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Salesforce is being sued by 50 women who alleged the company profited by helping Backpage participate in sex trafficking, as reported by CNBC . The lawsuit — which was filed Monday in Superior Court in San Francisco — claims that Salesforce’s data tools were utilized by Backpage and provided the “backbone” of its exponential growth. “With Salesforce’s guidance, Backpage was able to use Salesforce’s tools to market to new “users” — that is, pimps, johns, and traffickers — on three continents,” the lawsuit claims. A Salesforce spokesperson wouldn’t comment on pending litigation, but told CNBC, “We are deeply committed to the ethical and humane use of our products and take these allegations seriously.” Salesforce is known to have a sort of social justice profile. On the same day that the lawsuit was filed, the Red Cross of the Bay Area named Salesforce 2019 Humanitarian Company of the Year . Backpage was a classified ad site that was seized by U.S. authorities in April 2018 . The site...
Facebook has gotten away with a lot — from continuous privacy breaches to questionable advertising systems — but it seems the government’s patience is wearing thin. Today, the Department of Housing and Urban development hit Facebook with a lawsuit , saying the social media giant participates in housing discrimination. HUD’s actions are a follow up to a complaint filed in August 2018 , that stated there was evidence to believe Facebook violated the Fair Housing Act. According to a press release , HUD alleges that Facebook’s ad system unlawfully discriminates by barring certain people from seeing listings. In addition, HUD says that Facebook gathers data about users, which it then uses to figure out which of its users can view housing-related ads. “Facebook is discriminating against people based upon who they are and where they live,” HUD Secretary Ben Carson said in a statement. “Using a computer to limit a person’s housing choices can be just as discriminatory as slamming a door in...
Peleton, the in-home exercising equipment that hosts virtual classes for users, is now in big legal trouble. National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA) members are suing the company for using artists’ music without permission. If Peloton loses the case, the company could be out of $150 million. “It is frankly unimaginable that a company of this size and sophistication would think it could exploit music in this way without the proper licenses for this long, and we look forward to getting music creators what they deserve,” NMPA President & CEO David Israelite said in a press release. Rihanna, Wiz Khalifa, Bruno Mars, Drake and dozens of more artists are named in the lawsuit, alleging copyright infringement. “While the fitness technology company has licensed with some of the music publishing industry, it has failed to do so with a significant number of publishers, leaving a great deal of income lost to songwriters,” Israelite said. Peloton gained popularity as it used video workouts...
Some states are stepping up to the plate in regards to appropriately regulating tech. Recently, Mississippi’s attorney general, Jim Hood, said the state is preparing an antitrust case against Google, as reported by CNBC . “At some point in the future, there will be a reckoning,” Hood said, according to CNBC. “It’ll either be in Congress or in a court of law.” Hood said the case will tackle the privacy practices of Alphabet — Google’s owner — and it’ll be similar to a federal case brought against Microsoft in the late 1990s. In that case, the federal government reviewed antitrust charges against Microsoft. Eventually, the company was charged with acting as a monopoly and limiting competitions on PCs. At the time, they were forcing manufacturers to bundle Internet Explorer on their hardware products before receiving a license for the Windows 98 operating system. Obviously, Microsoft wasn’t forced to split up because they’re still around today. However, the settlement definitely shook...
AT&T’s competitors have taken note of the company’s “5G Evolution” branding on phones and networks using 4G LTE Advanced Technology, but it hasn’t gone beyond crafty tweets or company blog posts –until now. Sprint recently filed a lawsuit in federal court, seeking an injunction to stop AT&T from using 5GE tags on its devices or advertising. In Sprint’s legal complaint , the company said it surveyed customers and found 54 percent of them believed AT&T’s “5GE” is as fast as, or faster than, actual 5G. Sprint also found that 43 percent of customers believed if they bought an AT&T phone today it would be 5G capable. According to Sprint, neither of those are true. Basically, Sprint says AT&T is cheating. While AT&T did launch the nation’s first 5G network last year, it’s not available everywhere. What AT&T calls 5GE is technology apart of the years-old 4G LTE-Advanced standard used by Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint on their 4G Networks. Despite this, AT&T has already incorporated 5GE...
Kanye West is out of legal trouble after promising his album would be exclusively available on Tidal. The artist settled a class-action lawsuit of nearly $85 million with a fan over the exclusivity of ‘The Life of Pablo.’ West originally said the album would only be streamed on the platform, but weeks later it was offered on both Apple Music and Spotify. Justin Baker-Rhett, the plaintiff in the lawsuit, said that he bought a $9.99 subscription to Tidal in order to stream ‘The Life Of Pablo.’ After the album began streaming on other platforms, Baker-Rhett felt slighted and deceived into downloading the service. The terms of the settlement are not known; however, the 2016 lawsuit from Baker-Rhett has been dropped. Exclusivity on streaming services is now a thing of the past. As artists, record labels and the platforms agree to more effective contracts, an artists’ need to only offer content on one service has evaporated. There are special cases when artists offer albums exclusively...