Tag Archive for: Opposition

India probing iPhone hacking complaints by opposition politicians

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(Corrects first name of minister in first paragraph to Ashwini)

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India’s cyber security agency is investigating complaints of mobile phone hacking by senior opposition politicians who reported receiving warning messages from Apple, Information Technology Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said.

Vaishnaw was quoted in the Indian Express newspaper as saying on Thursday that CERT-In, the computer emergency response team based in New Delhi, had started the probe, adding that “Apple confirmed it has received the notice for investigation”.

A political aide to Vaishnaw and two officials in the federal home ministry told Reuters that all the cyber security concerns raised by the politicians were being scrutinised.

There was no immediate comment from Apple about the investigation.

This week, Indian opposition leader Rahul Gandhi accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government of trying to hack into opposition politicians’ mobile phones after some lawmakers shared screenshots on social media of a notification quoting the iPhone manufacturer as saying: “Apple believes you are being targeted by state-sponsored attackers who are trying to remotely compromise the iPhone associated with your Apple ID”.

A senior minister from Modi’s government also said he had received the same notification on his phone.

Apple said it did not attribute the threat notifications to “any specific state-sponsored attacker”, adding that “it’s possible that some Apple threat notifications may be false alarms, or that some attacks are not detected”.

In 2021, India was rocked by reports that the government had used Israeli-made Pegasus spyware to snoop on scores of journalists, activists and politicians, including Gandhi.

The government has declined to reply to questions about whether India or any of its state agencies had purchased Pegasus spyware for surveillance.

(This story has been corrected to fix the first name of the minister to Ashwini in paragraph 1)

(Reporting by Rupam Jain and Munsif Vengattil; editing by Miral Fahmy)

Source…

Texas AG Joins Lawsuit Against T-Mobile, Showing Bipartisan Opposition To Mindless M&As

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Despite obvious red flags regarding reduced competition and massive layoffs, both the FCC and DOJ have rushed to support T-Mobile’s $ 26 billion merger with Sprint. We’ve noted that the math (and history) are very clear on this front: the reduction of major telecom competitors uniformly results in much higher consumer prices as the incentive to compete in direct price competition is hugely reduced. It’s a major reason why you haven’t seen AT&T and Verizon (both lobbying juggernauts) criticizing the merger. History’s also clear: such mergers inevitably result in huge layoffs as redundancies are eliminated.

And while the FCC and DOJ (both now run by former telecom executives, it bears repeating) are tripping over themselves to sign off on the merger, a growing coalition of states has other plans. 10 states have sued to block the deal, quite correctly noting that mindless M&As are one of the biggest reasons we all hate broadband providers like AT&T and Comcast so much. Such deals help just two class of folks: investors and executives. Everybody else pays a steep price.

While the DOJ had approached numerous states in the hopes it could convince them to drop the lawsuit, that’s not going all that well. Republican Texas AG Ken Paxton has now done the complete opposite, and in a statement announced that Texas will be joining the suit instead:

“While we appreciate the time and effort that went into the agreement between the parties and the U.S. Dept. of Justice, the Texas Attorney General has an independent obligation to protect Texas consumers. After careful evaluation of the proposed merger and the settlement, we do not anticipate that the proposed new entrant will replace the competitive role of Sprint anytime soon,” Attorney General Paxton said. “It is the Attorney General’s responsibility to preserve free market competition, which has proven to result in lower prices and better quality for consumers. The bargain struck by the U.S. Dept. of Justice is not in the best interest of working Texans, who need affordable mobile wireless telecommunication services that are fit to match the speed and technological innovation demands of Texas’ growing economy.”

It’s a rare moment of bipartisanship that might otherwise be missed in the current climate. Now, even with the FCC and DOJ approval, the deal will have to survive this lawsuit as well. Originally slated to begin in October, the court battle has now been bumped to December, meaning any approval (if it happens at all) likely won’t occur until the new year. This certainly isn’t the big win T-Mobile was envisioning after spending millions of dollars sucking up to the Trump administration (be it ramping up patronage of Trump hotels or hiring Trump ally Corey Lewandowski as an advisor).

The DOJ’s “fix” for the competitive problems of the deal is to force Sprint to sell some spectrum and prepaid brand Boost Mobile to Dish Network, then hope that Dish is competent enough to build a replacement fourth mobile carrier out of twigs and scraps. But Dish has a long history of empty promises, Boost Mobile has just 8 million subscribers (compared to 150 million for AT&T and Verizon each), and nobody really thinks the Ajit Pai FCC will hold T-Mobile and Dish to deal agreements, or stop AT&T and Verizon from trying to undermine this new fourth competitor.

The DOJ’s “solution” to the merger is made up of duct tape and dreams, and the Texas AG can see right through it. The simpler route remains blocking the deal outright, forcing Sprint (whose tenuous financial position has been exaggerated for effect) to pursue a new mobile partner that doesn’t result in the elimination of a direct wireless competitor.

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Monster Energy Loses Trademark Opposition Against UK Drink Company, But May Have Bullied It To Death Anyway

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A review of our stories about Monster Energy’s trademark bullying ways might leave some scratching their heads as to why the company continues along these lines at all. After all, any review of those stories will leave one with the impression that Monster Energy seems to lose these trademark oppositions at nearly every turn. So, if that’s the case, why continue with this losing streak?

Well, as we’ve explained previously, winning an opposition or lawsuit is only one of the real goals in trademark bullying. Other goals include making the opposition so painful and expensive so as to either push the victim into unreasonable changes or to simply drain the victim of cash and assets as they attempt to defend themselves. Likewise, such bullying serves as public notice to anyone else that might consider similar actions that would draw the bully’s ire, chilling their willingness to do so. In this, Monster Energy’s trademark bullying is often quite successful.

An example of this can be found in UK beverage company Thirsty Beasts, which recently won its case against Monster Energy’s opposition to its trademark for the second time on appeal.

Dan Smith, from Newbury, created healthy drinks company Thirsty Beasts in 2018, and the US firm filed a legal challenge against him.

It claimed customers would confuse both Mr Smith’s slogan – “Rehab the beast” – with its “Unleash the beast” line. The case, which was dismissed, cost Mr Smith more than £30,000 in legal fees. He said he and his wife had ploughed every penny they had into launching the business. After registering his first trademark in the UK in 2016, Mr Smith then filed the Thirsty Beasts logo. Billion-dollar company Monster Energy objected to his application, claiming Mr Smith’s slogan was too similar to its own.

The UK Trademark Office ruled in favour of Thirsty Beasts, but Monster Energy appealed the decision.

And Thirsty Beasts won that appeal. The Trademark Office once again reviewed the material provided by the two companies, including the branding, company names, and logos, and rightly decided that there was no customer confusion to be had here. You can read the entire timeline of events for yourself on the company’s website, but ultimately this story has a happy ending, right?

Well, again, winning the opposition isn’t the only, or perhaps even primary goal, of the trademark bully.

“Financially it has crippled the company,” Mr Smith said. He added: “We had savings set aside to boost the product, to do the marketing, to get that one drink out. Now we’ve burnt all of that, that and more trying to win this. We are two years behind where we want to be.”

The entrepreneur now needs to raise £28,000 for a limited launch of the product in spring 2019.

Maybe the Smith family will be able to do that, maybe they won’t. And that’s the real harm of large corporate trademark bullies like Monster Energy. Even in losing, it might still ultimately win if its victim can’t survive in business because of its bullying. And, again, Monster Energy can point to such an outcome should anybody else out there want to take similar innocuous actions.

Trademark bullying works. And on more than one front.

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Monster Energy Loses Trademark Opposition With Monsta Pizza In The UK

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For readers of this site, we writers would simply need to utter the name “Monster Energy” to get their eyes rolling. The makers of energy beverages have been notorious in their trademark bullying habits and have built a reputation for being both blowhards and litigious. If one actually reviews our stories about the company, however, these bullying attempts just as often lead to pushback and losses for Monster Energy. And now it seems we have another such instance on our hands.

A little over a year ago, a pizza joint in the UK applied to register its business name, Monsta Pizza, as a trademark. Monster Energy, which again I will point out makes drinks and not pizza, immediately opposed the registration, citing its own trademarks and claiming that the public would somehow be confused. A year and lots of legal fees later, the trademark office has finally ruled that Monster Energy’s opposition is denied and Monsta Pizza’s mark will be granted. The pizza company will not need to change any of its branding moving forward. Monster Energy has also been ordered to pay some of Monsta Pizza’s legal fees.

The folks at Monsta Pizza are understandably pleased.

“On Thursday George Salthouse of the UK Intellectual Property Office ruled that Monster Energy Drinks had failed in their attempt to prevent us using the the name Monsta Pizza.

Its been a long and frustrating battle, which started in June 2017 when we applied to register our trademark, and finally ended in a tribunal hearing in London a few weeks ago and the decision last week.

They objected to our use of the word Monsta on all possible grounds. We decided to fight it rather than give up and rebrand for two reasons; firstly, we really like our name, it perfectly encompasses what we do and our customers like it too. And secondly, we believed their objection was wrong and we weren’t prepared to walk away from all our hard work just because a bully didn’t like what we were doing.

I’ve done that before and its the only thing I’ve ever really regretted.

We’re so pleased that common sense prevailed and incredibly grateful for the support and encouragement we received from everybody who heard about it when we finally made public what was going on.

Now that this is all over we’re roaring to go.

Or as the Monsta says, ‘Pizzaaaaaargh!’

As we’ve said before, trademark bullying often works, mostly because large companies can drown smaller companies in expensive litigation and oppositions. But it’s good to see that occasionally the victims of this bullying are willing to fight back, not to mention that courts occasionally lighten the burden by awarding legal fees.

That said, I don’t think anyone expects Monster Energy to cease being such a monster trademark bully.

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