Axios

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg held an unannounced meeting with President Trump during his visit to Washington on Thursday, Axios has learned.

Why it matters: With Facebook under pressure from regulators and lawmakers on privacy and other issues, Zuckerberg turned to personal diplomacy with the president on his first visit to D.C. since he testified before Congress last April. Zuckerberg also ate dinner with a group of senators on Wednesday and held a number of meetings on Capitol Hill.

A new feature in Mozilla and, soon, Chrome web browsers will stop snoops — from your boss to criminals — from tracking which sites you visit. But the same technology also has opponents, as many groups fighting child exploitation say it will hamper their work, and a few internet experts argue it will undermine security.

The big picture: The feature, known as DNS over HTTPS (DoH), has a lot of support in the internet engineering and privacy communities, including the Internet Engineering Task Force, a key internet standards body. But as in the larger debate over encryption, privacy benefits can have downsides for some parties.

Customers have to wait another day to buy the latest iPhones, but starting Thursday they can update existing phones to the latest operating system.

Why it matters: iOS 13 won't magically add a third camera to the back of your phone, but it will deliver other features found on the latest iPhones, including dark mode, Sign in with Apple and improved maps and photos.

Jeff Bezos announced Amazon’s Climate Pledge — to hit the Paris climate accord goal of carbon neutrality in 2040, 10 years early — Thursday in Washington, D.C.

Why it matters: More than 1,000 Amazon employees in Seattle plan to walk out Friday as part of the Global Climate Strike, CNBC reports. And over 8,200 have signed an open letter to Bezos to lower Amazon's carbon footprint.

Microsoft plans to buy back as much as $40 billion in stock and raise its dividend to 51 cents a share, the company said Wednesday. It's the third time Microsoft has authorized a package that large, following $40 billion buybacks in 2013 and in 2016.

The big picture: S&P 500 companies are again picking up the pace of buybacks after a major lull in the second quarter, with tech companies leading the way.

At an MIT conference on Wednesday, a journalist pointedly asked Russian President Vladimir Putin whether he would interfere again in U.S. elections. Putin demurred.

What's happening: The world leader was actually a glitchy deepfake. His face was a real-time AI-generated mask that made a performer look like Putin on screen — but because the mask stopped at the forehead, this was Putin with a fresh head of hair.

For the last 2 years, Amazon has largely been a subplot in the global backlash against Big Tech, with much of the scrutiny on Facebook, Uber and Google — until now.

Why it matters: Amazon is one of the richest companies in history, and for decades, no amount of bad news has stuck to it. Now, an onslaught of regulatory investigations and critical coverage is putting the behemoth on the defensive.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg discussed election security and privacy with a group of senators over dinner ahead of his return to Capitol Hill Thursday, said a spokesperson for Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), who organized the meeting.

Why it matters: Per Axios' Mike Allen, Zuckerberg is returning to Washington to meet with lawmakers for the first time since he testified before Congress in April 2018. He's trying to engage with Washington at a time when pressure on Facebook is rising from regulators and legislators around the world.

Facebook announced on Wednesday a ban on single-use plastic water bottles at its new global offices, the San Francisco Chronicle reports.

The state of play: This appears to be the largest ban from a private employer, impacting the company's roughly 40,000 employees. The Big Tech company will instead offer water-filling stations in its employee cafeterias in Burlingame, San Francisco, Fremont and Sunnyvale, California, and will install filling stations in its existing Menlo Park headquarters.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg will meet with lawmakers on Capitol Hill on Thursday — his first time in Washington since he testified before Congress last year, sources tell Axios.

Why it matters: Zuckerberg is returning to engage with Washington at a time when pressure on Facebook is rising from regulators and legislators around the world. A Facebook official said: "Mark will be in Washington, D.C., to meet with policymakers and talk about future internet regulation. There are no public events planned."

The U.S. Department of Transportation on Wednesday announced nearly $60 million in federal grants to 8 automated driving projects in 7 states.

Why it matters: The projects will help communities gather significant safety data that will be shared with the agency to help shape future regulations on self-driving cars.

Facebook on Wednesday announced a significant expansion to the Portal family of video chat devices that debuted last year, offering new features, lower prices and increased versatility.

Why it matters: Competition in the space is heating up, with Google's Nest Hub Max just hitting the market and Amazon potentially introducing new smart displays at an event next week.

The medical records of more than 5 million Americans and even more people globally — including X-rays, MRIs and CT scans — are vulnerable targets to even the simplest cybersecurity threats, ProPublica and German broadcaster Bayerischer Rundfunk found.

Why it matters: Because of the sensitivity of some of these records, patients face potential devastation if their images are hacked.