About 7% of employees worldwide at Verizon, or 10,400 workers, have accepted a buyout as part of a strategy to save the company $10 billion by 2021. The package, which includes 60 weeks of salary bonus, plus benefits, was offered to 44,000 employees.
⋅ Recode
Airbnb and Slack reportedly are weighing whether to go public through direct listing, the unconventional structure used by Spotify that does away with bank underwriters. Bankers say they've received a lot of questions about direct listing, but they don't expect any big startups to use the tactic in 2019.
⋅ BBC
Researchers are training algorithms to machine translate 69,000 Mesopotamian records from the 21st-century BC. Researchers on the project say about 90% of cuneiform texts remain untranslated, and if these texts can be translated, more can be learned about ancient Mesopotamia and extinct languages.
US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said if a trade deal with China hasn't been agreed upon by March 1, the US will proceed with new tariffs. "As far as I am concerned it is a hard deadline," he said.
Costco has issued higher standards for its meat suppliers regarding the use of antibiotics as it looks to limit the exposure to uses that are only most necessary. The shift comes as meat producers are revising their practices to conform to new Food & Drug Administration guidelines.
Researchers from IntSights evaluated 50 health care databases and found that 15 were exposed online, compromising 1.5 million patient records at the rate of about 16,687 records per hour. The researchers' report states that hackers target medical data and health care organizations because they can buy and sell personally identifiable information, test cyberattack tools and techniques, and demand ransom for the release of infected devices.
Users can send voice messages through Instagram Direct, and those messages can be shared with individuals or groups. The messages are created by holding down the microphone button in the app and recording.
Amazon, which continues to work to reduce seller scams, has reportedly fired several employees believed to have improperly accessed data from an internal database. The company also deleted thousands of suspicious reviews.
Hong Kong companies and residents have lost more than $250 million in more than 9,000 cyberattacks this year, making the city one of the prime global targets for hackers, a new report states. Experts say that Hong Kong's lack of investment in cybersecurity is one of the reasons the city has been so vulnerable, especially to scams involving financial transactions.
An antitrust lawsuit that began over two drugs in 2016 has expanded to an investigation of alleged price-fixing at over 16 companies and 300 drugs. Joseph Nielsen, an assistant attorney general and a lead antitrust investigator in the case, said, "This is most likely the largest cartel in the history of the United States."
The White House has issued a memorandum calling for reports and recommendations related to wireless technology, setting in motion a process intended to produce a national 5G connectivity strategy. At the same time, it made a blog post headlined "America Will Win the Global Race to 5G."
⋅ Forbes
Professional sports teams across the NBA, NFL, NHL, MLB and MLS could all reach turning points in stadium construction next year. Tim Newcomb provides an overview of major developments, including Chase Center in San Francisco, Las Vegas Stadium, Los Angeles Stadium, Globe Life Field in Texas and the Seattle Center Arena.
⋅ The Hill
The Bureau of Land Management has proposed loosening Obama-era regulations protecting the greater sage grouse in seven Western states to open more land for oil and natural gas drilling and other activities.
Delta Air Lines has launched a biometric international terminal at Georgia's Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, featuring facial-recognition technology at check-in, the security checkpoint, boarding and Customs.
The Hotel Petaluma in Petaluma, Calif., held its third annual Gingerbread House Showcase and Competition over the weekend, with an array of imaginative renderings of sweet building materials and faux snow frosting. Children's creations shared the stage with elaborate replicas of local structures.