The Week in Tech: Facebook Exposes Data of Millions of Users

While Donald Trump became the third US president to be impeached for abusing his power by asking Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden, Facebook (again) experienced a data breach that exposed personal data from more than 267 million users, according to cybersecurity experts. Mark Zuckerberg’s company said it is investigating but added that it appears the exposed data was from a period of time before new security improvements were implemented.

But it was not all bad news for the big tech, as Facebook said it is headed to the Super Bowl for the first time, featuring an ad during the game in February to promote the connectivity benefits of Facebook groups. The ad will have cameo appearances from Chris Rock and Sylvester Stallone. 

In other news, France's competition authority fined Google with US$167 million over antitrust abuses in its ad business. The watchdog said Google's rules for advertisers were non-objective, non-transparent and discriminatory. The monetary fine is accompanied by an order for Google to change its terms and procedures. 

More news below:

• Uber agreed to pay US$4.4 million to resolve an Equal Employment Opportunity Commissioner's 2017  sex discrimination charge. The settlement ends an investigation launched in the wake of reports alleging Uber's leadership allowed for discrimination and harassment in the workplace under Co-founder and Former CEO Travis Kalanick. 

• Google's internal conflict has ratcheted up again following a decision by management to end the company's policy of letting workers have access to almost any internal document. The open systems have been valuable for activists within the firm and have been pivotal to their increasing organization against certain Google contracts and policies. 

• FedEx reported worse-than-expected adjusted quarterly earnings and revenue. The delivery giant also cut its fiscal 2020 profit forecast following higher costs and the end of its delivery relationship with Amazon.