Category: Fortune

After trying multiple times to find a way to survive as a standalone entity, Yahoo finally convinced Verizon to buy most of the failing Internet company last year for $4.8 billion. But the sale process has been anything but smooth, and one of the biggest potential roadblocks was the news that the company was the target of two massive hacks that exposed the data of hundreds of millions of users.

Although the two attacks happened in 2013 and 2014, Yahoo didn’t disclose this information until last year — and most importantly, it didn’t divulge that news until after it had already signed the deal with Verizon. The telecom giant has since said it is re-evaluating the offer.

Now, to add insult to injury, the Securities and Exchange Commission has opened an investigation into the company’s failure to tell shareholders about the incidents, according to the Wall Street Journal. The securities regulator is just one of a number of federal and state agencies that has asked Yahoo for documents on the attacks, along with the Federal Trade Commission and the U.S. attorney’s office.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Yahoo can’t even figure out how to die without drama”

For fans of net neutrality — that is, the principle that network providers shouldn’t discriminate between different kinds of content when delivering services to consumers — a nightmare scenario was that Donald Trump would name an FCC chairman who would gut the protection for neutrality. And that scenario just came to pass, with the appointment of Ajit Pai.

Pai, who was named to the position of chairman on Monday by the Trump administration, has been a member of the Federal Communications Commission since 2012, so there is plenty of evidence available when it comes to his views on net neutrality. And he doesn’t like it at all.

In a speech in December after Trump had won the election, Pai said he wanted to “take a weed whacker” to the FCC’s regulations, and one of the things he had his sights set on was the FCC’s Open Internet Order, which was adopted in 2015. That decision made Internet providers “common carriers,” and required them to carry data without playing favorites.

The new FCC chairman has said that he believes net neutrality is “a solution that won’t work for a problem that doesn’t exist.” He says he hasn’t seen any evidence that consumers are disadvantaged by network providers discriminating between different content or services, and therefore such legislation isn’t necessary, and harms small ISPs.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Don’t like Net Neutrality? Then you’re going to love Trump’s FCC chief”

At the Trump administration’s first official White House press briefing on Monday, press secretary Sean Spicer was clearly trying hard to overcome some of the negative impressions he created with his performance just a couple of days before, after the inauguration of his boss as the 45th president of the United States. But should we buy this new nice-guy act?

The short answer is no. Trump has made it clear both during his campaign and since being elected that he sees the media as untrustworthy and beneath contempt, and Spicer’s attack on the press following the inauguration seemed a lot more sincere than his attempts to apologize for it.

Just to recap, the press secretary went ballistic on Saturday, after numerous reports pointed out that Trump’s inauguration ceremony in Washington drew much smaller crowds than the inauguration of his predecessor, Barack Obama. Photos were posted and shared on social media that confirmed this fact, and the New York Times even wrote a story quoting crowd experts to that effect.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Note to the media: Don’t get played by the Trump White House”