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“One can only thank the French authorities for their willingness to protect their citizens and the citizens of other countries from […] distribution of child pornography, calls to terrorism, drug trafficking, smuggling, financial fraud, propaganda of ‘Russian peace’,” 

• Said Yaroslav Yurchyshyn, liberal Ukrainian MP (Holos, ALDE/Renew Europe), commenting on the arrest of Telegram CEO Pavel Durov 

Story of the week: Yaroslav Yurchyshyn, liberal Ukrainian MP (Holos, ALDE/Renew Europe), has welcomed Telegram CEO Pavel Durov’s detention as it disrupts the communication networks used by the Russian leadership. He expressed the hope that Durov would provide information on the alleged terrorist activities of the Russian authorities in Ukraine. Durov was arrested in Paris on Saturday (24 August) for a wide range of offences, ranging from organised fraud to distributing pornographic images of minors, a press release signed by Paris Prosecutor Laure Beccuau and sent to Euractiv on Monday reads. Read more. 

Don’t miss:  Experts think a controversial California bill regulating the most powerful artificial intelligence (AI) models could inspire and strengthen the EU’s AI regulation if it becomes law. However, as it enters the final legislative phase, the bill faces pushback from industry leaders and US Congress Democrats. The EU Commission’s AI Office has “closely followed the Californian bill through [its] San Francisco Office” and met with Senate representatives in early summer to “exchange views and explain the EU's AI Act,” a Commission official told Euractiv. Having passed the Assembly (48 to 16) on Wednesday and the Senate (30 to 9) on Thursday, the bill becomes law if California Governor Gavin Newsom signs the bill within 30 days. Read more. 

Also this week: 

• Dutch Data Protection Authority hits Uber with €290 million fine for violating EU data protection rules 
• Macron says Telegram CEO’s arrest has nothing to do with free speech

AI Treaty to be signed. On 5 September, the EU is expected to sign the first human rights Treaty on AI at a conference in Vilnius, Lithuania. In the past few weeks, EU countries have been squabbling over whether the EU Commission has the authority to sign the controversial treaty on behalf of the bloc, Mlex reported.  

Commission in SF. The EU executive is hiring an AI expert in its San Francisco office to help implement the EU's AI Act.  

The US AI Safety Institute (US AISI). OpenAI and Anthropic have agreed to grant the US AISI pre-deployment access to their models and to collaboratively research how to evaluate AI capabilities and safety risks and mitigate them. The US AISI will also collaborate with the UK AISI to provide feedback on potential safety improvements of the AI models. OpenAI and Anthropic’s next-generation AI models might be trained with more than $100 million worth of computing resources, triggering mandatory safety evaluations if California's contested AI bill passes.

Labelling AI-generated content. OpenAI, Adobe, and Microsoft expressed support for California's AB 3211, a bill mandating the labelling of AI-generated content, TechCrunch reported on Monday. The bill, voted in August, requires AI-generated photos, videos, and audio clips to include watermarks in their metadata and compel large online platforms to visibly label such content for users. In the EU, Meta, for example, pledged to review and label AI-generated content before the EU elections, down-ranking altered content and banning debunked ads. 

Fines for deepfakes. Lingo Telecom, the company that transmitted deceptive AI-generated robocalls mimicking Joe Biden's voice to New Hampshire voters, agreed to pay a $1 million fine in a settlement with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), Reuters reported last Thursday. Meanwhile, the political consultant behind the calls, Steve Kramer, still faces a potential $6 million fine and criminal charges for voter suppression and impersonating a candidate.  

Germany’s cybercrime costs. Cybercrime and sabotage have cost German companies around €267 billion over the past year – a 29% increase – with 90% of companies expecting more attacks, Reuters reported on Wednesday. The survey by Bitkom found that 70% of attacks were attributed to organised crime, 81% involved data theft, 45% were linked to China, and 39% were attributed to Russia. Despite increasing IT security spending, only 37% of companies have emergency plans for supply chain incidents.
according to the article. 

Uber €290 million fine. The Dutch Data Protection Authority (DPA) fined Uber for transferring European taxi drivers’ personal data to the US without proper protection for over two years, violating the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the authority announced on Monday. The data included sensitive information like account details, taxi licenses, location data, photos, payment details, identity documents, and criminal and medical records. Read more.  

No Google plant in Dublin. Google's plan to build a 72,400 square-meter data centre near Dublin was rejected by South Dublin County Council due to insufficient details on the project's impact on the power supply once operational in 2027, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday. The decision, published last week, cited failure to meet Ireland’s sustainability requirements. 

Intel’s troubles. The US chipmaker is working with investment bankers to find a way out of its financial troubles, Bloomberg reported on Friday. Possible solutions include splitting up its product design and manufacturing businesses but halting factory expansion is a more likely scenario.

Russia sanctions evasion. Russia will start trials of cryptocurrency exchanges and the use of digital tokens for cross-border transactions through the National Payment Card system on 1 September, two people with knowledge of the matter told Bloomberg. Russia’s central bank proposed to ban the use and creation of cryptocurrencies weeks before the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, but now the government sees crypto as a way to ease payment difficulties for Russian companies pressured by international sanctions, Bloomberg reports. 

Macron on Durov’s arrest. The arrest of the Telegram CEO has nothing to do with restricting free speech, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday. Read more. 

Telegram’s future in jeopardy. While Durov's bail was set at €5 million, the formal investigation against him is still ongoing and could take months or even years to conclude. Under the bail conditions, he cannot leave French territory and must report twice a week to the police station. Almost a week after his arrest, Telegram’s cryptocurrency TON, which supports Telegram’s financial stability, lost roughly 18% of its value. In addition, as Politico reported, France issued an arrest warrant against Nikolai Durov, Pavel's elder brother and co-founder of Telegram. 

Telegram faced multiple crackdowns across the globe. Telegram has encountered government crackdowns worldwide, including bans in 31 countries, Euronews reported on Tuesday. The app has been used to organise protests in Belarus and Thailand. It  also faced criticism for enabling hate speech, disinformation, and criminal activities in countries like the UK, Germany, and India. Despite these issues, Telegram remains a crucial platform for communication, especially in conflict zones like Ukraine. After Durov's arrest in France for allegedly allowing illegal activities on the app, Telegram saw a spike in downloads, rising to No. 2 on the US App Store's Social Networking charts and topping the category in France, TechCruch reported on Monday.  

No more X in Brazil? Elon Musk’s X expects to be shut down in Brazil after it failed to meet a Supreme Court deadline, the firm’s Global Affairs team posted on the social media platform on Friday. The court had set a deadline for X to name its legal representative in the country and to take down accounts spreading fake news, mostly from supporters of former Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro on Thursday evening, Reuters reported, but X and Musk say this was a deadline to censor political opponents illegally. In response, the Supreme Court Justice, Alexandre de Moraes, blocked Starlink bank accounts in Brazil to pay for X fines, the firm posted on X on Friday. Starlink is another Musk company that operates satellites.  

Biden vs. Zuckerberg. Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta, stated that it was inappropriate for the Biden administration to have pressured Facebook into censoring content related to the coronavirus pandemic in 2021, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday. He emphasised that Meta would reject any similar future attempts. Additionally, Zuckerberg mentioned that he does not plan to fund nonprofits to assist in state election efforts, a move he previously made during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

TikTok’s troubles. A UK-based content moderator, Olivia Anton Altamirano, sued ByteDance's TikTok for disability discrimination and a toxic work environment, claiming that her role in moderating harmful content led to stress and pregnancy complications, Bloomberg reported on Thursday. Altamirano, who has multiple sclerosis, alleged that she faced unrealistic targets and discrimination due to her condition. TikTok has denied all allegations. Meanwhile, A US appeals court revived a lawsuit against TikTok over the death of a 10-year-old girl, ruling that the platform's algorithmic recommendations are not protected by the American Communications Decency Act, Reuters reported on Wednesday. 

EU-China data flows. The EU and China launched a new Cross-Border Data Flow Communication Mechanism on Wednesday to address challenges European companies face in China regarding the cross-border flow of non-personal data. This initiative, the first of its kind between the EU and China, stems from a 2023 political agreement and aims to facilitate data transfers while ensuring compliance with Chinese data laws.  

• How Telegram’s Founder Went From Russia’s Mark Zuckerberg to Wanted Man (The New York Times) 
• How Digital Wallets Like Apple Pay and Google Pay Work (Bloomberg) 
• AI Doomers Had Their Big Moment (Atlantic)

[Edited by Martina Monti]

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