europe News of 08/21/19

SpotQA Picks Up $3.25m Seed Funding For Its Automated Software Testing

SpotQA picks up $3.25M seed funding for its automated software testing image SpotQA , a new automated software testing platform that claims to be significantly faster than either manual testing or existing automated QA solutions, has raised $3.25 million in seed funding. Leading the round is Crane Venture Partners, the ...

HPE Growth Backs WeTransfer In €35m Secondary Funding Round

WeTransfer , the Amsterdam-headquartered company that is best know for its file-sharing service, is disclosing a €35 million secondary funding round. The investment is led by European growth equity firm, HPE Growth, with “significant” ...

Privacy Researchers Devise A Noise-Exploitation Attack That Defeats Dynamic Anonymity

Privacy researchers in Europe believe they have the first proof that a long-theorised vulnerability in systems designed to protect privacy by aggregating and adding noise to data to mask individual identities is no longer just a theory. The ...

US Legislator, David Cicilline, Joins International Push To Interrogate Platform Power

US legislator David Cicilline will be joining the next meeting of the International Grand Committee on Disinformation and ‘Fake News’, it has been announced. The meeting will be held in Dublin on November 7. Chair of the committee, the ...

Elon Musk: Spotify Is “Coming” To Tesla Vehicles In North America

Tesla owners in the U.S. and Canada may finally get that free Spotify Premium integration they’ve been asking for. Tesla CEO Elon Musk tweeted late Wednesday night that Spotify premium integration is “coming.” Musk, who ...

Microsoft Tweaks Privacy Policy To Admit Humans Can Listen To Skype Translator And Cortana Audio

Microsoft is the latest tech giant to amend its privacy policy after media reports revealed it uses human contractors to review audio recordings of Skype and Cortana users. A section in the policy on how the company uses personal data now reads ...

Launching Out Of YC, Blair Is Aiming To Reshape The Financing Of College Tuition

It’s generally agreed that Higher Education in the United States has gradually become more and more unaffordable. Students are dependent on external financial resources for which many of them do not even qualify. Students that are able to secure a ...

WebKit’S New Anti-Tracking Policy Puts Privacy On A Par With Security

WebKit, the open source engine that underpins Internet browsers including Apple’s Safari browser, has announced a new tracking prevention policy that takes the strictest line yet on the background and cross-site tracking practices and ...

Flatfair, The ‘Deposit-Free’ Renting Platform, Raises $11m Led By Index Ventures

Flatfair , a London-based fintech that lets landlords offer “deposit-free” renting to tenants, has raised $11 million in funding. The Series A round is led by Index Ventures, with participation from Revolt Ventures, Adevinta, Greg ...

Another Day, Another Reversal In Stock Fortunes As Recession Fears Grow

U.S. stock markets plummeted today as recession fears continue to grow. Yesterday’s good news about a reprieve on tariffs for U.S. consumer imports was undone by increasing concerns over economic indicators pointing to a potential global ...

Oyo To Invest $335m In Vacation Rental Business In Europe Push

Indian budget hotel booking startup Oyo will invest 300 million euros ($335 million) in its vacation home rental business, it said Wednesday, as it looks to expand its footprint in Europe and possibly closely compete with global giant Airbnb, one of ...

Business Management Startup VCita Acquires Email Marketing Tool WiseStamp

Just a couple of months after disclosing a $15 million round of funding, vCita , the business management SaaS for SMEs, has made an acquisition: It’s acquiring WiseStamp, a veteran of the Israeli startup scene that launched its email ...

Facebook’S Human-AI Blend For Audio Transcription Is Now Facing Privacy Scrutiny In Europe

Facebook’s lead privacy regulator in Europe is now asking the company for detailed information about the operation of a voice-to-text feature in Facebook’s Messenger app and how it complies with EU law. Yesterday Bloomberg ...

Dostavista, The ‘Crowdsourced’ Same-Day Delivery Service, Raises $15m Series B

Dostavista , the “crowdsourced” same-day delivery service founded in Russia but operating in several countries, has raised a $15 million Series B. Leading the round is Vostok New Ventures, with participation from existing investors ...

Rocket Internet’S Caterwings Acquires German Business Catering Marketplace Lemoncat

Caterwings , the Rocket Internet-founded corporate catering marketplace that operates in 8 countries, has acquired German competitor Lemoncat . Terms remain undisclosed, although I understand from a source close to the company that it was an ...

Facebook Denies Making Contradictory Claims On Cambridge Analytica And Other ‘Sketchy’ Apps

Facebook has denied contradicting itself in evidence to the UK parliament and a US public prosecutor. Last month the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) committee wrote to the company to raise what it said were ...

London Edtech Startup Pi-Top Sees Layoffs After Major Contract Loss

London-based edtech startup Pi-Top has cut a number of staff, TechCrunch has learned. According to our sources the company has reduced its headcount in recent weeks, with staff being told cuts are a result of restructuring as it seeks to implement ...

Deliveroo Is Exiting The German Market

Deliveroo is exiting the German market image UK on-demand food delivery startup Deliveroo is pulling the plug on its service in Germany. The startup expanded into the market more than four years ago . But in an email sent to users it writes that — “regrettably” — it ...

Most EU Cookie ‘Consent’ Notices Are Meaningless Or Manipulative, Study Finds

New research into how European consumers interact with the cookie consent mechanisms which have proliferated since a major update to the bloc’s online privacy rules last year casts an unflattering light on widespread manipulation of a system ...

How A Swedish Saxophonist Built Kobalt, The World’S Next Music Unicorn

How a Swedish saxophonist built Kobalt, the world’s next music unicorn image You may not have heard of Kobalt before, but you probably engage with the music it oversees every day, if not almost every hour. Combining a technology platform to better track ownership rights and royalties of songs with a new approach to ...