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Can this video parody get Brits to care about online privacy?
After John Oliver used humor to tackle the U.S. surveillance reform debate last year, to try to get Americans to care about online privacy — via the mass medium of, er, dick pics — U.K. comedy duo Cassetteboy is attempting something similar, using its trademark video cut-up parody format to slice through all the government spin around UK surveillance legislation… Read More
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Aylien launches news analysis API powered by its deep learning tech
Text analysis startup Aylien, which uses deep learning and NLP algorithms to parse text and extract intel from documents for its customers, has launched a new tool specifically focused on analyzing written news content. Read More
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E-commerce search startup Twiggle scores $12.5M Series A led by Naspers
Search engines on large e-commerce sites often spit up a lot of results, which is great if you want to browse, but otherwise annoying. Twiggle thinks it has the solution. Internet conglomerate Naspers agrees, because it has led the Tel Aviv-based startup’s $12.5 million Series A. Yahoo Japan, State of Mind Ventures (a returning investor), and Sir Ronald Cohen also participated in the round. Read More
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Crunch Network
The Silicon Valley of Transylvania
Romania has long been a hotbed for tech companies outsourcing contact centers, software development and even research and development. Now, Romania is growing its own entrepreneurial culture. Read More
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InkHunter is an AR app for trying tattoos before you ink indelibly
If you’ve been procrastinating about getting a tattoo here’s a neat little AR app, called InkHunter, that’s aiming to help you decide what and where to ink without having to regret that snarling wolf facial tat after the fact. Read More
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Social payments startup Circle rolls into Europe
It may have started as a Bitcoin wallet but veteran entrepreneur Jeremy Allaire’s fintech startup Circle has since shifted focus to social payments, launching an app in Q4 last year that lets users send U.S. dollars to settle IOUs between each other, with its pitch being it makes payments as easy as firing off an SMS. Read More
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Lydia is launching a bot to pay back your friends directly from Slack
Lydia and Slack are two charming services and I like using them. So when I learned the two of them were having a baby together, you bet I was excited. Lydia is a French payment app, a sort of Venmo for Europe like stealth startup Cookies. It lets you instantly send and receive money with your friends without paying any fee. And it’s Read More
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Cookies teases its payment app that wants to become the Venmo of Europe
Cookies wants to become the Venmo of Europe with a consumer app to pay back your friends in no time and with no fees. The company promises a speedy onboarding experience and a great design. And today, the company is showing a bit more about the app. Read More
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Intel acquires Italy’s Yogitech to improve functional safety of autonomous cars, IoT systems
The concept of the Internet of Things is getting a big boost from emerging industries like autonomous cars and robotics, and today Intel announced an acquisition that could help it make sure that its own developments and products in this market are fault-free: it is acquiring Yogitech, a small company based out of Italy that works on functional safety for semiconductors. Terms of the deal… Read More
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London-based on-demand delivery service Jinn picks up $7.5M Series A
After months of rumours that the startup was raising, Jinn, the same-hour ‘shop on your behalf’ delivery app, is disclosing $7.5 million in Series A funding, money that it plans to use to expand to more UK cities — the service is currently in central London and most recently Manchester — and to reach Southern Europe. Read More
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AccorHotels acquires Onefinestay for $170 million
AccorHotels is acquiring Onefinestay for around $170 million (£117 million). The company is also committing to a $70 million investment in Onefinestay (£50 million) over the next few years. Onefinestay is a London-based startup that provides an Airbnb for high-end homes combined with a hotel-like service for hosts and travelers. Read More
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Austrian jobs platform aims to connect refugees and employers
Europe’s refugee crisis is proving all but impossible for the region’s politicians to tackle without being sucked into an inglorious mire of prejudice — leaving desperate people fleeing conflict-torn countries to be shunted towards the margins or even sent back to the places they were fleeing in the first place. Read More
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More calls for privacy safeguards in UK surveillance legislation
The official opposition Labour party in the UK has again called on the government to make changes to draft surveillance legislation to improve privacy safeguards. Read More
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As Valk Fleet is put into administration, drivers claim to be unpaid and staff receive ‘death threats’
A number of Valk Fleet’s management team tell TechCrunch they have been on the receiving end of “death threats” from disgruntled drivers who, due to their self-employed status, have no employment rights beyond the contract they signed with Valk Feet. Read More
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Citymapper launches seamless routing between Cabs and Public Transit
Citymapper is making a significant change to its routing app with the news that it has added what it is calling a “SuperRouter” capability. This effectively combines public transit with cabs to create completely new integrated routes. In simple terms, it means you could ask Citymapper’s app to come up with a route, and it would give you options both a cab service like Uber and… Read More
