A TikTok bill gains steam, Musk steps in it (again), and the next big thing in AI could be proof that you're human

The Federal Trade Commission has demanded Twitter turn over internal communications related to owner Elon Musk, as well as detailed information about layoffs—citing concerns that staff reductions could compromise the company’s ability to protect users, documents viewed by the WSJ show. More here.

The White House today threw its support behind a new bipartisan Senate bill that would give the Biden administration the power to ban TikTok in the U.S. The legislation would empower the Commerce Department to review deals, software updates or data transfers by information and communications technology in which a foreign adversary has an interest. CNBC has more here.

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Fake virtual identities are nothing new. The ability to so easily create them has been both a boon for social media platforms -- more "users" -- and a scourge, tied as they are to the spread of conspiracy theories, distorted discourse and other societal ills. 

Still, Twitter bots are nothing compared with what the world is about to experience, as any time spent with ChatGPT illustrates. Flash forward a few years and it will be impossible to know if someone is communicating with another mortal or a neural network.

Sam Altman knows this. Altman is the cofounder and the CEO of ChatGPT parent OpenAI and has long had more visibility than most into what's around the corner than most. It's why more than three years ago, he conceived of a new company that could serve first and foremost as proof-of-personhood. Called Worldcoin, its three-part mission -- to create a global ID, a global currency, and an app that enables payment, purchases and transfers using its own token, along with other digital assets and traditional currencies -- is as ambitious as it is technically complicated, but the opportunity is also vast.

In broad strokes, here's how the outfit, still in beta and based in San Francisco and Berlin, works: to use the service, users must download its app, then have their iris scanned using a silver, melon-sized orb that houses a custom optical system. Once the scan is complete, the individual is added to a database of verified humans, and Worldcoin creates a unique cryptographic "hash" or equation that's tied to that real person. The scan isn't saved, but the hash can be used in the future to prove the person's identity anonymously through the app, which includes a private key that links to a shareable public key. Because the system is designed to verify that a person is actually a unique individual, if the person wants to accept a payment or fund a specific project, the app generates a 'zero-knowledge proof' -- or mathematical equation -- that allows the individual to provide only the necessary amount of information to a third party. Some day, the technology might even help people to vote on how AI should be governed. (A piece in the outlet IEEE Spectrum better spells out the specifics of Worldcoin's tech.)

Investors eager to be in business with Altman jumped at the chance to fund the outfit almost as soon as it was imagined, with Andreessen Horowitz, Variant, Khosla Ventures, Coinbase and Tiger Global providing it with $125.5 million. But the public has been more wary.

More here.

Believer Entertainment, a new gaming studio founded by former executives of Riot Games, raised a $55 million Series A round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, with Andreessen Horowitz, Bitkraft Ventures, Riot Games, 1Up Ventures, Cleveland Avenue, and Michael Eisner’s Tornante Co. also anteing up. TechStory has more here.

CHAOS Industries, a one-year-old Los Angeles startup that
is developing defense and critical industry technology such as COHERENCE, a sensor, detection, and radar system, raised a $70 million Series A round led by 8VC and including Alpha Wave Global, Lerner Enterprises, Liquid 2 Ventures, Tamarack Global, and Valar Ventures. Crunchbase News has more here.

Macro, an eight-year-old Los Angeles startup that develops TV and film content focused on people of color, raised a $90+ million round led by BlackRock Alternatives, with additional participation from Harbourview Equity Partners and Goldman Sachs Asset Management. Deadline has more here.

Noema Pharma, a four-year-old startup based in Basel, Switzerland, that is developing a pipeline of molecules focused on central nervous system disorders such as Tourette syndrome, raised a $112 million Series B round co-led by Forbion and Jeito Capital, with UPMC Enterprises and previous investors Sofinnova Partners, Polaris Partners, Gilde Healthcare, and Invus also taking part. Endpoints News has more here.

Rapport Therapeutics, a San Diego startup that is developing precision neuromedicines based on a clinical-stage neuroscience asset born in Johnson & Johnson’s labs, raised a $100 million Series A round. Investors included Third Rock Ventures, ARCH Venture Partners, and Johnson & Johnson Innovation. FierceBiotech has more here.

SOCi, an 11-year-old San Diego startup whose marketing platform provides customers with workflows, a permissioning system, approval processes, and analytics and management tools that integrate with popular ad networks, raised an $80 million round led by JMI Equity, with additional participation from Vertical Venture Partners and Blossom Street Ventures. The company has raised a total of $237.8 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Ampersand Biomedicines, a startup based in Cambridge, Ma., that is developing a platform for making molecules that target the site of disease without affecting healthy cells and tissues, raised a $50 million from Flagship Pioneering, which also incubated the company. FierceBiotech has more here.

Assured Allies, a six-year-old startup based in Wellesley, Ma., whose insurance products are focused on retirement savings, raised a $42.5 million Series B round co-led by FinTLV Ventures and participation from previous investor Harel Insurance and a mix of new and existing investors that includes Lumir Ventures, Hamilton Lane, New Era Capital Partners, MS&AD Ventures, Core Innovation Capital, Poalim Equity, EquiTrust Life Insurance Co., Akilia Partners, and Samsung Next. The company has raised a total of $65 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Banyan Infrastructure, a five-year-old San Francisco startup whose project finance software enables banks, financiers, and developers to automate and track complex project finance transactions with a unified risk and data management system, raised a $25 million Series B round led by Energize Ventures, with SE Ventures, Elemental Excelerator, and previous investors VoLo Earth and Ulu Ventures also contributing. The company has raised a total of $33.2 million. More here.

Candidly, a seven-year-old New York startup that partners with employers, financial institutions, retirement, and wealth management firms to embed student debt and savings optimization products into employee benefits engines, raised a $20.5 million Series B round led by Altos Ventures and including Cercano Management. The company has raised a total of $57 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Overhaul, a seven-year-old Austin startup that uses AI to secure physical supply chains, raised a $38 million Series A round led by Edison Partners, with eGateway Capital, StepStone Group, and TRM Ventures also chipping in. Stifel also provided the company with a $35 million debt line. Overhaul has raised a total of $137 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Plus One Robotics, a seven-year-old startup based in San Antonio, Tex., whose robots pick parcels for logistics and e-commerce organizations, raised a $50 million Series C round led by Scale Venture Partners, with Top Tier Capital Partners, Tyche Partners, and ROBO Global Ventures also investing. The company has raised a total of $93.6 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Roami, a six-year-old Miami startup that focuses on short-term rentals with apartment-style units, raised a $14 million Series A round. Vigo Capital was the deal lead. TechCrunch has more here.

XGS Energy, a Palo Alto startup that is developing technology to better harvest geothermal energy, raised a $14 million Series A round. Anzu Partners was the deal lead. Silicon Valley Journals has more here.

Evove, a British startup that is developing membranes to process industrial waste water, raised a $6.7 million Series A round. At One Ventures was the deal lead, with AM Ventures and previous investor Maven North West also pitching in. Tech.eu has more here.

pgEdge, a one-year-old startup based in Alexandria, Va., that is building a distributed database that can be optimized for use at the network edge, raised a $9 million seed round. Sands Capital Ventures and Grotech Ventures co-led the deal. Technical.ly has more here.

Shifted Energy, a seven-year-old Honolulu startup that provides utilities, property managers, and owners of multi-family housing with analytics about energy usage, raised a $4.3 million seed round co-led by EPIC Ventures and Kapor Capital, with Buoyant Ventures, Startup Capital Ventures x SBI Fund, and Hunt Development also piling on. Solar Builder has more here.

Speedscale, a three-year-old Atlanta startup that provides tools that help Kubernetes engineers to stress-test their APIs with real-world scenarios, raised a total of $9 million in pre-seed and seed funding. Grotech Ventures was the deal lead; Sierra Ventures, Tech Square Ventures, Correlation Ventures, CreativeCo, and TIE Atlanta also participated. The company has raised a total of $12 million. SiliconANGLE has more here.

Unitary, a four-year-old startup based in Cambridge, UK, that uses AI to assess the level of risk and harm in user-generated content uploaded to social media, raised a $9.7 million round led by Plural. Sifted has more here.

Speaking during a new webinar from Affinity, Amy Francetic, Managing General Partner at Buoyant Ventures, discussed how her firm approaches founder and LP engagement over the long-term. Watch the discussion to hear all her insights.

La Famiglia, a Berlin-based venture fund, has raised €250 million for its third seed fund (which garnered €165 million in capital commitments) and its first growth co-investment fund (€90 million). TechCrunch has more here.

Salesforce Ventures today announced a $250 million generative AI investment fund, which it said has already invested in four startups: the search engine upstart You.com, which introduced generative AI smarts a few months back; Anthropic, a heavily VC-backed AI startup from former employees of OpenAI, which developed ChatGPT; Cohere, a natural language processing (NLP) startup that recently partnered with Google; and a stealthy startup called Hearth.AI. TechCrunch has more here.

The publicly traded ad tech outfit Criteo has taken a step into physical stores. Earlier today, it said it has acquired Brandcrush, a 20-person Australian ad startup that manages physical retail campaigns, including in-store signage, coupon circulars, free sampling and miscellaneous inventory that surrounds a grocery store, like screens on gas pumps and car-charging stations. AdExchanger has more here.

Elon Musk got into another high-profile tangle on the social network he owns this week, shaming and defaming a former employee who'd sold his company to Twitter and was never informed that he'd been abruptly laid off recently. Musk ultimately apologized to the entrepreneur, who has muscular dystrophy (and is widely beloved in his native Iceland). In the meantime, distrust within Twitter is high enough that Musk is reportedly surrounded by two large bodyguards at all time inside its San Francisco headquarters -- even when he heads to the bathroom.

Gigi Sohn, President Biden’s pick to serve as a telecommunications regulator, is withdrawing her nomination to the Federal Communications Commission after a bitter 16-month lobbying battle that blocked her appointment and opened her up to personal attacks. The Washington Post has more here.

How Google became cautious of AI (and gave Microsoft an opening).

Troubled WeWork is in talks with investors to restructure its outstanding debt of more than $3 billion and raise more cash, reports the New York Times.

Sam Bankman-Fried made effective altruism a punchline, but the do-gooding philosophy is part of a powerful tech subculture full of opportunism, money, messiah complexes—and alleged abuse, says Bloomberg.

How to write a New Yorker cartoon caption: Jon Hamm edition.

Choose-your-tip adventure.

The astonishing depth of Chinese industrial espionage.

A lovely garden walk.

How "Succession," and "Billions" get the details just right: "Rich people don't use napkin rings."

Bruce Lee wall clock.