While having physical stores open on a regular basis might not happen for some time, a unified approach to your business in-store and online could help retailers, no matter what happens.

In fact, Shopify counts larger businesses such as Heineken, Staples, General Mills and D-Link as customers. One other factor could also be helping explain Shopify’s growing success: It serves as an alternative for a growing number of firms and online shoppers who don’t want to give their business to online retail giant Amazon.

Having that level of product and customer could help explain why Shopify’s fortunes have been on the rise in spite of the pandemic’s overall impact on the economy. Let’s dig a bit further.

From product to profit

After 8 years of Unreal Engine 4, Epic Games is finally ready to talk about Unreal Engine 5, which they’re announcing will launch in preview early next year with a wider launch by the year’s end.

Unreal Engine 5 is all about harnessing the performance of next-generation consoles like the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. The consoles support wild resolutions and frame rates, but Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney was most excited about how the new hardware handles data storage, something he says will lead to “state of the art performance” better than any gaming PC.

For Unreal Engine 5, the big evolution appears to be dynamic rendering, allowing developers to drop in massively complex objects with millions of polygons into their games and lean on the engine to determine how intricately the object can be rendered onscreen.

In the case of the PlayStation 5, that’s pretty damn intricate. Epic Games showcased the new engine running on the PS5 in a truly stunning demo.

“We’re turning scalability from a developers problem into an our problem,” Sweeney says.

Sweeney says the demo is the representation of what happens when the polygons being rendered shrink to the size of individual pixels, “This is all the detail that you can get until you get a higher resolution monitor, or until 8K or 16K come along,” he says.

Alongside news of the big update’s release, Epic Games has shared that Fortnite, which will unsurprisingly be leveraging Unreal Engine 5, will be a launch title on the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. While the game’s cartoonish art style won’t be pushing boundaries quite as much as hyperrealistic titles like the one above, adding the next-gen consoles means more platforms to reign supreme on.

Having a holistic picture of your health might not mean just wearing a device like an Apple Watch that can monitor your biometrics – researchers at MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) have developed a new system that can figure out when and where in-home appliances like hair dryers, stoves, microwaves and washing machines are being used, and they believe that info could help inform healthcare practitioners about the habits and challenges of people under their care.

The researchers devised a system called ‘Sapple’ which uses just two sensors placed in a person’s home to determine use patterns of devices including stoves, hair dryers and ore. There’s one location sensor that works using radio signals to figure out placement, with a user able to calibrate it to cover their area by simply walking the bounds of their space. A second sensor measures energy usage through the home, and combines that data with movement information to matching energy use signals with physical locations of specific applicants, to provide data both when aa person is using the appliances around the house, and for how long.

This gets around a lot of the issues raised by similar systems, including more simple voltage meters used on their own. While appliances do tend to have specific energy use patterns that mean you can identify them just based on consumption, it’s hard to tell when and how they’re being used with that data on its own. This info can let health professionals know if a patient is taking proper care of hygiene, food preparation and intake and more.

Of course, the system does sound like one that has a lot of potential privacy pitfalls, but its intended use is for specific cases, like providing supervised care of aging populations that need it while also still preserving resources and enabling better distancing, which is actually a more urgent need right now as we continue to figure out how to address caregiving in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.

It’s a clever system in that it doesn’t require any special smart IoT devices to work, beyond the two simple sensors, and essentially also doesn’t require any technical expertise on the part of the patients receiving care.

The Extra Crunch Live series rolls along next week with something special: My old boss is taking part.

Let me explain. Alexia Bonatsos was once co-editor of TechCrunch and was part of my interview circuit when I first joined the publication. She taught me more than I can write down; Alexia is one of my favorite people.

She’s joining us for an Extra Crunch Live session as she’s now a venture capitalist at Dream Machine VC, a firm she started. Her partner, Niko Bonatsos, is taking part as well. Niko works for General Catalyst, where he’s a managing director.

Dream Machine is a self-described “opportunistic seed fund,” meaning it makes early bets. General Catalyst tends to invest a little later but also has a seed effort that’s worth a few dozen million dollars each year. So, the two are likely focused on different parts of the market, even if there is some overlap.

I won’t lie; I’m excited about this conversation. Alexia is someone who always challenges my thinking, and Niko is a curious VC in that I don’t think he’s ever tried to bullshit me. (Indeed, he swung by the other week to chat with my Equity co-host Danny, which went pretty well. But call that a warm-up for this particular chat.)

What will we talk about? We’ll cover the basics quickly — their current investing pace, changes in the face of COVID-19, that sort of thing — but then we’ll dig into the future. General Catalyst has taken part in a few AI-focused funding rounds in 2020, and Dream Machine says that it “hopes to help exceptional founders make science fiction non-fiction.”

I have some questions.

But I won’t be able to draw all the lines that we ask them to color in for us — you’ll be on hand to help. These Extra Crunch Live chats have been a good reminder that you have a lot of ideas and questions that are worth raising. So, I’ll see you on May 19 in the early afternoon on the East Coast, or the late morning if you’re out West.

Details are below for Extra Crunch subscribers; if you need a pass, you can get an inexpensive trial here.

Let’s have some fun and talk about the future.

— Alex

Details

Here’s the information you’ll need:

• May 19, 11:00 a.m. PDT/2:00 p.m. EDT/5:00 p.m. GMT
  
  

Facebook strikes a deal to compensate content moderators with PTSD, Tesla might reopen its factory next week and Twitter says some employees can work from home indefinitely.

Here’s your Daily Crunch for May 13, 2020.

1. Facebook to pay $52M to content moderators suffering from PTSD

Facebook employs thousands of content moderators to sift through the vast number of posts, images and other content posted to the site.

The Verge reported Tuesday that the settlement — to which Facebook has agreed “in principle — will cover more than 11,000 content moderators who developed depression, addictions and other mental health issues while they worked moderating content on the social media platform.

2. Alameda County may allow Tesla’s Fremont factory to reopen as soon as next week

The Alameda County Public Health Department may be close to resolving a dispute with Tesla CEO Elon Musk. The department released a statement saying, “If Tesla’s Prevention and Control Plan includes these updates, and public health indicators remain stable or improve, we have agreed that Tesla can begin to augment their Minimum Business Operations this week in preparation for possible reopening as soon as next week.”

3. Twitter says staff can continue working from home permanently

Jack Dorsey recently sent an email notifying employees that they will be able to continue working from home as long as they see fit. The CEO noted that Twitter was an early adopter of a work-from-home model, though — like much of the rest of the world — that push has been accelerated by COVID-19 stay-at-home orders.

4. Deliveroo criticized over ‘inadequate’ PPE provision and income support for riders risking coronavirus exposure

More than forty U.K. legislators from across the political spectrum have co-signed a letter urging the company to provide all riders with adequate personal protective equipment, given the risks faced to those who continue making deliveries during the COVID-19 pandemic.

5. Adding three more companies to the $100M ARR club

When Alex Wilhelm kicked off his series on private companies that have reached $100 million ARR, he says he didn’t expect it to last. But today’s entry brings the series past the 30-company mark. (Extra Crunch membership required.)

6. Slice, an online ordering and marketing platform for pizzerias, raises $43M

Slice has created a mobile app and website where diners can order a custom pizza delivery from their local, independent pizzeria. And for those pizzerias, CEO Ilir Sela said the startup helps to digitize their whole business by also creating a website, improving their SEO and even allowing them to benefit from the “economies of scale” of the larger network through bulk orders of supplies like pizza boxes.

7. Loon signs deal to expand commercial internet service to Mozambique

Loon has signed a new deal with carrier Vodacom to expand its internet-via-stratospheric-ballon offering to Mozambique. This is the second commercial agreement the Alphabet-owned company has in place in the continent. Mozambique’s close proximity to Kenya — the location of its first deal — means that Loon will be able to use balloons across both markets.

The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 9am Pacific, you can subscribe here.

While the world feels paused, in some respects, new startups are still cropping up like usual. Today, 13 companies are graduating from the Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator, based in NY, with $100,000 each in funding from the accelerator.

This is ERA’s 14th class, with the accelerator having launched more than 200 companies since its inception, which have collectively raised more than $500 million.

Let’s meet the companies:

Artists on Go is a marketplace platform that connects individual hairstylists with salon owners. Stylists can rent salon space from owners for $20/hour and keep the revenue they earn from their clients, rather than splitting it with a salon employer. Salon owners, meanwhile, earn revenue on their empty space when they don’t have clients of their own.

Coinapoly is an asset management platform that helps customers go from renters to real estate owners, by letting them buy a part of their home over time while offering better risk-adjusted returns to real estate investors. The company charges fees on managed homes.

FieldClix is a SaaS platform for remote construction projects, specifically tailored toward wireless, solar and broadband construction projects. With carriers pushing toward a 5G roll out, FieldClix allows workers to collaborate on project planning, field resource management, cost tracking, etc. The company has 30 companies on the platform right now, charging a recurring monthly, tiered subscription fee per licensed seat.

Hailify is a B2B platform that looks to utilize on-demand driver fleets during their downtime in between rides. Where drivers are waiting around for their next ride, Hailify offers them a last-mile delivery gig to keep earning even without a rider. Hailify charges the on-demand driver company, and pays out drivers for each delivery made, taking a percentage of each delivery that goes through the platform.

Hazel is tackling the female incontinence space with a re-engineered adult diaper, focusing on fit, function and aesthetics. The D2C business uses new materials and techniques to deliver a disposable product that looks and feels like real underwear. Hazel launches later this fall.

Mouth Off is a dissolvable gum that is meant to eliminate bad breath, not by simply masking the odor but by attacking the molecules in the mouth that produce bad breath. Mouth Off is plant-based and has no sugar or artificial ingredients. The company, which is launching later this fall, offers both a D2C subscription and retail options for purchase.

Nayya is an enterprise business that helps employers find the right health insurance coverage plan for their employees, using data to increase transparency and provide cost-saving insights and information around the doctor network nearby. The Nayya companion product lets employees enroll and helps them throughout the year as they navigate coverage, doctors, and supplemental coverage options. Nayya also offers payroll integration.

As parental leave grows as an important feature for employees and employers alike, Parento offers an insurance-based paid parental leave platform for employers. The company offers predictable pricing allowing for employees to take up to 16 weeks off, alongside offerings for new parent coaching and transition support. The company uses a B2B model, with pricing varying based on employee salary and the existing paid parental leave policy.

RillaVoice gives companies in real-world environments, like grocery stores, fast food chains, hospitals and brick and mortar stores the chance to record and analyze their face-to-face conversations with customers. Using lapel mics and machine-learning technology, Rilla analyzes these conversations to better understand customer experience, conversion, etc. in a way that’s secure, compliant and anonymous. Rilla charges a monthly fee per seat, which ranges from $50/month to $350/month.

Salusion is a SaaS company focused on maximizing HSA tax savings for consumers and their employers. By revamping the health savings account process, Salusion lets users ‘HSA as they go’, and charges employers a fee per employee per month to administer the HSA accounts.

Spotter is a software targeted at the long-haul trucking industry, helping these companies select the best load for an individual truck and driver based on input criteria like rate, schedule and fuel costs. The platform also provides drivers with pickup and drop-off instructions. Spotter charges fleets a subscription fee per truck.

Top is a multi-channel engagement platform for brands, giving them the chance to collect privacy-compliant data without the use of cookies. Top helps brands create interactive content, such as live voting, games and competitions to collect this data and build customer profiles, which includes data such as shopping preferences and purchase intent. Top charges clients monthly for use of their data and engagement platform.

Undock is a SaaS business focused on scheduling and coordinating meetings. The predictive machine-learning model looks for the perfect meeting time for participants by comparing availability, preferences and behavior. The Undock platform also offers collaborative agenda and note-taking functionality that lays on top of any conferencing platform. Undock operates a freemium model.