Google: Barbie and Shakira among most searched in 2023

Sequoia Capital wants you to know that it was “deliberately misled and lied to” by convicted cryptocurrency scam artist Sam Bankman-Fried during the discussions that led to its $213.5-million investment in Bankman-Fried’s firm, FTX, last year. That’s an extraordinary admission, given that Sequoia is one of Silicon Valley’s oldest and largest venture investing firms, with…

AI-generated fake advertisements are making the rounds on social media again, this time using the voice and likeness of Taylor Swift promising free Le Creuset cookware sets. As any proper Swiftie knows, the “Hoax” singer is fan of Le Creuset. In the pop star’s 2020 documentary “Miss Americana,” she whipped up some pasta sauce in…

A gift card issuer is facing a lawsuit over allegations it failed to make its popular prepaid cards less susceptible to a common scam. The lawsuit, filed last month by San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu, alleges Incom’s “Vanilla Gift” and “One Vanilla” non-reloadable cards featured “insufficient” packaging and “lax security features” that made them…

Perplexity, with a fraction of Google’s users, raised the largest sum by an internet search startup in recent years.

Tom Petty’s B-side track Love Is A Long Road has seen a near 37,000% increase in streams on Spotify.

Meta Platforms said Tuesday it would hide more content from teens on Instagram and Facebook, after regulators around the globe pressed the social media giant to protect children from harmful content on its apps. All teens will now be placed into the most restrictive content control settings on the apps and additional search terms will be limited…