Author: TechBrunch
Peter Williams, former general manager of defense contractor L3Harris, has pleaded guilty to selling surveillance technology to Russian brokers who purchase “cyber tools,” the U.S. Department of Justice confirmed Wednesday. “This material, stolen over a three-year period from a U.S. defense contractor for which he worked, consisted of national security-focused software containing at least eight classified and protected cyber exploit components,” a Department of Justice press release on Wednesday said. “These parts were intended to be sold exclusively to the U.S. government and some allied nations.” TechCrunch previously exclusively reported, citing four former Trenchant employees, that the company was investigating…
Bending Spoons, one of Europe's largest mobile app developers, announced Wednesday that it has agreed to acquire AOL, backed by private equity giant Apollo, from Yahoo. Vending Spoons said it has secured a $2.8 billion debt financing package to support the acquisition. The acquisition is expected to close by the end of the year and is subject to closing conditions and regulatory approvals. “AOL is an iconic and beloved company that we believe is healthy, has stood the test of time, and has untapped potential,” Luca Ferrari, CEO and co-founder of Bending Spoons, said in a press release. “According to…
TechCrunch Disrupt 2025 is coming! If you're still on the fence about attending in person, join us for the extensive schedule of speakers, networking opportunities, workshops, afterparties, and more available here. There's still plenty of time to buy last-minute tickets. There's only one day left, so we're offering you a 50% discount. If you can't attend in person, the next best thing is to check out the Disrupt Stage livestream. The stage will feature some of the most prominent speakers and the highly anticipated Startup Battlefield 200 pitch competition. We're streaming via YouTube, so you can watch the embed below…
Welcome to the third and final day of TechCrunch Disrupt 2025 at Moscone West in San Francisco! The excitement here is still at its peak and shows no signs of slowing down. If you thought it was too late to join, think again. There's still time to sign up and get in on the action with a 50% discount. You don't have to wait a year to join this year's tech capital. Today's agenda features some of the most anticipated on-stage sessions and highlights insights from pioneers such as Rohit Patel, director of the MetaSuperintelligence Institute. Kirstin Green, founding partner…
Mogul, the movie studio fantasy platform created by movie theater subscription service MoviePass, launched in private beta on Wednesday, the company announced. The platform is now available to everyone as a public beta. Designed specifically for the Hollywood industry, players own their own film studio, assemble a team of actors, directors and films, and earn points based on their performance. Mogul takes inspiration from daily fantasy sports, where players take on the role of team managers and form teams made up of real-life athletes. The web version of Mogul is currently live for over 400,000 users on a waiting list.…
On Monday, researchers at cybersecurity giant Kaspersky Lab released a report identifying a new piece of spyware called Dante that they say is targeting Windows victims in Russia and neighboring Belarus. Dante spyware is made by Milan-based surveillance technology maker Memento Labs, which was founded in 2019 after earlier spyware maker Hacking Team was acquired and taken over by new owners, researchers said. Memento CEO Paolo Lezzi confirmed to TechCrunch that the spyware captured by Kaspersky was indeed Memento's. In the call, Lezzi accused one of his company's government customers of exposing Dante, saying that the customer was using an…
LG U+, one of South Korea's largest carriers, confirmed to TechCrunch that it had reported a suspected data breach to KISA, South Korea's national cybersecurity watchdog, but did not say when the findings of the investigation would be available. South Korea's three major telecommunications providers, SK Telecom, KT Telecom, and now LG U+, have all reported cybersecurity incidents in the past six months, pending confirmation from the South Korean government. South Korea's Ministry of Science, Information and Communications told TechCrunch that an investigation into KT and LG Uplus that began last month is still ongoing amid reports that the companies…
Indian auto giant Tata Motors has fixed a series of security flaws that exposed sensitive internal data including customer personal information, company reports and dealer-related data. Security researcher Eaton Zuber told TechCrunch that he discovered the flaw in Tata Motors' E-Dukaan division, an e-commerce portal for purchasing spare parts for Tata commercial vehicles. Tata Motors, headquartered in Mumbai, produces passenger cars as well as commercial and defense vehicles. The company has a presence in 125 countries and seven assembly facilities, according to its website. Zuber found that the portal's web source code contained private keys to access and modify data…
Companies using software often have to strike a difficult balance between patching systems as quickly as possible to prevent cyber-attacks, while also ensuring that updates do not break system operations. That's what startup CyDeploy wants to help you with. The company's founder, Tina Williams Koroma, explained to TechCrunch that the idea of CyDeploy is to use machine learning to observe and record the most critical systems that companies run, create replicas of them, and allow companies using CyDeploy to run tests on what she calls a “digital twin” before deploying to actual live systems. “We record how users use applications…
TechCrunch Disrupt 2025 is coming! If you're still on the fence about attending in person, join us for the extensive schedule of speakers, networking opportunities, workshops, afterparties, and more available here. There's still plenty of time to get your tickets, and since there's only 2 days left, we're offering you a 50% discount. However, if you can't attend in person, checking out Disrupt Stage's livestream is the next best thing. The Disrupt Stage will feature some of the most prominent speakers and the highly anticipated Startup Battlefield 200 pitch competition. We're streaming via YouTube, so you can watch the embed…