With Locate X, an agency like the Secret Service could, for instance, create a geo-fence around a crime scene. It could then identify mobile devices that were in that area prior to the crime and see where those devices traveled before or after the incident. Police took that approach following a burglary in 2019, and they ended up investigating an innocent cyclist based on his RunKeeper data.

In March, Protocol reported that US Customs and Border Protection purchased Locate X, and a former Babel Street employee told Protocol that the Secret Service and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) were using the location-tracking tech. But Motherboard has the first confirmation that the Secret Service did in fact purchase Locate X. 

This isn’t a new issue. Federal agents have reportedly been buying commercially-available cell phone location data to track immigrants for years. A recent report on Black Lives Matter protestors released by Mobilewalla shows just how much info private companies can glean from smartphone apps.

It’s unclear how federal agencies get away with obtaining this info without a warrant. In 2018, the US Supreme Court ruled that law enforcement need a warrant to perform cell phone tower searches. But why bother when you have app data?

Senator Ron Wyden is reportedly planning legislation to block law enforcement from purchasing products like Locate X.

“It is clear that multiple federal agencies have turned to purchasing Americans’ data to buy their way around Americans’ Fourth Amendment Rights. I’m drafting legislation to close this loophole, and ensure the Fourth Amendment isn’t for sale,” Wyden said in a statement provided to Motherboard.

TikTok asks users to self-report their birthdays, and it uses tools like facial recognition to estimate users’ ages. Users under 13 only have access to a walled-off mode within the app, and they can’t share personal info or videos. But it wouldn’t be hard to lie to get around age restrictions. The app doesn’t ask for consent from guardians, and videos seem to slip through the cracks. One former TikTok employee told The New York Times that videos of children who appeared to be younger than 14 were allowed to remain online for weeks.

“As is standard practice across our industry,” the company conducts “high-level age-modeling to better understand our users and allow our safety team to better protect the safety of our younger teens in particular,” TikTok said in a statement provided to The New York Times.

The stakes are fairly high. If TikTok is found to be in violation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), which requires parental permission before internet platforms collect personal info on children under 13, it could face hefty fines. Of course, TikTok knows this, it already paid $5.7 million on behalf of Musical.ly over reported COPPA violations. Now, with TikTok facing President Trump’s ultimatum to sell its US operations before September 15th or be shut down, there’s more on the line.

According to the indictment, the hackers were working both for the Chinese government’s Ministry of State Security and for their own personal gain. At the moment, there’s no indication that they obtained any COVID-19 research.

“China has now taken its place, alongside Russia, Iran and North Korea, in that shameful club of nations that provide a safe haven for cyber criminals in exchange for those criminals being ‘on call’ to work for the benefit of the state, here to feed the Chinese Communist party’s insatiable hunger for American and other non-Chinese companies’ hard-earned intellectual property, including COVID-19 research,” John C. Demers, assistant attorney general for national security, said in a statement.

In addition to targeting COVID-19 research, the cyberattacks allegedly targeted robotics, aircraft and marine engineering, clean energy engineering, biotechnology, non-governmental organizations and human rights activists. According to the Justice Department, the hackers stole trade secrets, technologies, data and personal information from the computer systems of businesses, individuals and agencies throughout the world.

“During this pandemic, telehealth services are helping families receive the critical health care they need,” said Senator Schatz. “Our bill will provide much-needed funding to help hospitals improve their connectivity so they can care for more patients.”

According to the press release Senators Schatz and Murkowski shared, several trade groups, including the United States Telecom Association, have endorsed the legislation. Alongside the Medicare changes the Trump administration introduced in March, the additional funding could go a long way toward making remote healthcare more accessible to the public.

US officials have taken a dim view of Huawei — and indeed other Chinese tech companies — for a long time. Back in 2008 the company dropped a bid for 3Com after the US revealed it planned to investigate whether the deal would give China access to anti-hacking technology used by the Defense Department. In 2011, those security concerns meant the company was excluded from the creation of the dedicated first responder wireless network, and then in October 2012 a Congress report claimed that Huawei couldn’t be trusted, citing dubious connections with the Chinese government, corruption and bribery, among other misdeeds. Huawei denied such accusations.

Fast-forward to more recent times, and Huawei remains America’s — or at least President Trump’s — persona non grata. In 2018, the Defense Authorization Act came into law, preventing US government employees, contactors and agencies from using Huawei tech, and then in 2019, the decisive blow: President Trump signed an executive order declaring a national emergency banning sales and use of telecom equipment that poses “unacceptable” risks to national security, including critical infrastructure and the online economy. In other words, Huawei was banned.

The repercussions for the company were immediate. In the wake of the ban, American chipmakers Intel, Qualcomm, Broadcom and Xilinx backed off, as did UK-based chip designer ARM, leaving Huawei without access to vital components. US pressure on its allies meant that other countries followed suit, even when their own investigations suggested Huawei represented little threat. Meanwhile, the likes of Verizon and AT&T dropped Huawei products entirely.

At this juncture, Huawei — while vocal about its perceived victimization — remained cautiously optimistic about the situation, signing a deal with TSMC and announcing plans for its own operating system, Hongmeng, which would serve to sidestep the problems resulting from Google’s departure from the brand. (China itself, however, did not respond well to the situation, creating its own “unreliable entities list” in retaliation). At one point, it looked like Huawei might even be given some kind of reprieve, after President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed a deal that would remove some restrictions on Huawei in the US. However, this supposed “truce” came amid a wider and rapidly-escalating trade war, the potential ramifications of which could have had major impact on America’s economy.

But it’s now 2020, and it’s more apparent than ever that there is no redemption for Huawei. Earlier in the year, Trump signed a bill to help rural carriers replace Huawei gear, while over in Europe carrier Vodafone announced it was removing Huawei equipment from its networks. The company unsurprisingly revealed a very bleak sales forecast for the year (despite its best efforts leveraging technical loopholes), and then last week, Huawei’s ban was extended until May 2021. So for Huawei, it must have felt like the US Commerce Department was pouring salt in the wound when just days later, it announced the new rules which has ultimately left it without a chip provider.

TSMC had been something of a lifeline for Huawei, although that’s not to say the move won’t have an impact TSMC, too. Huawei was its second-largest customer, accounting for some 15 to 20 percent of its revenue, according to Nikkei Asian Review. However, it’s probably no coincidence that on the very same day that the Commerce Department made its announcement, TSMC — whose number one customer is Apple — revealed that it’s opening a new $12 billion chip facility in Arizona, with state and US federal government support. The foundry will allow more of TSMC’s American customers to make their chips domestically, so in short, they’ll be alright in the long-run.

For Huawei, however, the situation is more precarious than ever, and the company is, understandably, more than a little upset. In a statement reported on The Verge, Huawei rotating chairman Guo Ping hit back at the latest developments with a few choice words. “The US government still persists in attacking Huawei, but what will that bring to the world?” he said. The company added in an official statement that, “This decision was arbitrary and pernicious, and threatens to undermine the entire industry worldwide.” The statement concludes in a resigned tone. “We expect that our business will inevitably be affected. We will try all we can to seek a solution.”

But the company is swiftly running out of potential solutions. The company has previously hinted at switching its chip supply to Samsung — although whether Samsung would enter into such a partnership considering the wider situation is another question. Domestic chip production is another option — China’s Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC) has just received a $2.2 billion investment from the Chinese government. However, compared to the likes of Intel, Qualcomm and indeed TSMC, there’s no way SMIC could manage Huawei’s large-scale demands. And production volumes aside, its tech is still slightly behind the curve. As The Verge reports, SMIC started mass production of HiSilicon’s Kirin 710A processor on its 14nm node just last week, while TSMC is expected to progress to a more advanced 5nm method later this year.

Even if Huawei does find a logistical solution to its chip nightmare, the damage this ongoing affair has caused the brand cannot be underestimated, nor can its impact on the global tech landscape – or at least Huawei thinks so. As its statement notes, “In the long run, this will damage the trust and collaboration within the global semiconductor industry which many industries depend on, increasing conflict and loss within these industries. The US is leveraging its own technological strengths to crush companies outside its own borders. This will only serve to undermine the trust international companies place in US technology and supply chains. Ultimately, this will harm US interests.”

There’s no question that losing your job is incredibly stressful, and since the COVID-19 pandemic began, millions of people in the US have been laid off or furloughed. In an attempt to ease some of the stress that causes, the mindfulness app Headspace is offering a free one-year subscription to anyone in the US who is now unemployed.

Anyone who qualifies can register at Headspace.com/unemployed. Headspace asks for the name of your most recent employer and your last date of employment, but it’s unclear if they do any cross checking or if this is an honor system. Once you sign up, you’ll get access to over 1,200 hours of meditation and mindfulness content, including sleep aids, kids content and mindful movement. 

As for these recent sightings, however, the Pentagon has decided to release the clips “in order to clear up any misconceptions by the public on whether or not the footage that has been circulating was real, or whether or not there is more to the videos,” Pentagon spokesperson Sue Gough told CNN. She added that “After a thorough review, the department has determined that the authorized release of these unclassified videos does not reveal any sensitive capabilities or systems, and does not impinge on any subsequent investigations of military air space incursions by unidentified aerial phenomena.”

So in a nutshell, the Pentagon is saying there’s nothing to worry about — although they haven’t exactly clarified what these objects are. Sightings like this can often be chalked up to weather, test aircraft and other phenomena, or as one of the voices in the videos speculates, it could just be a drone.

At $59,900 the Polestar 2 isn’t exactly cheap, but it’s close enough to the Model 3’s $40,000 price tag to make it a solid competitor. While it’s arguably better looking than the Model 3, it has similar specs. Its 78 kWh battery delivers a range of roughly 275 miles, and it packs 408 horsepower.

Despite the coronavirus pandemic, Polestar began production of the EV in China last month. It’s manufacturing the car on the same production lines that its parent company Volvo is assembling the Volvo XC40. The first Polestar 2 vehicles produced will be sold in Europe, with sales in China and North America after that.

For an additional $4,000, customers can get a leather interior and for an extra $1,200, they can upgrade to 20-inch alloy wheels. The Polestar 2 is the first production vehicle to come with Google’s Android platform for its infotainment system, so you can expect Google Assistant voice commands, Google Maps, EV charging support and apps via the Google Play Store.

In 2017, the FCC denied Swarm’s application to launch its satellites, saying they could pose a safety hazard to other spacecraft. But Swarm went ahead and launched four cubesats without obtaining the necessary approvals. The FCC was obviously not happy about that, and it took Swarm to court. In a settlement, Swarm agreed to pay $900,000 and submit to extended FCC oversight.

Ultimately, Swarm hopes to deploy an affordable satellite data network that can be used for IoT applications. Swarm now has ground stations in the US, UK, Antarctica, New Zealand and the Azores, and it expects to have more than 30 ground stations installed by the end of the summer, which will give it one of the largest ground station networks deployed for a satellite communications company. According to TechCrunch, it is also approved to use the wireless spectrum required to transmit from its satellites to Earth.