Good morning. Have you heard about the latest Apple deal?
No, it’s not about AI (for once). Apple reached an agreement with the digital radio service TuneIn to distribute its six homegrown, ad-free radio stations to TuneIn’s 75 million monthly active users.
Odd, right? Isn’t the company that invented the iPod—and enjoys an iPhone install base of, oh, about 1.6 billion worldwide—big enough in that category?
In truth, no. Spotify, the category leader, continues to increase its share in part at the expense of Apple Music, whose share has declined. (How well is Spotify doing? The Swedish company adds more subscribers in a year than services by Tencent, Apple, and Amazon combined. Skål!)
So you can imagine how Apple feels about it. In the words of a rather famous Dude: “This aggression will not stand, man.” Today’s tech news below. —Andrew Nusca
P.S. Fortune’s editor-in-chief Alyson Shontell has launched a new podcast called Fortune 500: Titans and Disrupters of Industry. If you’d like to pick the brains of some of the biggest names in business, smash that subscribe button.
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‘Salt Typhoon’ hacking campaign spreads across the globe
The Federal Bureau of Investigation warned on Wednesday that the long-running “Salt Typhoon” cyber espionage campaign has now affected hundreds of U.S. companies and organizations in more than 80 countries.
Launched in 2019 but discovered only last year, “Salt Typhoon” gave Chinese intelligence officers access to surveil the private communications and geolocation data of U.S. citizens, the FBI says, thanks to more than a million intercepted call records via telecommunications firms including AT&T, Lumen, and Verizon.
The hackers targeted the phone calls and text messages of more than 100 Americans, including U.S. President Donald Trump. They were also able to access information from federal government systems—most notably one used for court-authorized wiretaps.
“Their actions didn’t just violate the expectation of privacy in the United States,” the bureau wrote in a blog post. “They abused that expectation globally.”
The FBI described the campaign as “indiscriminate” and says it has notified about 600 companies that the cyber spies expressed interest in them.
In conjunction with security agencies in the U.S. and abroad, the National Security Agency also published an advisory guiding IT pros on how to mitigate the threat.
Chinese officials have reportedly denied involvement in the effort, opting instead to accuse U.S. firms of working together to fabricate false evidence in a bid to frame China.
As Brett Leatherman, the FBI’s deputy assistant director for cyber operations, told the Wall Street Journal: “This is one of the more consequential cyber espionage breaches we have seen here in the United States.” —AN
Nvidia earnings beat Wall Street’s sky-high expectations
Nvidia recorded no China sales revenue for its H20 chips and reported revenue that narrowly beat Wall Street targets in the second quarter as the AI chipmaker reported financial results on Wednesday.
The results, while confirming that demand for AI hardware remains solid, left investors underwhelmed and shares of Nvidia, the world’s most valuable company, declined 4% to around the $175 mark in extended trading Wednesday evening.
“[The stock movements are] probably just an initial reaction to a so-so number,” Scott Bickley, an advisory fellow at Info-Tech Research Group, told Fortune before the earnings call. “Which is kind of insane that we’re viewing $46.7 billion in a quarter as ‘so-so.’”
Nvidia’s revenue increased 56% from the same period a year ago to $46.74 billion, exceeding Wall Street’s projection of $46.52 billion. Profits came in at $26.4 billion, a 40.8% increase from $18.78 billion last quarter.
Nvidia posted diluted earnings per share at $1.08, beating projections of $1.02 for the second quarter. Gross margins grew to 72.4%, up significantly from 61% last quarter.
Nvidia has been navigating trade restrictions on H20 shipments to China since April. The U.S. government began issuing licenses for approved buyers in China in July, and Nvidia said a few of its China-based customers had received such licenses.
But no H20 chip revenue to China was included in its second-quarter revenue, Nvidia said. (It noted that some H20 chip inventory was sold outside of China in the second quarter, adding a $180 million benefit to the topline.)
While the Trump administration announced plans earlier this month to allow Nvidia and rival AMD to sell certain AI chips to approved Chinese buyers while giving the U.S. government a 15% cut of the proceeds, Nvidia said nothing concrete has yet come of it.
Not that it’s slowing down the company. As CEO Jensen Huang said on an investor call: “The AI race is on.” —Nino Paoli
Duolingo is facing an existential crisis
Google’s new AI-powered features for Google Translate are taking a page from Duolingo—and its responsive live translation could increasingly make language barriers a thing of the past.
Powered by its AI model Gemini, Google’s new beta “practice” option will let English-speaking Google Translate users practice their Spanish or French with custom lessons designed to fit each learner’s level of comprehension.
Spanish, French, or Portuguese speakers can also bolster their English skills using the app.
Much like the language-learning app Duolingo, users can use the new Google Translate features to practice both listening and speaking, with helpful hints available when necessary, while also checking their daily progress, Google said in a blog post.
Shares of Duolingo fell 3% following Google’s announcement before rebounding Wednesday as of midday.
The language-learning app, which boasts 130 million active users, has faced increased pressure from AI models like ChatGPT and Gemini, which are also capable of helping users learn a new language.
Notably, only about 10% of Duolingo’s users are paying customers, CEO Luis von Ahn told the New York Times earlier this month.
He added that he wasn’t worried about LLMs encroaching on the language learning space.
“Just having conversations in French on something like ChatGPT gets pretty boring after a while. It doesn’t keep you there,” he told the Times. “We keep you on task with all the gamification.” —Marco Quiroz-Gutierrez
More tech
—CrowdStrike shares drop 4%. Q2 revenue beats estimates but Q3 forecast underwhelms.
—Taiwan indicts three on trade secret allegations. Did TSMC 2-nanometer intelligence help Tokyo Electron?
—Google’s Pixel 10 Pro, reviewed: “The best AI phone on the market,” says one.
—TikTok’s parent is worth $330 billion, according to a ByteDance employee share buyback plan.
—HP Q3 revenue beats estimates. Strong computer sales thanks to that whole “AI” thing.
—Instagram’s Swift lift. Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s engagement announcement on the social platform has shattered…engagement records. (Oh, look what you made me do.)
—Microsoft Copilot comes to Samsung TVs. Movie suggestions, plot recaps, and more.
—Meituan profit drops 97%. Why? “Irrational competition” in the Chinese food delivery market. Oof.
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