Administration

A new report says the imminent antitrust lawsuit against Apple could be filed by the Justice Department as early as Thursday, over the ongoing issues of blocking rivals access to some of the features of its iPhone. The pending lawsuit was reported Wednesday by Bloomberg, which indicates the suit could be filed in federal court “as soon as Thursday.” At its heart, the suit will reportedly accuse Apple “of violating antitrust laws by blocking rivals from accessing hardware and software features of its iPhone.” It’s likely…

The Biden administration announced Thursday that it is investigating the national security risks posed by Chinese-made “smart cars” amid concerns about foreign governments gaining access to the cars’ systems and data. The Commerce Department will investigate the risks associated with connected cars that incorporate technology from China and other “countries of concern” and consider potential regulations, the White House said. “It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to think of how foreign government with…

The Biden administration announced Friday that it is waiving some “Buy America” requirements for its $42 billion broadband program. The waiver allows some of the funds for the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program — President Biden’s push to expand high-speed internet access nationwide — to be spent on equipment manufactured abroad. The decision comes after the Department of Commerce found that some materials are not produced stateside in “sufficient and reasonably available quantities” to…

The Biden administration announced a preliminary agreement Monday to provide $1.5 billion in funding through the CHIPS and Science Act to a New York-based company in an effort to bolster domestic production of semiconductor chips. The Commerce Department said it signed a nonbinding preliminary memorandum of terms with GlobalFoundries to give funding through the bipartisan legislation President Biden signed into law in 2022. The money would be used for a new facility, expansion of production capacity and the…

The Biden administration plans to loosen the limits on tailpipe emissions proposed last year by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), giving automakers more time before they’ll be required to sell significantly more electric vehicles than gas-powered cars, reported this weekend. Under the , EVs would have to account for 67 percent of new car and light-duty truck sales by 2032.Rather than forcing manufacturers to start ramping up EV sales right away, the changes would allow them to make the shift more gradually…

US president Joe Biden's 2024 campaign is now on TikTok, even though he has expressed national security concerns over the platform and banned it on federal devices. Biden isn't expected to personally join the platform, aides said, nor the others in his administration. The account will be run entirely by the campaign team in an effort to reach voters in an ever-fragmented American population, particularly as younger voters gravitate away from traditional platforms. Elevate Your Tech Prowess with High-Value Skill…

The Biden administration will halt enrollment in a program that provides broadband discounts to millions of Americans as it runs low on funds and prepares to wind down in the coming months. The Affordable Connectivity Program will stop accepting new enrollments at 11:59 p.m. ET Wednesday, a White House spokesperson confirmed. The cutoff comes as the program’s remaining funding is to set to run out in May. The Biden administration, which has previously called on Congress to provide an additional $6…

Leading artificial intelligence (AI) companies joined a new safety consortium to play a part in supporting the safe development of generative AI, the Biden administration announced Thursday.  Microsoft, Alphabet’s Google, Apple, Facebook-parent Meta Platforms, OpenAI and others have joined the AI Safety Institute Consortium, a coalition focusing on the safe development and deployment of generative AI. The newly formed consortium also includes government agencies, academic institutions and other companies…

More than a dozen lawmakers called on the Department of Commerce on Thursday to add ByteDance, the Beijing-based parent company of TikTok, to its export control list in order to “address critical vulnerabilities created by the company’s access to U.S. software.” The group, led by Reps. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas) and Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.), expressed concerns about the security of U.S. user data on TikTok, as well as the relationship between ByteDance and the Chinese government. “TikTok provides the with…

The Biden administration recently announced that it would be requiring large cryptocurrency mining operations to report electricity usage, via a press release from This follows concerns that the industry could pose a threat to the nation’s electricity grids and hasten the impacts of climate change.To that end, the EIA has targeted 137 “identified commercial cryptocurrency miners” working in the US. These operations account for around 2.3 percent of national energy usage. This breaks down to , which is use in that same…