TECH

Europe may move forward by blocking 5G technology from China, making the toolbox mandatory

Huawei and ZTE will be targeted by new security measures from the European Commission, according to a new report that mentions Commissioner Henna Virkkunen's contacts with member states to implement the 5G toolbox.

The news comes from Bloomberg and says that the vice president and commissioner for technological sovereignty and security has asked member states to "stop using high-risk manufacturers in mobile networks."

Sources close to the matter say that Commissioner Henna Virkkunen wants to transform the recommendations of the 5G Toolbox, defined in 2020, into a legal requirement, limiting the use of Chinese technology from companies like Huawei or ZTE.

The proposal would force member states to align their strategies with European definitions, which until now were only recommendations. Those who do not adopt these new rules may face infringement proceedings and financial penalties. Some countries, and also telecommunications operators, have already adopted measures to remove equipment from Chinese brands from their network.

According to the information shared, these measures may apply not only to mobile networks but also to fiber optic networks, being a condition for the use of funds in infrastructure development.

In a statement, the European Commission stressed that network security is crucial for the economy. "The Commission urges Member States that have not yet implemented the 5G toolkit to also adopt relevant measures to address risks effectively and quickly." “The lack of swift action exposes the EU as a whole to obvious risk,” the same source states.

The European executive is concerned about the non-linear approach of European countries to the adoption of the toolbox. Sweden and the United Kingdom have already banned Huawei and ZTE, but others have continued to use the technology, such as Spain and Greece. In Portugal, operators have been reducing the use of the technology in their networks.

In April, Agne Vaiciukeviciute, a researcher at the Consumer Choice Center Europe, published an article in The Brussels Times, where she harshly criticizes the lack of stronger action from the European Commission in this area, capable of standardizing the policies of each country on this issue and focusing strategies more on user security than on economic or political priorities, as is still the case today.

Commissioner Henna Virkkunen is in Portugal for the Web Summit and yesterday visited the Deucalion supercomputer, installed on the Azurém campus of the University of Minho (UMinho), in Guimarães. Today she will be on the main stage of the summit taking place in Lisbon for the Europe’s tech session. sovereignty: Powering startups and innovation, at 4:40 PM (Portugal time)

mundophone

 

AMAZON

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TECH

'Anti-woke': US big tech companies stop publishing diversity data

Three of the largest technology companies in the United States – Google, Microsoft, and Meta – have decided to stop publishing annual reports on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), ending a decade-long practice that began with pressure from civil rights movements.

Google, which had been publishing statistics on the racial and gender composition of its workforce since 2014, informed employees that it does not intend to release new data in 2025. This was confirmed by the two giants.

The suspension marks a significant loss of transparency in the sector and contrasts with decisions by peers such as Apple, Amazon, and Nvidia, which maintained the practice in 2025. Apple and Amazon continued to disclose data to the US government through EEO-1 reports, short for Equal Employment Opportunity, required of companies with more than 100 employees.

The decision comes months after Donald Trump's return to the US presidency in January 2025. The Republican issued an executive order directing federal agencies to combat "illegal private sector preferences" linked to DEI, which includes the possibility of lawsuits against companies that consider identity as a hiring criterion.

Diversity reports have become an important tool for lawsuits and public campaigns. In 2024, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) released a study with data from more than a decade indicating that "discrimination likely contributes to the low representation of women, Black people, Hispanics, and older people in the technology sector."

The Future of Diversity: Regression or Reconfiguration?...The debate about representation and the presence of diverse groups in the arts and culture shows no clear signs of closure or total reversal. What is perceived in 2025 is a phase of adjustment and reassessment, with different sectors and audiences testing new limits and guiding strategies in the face of ongoing political and social pressures.

Market movements, coupled with research on audience behavior, show that diversity tends to consolidate in a more strategic way and less dependent on trends or current pressures, becoming an integral part of creative processes and commercial decisions.

Regardless of conservative waves or criticism of the so-called "woke" agenda, the economic and symbolic potential of representation continues to act as a driving force for innovation and the construction of new spaces for cultural expression. The current environment may be one of caution, but it does not point to the erasure of achievements, but rather to new dialogues about how and why to represent the multiplicity of contemporary society.

Umbilical alignment..."What is happening today is a true collusion between big tech companies and the Trump administration...What big tech companies want today is to have superpowers to be above any state in the world; recently, the European Union imposed severe fines on Google, but the Donald Trump administration has already intervened to shield it, and even now the fines have been suspended...This shows that this umbilical alignment of tech companies with Trump simply serves to give them even more power than they already have today and to make them immune to any kind of interference from any government in the world that could threaten their hegemonic position..." said site mundophone

mundophone

DIGITAL LIFE

China removes major gay dating apps from digital stores in new offensive against LGBTQ+ platforms

The gay dating apps Blued and Finka have been removed from the Apple Store and several Android app stores in China following a ruling by the country's Cyberspace Administration, China's main internet censorship and regulation body.

The removal was confirmed by Apple to Wired. "We respect the laws of the countries where we operate. Based on an order from the Cyberspace Administration of China, we have removed these two apps only from the Chinese store," a spokesperson said.

The person added that the apps had already been unavailable in other countries for some time: "Earlier this year, the developer of Finka chose to remove the app from stores outside of China, and Blued was only available in China."

Despite the removal, users who had already downloaded Blued and Finka can still access them - at least for now. The measure, however, reignites the debate about the growing siege imposed by the Chinese government on the LGBTQ+ community, which in recent years has seen the closure of specialized organizations and constant censorship of profiles on social media.

China decriminalized homosexuality in the 1990s, but the government does not recognize same-sex marriage.

Blued is controlled by BlueCity. In 2020, the company went public and reported that the gay dating app had over 49 million registered users and over 6 million monthly active users.

In the same year, as reported by Wired, BlueCity announced the acquisition of Finka, its main competitor in China. The company ceased trading on the stock exchange in 2022 and was acquired by the social media business Newborn Town, listed in Hong Kong.

A few years ago, BlueCity expanded its activities into the healthcare sector, launching a digital pharmacy service and a telemedicine clinic aimed at Chinese men. Furthermore, she operates a non-profit organization dedicated to combating HIV/AIDS.

It is not yet known whether the removal of the apps in China is permanent. In previous cases, some services managed to return to the app stores after making changes required by censors.

Blued and Finka...Blued is China's leading gay dating app and at one point had 49 million registered users. Its parent company, BlueCity, bought Finka in 2020 for US$33 million and was acquired in 2022 by Newborn Town, a Hong Kong social media company.

In 2024, the international version of Blued was renamed HeeSay, popular in India, Pakistan, and the Philippines. The app remains available normally outside of China.

It is not yet confirmed whether the removal of Blued and Finka will be temporary or permanent. In previous cases, apps only returned to the app stores after adjustments required by the authorities.

Homosexuality was decriminalized in China in the 1990s, but same-sex marriage remains without legal recognition. In recent years, LGBTQ groups have faced increased censorship and restrictions under the control of the Communist Party.

Reporter: Renata Turbiani, Brazil

 

DIGITAL LIFE

Landfall spyware targeted Samsung phone flaw, attackers still unknown

Samsung Galaxy phones have been targeted by Android spyware dubbed Landfall, and for nearly a year, the attack went unpatched, running rampant throughout the Middle East. Unit 42 has recently released an in-depth report on the spyware and how it works, showcasing how a weakness in Samsung's image processing library allowed for Landfall to execute arbitrary code on victims' devices. Unit 42's findings indicate that the attack was not deployed on the larger Internet like Herodotus, but rather toward specific individuals in the Middle East, and exact motivations or identities of the attackers in question remain unknown.

Thankfully, the CVE-2025-21042 vulnerability that provided the attack vector for this spyware has been patched by Samsung since April 2025. But this was only after the attack was already in use since at least mid-2024, and Unit 42's research indicated that the attack was used for comprehensive surveillance of compromised devices in the Middle East. Surveillance functions included "microphone recording, location tracking, and collection of photos, contacts, and call logs". The malformed image files used to carry the attack were sent to victims via WhatsApp and subsequently burrowed deep into the system, remaining active and undetected for months until Samsung's patch for the underlying vulnerability was released.

So, fortunately for current Samsung and Android users, there's no immediate cause for concern. As long as you've patched your Android phone since April 2025, you're most likely safe from this specific attack and the vulnerability it exploited. However, it does show a concerning trend in zero-click attacks on Android devices that don't even require users to download an application or misclick on a web page, which makes careful curation of browsing destinations and contacts even more important for those trying to protect their privacy.  Many new pieces of malware no longer require user ignorance to exploit—now, just being the recipient of an innocuous image file on an unpatched device could be a precursor to a malware infection.

The full Unit 42 report is available on Palo Alto Networks' blog, and goes into far more details on the specifics of this attack and how it and its contemporaries do their work. Knowledge of attacks like these emphasize the importance of security updates and up-to-date knowledge of cybersecurity, but especially for government or private sector employees dealing with highly-sensitive information.

mundophone

DIGITAL LIFE

The absurd (and brilliant) invention created for those who can't put down their cell phones

A company decided to combat digital addiction in a radical way: by transforming the cell phone into an object that is almost impossible to carry. The idea seems like a joke, but it's real, expensive, and was created based on neuroscience concepts. The goal is simple — to tire the user until they give up using the device.

If you've already tried time limit apps, focus modes, reduced notifications, and are still addicted to your cell phone, perhaps this idea is the most extreme of all. A company has developed a smartphone case weighing almost three kilograms to force the user to put down the device due to sheer physical exhaustion. The project mixes irony, engineering, and a bit of psychology — and is already seeking investors to reach the market. It may seem absurd, but the proposal is serious.

The proposal is reminiscent of the old metaphor of the "ball and chain." Matter Neuroscience created a stainless steel case that weighs about 2.7 kg, the equivalent of carrying a large bottle of water along with the cell phone. The idea is simple: if the device becomes too heavy to hold or carry, the user automatically reduces usage time.

The system consists of two metal plates that are fastened with screws, making the smartphone heavier than many laptops.

The design was inspired by the Black Diamond model, a robust phone from the 1980s. The company started from a basic principle of neuroscience: physical effort creates a negative feedback mechanism. In other words, the more uncomfortable the use, the less the desire to continue repeating the habit.

In addition to weighing a ton — literally for the arms — the case doesn't fit in a pocket and is uncomfortable to hold for long periods. Expected result: the phone ends up lying on the table, out of reach.

To prevent the user from simply giving up on the idea and removing the case, it can only be removed with an Allen key. This detail reduces the temptation to unscrew everything and return to normal use of the device.

The Neuroscience...We’re wired for face-to-face connection, not endless scrolling. Our brains have 6 feel-good neurotransmitters, only 2 of which are easily activated by your phone (dopamine and serotonin). The other 4 (cannabinoids, testosterone, opioids, and oxytocin) are activated more easily IRL, and with other people.  

And even dopamine and serotonin are more effective when activated IRL. The “happiness” we think we feel in our brain from our phones is often too fleeting to satisfy our brain’s needs. Instead, our brain gets caught in a continuous loop of craving in which we want positive satisfaction, but nothing we’re getting is sufficient for our brain, and just increases our cortisol (stress) levels over and over again.

Whether you're 16 or 60, too much screen time starves your brain of the social neurotransmitters it craves. Basically, real life hits different (and much better.)

Matter Neuroscience offers two versions:

-Stainless steel, for about $210

-Brass, even heavier, for approximately $500

A joke, a protest, or a real solution? The company is seeking to raise $75,000 to produce on a large scale. So far, it has received about $17,000 in support. The proposal mixes humor, criticism of digital addiction, and behavioral science. The message is clear: if nothing else works to reduce cell phone use, perhaps the weight of reality—or the case—will work.

While psychologists warn of the impact of excessive smartphone use on mental health and family relationships, the invention emerges as a solution as absurd as possible. The future will tell if it's just provocation…or a new market for those who need help disconnecting.

by mundophone 

 

DIGITAL LIFE

Big tech companies hold consumers and governments hostage with dependency-based discourse, says teacher

Tech giants like Google, Microsoft, and Meta do everything to increase the dependence of governments and consumers on their products, says Rodrigo Ochigame, 33, a professor of anthropology at Leiden University in the Netherlands.

Ochigame, originally from Mato Grosso do Sul and a computer science graduate, went to the US to study at two centers of excellence—the University of California, Berkeley, and MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)—how computer companies adapt their discourse to gain advantages.

He gained prominence in the public sphere as a critic of Silicon Valley with an article published on the American news website The Intercept, in which he described how an ethical AI researcher at MIT received funding from investment funds to campaign against technology regulation.

His book "Informatics of the Oppressed," written in 2020 and translated into Portuguese this year, shows how big tech services are subsidized by anti-competitive practices, such as the inclusion of free WhatsApp in internet plans, and contracts with the government, such as Google's presence in universities through cloud services. At the same time, local and collaborative projects are left uncovered by public policies.

"The zero-data franchise gives Meta's platforms a very large and extremely unfair competitive advantage, creating dependence on this company for a huge number of users," exemplifies the researcher.

"Brazil should not only prohibit the zero-data franchise of big tech companies, but use it in reverse: there should be subsidies for people who don't have mobile phone credit so they can use non-extractive alternatives, such as Signal [an ad-free and non-profit messaging app]," he adds.

The same, he says, applies to cloud computing services, where there are open-source alternatives, such as NextCloud. "It works perfectly, we use it at Leiden University, but it's not free, there's a transparent cost—you have to pay, but no one is exploiting your data."

For Ochigame, it's necessary to overcome the lobbyists' strategy that only large technology companies are capable of delivering cutting-edge technology. "What's the advantage of living in a high-resolution virtual reality, using state-of-the-art devices, if the sponsored advertising content is generated by artificial intelligence and optimized for technological manipulation?"

To do this, says the researcher, it's necessary to seek out theses and accounts that "won't easily appear in social media news feeds." Even the official history of Silicon Valley, he adds, reinforces the prominence of "ingenious inventions by geniuses" like Larry Page (Google), Mark Zuckerberg, and Bill Gates.

"In the case of Google, there is an erasure on at least two levels: the collective work of the field of information science and the more feminized field of work of librarians that gave rise to modern information science," the researcher exemplified.

It was while he was at MIT, in 2019, for example, that Ochigame met a retired librarian, Theresa Tobin, who introduced him to the work of the Cuban researcher María Teresa Freyre de Andrade, fundamental to research in information science. "Google Scholar does not index any of María's main books, although the Cuban online encyclopedia EcuRed has an extensive article about her," he says.

The Cuban digital library system of the 1980s, incidentally, is cited in the book as visionary. "A peculiar quality of the information science that developed in Cuba is that Cuban information scientists recognized that the metrics and algorithms they used to prioritize some information over others could never be neutral," says Ochigame.

In the current scenario, the researcher says, the US should oppose the construction of democratic digital infrastructures because the Donald Trump administration is captured by large corporations. "China (which is a dictatorship) will also not support these projects, as they contradict its regime of surveillance and censorship."

Brazil itself, the professor states, was once an example in the search for alternatives to Chinese and American technologies. "The first Lula government had great courage and audacity in supporting free software, which made Brazil, in the past, a certain leader internationally."

However, this public policy has lost strength since 2010, and today the Brazilian government has also been signing billion-dollar contracts with big tech companies to install foreign servers in public companies such as DataPrev and Serpro. "At this moment, the federal government has become complicit with the tech giants by making a discourse of digital sovereignty that has been co-opted by lobbyists," says Ochigame.

For the researcher, the country needs to propose free public alternatives. "In Brazil, there are already some laboratories with supercomputers for research purposes to which university researchers can submit proposals for use and be able to use part of this computing capacity for a period of time, and this model can be extended to general-use services, such as email and cloud computing."

"Of course, it's an investment that needs to be made, but it's not astronomical," says Ochigame. "For the kind of benefit that breaking this dependence and this enormous geopolitical vulnerability would bring, it's actually a rather modest cost."

https://ochigame.org/

mundophone