Author : zebethcontrol

Peacock experiments with interactive scenes to give fans a ‘Real Housewives’ deep dive • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 14, 2022Posted in Media & Entertainment, peacock, streaming serviceNo Comments

NBCUniversal’s Peacock is unveiling a new interactive video feature that will let Peacock Premium subscribers delve into extended clips, including extra footage and interviews, from within an episode of “The Real Housewives.” From October 14-16, BravoCon attendees will be able to preview the upcoming feature by watching an episode from season 2 of “The Real Housewives Ultimate Girls Trip.” As of now, the feature is only being tested on Roku devices but will gradually roll out to other devices over time. Season 3 of the hit series is set to premiere next year and will be the first to have the new feature. At launch, premium subscribers can interact with three episodes of “The Real Housewives Ultimate Girls Trip,” with the option to watch extended clips and exclusive interviews. As viewers watch the show, they will be prompted to get their remote ready for an “interactive scene” and have around 15 seconds to decide if they want to watch extended footage of that scene as well as exclusive interviews, which go deeper into what characters were thinking during that particular scene. Image Credits: Peacock “Combining culture-defining content with cutting-edge innovation, this experience is about giving fans the choice to dive deeper into the most dramatic ‘Housewives’ moments on their own terms,” John Jelley, Senior Vice President, Product & UX, Peacock and Direct-to-Consumer, NBCUniversal, said in a statement. Viewers are not required to select anything and can continue to the main story, though anyone who wants to can watch a director’s cut-like version of the episode. “This is an opt-in experience. It’s not something where we’re forcing everyone to change the way they’re watching their favorite show,” Jelley told ZebethMedia. They also have the option to go back to the main story at any time. This new “unique experience” will hopefully get new fans to the platform, Jelley added. “Now that we’re an exclusive streaming home for Bravo content, it’s an opportunity to show Bravo fans that Peacock is a great place to come for this type of content,” he said. NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell boasted last week that Peacock added over 2 million paid subscribers in the third quarter, partly due to Bravo content moving to the platform. Because “The Real Housewives Ultimate Girls Trip” is a Peacock original, the team at Bravo worked in close partnership with Peacock to film scenes specifically for the interactive feature exclusive to the platform. For instance, Peacock is exploring giving viewers the option to watch what’s happening in the next room during a scene, Jelley told us. In a demo with ZebethMedia, Jelley gave us a sneak peek of the feature. We watched the coffee reading scene in the second episode of season 2 when Dorinda invited the other cast members to her famous Bluestone Manor. Interactive scenes included extra footage of Dorinda blowing up at Brandi and exclusive interviews from Eva, Tamra and Brandi. Peacock continues to invest in interactive features to engage viewers further. In May, the company announced “Catch Up with Key Plays,” which lets English Premier League viewers stream highlights without disrupting the game. Peacock recently launched a “Halloween Nightmare Game,” an interactive virtual escape room game that makes the viewer click on different objects on the screen. Today’s announcement comes on the heels of Meta partnering with NBCUniversal to bring the Peacock streaming app to the Meta Quest virtual reality headset.

Touchlab to begin piloting its robotic skin sensors in a hospital setting • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 14, 2022Posted in Hardware, robot, robotics, Robotics & AI, Touchlab, XPRIZENo Comments

Manipulation and sensing have long been considered two key pillars for unlocking robotics’ potential. There’s a fair bit of overlap between the two, of course. As grippers have become a fundamental element of industrial robotics, these systems require the proper mechanisms for interacting with the world around them. Vision has long been a key to all of this, but companies are increasingly looking to tacticity as a method for gathering data. Among other things, it gives the robot a better sense of how much pressure to apply to a given object, be it a piece of produce or a human being. A couple of months back, Edinburgh, Scotland-based startup Touchlab won the pitch-off at our TC Sessions: Robotics event, among some stiff competition. The judges agreed that the company’s approach to the creation of robotic skin is an important one that can help unlock fuller potential for sensing. The XPrize has thus far agreed, as well. The company is currently a finalist for the $10 million XPrize Avatar Competition. The firm is currently working with German robotics firm Schunk, which is providing the gripper for the XPrize finals. Image Credits: Touchlab “Our mission is to make this electronic skin for robots to give machines the power of human touch,” co-founder and CEO Zaki Hussein said, speaking to ZebethMedia from the company’s new office space. “There are a lot of elements going into replicating human touch. We manufacture this sensing technology. It’s thinner than human skin and it can give you the position and pressure wherever you put it on the robot. And it will also give you 3D forces at the point of contact, which allows robots to be able to do dexterous and challenging activities.” To start, the company is looking into teleoperation applications (hence the whole XPrize Avatar thing) — specifically, using the system to remotely operate robots in understaffed hospitals. On one end, a TIAGo++ robot outfitted with its sensors lends human workers a pair of extra hands; on the other, an operator outfitted with a haptic VR bodysuit that translates all of the touch data. Though such technologies currently have their limitations. Image Credits: Touchlab “We have a layer of software that translates the pressure of the skin to the suit. We’re also using haptic gloves,” says Hussein. “Currently, our skin gathers a lot more data than we can currently transmit to the user over haptic interfaces. So there’s a little bit of a bottleneck. We can use the full potential of the best haptic interface of the day, but there is a point where the robot is feeling more than the user is able to.” Additional information gathered by the robot is translated through a variety of different channels, such as visual data via a VR headset. The company is close to beginning real-world pilots with the system. “It will be in February,” says Hussein. “We’ve got a three-month hospital trial with the geriatric patients in the geriatric acute ward. This is a world-first, where this robot will be deployed in that setting.”

Clear Capital lays off 27% of its global staff • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 14, 2022Posted in Clear Capital, Commerce, Layoffs, real estate techNo Comments

Clear Capital, a real estate valuation technology company and firm, is laying off 27% of its staff months after freezing mass hiring, ZebethMedia has learned from sources. A spokesperson for Clear Capital confirmed the layoffs to ZebethMedia but did not share the specific number of employees impacted. Last November, the company announced they had 1,400 total global employees, so using that figure the layoff could have impacted 378 employees. The reduction primarily impacted its operational team, according to sources. “Clear Capital is restructuring all company divisions to reduce expenses and support our future business strategy amidst today’s housing market reality,” said Duane Andrews, CEO of Clear Capital in a written statement to ZebethMedia. “This will allow us to refocus the business on key areas and ensure we are on track for sustainable growth. The CEO also cited ”the impact of a rising interest rate environment in the mortgage industry has resulted in a significant decrease in volume from our customers,” as a reason for the layoffs. The company did not explain what type of severance, if any, was offered to employees. In an internal memo sent to employees obtained by ZebethMedia, Andrews explained Clear Capital executives had anticipated a decrease in work volume over the summer but did not expect to make cuts come fall. “Keeping folks engaged and contributing was necessary; our forecasts showed that the Fall would bring increased volume,” read Andrews’ memo. “As we approached Fall, the markets stated indicating otherwise, and we now know volume will not return for a significant period of time.” Andrews added the decision to cut staff and locations was “a last resort” and “there are no guarantees” that further cuts won’t be made. Sources explained employees were required to attend an “abrupt” Google Meet call at 9 a.m. PST on Wednesday. Once in, they were split into two groups: those that would remain and those laid off. Employees were told back in August that there would be no layoffs, sources say. Sources declined to comment on the record due to fear of retaliation, and because they said Clear Capital advised employees not to speak to the press. According to a meeting call recording obtained by ZebethMedia, Clear Capital’s Vice President of Customer Success Heather Shick and Executive Vice President of Customer Experience Luke Fredrick addressed the layoffs to employees and asked for those staying to feed into their “grit”. “Everything that we planned on with this was so that we didn’t need to do it again,” Shick said, “Our goal is to not have this meeting a second time, but there is no guarantee. Your workloads are going to change. You’re going to be busier. We are all going to be busier, and it’s going to be tough.” Shick further explained in the call that inflation rates in the real estate investing market led to the company’s decision. Inflation rates have surged drastically after the COVID-19 pandemic and have impacted the real estate space. As the once-hot market begins to freeze the rate hike has brought into question if there will be a potential recession. The Reno, Nevada-based company claims to be the “leader in property valuation management and data solutions”, and works as the middleman for banks, investors and homeowners. Last year, the company bought CubiCasa, a Finland-based floor planning app for iOS and Android for an undisclosed amount. Despite the company’s signs of growth, it was facing declines in customer volume to which Clear Capital cites macroeconomic conditions. Employees laid off explained that the decision was unexpected and caught them by surprise. One source told ZebethMedia they “feel in shambles”. During the meeting, Clear Capital announced it would be closing its Truckee, Calif. office and said there will be no operational staff in its Roseville, Calif. location. Those still employed are expected to return back to in-person work on Oct. 24. Current and former Clear Capital employees can contact Andrew Mendez by e-mail at andrew.mendez@techcrunch.com or on Signal, a secure encrypted messaging app, at 669-832-6800.

Fast Forward Venture Studio to build African startups from idea to scale • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 14, 2022Posted in Fast Forward Venture Studio, fast-forward, Startups, VentureNo Comments

Opeyemi Awoyemi, one of Nigeria’s well-known serial founders, is back with another outfit. It’s not a tech company this time — Awoyemi co-founded online jobs site Jobberman (which was acquired by ROAM Africa in 2016) and Whogohost, a bootstrapped hosting platform — but instead, a venture studio: Fast Forward Venture Studio. Awoyemi choosing this route is quite interesting, especially as many African founders either launch syndicates or venture capital funds post- or during their entrepreneurial journies. But if anything, he and his co-founder, Omolara Awoyemi, bring much-needed operational expertise to scale a venture studio, a rare feat in these parts. After exiting Jobberman, Awoyemi, the firm’s managing partner, was a senior technical product manager at Indeed. On the other hand, Omolara, its operating partner, has worked as country manager of Jumia’s fintech arm in Nigeria and was a senior program manager at Facebook. With such roles, including as angel investors, brainstorming ideas and citing opportunities based on trends and tailwinds within the tech space is inevitable (for instance, Awoyemi co-founded a digital bank for migrants last year that has since pivoted from serving customers to businesses). However, with little or no capacity to individually pursue these ideas, launching a venture studio and bringing capable hands to run these projects was the next best thing. Here’s how Fast Forward operates, as Awoyemi explained in an interview with ZebethMedia. It starts with an “impact-focused” idea that Fast Forward can build a solid business around. The venture studio firm’s idea selection is grand. According to the founding partner, the firm is keen on those it believes can impact at least 10 million people and generate at least $10 million in annual recurring revenue in 3-5 years. When the idea is established, the venture studio finds an experienced operator they believe can achieve product-market fit, scale the product and lead the company. Fast Forward acts as the company’s co-founder. Once the parties are on the same page, FastForward provides the operator or founder with $100,000 — and value-add such as co-founder recruitment, engineering support, initial product strategy, execution on the growth side, administrative operations such as accounting and legal — in exchange of 20% of the company. “We back entrepreneurs from day one, so almost exclusively, we’re the first money in the company. Lara and I are entrepreneurs that have scaled businesses in Africa, so we don’t see ourselves as only investors but also as builders,” said Awoyemi, who launched a digital bank for migrants last year that has since pivoted from serving customers to businesses. “We understand the market and believe that the best way to unlock some of these opportunities, even most people are not thinking about, is to put entrepreneurs at the centre. The ideas can come from us, but they are a dime a dozen; the real work is execution.” Fast Forward is interested in the following sectors: B2B and B2B2C services, infrastructural fintech, e-commerce, future of work, edtech, healthcare, logistics, deep tech, blockchain and globally scalable SaaS out of Africa, to name a few. Yearly, FastForward plans to work with 10 ideas within these sectors and spin-off 3-5 companies that will receive follow-on funding from other investors and gain acceptance into accelerators such as Y Combinator and Techstars. Here are some of the startups in its venture studio portfolio. Bumpa is a social commerce platform for over 100,000 small businesses (Lara is a founding executive); it recently integrated with Meta and has closed a seed round. AltSchool is a Techstars-backed platform for learning coding and other tech-related skills. TalentQL, a subsidiary of AltSchool, is a platform connecting tech talent with employers (Awoyemi is a co-founder). Dojah is a YC-backed identity verification and KYC platform for African businesses also in the process of closing a round. And Buzzline, a mobile OS for solo entrepreneurs. Fast Forward also runs a syndicated fund that selectively invests $20,000 in some companies from the studio — Bumpa is its sole recipient, according to its site — at pre-seed and seed stages. The fund, which also consists of deals its partners conducted before instituted, has invested in startups such as Casava, Convoy, Odiggo and Reliance Health. “The early stage fund is there to make opportunistic deals and follow on companies in the venture studio,” noted Awoyemi. Besides the progress made by FastForward Venture Studio, another compelling outcome for the studio is that it has begun logging exits and returns in beta despite a generally exit-light tech space. It’s one of the points Awoyemi made while arguing that venture studios are typically better placed to help founders succeed than incubators, accelerators and funds. For Fast Forward, Awoyemi noted that startups also have the advantage of riding on the back of the partners’ backgrounds and their relationship with previous international employers, as well as venture partners whose roles include providing investor relations, strategic communications and portfolio company support. Jake Bright, the former African correspondent for ZebethMedia, is one of its venture partners. “First, we’re more hands-on than funds and incubators or accelerators. We back expressed entrepreneurs and operators while working very closely with them on our ideas,” said the managing partner. “The returns are also much higher in terms of liquidity. It’s better for backers, and also for us. With all the checks we’ve written so far, overall, we already have a 64x multiples on invested capital, which many small funds or seed funds cannot boast about.” However, it’s worth noting that while several venture studios have debatable pros over other investment entities, the model hasn’t been particularly successful and has become less appealing to founders and operators. Yet, FastForward hopes to be an outlier whose learnings others can follow. Also, if recent activities that ZebethMedia has covered from the industry are a harbinger of what’s to come, the model might make a comeback. In the last couple of months, for instance, Adanian Labs, a Kenyan-based studio, said it’s looking to build 300 startups over the next five years and Purple Elephant Ventures, another based studio

Twitter is developing a way for users to control who can mention them • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 14, 2022Posted in Apps, Social, social media, TwitterNo Comments

Twitter is developing a feature that has the potential to curb harassment and bullying on the social network. App engineer Jane Manchun Wong discovered that the company is developing a way for users to control who can mention them on Twitter. According to a screenshot posted by Wong, the new controls would give users the option to limit mentions to people they follow or turn off mentions altogether. Of course, you would still have the option to allow anyone to mention you, which is how Twitter currently operates. Giving users the option to turn off mentions altogether would be a dramatic shift for the company, but it would also give users a way to protect themselves from all sorts of bullying and harassment they face on the platform. Although users who are targeted by trolls currently have the option to block or mute users, individually blocking abusive accounts or muting specific tweets does not scale in instances when there may be hundreds of accounts involved in the targeted abuse. As with any other test feature, it’s unknown when or if Twitter plans to roll out the new controls officially. When asked about the possible upcoming change, a spokesperson from Twitter told ZebethMedia that the company doesn’t have anything to share at the moment. It’s worth noting that Twitter privacy designer Dominic Camozzi confirmed the new controls were in the works in a now-deleted tweet, as noted by The Verge, and had asked users for feedback. If Twitter decides to roll out the feature, it would join the social network’s current audience management features. Two years ago, Twitter gave all users the option to limit replies to their tweets. The feature lets you limit replies to people you follow or the people you mentioned in the tweet. With this feature, trolls can still unfortunately Quote Tweet another user’s tweet as a way to send abuse. The new controls uncovered by Wong would likely get rid of this workaround and protect users from incessant trolls. Twitter also rolled out its “Unmentioning” feature to all users earlier this year. The feature allows users to remove their name from another user’s tweet so they’re no longer tagged in it and any ongoing chatter around it won’t keep appearing in their mentions feed. The new controls would take this option even further by preventing your handle from being mentioned in the first place. The new controls would be a welcome addition to the platform and it’s nice to know that Twitter is looking at ways to help users protect themselves from abuse beyond the existing anti-abuse features. Coordinated trolling attacks have been an unwanted part of Twitter’s platform and the company has frequently been criticized for not doing enough to prevent harassment and abuse. Although public figures may be more likely to face higher levels of harassment than other types of users, it’s a problem that isn’t limited to users with a public profile, especially when racist abuse remains a problem on Twitter. The new controls would be a step toward protecting users online from all sorts of abuse and trolling.

5 ways disruptive component startups can win over OEMs • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 14, 2022Posted in Column, components, EC Column, EC Hardware, EC How To, Hardware, hardware startups, StartupsNo Comments

Ori Mor is chief business officer and co-founder of Wi-Charge. Creating a disruptive hardware components startup can be quite exciting. Few things can compare to the joy of physically interacting with your creation as you design and build it from scratch. But hardware startups are challenging. Think of it as the business version of the age-old question: “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?” You have to figure out which comes first: The components you’re creating or the devices that are designed to use those components. This may sound like an easy question to answer, but it isn’t. For example, our company built a new way of delivering long-range wireless electricity using infrared light. In order to “catch” those beams of electricity, though, devices would need to have the receiver chips built in, and product designers would need to substantially change their devices to power them wirelessly. We hoped that manufacturers would be excited for our system and move quickly to update their products. We got positive feedback, too, but most simply had no bandwidth for disruption as they grappled with their burdens of running a business and worrying about earning calls. They liked the idea, but they put it on the back burner. So we began to build devices with the necessary receivers built-in to showcase how they work. Here are five things you should do if you’re on a similar path: Creating your own devices does not mean giving up on your original goal of providing components for other manufacturers to use. Start with just one Let’s be honest. The chances are quite low that you’ll have the world-changing success of cargo containers or Qualcomm SoCs. So there’s no point rushing when building a hardware startup. Instead, start by making just a single prototype that you can use to show OEMs. Don’t worry about making this first version of your device perfect or packing in all the features you’ve thought up. Think of it as a relatively crude demonstration that can give people a glimpse of what’s possible. For example, we made a small digital display device for a supermarket shelf that could be powered wirelessly. We 3D printed it and actually used some tape on the inside to keep things in place. The only goal was to show potential buyers a proof of concept that validated our idea. While you’re showing off your first device, gauge people’s responses and ask for both initial impressions and constructive feedback. Would they use it? Would they want more? What might make it work better?

Google is updating its ‘Ad’ tag to ‘Sponsored’ for mobile search • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 14, 2022Posted in Apps, dark patterns, Google, Google Ads, google searchNo Comments

Over the years, Google has made it harder to separate ads from organic search results at a glance. In its current iteration, when users perform a search, the only distinction between the two is “Ad” written in bold — and it’s easy to miss. The search giant is making a small change to that today by replacing the “Ad” label with the “Sponsored” label in bold next to the advertisements appearing in search results. The company is also moving the label above the site URL in a separate line, instead of showing it next to the URL. Currently, Google is slowly rolling out this update across mobile and said it will start testing these changes on the desktop without specifying a date. Old ad format Image Credits: ZebethMedia New ad format with the ‘Sponsored’ tag Image Credits: ZebethMedia “This new label and its prominent position continues to meet our high standards for being distinguishable from search results and builds on our existing efforts to make information about paid content clear,” Google said in a statement. But these changes still might not be enough for users to clearly separate ads and organic search results. If you’re reading this story and looking at the changes side-by-side, you would notice a difference between “Ad” and “Sponsered.” But in daily usage when you’re scrolling through thousands of search results, you may not have these modifications in mind. Ginny Marvin, Google’s Ads Product Liaison, has tweeted the visual history of the company’s ad labeling many times over the years. While the tweet below captures changes only till 2019, it’s easy to see how Google has slowly blurred the lines between ads and search results. When Google rolled out the new bold “Ad” label in 2020, many folks pointed out dark patterns in this design change that made users squint to separate out paid content. But it took the company two years to make any kind of change. The ad business is the main money maker for Google: the company earned $56.3 billion in ad revenue in Q2 2022. So it’s important for the search giant to keep churning out money from that funnel in different ways. Given the position Google holds in the ads space many watchdogs are looking to probe the company’s ads business through an antitrust lens. Including website names Along with changing the ad labels, Google will also display site names in search results. Until now, you could only see URLs in the search results making it confusing to identify some sites. Plus, it is making website favicons more prominent so users can easily recognize familiar site logos. The company said it will also extend these changes to ads to increase transparency for users. Image Credits: Google

Andreessen Horowitz backs Synonym’s bio-manufacturing facilities • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 14, 2022Posted in Andreessen Horowitz, bio-manufacturing facilities, fermentation farm, Startups, Synonym Biotechnologies, VentureNo Comments

Armed with $6.3 million in new pre-seed capital, Synonym Biotechnologies has begun the development phase for its first productized bio-manufacturing facilities for non-pharmaceutical applications. Edward Shenderovich and Joshua Lachter started the company in January 2022 to develop, finance and build commercial-scale bio-manufacturing facilities to provide synthetic biology producers of all size with flexible production capacity while also giving infrastructure investors access to a new, carbon-negative bio-manufacturing asset class they are calling “fermentation farms.” Andreessen Horowitz, Giant Ventures, Blue Horizon, Thia Ventures and other venture funds active in decarbonization were part of the investment. Shenderovich and Lachter closed on the funding this month and told ZebethMedia via email that the pre-seed round “has allowed us to build an exceptional and well-rounded launch team and establish our product in the market.” “We plan to use the capital to catalyze our facility development efforts,” CEO Shenderovich said. “This means focusing on hiring across our design, engineering and finance teams to lay the foundations for our first facility break-ground and accelerate our outreach for strategic partnerships across the value chain.” Synonym is developing both the standardized designs and underwriting standards for financing its fermentation farms so that companies will be able to easily utilize them to produce better quality bioproducts at lower costs than existing options. On the investor side, the company said it is building an underwriting model to provide ESG investment opportunities. The company is also channeling the U.S. government’s recent executive order on bio-manufacturing that wants to accelerate innovation in this area to meet goals around climate and energy goals, food security and sustainability and supply chains. However, Shenderovich and Lachter say this will only be possible if bioproducts, for example, dairy protein, polymers and resins, reach cost parity to legacy products. And right now, the infrastructure to properly scale “does not exist today” in a way that enables companies to make the quantity at the kind of quality that will meet future demand. They either have to build their own facility — which costs hundreds of millions of dollars — or rely on contract manufacturing organizations to produce products on their behalf. “Costs will be the driving factor to adoption and production costs have prevented them from already entering supply chains,” Shenderovich said. “The means of production for these products will therefore be crucial, and Synonym’s core insight is that when it comes to industrial infrastructure, productization precedes financialization which precedes mass adoption.” The global contract bio-manufacturing organization market, which venture-backed startups like Planetary and Culture Biosciences are doing, was estimated to be $22.2 billion in 2021 and is expected to more than double by 2030. Lachter said what Planetary is doing is “indeed trying to close the capacity gap in fermentation,” but where Synonym varies is its approach to “focusing more on productization and financialization of facilities rather than a more traditional CMO model.” The company is still very much in the early stages, with the co-founders saying their most important milestone was the launch of the development of its first facility that includes site selection and initial design. They expect to break ground on the facility in the third quarter of 2023. This will be followed up in coming months by further announcements on construction, architecture and other development partners.

Shein owner fined $1.9M for failing to notify 39M users of data breach • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 14, 2022Posted in China, Commerce, eCommerce, SheinNo Comments

A data breach from 2018 is putting Shein under the spotlight as the ultra-fast fashion e-commerce platform continues to conquer Gen-Z markets across the world. Zoetop, the firm that owns Shein and its sister brand Romwe, has been fined $1.9 million by New York for failing to properly handle a security incident, according to a notice from the state’s Attorney General office this week. New York doesn’t publicly release data breach notifications like Maine, New Hampshire, California, or other states, which is why the AG came so much later than when the cyberattack happened. Shein, which was founded in China and recently moved its core assets to Singapore, saw explosive growth during the pandemic as the virus prevention pushed consumers to shop online. Its jaw-dropping affordability and vast clothing options have made it one of the fastest-growing consumer internet platforms worldwide in the past two years. The firm’s meteoric rise puts the once low-key fashion exporter from China on the spot. It went from having no dedicated PR personnel just a few years ago to now scrambling to handle mounting media inquiries about supply chain transparency and alleged design theft as it further grows and gears up for an IPO. The data breach brings it yet another PR problem. The company claims it’s significantly stepped up its security measures since. “We have fully cooperated with the New York Attorney General and are pleased to have resolved this matter. Protecting our customers’ data and maintaining their trust is a top priority, especially with ongoing cyber threats posed to businesses around the world. Since the data breach, which occurred in 2018, we have taken significant steps to further strengthen our cybersecurity posture and we remain vigilant,” Shein says in a statement. What happened? A cybersecurity attack that originated in 2018 resulted in the theft of 39 million Shein account credentials, including those of more than 375,000 New York residents, according to the AG’s announcement. An investigation by the AG’s office found that Zoetop only contacted “a fraction” of the 39 million compromised accounts, and for the vast majority of the users impacted, the firm failed to even alert them that their login credentials had been stolen. The AG’s office also concluded that Zoetop’s public statements about the data breach were misleading. In one instance, the firm falsely stated that only 6.42 million consumers had been impacted and that it was in the process of informing all the impacted users. A lot has changed since 2018. Shein has risen from an up-and-coming online fast fashion seller at the time to an all-encompassing e-commerce platform that is threatening Amazon. In the second quarter of this year, the app’s U.S. downloads surpassed Amazon’s for the first time. The data breach might be dated, but keep in mind that Shein has been operating since 2008, so four years is quite recent in the firm’s history of existence. Cost-saving, trend-seeking Gen-Z consumers might continue to shop on Shein despite its publicity issues, but to win the trust of regulators and the general public, there’s still much to be done.