PayPal won a legal victory against the U.S. consumer protection watchdog.According to court documents cited in a Friday (March 29) Law 360 report, U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon tossed out an aspect of the so-called “prepaid rule” for digital wallets that went into effect five years ago and became the center of PayPal’s case against the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).In doing so, the report said, the judge agreed with PayPal that the CFPB “had no rational justification” for placing digital ...

OpenAI and Microsoft are reportedly working on a $100 billion data center project.The center, the subject of a Friday (March 29) report by The Information, would involve an artificial intelligence (AI) supercomputer dubbed “Stargate” that is scheduled to launch in 2028.According to the report — which cities sources involved in discussions of the project — Microsoft would likely finance the effort, expected to dwarf the cost of even the largest data centers. The Stargate would be the largest in a series of s ...

AT&T says personal data of several million customers was leaked onto the dark web.“Based on our preliminary analysis, the data set appears to be from 2019 or earlier, impacting approximately 7.6 million current AT&T account holders and 65.4 million former account holders,” the company wrote on its website Saturday (March 30). “Currently, AT&T does not have evidence of unauthorized access to its systems resulting in theft of the data set.”The telecom giant said its investigation found that “AT&T data-specifi ...

Meta will close Facebook News in the United States and Australia in April.This move comes after the company did the same thing in the United Kingdom, France and Germany in September 2023, Meta said in a Friday (March 29) update.“This is part of an ongoing effort to better align our investments to our products and services people value the most,” the company said in the update.The number of people using Facebook News, which is dedicated tab for news content, dropped by 80% over the last year in Australia and ...

This week in artificial intelligence news, the White House unveiled regulations to promote safe and ethical AI use by the government. Meanwhile, Amazon teamed up with Dashbot to ease chatbot creation for businesses, and OpenAI’s ChatGPT success sparked a race to craft cutting-edge language models.White House Calls for Responsible Use of AIThe White House announced new rules to ensure the government uses AI safely and responsibly. The mandate said federal agencies must check and reduce any risks from using A ...

As Amazon and Walmart look to generative artificial intelligence (AI) to improve their businesses and capture more of consumers’ total spending, Amazon is stepping up its investment in the space by the billions.The eCommerce giant announced Wednesday (March 27) that it has made an additional $2.75 billion investment in AI startup Anthropic, an OpenAI competitor, bringing its total investment in the company to $4 billion. As part of the deal, the AI company will use Amazon Web Services (AWS) as its primary c ...

Alan Marquard, head of transfer solutions at Mastercard, told PYMNTS that remittances are ripe for continued transformation — to digital channels, and to digital wallets, which make international fund flows cheaper, faster and more convenient.Earlier this month, Mastercard announced a new connection with China’s Alipay, which enables bank, FinTech and corporate clients to offer customers a connection to an e-wallet that has more than 1 billion users. Marquard noted that although sending money across borders ...

Cyberattack Impact and Recovery - Change Healthcare will begin processing over $14 billion in claims following a cyberattack that disrupted services [1] - UnitedHealth Group (UHG), the parent company, expects its largest clearinghouses to be back online soon, enabling the flow of these claims [1] - The cyberattack occurred on February 21, causing nationwide disruptions to the healthcare payment system and prompting a federal investigation [1] - UHG has provided over $2.5 billion in assistance payments to healthcare providers affected by the disruption [1] Assistance and Service Restoration - UHG continues to offer temporary funding assistance at no cost to providers, particularly smaller practices struggling due to the disruption [2] - Critical services at Change Healthcare were restored approximately three weeks after the attack [2] Regulatory Investigation - The U S Department of Health and Human Services' Office for Civil Rights (OCR) is investigating the breach due to its unprecedented magnitude [2] - The investigation will focus on whether protected health information was breached and compliance with HIPAA rules by Change Healthcare and UHG [3] - UHG has stated it will cooperate fully with the investigation [3] Industry Response and Recommendations - The cyberattack is attributed to the BlackCat ransomware group, highlighting vulnerabilities in healthcare supply chains [3] - The American Hospital Association recommends implementing immutable backup technology to enhance network security and prevent future disruptions [3]

With Kroger selling off its specialty pharmacy business, it seems that retailers’ efforts to pack more and more into their stores may not always be the right move.The Kroger Company announced plans to sell the business to CarelonRx, a subsidiary of Elevance Health, earlier this week, with the sale expected to close in the second half of the year.“As part of our regular review of assets, it became clear that our strong specialty pharmacy business unit will better meet its full potential outside of our busine ...

Apple is reportedly in preliminary talks with Chinese tech giant Baidu, exploring a potential partnership to use Baidu’s generative artificial intelligence technology for Apple devices in China.The move is part of Apple’s ongoing strategy to enhance its AI capabilities and navigate China’s stringent regulatory landscape, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported Friday (March 22), citing unnamed sources.Apple did not immediately reply to PYMNTS’ request for comment.China’s regulations mandate that generative A ...