Category: TECHNOLOGY
Pinterest Investors Should Buy Elliott’s Vision
Investors have reason to believe Elliott Management’s involvement should make for an effective wake-up call to a company stuck in the clouds. …read more
Runa Sandvik’s new startup Granitt secures at-risk people from hackers and nation states
For much of her career, hacker Runa Sandvik has worked to protect journalists and newsrooms from powerful adversaries who want to keep wrongdoing and corruption out of the public eye. Journalists and activists are increasingly targeted by the wealthy and resourceful who seek to keep the truth hidden, from nation-state aligned hackers hacking into journalist’s inboxes to governments deploying mobile spyware to snoop on their most vocal critics.
Few know the threats that journalists face better than Sandvik, a native Norwegian. She defended The New York Times newsroom from hackers and nation-state adversaries, trained reporters to cloak their online activity in anonymity at the Tor Project, and helped organizations like the Freedom of the Press Foundation to build tools that allow journalists, like us at TechCrunch, securely communicate with sources and receive sensitive source documents. Sandvik is also a renowned hacker and security researcher and, as of recently, a founder.
With her new startup, Granitt — with Sandvik as its principal — aims to help at-risk people, like journalists and activists but also politicians, lawyers, refugees and human rights defenders, from threats they face doing their work.
“At any point someone finds themselves in a category where there might be some repercussions for them doing whatever it is they’re doing, that’s something I would consider ‘at risk’ and something that I can help with,” Sandvik told me when we spoke in New York City this week.
Sandvik told me about her work and her new bootstrapped startup, how leaders should prioritize their cybersecurity efforts, and, what piece of security advice she would give that every person should know.
Our chat, which has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity, follows.
ZW: You’ve been laying the groundwork for Granitt for the past decade. Tell me how you got here.
RS: If you look at a decade ago when I worked for the Tor Project and they got funding, we set out to teach reporters how to use the Tor Browser. And very quickly realized that it’s not super impactful to just teach someone how to use the Tor Browser if they’re not also familiar with good passwords, two-factor authentication and software updates — things to consider when they’re traveling to conflict zones, for example. And we started building out a curriculum around what you should do to be safe online. I later consulted for the Freedom of the Press Foundation doing somewhat similar work, and also then working on SecureDrop. And my role at The New York Times was building on that type of work as well. And after the Times eliminated my role, I worked with ProPublica, Radio Free Europe, and the Ford Foundation to look at not just security for individuals but also how to help the business side of media organizations to support the newsroom.
<p Not gonna lie, this NGL lawsuit is kinda juicy
The anonymous Q&A app NGL climbed to the top of the App Store by tricking its users with questions it claims are sent in by their friends and by charging for useless hints about who supposedly wrote those messages. But many of the questions users receive aren’t from real people; they’re generated automatically — an idea NGL’s top competitor, the maker of the Sendit apps, is now alleging NGL’s maker stole alongside other confidential business information, according to a new lawsuit.
In a complaint filed on July 1, 2022, in the Superior Court of California, Sendit’s creator, Iconic Hearts Holdings, Inc. (previously known as FullSenders), claims that NGL acquired its trade secrets through “improper means” as a result of a breach of duties by the suit’s defendant, Raj Vir, an Instagram software engineer, who had worked on Sendit on the side.
For those who don’t keep up with teen app trends, both Sendit and NGL are leading anonymous Q&A apps, a subgroup of social apps currently popular among a younger demographic. The apps have been ranking at the top of the app store charts for months, as anonymous apps typically do — before they implode from bullying, lawsuits or get banned by the app stores themselves.
As of today, NGL is the No. 5 top (non-game) free app on the U.S. App Store. Since launching late last year, the company has generated more than $2.4 million in revenue, according to third-party estimates. Sendit’s apps are currently ranked at No. 12 in Social Networking (Sendit) and No. 57 in Social Networking (Sendit — Q&A on Instagram), and have earned over $11 million, per data from Sensor Tower.
Both Sendit and NGL allow users to post links to their social accounts, like Instagram or Snapchat Stories, which friends can click on to send the poster anonymous questions. (Think: “who do you have a crush on?” and other teenage gossip.)
The recipient, in turn, receives the questions in the app’s inbox, and can then post their response to their social accounts for all to read. The apps monetize this activity by offering their users “hints” about the person asking the questions so they can find out who asked what.
While NGL focuses only on anonymous Q&As, Sendit offers two variations of its service. Its original app is aimed at Snapchat users and provides a variety of games in addition to the anonymous Q&A feature. Its newer app, meanwhile, brings anonymous Q&A’s to Instagram. It launched following Snapchat’s rollout of stricter policies earlier this year that banned anonymous apps from using its developer tools. (Sendit received an extension to come into compliance with those policies, Snapchat told us.)
The apps are problematic, however, because they’ve been demonstrated to be using misleading tactics to trick …read more
https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/15/not-gonna-lie-this-ngl-lawsuit-is-kinda-juicy/
The next decade for health tech may look a lot like the last decade for fintech
After the 2008 financial crisis, a new slate of regulations aimed at protecting consumers and businesses opened the floodgates for a surge of fintech companies to develop into household names over the last decade. Now, it might be healthcare’s turn.
Part of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Consumer Reform and Protection Act, passed in 2010, stated that financial institutions were required to give consumers access to their financial data electronically either for personal or third-party use. This regulation is why we can link our bank accounts to Venmo or Zelle to send money to our friends or why Stripe and Plaid have been able to revolutionize payment infrastructure for so many businesses.
Now, healthcare is seeing a regulatory catalyst of its own. The 21st Century Cures Act, which passed in 2016 and will begin to be enforced this year, outlines information sharing guidelines, API standardization and national infrastructure for sharing this type of information. An increase in healthcare innovation is listed as one of the act’s goals.
The question is, will healthcare startups tap into these regulatory guidelines with the same fervor that fintech founders have over the last decade?
Sony officially owns Bungie now
The ink is dry on Sony’s acquisition of Bungie, the gaming company that created sci-fi hits Halo and Destiny.
Both companies announced the news on Twitter Friday, confirming that the $3.6 billion deal had gone through without any surprises.
While that’s a large sum for a relatively small company, the merger was modest enough to evade the antitrust scrutiny that Sony rival Microsoft triggered with its planned parallel acquisition of Activision Blizzard for $69 billion.
Bungie may not be a sprawling entity like Activision Blizzard — which publishes everything from Overwatch and World of Warcraft to the Call of Duty mega-franchise — but it’s nonetheless poised to have a huge impact on Sony’s roadmap for near-future games.
At Sony, Bungie will remain a standalone game studio but its expertise will be woven into the company’s strategy for PlayStation Studios, the division of Sony Interactive Entertainment dedicated to making tentpole games that showcase the company’s technological prowess. Sony has big plans to leverage Bungie’s fine-tuned model for a whole slate of live service games — online multiplayer games that sell virtual goods and evolve over time, often charging players set monthly fees for access or special perks.
In an investor presentation this May, Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Jim Ryan outlined the company’s intention to steer 49% of its PlayStation Studios development budget toward live service games by the end of 2022. Within three years, Sony plans to launch and maintain 12 of its own in-house live service games.
“The strategic significance of this acquisition lies not only in obtaining the highly successful Destiny franchise, as well as major new IP Bungie is currently developing but also incorporating into the Sony group the expertise and technologies Bungie has developed in the live game services space,” Sony CFO Hiroki Totoki said shortly after news of the Bungie acquisition was made public.
Though the company didn’t specify which titles would get the live service treatment, it’s likely that core PlayStation properties like Horizon Forbidden West, God of War and The Last of Us will be imbued with Bungie’s secret sauce, bringing in ongoing revenue well beyond launch day if Sony plays its cards right.
Today’s your last chance to vote for roundtable topics at TC Disrupt
Two weeks ago, we announced Audience Choice and asked you to cast your votes for the roundtable topics you most want to see this year at TechCrunch Disrupt on October 18-20 in San Francisco. And holy smokes, you answered the call. There’s been a whole lot of voting going on.
For the uninitiated, roundtable discussions are the most popular sessions at Disrupt. They’re 30-minute, expert-led discussions with up to 20 attendees. This format encourages interactive, in-depth conversations where Disrupt attendees can learn, contribute and network with other folks interested in the same topic.
But listen up — the Audience Choice poll closes tonight, Friday July 15 at 11:59 pm (PT). Today is the last day you can make your voices heard and your votes count.
Here’s how Audience Choice works. Head to the Audience Choice voting site, where you’ll find a sizable list of potential sessions. You can filter and search by more than 20 categories, like Financial Services/Blockchain, Founder Lessons, Gaming, Investor Insights, Operations/Strategy, SaaS/Enterprise and many more.
You can vote for as many sessions you like, and the votes you cast today could keep — or put — your favorite roundtables in the running. So start stuffing the ballot boxes and feel free to share your thoughts or offer feedback in the comment box.
This is your chance to influence the programming at the world’s most iconic startup conference. Voting ends tonight, Friday, July 15 at 11:59 pm (PT). Head on over to the Audience Choice site, cast your votes for the roundtable sessions you want to see, then register to join us at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco on October 18-20 (with an online day on October 21).
Is your company interested in sponsoring or exhibiting at TechCrunch Disrupt 2022? Contact our sponsorship sales team by filling out this form.
Despite creaky markets, European edtech is showing its resilience
These are turbulent times. Given the circumstances, it’s hardly surprising that public markets are creaking and only niche sectors remain either unaffected or in a marginally positive position. Edtech is no exception.
Today, Brighteye Ventures published its Half Year European Edtech Funding report, built around Dealroom’s data. The report primarily focuses on investment activity in Europe but is contextualized with what we are seeing in other markets.
Global VC funding into edtech startups totaled $6.5 billion in H1 2022 compared to a total of $20.1 billion raised in 2021. This pullback in global funding can partially be explained by fewer edtech mega-rounds (over $100 million) in H1 2022 compared to previous periods.
The first half of 2022 saw 16 so-called mega-rounds, compared to 24 in the second half of 2021 and 30 in the first half of 2021. At the same time, the number of early-stage rounds, categorized as deals under $15 million, has fallen fairly consistently since a peak in H1 2018.
We expect the European edtech market to maintain some positive signs of resilience, but naturally, the ecosystem cannot be immune to the headwinds it faces.
Note that this doesn’t necessarily reflect lower activity in the ecosystem — it simply means that more early deals are being done by angels and via involvement with incubators and accelerators, which are not comprehensively covered in the data.
We were pleased to see that the European edtech ecosystem has managed to maintain most of its momentum, at least for the time being. The fact that the sector has secured $1.4 billion thus far in 2022, 40% more than a year earlier, demonstrates its resilience to maintain growth even amid challenging conditions.
This isn’t surprising given the inverse correlation between worsening macro employment markets and appetite for education, particularly in the market for post-18 education.
https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/15/despite-creaky-markets-european-edtech-is-showing-its-resilience/
Robert Curl, Nobel-Winning Chemist, Helped Spur Nanotechnology Boom
The Rice University professor, who has died at age 88, was among scientists who discovered buckyballs in 1985. …read more
TechCrunch podcasts this week: Bowery Farms, web3 startup Yat and Stripe’s internal valuation
TechCrunch is more than just a site with words. We have a growing stable of podcasts focused on the most critical topics relating to the startup and venture capital worlds. Embedded below are the latest from The TechCrunch Podcast from Darrell, who talks to TC writers about their own stories of the week; Chain Reaction, our crypto-focused podcast hosted by Lucas and Anita; Found, a long-form bit of work that goes deep on the real saga of company formation from Jordan and Darrell; and Equity, our long-running, Webby-award-winning podcast focused on venture capital and the latest startup news, hosted by Natasha, Mary Ann and Alex. Be sure to subscribe where you listen to podcasts!
The TechCrunch Podcast
This week on The TechCrunch Podcast Managing Editor Darrell Etherington gives you a rundown of the biggest stories in tech this week and sits down with TC writers for a deep dive into a few of them. In this episode, he talks with Zack Whittaker about Apple’s latest security feature, Lockdown Mode, and Amanda Silberling about the end of former Theranos exec Sunny Balwani’s trial.
Please note, we recorded with episode before news of Elon’s attempt to terminate his deal to acquire Twitter broke. Read Taylor Hatmaker’s coverage here to stay up to date.
Articles from the episode:
- Apple says Lockdown Mode in iOS 16 will help block government spyware attacks
- Former Theranos exec Sunny Balwani is found guilty
Other news from the week:
- Elon Musk tells Twitter he is killing the deal
- Things get messy for Elon Musk with report about new twins he shares with Neuralink exec
- A huge data leak of 1 billion records exposes China’s vast surveillance state
- Hotel giant Marriott confirms yet another data breach
- Apple reportedly plans to launch an ‘extreme sports’ Apple Watch with a larger screen and metal casing
Chain Reaction
This week Lucas and Anita return to discuss the ultimate meme investing crossover episode with GameStop launching an NFT marketplace. We also break down this week’s latest drama with the liquidation of crypto hedge fund 3 Arrows Capital. It wasn’t all doom and gloom, as we discussed some of the new crypto funds injecting fresh capital into the space.
In their interview this week, Lucas and Anita chat with Naveen Jain. Naveen is the founder of web3 startup Yat, which lets people buy their own emoji URL. The marketplace saw some wildly expensive sales this year, but when can pricey emojis tell us about the future of identity?
Found
Bowery Farms founder and CEO Irving Fain wants you to taste the best strawberry you’ve ever had, grown only a few miles from your urban home. As the leading and largest vertical farming company in the U.S, their goal is to make agriculture possible in urban spaces while also making it possible to grow a wide array of crops from anywhere in the world. Darrell and Jordan talk to …read more
https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/15/bowery-farms-web3-startup-yat-and-stripes-internal-valuation/
A Frozen Document in China Unleashes a Furor Over Privacy
A 25-year-old writer had been working on her urban romance novel for months when she found she was locked out of it by the software program where it was stored, sparking an outpouring of frustration by Chinese internet users. …read more