Axios

The tech industry and its liberal allies pushed back Tuesday on Republican FCC Chairman Ajit Pai's contention that they're a greater threat to free speech online than internet providers like Comcast and Verizon that are subject to the net neutrality rules he's trying to repeal.

Why it matters: Pai is trying to close the deal on a policy reversal that is supported by established telecom companies under the banner of Trump-era conservative populism. Jabbing Silicon Valley for supporting the net neutrality rules, while also removing some content from their own platforms, is exactly what some on the right want to hear.

A San Francisco judge (again) delayed Waymo's upcoming trial against Uber after a mysterious letter from a former employee of the ride-hailing company surfaced. The judge granted Waymo's request for more time to prepare for the trial, since the letter had been withheld by Uber.

Why it matters: The letter was uncovered last week, when the Department of Justice contacted the presiding judge about its existence. Though the letter's contents aren't publicly available, and even Waymo's lawyers have only seen a redacted version of it, it appears to contain important information about Uber's acquisition of Otto Trucking. It also appears to explain why the thousands of proprietary files Waymo says its former employee took with him never seemed to have made it onto Uber's computers.

Chicago and Illinois' Cook County are suing Uber over the 2016 data breach that implicated 57 million driver and passenger accounts and the company's decision not to publicly disclose it until this month, per the Chicago Sun-Times. The paper notes that the city's mayor, Rahm Emanuel, is the brother of an Uber investor and is seen as having been favorable to the ride-hailing company in the past.

Why it matters: State, local and federal officials aren't happy about the breach, with attorneys general around the country investigating the issue and members of Congress writing to the company about the hack on Monday.

What they're saying: "We take this matter very seriously and we are happy to answer any questions regulators may have," said an Uber spokesperson in a statement.

The drawn-out legal battle between Waymo and Uber will finally begin the trial process this week, with jury selection scheduled for Wednesday and the actual trial to begin next Monday.

Last-minute twist: Last week, the presiding judge received a letter from the Department of Justice. Though he hasn't revealed its contents, the judge ordered Uber to bring in three witnesses, including a former security analyst, to a pre-trial hearing today. Subsequently, yesterday Waymo asked for a continuance so it can adequately prepare after Uber turned over a critical letter from the former security analyst that it had previously concealed.

Over the course of two weeks, a woman named Jaime Phillips met for several interviews with the Washington Post during which she falsely alleged that Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore had a sexual relationship with her in 1992 and that she had an abortion at 15, the Post reports. The story was fake, and, while she told it, Phillips repeatedly asked Post reporters how her claims would impact Moore's bid for the Senate if made public.

The fallout: When the Post confronted Phillips about inconsistencies in her story, she "insisted that she was not working with any organization that targets journalists." But Post reporters saw her walking into the New York offices of Project Veritas — a group that goes after mainstream media by feeding reporters fake stories to expose, as the organization calls it, media bias.

Facebook said Monday it would use artificial intelligence to identify posts and live videos where users are expressing suicidal thoughts.

Why it matters: The company has been under pressure for live-streaming violent and graphic incidents, while being accused of not having the human resources to successfully moderate live content on its platform.

An Israeli court has banned Uber from operating in the country less than a month after the company began offering 24/7 ride-sharing services there, per Haaretz and The Jerusalem Post. The ban comes as the result of a lawsuit by a taxi drivers' association with a judge agreeing that Uber drivers did not have the appropriate insurance to transport customers.

Why it matters: It's illustrative of Uber's growing pains within global legal and regulatory frameworks as it attempts to expand its reach around the world. To make matters worse in Israel, Uber still has a pending lawsuit against it from Israel's Transportation Ministry, claiming that it subverts an Israeli regulation that forbids drivers offering passengers a ride for a profit without a taxi license.

Newspaper columnists are mocking cities like Chicago and Fresno, Calif., over the largesse they are offering to attract Amazon's new headquarters, from multi-billion-dollar tax abatements to more exotic handouts like the right to have its tax dollars spent only on public projects benefitting the company directly.

Why it matters: Amazon says HQ2, as it calls its planned second headquarters, will employ some 40,000 to 50,000 future workers and pay them an average of about $100,000 a year each when you include salary and benefits. "A single company is viewed as such a shiny prize that some seem ready to wave the white flag on the whole 'for the people, by the people' experiment," writes the Seattle Times' Danny Westneat. The offers are, "let's face it, the equivalent of bribes," the L.A. Times' Michael Hiltzik wrote last month.