San Francisco

Google ordered to pay $425.7 mn in damages for improper smartphone snooping

A federal jury has ordered Google to pay $425.7 million for improperly snooping on people's smartphones during a nearly decade-long period of intrusions. The verdict reached Wednesday in San Francisco federal court followed a more than two-week trial in a class-action case covering about 98 million smartphones operating in the United States between July 1, 2016, through Sept 23, 2024. That means the total damages awarded in the five-year-old case works out to about $4 per device. Google had denied that it was improperly tracking the online activity of people who thought they had shielded themselves with privacy controls. The company maintained its stance even though the eight-person jury concluded Google had been spying in violation of California privacy laws. This decision misunderstands how our products work, and we will appeal it, Google spokesman Jose Castaneda said Thursday. Our privacy tools give people control over their data, and when they turn off personalisation, we honour

Indian-origin Delta pilot arrested in US on child sex abuse charges

Delta co-pilot Rustom Bhagwagar, 34, was arrested in San Francisco after landing; charged with five felony counts of child abuse, bail set at $5 million

He made billions on Google and PayPal. Now, he's betting on news

Michael Moritz co-founded The San Francisco Standard, a local news organization. It is acquiring Charter, a start-up focused on the future of work

NYC, San Francisco, others wrap Pride Month with mix of parties, protests

The monthlong celebration of LGBTQ+ Pride reaches its rainbow-laden crescendo as New York and other major cities around the world host major parades and marches on Sunday. The festivities in Manhattan, home to the nation's oldest and largest Pride celebration, kick off with a march down Fifth Avenue featuring more than 700 participating groups and expected huge crowds. Marchers will wind past the Stonewall Inn, a Greenwich Village gay bar where a 1969 police raid triggered protests and fired up the LGBTQ+ rights movement. The site is now a national monument. In San Francisco, marchers in another of the world's largest Pride events will head down the city's central Market Street, reaching concert stages set up at the Civic Center Plaza. San Francisco's mammoth City Hall is also among the venues hosting a post-march party. Chicago, Seattle, Minneapolis and Toronto, Canada are among the other major North American cities hosting Pride parades on Sunday. Several global cities including

Anthropic wins key US ruling on AI training in authors' copyright lawsuit

US copyright law says that willful copyright infringement can justify statutory damages of up to $150,000 per work

FM Sitharaman meets business leaders in San Francisco, discusses investment

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman met several senior executives and business leaders in San Francisco and discussed bilateral areas of cooperation in sectors such as technology, artificial intelligence, energy and digital infrastructure as well as opportunities to enhance investment collaboration between India and the US. Sitharaman arrived in San Francisco Sunday as she began her 11-day trip to the US and Peru with an interaction with the Indian diaspora in the Californian city. On Monday, she held several meetings with business leaders and corporate executives. The minister met Silicon Valley venture capital firm a16z General Partner Anjney Midha and technology company VMware Chief Executive Officer Raghu Raghuram in San Francisco. She discussed the remarkable transformation in technology space driven by Prime Minister Narendra Modi's leadership and suggested that a16z and VMware "may like to explore collaboration across sectors" within the domain of AI including in education,

London's Imperial College to open Indian hub in Bengaluru: Prez Hugh Brady

London's Imperial College is set to establish its Indian hub in Bengaluru to strengthen scientific, education and innovation partnerships between India and the UK, college President Hugh Brady said. The hub called "Imperial Global India" will be established as a Liaison Office and will focus on strengthening and co-creating new research partnerships between Imperial and leading universities and institutes in India, he said. It will also act as a communication channel to form closer ties with industry and policymakers and provide a platform for greater collaboration in innovation between India and the UK, he added. Sharing the development in an interview with PTI, Brady said Bengaluru is fourth in the series of Imperial Global network hubs following Singapore, San Francisco in US, and Accra in Ghana. He clarified that the hub will not be a branch campus of Imperial College, London which has been ranked second best university in the world and top in the UK in the latest QS World ...

Lyft accuses San Francisco of overcharging $100 mn for taxes over 5 years

The company said its hometown calculated its taxes from 2019 to 2023 based on the total amount of money that passengers paid for rides

Tabla maestro Ustad Zakir Hussain passes away at 73: His life and legacy

Tabla maestro Zakir Hussain died in a hospital in San Francisco, US, his family said on Monday. He was 73. Hussain died from complications arising out of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, the family said

Tabla maestro Zakir Hussain passes away at 73, fused music to make magic

His fingers flew, fluttered and floated in quicksilver changes of raga and rhythm, drumming up music and magic. Zakir Hussain was the maestro of tabla, percussionist, composer and even actor a legend who was India's very own and yet belonged to the world. Hussain died from 'idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis', a lung disease, in a San Francisco hospital early Monday. He was 73. The artiste, a marquee name in India and abroad, leaves behind more than 60 years of music. He played on the stage alongside some of the greatest Indian and international musicians in a fusion of Indian classical and world music, giving the tabla a whole new identity. The great percussionist created music across genres and styles, including in his repertoire jazz and concertos, naturally developing an all-inclusive musical creativity after learning and playing under the tutelage of his father and renowned tabla player, Alla Rakha. The mindset as I was growing up tuned itself to the idea that music is music, it's

Who is Luigi Mangione, the suspect in killing of UnitedHealth executive

Such posts by a Luigi Mangione, the name New York police have announced as the 26-year-old suspect in last week's killing of a health insurance executive in New York

Live from SF: Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg tapes podcast with 6,000 friends

Engineers, venture capitalists, and other Silicon Valley digerati chatted as they found their seats, with Modelos and slices of pizza in hand. The anticipation was high

Tamil Nadu CM visits San Francisco, inks pact with Microchip, Nokia, PayPal

The Tamil Nadu government has inked pacts with leading companies including Nokia, PayPal, Yield Engineering Systems, Microchip, Infinx, and Applied Materials for an investment commitment of Rs 900 crore and employment of 4,100 people in Chennai, Coimbatore and Madurai, the government said on Friday. Six companies signed the Memorandum of Understanding (MoUs) in the presence of Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin and officials during the investors' meeting in San Francisco, an official release here said. The chief minister, who is leading a high-level official delegation, is currently on a tour to the US till September 14 to attract investments into Tamil Nadu, as part of an ambitious goal to transform the state into a USD one trillion economy by 2030. He left for the US on August 27. He participated in a meeting with potential investors in San Francisco on Thursday. An MoU was signed with Nokia, represented by Chief Strategy and Technology Officer Nishant Batra and President - Fixe

26 pro-Palestinian demonstrators charged for blocking Golden Gate Bridge

San Francisco prosecutors have charged 26 protesters who blocked the Golden Gate Bridge for hours in April to demand a cease-fire in Gaza. The protest on April 15 was one of many held by pro-Palestinian demonstrators who blocked roadways around the country, causing traffic jams and temporarily shutting down travel into some of the nation's most heavily used airports. The protesters were charged with felony conspiracy, false imprisonment, trespassing to interfere with a business, obstruction of a thoroughfare, unlawful assembly, refusal to disperse at a riot, and failure to obey the lawful order of a uniformed officer, the San Francisco District Attorney's Office announced Saturday. Traffic snarled for hours after demonstrators blocked lanes with vehicles, shutting down all vehicle, pedestrian and bike traffic on the Golden Gate Bridge. The demonstration was part of coordinated protests across the country to demand an immediate cease-fire in Gaza and an end to military aid to ...

Elon Musk's X to shut San Francisco office, workers to be relocated

Musk, who acquired the company in 2022, has been vocal about his disdain for San Francisco and previously blamed the city's left-leaning culture for making Twitter too liberal

AI aircraft leaves for US with passengers of flight diverted to Russia

An Air India relief aircraft for passengers of its Delhi-San Francisco flight stranded at Russia's Krasnoyarsk Airport has now departed from there for the US city, the airline has said. "The flight AI 1179 departed Krasnoyarsk (KJA) at 0002 hours local time (20 July) for San Francisco (SFO), carrying all passengers and crew of AI183 that was diverted to Krasnoyarsk," Air India said in a statement. The airline had to divert its Delhi-San Francisco flight with 225 passengers and 19 crew members to the Russian city on Thursday after the cockpit crew detected a potential issue in the cargo hold area of the Boeing 777 aircraft. The relief flight with an Air India team, including crew and security personnel, took off from the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport here at 12.52 pm for the Russian city of Krasnoyarsk. The ferry flight also carried on board essentials in addition to sufficient food for all passengers. The airline said it has mobilised additional on-ground suppo

Air India's Delhi to San Francisco flight diverted to Russia due to glitch

According to the information, the aircraft has landed safely and airline officials are working with relevant authorities to ensure guests are taken care of until the next course of action is decided

Early blast of heat & humidity leaves millions sweltering across US

A blast of heat and humidity in the Midwest and Northeast days before the official start of summer put a wet blanket on outdoor activities from festivals to sports camps as officials urged people to take precautions. Cities that opened cooling centers this week advised that Wednesday's Juneteenth holiday means some public libraries, senior centers and pools where residents could beat the heat will be closed. The dangerous temperatures were expected to peak in the eastern Great Lakes and New England on Wednesday and Thursday, and in the Ohio Valley and Mid-Atlantic on Friday and Saturday, the National Weather Service said. Heat index readings were expected to reach 100 to 105 degrees (37.7 C to 40.5 C) in many locations. People and even zoo animals were forced to find ways to thwart the muggy weather. An organization that provides produce to areas with limited access to fresh food in Columbus, Ohio, prepared frozen towels and packed cold water for their workers. Hydration is the ke

San Francisco police arrest 70 protesters for trespassing Israeli consulate

Police led protesters out of the building one by one and loaded them into police vehicles, their hands bound by zip ties

California firefighters continue to battle wildfires east of San Francisco

California firefighters expected to gain ground on Sunday on a wind-driven wildfire that scorched thousands of acres 97 kilometres east of San Francisco, burned down a home and forced residents to flee the area near the central California city of Tracy. The fire erupted on Saturday afternoon in the grassy hills managed by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, one of the country's key centres for nuclear weapons science and technology. The cause was under investigation. The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said the research centre was not under immediate threat from the blaze, dubbed the Corral Fire, which had devoured some 52 square kilometres by Sunday afternoon and was 30 per cent contained. Thousands of people in the area, including parts of the city of Tracy with a population of 1,00,000, were ordered to leave for evacuation centres. Tracy is about 112 kilometres south of California's capital in Sacramento. CalFire Battalion Chief Josh Silveira said o