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The Justice Department Has Opened A Criminal Investigation Into Uber

Toby Melville / Reuters

The Justice Department has launched a criminal investigation into Uber’s use of an internal tool to evade law enforcement and regulators, according to Reuters.

The tool, called Greyball and revealed by the New York Times in March, reportedly helped Uber sidestep law enforcement by targeting those users based on their credit card information and other data, and then showing them phantom cars. Uber has since said it has stopped using the tool to evade law enforcement.

The Justice Department did not immediately return a request for comment. An Uber spokesman declined to comment.

Uber used Greyball in Boston, Paris, and Las Vegas, among other cities, and across Australia, China, Italy, and South Korea, according to the New York Times.

“We have started a review of the different ways this technology has been used to date,” Joe Sullivan, Uber’s chief security officer, wrote in a March 8 blog post announcing a review of how Greyball was used. “In addition, we are expressly prohibiting its use to target action by local regulators going forward.”

Uber argued in the same blog post that Greyball was “used for many purposes, for example: the testing of new features by employees; marketing promotions; fraud prevention; to protect our partners from physical harm; and to deter riders using the app in violation of our terms of service.”

News of a DOJ review comes as Uber is grapples with a nasty legal battle with Waymo over allegations that it stole the Alphabet-owned company’s self-driving car trade secrets, and as it continues an investigation into allegations of systemic sexism inside the ride-hail company.

Quelle: <a href="The Justice Department Has Opened A Criminal Investigation Into Uber“>BuzzFeed

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Facebook Is Closing Its Oculus Story Studio, Which Produced Virtual Reality Movies

Facebook is closing Oculus Story Studio, an in-house virtual reality content development arm meant to inspire creators to make virtual reality movies by creating its own high-quality VR films.

The company announced the closing today. “After careful consideration, we’ve decided to shift our focus away from internal content creation to support more external production. As part of that shift, we’ll be winding down Story Studio,” Oculus VP of Content Jason Rubin said.

Story Studio debuted with big expectations in January 2015. Facebook staffed it with a number of veterans from state of the art film and animation companies including Pixar and Lucasfilm. The company said these experts would share insights and best practices in an effort to help others learn from their work.

Story Studio's first short, Lost, debuted to rave reviews. “I just saw the first movie from Oculus, and it is the future,” a headline in The Verge read. And the division won an Emmy for its 2016 film, Henry.

Facebook acquired Oculus in 2014 for slightly more than $2 billion. Since then, the company's virtual reality ambitions have run into some speed bumps. In February 2017, Facebook decided to close 200 of its 500 Oculus demo stations in US Best Buy stories, according to Business Insider. And Oculus founder Palmer Lucky left Facebook in March 2017.

At its F8 conference in April, Facebook introduced Spaces, a social virtual reality experience that allows two people to spend time together in virtual reality, using avatars.

Quelle: <a href="Facebook Is Closing Its Oculus Story Studio, Which Produced Virtual Reality Movies“>BuzzFeed