The cloud is an essential component of all e-commerce sites. Not all clouds, however, are created equal. The key thing here is reliability. Making sure that the cloud service and Service Level Agreement (SLA) are right for your business may not be clear before you enter into a website development contract.

Nintendo seems to be uncomfortable with the dominant business model in the mobile-gaming market, which allows players to download and start playing a game for free, then entices them to spend money on the software through in-app purchases. Those tactics have come under the increased scrutiny of regulators, which also concerns Nintendo, a brand with a family-friendly image.

Twitter on Tuesday notified business clients that their personal information, including email addresses, phone numbers, and the last four digits of their credit card numbers may have been compromised. Self-serve advertisers that viewed billing information on ads.twitter.com or analytics.twitter.com were affected. The issue occurred prior to May 20, 2020. However, Twitter only notified customers about it on June 23.

In the midst of the global Covid-19 pandemic this spring, entrepreneurs Rebecca Cahua and Vivian Qu joined forces, skills, and teams to create and bring to production a reuseable nanofiltration mask that combines a high level of filtration with breathability and comfort. The E-Commerce Times spoke with Cahua and Qu to hear the story behind their new mask.

Cisco Live was last week, and this was their first large scale virtual event. What made this event very different from the other games was the amount of effort they put into socially responsible projects. Many of the customer projects they highlighted are dealing with a variety of world problems, be they related to the pandemic or not.

Qualcomm has announced its Robotics RB5 platform, with 5G and 4G connectivity, on-device AI and machine learning. The platform's Qualcomm QRB5165 processor, which is customized for robotics applications, offers a heterogeneous computing architecture coupled with the 5th-generation Qualcomm AI Engine that delivers 15 Tera Trillion Operations Per Second (TOPS) of AI performance.

A new e-commerce partnership could bring 1,200 Shopify small business sellers to the Walmart Marketplace this year. Walmart's top e-commerce priority for years was to build a marketplace customers would trust. The company has joined forces with Shopify, an all-in-one commerce platform used by more than 1 million businesses, to open the Walmart Marketplace to its sellers, said VP Jeff Clementz.

There has been a lot of debate in the public sphere around the degree and kind of legal regulation a society should apply to online speech. While the dialogue has become more intense and urgent in the last few years, the effort to impose limits on Internet speech has been contentious from the start. At present, Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act is undergoing reconsideration.

Online medical appointments have become commonplace during the pandemic, and they're likely to continue, even as in-person medical visits resume. The convenience, accessibility and cost-effectiveness of telemedicine will make it a vital part of comprehensive medical care in the digital age. "Both patients and providers can benefit," said Mia Finkelston, MD, medical director at Amwell.

When entering into website development contracts, the more you know, the more likely you will be able to avoid common pitfalls. It is your website, but ownership of the intellectual property on the site is not always apparent or obvious. When you engage an information technology vendor to build a new website you probably expect that you will own the IP in the end product.

Google is facing a class-action lawsuit for tracking people who used the Chrome browser's Incognito mode. Law firm Boies Schiller Flexner filed the complaint on behalf of people who used the privacy mode during the past four years. "Google tracks and collects consumers' history and other Web activity no matter what safeguards consumers undertake to protect their data privacy," it states.

U.S. government agencies and cloud technology providers are heading toward a reset in how they cooperate on cybersecurity challenges. The expected growth of cloud use will create a more complex federal security landscape, according to a report from Thales. Federal agencies actually have moved ahead of businesses in cloud adoption, with 54 percent of agency data already embedded in the cloud.

Building a successful global business is a never-ending juggling act. With what can seem like an unlimited number of moving parts, compromises feel inevitable. Efficiency is traded for simplicity. Optimal long-term solutions are traded for quick and dirty fixes. These tradeoffs can be especially problematic for e-commerce businesses. Inefficiencies aren't just theoretical problems.

When entering into website development contracts, the more you know the more likely you will be able to avoid contract disasters that could prevent your website from launching on time or working properly. There are many stories about failed software development projects, not just in connection with website development contracts, but with all information technology projects.

I'm a member of what is likely a reasonably sizable informal group of people who trained to be a CEO but declined the job -- in my case, several times. So I don't envy the position that Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey is in as he tries to figure out a way to do the right thing concerning the spread of false information and defend his company against an attack by the designated leader of the free world.

Consumer spending has shifted even more heavily from brick-and-mortar to e-commerce during the coronavirus pandemic. Many retailers are pivoting to e-commerce shops for the first time, and established online retailers are experiencing sizable growth. Businesses that are seeing the highest uptick are those selling "essentials" -- including groceries, office supplies and more.

Switzerland has launched a pilot program for SwissCovid, a contact tracing app based on Apple and Google's jointly developed APIs. The APIs will work with iOS 13.5 and devices running Android 6.0 or higher. The pilot involves several thousand workers at Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne, ETH Zurich, the Swiss Army, and staff at some hospitals and cantonal administrations.

COVID-19's rampage is causing the electronics industry to suffer supply chain setbacks. Product innovation remains incredibly important in today's new normal, but electronics industry product launches have been delayed or canceled due to the pandemic, suggests a new study. COVID-19 also has led to increased component costs, the need to rework products, and the inability to fill customer orders.

One of the exciting things that came out of Microsoft Build was that the company has been working to create virtual court solutions. If done right, a virtual system could fix a lot of court-related problems. It would allow judges to work around their schedules better and give attorneys improved access to online resources. It also might provide a way for jurors to improve their understanding.

The Linux Foundation has achieved a major milestone: formal status on the international standards front. Its Joint Development Foundation received approval as an ISO/IEC JTC 1 Publicly Available Specification Submitter. The submitter status designation benefits the global business and technical ecosystem by enabling accelerated adoption of open standards and specifications.

Apple has reopened nearly 100 of its retail outlets around the world and plans to open another 25 in the U.S. and 12 in Canada. All of its retail stores previously were closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. "Our commitment is to only move forward with a reopening once we're confident we can safely return to serving customers from our stores," noted Apple SVP of Retail Deirdre O'Brien.

Oracle appears to be undergoing a kind of resurgence during the coronavirus crisis. Financial analysts are saying nice things about its ability to pay dividends even in tough times. Its technology, which always has been good, is seeing an interesting uptick. All of this is buffing the company's image after years of, yes-but responses from the market.

By necessity, almost all education is happening online at the moment. However, the trend of online education likely will continue even after the COVID-19 pandemic is over. Online learning is often more convenient than in-person training, and because the methods and techniques for online education are evolving and improving, it quickly has become a preferred business tool.

Facebook has set up American Edge, a political advocacy group for the high-tech industry, which is drawing scrutiny from United States lawmakers. American Edge will fund ad campaigns and studies by academics to push its efforts. Facebook is working with a diverse group of stakeholders to build support for the tech industry. It formed American Edge as a nonprofit organization in December.

Oracle and Zoom just entered a deal that for once is more about technological audacity than about dollars -- a partnership to host Zoom on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure. In just a few months -- basically since the beginning of the novel coronavirus pandemic -- Zoom has seen demand for its service grow from about 10 million daily meeting participants to more than 300 million.

Some of the troubling reports of corporate responses to COVID-19 include forced work in unsafe areas, not enough -- or any -- protection gear, massive layoffs and furloughs, and the sense that a critical mass of well-paid CEOs and politicians don't get that many people live paycheck to paycheck. There are exceptions though, and HP stands out, thanks to HR VP Tracy Keogh and CEO Enrique Lores.

Legal experts and leading scientists have teamed up with Creative Commons to create the Open COVID Pledge to help speed up the battle against the coronavirus pandemic. The Pledge gives broad permission to anyone to use intellectual property not otherwise accessible to the public, and generally replaces the need for any other license or royalty agreement.

Life as we knew it before the coronavirus is gone forever, and many changes will manifest in the pandemic's aftermath. How will it impact privacy laws around the globe? No one knows for sure, and we will not know until after the coronavirus is behind us. Cybercriminals long have been taking advantage of the Internet, and now the spread of COVID-19 has sped up their evil work.

Amazon has promised to check temperatures and provide surgical masks for workers at its fulfillment centers and Whole Foods grocery stores starting next week. Instacart workers have not received similar promises. The news came in the midst of brewing turmoil among employees. Some full-time and contract workers at Whole Foods, Amazon and Instacart walked out or called in sick on Monday and Tuesday.

As COVID-19 continues to spread, states and cities across the U.S. have imposed restrictions -- from banning large gatherings to lockdowns, with citizens ordered to stay home except for essential jobs and errands, or get outdoor exercise. These steps came as infection numbers mounted, and the World Health Organization stated that COVID-19 was in fact a global pandemic.