A Facebook recruiter and two rejected job applicants filed a complaint Thursday with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission accusing the company of discriminating against Black workers, as first reported by The Washington Post.The three workers, all of whom are Black, alleged that Facebook has a pattern of "racial discrimination in hiring, evaluations, promotions, and pay" for Black employees and job applicants."There may be Black Lives Matter posters on Facebook's walls, but Black workers don't see that phrase reflecting how they are treated in Facebook's own workplace," the complaint says.Facebook has faced accusations about racism within its walls previously, including from a Black former executive, anonymous Black employees, and other Black recruiters.The company is also facing growing pressure from employees, civil rights groups, and more than 500 advertisers to take a stronger stance on moderating hate speech on its platform. Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

A Facebook hiring manager and two job applicants he tried to recruit filed a complaint against the company on Thursday accusing it of discriminating against Black workers, as first reported by The Washington Post.

The complaint, which was filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, alleges that Facebook "has had and continues to have a general policy of discrimination against Black applicants and workers, including in hiring, evaluations, promotions, and pay."

"Facebook's deeds have not matched its rhetoric," the complaint says, adding that people of color at the company, especially Black workers, are underrepresented, don't feel respected or heard, and don't have an equal opportunity to advance.

"There may be Black Lives Matter posters on Facebook's walls, but Black workers don't see that phrase reflecting how they are treated in Facebook's own workplace," it says.

Oscar Veneszee Jr., a recruiter for Facebook's infrastructure team and Black US Navy veteran who focuses on helping the company recruit other people of color and veterans, and who brought the complaint, said that he has struggled to get fair performance evaluations or raises, and frequently experiences racism on the job.

Howard Winns Jr. and Jazsmin Smith, two applicants recruited by Veneszee, also joined the complaint, alleging that they were rejected for positions despite being "well-qualified" and having recommendations from a current Facebook employee.

"Facebook can and must do a far better job recruiting, hiring, promoting, and retaining Black workers. It's time to close the gap between Facebook's words and deeds on the issue of diversity," Peter Romer-Friedman, an attorney at Gupta Wessler who represents the workers, said in a statement.

"We believe it is essential to provide all employees with a respectful and safe working environment. We take any allegations of discrimination seriously and investigate every case," Facebook spokesperson Pamela Austin told Business Insider in a statement. 

The complaint takes aim at a wide range of Facebook policies, cultural issues, and lack of diversity, and comes at a time when the company is under intense pressure from outside critics as well as within its walls to take stronger actions to combat systemic racism.

The lack of diversity among Silicon Valley tech companies is widespread and not limited to Facebook. At Apple, just 3% of the company's top leaders were African-American in 2018, the year of its most recent public demographics report. Latinos represented 7% of Apple's leadership. At Google-parent Alphabet, Blacks and Latinos accounted for 2.6% and 3.7%, respectively, of its leadership ranks in the company's most recent report.

The Facebook complaint criticizes a number of Facebook's hiring practices — many of which are common throughout the tech industry — such as "culture fit" and a preference for referrals. It alleges that these practices, given Facebook's "overwhelmingly white and Asian-American workforce," adversely affect Black applicants.

The complaint also calls out the company for forcing employees to raise racial discrimination and harassment claims via a "secret forum where all rulings are 'confidential and not available to the public.'"

Similar arbitration requirements around sexual harassment claims faced pushback during the #MeToo movement and have since been abandoned by many tech companies.

This is hardly the first time Facebook has been accused by employees of discrimination within the workplace. In late 2018,  former Facebook employee Mark Luckie wrote that the company had failed to build an inclusive work environment and deal with racism, saying that: "Facebook has a black people problem."

A year later, anonymous Black employees circulated a memo saying those problems had only gotten worse, writing: "Facebook still has a black people problem."

Earlier this year, another diversity-focused recruiter at Facebook sued the company for $100 million, also alleging racial discrimination.

The social media giant is also facing a growing chorus of critics who say it needs to do more to combat racism and hate speech on its platform as well. After CEO Mark Zuckerberg defended his decision not to take action on controversial posts by President Donald Trump, employees at Facebook as well as Zuckerberg's philanthropic initiative revolted.

Last month, civil rights groups including the NAACP, the Anti-Defamation League, and Color of Change called for advertisers to boycott Facebook, and more than 500 companies, including major brands such as Coca-Cola, Ford, Starbucks, Verizon, Adidas, and Unilever, have signed on.

Original author: Tyler Sonnemaker

Elon Musk said on Twitter that testing errors, rather than new infections, are causing the new surge of coronavirus cases.Virologist Angela Rasmussen rushed to debunk the claim, which she called "dangerous misinformation."COVID-19 diagnostic tests have relatively low rates of false positives, and spikes in hospitalizations show that transmission really has increased.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Elon Musk took to Twitter on Thursday to claim that testing errors, rather than increasing transmission, are driving the recent surge in coronavirus cases across the US.

"There are a ridiculous number of false positive [COVID-19] tests," Musk wrote. "This is a big part of why C19 positive tests are going up while hospitalizations & mortality are declining."

But Columbia University virologist Angela Rasmussen called that "false and dangerous misinformation," and the two got into an online spat as she debunked Musk's claims.

Diagnostic COVID-19 tests don't give false positives often enough to account for the recent spike of cases, she said. Since June 15, the seven-day rolling average for daily new cases has more than doubled, and the country's total case count has jumped from 2.1 million to more than 2.7 million.

 

Contrary to Musk's claim, hospitalizations are rising in places with new outbreaks. In Texas, for example, daily COVID-19 hospitalizations have more than doubled in the last two weeks.

After Musk suggested that all people who test positive should get tested again, Rasmussen said, "no one benefits if people with platforms allowing them to reach millions are spreading demonstrably false information and public health guidance."

Elon Musk (left) and NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine wear face masks to greet NASA astronauts Robert Behnken (left) and Douglas Hurley at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, May 27, 2020. NASA/Kim Shiflett

That's when she got a response.

"Yes, Angela, please show us the graphs/data that prove your point," Musk said, seconding a follower who urged Rasmussen to "challenge the facts and not the credentials."

To bolster his argument, Musk shared New York Times graphics showing the spike in cases alongside a fall in daily death counts. The implication — that the rising case counts must be in error if death counts are falling — is misleading, since it usually takes several weeks for the coronavirus to kill people, and this uptick in cases only began in mid-June.

 

Death counts lag behind case counts by about three or four weeks, according to Rasmussen and other infectious-disease experts.

"Deaths will likely increase in the next few weeks as time passes and the cases diagnosed earlier in the surge get sicker," Rasmussen said. "The worst is yet to come."

There are reasons, however, why this new surge may not produce as many deaths as the US saw in April and May. But they have nothing to do with testing errors, as Musk suggested. Instead, experts say that because more young people are getting infected this time around, and they are less likely to die. About 80% of US coronavirus deaths through mid-June were people over 65.

Still, deaths are rising in some states. Arizona's seven-day rolling average of new COVID-19 deaths has more than doubled since the beginning of June, from an average of 15 deaths per day to 37.

In the same time period, Texas's average daily death count has increased by 53%.

 

Musk has a track record of sharing misleading theories about the pandemic. He previously suggested that deaths were being overcounted and that lockdowns were unnecessary.

In March, Musk also predicted that the US would be seeing "close to zero" new cases by the end of April. That ended up being the virus' first peak.

A hearse car backs into a refrigerated truck to pick up deceased bodies outside of the Brooklyn Hospital on April 1, 2020 in New York City. ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images

Responding to Rasmussen's debunk of his statements, Musk lashed out at the field of medicine itself.

"Something's messed up about medicine that's anti-science," he wrote. "In science, you question everyone, no matter who they are. Facts and reasoning are everything, but in medicine too much emphasis is on credentials, often by people who've accomplished nothing but a PhD thesis used by no one."

But Musk's own argument did not seem to take the facts into account. For one, he insisted that hospitalizations are declining.

As a rebuttal, Rasmussen pointed to the rising intensive care hospitalization rates in Arizona, which has one of the country's steepest surges in new cases.

 

Musk accused her of cherry-picking one state and called her argument "bs." He again shared the same New York Times graphics, even though those do not show hospitalizations.

In fact, hospitalizations have been increasing nationwide since June 17, according to data from the COVID Tracking Project. The project, run by reporters at The Atlantic, also notes that hospitalizations are likely undercounted, especially since Florida does not report those numbers and currently has one of the nation's biggest surges.

Shayanne Gal/Business Insider

It can take weeks for a COVID-19 case to get severe enough to warrant a stay at the hospital, so hospitalizations usually lag behind case counts the same way deaths do. The CDC even notes this on the site where it publishes preliminary hospitalization data. That site shows a decline in the number of people hospitalized with positive COVID-19 test results from April 18 to June 20. But the CDC has no more data after that.

As for diagnostic COVID-19 tests, the likelihood of false positives is low. According to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the PCR tests used across the country "almost never" give false positive results.

Rasmussen said that the "bigger issue" is false negatives, which can lead to underreporting of new cases.

Original author: Morgan McFall-Johnsen

President Donald Trump. Associated Press

Good morning! This is the tech news you need to know this Tuesday.

Reddit banned r/The_Donald, the largest pro-Trump subreddit, as it cracks down on hate speech and targeting. The subreddit was one of roughly 2,000 communities that were banned across Reddit on Monday, CEO Steve Huffman said.Amazon's live streaming service Twitch suspended President Trump's channel for violating 'hateful conduct' policies and cited his campaign speeches as the reason. Twitch said Trump's words at campaign rallies violated the company's hateful-conduct rules. Microsoft paused ad spending on Facebook and Instagram over concerns about 'inappropriate content.' The news comes as other major advertisers halt ad spending on Facebook to protest the way the company moderates hate speech.India has blocked TikTok and dozens of other Chinese apps that the government says pose a security threat. The move banning 59 apps follows major clashes between India and China earlier this month along a disputed border shared between the two countries.Uber is in discussions to buy Postmates for about $2.6 billion as it looks to consolidate its position in the food delivery market. A deal, which could be announced in the next week, marks a different direction for Postmates which had been planning to file for an IPO, the Wall Street Journal reported. YouTube has banned white supremacist channels including those of Richard Spencer, David Duke, and Stefan Molyneux. "We have strict policies prohibiting hate speech on YouTube, and terminate any channel that repeatedly or egregiously violates those policies," a YouTube spokesperson said in a statement.Google will expand free retail listings to its main search page in a bid to fend off a growing ad rivalry with Amazon. Merchants will soon be able to advertise products at the top of Google's search pages for free, which could help Google lure over more retailers. Elon Musk said in a leaked email that Tesla may break even during Q2 despite its US car factory closing for 2 months. "Breaking even is looking super tight," he said. "Really makes a difference for every car you build and deliver. Please go all out to ensure victory!"Tech employees are selling referrals online to job candidates for under $50 to help them get hired at Google, Facebook, and other industry giants. Job candidates have purchased more than 11,000 job referrals through the online marketplace Rooftop Slushie since the website was launched in 2019,Twitter has apologized for slapping a COVID-19 label on tweets about 5G, but experts say the platform's algorithm could be encouraging the spread of conspiracy theories. Twitter users noticed that the platform was marking tweets mentioning "5G" or "oxygen" with a warning about COVID-19 misinformation.

Have an Amazon Alexa device? Now you can hear 10 Things in Tech each morning. Just search for "Business Insider" in your Alexa's flash briefing settings.

You can also subscribe to this newsletter here — just tick "10 Things in Tech You Need to Know."

NOW WATCH:

Original author: Callum Burroughs

India on Monday blocked dozens of Chinese apps, including the popular viral video app TikTok, in order to "ensure safety and sovereignty of Indian cyberspace." 

In total, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology listed 59 mobile apps that it said posed a security threat. 

"In view of information available, they are engaged in activities which is prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defense of India, security of state and public order," the statement said. 

The ministry said that it received "many complaints" about mobile apps available on both iOS and Android platforms that have been accused of "stealing and surreptitiously transmitting users' data in an unauthorized manner to servers which have locations outside India." 

"The compilation of these data, its mining, and profiling by elements hostile to national security and defense of India ... is a matter of very deep and immediate concern which requires emergency measures," the ministry said. 

Among the companies listed is TikTok — which is owned by Chinese company ByteDance that has come under scrutiny in recent months over reports of ties to the Chinese Communist Party and allegations of censorship on its platform. Earlier this year, several US government agencies banned TikTok over concerns about cybersecurity. 

TikTok is one of the most downloaded phone apps in the world and has already entered more than 150 global markets, with India being one of its most active regions. According to the Economic Times, the app claims to have 200 million users in India, with about 120 million monthly active users. 

Other major Chinese apps banned by India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology include WeChat, Weibo, and QQ, an instant messaging service owned by Chinese internet giant Tencent.

In a statement on Tuesday morning local time, Nikhil Gandhi, head of TikTok India, said that the company was "in the process of complying" with India's ban. 

"We have been invited to meet with concerned government stakeholders for an opportunity to respond and submit clarifications," the Gandhi said. "TikTok continues to comply with all data privacy and security requirements under Indian law and has not shared any information of our users in India with any foreign government, including the Chinese government." 

"Further, if we were requested to in the future we would not do so," Gandhi added. 

The move follows major clashes between India and China earlier this month along a disputed border shared between the two countries. During the standoff in the Galwan River Valley at least 20 Indian soldiers were killed.

Satellite photos released Monday showed a buildup of troops along both sides of the border. 

Original author: Rosie Perper

A website is allowing prospective tech employees to anonymously purchase a job referral from existing tech workers for $20 to $50 apiece.Rooftop Slushie, created by the makers of techie chat favorite Blind, has hosted 11,000 referral transactions since it was launched in 2019. Facebook and Google referrals are the most popular.The "vendors" are established employees at companies like Amazon, Google, and Twitter who can become verified on the website and vet candidate submissions before accepting the deal.The site's product manager told One Zero that the service helps improve a skilled candidate's chances of getting hired, but critics say paying for and accepting payment for a job referral is unethical.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

The hiring process in the tech world can be competitive, and getting your foot in the door to score an interview can be easier if someone's vouching for you.

A website has commoditized such referrals, allowing eager prospective employees to purchase one for $20 to $50.

Job candidates have purchased more than 11,000 job referrals through the online marketplace Rooftop Slushie since the website was launched in 2019, as writer Seth King reported in One Zero on Sunday.

Rooftop Slushie was formed by the creators of Blind, the anonymous chat site favored by tech workers where they can freely air their grievances about the industry. 

Here's how it works: Job candidates fill out a form, seen below, indicating the companies where they're hoping to apply. Then they list what they're willing to pay and upload their resume.

Rooftop Slushie. Rooftop Slushie

Tech workers can become verified on Rooftop Slushie as "vendors." They peruse the forms that candidates submit, taking into account their asking price and the quality of their resume, and then decide if they will accept or not. According to Gizmodo, employees from 83,000 companies — including Google, Amazon, and Facebook — are verified on the site. They are required to use their work email to be verified.

As Daniel Kim, Rooftop Slushie's product manager, told One Zero, job referrals for positions at Facebook and Google are the hottest sellers.

Kim told One Zero that its referral transactions help even the odds for skilled employees who perhaps make the cut for a role but lack desirable application features like job referrals. As the author notes, many of the high-earning tech workers that accept the payment of under $50 hardly need such supplemental income. 

But critics told One Zero the transactional nature of Rooftop Slushie's service "smells like bribery" and is ethically questionable. For employees that opt to become vendors, they could also be violating a legal binding to stay loyal to their employers. 

Tech companies typically have some sort of referral bonus system in place for employees. Amazon told One Zero that accepting payment for a job referral, however, is a violation of company policies and is looking into putting an end to the practice.

"Silicon Valley." Jaimie Trueblood/HBO

The website also allows users to pay for tips on how to beef up their resumes and how to prepare for interviews, according to Gizmodo, but the referral transactions are the most popular feature on the site.

According to One Zero, the website was named after a character in the HBO show "Silicon Valley," a series that has come to be known as a strikingly accurate portrayal of the tech ecosystem and its idiosyncrasies. The character Nelson "Big Head" Bighetti has a penchant for sipping Big Gulps on rooftops while "resting and vesting."

As Business Insider's Melia Russell reported in 2016, the "Big Head" character embodies the Silicon Valley founder whose company has been acquired and is left to wait out a contract while their equity vests.

Original author: Katie Canales

Google has announced that retailers will soon be able to list items for free at the top of Google search pages.The company had already changed the rules so that merchants could list items in the Google Shopping section for free – but they still had to pay for a slot at the top of Google Search. That's soon changing.The change gives Google power to fight back against Amazon's swelling ad business.Do you work at Google? You can contact this reporter securely using encrypted messaging app Signal (+1 628-228-1836) or encrypted email (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.).Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Google has announced it will change its rules for shopping listings, by allowing merchants to promote their products at the top of search pages for free.

It's the latest move by the company to lure more sellers onto its platform and take the fight to Amazon. In April, Google changed the rules to more prominently display free product listings over paid ads in its Shopping section.

But starting this summer, Google will also allow merchants to display products at the top of its main Search pages for no cost.

In a blog post announcing the news, Google's commerce president Bill Ready said these listings will show up in Google's knowledge panels, which appear at the top of the page.

This will happen first on mobile, followed by desktop browsers down the road, he said.

"For many merchants, connecting with customers in a digital environment is still relatively new territory or a smaller part of their business," said Ready.

"However, consumer preference for online shopping has increased dramatically, and it's crucial that we help people find all the best options available and help merchants more easily connect with consumers online."

For Google, this could be a deft tactic to claw back some search advertising revenue from Amazon, which has benefited hugely from the boost in online shopping during the pandemic.

According to financial services firm Cowen, Amazon's ad business is expected to make $17.6 billion this year. It's cementing Amazon as the third major player in online advertising behind Google and Facebook, and an increasing threat to both.

The change also feasibly means a temporary dip in advertising revenue for Google as retailers will now be able to have their products appear in search without paying for the visibility.

The company is already preparing to possibly see its ad revenue decline for the first time as a result of the pandemic, as Business Insider previously reported.

But Google is clearly thinking about the long-term strategy, and this latest move is one way to keep ahead of the Amazon threat.

Original author: Hugh Langley

Major social media platforms on Monday took action against Trump, pro-Trump groups, and far-right accounts for violating their policies against hate speech.Reddit banned r/The_Donald, the largest pro-Trump subreddit, Twitch suspended Trump's official account, and YouTube banned a number of prominent white supremacists' channels.The moves come as major advertisers are boycotting Facebook over the company's refusal to take more aggressive action against hate speech and misinformation.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Reddit, Amazon subsidiary Twitch, and Google's YouTube took actions on Monday against prominent pro-Trump and far-right accounts and groups, as well as Trump himself, in an attempt to crack down on hate speech on their platforms.

Reddit banned more than 2,000 subreddits that regularly broke its rules about harassment, hate speech, and targeting, including r/The_Donald, a pro-Trump forum with more than 790,000 users.

"The community has consistently hosted and upvoted more rule-breaking content than average ... and its mods have refused to meet our most basic expectations," CEO Steve Huffman wrote in a blog post Monday.

The subreddits were banned as part of Reddit's enforcement of a new policy banning people or subreddits who "promote hate based on identity or vulnerability" or target "victims of a major violent event and their families."

Twitch, a video streaming platform popular among gamers, said it had temporarily suspended President Donald Trump's official account for violating its hateful-conduct rules.

"Hateful conduct is not allowed on Twitch," the company said in a statement. "In line with our policies, President Trump's channel has been issued a temporary suspension from Twitch for comments made on stream, and the offending content has been removed."

Twitch cited two examples of "offending content" from Trump's account, one from a campaign rally in 2016 and another from Trump's recent campaign event in Tulsa, Oklahoma, both of which showed the president making racist comments about Mexican Americans.

Also on Monday, YouTube announced it had banned the accounts of many popular white supremacists, including longtime Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke, Richard Spencer, and Stefan Molyneux, citing their violations of YouTube's hate speech guidelines.

"We have strict policies prohibiting hate speech on YouTube, and terminate any channel that repeatedly or egregiously violates those policies," a YouTube spokesperson said in a statement provided to Business Insider.

A YouTube spokesperson told The Verge, which first reported the news: "After updating our guidelines to better address supremacist content, we saw a 5x spike in video removals and have terminated over 25,000 channels for violating our hate speech policies."

The actions by Reddit, Twitch, and YouTube came the same day that a long list of major brands announced they would pause advertising on Facebook and subsidiary Instagram, citing inaction around hate speech.

Civil rights groups including the NAACP and Anti-Defamation League called for the advertising boycott earlier this month following Facebook's refusal to take action against controversial posts by Trump in which he called those protesting the death of George Floyd "thugs" and suggested violence against them.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg defended Facebook's decision not to label or remove the posts at the time, while Twitter labeled identical tweets from Trump as "glorifying violence."

On Friday, after clothing retailer The North Face joined the Facebook boycott, other major brands including Verizon, Unilever, Honda, Coca-Cola, and Ben & Jerry's said they too would join.

In response, Facebook announced a slew of new rules around hate speech and misinformation, but so far, those changes don't appear to have appeased advertisers

On Monday, the boycott grew significantly as Starbucks, Adidas, PepsiCo, Denny's, Diageo, Conagra Foods, and Clorox said they would also pause ad spending on the platform.

Some of the companies also announced a pause on advertising across all social media platforms, citing the broader problem of their role in amplifying misinformation and hate speech.

Amid the coronavirus pandemic, racial justice protests, and upcoming elections, social media companies are facing growing pressure to get tougher on moderating harmful content and misinformation.

Aaron Holmes, Ben Gilbert, Rachel Greenspan, Isobel Asher Hamilton, and Rob Price contributed reporting for this story.

Original author: Tyler Sonnemaker

Tesla may avoid a loss during the second quarter, CEO Elon Musk told employees in an email on Monday."Breaking even is looking super tight," he said. "Really makes a difference for every car you build and deliver. Please go all out to ensure victory!"While Tesla made a surprise profit in the first quarter of this year, analysts are predicting the electric-car maker will lose money in the second quarter, according to Marketwatch.Are you a current or former Tesla employee? Do you have an opinion about what it's like to work there? Contact this reporter at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., on Signal at 646-768-4712, or via his encrypted email address This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Tesla may avoid losing money during the second quarter, CEO Elon Musk said in an email to employees on Monday. 

"Breaking even is looking super tight," he said. "Really makes a difference for every car you build and deliver. Please go all out to ensure victory!"

Electrek's Fred Lambert first reported on the email, and Business Insider viewed a photo of the message.

Tesla did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment.

While Tesla posted a surprise profit in the first quarter of this year, its US car factory stopped production for two months because of a local shelter-in-place order associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. Analysts are predicting the electric-car maker will lose money in the second quarter, according to Marketwatch.

Though Tesla started making its Model Y SUV in January almost a year ahead of schedule, Musk referenced manufacturing and supply-chain issues for the vehicle earlier this month.

"We are doing reasonably well with S, X, and 3, but there are production and supply chain ramp challenges with Model Y, as is always the case for new products," Musk said in a separate internal email, referring to Tesla's other models.

Are you a current or former Tesla employee? Do you have an opinion about what it's like to work there? Contact this reporter at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., on Signal at 646-768-4712, or via his encrypted email address This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Original author: Mark Matousek

You can change your Epic Games password from the Epic Games website in the "Account" section.If you've lost or forgotten your Epic Games password, try to log into the Epic Games website and choose "Forgot Your Password," then follow the instructions. Be sure that your new password is strong and unique.Visit Business Insider's Tech Reference library for more stories.

Epic Games is a popular game developer and distributor, perhaps best known for the massive hit Fortnite.

To play any titles published by Epic Games or sold on the Epic Games Store, you'll need to have an account. And if you need to change the password on your Epic Games account, you can do that through any browser on your Mac or PC.

Check out the products mentioned in this article:

Apple Macbook Pro (From $1,299.00 at Apple)

Acer Chromebook 15 (From $179.99 at Walmart)

How to change your Epic Games password

1. In any web browser on your Mac or PC, open the Epic Games website.

2. Hover the mouse over your account avatar at the top-right of the screen and, in the drop-down menu, click "Account."

Original author: Dave Johnson

On June 29, 2020, Tesla celebrates its 10th year anniversary of going public.In 2010, Tesla offered 13.3 million shares at $17 per share.The company has permanently changed how the public perceives electric cars.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Tesla celebrates its 10th anniversary of going public on June 29.

It's been a long 10 years, full of ups and downs. But it's fair to say that in 2020, Tesla has succeeded in putting electric cars on the radar for many buyers who once would have never considered them.

Tesla's journey has not always been easy. While the company has celebrated plenty of achievements, it has also experienced its fair share of setbacks. 

Here's a breakdown of the company's most defining moments since its founding. 

Original author: Cadie Thompson and Kristen Lee

When you buy through our links, we may earn money from our affiliate partners. Learn more.

Original author: Sunny Chanel and Steven Cohen

YouTube banned Richard Spencer, David Duke, Stefan Molyneux, and other popular white supremacist channels from the platform on Monday, citing their violations of hate speech guidelines.

"We have strict policies prohibiting hate speech on YouTube, and terminate any channel that repeatedly or egregiously violates those policies," a YouTube spokesperson said in a statement provided to Business Insider. Julia Alexander of The Verge first reported the news. 

Duke is a longtime Ku Klux Klan leader and neo-Nazi, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center; Spencer is the head of the National Policy Institute, a white supremacist lobbying organization and think tank, which was also removed from YouTube on Monday; and Molyneux is a far-right activist who advocates for "eugenics and white supremacism," according to the SPLC. The platform also banned the channel of the white nationalist group American Renaissance and its podcast channel.

Molyneux, who calls himself a philosopher, tweeted that his ban was an "egregious error." Spencer said he planned to appeal his ban, which he called a "systemic, coordinated effort." 

For years, YouTube has faced criticism for allowing the channels of white supremacists to thrive. A September 2018 report from the independent research organization Data and Society called YouTube "the single most important hub by which an extensive network of far-right influencers profit from broadcasting propaganda to young viewers."

In June 2019, YouTube, which is owned by Google, rolled out a hate speech policy overhaul. A YouTube spokesperson said that more than 25,000 channels had been removed for "violating our hate speech policies" in the year since. 

The news comes the same day that Reddit banned over 2,000 subreddits for hate speech, including r/the_donald, a pro-Trump group that's long been criticized for racist and offensive language. Former Reddit CEO Ellen Pao criticized the company in June for allowing the subreddit's "hate, racism, and violence" to continue on the platform.

"Reddit is a place for community and belonging, not for attacking people," the platform's current CEO Steve Huffman said on Monday, according to The New York Times. 

Also on Monday, livestreaming platform Twitch suspended President Trump's channel for "hateful conduct," using the president's language in campaign rally speeches as examples. 

Original author: Rachel E. Greenspan

Lululemon has agreed to acquire the exercise-tech startup Mirror for $500 million, the company announced on Monday.The athletic-apparel company invested in the startup last year and has a content partnership with the it.Mirror sells a $1,500 device of the same name that allows customers to participate in fitness classes at home.The acquisition comes as demand for streaming at-home workout classes has grown, particularly during the coronavirus pandemic.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

The workout-apparel brand Lululemon has agreed to acquire the at-home-exercise startup Mirror for $500 million, the company announced on Monday.

Lululemon Athletica Inc. said in a press release that the deal would help the apparel maker boost its "digital and interactive capabilities." It also comes after Lululemon invested in Mirror in October as part of a $34 million funding round led by Steve Cohen's hedge fund Point72.

Brynn Putnam, Mirror's founder and CEO, will stay on as the company's chief executive, and Mirror will operate as a standalone company within Lululemon. The transaction is expected to close in the second fiscal quarter of 2020.

In addition to the investment, Lululemon has also worked with Mirror through a content partnership that included sweat and meditation classes from the apparel company's global ambassadors on Mirror's platform.

Mirror, as its name implies, sells a $1,500 high-tech mirror that's meant to serve a sleek gym alternative for working out at home. The product helps customers keep track of their form during exercises and doubles as a screen for interactive workout classes.

The mirror can be controlled via a smartphone app, and users can see exercise stats on the mirror's screen. The company also expanded into personal training in October.

The deal comes as the demand for streaming workouts and specialized equipment meant to replicate the experience of participating in a boutique fitness class at home has risen in recent years, following the popularity of brands like Peloton.

For Lululemon, the acquisition could help the company further expand into digital fitness as the company faces heightened competition in athleisure from rivals like Nike.

It also comes as there's an increased interest in working out from home amid the coronavirus pandemic. Peloton, which makes high-end fitness bikes and treadmills and offers digital workout classes, said its sales were up 66%when it reported third-quarter earnings in early May.

Putnam said her dissatisfaction with other at-home workout platforms led her to create Mirror, which launched in 2018.

"It was a passive, one-way experience," Putnam said in a previous interview with Business Insider in reference to at-home workout apps she's tried in the past. "There was no interaction. There was no community. There was no progress reporting."

It's unclear how many units Mirror has sold, but Putnam told Business Insider last year that the company had sold Mirrors in every state in the US within a couple of months of its launch.

Original author: Lisa Eadicicco

Microsoft has paused advertising spending on Facebook and Instagram through at least August, the company confirmed Monday after Axios first reported the news, citing an internal chat transcript. 

The company first suspended advertising on the social networks in the US in May and more recently paused spending globally, Axios reported Monday. Microsoft confirmed the Axios report to Business Inisder.

Facebook's market value has dropped by $60 billion in the past two days as advertisers including Coca-Cola, Starbucks, and PepsiCo pause spending as part of a boycott in response to Facebook's inaction on hate speech.

Microsoft, according to the Axios report, is not participating in the boycott but is pausing the ad spending because it's concerned about where the company's ads will appear. The company reportedly cited "hate speech, pornography, terrorist content, etc." as examples of "inappropriate content," but, in the transcript Axios reviewed, did not explicitly say what kind of content it didn't want its ads to appear beside.

"Our experience tells us that the most impactful means to effect genuine, long-term change is through direct dialogue and meaningful action with our media partners, including the suspension of real marketing dollars," Microsoft CMO Chris Capossela said in an internal Yammer post, according to the Axios report. 

Got a tip? Contact this reporter via email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., message her on Twitter @ashannstew, or send her a secure message through Signal at 425-344-8242.

Original author: Ashley Stewart

UNest, an app that allows parents to set aside savings for their children, just raised a $9 million Series A.The round was led by Anthos Capital with participation from investors like Northwestern Mutual Future Ventures and former NBA all-star Baron Davis.UNest, which started as a 592 college savings app, has broadened its product offerings since its founding in 2018. Since February, UNest has added 25,000 accounts.Here's the 15-slide pitch deck UNest used to raise its Series A.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Millennials aren't kids anymore. In fact, many have kids of their own. And UNest, founded by Ksenia Yudina, is targeting this cohort of new parents with a savings app.

UNest started as a college savings app, offering 529 college savings plans. Since its launch in 2018, the fintech has broadened its scope to include general savings accounts for kids.

"The feedback that we've heard from our existing users is that they don't want to save just for education," Yudina said. "They want to invest in their kids' futures, but be able to save for their first car or a down payment on a home."

Los Angeles-based UNest, which extended its seed round in January, announced a $9 million Series A on June 16 led by Anthos Capital with participation from investors like Northwestern Mutual Future Ventures and former NBA all-star Baron Davis.

As UNest has expanded its product offerings, its userbase has continued to grow, especially amid the coronavirus pandemic during which many parents are spending more time with their kids. Since February, UNest has added 25,000 accounts. The funding will be used to invest in more marketing and brand awareness as UNest looks to grow its userbase, Yudina said.

And the round was raised entirely remotely amid coronavirus shutdowns.

"The concern that most companies seem to have going into the pandemic is that there would be a lot of down rounds," Peter Mansfield, chief marketing officer at UNest, told Business Insider.

Given the economic volatility over the past few months, it's easy for founders to feel a bit bearish, Mansfield said. Instead, UNest was able to leverage the growth it had already experienced, resulting in a "a very big up round," he added.

"We're at a really fortunate spot because we didn't really need to raise," Mansfield said. "That probably gave us more confidence than the average bear to be able to go in there with our heads held high asking for a valuation that we thought was eminently fair."

While UNest's pitch deck itself has gone through a number of iterations, there are other factors to successful fundraising.

"Fundraising is all about relationship building," said Yudina. "You have to get in front of them, you have to show your energy and drive, and prove why you're the right person to solve this problem."

"The pitch deck follows. It's kind of like marketing materials, it's post-fact," Yudina said.

Part of UNest's confidence came from building out an experienced team after its seed round, Yudina said. While Yudina had prior experience as a financial advisor at Capital Group's American Funds, she didn't have experience at a fintech. Mansfield led marketing in the early days of Marqeta, and Mike Van Kempen, UNest's chief operating officer, joined UNest last year from Acorns. 

"We built a super strong team with actual experience in fintech," said Yudina, "and that's what investors like."

And proving you can deliver on product development and user acquisition is key when fundraising, Yudina said. For example, UNest launched with an iOS app, promising investors to build out an Android app, which it launched in February.

Here's the pitch deck UNest used to win over investors and raise its Series A.

Original author: Shannen Balogh

The former high-flying San Francisco venture capitalist Michael Rothenberg is, for the first time, facing criminal charges over allegations that he defrauded investors in his venture fund.The US attorney's office in Northern California announced the charges on Friday after investigations by the FBI and the IRS criminal-investigations unit.A whistleblower came forward about Rothenberg's business dealings in 2016.In a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission, he was barred from the investment business for five years and ordered to pay more than $31 million in fines and disgorgement.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

The former high-flying venture capitalist Michael Rothenberg is, for the first time, facing criminal charges over allegations that he defrauded investors in his venture fund.

The new charges were announced Friday by the US Attorney's Office for the Northern District of California after investigations by the FBI and the IRS criminal-investigations unit.

Rothenberg has been under scrutiny for years over allegations that he found ways to funnel money from investors to himself or his venture firm instead of using the funds to buy shares in startups. The new federal charges allege that he charged investors management fees above the contractual amount they agreed to and lied to a bank when applying for a loan. They also allege he convinced investors to wire him $1.35 million to buy shares of a startup but then transferred the money elsewhere and never bought the stock.

All told, the US attorney's office said it was charging Rothenberg with 23 crimes for what it described as "multiple schemes to defraud spanning from 2013 to 2016," including wire fraud, bank fraud, and making false statements to a bank. 

The criminal charges are the latest troubles for the 36-year-old who was once considered an outlandish but rising star of Silicon Valley's venture world.

He was known for his lavish parties and over-the-top lifestyle until one day, his newly hired chief financial officer told employees that the company was out of cash and could not pay them, Business Insider reported in 2016.

That same year, a whistleblower came forward to the Securities and Exchange Commission, Business Insider reported at the time. The SEC then asked people to speak with the FBI and the US attorney's office, a person close to the matter told us at the time. TechCrunch and Backchannel wrote exposés.

The SEC was first to act. In a 2018 settlement with Rothenberg that accused him of "misappropriating" millions, the SEC barred him from the brokerage and investment-advisory business for five years. A year later a federal judge ordered Rothenberg to pay more than $31 million in fees stemming from the SEC case.

Friday's charges are the first criminal charges he has faced, meaning that he could be sentenced to prison if found guilty. Each wire-fraud charge carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison plus other penalties. The charges of bank fraud and false statements to a bank each carry a maximum of 30 years in prison and a $1 million fine, according to the US attorney's press release.

One reason it may have taken the US attorney four years after the whistleblower came forward to announce these charges is that Rothenberg's business affairs were a complex web of interrelated companies and transactions, Drew Olanoff, one of his former employees, said. Olanoff is a former TechCrunch reporter who was working for one of Rothenberg's companies during the time period when it ran out of cash.

"On my way out the door, I saw it unravel. And as it unraveled it became very clear: This was extremely complicated and complicated for a reason — to hide things," Olanoff told Business Insider.

Rothenberg did not respond to Business Insider's request for comment.

Original author: Julie Bort

YouTube creators who are part of the Partner Program can monetize their videos with Google-placed ads and often it's a big chunk of their overall income. But the amount of money different creators make per view varies based on a variety of factors like content category and viewer demographic.Business Insider spoke with dozens of influencers who broke down how much they'd earned per view, and what they made on videos with 100,000 and 1 million views.Some also shared their monthly and yearly incomes, as well as their highest-earning videos of all time.Subscribe to Business Insider's influencer newsletter: Influencer Dashboard.

This is the latest installment of Business Insider's YouTube money logs, where creators break down how much they earn.

Influencers who are part of the YouTube Partner Program can earn money off their videos with Google-placed ads.

But how much do they make? 

Many factors — like whether a video went viral, or whether the audience that watches their content is valuable to advertisers — will determine what a creator earns per paycheck. YouTubers are paid out monthly and either receive a check by mail or direct deposit. 

To start earning money from YouTube, creators must have at least 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours in the past year. Once they reach that threshold, they can apply for Partner Program.

Making money through Google-placed ads isn't the only form of revenue for these digital stars. Creators on YouTube can earn their money a number of ways, from sponsorships to selling merchandise.

But revenue from Google ads is a big chunk of many YouTube stars' incomes.

Over the last few months, Business Insider has spoken with dozens of YouTube creators about how much each of them earn on average per view (their CPMs), and on videos with 100 thousand, 1 million views, and even 150 million views.

Some also shared with us their monthly and yearly incomes from YouTube, as well as their highest-earning videos of all time.

Here's a comprehensive breakdown of what they said:

Original author: Amanda Perelli

On Friday, Twitter users noticed that the platform was marking tweets mentioning "5G" or "oxygen" with a warning about COVID-19 misinformation.Mislabeling tweets that link 5G and COVID-19 could help to "raise the profile" of the popular conspiracy theory that the cellular technology caused the coronavirus outbreak, according to social media researcher Wasim Ahmed.In a statement to Business Insider, Twitter said it had make a mistake and was working to "improve" its labeling process. It blamed the error on the algorithm it has been using to prioritize the immediate labelling of 5G-related tweets.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Twitter has admitted it mistakenly slapped a coronavirus misinformation warning on some tweets mentioning 5G technology, but experts say the error could have far-reaching implications in social networks' struggle to battle COVID-related conspiracy theories.

Several Twitter users pointed out Friday that the platform was marking tweets mentioning "5G" and "oxygen" — including some that used these terms in jest — with a label indicating their posts contain misinformation regarding COVID-19, the coronavirus disease. Twitter, in a statement to Business Insider later that afternoon, said that it had made a mistake by labeling "unrelated" posts, and attributed the error to the algorithm it's using to identify tweets containing coronavirus-related misinformation.

 

Nonetheless, the labels suggesting users "get the facts about COVID-19" still appear on the tweets in question as of Monday afternoon. Clicking on the warning label brings users to a Twitter Moment about the particularly widespread conspiracy theory that blames the coronavirus outbreak on the rollout of 5G, a new technology designed to increase mobile connectivity speeds.

Twitter; Paige Leskin/Business Insider

Twitter first added the COVID-19 misinformation label in May, in an attempt to crack down on "potentially harmful and misleading" coronavirus-related content. The 5G-related conspiracy theory has garnered widespread attention online for months, even though there's no scientific evidence to support it. It's led to dozens of arson attacks on 5G cell towers and other telecom infrastructure in the UK and Europe. It's also been spread online by Hollywood celebrities and popular artists to their hoards of fans and followers.

However, social media researchers say that Twitter's mixup in its attempt to fight misinformation could end up having the opposite effect of what's intended. According to researcher Wasim Ahmed, mislabeling these tweets could "inadvertently raise the profile" of the conspiracy theory, spreading its reach to more users online.

"This mislabeling could be used to further strengthen the belief in conspiracies by saying, 'Look what's happening on Twitter, it looks suspicious,'" Ahmed told Business Insider. "Mislabeling non-offending tweets with an incorrect label linking to a Twitter moment, showing 5G and COVID-19 are not linked, may also inadvertently draw more attention to it, as it could lead to further tweets on the topic."

Twitter's "false-positives" in labelling coronavirus misinformation could reduce users' trust in the platform to tell them when information is accurate, according to misinformation expert John Cook.

"We want people to be resilient against misinformation. If you put people on high alert that misinformation is out there and dangerous, the danger is they can become cynical," Cook told Business Insider. "We need these kind of warnings to be more surgical. We want to bring down the misinformation, but not hurt accurate information."

The link between coronavirus and 5G is just one of the bizarre bits of misinformation that has spread on the internet in recent months related to the disease, as well as nationwide protests against police brutality. Outlandish conspiracy theories have blamed Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates for the pandemic, and backed a "Plandemic" video that insists social distancing and wearing masks makes people sick.

More recent conspiracy theories have claimed the far-left group "antifa" is stoking violence during Black Lives Matter protests. Some pieces of misinformation have had more serious consequences: Many have bought into fake coronavirus treatments costing thousands of dollars, and BLM protests have become targets for alt-right supporters instigating violence.

In response, social networks have struggled to adequately stymie the spread of misinformation on their platforms. Facebook, in particular, has been slow to moderate hate speech and misinformation, which has led dozens of advertisers to boycott paying for advertisements on the platform.

Twitter, meanwhile, has been celebrated for recent actions taken against Donald Trump's policy-violating tweets. But when it comes to coronavirus misinformation, the platform has seen such content flourish. A report in April out of the University of Oxford found that nearly 60% of coronavirus-related misinformation on Twitter remained without a warning label.

Original author: Paige Leskin

When you buy through our links, we may earn money from our affiliate partners. Learn more.

Lenovo Lenovo makes some of the industry's most celebrated laptops, especially 2-in-1 hybrids having coined the brand name "Yoga" describing their 180-degree bending hinges. Yoga has since become akin to what "Kleenex" are to tissues.The company sells plenty of other effective laptops in several subcategories, including Chromebooks, gaming laptops, and a range of straight Windows laptops from budget to flagship luxury prices.Lenovo discounts its laptops regularly, and right now is putting on a major sale through Woot on a select few popular models.See also: The best laptops, the best Chromebooks, and the best gaming laptops.Visit Insider Reviews' deals page for more sales.

At this point in modern life, it's not hyperbole to say that absolutely everyone needs a laptop. Of course, we include laptops of all shapes, sizes and budgets in that claim. Even if it's a $100 Chromebook, the world that it opens you up to is practically priceless. It's no wonder then that people are always searching around for laptop deals.

However, it takes a trained eye to find the best laptops deals out there, especially because individual laptop models are sold in several configurations of varying power and capability. We've been collectively looking at laptop deals as professionals for a few decades now, so we know a real savings when we see one.

From the time of writing until June 30 at 12 a.m. CT, Woot is selling six different Lenovo laptops for up to $350 off.

We're particularly bullish on the Lenovo Chromebook 14 S340 for just $259.99 and the Lenovo Flex 15 for $649.99. These deals are especially welcome at a time when laptops are being up-marked on retailers listing third-party sellers, like Amazon, so act quickly if you're comfortable with refurbished products.

Original author: Joe Osborne

Sandi Lin started Skilljar after spending years nearly four years at Amazon because she wanted to find a way to improve customer interactions. Her company makes a customizable customer-training platform for software companies and has signed on big clients, like Tableau, Verizon, and Zendesk. It's seeing demand skyrocket in the remote-work era as companies quickly look to connect with customers digitally, and having what one of its investors calls its "Zoom moment." Online education and training are effective ways for businesses to engage with their user bases, Lin said, especially in this moment when all customer interaction is online.Click here to read more BI Prime stories.

As a senior product manager at Amazon in customer-facing roles, Sandi Lin always felt like there was a disconnect between her customer interactions and the product training those customers would receive. 

With the belief that she could create a better system, she took a leap of faith and left Amazon in 2013 to start her own company. She's since built Skilljar into a platform that allows companies to customize their own customer-training programs. Skilljar got its start by participating in the Techstars accelerator program in 2013 and has raised $20 million at a $46 million valuation from investors, including T-Mobile founder John Stanton's Trilogy Equity Partners. 

Since its launch, Skilljar has signed on big customers like Tableau, Zendesk, and Verizon. Now it's seeing its demand skyrocket in the coronavirus-related remote-work era as companies are quickly looking to train and connect with customers digitally. The company's growth prompted one investor to describe Skilljar as having its "Zoom moment." 

With all customer interactions moving online for the foreseeable future, Lin said companies were relying more than ever on their customer-training teams to engage with new and existing customers to drive product adoption and customer success. Online classes and training are ways to do that.

"Executives are now relying on their customer-training teams to be the front line," Lin told Business Insider. 

Skilljar provides templates for businesses to build online training programs for their customers, including webinar-style courses, quizzes, and live video training in a self-contained website. It also integrates with tools like Zoom, Webex, Salesforce, Box, and other customer-facing tools that businesses use. 

So when customers go to Tableau's online learning academy or Zendesk's training website, they're powered by Skilljar behind the scenes, though the company's branding is rarely displayed on the page. 

Skilljar has had increased interest and demand amid the pandemic

Lin said she's noticed that customers who already used Skilljar now use it even more — in some cases, companies have done five times the amount of virtual training than normal to accommodate what previously was done in person. Some customers, like Tableau, have opened their virtual training tools to everyone for free, even though the service is normally reserved for paying customers.

It's not just software companies that sell to corporate offices that have to rethink customer education, Lin said. Skilljar's clients include a music-technology company that sells to schools and a student information system company. Across the board, Skilljar's customers are relying on it more than ever. 

April was the company's biggest sales month this year, Lin said. All of its customers with over 100 employees renewed contracts this year, she said, and it's signed on new customers too. The number of active "students" using Skilljar's technology and the number of students signing up for courses on the platform have both more than doubled between January and April.

"COVID-19 has changed how companies think about education in general," Aashish Dhamdhere, Skilljar's vice president of marketing, said. "It wasn't top of mind for a lot of companies and they've suddenly realized that education is a great way of driving customer engagement."

Many of the startup's customers have realized that education can be delivered to customers effectively online and will permanently switch most of their education to a digital format, Lin added.

Skilljar fills a big hole in the customer-training market 

Rajeev Batra, a partner at Mayfield, was an early investor in Skilljar and sees it as having cracked the code on customer-education software. He said most companies buy software and employees don't really know how to use it to do their work more efficiently. No one reads manuals either, so training is key, he added. 

The way most online education works today is not super effective, but Skilljar seems to have gotten it right.

"[Lin] worked on cracking the code of building a really great product that supports different learning modalities, different tools, different tech, different approaches, different content is delivered in different ways and different types of people and audiences learn differently," Batra said. "They built an incredibly interesting and very modern approach to helping these companies actually help their customers learn and use the products."

Other online training companies are more focused on internal employee-facing training versus a customer format, he said, though he could imagine Skilljar eventually expanding outside customer-training tools.

For now, though, Lin said the company was focused on keeping up with its newfound demand.

Got a tip? Contact this reporter via email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or Signal at 925-364-4258. (PR pitches by email only, please.) You can also contact Business Insider securely via SecureDrop.

Original author: Paayal Zaveri