Last November, Amazon notified customers that it would stop accepting Visa credit cards in the UK as of January 19th, 2022, blaming the high fees Visa charges for credit card transactions. Now, the company has backtracked on that, telling customers via email that it will continue accepting Visa cards, at least for the time being.

"The expected change regarding the use of Visa credit cards on Amazon.co.uk will no longer take place on January 19," an Amazon spokesperson told Engadget. " We are working closely with Visa on a potential solution that will enable customers to continue using their Visa credit cards on Amazon.co.uk."

The dispute has been simmering for a while, with Amazon previously accusing Visa of charging high credit card transaction fees, and Visa saying that Amazon was "threatening to restrict consumer choice in the future." Both companies, global leaders of their respective industries, previously said that they were attempting to work towards a solution. 

Amazon didn't elaborate further on its statement but also didn't set another deadline — so presumably UK buyers will be able to use their Visa cards for the foreseeable future. 

Last June, Alphabet’s self-driving unit worked with J.B. Hunt, a trucking and logistics company, to test its Waymo Via technology in Texas. On Friday, the two announced they’re forming a strategic partnership with the hope of deploying a fully autonomous trucking operation within the state sometime in the next few years. In the immediate future, Waymo and J.B. Hunt say they plan to hold multiple pilots involving Waymo Via. That’s the Waymo Driver-powered unit the Alphabet subsidiary developed for Class 8 trucks. They also plan to complete additional market studies.

The expanded partnership follows a successful first pilot in which Waymo and J.B Hunt said they moved 862,179 lbs of freight without their test trucks speeding or ending up in any accidents. The conclusion they drew at the time was that Waymo Driver was ready to deliver freight on-time and safely. Waymo is just one of a handful of companies working on autonomous trucking technology. A few months before the company completed its June pilot with J.B. Hunt, Aurora, the startup that acquired Uber’s Advanced Technologies Group, announced it was working with Volvo to build fully autonomous semi trucks that would carry cargo across North America.

A group of hackers is trading a database of stolen information from FlexBooker, a cloud-based tool for scheduling appointments, containing sensitive customer data. According to BleepingComputer, the company suffered a security breach before the holidays and notified its customers about the attack in an email, where it revealed that its Amazon AWS servers were compromised on December 23rd. It also admitted that its system data storage was accessed and downloaded.

Based on information from Have I Been Pwned, the breach compromised 3.7 million accounts containing email addresses, names, passwords, phone numbers and partial credit card numbers. BleepingComputer says a group called Uawrongteam took credit for the attack and shared links to archives with the stolen data, which the group claimed also include users' drivers' licenses, other IDs, password salt and hashed passwords. FlexBooker's typical customers are people who need to be able to quickly schedule appointments with clients, such as doctors, lawyers, dentists, gyms, mechanics, salons, trainers, therapists, so and and so forth. 

In Flexbooker's email to users, it said the infiltrators failed to get "any credit card or other payment card information." We're guessing the company didn't take the stolen partial credit card numbers into account. Before Flexbooker, Uawrongteam previously claimed other data breaches and also traded databases with stolen information from its previous targets. They include data from Racing.com, a digital TV network that broadcasts horse racing, and from rediCASE Case Management Software solution for health services and other businesses. 

The European Commission has approved Microsoft’s $19.7 billion bid to buy Nuance Communications. The regulator said on Tuesday the proposed acquisition “would raise no competition concerns” within the European Union. In analyzing the bid, it found that “Microsoft and Nuance offer very different products.” Moreover, it believes the company will continue to face “strong” competition from other firms in the future.

Before today, the US and Australia had both signed off on the purchase, but it’s not yet a done deal. On December 13th, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority said it would investigate the transaction. With the regulator accepting public comments until January 10th, 2022, it’s unlikely the deal will close by the end of 2021 as Microsoft had said it would when it first announced its intention to buy Nuance. 

Electric vehicle company Nikola will pay $125 million to settle civil charges from the Securities and Exchange Commission of defrauding investors. The company was accused of misleading investors about its in-house production capabilities, technological advancements, reservations and orders, hydrogen production and more.

The SEC accused founder and former CEO Trevor Milton of undertaking "a public relations campaign aimed at inflating and maintaining Nikola’s stock price" through tweets and media appearances before the company had made a commercial product. It said that the company also misled investors by "misrepresenting or omitting material facts" about the hydrogen station at its headquarters, how long it would take to refuel its concept vehicles, the source and cost of power for planned hydrogen production and the risks and benefits of a mooted partnership with a major automaker.

“As the order finds, Nikola Corporation is responsible both for Milton’s allegedly misleading statements and for other alleged deceptions, all of which falsely portrayed the true state of the company’s business and technology,” SEC enforcement director Gurbir S. Grewal said in a statement.

Although Nikola did not admit to or deny the SEC's charges of securities law violations, it agreed to some voluntary undertakings, to pay the penalty and to cease and desist from "future violations of the charged provisions." It will cooperate with ongoing litigation and investigation too.

"We are pleased to bring this chapter to a close as the company has now resolved all government investigations," Nikola said in a statement. "We will continue to execute on our strategy and vision to deliver on our business plan, including delivering trucks to customers, expanding our manufacturing facilities and our sales and service network, and building out our hydrogen infrastructure ecosystem including hydrogen production, distribution and dispensing stations." The company also said it was seeking reimbursement from Milton "for costs and damages in connection with the government and regulatory investigations."

Nikola became a publicly traded company in June 2020 through a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) deal, which enables companies to bypass the usual process of going public. That September, reports suggested the SEC was looking into Nikola's claims about its electric trucks. Milton, who had stepped down as CEO just before the company went public, resigned as executive chairman a few days after news emerged about the probe.

A grand jury indicted Milton on fraud charges in July 2021. He was accused of lying to investors about “nearly all aspects of the business” to increase Nikola's share price. He denied the charges and is free on bail pending a trial that's scheduled for April. 

Meanwhile, Nikola delivered its first electric trucks to customers last week.

Following months of speculation, electric transport startup Rivian shared where it plans to build a second factory. In the summer of 2022, the automaker will break ground on a facility about an hour east of Atlanta, Georgia, it announced on Thursday. Once the plant is complete sometime in 2024, the company hopes to eventually produce 400,000 electric vehicles there. It also plans to build a battery production facility nearby.

Rivian says the EV facility will cost approximately $5 billion to build and will employ more than 7,500 employees. The company will pay for it with proceeds from its recent November 10th IPO. Once complete, the facility will significantly boost Rivan’s manufacturing capacity. The automaker claims its first and currently only factory in Normal, Illinois can produce about 150,000 cars annually. It plans to eventually manufacture about 200,000 there every year.

That might seem like a lot but Rivian is still in the process of scaling production and meeting demand for its vehicles. As of December 15th, 2021, the company said it had produced 652 of its R1 vehicles. As of that same day, it had a total of 71,000 pre-orders from customers. It also needs to produce at least 100,000 trucks for Amazon. In other words, it has its work cut out for it.

General Motors announced Thursday that Dan Ammann, CEO of its self-driving vehicle division, Cruise, is leaving both his position and the company. Details are remain scarce on the reason for Ammann's sudden departure, though the company has already named Cruise President and CTO Kyle Vogt the interim CEO. What's more, former Northrop Grumman CEO, Wesley Bush, will be joining the Cruise Board of Directors as well.

"GM will accelerate the strategy the company detailed in its recent Investor Day, in which Cruise will play an integral role in building GM’s autonomous vehicle (AV) platform as GM aggressively pursues addressable AV markets beyond rideshare and delivery," GM PR wrote in Thursday's staffing announcement. 

The move comes weeks after the company earned DMV approval to offer autonomous rides to the California public in October and the launch of its driverless taxi service this November.

Block may have hit a snag in its rebranding effort. Per The Wall Street Journal, H&R Block is suing the company formerly known as Square. In a federal complaint filed on Thursday, the tax-prep firm said the name change could hurt its brand. It wants Jack Dorsey’s payments outfit to stop using the name and a logo it contends is “nearly identical” to its own.

“The goodwill that Block has so carefully created and nurtured over the past six decades is now under attack by a Silicon Valley fintech company,” it said. We’ve reached out to Block, the other one, for comment.

Square changed its name to Block at the start of December. At the time, the company said it wanted a name that better reflected the expansion of its business beyond payments and the growing importance of blockchain technologies to its identity. Since its founding in 2009, Block’s business has expanded to include stock and crypto trading, money lending and even music streaming.

Where things may get tricky in terms of a trademark infringement complaint is that Block bought Credit Karma's tax-prep business in 2020. It plans to offer tax returns through its Cash App. In trademark cases, a court will look at similarities between the products and services two companies offer. It will also consider how the two may compete against one another in the future. Jack, if you're reading this: it's never been a better time to rebrand the company to "Tesseract."

Reddit has taken a big step towards going public. In a press release, the company has revealed that it has confidentially submitted a draft registration statement with the US Securities and Exchange Commission regarding "the proposed initial public offering of its common stock." The announcement offers very little detail about its planned IPO, which is expected to take place after the SEC's approval. 

The social network also said that it has yet to determine how many shares will be offered and for how much. It will likely reveal an initial valuation in the near future as it prepares for an IPO, but it's worth noting that it raised $700 million in a funding round back in August at a valuation of over $10 billion. 

According to Reuters, Reddit sought to hire investment bankers and lawyers in September as advisers for a planned IPO in New York. While the IPO's timing will depend on market conditions, Reddit was apparently hoping that the company will be valued at over $15 billion by the time it takes place next year. In March, the company also hired hired Drew Vollero, who led Snap's IPO back in 2017, as its first chief financial officer.

Reddit was founded in 2005 and has shot up in popularity as a news aggregator, messaging board and social media website since then. In the second quarter of this year, it generated $100 million in advertising revenue — 192 percent more than what it generated in the same period of 2020 — for the first time. Going forward, it intends to find more way to incorporate video and audio into its website, which could lead to even bigger ad earnings.

Lending apps have shaken up Kenya’s financial landscape, but they’ve largely gone unregulated — until now. TechCrunchreports President Kenyatta has signed an amended law that gives the country’s Central Bank the power to license and regulate digital lenders. Companies have six months to apply for a license.

Lenders will also have to honor existing consumer and data protection laws. Firms will have to maintain the confidentiality of customer info. They’ll need to disclose pricing, the consequences of defaulting on loans, and outline debt recovery.

Mobile lending has thrived in Kenya and other countries where many residents don’t have bank accounts and can’t take advantage of conventional financing. However, some services have been accused of abusing their audiences with predatory interest rates. While the updated law isn’t guaranteed to end shady practices, it might discourage those lenders and improve trust for would-be customers.