Activity

The Financial Conduct Authority fined Kristo Käärmann £350,000 for breaching senior manager conduct rules by failing to notify the FCA of his significant tax issues for over seven months between February and September 2021. The FCA said his approach was 'careless rather than deliberate or reckless' but prevented real-time assessment of his fitness and propriety. He received a 30% discount for agreeing to settle. The FCA made no adverse findings on his fitness to continue in his roles.

UK FCA fined Wise CEO Kristo Käärmann £350,000 for failing to disclose his inclusion on HMRC's deliberate tax defaulters list. Käärmann failed to pay £720,495 in capital gains tax from a 2017 share sale and was separately fined £365,651 by HMRC. The FCA found his approach 'careless rather than deliberate' but his failure to disclose prevented assessment of his fitness for senior management roles.

In 2024, Khosla publicly opposed California's SB 1047 AI safety bill, writing an opinion article in The Sacramento Bee arguing the bill could harm national security. He called the bill's author, Senator Scott Wiener, 'clueless about the real dangers of AI' and 'not qualified to have an opinion' on global national security issues. While Khosla supports AI safety research funding, he opposed legislative safety frameworks that could constrain AI development.

On October 25, 2024, Jeff Bezos killed The Washington Post's planned endorsement of Kamala Harris, overruling the editorial board. The decision led to 200,000+ subscriber cancellations and two columnist resignations. Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp met with Trump at Mar-a-Lago the same day. Bezos defended it as 'principled' but critics called it capitulation to Trump.

Richard White resigned as CEO in October 2024 amid allegations he paid millions to settle claims, had relationships with employees, and gifted a $7M house to one partner. Multiple women alleged he expected sex in exchange for business investments. Share price plummeted, costing $2B in personal wealth.

In October 2024, the Irish Data Protection Commission fined LinkedIn EUR 310 million for processing personal data for behavioral analysis and targeted advertising without valid lawful basis. The investigation originated from a 2018 complaint by French nonprofit La Quadrature Du Net. The DPC found LinkedIn's consent was not freely given, its legitimate interests claims were invalid, and it violated GDPR fairness and transparency principles. LinkedIn was ordered to bring processing into compliance within three months.

In October 2024, Dow Jones and New York Post filed a lawsuit against Perplexity alleging copyright infringement. News Corp CEO Robert Thomson stated Perplexity 'perpetrates an abuse of intellectual property that harms journalists.' Forbes had earlier publicly criticized Perplexity for publishing stories largely copied from their proprietary articles. Copyleaks analysis found one summary paraphrased 48% of a Forbes article, with 7% direct plagiarism.

In October 2024, Musk pledged through America PAC to give away $1 million per day to a registered voter in swing states who signed his petition supporting the First and Second Amendments. Legal experts and election law scholars raised concerns the sweepstakes could violate federal law prohibiting paying people to register to vote. Philadelphia DA Larry Krasner filed a lawsuit alleging the program was an illegal lottery. A judge allowed the sweepstakes to continue. The program ran primarily in battleground states including Pennsylvania, a key swing state.

In October 2024, Linux kernel maintainer Greg Kroah-Hartman removed 11 Russian nationals from the MAINTAINERS file, citing vague 'compliance requirements.' The Software Freedom Conservancy later argued that the relevant US Executive Order 14071 did not legally require this removal. Critics noted the lack of transparency, the failure to credit removed developers, and the precedent of geopolitics influencing open source contributor access. Linus Torvalds defended the decision.

In October 2024, the Linux kernel removed about a dozen maintainers associated with Russian entities from the MAINTAINERS file, citing 'various compliance requirements.' The changes were made without review by other developers or the affected maintainers. Torvalds affirmed the decision, referencing Russian sanctions and his Finnish heritage. Community members criticized the lack of transparency and the process used.

In October 2024, NHTSA opened a preliminary evaluation of 2.4 million Tesla vehicles (2016-2024 model years) over the safety of Full Self-Driving technology. The probe was triggered by four FSD-engaged collisions in low-visibility conditions (glare, fog, dust), including a November 2023 fatality in Rimrock, Arizona where a 71-year-old pedestrian was killed by a FSD-equipped Model Y. NHTSA also expressed concern in November 2024 that Tesla was endorsing distracted driving with FSD in its social media messaging.

Revolut CEO and co-founder Nik Storonsky officially changed tax residency from UK to United Arab Emirates in October 2024 according to Companies House filings. Move could save him more than £3 billion in UK capital gains tax. Storonsky had been critical of UK's 'extreme bureaucracy' and regulatory landscape. Changed residence from England on October 16, 2024.

During Lina Khan's tenure as FTC Chair (2021-2025), the FTC enacted significant consumer protection rules: a ban on hidden junk fees saving consumers an estimated $11 billion, a click-to-cancel rule for subscriptions, a ban on non-compete clauses affecting 30 million workers, a $245M Epic Games settlement over children's privacy, and secured $1.5 billion in direct consumer refunds. The Amazon Prime dark patterns case resulted in a $2.5 billion settlement.

In October 2024, Revolut CEO Nikolay Storonsky relocated his tax residency from the UK to the UAE. This move could allow him to avoid approximately £3 billion in capital gains taxes that would have been due on his Revolut stake if sold while a UK resident. The UAE has no capital gains tax, making it a popular destination for wealthy tech executives.

Anthropic published major update to RSP adding new capability thresholds, refined evaluation processes inspired by safety case methodologies, and measures for internal governance and external input. Established specific thresholds for ASL-3 (CBRN assistance) and ASL-4 (autonomous AI research).

The European Commission opened an antitrust investigation into Broadcom in October 2024 over concerns the company is using anticompetitive practices following its $69 billion VMware acquisition. The investigation focuses on allegations that Broadcom is tying VMware products together to force customers into comprehensive deals, restricting interoperability with competing products, and using its dominant position to lock customers into its ecosystem. The European Cloud Competition Observatory gave Broadcom a 'red' rating indicating serious competitive concerns.

BBC Panorama investigation October 2024 found Revolut named in 10,000 fraud reports in 2023 - 2,000 more than Barclays and double Monzo. Payment Systems Regulator data showed for every £1M paid into Revolut accounts, £756 was from APP fraud - more than 10× the amount flowing through Barclays. Financial Ombudsman received 3,500 complaints about Revolut in 2023, more than any similar company. Notable case: customer lost £165K after criminals bypassed selfie verification, took 23 minutes to reach right department to freeze account, during which £67K more stolen. Former employee told BBC: 'Protecting Revolut from being used for financial crime always played second fiddle to the desire to launch new products.'

Klarna board member Mikael Walther was voted out after challenging governance decisions including a bonus plan he claimed could hand CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski as much as $35 billion. Walther urged investors to vote against the board's decision to remove him, raising corporate governance concerns.

Poppy Gustafsson was appointed Minister of State for Investment by Prime Minister Keir Starmer in October 2024. Created life peer as Baroness Gustafsson to sit in House of Lords. House of Lords Appointments Commission complained it was only given 48 hours to vet her before announcement.

Uber introduced multiple accessibility features on October 10, 2024: (1) Self-identification for blind/low-vision riders allowing them to disclose disability status and communication preferences to drivers after trip acceptance; (2) Self-identification for deaf/hard-of-hearing riders with chat/phone preference options that prevent unwanted calls when chat-only selected; (3) Mandatory service animal education video sent to all US drivers, designed with blind and service animal advocacy organizations, covering service animal rights and reminder that denying rides violates Uber policy and federal law; (4) Pilot program for voluntary service animal advance notification in US and Canada. Features aim to improve accessibility and reduce discrimination, though launched after company received over 21,000 service animal complaints and faced October 2024 protests.

In October 2024, Internet Archive suffered a significant data breach affecting 31 million users. Attackers exploited unsecured Zendesk API tokens that had been accessible in a GitLab repository for nearly two years. Exposed data included email addresses, screen names, and bcrypt password hashes. A second breach occurred via unrotated tokens after the initial attack.

India's Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) issued a show cause notice to Ola Electric in October 2024 following over 80,000 consumer complaints on the National Consumer Helpline. Issues included battery fires, range and charging problems, software glitches, and poor service center experience. The CCPA investigation found potential violations of consumer rights and unfair trade practices.

In October 2024, CEO Bhavish Aggarwal engaged in a heated exchange with comedian Kunal Kamra after Kamra posted a picture of Ola Electric scooters gathering dust outside a dealership. Aggarwal accused Kamra of taking money for the criticism and challenged him to work at Ola's service centre, saying 'I will pay better than your flop shows pay you.' The controversy caused Ola Electric shares to drop 8% over three consecutive days. The company reportedly receives nearly 80,000 customer complaints monthly.

In October 2024, during the WP Engine dispute, Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg offered employees a severance package of up to 9 months' pay if they disagreed with his actions and wanted to leave. 159 employees (8.4% of the workforce) accepted, a significantly higher departure rate than typical voluntary buyouts. Critics viewed it as a loyalty test that chilled internal dissent.

The National Labor Relations Board filed complaints alleging Apple required employees nationwide to sign illegal confidentiality, non-disclosure, and non-compete agreements that deterred discussions about pay equity and workplace issues. The complaints stem from charges by former employees Ashley Gjovik (2021) and Cher Scarlett, who played a central role in the #AppleToo movement. Apple was also accused of intimidating retail staff over unionization efforts.

Before the 2024 presidential election, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei publicly endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president.

DJI donated drones and technical support for search and rescue operations during Hurricane Helene, enabling first responders to locate survivors and assess damage in areas inaccessible by ground.

SpaceX deployed Starlink for disaster relief during Hurricanes Helene and Milton in October 2024, delivering more than 10,000 Starlink kits to affected areas. Initial offer required $349 equipment purchase with only one month free service, drawing criticism. SpaceX subsequently extended free service through end of 2024. The company also activated direct-to-cell emergency texting via T-Mobile partnership after FCC granted emergency authorization.

Meta faces a lawsuit from Ferras Hamad, a Palestinian-American engineer who claims he was fired for attempting to fix bugs that suppressed Palestinian posts on Instagram. Hamad found content by Palestinian photojournalist Motaz Azaiza was misclassified as pornographic. The lawsuit alleges Meta deleted internal employee communications mentioning relatives killed in Gaza and investigated employees for using the Palestinian flag emoji.

Unlike many tech companies rolling back DEI initiatives in 2024-2025, Nvidia maintained its 'Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging' programs and released its 2024 Sustainability Report with a dedicated section on diversity. However, the company has faced internal criticism, with a former employee noting that Black employees represented only 0.08% of the workforce (about 90 out of 11,000+ employees) and that three Black employee resource group presidents left within six months after being 'passed up for promotion.'