Meta chatbots, a Barbie hoax, and Apple cops to issues with its parental controls

In response to a law passed last month requiring internet giants to pay news publishers, Meta Platforms has begun the process to end access to news on Facebook and Instagram for all users in Canada, it said today. The Canadian government quickly denounced the move as "irresponsible." Online News Act, passed by the Canadian parliament, would force platforms like Alphabet and Meta to negotiate commercial deals with Canadian news publishers for their content. Reuters has more here.

Tesla is reportedly under investigation for Model 3 and Model Y steering wheels that freeze up. Approximately 280,000 vehicles could be affected by the results of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration investigation. CNBC has more here.

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Reed Jobs, the 31-year-old son of Apple cofounder Steve Jobs and philanthropist Laurene Powell Jobs, has spent his career behind the scenes. But he’s “stepping into the spotlight,” with a new venture capital firm to invest in new cancer treatments, DealBook reported earlier this morning.

Called Yosemite — after the national park where his parents were wed — the firm has already closed its debut fund with $200 million from prominent individuals and institutions, including MIT, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and John Doerr, per the report.

Jobs tells DealBook that when his father died from pancreatic cancer in 2011, he was at Stanford, studying as an undergraduate student to become a doctor; shaken by his father’s death, he switched majors, diving into history instead, nabbing a master’s degree and afterwards joining his mother at the impact investing and philanthropic organization she formed back in 2004, Emerson Collective.

Yosemite is a spin-off from that organization, and Jobs — who was the managing director of health at Emerson Collective, working with “entrepreneurs, researchers, and patients to accelerate cancer research,” per its website — is continuing that work under his new brand.

More here.

Airalo, a four-year-old Singapore startup that uses software-based eSIM connectivity to provide a wide range of lower-cost mobile data packages for international travelers, raised a $60 million Series A round at a $280 million post-money valuation. The deal lead was e& Capital, while other investors included Antler Elevate, Liberty Global, Rakuten Capital, Singtel Innov8, Surge, Orange, T Capital, KPN Ventures, Telefónica Ventures, and I2BF Global Ventures, GO Ventures, and LG Technology Ventures. The company has raised a total of $67.3 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Nile, a five-year-old startup San Jose, Ca., that delivers wired and wireless networking as a service to large corporate customers, raised a $175 million Series C round co-led by March Capital and Sanabil Investments, with additional participation from solutions by stc, Prosperity7, Liberty Global Ventures, 8VC, Geodesic Capital, FirstU Capital, and Valor Equity Partners. The company has raised a total of $300 million. Former Cisco honcho John Chambers cofounded the company. TechCrunch has more here.

Tradeshift, a 14-year-old San Francisco company behind a platform for building B2B payments, supply chain procurement, and B2B marketplace services, raised a $70 million round led by HSBC, with AYTK Ltd., LUN Partners Group, Fuel VC, Doha VC, Notion Capital, IDC Ventures, and The Private Shares Fund also piling on. TechCrunch has more here.

Entia, a nine-year-old London startup that offers at-home blood testing to individuals undergoing cancer treatment, raised a $20 million Series A round. BGF and Parkwalk Advisors co-led the deal. The company has raised a total of $35.7 million. Tech.eu has more here.

Debtbook, a four-year-old startup based in Charlotte, NC, that helps finance teams in local government, higher education, and healthcare manage their debt and leases in the cloud, raised a $12.5 million Series A extension round led by Elephant Partners, with previous investors Meeting Street Capital and CreativeCo. also taking part. The company has raised a total of $23.7 million. More here.

Socket, a three-year-old San Francisco startup that provides a scanning tool to detect security vulnerabilities in open source code, raised a $20 million Series A round led by Andreessen Horowitz, with additional funds provided by Abstract Ventures, Wndrco, Unusual Ventures, and the co-founders of Box, Figma, Okta, Vercel, and Eventbrite. TechCrunch has more here.

Abbey Labs, a one-year-old San Francisco startup that helps companies improve their data security and compliance programs by automatically controlling permissions, raised a $5.25 million seed round led by Point72 Ventures, with Haystack and Essence Ventures also pitching in. SiliconANGLE has more here.

Béa Fertility, a three-year-old London startup that aims to make clinical-grade fertility care available at home, raised a $3.2 million round led by Octopus Ventures and including JamJar, Forward Partners, Calm/Storm, and Q Ventures. The company has raised a total of $4.3 million. Forbes has more here.

BrainTale, a five-year-old Paris startup that says it develops and distributes diagnosis and prognosis tools that decipher white matter in order to enable better brain care, raised a $4.9 million. Capital Grand Est and MACSF co-led the deal. The company has raised a total of $6.1 million. Silicon Canals has more here.

ConfiAbogado, a three-year-old Mexico City startup that provides legal services for Mexican consumers and small businesses, raised a $1.7 million seed round. Tuesday Capital was the deal lead, with additional investment from DTB Capital, Seedstars International Ventures, 500 Global, Invariantes, Goodwater, GAIN Capital, and Side Door Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

CorralData, a three-year-old New York startup that uses AI to help non-technical teams make sense of their company's data, raised a $1.5 million seed round co-led by NY Angels and the NY Angels Fund, eonCapital, and Hilltop Ventures. with participation from Orange Ocean Ventures and Perimetre Capital. More here.

Epiterna, a Swiss startup that is developing small molecule drugs to slow the aging process, initially for dogs and later for humans, raised an $11.1 million round. Prima Materia was the deal lead. Sifted has more here.

FeelBetter, a five-year-old Boston and Tel Aviv startup that helps healthcare professionals manage patient medication, raised a $5.9 million round co-led by Firstime Ventures and Shoni Health Ventures, with Random Forest VC, The Group Ventures, and previous investor Triventures also participating. The company has raised a total of $8 million. More here.

Grasp, a one-year-old London startup whose goal is to increase the rate at which humans learn, raised a $4 million seed round led by Balderton Capital. EU-Startups has more here.

MasterExchange, a one-year-old Swedish startup whose platform allows anyone to invest in their favorite songs by purchasing a share of a song's royalties, raised a $2.7 million from a group of investors including Vectr Fintech. Silicon Canals has more here.

Remedial Health, a Nigerian startup that is providing a digital platform that pharmacies and hospitals can use to order drugs, raised an $8 million Series A round along with $4 million in venture debt. QED Investors led the transaction. The company has raised a total of $17.4 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Sk3w Technologies, a three-year-old startup based in Hoboken, N.J., that helps exchanges audit latency in their network infrastructure, raised a $7 million Series A round, Investors included Tower Research Ventures, IMC, and Citadel Securities. More here.

SnoFox, a three-year-old New York startup whose software keeps track of items in the supply chain that need to be refrigerated, raised a $4.5 million seed round led by Voyager Ventures, with Pale Blue Dot, Ponderosa Ventures, and Mudcake also joining in. More here.

Steg.AI, a four-year-old New York startup that is developing invisible watermarks that are difficult to remove from an image, raised a $5 million Series A round led by Paladin Capital Group, with Washington Square Angels and the NYU Innovation Venture Fund also investing. The company has raised a total of $6.2 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Traction, a three-year-old Lagos startup that allows small Nigerian companies to receive payments, manage accounts, and access operational tools, raised a $6 million seed round co-led by Ventures Platform and Multiply Partners, with P1 Ventures also chipping in. The company has raised a total of $10 million. TechCrunch has more here.

TruckLabs, a nine-year-old Phoenix startup that has developed an aerodynamic device that closes the gap between a truck cab cab and trailer in order to reduce drag, improve stability, and increase fuel efficiency, raised a $7 million Series B round led by Blue Bear Capital, with previous investor Calibrate Ventures also contributing. More here.

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Tuesday Capital, a 12-year-old firm that moved from the Bay Area to Austin during the pandemic, says it has garnered $31 million in capital commitments for its fifth and newest seed-stage fund. We talked with firm cofounder Patrick Gallagher here.

Cisco Systems has acquired Code BGP, a privately held Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) monitoring startup in Greece. Code BGP will be absorbed into Cisco ThousandEyes, the company's network intelligence arm that Cisco picked up via acquisition in 2020. CRN has the story.

SoftBank Group's semiconductor unit Arm is targeting an IPO at a valuation of between $60 billion and $70 billion as soon as September, according to Bloomberg. More here.

Nelson Chai, who has been Uber’s CFO since 2018, plans to leave the San Francisco-based company effective Jan. 5, it said today. Uber has launched a search for a successor.

Amazon appointed Rohit Prasad, who previously was head scientist for the company’s Alexa voice assistant, to lead a group that is developing artificial general intelligence technology. Prasad will report directly to CEO Andy Jassy as part of the S-team. The Information has the story.

Google wants to “supercharge” its seven-year-old smart assistant using new advancements in generative AI, and as part of the move, it's laying off a small number of employees. CNBC has more here.

Satellite imagery company Planet announced today that it is laying off 117 employees, or around 10% of the workforce, as it looks to focus on driving revenue amid an ongoing downturn in the public markets. In a note posted on the company’s blog, CEO Will Marshall said the decision to cut staff came about after “a deep assessment of our business and spending.” TechCrunch has more here.

Yes, huge lottery jackpots are less rare now — and four other things to know about them.

A little-known U.S.-registered cloud service company called Cloudzy has been providing state-sponsored hackers with internet services to spy on and extort their victims, according to researchers at the cybersecurity firm Halcyon. TechCrunch has more here.

According to the FT, Meta is preparing to launch a range of AI-powered chatbots that exhibit different personalities as soon as next month to boost engagement with its social media platforms.

Apple finally admits to "an issue" with its screen time parental controls. (The issue is that it sucks.) The WSJ has more here.

Several news organizations fell for a hoax today that claimed all Mattel toys, including Barbie dolls, would be plastic free by 2030, starting with a new line of decomposable “EcoWarrior” dolls made with mushrooms, algae and clay.

More buyers are getting home loans from . . . the seller of their house.

How to ensure your annual beach vacation destroys your relationship with your extended family.

Once-piece swimsuits (now on sale).

Red-tinged restaurants.

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