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Trump Sets Plans for a 10% China Tariff Hike by February

American consumers will soon be paying more, economists predict in response to Trump's proposed tariffs.

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Published on January 24, 2025

In a White House press briefing this week, President Donald Trump says he is aiming to levy a 10% tariff on China imports to the US by February 1st. It’s another confirmation that Trump plans to double down on his long-term interest in tariffs.

These plans are an addition to the 25% tariffs for imports from Canada and Mexico, which Trump has already said he plans to implement within the same time frame.

Trump also promised to include tariffs for goods from the European Union as well.

China Tariffs Coming Within Weeks

According to Trump’s claims during the Tuesday press briefing, the reasoning for the 10% tariffs is due to the importation of fentanyl into Mexico and Canada, from China.

“Probably Feb. 1 is the date we’re looking at,” Trump said.

It’s not quite the day-one change Trump had initially promised during his campaign for the presidency, but it’s a clear signal that Trump’s plans to radically change North American trade policy are still moving forward in the near future.

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The changes will likely raise prices from American consumers to a significant extent.

American Consumers Will Shoulder the Burden, Economists Say

Economists aren’t convinced that Trump’s stated actions are in the best interests of the nation. The Economist, writing in an op-ed titled “Tariffs will harm America, not induce a manufacturing rebirth,” noted a few days ago that “the real cost of tariffs is borne, to a large extent, by American consumers through higher import prices.”

According to this analysis, the impact of tariffs during Trump’s first term resulted in both fewer exports bought by Americans and fewer American exports sold to the rest of the world.

“Even if import levels were to remain constant, a 10% universal tariff would fund little more than a twentieth of the federal budget. In reality, imports would not in fact remain constant but rather would decline as higher tariffs raised the price of imports. Even by Mr Trump’s flawed logic, tariffs cannot both create lots of jobs and also raise large amounts of income for the government. That is to count their effects twice over.” -The Economist

More Tariff News Is Set to Come

One thing’s for sure: We’ll be hearing much more about tariffs in the months and years to come.

Trump’s approach towards the conversation surrounding tariffs has been to focus on what other countries are paying, with discussions of creating an “External Revenue Service,” despite general consensus from economists that these costs will be passed largely to US consumers.

Speaking on Monday, Trump has already addressed the potential for universal tariffs, saying “We may, but we’re not ready for that just yet,” according to a CNN report.

He did mention his interest in additional taxes on the EU, later telling Reuters that “The European Union is very, very bad to us. So they’re going to be in for tariffs. It’s the only way … you’re going to get fairness.”

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Written by:

Adam Rowe Writer

Adam has been a writer at Tech.co for nine years, covering fleet management and logistics. He has also worked at the logistics newletter Inside Lane, and has worked as a tech writer, blogger and copy editor for more than a decade. He was a Forbes Contributor on the publishing industry, for which he was named a Digital Book World 2018 award finalist. His work has appeared in publications including Popular Mechanics and IDG Connect, and his art history book on 1970s sci-fi, 'Worlds Beyond Time,' was a 2024 Locus Awards finalist. When not working on his next art collection, he's tracking the latest news on VPNs, POS systems, and the future of tech.

8 WFH Tax Deductions Remote Workers Are Entitled to in 2025

Don't enter 2025 paying more tax than you need to. Check if you're eligible for these remote worker tax deductions.

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Published on January 24, 2025

If you’re one of the estimated 22.5 million US workers currently working from home, you’re probably feeling pretty smug about saving money on office commutes, and city lunches.

However, from investing in ergonomic office chairs to covering the costs of business travel, working from home isn’t a free ride. Fortunately, certain workers can ease this financial load by claiming tax deductions on WFH-related expenses – from home office costs to software license fees.

If you’re interested in claiming back cash in this tax season, we’ve outlined some key remote working tax deductions that you should be aware of, before offering some practical advice to help you file your claim.

Which Remote Workers Can Apply For Tax Deductions?

In 2025, most self-employed workers, including freelancers, small business owners, and independent contractors will be able to claim tax deductions for work-related expenses.

However, most formally employed W-2 employees are not eligible for federal tax deductions, unless they are employed in the following states or cities: California, Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana, New Hampshire, New York, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, The District of Columbia, and Seattle.

There are some exceptions, however. Military reservists are able to claim tax back on travel expenses if they travel over 100 miles from home for service activities, even if they’re W-2 employees. The Fair Labor Standard Act also declares that all US employees are entitled to tax write-offs if costs associated with working from home cause their earnings to drop below the federal minimum wage.

Which Tax Deductions Are Remote Workers Entitled to?

If you’re planning to claim for tax deductions, you need to be aware of the stipulations first. Here are some common tax write-offs remote employees are eligible for:

Home office costs
Business equipment
Travel expenses
Vehicle mileage
Business meals
License fees
Health insurance premiums
Retirement contributions

1. Home office deductions

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Do you work from a home office? If so, you may be able to deduct a portion of your home expenses on your tax return. This tax break is offered by the government to help remote workers offset the expenses of maintaining their home office.

The tax break is eligible for homeowners and renters (provided they meet the IRS’s requirements) and could help ease the costs of mortgage interests, homeowners insurance, rent, utilities, property taxes, and more.

To be entitled to the home office tax deduction, workers need to use their home office space exclusively and regularly for business purposes. This means that if you work in a room with multiple purposes – like a bedroom, dining room, or living room – you probably won’t be eligible.

Your home office will also need to be your primary working location. So, if you only work from home occasionally, you may not qualify.

2. Business equipment

Self-employed and eligible W-2 employees can also claim tax deductions for up to $1,050,000 for qualified business equipment.

Eligible items include hardware like computers, monitors, and prints, office furniture like desks, chairs, and laptop stands, and stationery products like paper, desk organizers, and printer ink.

However, according to the IRS, to be entitled to the tax break you must own all the property and be able to use it for over a year. The property must also be used to make money or contribute to your role, and you’ll need to explain how this is done as part of your application.

3. Travel expenses

If your remote job requires you to travel to different locations, and you don’t own a vehicle, you may also be able to claim tax deductions on travel expenses. Depending on your method of travel, deductible travel expenses could include transportation fees such as train, bus, or airplane tickets.

However, as with all tax deductions, certain stipulations apply. The travel you claim for must be “away from your tax home”, AKA where you carry out business affairs, and require an overnight stay. You’ll also need to keep detailed records of your travels, including information about your trip’s purpose, and the receipts from your travel tickets.

4. Vehicle mileage

If you travel using your own vehicle for business-related travel, you also may be able to claim back tax on your vehicle’s mileage. This perk applies whether you’re making a long trip across states, or covering short distances within your own city.

You’re able to claim by using the actual expense that occurred, or by using the IRS standard mileage rate. To claim during the latter, you’ll need to keep a log of miles driven and separate personal and business distances. As of 2025, the IRS’s standard rate is 70 cents per mile for eligible workers.

However, in addition to milage rates, you’ll also be able to claim tax back on other vehicle-related costs including insurance, vehicle registration, maintenance, parking costs, and toll fees.

5. Business meals

Does your job regularly require you to eat away from home? If so, remote workers are also entitled to claim tax deductions on business meals, under specific circumstances.

According to current IRS guidelines, 50% of the cost of the meal is deductible. But to qualify, the meal will have to either take place with customers, clients, or other business associates, be consumed during an overnight stay for business purposes, or be provided during business meetings or events that are directly related to work.

Meals for personal consumption or convenience aren’t covered with this tax deduction, however. This means that if you DoorDash a meal to your house during company time, you’ll, unfortunately, have to cover the full cost of this yourself.

6. License fees

If you’re paying for licenses that are directly related to your remote work, you may be able to claim tax deductions on these fees.

Deductible licenses include professional licenses required to work in professions like medicine, law, or accountancy, licenses businesses need in order to operate, and software subscriptions needed for daily work activities, like Microsoft Office 365 or Adobe Creative Cloud, for example.

In short, in order for the license to be tax deductible, it will need to be directly related to your remote work. This means that licenses and subscriptions for personal use, like lifestyle magazine subscriptions or social and recreational activities, will not be covered.

7. Health insurance premiums

Health insurance can be a huge expense for self-employed workers. So, you’ll probably be relieved to hear that you also may be able to claim tax discounts on health insurance premiums.

If you’re a self-employed worker and use health insurance that was purchased under you or your business name, you’ll be able to deduct the cost of health insurance premiums for yourself, your spouse, and your children aged under 27. However, you won’t be able to claim this deduction if you or your spouse is eligible for employer-subsidized health insurance, even if you choose not to enroll in your company’s plan.

In 2025, qualifying health insurance includes medical insurance, certain qualifying long-term care coverage, and all Medicare premiums (parts A, B, C, and D).

8. Retirement contributions

Planning for the future is necessary, but can be costly. Fortunately, certain workers can claim tax cuts on retirement contributions, to help ease the financial burden of filling the pension pot.

Several retirement plans are covered under these deductions, including the Simplified Employee Pension (SEP) IRA plan, the Solo 401(k) plan, and the SIMPLE IRA plan. The first two plans have contribution limits of up to $66,000, while SIMPLE IRA is substantially lower at $15,000, or $19,000 if you’re over 50 years old.

If you’re an employee who contributes to an employer-sponsored retirement plan, money put into these accounts is typically pre-taxed, which means they reduce taxable income automatically.

How Should Remote Workers Claim Tax Deductions?

If you think you’re eligible for some of these tax exemptions, but haven’t filed one before – rest assured. The process is relatively straightforward, and shouldn’t take too long provided you’ve kept detailed records of your expenses.

First, we recommend using dedicated tax software to help you keep track of important data and to ensure you claim all of your deductions. You can also hire an accountant to manage the process if you want to ensure all bases are covered.

Then, if you’re a self-employed worker, you’ll have to claim tax deductions on most business expenses with Schedule C tax forms (Profit or Loss from Business) and include self-employment taxes on the Schedule SE form.

The process will be slightly different for traditional W-2 employees. If you fall into this category, you’ll have to use a Schedule A (Itemized Deductions) form for any eligible deductions, in addition to filing state tax returns if your state permits additional deductions.

When Should Remote Workers Claim Tax Deductions?

You should aim to claim these tax deductions as you file your taxes. In the US, the tax season falls from January 1 to April 15. If you aren’t able to meet this April deadline, you can also request a filing extension using Form 4868. If your request is approved you will have until October 15 to file your tax deductions.

However, self-employed workers are required to pay taxes quarterly, with deadlines landing on April 15, June 15, September 15, and January 15, so it’s important to be aware of dates before you begin preparing your claim.

If you run your own business, don’t forget to check out our guide to grants for small businesses available this month.

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Remote Working

Written by:

Adam Rowe Writer

Stripe Lays Off Employees by Sending Cut Staff a Cartoon Duck

Stripe employees were sent PDF of a cartoon duck alongside their notice of role termination in a baffling HR mistake.

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Published on January 24, 2025

Payments software company, Stripe, has made 300 people redundant but their emails came accompanied with a picture of a cartoon duck.

As the tech job lay-offs look set to continue into this year, this has got to be one of the strangest stories to date.

While staff at Intel had their coffee removed before the notice of redundancies hit desks, no other employees as far as we know have reported cartoons in their lay-off process.

Accidental Email from Stripe

Employees reported receiving the image of the duck alongside emails announcing that their jobs were being cut. The image was in an attached PDF and accompanies with the caption: “US-Non-California Duck.”

The impacted staff were also sent the wrong date of termination in this massive HR fail.

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Business Insider broke the story having seen the leaked internal memo that addressed the mess-up. In it, Stripe’s chief people officer, Rob McIntosh wrote, “I also want to note that some impacted Stripes received a notification error to their personal email accounts Monday evening PT I apologize for the error and any confusion it caused. Corrected and full notifications have since been sent to all impacted Stripes.”

No Reprieve on Jobs

However, the apology didn’t come, unsurprisingly, with a note saying that in light of the mess-up, people will keep their jobs. Instead, the Irish-American financial services company has confirmed that it is pushing ahead with the jobs cull. The cuts are mainly from the product, engineering, and operations teams.

McIntosh did add, though, that the company is planning on recruiting later in the year to boost its employees up to 10,000.

Job Losses Continue in 2025

While 2023 was horrific for job cuts, especially in the tech sector, they continued into 2024 and already Mark Zuckerberg is warning Meta’s employees that this year will also be “intense” and some jobs will go.

There is also rising concern that AI could see some job roles replaced. The World Economic Forum gave the dire prediction that 41% of companies will cut jobs due to AI in the next five years.

Duck or no duck, the signs are there that we might be in for another year of job cuts, whether straight redundancies or people feeling forced from their roles by strict RTO policies. However, Stripe has just given HR teams everywhere a lesson in how not to handle it.

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Adam Rowe Writer

Heads Up: Microsoft Is Leaving You Logged on Starting In February

If you use a public computer, remember that from next month, Microsoft will not automatically log you out when you stop work.

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Published on January 24, 2025

Microsoft is changing how you sign into a Microsoft account. Starting next month, you will remain signed it automatically, so make sure to log out if you’re using a public computer.

At the moment, when you sign into a Microsoft account, a message pops up asking if you want to stay signed in. However, in February, this will be automatic.

There are enough scammers trying to access your personal information, and leaving your account open on a public machine would be easy pickings, which is why understanding this change could make a big difference for your online security.

What Do You Need To Do?

If you are using a public computer, the best option is to use private browsing and scribble yourself a reminder to sign out until it becomes your standard practice. This is something that Gmail users have gotten used to doing.

However, there is also a backstop. If you leave where you have been working but have forgotten to sign out, Microsoft and Outlook users have the option of forcing sign out everywhere from their accounts. Following the instructions on this link to do this.

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Passkey Support

Microsoft has slowly added passkey support to its systems, in a bid to get customers to move away from passwords. It kicked off last May, when Microsoft announced passkey support for Xbox, Microsoft 365, and Microsoft Copilot users.

In a blog post in December, the company said that the “password era is ending.” It added that “bad actors know it” and this has seen a spike in password-related attacks.

“At Microsoft, we block 7,000 attacks on passwords per second—almost double from a year ago. At the same time, we’ve seen adversary-in-the-middle phishing attacks increase by 146% year over year,” it writes.

The Advantages of Passkeys

Passkeys can be a fingerprint, face scan, or a PIN, and Microsoft argues that they are far more effective against hacking than passwords. Here is where you can create your passkeys.

There are notable advantages for passkeys, not least for those of us who regularly forget our passwords. Passkeys like fingerprints or faces can’t be lost, after all. They are also a better defense against phishing attacks.

However, there can be issues with passkeys because of cross platform compatibility, functionality with older devices, and their need for certain hardware security modules.

For the moment though, Microsoft users working on public machines just need to remind themselves to log out and perhaps think about setting up their passkeys once they have this figured out.

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Adam Rowe Writer

Instagram Insists That Hiding Liberal Terms Was ‘Technical Issue’

Mete denies accusations of partisanship as Instagram users get error messages when searching for "democrat" and "democrats."

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Published on January 24, 2025

Instagram users searching for the terms “Democrat” or “Democrats” have been getting an error message.

In a story that has raised eyebrows in light of the newly sparked bromance between Mark Zuckerberg and Donald Trump, Meta is claiming that the “results hidden” message popping up is a technical problem.

Instagram, which will soon see sweeping changes to its moderation, claims that the problem is also affecting some Republican hashtags and promises there is no political maneuvering at play.

What Are Users Seeing?

BBC News reports that the error comes up when users directly search for “Democrats” or “Democrat.” These searches result in an error screen that says: “We’ve hidden these results. Results for the term you searched for may contain sensitive content.”

However, there are also limited results being reported when users search for “Republicans” but not “Republican.” But a search using the hashtag “Republican” returns 3.3 million posts while, at one point, users were reporting that the hashtags “#Democrat” or “#Democrats” returned no results at all.

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Issued Resolved but Questions Remain

Meta was quick to bat away accusations of partisanship and told the BBC in a statement:

“We’re aware of an error affecting hashtags across the political spectrum and we are working quickly to resolve it.” – Meta spokesperson

It could be an innocent technical error but comes at a time when Meta is fundamentally changing its approach to politicized speech across all of its platforms. This also includes changing its Community Guidelines, and the flagging of certain search terms.

Entrepreneurs and Government

This technical issue also comes at a time when Mark Zuckerberg has gone from banning Donald Trump from his platforms to visiting him at Mar-O-Lago, donating $1 million to his inauguration fund and being at the president’s inauguration ceremony.

He was there alongside Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Google boss Sundar Pichai.

There has been a fundamental shift in Zuckerberg’s attitude to the now president and this technical glitch has hit the headlines because of this.

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Adam Rowe Writer

Calls To Ban X Links on Reddit As Controversy Over Musk’s “Salute” Continues

Redditors divided as heated debates rage over whether the platform should distance itself from X because of Musk's "salute".

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Published on January 24, 2025

The controversy around Elon Musk’s “salute” on Donald Trump’s inauguration day is reaching fever-pitch in the news and social media, but on Reddit, it has resulted in calls for the platform to cut ties with X.

Redditors are reportedly advocating a ban on X links appearing in Reddit posts after two arm gestures that Musk made at one of the inauguration events have been compared to a Nazi salute.

The spotlight is now very much on Musk (isn’t it always), who is a staunch and very vocal advocate of Donald Trump’s but has also been given a role in Government heading up a government efficiency commission, nicknamed DOGE.

Clashing Views

As reported by Newsweek, the movement to ban X links on Reddit is gathering pace and it’s pretty heated. Groups are even arguing that the collective stance on this issue reflects their wider views of far right politics.

In one group, for the Valorant eSports community, a Redditor commented: “Throwing a n*zi salute is NOT a valid expression of a political opinion. NO ONE should condone the fascist nzi ideology, regardless of their political affiliation. This is NOT just “politics“, we as a sports/e-sports community have to take our stance against fascism.”

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The moderator in this group is suggesting screenshots instead of links for X content. But in other groups, this suggestion has been met with accusations of censorship and undermining free speech. In one group called “Change my view”, the discussion has got pretty heated.

A Redditor called Marco Tropoja wrote: “This is absolutely censorship, no matter how it’s framed. Reddit is supposed to be about discussions—whether you agree with the content or not. Banning links from x.com just because you don’t like Elon Musk or his politics undermines the platform’s purpose as a space for open dialogue.”

Musk Quick To Dismiss Claims

Musk himself has been quick to take to X to dismiss the allegations, writing: “Frankly, they need better dirty tricks. The ‘everyone is Hitler’ attack is sooo tired.”

But detractors and supporters have been quick to get involved. Rome-based Andrea Stroppa, who is one of Musk’s fervent supporters and advisors, posted the clip of Musk gesturing on X with the caption: “Roman Empire is back starting from Roman salute.” The Roman salute was widely used by Benito Mussolini and his fascist party in Italy during the Second World War. She has since deleted it.

Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a professor at New York University, wrote on X: “”Historian of fascism here. It was a Nazi salute and a very belligerent one too.” Others have said it was just Musk being excited; and hundreds of images of leaders from both parties holding similar arm positions have been published.

Others have been more circumspect. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) said on X: “This is a delicate moment. It’s a new day and yet so many are on edge. Our politics are inflamed, and social media only adds to the anxiety. It seems that @elonmusk made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute, but again, we appreciate that people are on edge. In this moment, all sides should give one another a bit of grace, perhaps even the benefit of the doubt, and take a breath. This is a new beginning. Let’s hope for healing and work toward unity in the months and years ahead.”

However, Musk’s support of the German AfD party and the anti-immigration Reform party in the UK are undeniable and definitely giving credence to the view that this was a political statement; not the wild arm gestures of an excited man.

Wider Questions Over Social Media Moderation

However, whatever you feel about Musk, the debate feeds into a wider question on what moderation should look like; and whether there is a place for it at all. Like so many politicized issues, it is highly divisive.

Meta has caused consternation in some camps with its decision to get rid of third-party moderation in the US across its platforms. The move is already turning into a war of words with EU authorities; and Mark Zuckerberg has pre-emptively appealed to Donald Trump to protect his company from potential EU fines that could result from the moderation shake-up.

Musk was brutal in slicing all of his moderation staff right in the earliest days after his takeover of X. And Donald Trump is someone who has actually been banned (ironically by Zuckerberg and Musk’s predecessor) on several social media platforms.

The debate continues on Reddit and we can be sure that this isn’t the last time that Musk will do something controversial (this week perhaps?) but the question over how it should be handled is going to be debated for a long time.

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Written by:

Adam Rowe Writer

What Is Stargate AI? Trump’s New $500Bn AI Infrastructure Project

Working alongside companies such as OpenAI and Softbank, Trump's new Stargate project aims to herald the "golden age" of AI.

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Published on January 24, 2025

President Donald Trump has announced private-sector investments of up to $500 billion into ‘Project Stargate’ – a new company that aims to be the “largest AI infrastructure project in history.”

The new company is being spearheaded by some biggest players in AI, including OpenAI, SoftBank, and Oracle, and aims to construct 20 data centers across the US and create hundreds of thousands of jobs. As the AI race intensifies, the historical initiative will also see the US compete with global powers like China.

However, just a day before Stargate was unveiled, the President overturned a previous executive order designed to mitigate the risks of AI, leading some experts to question the ethical implications of Trump’s build-first, think-later approach to AI.

What Is Stargate? Trump’s New AI Infrastructure Project

Just a day into his administration, President Donald Trump has announced a new artificial intelligence project that aims to set the standard for AI infrastructure and see the US compete with global powers like China.

Project Stargate was unveiled by Trump at a White House event on Tuesday, alongside joint collaborators OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, and SoftBank SEO Masayoshi Son. Alongside other equity backers, these companies have committed to investing $100 billion into kick-starting the project, with plans to funnel a further $500 billion into Stargate in years to come.

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As part of Stargate’s mission to build the “physical and virtual infrastructure to power the next generation of AI”, Trump revealed that 20 data centers would be constructed across the country, with each measuring at least half a million square feet. According to Ellison, a one-million-square-foot data center is already under construction in Texas.

Talking about the initiative, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman explained Stargate aims to create “hundreds of thousands of jobs”, while also having the potential to “redefine healthcare” and offer unprecedented advancements in disease diagnosis and treatment. Oracle’s Ellison echoed this sentiment, adding that the project could make it easier to treat diseases like cancer with mRNA vaccines.

Will Stargate Actually Create 100,000 Jobs?

Trump’s claim that project Stargate could create 100,000 jobs challenges widely held anxieties about AI being a job destroyer. However, while the company will undeniably provide new opportunities for thousands of developers, technicians, and engineers, previous initiatives suggest that these job estimates could be overblown.

In 2017 Trump stated that Foxconn’s proposed $10 billion electronics factory was expected to create 13,000 jobs. Later in 2021, the company announced it would be scaling back its plans and investing just $672 million, in a revised deal that could create fewer than 1,500 jobs.

So, while Project Stargate does have financial backing from some of the biggest companies in AI, if Donald Trump’s track record is anything to go by it’s uncertain whether this new initiative will actually be able to meet its sky high job targets.

Stargate Aims to Position US at the Front of the Global AI Race

Stargate’s announcement comes a week after AI trailblazer OpenAI published a policy white paper calling the US government to invest more in the technology to continue the country’s global leadership in innovation while protecting national security.

The paper estimates that there’s $175 billion sitting in global funds awaiting to be invested in AI projects, and claims if the US doesn’t attract those funds, they could flow into the pockets of our biggest global competitor, China, “strengthening the Chinese Communist Party’s global influence” as a result.

“This project ensures that the United States will remain the global leader in AI and technology, rather than letting competitors like China gain the edge,” – President Donald Trump at the White House event

China has outpaced the US in machine learning patents every year since 2021, and the nation’s rapidly developing AI sector is intensifying concerns around surveillance and trading dominance. With Stargate aiming to set the global standard in AI, it appears OpenAI’s prayers have been answered.

Yet, as the US prioritizes unchecked innovation, it’s likely that Stargate could raise the stakes of the AI race and exacerbate global trading disputes even further. What’s more, with Trump reversing an executive order from former President Joe Biden which aimed to regulate AI risks on the first day of his administration, it’s unclear how the President’s hands-off AI strategy will play out in the long term.

Donald Trump by Gage Skidmore. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

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Written by:

Adam Rowe Writer

MrBeast Launches Cash Bid to Buy TikTok

One of the world's highest earning influencers, MrBeast, has confirmed his bid to buy TikTok.

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Published on January 24, 2025

Another contender has joined the starting line as the race starts to buy TikTok and save it from closure.

The latest person to take their mark is YouTube star and one of the world’s highest earning creators, MrBeast.

According to reports, MrBeast has teamed up with tech entrepreneur Jesse Tinsley, who is the founder of the online HR company employer.com. They are taking on rival bids from a team including Kevin O’Leary of Shark Tank fame and there are also rumors that Trump’s new best friend, Elon Musk, might throw his hat in too.

All-Cash Bid for TikTok

The Guardian is reporting that MrBeast – whose real name is Jimmy Donaldson – has made a formal bid for the Chinese-owned social media platform. He has partnered with Tinsley and they have offered an all-cash bid.

The confirmation came from US law firm, Paul Hastings, which says that alongside 26-year old Donaldson and Tinsley are a group of “institutional investors and high-net-worth individuals” although they are not named. The statement is short and sweet, and doesn’t detail how much the bid is nor any time frames.

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Interestingly, adds the newspaper, the lead lawyer on the bid is Brad Bondi, who is the brother of Trump’s choice as US attorney general, Pam Bondi.

Donaldson had flagged his interest earlier this month, writing on X: “I’ll buy TikTok so it doesn’t get banned.” He later added on TikTok that he had started talks with a “bunch of billionaires”.

Clock Is Ticking for TikTok Ban

There is a pressing sense of urgency to the situation. TikTok went dark the day before Trump’s inauguration, only to be reinstated with a 75-day extension by the now president. But he hasn’t completely reversed the ban (which he was actually instrumental in) and so TikTok must find a buyer.

As to the price, Trump mentioned the figure of $1tn at a press conference with a 50% US ownership and a “permit” to operate in the country. He also nodded to Musk’s interest while adding that the multibillionaire founder of Oracle, Larry Ellison, might also make a bid. Ellison, who was actually at the press conference, reportedly said that it sounded like “a good deal”.

While it is looking likely that a buyer will be found, who that will be and how the platform will then operate is a guess. After all, none of the concerns about national security have disappeared and the scrutiny will no doubt continue in the 75-day period.

Uncertainty Still Reigns for TikTok

In the meanwhile, some of TikTok’s 170 million US users have started looking at alternatives, including, ironically, another Chinese social media app called RedNote. Reuters is reporting that Apple and Google have not reinstated TikTok in their app stores as yet, so rivals definitely have an opportunity to jump in and they’re using it.

But is Trump’s suspension of the ban even legal? And is there steering going on behind closed doors as to who the new owner will be? Plenty of questions to be answered and not a huge amount of time for answers.

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Social Media

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Adam Rowe Writer

Instagram Offers TikTok Influencers Big Bucks for Exclusivity

Top creators might be getting as much as $10,000 to $50,000 per month to become Reels-first influencers.

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Published on January 24, 2025

Poor TikTok has not only faced a nail-biting teeter at the edge of survival this week, but is also contending with a Chinese rival actively recruiting its influencers.

Now, another rival, Meta’s Instagram, is also reported to be trying to court TikTok influencers over to its platform, with thousands of dollars promised if they will post to Reels.

The alleged deal would see influencers pocket the cash from Meta if they post to Reels first but then are able to publish elsewhere. Meta, though, would get the exclusive.

Capitalizing on the Chaos

According to a report from The Information, Instagram is actively approaching creators and offering them “bonuses” valued at between $10,000 to $50,000 per month.

The Meta execs are obviously hoping this will give the platform a boost of exclusive content from some of TikTok’s biggest names, and attract TikTokers to follow them to Instagram.

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TikTok users are actively looking for alternatives as the surge of interest in Shanghai-based social media app, RedNote, has shown and so it’s understandable that Instagram would want to capitalize on the chaos around TikTok’s future as well.

Waiting in the Wings

Instagram’s Reels, launched in 2020, was designed specifically to compete with TikTok. A recent (and not universally loved) decision to switch from square to rectangular profile grids is a measure of exactly how much emulation there is.

The two platforms have always fought a close battle, with Business Insider reporting last June that increased engagement with Reels was directly correlated with decreased usage of TikTok.

The report quotes a Morgan Stanley survey of 2,000 US consumers, which revealed that more than a third of Instagram users use Reels daily, and 78% engage with it monthly. But specifically, it revealed that 26% of reels users are not using TikTok at all, which is an increase on the previous year’s percentage.

The Meta team may be suggesting that TikTok’s popularity is waning but its incoming changes to moderation (and TikTok’s possible reprieve) might yet change the rankings.

Have Reels Bonuses Worked Before?

The Verge suggests that bonus-led schemes to get creators on board have had mixed results for Instagram in the past. The company launched a bonus program in 2021, but it was short-lived with creators complaining about decreasing payments. There is a bonus program on the Instagram site at the moment.

Meta also ran an invite-only bonus program for Threads last spring, but Engadget wrote that, despite the dollars coming in, many were totally baffled by the algorithm.

With the fight for TikTok refugees ongoing, despite the 75-day window, this is one bonus program that Meta needs to work and really catch the big-hitting influencers’ attention. However, it also needs to be good enough to keep them from returning to TikTok or looking elsewhere.

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Adam Rowe Writer

TikTok Rival RedNote Recruited US Influencers for Promotion

RedNote is taking advantage of its unexpected popularity as a would-be TikTok replacement by rolling out a marketing plan.

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Published on January 24, 2025

TikTok may now have a 75-day reprieve thanks to President Trump, but when its ban was looming, rival RedNote is reported to have recruited influencers to raise its profile with US users.

The Chinese social media platform enjoyed a boom in interest stateside as TikTokers prepared for their beloved app going dark.

But reports suggest that the company hasn’t just sat back and waited for people to find it. Instead, it actively recruited US-based influencers to bolster its profile by working with a New York-based marketing agency.

Paid Posts

Wired has published an article giving details of a campaign brief it has had eyes on. Created by marketing agency Solare Global, the brief was sent to select TikTok influencers and laid out how they could talk about “how fun and engaging the app [RedNote] is” and “emphasize its user-friendly design and international appeal.”

In the days leading up to the ban, there were reports of just this with influencers making videos about how to set up RedNote accounts and gushing about its “cuteness.”

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There are no details on which influencers it was sent to and whether or not they were paid per post (and if so, how much).

Wired adds that it contacted both Xiaohongshu, which is the Chinese name for RedNote, and Solare Global for comment but neither have responded.

RedNote’s Rise

As the TikTok ban approached, users were furiously searching for alternatives and RedNote appealed because of its similarity to its rival; but also because it also shares features with Instagram and even Pinterest.

Just a week ago, the Shanghai-based app surged to the top spot in Apple’s app store listings for free apps in the US. Wired reports that the company has furiously recruited English-speaking moderators as Americans joined and started posting.

However, RedNote has to adhere to the content moderation (or censorship) policies set for it by the Chinese government so this will be problematic with a surge of content coming from outside of China. TikTok, in contrast, is owned by a Chinese company, ByteDance, but is not available in China.

TikTok’s Revival

However, in the next few weeks, we will see whether RedNote’s popularity continues to rise as TikTok comes back from the cusp. It has been given a 75-day lifeline, with Trump determined to find a resolution to ensure the social media platform’s survival. He hasn’t reversed the ban altogether, though.

Options on the table include the US operations being sold to a team of entrepreneurs, including Shark Tank host, Kevin O’Leary. There are even rumors that Elon Musk is eyeing up the platform.

What the ByteDance execs now have is a little time; but there is still uncertainty and RedNote has shown that it’s only too happy to capitalize on that.

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Adam Rowe Writer

Quarter of HR Leaders Say Managing RTO Is a Huge Headache

With more companies bringing back workers to the office, managing staff expectations and working arrangements is tough.

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Published on January 24, 2025

Won’t anybody think of the HR managers!? While companies the world over continue to end or curtail remote working arrangements, human resource leaders are finding the management of return-to-office (RTO) mandates one of the biggest challenges to handle.

That’s according to a new survey that asked more than 1,000 HR leaders about the leave and accommodations landscape within their companies – 1 in 4 respondents said that managing RTO mandates has been one of their top challenges in the last 12 months.

Yet despite an increasing number of employees being forced back into the physical workplace, working remotely remains the most common job accommodation request made to businesses.

Recruitment and Retention

Management platform AbsenceSoft carried out the survey for its 2025 State of Leave and Accommodations paper, which included a cohort of 1,200 HR and People Ops leaders at companies with no less than 500 employees.

One of its key questions was to ask respondents what their top challenges were in 2024, with ‘recruiting the right talent’ coming out on top with 57%.

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Other frequent responses were ’employee stress and burnout’ (54%), ‘retaining valuable employees’ (52%) and ’employee health and well being’ (41%).

Due to the changing nature of the working landscape, supporting remote employees has fallen from the second biggest challenge, with just over a third of those surveyed saying it was an issue they faced. 24% said managing RTO mandates.

“With the proliferation of return-to-office mandates, it’s no surprise that remote work is not reported as being as big a challenge in 2025. However, it’s clear that today’s workforce isn’t getting any less stressed, and retention is becoming an issue as employees leave roles for more accommodating work environments.” – AbsenceSoft

Jury Still Out on RTO

HR managers aren’t the only ones who are finding the ‘great return to the office’ problematic.

We reported in October on survey results revealing that RTO mandates are driving employees to look for other jobs, with 73% of respondents having moved on from jobs because they didn’t like their employer’s work policy.

That isn’t stopping companies from proceeding to force staff back to the workplace, though. JP Morgan is the latest big name to issue a five-day-a-week RTO mandate, following in the footsteps of tech giants like Amazon, Dell, and Ubisoft.

While others such as Microsoft and Spotify are resisting such heavy handed workplace strategies.

Requests for Leave Increasing

Other notable findings from the survey included 57% of respondents saying that requests for leaves of absence increased year-on-year in 2024, and the top three reasons for leave risks pertained to recovering from illness or injury (57%), managing mental health-related issues (47%) and caring for an aging relative (37%).

When it comes to job accommodations, 51% of those surveyed said that a desire to work from home or via teleworking was among the top three requests they receive.

“We often think of job accommodations as something physical an employee with a disability needs, such as a chair for back pain or wrist brace for carpal tunnel syndrome. Our survey found that it’s much more likely that an employee will request less costly accommodations related to when and where they work.” – AbsenceSoft

That was followed by intermittent leave or reduced schedules (46%), specialized equipment (35%) and additional breaks (34%).

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Adam Rowe Writer

US Officials Get Closed Door Unveiling of OpenAI Super Agents

Details are scant and the door will be closed as OpenAI will give US officials a glimpse at its AI super agent.

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Published on January 24, 2025

A select group of US officials are going to get to “meet” the “Ph.D-level” agents from OpenAI behind closed doors.

The meeting, which will reportedly take place on January 30th, is being hosted by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.

However, details of what the officials will get to see are scant. When they do hit the press, they are sure to be accompanied by concerns about the power tech companies are unleashing. This is not least because legislation is dramatically lagging behind and because the Trump administration (and its gang of supporting tech bros) are advocates of minimal intervention when it comes to innovating to make big bucks.

What Is a Super Agent?

This is an AI agent that is capable of doing complex human tasks. They have the advantage of being able to deep dive through thousands of pieces of data autonomously and make sense of it – and in a fraction of the time of a human. This is why they have been described as comparable in intelligence to a Ph.D level student. They can tackle a goal, as opposed to a single task, says Axios, which broke the story.

Altman has suggested that this year will be meteoric for his company, as it pushes to make ChatGPT even more appealing.

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This is also the year in which the company is striving to create AI agents that could “join the workforce and materially change the output of companies,” he shared in a blog post.

What the officials will actually be getting to see could be something entirely different, aimed specifically at government services, as opposed to bookings.

AI Arms Race

Creating these super agents or Agentic AI is becoming the Holy Grail for those competing in the AI sphere. Meta has been furiously pushing its Llama-powered Meta AI on its social media platforms and messaging apps. It has also made the open source AI model available to the US government to “support the prosperity and security of the United States.”

Meanwhile, Amazon is facing accusations that it is falling behind as it admits that AI Alexa is nowhere near ready for public consumption. This is despite the billions the company has pumped into AI wunderkind Anthropic.

Microsoft is facing similar negativity but specifically from the CEO of Salesforce. Marc Benioff has called Microsoft’s AI assistant, Copilot, a “huge disaster” and “…the new Microsoft Clippy.”

Whatever OpenAI is going to show off has got to be something above and beyond what is available now or even what we can imagine to merit such covertness.

Concerns Abound

While we don’t know the details, the fact that the closed-door meeting is being held with government officials might get federal employees concerned.

They are already facing four years under a president who strongly believes that there is government wastage to attack – and has appointed his DOGE team to do so. Could AI play a role in cutting costs too?

The World Economic Forum warned earlier this month that 41% of companies will make job cuts in the next five years because of AI. With the most powerful men in tech now behind the Trump Administration, could the US Government and its many departments be one of the first places where agentic AI is given a place at the table?

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Adam Rowe Writer

Study: Using AI Chatbots Can Expose Sensitive Business Data

Companies are at risk from intellectual property with 8.5% of AI chatbot prompts found to include sensitive company data.

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Published on January 24, 2025

While many experts consider AI to be the future of productivity gains at work, new research has warned that careless use of chatbots by workers may leave their employers exposed to costly data leaks.

It says that nearly one in 10 prompts entered into generative AI tools by workers include sensitive data, with a large number comprising customer data such as billing information.

With the majority of these prompts being inputted into the free versions of ChatGPT and other AI chatbots like Copilot, Gemini, Claude and Perplexity, businesses are potentially more exposed than they would be with paid tiers.

Sensitive Customer Information

In a report produced by Harmonic – a cybersecurity startup specializing in artificial intelligence – the company says it analyzed tens of thousands of prompts made by businesses to the planet’s biggest AI chatbots during Q4 2024.

It found that, while the vast majority of usage is harmless (e.g. summarizing text, editing blogs, writing documentation for code), 8.5% of all prompts included sensitive information.

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Of that sensitive data, more than 45% instances included information such as customer reports and profiles, payment transactions, billing information, and credit card details.

Harmonic gives an employee entering the particulars of an insurance claim, which will often contain private, detailed information, as an example of using AI to save time.

“While efficient, this practice risks exposing sensitive customer information like billing details, authentication credentials, and payment transactions.” – Harmonic spokesperson

Intellectual Property Concerns

The research revealed that around a quarter of the prompts investigated contained employee data (e.g. personally identifiable information, payroll, employment records), which could leave individuals exposed.

The remainder concerned legal and finance, security, and sensitive code. That will be an even greater concern for businesses, as the leaking of such information could give competitive advantage to other companies, bring about regulatory compliance issues, and “provide attackers with a blueprint for exploiting vulnerabilities.”

“When we think of data leakage, our minds often immediately go to PII, social security numbers, credit cards, and API keys,” says an accompanying blog from Harmonic. “However, for many businesses, the concerns are more often around IP – source code, intellectual property.”

Problem with Free Tiers

Harmonic says that the data it has discovered is even more concerning when considered alongside the fact that most of the prompts are entered using the free tiers of chatbots; more than 50% of all the ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude entries it looked at were on their respective free tiers.

That’s because, the company says, using a free product rather than a paid-for enterprise-level plan means that the business doesn’t get the benefit of extra security features. Plus, many free-tier tools explicitly state they train on customer data, meaning sensitive information entered could be used to improve models, further compounding risks.

It’s not the first time that businesses have been warned against the risks of their staff using AI tools. Consumer tech giant Samsung restricted their use after sensitive code was leaked in 2023, while a study last year revealed that 77% of businesses have faced AI security breaches.

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Adam Rowe Writer

Trump Issues Return-to-Office Mandate for Government Execs

The Trump Administration has issued an RTO mandate for the exec branch of its government demanding attendance 5 days a week.

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Published on January 24, 2025

It will surprise absolutely no one that President Trump’s first day in office included an return-to-office mandate.

Addressed to the “heads of all departments and agencies in the executive branch of Government,” the notice insists on a full-time return to office and says employees must make it so “as soon as practicable.”

Trump has been open in his feelings towards remote working. In a recent news conference, he stated bluntly: “If people don’t come back to work… they’re going to be dismissed.” While employees working for the likes of Dell and Amazon have pushed back against strict RTO mandates, the White House looks increasingly unlikely to negotiate.

No Explanation

The statement published by The White House is short and snappy. While CEOs of the big tech companies have tried to make their RTO mandates easier to swallow with assertions about team building and collaboration, there has been no such mercy from Trump’s team.

It states that employees must “…take all necessary steps to terminate remote work arrangements and require employees to return to work in-person at their respective duty stations on a full-time basis.” It does add that “the department and agency heads shall make exemptions they deem necessary.”

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The mandate will hit hard, because currently more than half of some departments work remotely. On top of that, the Department of Education and General Services Administration will be among those where the changes will be felt most.

More To Come?

It’s fair to suggest that more mandates will no doubt follow with Trump calling remote working policies “terrible” and “ridiculous.”

His two DOGE chiefs — Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy — are also outspoken advocates of having everyone in the office full time. Musk has enforced strict policies at his own ventures and voiced his plan to do the same in Government.

In a Wall Street Journal op ed, the duo wrote: “If federal employees don’t want to show up, American taxpayers shouldn’t pay them for the COVID-era privilege of staying home.”

Musk has also stated that the RTO mandate is a way of slimming down the federal workforce – with a wave of “voluntary terminations.” He said that workers who can’t make being in the office five days a week work for them should quit and move on.

He isn’t alone in taking such a brutal stance. It is a charge that was laid squarely at Amazon’s CEO Andy Jassy – though he denied it.

Thorn in His Side

Around 42,000 workers may have a reprieve, as they fall under an agreement signed between President Biden and the Social Security Administration and the American Federation of Government Employees union in early December.

Under the terms of the deal, these employees will have to right to hybrid working until 2029. It sparked an immediate backlash from Republican senators, including Senator James Comer on X.

Trump has suggested that he will seek out a court order to reverse the impact of the deal, leaving thousands of employees facing uncertainty as they become pawns in a battle between the outgoing and incoming administrations and their opposing views on hybrid working.

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Adam Rowe Writer

Meta Not Shelving Fact-Checkers Outside of US…Yet

Meta says no plans to change moderation model outside of the US but doesn't rule out a re-haul in the future.

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Published on January 24, 2025

Meta says that it is not going to shelve third-party fact-checking outside of the US, seeming to give weight to the rumors that the move in America was very much a political one.

Mark Zuckerberg himself laid out the sweeping changes to moderation, claiming that the Community Notes program that would be put in place instead would “empower the community”. He also pointed to X as an example of how this model works, which raised a few wry eyebrows.

However, the Meta chief followed the news just days later with a plea to the then soon-to-be president, Donald Trump – to protect US companies from EU fines, pre-empting a negative response to the moderation move outside of the US.

No Change for Meta Moderation Outside US…Yet

In an interview with Bloomberg, Meta’s head of global business Nicola Mendelsohn suggested that the company is going to keep the present status-quo but didn’t rule out changes in the future.

She said: “We’ll see how that goes as we move it out over the year. So nothing changing in the rest of the world at the moment, we are still working with those fact checkers around the world.”

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In the US, Meta has called for users to sign up to its moderation program (Facebook, Instagram, Threads) and roll-out will start in the next couple of months.

What Will Users See in the US?

The changes that will kick off in the US were laid out by Meta’s newly-appointed chief global affairs officer Joel Kaplan in a statement that was published alongside Zuckerberg’s video.

Kaplan said that Meta will “stop demoting fact-checked content.” He added too that a “much less obtrusive label indicating that there is additional information for those who want to see it” will replace “full screen interstitial warnings.”

Kaplan added that the company will be “getting rid of a number of restrictions on topics like immigration, gender identity and gender”.

Why Could There Be Issues for Meta in the EU?

The changes have already caused concern. Former Danish Prime Minister, Helle Thorning-Schmidt, who is co-chair of Meta’s independent oversight board, told the BBC that she was worried that there could be a spike in hate speech, especially towards people in the LGBTQ+ communities. “We are seeing many instances where hate speech can lead to real-life harm, so we will be watching that space very carefully,” she said.

However, she will not be alone in scrutinizing the content. A pre-emptive war of words has already kicked off between Zuckerberg and EU authorities. In an interview with Joe Rogan, the Meta CEO rallied against the EU fines his company has had to pay in antitrust rulings. He said: “I think it’s a strategic advantage for the US that we have a lot of the strongest companies in the world, and I think it should be part of the US strategy going forward to defend that.”

As reported by Reuters, Zuckerberg went as far as the say that EU rules were choking innovation. “Europe has an ever increasing number of laws institutionalizing censorship and making it difficult to build anything innovative there,” he said. But the European Commission hit straight back and said: “We absolutely refute any claims of censorship.” It also said that it did not prescribe any specific form of moderation for social media platforms but “…whatever model a platform chooses needs to be effective.”

So while Zuckerberg might now have the favor of the US president and approval for his hands-off model, other countries have a very different view of what moderation should look like.

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Adam Rowe Writer

Trump Reverses Biden’s AI Safety Law

Trump sidelines law put in place by outgoing government seeking to set standards for AI safety and security.

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Published on January 24, 2025

Donald Trump has revoked an executive order put in place by Joe Biden that aimed to “drive safe, secure, and trustworthy development of AI”.

The order, created in October 2023, was the first ever executive order on how artificial intelligence is being developed and used in the US and was seen as a response to experts calling for greater regulation on the sector.

The move seeks to deliver on the Republican Party’s pre-election promise to repeal an act it called “dangerous” and support the development of AI in the United States.

Unleashing the Potential of American Citizens

Among a raft of executive orders signed by Trump on his first day back in the White House – including to give TikTok a 75 day lifeline – was one named the ‘Initial Recissions of Harmful Executive Orders and Actions’.

The stated purpose of the order is to reverse practices forwarded by the Biden administration that it claims are “deeply unpopular, inflationary, illegal, and radical”.

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“To commence the policies that will make our Nation united, fair, safe, and prosperous again, it is the policy of the United States to restore common sense to the Federal Government and unleash the potential of the American citizen.” — President Trump’s executive order

Among the 78 revoked laws was Biden’s ‘Executive Order on the Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Development and Use of Artificial Intelligence passed on 30th October 2023.

Championing Innovation

Biden’s order broke ground by attempting, among other things, to establish standards for detecting AI-generated content, protect user privacy, lower cases of algorithmic discrimination and address concerns around national security.

At the time, White House Chief of Staff Bruce Reed claimed it to be the “strongest set of actions” any government had taken to safeguard AI (although the EU AI Act 2023 had been passed earlier in the year).

However, the 2024 Republican Party Platform upon which Trump built his campaign to return to the presidency clearly laid out the GOP’s thoughts on and intentions for the order as part of its plans to ‘Champion Innovation’:

“We will repeal Joe Biden’s dangerous Executive Order that hinders AI Innovation, and imposes Radical Leftwing ideas on the development of this technology. In its place, Republicans support AI Development rooted in Free Speech and Human Flourishing.” – 2024 Republican Party Platform

Progress vs Protection

The reversal of the order will likely be music to the ears of the cavalcade of big tech CEOS who were in attendance at Trump’s inauguration, which included Elon Musk, Tim Cook and Sam Altman.

Only last week, an executive at OpenAI (that owns ChatGPT and is run my Altman) called artificial intelligence “a race America can and must win” and warned that failure to do so would stifle innovation and allow China and other foreign powers to gain an upper hand with the tech.

But there remain critics of the fast moving nature of the industry and what negative effect upcoming AI trends may have on the country. These fears were writ large when California lawmakers tried passing a controversial AI bill last year, with supporters voicing concerns that its rapid growth could lead to sweeping job cuts.

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Adam Rowe Writer

Trump Gives TikTok a 75-Day Lifeline But It’s Not Safe from Ban Yet

One of returning president's first acts was to give social media platform more time to find avoid permanent shutdown.

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Published on January 24, 2025

It may not be a complete reversal of the TikTok ban, but users of the social media platform in the US have been granted an extra 75 days of use while the incoming president considers its future in the country.

On his first day back in the White House, Donald Trump passed an executive order to temporarily halt the ban to allow him to “negotiate a resolution to avoid an abrupt shutdown of the TikTok platform”.

That gives the US government until Saturday 5th April to explore ways with TikTok owner Bytedance and Chinese officials in which the service can be saved in the US.

“TikTok is Back”

Trump promised during is reelection campaign that voting for him would mean a stop to the TikTok ban.

And while the long awaited TikTok ban came into effect on Sunday, its estimated 170 million US users didn’t have to wait for long before normal service was restored – the blackout lasted roughly 12 hours, with a notification from the platform telling its users that: “As a result of President Trump’s efforts, TikTok is back in the U.S.!”

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The reprieve was then made formal on Monday in an executive order formally titled ‘The Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act’.

National Security Considerations

In the text of the order, Trump took a swipe at outgoing president Joe Biden, saying: “The unfortunate timing of [the ban] — one day before I took office as the 47th President of the United States — interferes with my ability to assess the national security and foreign policy implications of the Act’s prohibitions before they take effect.”

Trump stopped short from reversing the ban altogether and the clock has begun ticking again on the app’s future, giving the government until early April to consider the “national security concerns” posed by TikTok and to “review sensitive intelligence related to those concerns and evaluate the sufficiency of mitigation measures TikTok has taken to date”.

“I am instructing the Attorney General not to take any action to enforce the Act for a period of 75 days from today to allow my Administration an opportunity to determine the appropriate course forward in an orderly way that protects national security while avoiding an abrupt shutdown of a communications platform used by millions of Americans.” – Donald Trump’s executive order

However, the 75 days is likely to be seen more as a negotiating window, with the @TeamTrump handle on the president’s own Truth Social platform saying: “President Trump signs an Executive Order to keep TikTok alive so that a deal can be reached”

CEOs Out in Force for the President

In addition to the deadline extension itself, the executive order also instructs the Department of Justice that no action is to be taken against any parties that had not complied with the ban during its brief enactment.

That means any service providers who may have continued to allow TikTok’s use on Sunday – inadvertently or otherwise – will avoid punishment.

This and a raft of other executive orders were passed shortly after Donald Trump’s inauguration on Monday 20th January, with big tech CEOs in attendance such as Elon Musk (X, SpaceX, Tesla), Mark Zuckerberg (Meta), Tim Cook (Apple), Sundar Pichai (Google) and Sam Altman (OpenAI) as well as TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chou.

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Adam Rowe Writer

All the Big Tech CEOs in Attendance at Trump’s Inauguration

From Zuckerberg and Cook to Musk and Pichai, the dais at Trump's inauguration is full of big tech CEOs hedging their bets.

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Published on January 24, 2025

If you’re watching the inauguration of Donald Trump today, you’ll likely see some familiar faces, as a bevy of tech CEOs have accepted invitations to be part of the dais at the Capitol to kick off the new administration.

Donald Trump’s return to the US presidency has set of a domino effect in the tech industry over the last few months. CEOs have quickly gotten in line since the November election, announcing new policies and ditching old features that cater to more “liberal” sensibilities.

Now, the big tech support is in full swing, with a parade of CEOs showing the world that the most innovative industry in the world is very much on board with this administration and whatever it plans to do.

Tech CEOs at Trump’s Inauguration

Trump is set to be sworn into the office of the presidency at 12pm EST in the Capitol Rotunda in Washington, D.C. The event will be held indoors for the first time since 1985, with colder temperatures expected in the nation’s capital.

While the scores of Trump supporters that traveled to Washington D.C. to see the event will not be in attendance, there will be plenty of big tech CEOs in the spotlight, including:

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Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX and Tesla
Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta
Jeff Bezos, former CEO of Amazon
Tim Cook, CEO of Apple
Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google
Shou Zi Chou, CEO of TikTok
Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI
Dara Khosrowshahi, the CEO of Uber

Attending the inauguration certainly isn’t the only support that these CEOs have shown the incoming president. These CEOs and their companies have contributed $1 million each to the inaugural fund, likely to curry favor with Trump before his next run as president kicks off.

‘An Oligarchy Is Taking Shape’

In his farewell address to the nation, President Joe Biden warned about this kind of support, warning citizens that this “dangerous concentration of power in the hands of a very few ultra-wealthy people” should be at the top of mind throughout the next four years of Trump’s presidency.

“Today, an oligarchy is taking shape in America of extreme wealth, power, and influence that literally threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedoms, and a fair shot for everyone to get ahead.” – President Joe Biden

To be fair, the US doesn’t really have a leg to stand on when refuting its oligarchic tendencies. The country has been cutting taxes for the rich while denying its citizens basic rights like healthcare and education through outrageous prices and predatory lending schemes. Still, there is mounting evidence that this will get notably worse under Trump, so I guess, thanks for the warning, Joe.

Is Tech Moving Right?

If it was just tech CEOs supporting Trump at his inauguration, that wouldn’t be entirely surprising. After all, billionaires are always going to stick together, right?

Well, it’s unfortunately a bit more pressing than that. As we’ve seen over the last few months, Trump’s rise in popularity has fueled a shift in the tech industry, encouraging decision makers to cater to the controversial president’s base on their platforms.

We’ve got Elon Musk gutting the hate speech protections on X, Mark Zuckerberg discontinuing the use of fact checkers on Facebook, and TikTok thanking the incoming president for helping it avoid the ban in the US. It’s safe to say these platforms are going to continue moving to the right until the rest of us have no choice but to find a suitable alternative.

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Written by:

Adam Rowe Writer

Fully Remote Jobs at Google You Can Apply for in January 2025

Dust off the January blues by landing your dream job at Google, and getting to work from home.

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Published on January 24, 2025

Was one of your New Year’s resolutions to level up in your career? If so, the good news is that search giant Google is currently hiring for new talent, and lots of available roles don’t even require you to leave your house.

While Google’s selection of remote roles isn’t quite as expansive as other tech companies like Microsoft, over 50 WFH-friendly positions are currently available, with specialisms ranging from sales to cybersecurity.

We’ve rounded up some examples of roles that are currently up for grabs, and also paint a picture of what it could be like to work at the Silicon Valley mega weight from home, to help bring your fully-remote dreams closer to reality.

Fully Remote Jobs at Google for January 2025

Want to know the best way to fight the January blues? Landing your dream job at Google.

At the time of writing, Google is hiring for 56 fully remote positions – 34 more than this time last month. While these roles require employees to report to offices across the US, they’re still able to be carried out remotely. It’s worth looking at the the job listings’ ‘remote location’, however, as certain roles are only hiring remote workers based in specific states.

Take a look at some of Google’s fully remote roles, alongside their remote location, below:

Take a look at Google’s career page to browse through more remote-friendly job listings.

What Is It Like to Work at Google Remotely?

While Google may no longer unanimously be seen as the best place to work in Silicon Valley, the Mountain View tech company still offers an abundance of in-office perks, including exciting bonuses like free meals from one of its micro kitchens and free access to its on-site gyms. But does this mean that remote employees will be missing out? Well, not entirely.

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Remote workers are still entitled to enviable paid time off (PTO) packages, enabling them to take an adequate amount of time off whether they’re sick, going on vacation, or about to take on more caregiving responsibilities. Google also covers the cost of gym memberships for fully-remote employees, to encourage fitness and to help workers reduce stress. These perks, combined with the obvious privilege of working from home, will make working at Google a dream opportunity for many.

But the search giant isn’t the only tech company opening its arms to remote workers, as we explore next.

What Other Top Companies Are Hiring For Fully Remote Roles?

Working at Google will likely be the pinnacle of most people’s careers, but it’s not the only prominent tech company seeking out remote workers.

Microsoft has been a flexible working pioneer since the early days of the pandemic and is bucking the return to office (RTO) trend in 2025 by letting employees work from wherever they’re most productive. While the company officially has a hybrid model in place, it’s also actively hiring for a huge number of fully remote roles, with over 900 WFH-friendly opportunities available this month alone.

Streaming giant Spotify is also renowned for its flexible ‘Work From Anywhere’ policy which supports employees to work wherever they want, while short-term rental platform Airbnb’s ‘Live and Work Anywhere’ program also champions workers to work from anywhere around the globe. The truth is that if you really want to ditch the office in 2025, chances are you’ll be able to – as long as you know where to look. There are plenty of companies committed to remote work in 2025.

For more exciting job listings, check out our guide to fully-remote jobs you can apply for this January.

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Adam Rowe Writer

How To Access TikTok After the Ban In 4 Simple Steps

Is the thought of a TikTok ban giving you separation anxiety? Learn how to evade the embargo in simple steps.

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Published on January 24, 2025

Since launching in the US market eight years ago, TikTok has been used by millions of Americans to connect with like-minded people, keep up with trends, and escape stress with some light-hearted comic relief.

However, after a long-standing tug-of-war between US politicians and TikTok parent company ByteDance over the app’s shady data collection practices, TikTok is on track to getting banned this week – unless the legislation is overturned or delayed by Congress in the eleventh hour.

Not ready to give up your Sunday night doom scroll? Rest assured, there are ways you can evade the looming ban with a little preparation. We outline how exactly this can be done in simple steps, so you can keep scrolling to your heart’s content if the ban does come into effect.

When Is TikTok Getting Banned In The US?

After a long back-and-forth between US legislators and TikTok’s parent company ByteDance, TikTok is on track to get banned in the US on Sunday, January 19. This is unless the Supreme Court accepts a last-minute legal bid from ByteDance, claiming that the action would be unconstitutional.

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If the ban takes place this weekend, users aren’t legally obliged to stop using the app, nor will it magically vanish from smartphones. However, with rumors circulating that the Byte-Dance-owned company will make the app unavailable to US users the day the ban goes into effect, we recommend taking precautionary measures while you still can.

How To Access TikTok After The Ban

Not ready to say goodbye to your favorite app? Follow the steps below to side-step TikTok’s looming ban:

1. Keep the app downloaded

If the ban goes ahead on January 19, the TikTok app will no longer be available to download from US app stores. Existing users will still be able to use TikTok if it’s already on their smartphones, though.

So, if you want to carry on using TikTok after its potential ban date, all you need to do is keep the app on your phone. However, you should be aware that as the app won’t be receiving regular updates, it will likely become less secure and more buggy over time.

2. Choose a VPN

To access TikTok after the ban, you’ll also need to use a VPN. VPNs are privacy tools that conceal a user’s Internet Protocol (IP) address. Not only does this obfuscation make it harder for cybercriminals to access user data, but it also allows users to bypass geo-restrictions and access content from anywhere in the world.

Lots of free VPNs don’t offer strong security protocols, however, and in some cases can actually leave devices more vulnerable to exploits like malware and DDoS attacks. To stay on the safe side, we recommend using a trusted provider like SurfShark, as it offers in-built security mechanisms and the fastest server speeds of any VPN we tested.

Pure VPN is another option that can help you avoid lag when scrolling through TikTok, or accessing other streaming services due to its fast response times. Check out our guide to the best VPN providers for iPhone for a detailed comparison of our favorite tools.

3. Open the VPN and select a location where TikTok isn’t blocked

Once you’ve downloaded and opened your chosen VPN, simply change your geo-location to a country where TikTok isn’t banned. Your choice will be pretty extensive as only a handful of countries have banned the app outright, including India, Jordan, Afghanistan, and Nepal.

You should bear in mind that using a VPN with TikTok will change what content you see on the app. So we’d suggest only choosing an English-speaking country, like the UK or Canada if you speak English as a first language. If you’re under 16, we’d recommend against using Australian geo-locations, however, due to the country’s age restrictions.

4. Open VPN and scroll TikTok

Once you’ve completed the steps above, you’ll be free to use TikTok as usual.

If, for any reason, you have to delete the short-form video app, it is also possible to download it again by changing the location of the App Store or Google Play to outside of the US. Doing so will also lift update restrictions on TikTok, so it’s worth taking this extra step if you don’t want your experience on the app to deteriorate in the future.

What Are The Best TikTok Alternatives?

TikTok’s unique algorithm is expert in knowing what content to recommend, but if you aren’t interested in using a VPN, or you’ve been considering moving on from the app anyway, other alternatives exist.

Our top recommendation is YouTube Shorts, as the functionality is already built into the YouTube platform, making it easily accessible, and in many cases, preventing users from having to download a separate app. YouTube Shorts takes your viewing history into account as well, helping provide you with more tailored short-form content.

Instagram Reels is another popular alternative, with a similar interface and algorithm to TikTok, and much of the same short-form content. There are lots of emerging lesser-known platforms too, so check out our full guide to the best TikTok alternatives for our full round-up.

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Adam Rowe Writer

Google Won’t Comply With EU Fact-Checking Requirements

New EU regulations call for Google to include fact-checking results alongside Google and Youtube searches.

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Published on January 24, 2025

Google has sent a letter in response to a new EU law requiring fact-checks on its search results and YouTube videos. Their response? Google won’t be adding the checks.

Google has never used fact-checking in its content moderation, despite the massive cultural dominance of its search results and YouTube videos — to say nothing of the hallucinations offered by the AI summaries that Google has been appending to most search engine results pages.

The European Commission’s recent Disinformation Code of Practice aims to combat disinformation online. However, like a lot of tech giants in 2025, Google is signalling a lack of interest in playing along.

The Letter

The news was broken by Axios, which obtained a letter penned by Google’s global affairs president Kent Walker to Renate Nikolay, the deputy director general for the European Commission’s content and technology wing.

In it, Walker states that Google won’t commit to the required fact-checking, saying it “simply isn’t appropriate or effective for our services.”

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Meeting the EU regulations would call for Google to include fact-checking results alongside Google and Youtube searches, as well as incorporating fact-checks into its ranking systems and algorithms themselves.

According to Axios, Walker instead pointed to the “significant potential” of the user-generated contextual notes that YouTube enabled last year, which function similarly to Twitter/X’s Community Notes program.

Google’s Issues With Disinformation

Google’s AI summaries have been dinged for inaccuracies in the recent past ranging from recommending Elmer’s glue in pizza sauce to claiming former US President James Madison graduated from the University of Wisconsin 21 times. Granted, those examples are from last year, but I’ve spoken to colleagues in just the last month who have noted inaccuracies in Google’s summaries.

Needless to say, this isn’t a great look for the most well-known search engine on the planet.

But making the changes required to turn out dependable results consistently would require significant changes to the tech giant’s algorithm. Judging from its new letter, Google either doesn’t have confidence that it can make those changes, or doesn’t think that it can keep profits high enough while doing so.

Google Isn’t the Only Tech Platform That Won’t Moderate

In 2025, it seems that ditching fact-checkers and moderation is a trend for tech giants.

Most recently, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg personally announced a Meta policy change that will see an end to fact-checks and a reduction in moderation across platforms including Facebook, Instagram, and Threads.

But the original source for the current trend might be the years-old Twitter takeover by controversial billionaire Elon Musk, who has presided over a Community Notes program that Meta, and now Google, will be cribbing from.

Whatever the case, tech giants appear to be adapting a “not our problem” approach to the content on their world-reshaping platforms.

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Written by:

Adam Rowe Writer