(This article is part of Today’s Cache, The Hindu’s newsletter on emerging themes at the intersection of technology, innovation and policy. To get it in your inbox, subscribe here.)
Zoom complains about Microsoft’s Teams
Video conferencing solutions company Zoom has met with regulators in the U.S., the European Union, and other regions to share its worries about rival Microsoft’s practice of bundling its own video service Teams with other office software packages, reported Bloomberg. The update comes just days after Zoom CEO Eric Yuan suggested during a tech conference that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission should perhaps look at how Microsoft includes Teams with its other products.
The software giant recently stopped this practice in the EU to allay authorities’ antitrust fears and possibly protect itself from being hit with a hefty fine. However, Yuan said U.S. regulators should examine this question as well. Microsoft’s rivals such as Salesforce’s Slack and Zoom are upset with the company’s dominance in the professional communications sector and feel that Microsoft’s prices and Teams bundles are undercutting their own offerings.
Snapchat seeks to protect teen users
The instant messaging and photo sharing app Snapchat has outlined some measures it will be putting in place to protect its teen users between the ages of 13 and 17. Teenaged Snapchat users can connect with people they know offline and this will be verified through phone book contacts or friend connections, while suspicious contact attempts will result in a warning popping up. Features such as letting users see the location of their contacts will also be restricted for teen users, while only age-appropriate content will be shown on their Stories and Spotlight sections.
Snapchat has faced scrutiny in the UK over the small number of children it has pulled off its app when compared to watchdogs’ estimates of a much larger population of underaged users who access the popular app.
Indian government to crack down on dark patterns
India’s central government wants the public to share its feedback on draft guidelines to crack down on “dark patterns,” or the manipulation of user interfaces online to make customers carry out actions which are not in their best interest. Internet users routinely encounter dark patterns on e-commerce platforms, which include tricks such as countdowns for added urgency, secretly adding more products to a cart, subscriptions that are hard to escape, and shaming users who do not choose certain options on a webpage. People are invited to comment via the Union Consumer Affairs Ministry’s website, where they can also view the guidelines. The deadline for accepting comments is October 5.
U.S. and EU consumer protection regulators have been proactive in calling out the dark patterns employed by internet giants such as Amazon. In Europe, Amazon was forced to make its Prime cancellation procedure far simpler because users were baited into signing up for the premium service and then struggled to exit it.
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