Business, Financial & Legal News - Page 2

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has filed a lawsuit against General Motors that alleges the company collected and sold drivers' data to insurance companies without their consent or knowledge.

The new lawsuit alleges that in car models from 2015 and above, General Motors implemented data-collecting technology to monitor and collect drivers' data, particularly any "bad" habits. The lawsuit alleges General Motors collected data on more than 1.8 million Texas drivers and that these "bad" habits were events such as braking too fast, steering sharply into corners, not using seatbelts, and driving at night. At the moment, it remains unclear if the data was used by the insurers to increase the premiums for Texans.

More specifically, the data collection method involved crunching the numbers down to what was referred to as "driver score," which was an aggregation of data from any time a driver used their vehicle. The attorney general's office claimed General Motors "deceived" its Texan customers by encouraging them to enroll in opt-in programs such as OnStar Smart Driver. The lawsuit alleges General Motors deceived its customers by failing to inform them enrolling in such programs mean they agree to the collection and sale of their data.

Following Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter and its conversation into the social media platform that is now called X, the SpaceX and Tesla CEO cleaned house, reducing the overall headcount at the company by at least 70%.

During that time, which was in November of last year, employees were going through a tumultuous time with rounds of firings, employees being locked out of offices, and company-wide emails being fired off from Musk. On November 16, Musk sent out an email titled "A Fork in the Road" and a warning to employees that for Twitter to reach "2.0," it would require long work hours at "high intensity," and the company would only be accepting "exceptional performance" as a passing grade.

The email also explained then-Twitter would be converting to a more engineering-driven company, and that if "you are sure that you want to be part of the new Twitter, please click yes on the link below. Anyone who has not done so by 5 pm ET tomorrow (Thursday) will receive three months of severance. Whatever decision you make, thank you for your efforts to make Twitter successful."

Corsair's second-quarter for 2024 financial report has been released and it revealed the company is in a tough spot, with net revenue down more than $50 million compared to the previous year of the same period.

During the financial call, Corsair informed investors of the reasons why Corsair is falling short of growth, with the company saying that refresh cycles of gaming components are lengthening, meaning buyers of gaming components aren't purchasing an upgraded component as quickly as they once were, leading to a declining demand for high-end gaming components. This lengthening of refresh cycles can be attributed to there being no games calling for an upgrade in hardware,

Corsair's CEO, Andy Paul, co-founder of the company, said during the earnings call that refresh cycles for high-end components used to be on a 3 to 5-year cadence, and now they are moving to a four to six-year cadence. Additionally, Corsair said its still feeling the "echo" of the COVID-19 surge, which was a period where people purchased a lot of products to enjoy at home. Corsair is now moving back to pre-COVID normalcy.

Edit: Don't worry, X spaces isn't broken right now... but the interview hasn't started (22 minutes late so far) with thousands not able to even get in. I'm currently enjoying some rather pleasant elevator music, waiting for President Trump and Elon Musk to start their discussion.

Edit #2: DDOS attack, records broken... 1 million in the X space, but now we're LIVE!

Elon Musk has been doing system scaling tests for the last few days, for his upcoming historic interview with President Donald Trump, and we're here to point you in the right direction to watch it.

Elon Musk's X, formerly Twitter, has now been banned for 10 days after being deemed dangerous to country residents.

The ban comes from Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who announced an order to ban Elon Musk's X for 10 days, which would sever access to the social media platform from local residents. According to Maduro's speech, which CNBC translated, the Venezuelan President has signed a decree ordering the nation's telecommunications regulator to block X after it determined the social media platform "violated all of the rules of the very social network Twitter, today known as X - all of them."

Maduro said, "And he has violated [the rules], by inciting hatred, fascism, civil war, death and confrontations among Venezuelans, [he] has violated all of the laws of Venezuela. And in Venezuela there are laws ... and we will enforce the laws." The temporary ban will give X enough time to respond to the recent change. Reports indicate that X has already become unavailable for users of several internet providers across the country.

Authorities have arrested a Tennessean man for running a "laptop farm" that deceived US and UK companies into thinking they hired American residents for positions when really they were hiring North Koreans.

The US Justice Department took to its website to post a press release about the arrest, with the authority writing that Matthew Isaac Knoot, a 38-year-old from Nashville, Tennesse, was arrested today for his efforts to generate revenue for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea's (DPRK or North Korea) weapons programs. According to the Justice Department, Knoot was running a "laptop farm" scheme that involved deceiving American and British companies with remote employment.

The press release states the American and British companies were deceived into hiring North Korean's that Knoot then assisted in using stolen identities to pose as US citizens. Knoot is accused of hosting company laptops at his place of residence, downloading and installing software without authorization to enable users to conduct deception, and conspiracy to launder payments for the remote work.

Only two days after Elon Musk's X, formerly Twitter, filed a lawsuit against the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM), alongside video platform Rumble. Both platforms accused GARM of boycotting companies by withholding advertising revenue in order to pressure X into compliance and limit choices for consumers.

A new report from Business Insider revealed the advertising trade group The World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) informed its members it was "discontinuing" activities with GARM, following the filing of the X lawsuit. According to the WFA's CEO Stephan Loerke, the decision was "not made lightly," but GARM is a non-profit organization that has limited resources at its disposal.

Initially, the WFA and GARM were intending to contest X's allegations, which alleged that GARM's members colluded to "collectively withhold billions of dollars in advertising revenue" from the social media platform. GARM members named in the suit were: Unilever, Mars, CVS, and Ørsted.

Intel has been in hot water lately, and it seems a fresh pan of boiling water has just been thrown on the company, as its CEO and CFO have now been wrapped up in a new class-action lawsuit.

The class-action lawsuit was filed in northern California Wednesday, with the Construction Laborer's Pension Trust of Greater St Louis alleging that Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger and Intel CFO David Zinsner mislead of hoodwinked investors about the health of its foundry business, or Intel's fabrication labs that are being constructed in various locations around the world.

The company has poured billions of investors' money into developing these foundry labs in the following locations: Arizona, Ohio, New Mexico, Ireland, Germany, and Israel. According to the plaintiffs, Intel's CEO and CFO made misleading statements to investors between January 25 and August 1, 2024. These statements allegedly misrepresented the overall health of these foundries, which artificially raised share prices.

SK hynix has announced it has signed a non-binding preliminary memorandum of terms with the U.S. Department of Commerce.

The South Korean memory giant will receive up to $450 million in proposed direct funding and access to proposed loans of up to $500 million as part of the CHIPS and Science Act, which will go towards its investment to build a production base for semiconductor packaging in Indiana, USA.

Not only that, but SK hynix also plans to seek from the US Department of Treasury a tax benefit equivalent of up to 2% of the qualified capital expenditures through the Investment Tax Credit program. SK hynix has said that it "deeply appreciates" the US government's support, and that it will comply with the requirements for the remaining procedures until the proposed funding is finalized.

Elon Musk's X has filed a lawsuit against multiple major companies, alleging they conspired to boycott the social media network, having a negative impact on its revenue. Elon Musk said he tried peacefully to sort this out for two years, but "now, it is war".

X CEO Linda Yaccarino highlighted the negative effects of the advertising boycott on free speech, with the lawsuit filed in Texas, looking to address the financial and operational damages that X has gone through.