Biden campaign asks Twitter, Facebook to remove Trump posts
Trump has for weeks stoked fears among his supporters that Democrats will abuse the vote-by-mail process.
Welcome to The Download, The Australian’s new technology blog for the latest breaking tech news. Today, Apple has revealed new products at its Worldwide Developers’ Conference this year held online. It has also flagged upgrades to its iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple TV operating systems.
5.05pm Apple’s seismic shift away from Intel
If you are in an IT department with a significant number of people using Apple Mac machines today you’ve probably seen the announcements overnight from the start of the company’s worldwide developer conference and are wondering, what does it mean for us?
In case you missed it, Apple just announced a plan to transition to its own custom-designed processors in place of Intel’s chips over the next two years, with the first new machines shipping later this year. Their key reason for the move is about delivering better energy efficiency without compromising on performance.
There’s no doubt about it, this is a big change. We think it’s one for the better for Apple’s business customers, writes Mark Santos.
12.30pm Biden campaign asks Twitter, Facebook to remove Trump posts bashing mail-in voting
Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden’s political campaign has asked social media giants Facebook and Twitter to remove posts by Republican President Donald Trump on Monday that it said made false claims aimed at discrediting mail-in voting.
Trump tweeted several times on Monday criticising vote-by-mail plans that numerous states have implemented so that voters concerned about the coronavirus infection can submit their ballots from home.
“If people can go out and protest, riot, break into stores and create all sorts of havoc, they can also go out and VOTE – and keep our Election Honest,” Trump wrote. “With millions of mail-in ballots being sent out, who knows where they are going, and to whom?”
Trump, who himself has submitted absentee ballots through the mail, has for weeks stoked fears among his supporters that Democrats will abuse the vote-by-mail process in November’s election.
“Voter rolls are notorious for including people who no longer live at the address on file, or are even deceased,” Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh said in response to the Biden camp’s claim. “It is a wide open invitation for fraud and an undermining of election integrity.”
Biden’s campaign said that Trump was forcing people to choose between protecting their health and exercising their right to vote.
“Today, he has unfurled tweet after tweet pushing baseless conspiracy theories meant to discredit vote-by-mail,” campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon told Reuters in a statement.
“Our campaign has sent letters to Twitter and Facebook demanding that this disinformation, which seeks to undermine faith in our electoral process, gets taken down immediately.”
A Facebook representative said Trump’s message does not violate their policies and would not be removed. A Twitter spokesman also said the posts did not violate its rules.
Reuters
David Swan 10.50am Swoop Aero closes eight-figure funding round
Melbourne-based medical drone logistics company Swoop Aero has defied the COVID-19 downturn to close a Series A funding round, landing an eight-figure sum as it moves towards its stated goal of providing 100 million people with better access to health care by 2025.
Swoop Aero boss Eric Peck, a former air force fighter pilot, told The Australian his start-up recently became the first company in the world to remotely pilot commercially used drones from another country, when delivering PPE and critical supplies in Malawi during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The company posted revenue growth of 50 per cent quarter-on-quarter for the past 18 months, supplying African countries with two-way drone networks capable of delivering essential medical supplies.
“As COVID-19 has shown, problems with access to much-needed healthcare supplies are consistent across the globe, even in developed countries like Australia, where pathology tests take days to arrive, if they arrive at all,” Mr Peck said.
“We can’t imagine a future where drone transport isn’t a universally critical component of the health supply chain. And ultimately we think we’re having new opportunities because of COVID-19, we are going to come out the other side and continue to grow and have an impact just as much as we were.”
Melissa Yeo 10.10am Zip boss cashes in on stock surge
Zip chief executive Larry Diamond has cashed in on the recent record trade in the stock, pocketing more than $33m as he sold down his stake in the group.
In a filing to the market this morning, Zip said Mr Diamond had sold down roughly 5.5 million shares in the group, owned between his Diamond Venture Holdings and joint SMSF with wife Ashlyn.
Sales over June 18 and June 19 netted Mr Diamond $33.71m, with shares sold at an average price of $6.12 apiece.
Zip shares hit a record of $6.97 intraday on June 11, after earlier in the month announcing a move into the US and successful $200m capital raise to fund the deal.
David Swan 9.55am: Turnbull joins cybersecurity board
Fresh off the release of his memoirs former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has joined the board of Sydney cyber security start-up Kasada, and poured $1m of his own money into the company via his investment vehicle Turnbull & Partners.
Kasada, which was founded in 2015 and has offices in Sydney and New York, protects the internet by “identifying automated bots and preventing them from accessing websites and servers”.
“The reality is our global economy is digital – it is central to everything we do and hope to achieve. While this shift towards digital presents enormous opportunities and strengths, it also creates vulnerabilities; nobody is immune,” Turnbull said in a statement.
“We are seeing unprecedented scale and rate of compromise as tactics used by malicious actors become more sophisticated. It is not only a security problem but one of economic wellbeing. After meeting with Kasada’s founder and the team, it was clear that Kasada understand this problem but they have designed a pioneering solution that protects the most critical assets of a business.
“The Kasada story is an inspiring one of Australian innovation and I am excited to join Sam and his team as they continue to keep the internet safe.”
Chris Griffith 9.40am: Macs will run iPhone and iPad apps
Future Apple MacBooks will be able to run iPhone and iPad apps natively. This will give Mac users access to millions of apps and games run on iPhones and iPads.
Apple today announced that it would cease to use Intel chips in MacBooks and instead use its own in-house designed chips. Apple already builds the chips used in its mobile devices, so making Mac chips compatible with them is achievable.
Apple says it still will sell MacBooks with Intel chips for the time being. CEO Tim Cook says the first new generation MacBooks with an Apple chip will be released before year’s end, with a general rollout taking about two years.
David Swan 9.30am: Watchdog takes on Dodo, iPrimus for misleading speeds
Australia’s consumer watchdog is taking on Dodo and iPrimus – both owned by Vocus – for allegedly misleading customers about NBN speeds.
In Federal Court documents the ACCC alleges that between March 2018 and April 2019 Dodo and iPrimus made false or misleading claims on their websites about the speeds consumers could expect if they signed up to their NBN broadband services.
“We believe many of Dodo and iPrimus’ NBN customers would have been unable to regularly receive the advertised speeds during the busy evening period of between 7pm – 11pm,” ACCC Chair Rod Sims said.
“The ACCC will argue that Dodo and iPrimus used a fundamentally flawed testing methodology, developed by Vocus, which was not a reasonable basis for their advertising claims about certain typical evening speeds.”
“It is alleged that the testing methodology determined the ‘typical evening speed’ claims by using only the daily 75 fastest speeds observed across Vocus’ entire network in the busy period, excluding slower speeds where a connection was more likely to be impacted by congestion.”
Sims said the ACCC’s data shows Dodo and iPrimus’ broadband speeds have consistently performed towards the lower end of the nine NBN providers measured and reported on.
The ACCC is seeking declarations, penalties and costs.
John Stensholt 8.45am: Canva now worth $8.8bn
Sydney-based software start-up Canva has raised $US60m in its latest investor round, reportedly giving it a $US6bn ($8.77bn) valuation.
Canva has maintained its performance during the COVID-19 pandemic, with more of its graphics being downloaded by users around the world working from home.
It was reported overnight that Canva had raised its latest funds from existing shareholders such as Australian firm Blackbird Ventures and China’s Sequoia Capital.
Chris Griffith 8.00am: Apple makes major announcements at its WWDC keynote
A new menu system for iPhone, dance workout tracking on Apple Watch, and a new future for the Mac were among a long laundry list of changes announced by Apple this morning.
Apple today began its three-day Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) where it previewed a massive number of changes to its operating systems that will be brought to existing and new Apple devices – iPhones, iPads, Apple Watch, Apple TVs and MacBooks.
The only thing expected to materialise that didn’t was a new iMac.
Developers usually pay about $US1600 to attend the conference held annually in Silicon Valley, but this year the entire event is being held online due to coronavirus restrictions.
Attendance is free. Mr Cook said Apple had a community of more than 23 million developers worldwide. They and anyone else could take part in the event which would host more than 100 engineering-led video sessions.
Chris Griffith 5.00am: Apple reveals handwashing guidance for Apple Watch
Apple has announced automatic handwashing monitoring for Apple Watch users in its next release of its watch OS operating system.
Apple vice-president Kevin Lynch says Apple Watch’s new Watch OS 7 operating system will automatically detect when you start washing your hands and will use sensors and audio prompts to determine if you are doing it correctly.
“Our approach here is using machine learning models to determine motion which appears to be handwashing, and then use audio to confirm the sound of running water or squishing soap on your hands,” Lynch explains.
“During this, you‘ll get a little coaching to do a good job. You’ll see a countdown, along with tapping sounds, to make sure you wash as long as you’re supposed to. If you pause early there’s a flight note to keep washing, and when you’re done, you’ll see, hear and feel it.”
Lynch made the announcement during a keynote at Apple’s Worldwide developers conference, which is underway as a virtual conference, streamed from Apple Park in California.
DeepSeek threat: ‘Act now or be obliterated’
DeepSeek risks becoming a greater threat to national security than Chinese-owned social media platform TikTok, a former innovation minister warns.
What DeepSeek says about Tiananmen Square, Xi and human rights
China’s answer to ChatGPT has plenty to say about Australia – labelling its human rights record a ‘mixed picture’ – but draws blanks when asked about the Tiananmen Square massacre, Xi Jinping, or China’s own record on human rights.