Dr. Li-Meng Yan wanted to remain anonymous. It was mid-January, and Dr. Yan, a researcher in Hong Kong, had been hearing rumors about a dangerous new virus in mainland China that the government was playing down. Terrified for her personal safety and career, she reached out to her favorite Chinese YouTube host, known for criticizing
President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s first economic test is coming months before Inauguration Day, as a slowing recovery and accelerating coronavirus infections give new urgency to talks on government aid to struggling households and businesses. With a short window for action in the lame-duck congressional session, Mr. Biden must decide whether to push Democratic leaders
WASHINGTON — When the Federal Reserve voted to “tailor” post-crisis financial regulations for all but the largest banks in October 2019, Gov. Lael Brainard cast the lone “no” vote. At the long oval table in Fed’s board room, Ms. Brainard laid out — point by detailed point — why she thought the changes risked leaving
SAN FRANCISCO — Facebook is planning to enact new measures to make it more difficult for election misinformation to spread virally across its platform, two people with knowledge of the matter said Thursday, as the outcome of presidential race remains uncertain. Facebook plans to add more “friction” — such as an additional click or two
Phoenix, that featureless and ever-spreading tundra of concrete, has been called “the world’s least sustainable city.” It has been characterized as a “sprawling, suburbanite wasteland” and “a monument to man’s arrogance.” The Onion has darkly predicted that by 2050, “most of Earth’s landmass” will be swallowed by the encroaching Phoenix exurbs. The Walk Score index
Ant Group, the Chinese financial technology titan, is set to raise around $34 billion when its shares begin trading in Hong Kong and Shanghai in the coming weeks, which would make its initial public offering the largest on record. The company, the parent of the Alipay mobile payment service, priced its shares around $10.30 apiece,
Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, has agreed to plead guilty to criminal charges related to its marketing of the addictive painkiller, and faces penalties of roughly $8.3 billion, the Justice Department announced on Wednesday. The settlement could pave the way for a resolution of thousands of lawsuits brought against the company for its role
SAN FRANCISCO — It is the 11th hour before the presidential election. But Facebook and Twitter are still changing their minds. With just a few weeks to go before the Nov. 3 vote, the social media companies are continuing to shift their policies and, in some cases, are entirely reversing what they will and won’t
LONE TREE, Colo. — Darcy Velasquez and her mother, Roberta Truax, were walking recently in the Park Meadows mall about 15 miles south of downtown Denver, looking for Christmas gifts for Ms. Velasquez’s two children, when they spotted a store with a display of rhinestone-studded masks. And while it has long been true that sparkles
WASHINGTON — House lawmakers who spent the last 15 months investigating the practices of the world’s largest technology companies said on Tuesday that Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google had exercised and abused their monopoly power and called for the most sweeping changes to antitrust laws in half a century. In a 449-page report that was