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EFF has faced recurring criticism from journalists and activists for accepting substantial donations from major tech companies including Google, Facebook, and others, raising questions about potential conflicts of interest when EFF advocates on issues affecting those donors. Critics noted EFF sometimes took positions aligned with Big Tech interests on issues like FOSTA-SESTA.

Fairphone implemented a living wage bonus program at its assembly partner's factory in China, paying a supplement directly to workers to bridge the gap between local minimum wages and a calculated living wage. This made Fairphone one of the first electronics companies to actively address the living wage gap in its supply chain.

In December 2018, YouTuber Tom Scott publicly revealed that Brave's Rewards system allowed users to tip BAT tokens to his channel despite him never signing up for or consenting to the program. Brave had not paid him the tipped money and did not clearly indicate to users that creators were not enrolled, raising concerns about misleading users and unauthorized use of creators' identities for fundraising.

In December 2018, Jack Dorsey posted tweets encouraging followers to visit Myanmar after a birthday meditation retreat, praising the country's people and food. This occurred while the UN had accused Myanmar's military of pursuing genocide against the Rohingya Muslim minority. The posts sparked widespread backlash under the hashtag #JackIgnoresGenocide. Dorsey did not publicly address the controversy.

In 2018, Huawei worked with Megvii to test an AI camera system that could scan faces, estimate age/sex/ethnicity, and trigger a 'Uighur alarm' if detecting minority members, potentially flagging them for police. A confidential document was hosted on Huawei's European website and later deleted after IPVM inquiry. Both companies acknowledged document authenticity. Huawei claimed it was 'simply a test' and had not seen real-world application.

Meng Wanzhou (CFO and founder's daughter) was arrested in Canada on December 1, 2018 on US extradition request for bank fraud and conspiracy to circumvent Iran sanctions. Charges involved long-running scheme where Huawei employees lied about relationship to Skycom, an Iran affiliate, enabling approximately $100M in US-dollar transactions supporting Iran work (2010-2014). Meng reached deferred prosecution agreement September 24, 2021, admitting misleading HSBC. Charges dismissed December 1, 2022.

In 2018, it was revealed that Facebook hired Definers Public Affairs, a Republican opposition-research firm, to discredit critics and competitors. The firm circulated research linking anti-Facebook activists to George Soros, with anti-Semitic undertones. Sandberg initially denied knowledge of Definers but later admitted the firm's work was 'incorporated into materials' presented to her and referenced in emails she received. Reporting by the New York Times and BuzzFeed revealed Sandberg was directly involved, having sent an email asking if Soros had shorted Facebook's stock after his public criticism of the company.

In November 2018, People's Daily identified Jack Ma as member of Chinese Communist Party (CCP), surprising many observers. Ma famously told employees they should be 'in love with the government [but] don't marry them,' and praised China's one-party system for its stability at World Internet Conference in Wuzhen. The revelation clarified his political alignment despite his entrepreneur image.

In November 2018, the US DOJ indicted Chinese state-backed Fujian Jinhua and Taiwan's UMC for conspiring to steal trade secrets from Micron Technology worth up to $8.75 billion. UMC engineers recruited from Micron allegedly took DRAM manufacturing secrets. The US subsequently placed Fujian Jinhua on the Entity List, effectively cutting it off from US technology. Micron was the victim of state-sponsored industrial espionage.

In October 2018, Stripe suspended payment processing for Gab, a social media platform popular with far-right users, following the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting by a Gab user who had posted antisemitic content on the platform. Stripe had previously frozen Gab's account citing adult content violations. PayPal and hosting provider Joyent also suspended Gab. Advocacy groups had warned Stripe about Gab's role in online hate months earlier.

In October 2018, Tim Cook delivered a keynote at the International Conference of Data Protection and Privacy Commissioners in Brussels, calling privacy a 'fundamental human right' and urging comprehensive federal privacy legislation in the US. He criticized the 'data-industrial complex' and companies that harvest personal data for profit, positioning Apple's business model as privacy-first.

In October 2018, Meta (then Facebook) hired Nick Clegg, who served as UK Deputy Prime Minister from 2010-2015, as VP of Global Affairs and Communications. He was promoted to President of Global Affairs in 2022, earning a reported £2.7 million annual salary. Clegg departed in late 2024 ahead of Trump's inauguration, replaced by prominent Republican Joel Kaplan, reflecting Meta's strategic approach to regulatory and political relationships.

In October 2018, co-founder Dan Houser described working '100-hour weeks' on Red Dead Redemption 2, later clarifying it was just the writing team for three weeks. However, Kotaku's investigation found mandatory crunch was widespread: one employee described 'a steady death march of mostly mandated 50-60 hour weeks for years,' another worked 80-hour weeks 'until I had a breakdown.' Internal emails confirmed mandatory late nights starting in 2017. One former employee said failure to crunch would result in contract termination.

In October 2018, the Wall Street Journal reported that a software bug in Google+ exposed the personal profile data of up to 500,000 users to third-party developers. Google discovered the vulnerability in March 2018 but chose not to disclose it publicly for six months, partly due to fears of regulatory scrutiny and comparisons to the Cambridge Analytica scandal. An internal memo showed Google's legal team advised that disclosure was not legally required. A second bug discovered in December 2018 affected 52.5 million users. Google shut down Google+ for consumers in April 2019.

Amnesty International's Security Lab established that Pegasus spyware was successfully installed on the phone of Jamal Khashoggi's fiancee Hatice Cengiz just four days after his murder by Saudi operatives in October 2018. His wife Hanan Elatr was also repeatedly targeted between September 2017 and April 2018, and his son Abdullah was selected as a target. NSO denied association with Khashoggi's murder but the evidence showed its Saudi client used Pegasus to surveil the journalist's inner circle.

On October 4, 2018, Bloomberg Businessweek published 'The Big Hack' alleging Chinese intelligence operatives planted tiny surveillance chips on Supermicro server motherboards used by Apple, Amazon, and US government agencies. Apple, Amazon, the NSA, and DHS all publicly denied the claims. No physical evidence of the chips was ever presented. Supermicro's share price cratered following the report. A February 2021 Bloomberg follow-up still provided no physical proof. The incident remains one of the most controversial unverified claims in tech hardware history.

On October 2, 2018, Amazon announced it would raise its minimum wage to $15 per hour for all US employees including 250,000 full-time workers and 100,000 seasonal employees, effective November 1. The move followed months of public criticism from Sen. Bernie Sanders, who introduced the 'Stop BEZOS Act.' Sanders praised the decision as 'a shot heard around the world.' However, the raise coincided with elimination of monthly bonuses and stock grants, leading some workers to report concerns about net compensation loss, though Amazon confirmed all workers would see total compensation increases.

The Philippine Competition Commission imposed multiple fines on Grab Philippines over the Uber merger: P16 million ($296,741) in October 2018 for failing to maintain operations during review; P11.3 million in Q1 2019, P7.1 million in Q2, and P5.05 million in Q3 for violating pricing commitments; and P16.15 million in December 2019 for continuing violations of price and service quality commitments. Total fines exceeded $39 million. Grab repeatedly violated commitments made to secure merger approval, demonstrating pattern of disregarding regulatory conditions once market dominance was achieved.

In September 2018, Musk agreed to settle SEC fraud charges after tweeting on August 7, 2018, that he had 'funding secured' to take Tesla private at $420/share. The SEC found Musk had no basis for the claim - he had not discussed specific deal terms with any financing partners. The settlement required Musk and Tesla to each pay $20M in penalties ($40M total), Musk to step down as Tesla board chairman, and future tweets to receive pre-approval. The tweets caused Tesla stock to jump 6%+ and significant market disruption.

Amazon made a $1 million gift to the Wikimedia Endowment, supporting the long-term sustainability of Wikipedia and Wikimedia projects. Amazon's total donations to the Endowment from 2018-2020 exceeded $3 million.

Salesforce maintained its contract with U.S. Customs and Border Protection despite protests at Dreamforce 2018, employee petitions, and opposition from advocacy organizations including RAICES (which rejected a $250,000 Salesforce donation). CEO Benioff defended the contract, saying the technology was not used for family separations. Critics argued Salesforce was providing the technology infrastructure that enabled CBP's border enforcement operations.

In September 2018, Singapore's Competition Commission fined Grab SG$6.4 million (US$4.7 million) and Uber SG$6.6 million (US$4.8 million) for anti-competitive merger. Following the March 2018 acquisition of Uber's Southeast Asia operations, Grab raised prices by 10-15% while its Singapore market share grew to 80%. CCCS Chief Executive Toh Han Li stated 'Mergers that substantially lessen competition are prohibited and CCCS has taken action against the Grab-Uber merger because it removed Grab's closest rival, to the detriment of Singapore drivers and riders.' The merger eliminated the only significant competitor in Singapore's ride-hailing market.

After decades of aggressive, personal attacks on Linux kernel contributors in mailing lists, Torvalds publicly apologized, calling his behavior 'unprofessional and uncalled for.' He took a 5-week sabbatical to 'get assistance on how to understand people's emotions' and adopted the Contributor Covenant Code of Conduct for the Linux kernel project.

In September 2018, Jeff Bezos launched the Bezos Day One Fund with a $2 billion commitment split between the Day 1 Families Fund (helping homeless families find permanent housing) and the Day 1 Academies Fund (building tuition-free Montessori-inspired preschools in low-income communities). Since 2018, the Day 1 Families Fund has issued 280+ leadership awards totaling over $850 million to organizations across all 50 states. In December 2025, Bezos donated $11.25 million to fight homelessness in the Washington DC area.

In September 2018, Apple received FDA clearance for the Apple Watch Series 4 with electrocardiogram (ECG) capability, making it the first consumer device to offer over-the-counter heart rhythm monitoring. The ECG feature achieved 99.3% specificity and 98.5% sensitivity for detecting atrial fibrillation. The Stanford-partnered Apple Heart Study validated the approach. In 2024, the FDA approved Apple Watch's heart monitoring tool for use in clinical trials under the Medical Device Development Tools (MDDT) program — the first digital health tool to receive this qualification. The feature has been credited with detecting previously undiagnosed heart conditions in users worldwide.

In September 2018 Congressional testimony, Sandberg called Facebook's role in Myanmar genocide 'devastating' and admitted the company failed to take down posts inciting violence. UN later called it a genocide. Internal accounts reveal content moderation was painfully slow, relying on a single Dublin-based moderator for Myanmar.

In 2018, Berners-Lee took a sabbatical from MIT to co-found Inrupt and commercialize the Solid Protocol - a technical architecture giving individuals control over their data through decentralized 'Pods'. The project directly addresses surveillance capitalism by providing an alternative where users, not platforms, own their data. Partners now include NHS, BBC, NatWest, and governments of Flanders, Sweden, and others.

In September 2018, the UN Fact-Finding Mission reported that Facebook was a 'useful instrument for those seeking to spread hate' in Myanmar and had been 'slow and ineffective' in tackling hatred against Rohingya. Hundreds of military personnel used fake accounts to flood Facebook with anti-Rohingya content. Facebook had only two Burmese-speaking content reviewers for 18 million active Myanmar users. Facebook's own 2018 human rights assessment concluded it was not doing enough to prevent incitement to violence.

Salesforce created its Office of Ethical and Humane Use, which developed the company's first set of trusted AI principles in 2018. The company established an Ethical Use Advisory Council composed of external experts from academia and civil society, customer-facing employees, and internal executives. Salesforce adopted 'consequence scanning' across all product teams to envision unintended outcomes of new features. In 2023, it augmented its principles with five guidelines for responsible generative AI development.

The DOJ sued SpaceX in August 2023 alleging the company discriminated against asylees and refugees in hiring from 2018-2022. Out of approximately 10,000 hires, only one person was an asylee and none were refugees. SpaceX wrongly claimed export control laws prohibited such hiring. Qualified applicants were rejected including a Georgia Tech graduate with 9 years of engineering experience. The case was dismissed in February 2025 after the Trump administration DOJ moved to drop it.