Author Archives: sristy

Snapdeal’s Shopo Marketplace to Shut Down on Friday

Snapdeal’s Shopo Marketplace to Shut Down on Friday Snapdeal-owned marketplace Shopo will close down from February 10, after a year and a half of operations. The move comes at a time when Snapdeal is aggressively looking at optimising costs amid intense battle with Flipkart and Amazon. “We started, a year and a half ago, from a small conference room with ... Read More »

Flipkart, Amazon, Snapdeal Argue Against GST’s Tax Collection at Source Provision

Flipkart, Amazon, Snapdeal Argue Against GST’s Tax Collection at Source Provision HIGHLIGHTS Flipkart, Amazon, Snapdeal partnered to lobby against a GST provision They want the tax-collected at source requirement removed They argue that this provision will increase complexity and costs At a press conference organised by FICCI on Thursday, the heads of Amazon, Flipkart, and Snapdeal all found common cause ... Read More »

Debit Card Breach: Hitachi Admits Its Systems Were Compromised

Hitachi Payments Services today accepted its systems were compromised by a sophisticated malware in mid-2016, that led to one of the biggest cyber-security breaches in country with 3.2 million cards affected and a scare over security of card-based transactions. The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) had said over 600 customers had reported losses of at least Rs 1.3 crore ... Read More »

Baidu to Fold Embattled Medical Business Into AI, Search Units

Chinese search engine giant Baidu Inc will close some of its medical businesses and fold other health segments into its artificial intelligence and search teams, the firm said in a statement sent to Reuters on Thursday. Baidu has been refocusing its business strategy after Chinese authorities cracked down last year on medical advertising, once a lucrative business sector for the ... Read More »

Microsoft Lawsuit Versus Secret US Government Searches Moves Ahead

A judge refused the US government’s request to throw out a lawsuit from Microsoft that claims a federal law is unconstitutional because it prohibits technology companies from telling customers when the government demands their electronic data. US District Judge James Robart, who temporarily blocked President Donald Trump’s travel ban last week, agreed with Microsoft that the law violates the company’s ... Read More »

Paytm Says It’s Confident of Topping Total Card Transactions in India

Paytm Says It’s Confident of Topping Total Card Transactions in India With 8.5 million daily transactions on its platform, Paytm on Thursday exuded confidence that the digital payment company will soon overtake the cumulative transaction volume for cards in the country. The Alibaba-backed company said it has also seen a multi-fold rise in its userbase post demonetisation in November. “… ... Read More »

Snapchat’s Parent Company to Spend $1 Billion on Amazon Web Services

Snap Inc, owner of the popular Snapchat app, said it expected to spend $1 billion (roughly Rs. 6,689 crores) over the next five years to use Amazon.com’s cloud services, in addition to the $2 billion cloud contract it already has with Google. Snap may eventually invest in building its own infrastructure, it said on Thursday, in an amendment to a ... Read More »

Alibaba Accuses IP Firms of Filing Fake Counterfeit Claims

Alibaba Accuses IP Firms of Filing Fake Counterfeit Claims Alibaba Group Holding Ltd on Thursday alleged that several intellectual property agencies were filing false complaints against vendors on its e-commerce platforms. The company called for a boycott of these IP agencies, also known as “reputation-protection” firms, which are hired by businesses to help manage their IP rights. Alibaba singled out ... Read More »

Wikipedia Editors Ban ‘Unreliable’ Daily Mail as Source

Wikipedia editors have voted to ban the use of articles from British tabloid The Daily Mail and its globally popular website as sources, calling them “unreliable”, according to a statement. English-language editors of the online encyclopaedia cited the newspaper’s “reputation for poor fact-checking, sensationalism, and flat-out fabrication”, said the statement posted on Wikipedia Wednesday. The vote means the tabloid’s use ... Read More »

ASCI Upholds Misleading Ad Complaints Against Amazon, Paytm, FreeCharge, and Others

ASCI Upholds Misleading Ad Complaints Against Amazon, Paytm, FreeCharge, and Others HIGHLIGHTS ASCI upheld complaints against online retailers such as Amazon, Paytm ASCI received 152 complaints in November Paytm’s 50 percent cashback on two movie tickets was termed misleading Advertising sector watchdog ASCI upheld complaints against 100 misleading advertisements in November, including those of HUL, Indigo Airlines, Emami, Idea Cellular, ... Read More »