10 things in tech you need to know today

REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a signing ceremony for the $2.2 trillion coronavirus aid package bill as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) Vice President Mike Pence and Rep. Kevin Brady (R-TX) stand by in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, U.S., March 27, 2020.

Good morning! This is the tech news you need to know this Monday.

1. The US government is using location data from millions of phones to track the spread of coronavirus. The CDC, and state and local governments, are making use of the data from mobile advertising industry, per the Wall Street Journal.
2. Apple's iPhone factories in China are back up and running but its suppliers are wary that demand may not keep up. Orders for Q1 are reportedly down 18% year-on-year as the coronavirus pandemic shutters much of Europe and the US, according to Reuters.
3. Amazon workers in New York are set to strike over coronavirus fears. About 100 Amazon employees at a fulfillment center plan to go on strike after claiming management have ignored their concerns, as reported by Bloomberg.
4. Tech giants such as Facebook, Google, and Twitter are struggling to handle the demands of the upcoming Presidential election. Concerns have been raised that the level of disinformation sophistication has increased since 2016 and that tech companies may not be able to cope with the new landscape, per the New York Times.
5. Saudi Arabia may have exploited weaknesses in mobile telecoms networks to secretly track its citizens in the US. Whistleblower data indicates that millions of secret tracking requests have came from Saudi Arabia since November 2019, according to the Guardian.
6. Microsoft has claimed that its seen a 775% increase in usage of its Azure cloud services in regions that are in isolation. The company estimates there are now 44 million daily active users of Microsoft Teams as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, per Betanews.
7. Andreessen Horowitz-backed startup Arweave says its decentralized 'permaweb' is fighting coronavirus misinformation in China. The company's blockchain permanently stores information which could otherwise be censored by government officials.
8. Insiders say $2 billion startup Deliveroo is frustrated its Amazon funding is under lengthy competition scrutiny even as it helps fight COVID-19. The food delivery startup is in discussions with the government about using its network of delivery riders to drop off care packages for the elderly and vulnerable as the UK remains under lockdown.
9. HQ Trivia, an app which hosted live daily quizzes and shut down bizarrely in February, is set to return. The company has reportedly been bought by an unnamed investor and could return imminently, per Axios.
10. SoftBank-backed farming startup Plenty could be in the market to raise a fresh $100 million in funding. SoftBank's Vision Fund is in discussions about leading the new round at a unicorn valuation, per Bloomberg.

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