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UK privacy and security experts warn over coronavirus app mission creep

A number of UK computer security and privacy experts have signed an open letter raising transparency and mission creep concerns about the national approach to develop a coronavirus contacts tracing app. The letter, signed by around 150 academics, follows a similar letter earlier this month signed by around 300 academics from across the world, who urged caution over the use of such tech tools and called for governments that choose to deploy digital contacts tracing to use privacy-preserving techniques and systems. “ We urge that the health benefits of a digital solution be analysed in depth by specialists from all relevant academic disciplines, and sufficiently proven to be of value to justify the dangers involved,” the UK academics write now, directing their attention at NHSX, the digital arm of the National Health Service which has been working on building a digital contacts tracing app since early March.  “ It has been reported that NHSX is discussing an approach which reco...
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Latin America’s startup ecosystem is not immune to COVID-19

Brian Walsh Contributor Share on Twitter Brian Walsh is the head of WIND Ventures , the venture capital arm of COPEC, a leading energy company in Central and South America and the U.S. WIND Ventures provides mobility, energy and retail startups and scaleups with access to Latin America. Over the last number of years, Latin America has emerged as a significant growth market for big tech, including Uber, Airbnb, Amazon, Facebook, Coursera and others. It has also become a growing and vibrant homegrown startup ecosystem. The region has sprouted 19-plus unicorns, several exits and even a billion-dollar, single-round financing. The coronavirus pandemic, however, is having an outsized impact on Latin America’s startup activity compared to other regions, judging by Q1 2020 activity numbers — and this is just the beginning. When including the U.S., Western Europe (WEU), U.K., China and Latin America, the global startup innovation landscape experienced a 27% drop in Q1 2020 in te...
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Niche’s one-stop shop for college searchers raises a $35M Series C

Despite the implications of its name, edtech platform Niche took nearly a decade-and-a-half to find its place within the world of the college search process. The company started as College Prowler, selling informational books, which looked like a hybrid between CliffsNotes and a Zagat guide, about colleges. It sold hundreds of thousands of copies and amassed millions in revenue, but then had to face the economic crisis of 2008 and figure out a new go-to-market strategy. Today, and a few pivots later, Niche partners with college campuses and schools to provide information to prospective students. The focus is the same as in 2002, according to founder Luke Skurman, as it tries to make the college search process more clear and student-focused. Think of Niche as a focused platform for students to review their college options without having to track multiple browser tabs and messy spreadsheets. It allows users to compare metrics like historic acceptance rate, cost and post-graduate e...
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Smart contact lens startup Mojo Vision raises $51M

Mojo Vision’s technology still felt early-stage when we met with them back at CES. But the demos we did see were enough to convince us that there really could be something to the California startup’s smart content lens technology. Clearly we weren’t alone in that. The company just announced that it has raised more than $51 million as part of a Series B-1, led by New Enterprise Associates (NEA), along with Gradient Ventures, Khosla Ventures, Liberty Global, Struck Capital, Dolby Family Ventures, Motorola Solutions Venture Capital and others. The lofty raise puts its total funding at north of $159 million. The move also finds NEA’s venture partner Greg Papadopoulos joining Mojo’s board. Mojo Vision’s AR contact lenses are very cool, but many questions remain As expected, Mojo’s using the large raise to help productize its technology. The company says it is currently working with the FDA’s Breakthrough device Program to introduce early applications for the technology focused on t...
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