Author: azeeadmin

Narrative, a startup that makes it easier to buy and sell data, is announcing that it’s raised $3 million in additional seed funding.

The round was led by Glasswing Ventures .  XSeed, Tuhaye and Revel also participated.

When I first wrote about the company two years ago, it had already raised $2.25 million, and its business revolved around a marketplace for data. Founder and CEO Nick Jordan told me that’s still what Narrative offers — but customers have also started using its software to manage data transactions beyond the marketplace.

“Buying or selling data sounds really simple — anybody can write in a board deck … ‘We’re going to acquire data, we’re going to distribute data,'” Jordan said. “But it’s much more complex. As a buyer you want specific records, you’re buying for multiple parties. Every seller sells data in a different format. Broadly speaking, there’s a ton of fragmentation.”

And yet, these transactions do happen, with or without Narrative . But Jordan said companies have “historically built their own systems out of duct tape and prayers,” and they often lack features that “seem incredibly trivial, like reporting how much data was sold or bought.”

With Narrative, on the other hand, businesses don’t need to spend the time and resources to create this infrastructure, and they get a tool that allows them to monitor, and hopefully grow, their entire data business.

As this happens, the broader landscape around buying and selling user data is changing, thanks to GDPR, the California privacy bill and the potential for more regulation.

Jordan acknowledged that when GDPR went into effect, Narrative saw “a fairly precipitous drop in data made available in the EU.” At the same time, he said, “The industry as a whole grew up a bit,” and that’s made the technology more appealing to some customers, because it provides “full transparency between the buyer and seller.”

“It [gives] you the ability to do your own due diligence and make sure the data you’re getting is compliant, based on your own reading of GDPR law,” Jordan said.

In fact, he claimed that Narrative really started to see a positive response from customers in the second and third quarter of last year — coincidentally or not, right as GDPR was going into effect.

“This money is really to show that we’ve found product market fit,” Jordan added. That means investing in sales and marketing — and if that pays off, Narrative can probably go out and raise a bigger round.

HAX today announced the launch of an initiative targeted at helping startups advance the state of tech for people over the age of 65. The program was developed in conjunction with Centrica, the energy company behind the newly launched Hive Link, a smart home service for people with elderly family members.

The program will invest $250,000 in the startups it selects, including mentoring, office space, education and the like, in exchange for equity in the companies — a pretty standard setup for the San Francisco/Shenzhen-based accelerator.

As HAX notes in a related press release, the US population aging. Studies put today’s 47.8 million population of people over 65 at 78 million in the year 2035.

“HAX has invested in over 200 high-tech startups over the past six years, and we were looking for the right partner to tackle this immense challenge,” partner Kate Whitcomb said in a release tied to the news. “We want to find the right sensors, service robots, or diagnostic devices that can help us age gracefully, and avoid $100 problems turning into $100,000 ones.”

Applications for the program are currently open through the HAX site. Interested parties need to provide a prototype of their project and be willing to relocate to either San Francisco or Shenzhen. It’s a great opportunity to grow a much needed hardware sector and help improve the availability of tech for good, through a focused accelerator program. 

“High Flying Bird,” the latest film from director Steven Soderbergh, isn’t an easy movie to categorize.

For starters, It’s a basketball movie without any basketball. Instead, the story focuses on agent Ray Burke (played by Andre Holland), and his efforts behind the scenes during an NBA lockout. It becomes surprisingly political, portraying the pro sports world as another arena for the conflict between labor and management.

Oh, and this is the second time Soderbergh’s shot a movie on an iPhone — but instead of the low-resolution, handheld shots you might imagine, it’s filled with carefully composed images of cushy backroom dealings.

On this week’s Original Content podcast, Jon Shieber joins us to review the movie. We all liked it — but while some of us struggled to keep up during the dense dialogue scenes, and whether they fully paid off in the end, Jon was completely won over.

You can listen in the player below, subscribe using Apple Podcasts or find us in your podcast player of choice. If you like the show, please let us know by leaving a review on Apple. You also can send us feedback directly. (Or suggest shows and movies for us to review!)

Mobile World Congress is underway, which means there are a handful of brand spankin’ new 5G phones hitting the market soon.

How ever will you decide?

Here’s a look at all the 5G phones announced thus far:

Huawei Mate X

The Mate X is a foldable 5G phone with one 4.6-inch screen, another 6.6-inch 2480×1148 screen, and (when unfolded) an 8-inch 2200×2480 display.

Some other specs:

• Processor: Kirin 980
• Battery: 4,5000mAh
• Memory: 8GB RAM, 512GB internal
• Price: $2,600
• Size: 11mm folded, 5.4mm unfolded

LG V50 ThinQ 5G

Aside from its unbearably long name, the LG V50 ThinQ 5G’s claim to fame new biometric security measure called Hand ID, which reads the veins in your hand to authenticate your identity. Plus, the new LG flagship has a dual-screen case, which effectively turns the phone into a foldable.

Some other specs:

• Processor: Qualcomm SDM855 Snapdragon 855
• Battery: 4,000mAh
• Memory: 6GB RAM, 128GB internal
• Price: Unknown

Samsung Galaxy Fold

The Galaxy Fold is likely to be the most talked-about phone out of MWC because 1) it folds and 2) it’s made by the biggest phone maker in the world. The handset, with a 7.3-inch 1536×2152 Super AMOLED unfolded display and a 4.6-inch cover display, will be available April 26.

Some other specs:

• Processor: Qualcomm SDM855 Snapdragon 855
• Battery: 4,380mAh
• Memory: 12GB RAM, 512GB internal
• Price: $1,980
• Size: 17mm folded

Samsung Galaxy S10 5G

The Samsung S10 5G is exactly what you would expect it to be. It’s packed with all the bells and whistles that might appeal to the customer who wants the top of the line phone regardless of price. It sports a 6.7-inch 1440×3040 AMOLED display.

Some other specs:

• Processor: Qualcomm SDM855 Snapdragon 855
• Battery: 4,500mAh
• Memory: 8GB RAM, 256GB internal
• Price: Unknown

Xiaomi Mi Mix 3

Interestingly, Xiaomi opted to leave 5G out of its flagship phone for the year, the Mi 9. That said, the 5G Mi Mix 3 has a handful its own interesting features, including a sliding front-facing camera that results in a 93.4 percent screen-to-body ratio. It also has a dual-camera system that offers the ability to shoot slow-mo videos at 960 frames per second.

Some other specs:

• Processor: Qualcomm SDM855 Snapdragon 855
• Battery: 3,800mAh
• Memory: 6GB RAM, 64GB/128GB internal
• Price: $680

ZTE Axon 10 Pro 5G

The Axon 10 Pro 5G doesn’t have many tricks, like a folding display, but it does come with a triple-camera system and what appears to be an in-display fingerprint reader. It also sports a 6.7-inch 1080p display. The phone will definitely launch in Europe and China, but no word on whether it will make its way stateside.

Some other specs:

• Processor: Qualcomm SDM855 Snapdragon 855
• Battery: 4,000mAh
• Memory: 6GB RAM, 128GB internal
• Price: Unknown

The FTC announced this morning its has approved the final consent order with online student loan refinancer SoFi, which resolves the allegations around the SoFi’s deceptive advertising practices. Last October, the FTC issued a complaint stating that SoFi had been misrepresenting how much money student loan borrowers could save in its online, TV and direct mail advertisements since April 2016.

According to the FTC’s findings, SoFi would inflate the average lifetime savings consumers could achieve – sometimes even as much as double the actual savings – by excluding large categories of consumers. Meanwhile, most of the excluded groups were actually paying more money as a result of their loans with SoFi, the FTC said. In fact, they were paying thousands of dollars more, on average, on a lifetime basis, and hundreds more, on average, per month.

For example, one online SoFi ad had claimed: “Refinancing student loans saves $22,359 on average.” Another had said: “Start saving on your student loans. Average monthly savings $292.”

The excluded groups were those borrowers whose loans have a longer term than the previous student loans those consumers financed, the FTC explained. That meant they ended up paying more over the loans’ lifetime. When SoFi did make disclosures, it was buried in the fine print, the complaint also said.

In addition, the FTC said SoFi misrepresented when consumers would actually pay more under certain refinancing plans, which violated the FTC Act.

The Commission voted 5-0 to approve the final consent order, following a public comment period.

The order says SoFi is prohibited from misrepresenting to consumers how much they can saved using its products, and from making claims about savings unless they’re backed up with reliable evidence.

SoFi at the time had disputed the FTC’s claims, saying it offers “clear and complete information” to its current and prospective members.

In a statement released in October 2018, the FTC noted its resolution doesn’t require SoFi to pay any money for its violations, due to limitations in its authority. But if SoFi violates the consent order, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the State Attorneys General would be able to seek penalties under existing federal law.

The order terminates on February 22, 2039 or 20 years from the most recent date the U.S. of the Commision files a complaint in federal court alleging any violations, whichever comes later.

The settlement comes at a time when student loan debt has become a hot button topic, having tripled over the last decade, and now surpassing auto and credit card debt, CNBC reported last fall. Average debt at graduation is now $30,000, up by $10,000 since the early ’90’s it said.

Target this morning announced Target+, a new initiative designed to expand the assortment on Target.com with merchandise from third-party sellers. But unlike with Walmart and Amazon’s marketplaces, Target is taking a more curated approach as to how sellers will be added to its program. The retailer says it’s starting with “thoughtfully selected” additions in areas like home, toys, electronics and sporting goods.

While any seller can apply to join Amazon or Walmart’s marketplace, there’s no such process for joining Target+. Instead, Target explains that each partner is “carefully selected” and then invited into the program – a move it hopes will help keep quality high.

At launch, guests will be able to discover an expanded array of running shoes, outdoor décor, patio accessories, a bigger selection of STEM learning toys, new musical instruments, and baseball gear from both national and speciality sellers, says Target. Some of the current sellers include: SVSports, Mizuno, Kaplan Early Learning Company, Serenity Health & Home Décor and Music123.

Over time, more products and sellers will be added, as Target learns more about guest needs.

Offering only a curated selection means Target+ won’t face the same struggles as other retailers when it comes to policing their third-party marketplaces for offensive content – like the racist merchandise found on Amazon, for instance; the toilet seat covers featuring holy text, politically charged and controversial apparel; and other items. Because these marketplaces are so large, offensive or just generally questionable or odd merchandise repeatedly surfaces, resulting in bad PR for the marketplace’s host, like Amazon, Walmart or eBay.

Target will avoid this issue by way of its curation, but it will come at the expense of having a larger third-party assortment.

Target+ merchandise will also be integrated into the site within the appropriate categories, so the items can be discovered through both browsing and search. There’s no way to just search for “Target+” items.

In addition, shoppers will have the same perks when buying from third parties as they do when buying from Target’s own assortment, including 5 percent off when using their Target REDcard, free shipping, and in-store returns.

“Guests look to Target for great products. With Target +, we aim to give them easy access to even more great products by partnering with best-in-class specialty and national brands that will help guests save and get more done in just one stop to Target.com,” said Rick Gomez, Target’s chief marketing officer and digital officer, in a statement.

The launch of Target+ follows Walmart’s recent announcement that it would expand its 2-day shipping program to the millions of products offered by its own marketplace sellers, to better compete with Fulfillment by Amazon, which allows sellers to make their items available on Prime. And, like Target, Walmart aims to leverage its brick-and-mortar stores for third-party merchandise returns.

Both moves put Amazon at more of a disadvantage, as its brick-and-mortar footprint is limited to its Whole Foods stores, and various bookstores and other shops in urban metros. Walmart, on the other hand, has 140 million weekly in-store customers, and says 90 percent of Americans live within 10 miles of a Walmart store.

Target, meanwhile, has 1,850 retail stores in the U.S. compared with roughly 475 Whole Foods stores in the U.S., and over 4,700 Walmart locations in the U.S. (excluding Sam’s Club.)

 

The European Commission’s digital commissioner has warned the mobile industry to expect it to act over security concerns attached to Chinese network equipment makers.

The Commission is considering a defacto ban on kit made by Chinese companies including Huawei in the face of security and espionage concerns, per Reuters.

Appearing on stage at the Mobile World Congress tradeshow in Barcelona today, Mariya Gabriel, European commissioner for digital economy and society, flagged network “cybersecurity” during her scheduled keynote, warning delegates it’s stating the obvious for her to say that “when 5G services become mission critical 5G networks need to be secure”.

Geopolitical concerns between the West and China are being accelerated and pushed to the fore as the era of 5G network upgrades approach, as well as by ongoing tensions between the U.S. and China over trade.

“I’m well away of the unrest among all of you key actors in the telecoms sectors caused by the ongoing discussions around the cybersecurity of 5G,” Gabriel continued, fleshing out the Commission’s current thinking. “Let me reassure you: The Commission takes your view very seriously. Because you need to run these systems everyday. Nobody is helped by premature decisions based on partial analysis of the facts.

“However it is also clear that Europe has to have a common approach to this challenge. And we need to bring it on the table soon. Otherwise there is a risk that fragmentation rises because of diverging decisions taken by Member States trying to protect themselves.”

“We all know that this fragmentation damages the digital single market. So therefore we are working on this important matter with priority. And to the Commission we will take steps soon,” she added.

The theme of this year’s show is “intelligent connectivity”; the notion that the incoming 5G networks will not only create links between people and (many, many more) things but understand the connections they’re making at a greater depth and resolution than has been possible before, leveraging the big data generated by many more connections to power automated decision-making in near real time, with low latency another touted 5G benefit (as well as many more connections per cell).

Futuristic scenarios being floated include connected cars neatly pulling to the sides of the road ahead of an ambulance rushing a patient to hospital — or indeed medical operations being aided and even directed remotely in real-time via 5G networks supporting high resolution real-time video streaming.

But for every touted benefit there are easy to envisage risks to network technology that’s being designed to connect everything all of the time — thereby creating a new and more powerful layer of critical infrastructure society will be relying upon.

Last fall the Australia government issued new security guidelines for 5G networks that essential block Chinese companies such as Huawei and ZTE from providing equipment to operators — justifying the move by saying that differences in the way 5G operates compared to previous network generations introduces new risks to national security.

New Zealand followed suit shortly after, saying kit from the Chinese companies posed a significant risk to national security.

While in the U.S. President Trump has made 5G network security a national security priority since 2017, and a bill was passed last fall banning Chinese companies from supplying certain components and services to government agencies.

The ban is due to take effect over two years but lawmakers have been pressuring to local carriers to drop 5G collaborations with companies such as Huawei.

In Europe the picture is so far more mixed. A UK government report last summer investigating Huawei’s broadband and mobile infrastructure raised further doubts, and last month Germany was reported to be mulling a 5G ban on the Chinese kit maker.

But more recently the two EU Member States have been reported to no longer be leaning towards a total ban — apparently believing any risk can be managed and mitigated by oversight and/or partial restrictions.

It remains to be seen how the Commission could step in to try to harmonize security actions taken by Member States around nascent 5G networks. But it appears prepared to set rules.

That said, Gabriel gave no hint of its thinking today, beyond repeating the Commission’s preferred position of less fragmentation, more harmonization to avoid collateral damage to its overarching Digital Single Market initiative — i.e. if Member States start fragmenting into a patchwork based on varying security concerns.

We’ve reached out to the Commission for further comment and will update this story with any additional context.

During the keynote she was careful to talk up the transformative potential of 5G connectivity while also saying innovation must work in lock-step with European “values”.

“Europe has to keep pace with other regions and early movers while making sure that its citizens and businesses benefit swiftly from the new infrastructures and the many applications that will be built on top of them,” she said.

“Digital is helping us and we need to reap its opportunities, mitigate its risks and make sure it is respectful of our values as much as driven by innovation. Innovation and values. Two key words. That is the vision we have delivered in terms of the defence for our citizens in Europe. Together we have decided to construct a Digital Single Market that reflects the values and principles upon which the European Union has been built.”

Her speech also focused on AI, with the commissioner highlighting various EC initiatives to invest in and support private sector investment in artificial intelligence — saying it’s targeting €20BN in “AI-directed investment” across the private and public sector by 2020, with the goal for the next decade being “to reach the same amount as an annual average” — and calling on the private sector to “contribute to ensure that Europe reaches the level of investment needed for it to become a world stage leader also in AI”.

But again she stressed the need for technology developments to be thoughtfully managed so they reflect the underlying society rather than negatively disrupting it. The goal should be what she dubbed “human-centric AI”.

“When we talk about AI and new technologies development for us Europeans it is not only about investing. It is mainly about shaping AI in a way that reflects our European values and principles. An ethical approach to AI is key to enable competitiveness — it will generate user trust and help facilitate its uptake,” she said.

“Trust is the key word. There is no other way. It is only by ensuring trustworthiness that Europe will position itself as a leader in cutting edge, secure and ethical AI. And that European citizens will enjoy AI’s benefits.”

OnePlus promised us a 5G handset this year. At Mobile World Congress this week, the company kind of, sort of delivered. Unlike the sea of other 5G devices unveiled at the show, however, the company’s offering is still very much in the prototype phase — like, behind protective glass with all of the interesting bits obscured, since it isn’t officially official.

The product appeared at Qualcomm’s booth this week, since OnePlus’ presence at the show has been mostly limited to closed door events. For the chipmaker, it was an opportunity to show yet again how ubiquitous its tech has become in the vast sea of Android devices.

“At Qualcomm Technologies’ booth, OnePlus simulated a futuristic setting of 5G cloud gaming where players would only need a smartphone and a gamepad,” Qualcomm explains. “Through the powerful capabilities of cloud processing as well as the throughput and responsiveness of 5G, players can play large sized games online that are generally only playable after downloading onto the PC first. Utilizing Snapdragon elite gaming features and optimizations, players were able to experience high definition and low latency cloud gaming like never before.”

Based on past release schedule, we can likely expect OnePlus to officially debut its next handset in the summer. Past release cycles have also seen a point upgrade later in the year as well, though the company has been shifting things around a bit, as it continues to grow and figure out where it best fits in the broader handset market.

This particular device, likely the OnePlus 7, is due out in Q2, though, sadly, its 5G variant won’t be released in the States in 2018.

The addition of 5G in 2019, meanwhile, finds OnePlus taking a more cutting edge approach to its release cycle, rather than holding back in order to lower the price tag on technology.

The FIDO Alliance and Google today announced that Android (from version 7.0 up) with the latest version of the Google Play Services, is now FIDO2 certified. At first glance, that sounds rather boring, but it will enable developers to write apps that use a phone’s fingerprint scanner or a FIDO security key to authenticate users without making them type in a password. Since I’m not aware of too many people who like to type in complicated passwords that their IT department makes them change every few months, that’s a big deal.

Developers will be able to enable password-less logins in their web and native apps. Chrome, Microsoft Edge and Firefox already fully support this feature, as does Apple’s Safari (but only in preview). In addition to the convenience, FIDO2 also promises to offer phishing-resistant security, given that this technology won’t let you authenticate on a malicious site.

“Google has long worked with the FIDO Alliance and W3C to standardize FIDO2 protocols, which give any application the ability to move beyond password authentication while offering protection against phishing attacks,” Google product manager Christiaan Brand. “Today’s announcement of FIDO2 certification for Android helps move this initiative forward, giving our partners and developers a standardized way to access secure keystores across devices, both in market already as well as forthcoming models, in order to build convenient biometric controls for users.”

It’s worth noting that Android already supported password-less authentication for native apps, but now it’ll also support these for browser logins. Once you’ve set up this new authentication mechanism (and once web apps support it), your phone will store all of the cryptographic data on the device and none of the raw fingerprint data, for example, will be transferred to anybody else.

The FIDO Alliance says this new mechanism will soon enable a billion users on modern Android devices to experience password-less logins. Developers will have to implement support in their web and native applications, though, but that’s relatively easy.

Telecom company Sprint has shared some of its plans when it comes to 5G service in the U.S. The company announced at MWC in Barcelona that mobile customers in Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas and Kansas City can expect 5G service as soon as May 2019.

If you don’t live in one of those cities, maybe you live in Houston, Los Angeles, New York City, Phoenix or Washington D.C. Sprint also promises 5G coverage in those cities soon after the initial launch, at some point before the end of June 2019.

Overall, Sprint expects to cover 1,000 square miles in nine cities by the end of the first half of 2019. It’s going to take years to roll out 5G coverage across the U.S.

When it comes to devices, Sprint will sell smartphones that are compatible with its 5G network. The first one will be the LG V50 ThinQ 5G. The company will also sell the Samsung Galaxy S10 5G at some point this summer.

Sprint is also partnering with Google so that Google Fi customers can take advantage of Sprint’s 5G network if they have a compatible device.

And that’s about all there’s to know. It’s still unclear whether 5G plans are going to cost more.

Disclosure: Sprint competitor Verizon owns TechCrunch