Daybreak Europe 7/14/2025
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Bloomberg
23 minutes ago
- Bloomberg
China Fails to Capitalize on Europe's Grievances Over US Tariffs
I'm Chris Anstey, an economics editor in Boston. Today we're looking at Europe-China ties. Send us feedback and tips to ecodaily@ And if you aren't yet signed up to receive this newsletter, you can do so here. Fifty years after the European Economic Community (now the European Union) established diplomatic ties with mainland China, relations with Beijing are at an ' inflection point.'
CNET
an hour ago
- CNET
Welcome to the Era of Online Age Verification. Are You Ready to Prove Yourself?
On Thursday morning I woke up to find I no longer had access to my messages on social network Bluesky. "You must complete age assurance in order to access this screen," a pop-up notification told me. It went on to say the local laws where I live mean that I need to verify I'm an adult to view mature content or send direct messages. I'm based in the UK, and the law Bluesky was referring to is the Online Safety Act, which comes into force today. This piece of legislation requires web companies to ensure that people under the age of 18 don't have access to harmful content, including porn and material relating to self-harm, suicide and eating disorders. If sites choose to allow this content, they must verify the ages of people using their platforms to confirm that they're adults. Failure to do so could result in fines of £18 million or 10% of annual revenue, whichever is greater. "Prioritising clicks and engagement over children's online safety will no longer be tolerated in the UK," Melanie Dawes, chief executive of regulator Ofcom, said in a statement. "Our message to tech firms is clear -- comply with age-checks and other protection measures set out in our Codes, or face the consequences." The Online Safety Act might be a UK-specific law, but it affects companies based in the US and around the world, including Bluesky, Reddit, Discord, X, Porn Hub and Grindr -- all of which have committed to "age-gating" features to protect young people from stumbling across harmful content. It's also emblematic of a bigger shift in internet culture, which is seeing age verification become a mainstream concern across the world. Increasingly, adults who want to keep accessing internet services, from mainstream social networks to porn sites, will have to prove their age. In other words, expect my Bluesky experience to be coming to the internet near you soon. Earlier this month, the European Commission published an age verification app prototype that will help keep young people safe online in accordance with the EU's Digital Services Act. We're also starting to see the ripple effect in the US of the legislation the UK and EU have enacted, says Vaishnavi J, founder of online child safety consultancy Vys. Just last month, the US Supreme Court upheld a Texas law requiring porn sites to verify the age of all visitors. "State laws, advocacy campaigns, and growing parental demand in the US are all converging around the need for age assurance," said J, who previously worked in the policy teams at Meta and Twitter. "Combine that with rapid advances in the tech ecosystem, and it's no longer a question of if the US adopts age verification, but how and when." Safety vs. privacy The Wild West nature of the internet and the ability to be largely anonymous often blurs the lines between spaces occupied by children and adults in a way that doesn't happen in the offline world. This means children are often exposed to content many would consider inappropriate or harmful. According to Ofcom's own research, around 1 in 10 children in the UK between the ages of 8 and 14 have watched online pornography -- an activity the new age verification rules are designed to prevent. Making the internet safer for children might be necessary and admirable, but age verification policies have also come under fire from digital rights and privacy groups. I've been covering the UK's attempts to bring in age verification since 2016. The government at the time decided it was too difficult and ultimately decided not to push ahead with plans aimed at age-gating porn sites in 2019. The main objection to the legislation was the same then as it is now. Asking people to share their government-issued identification with private companies poses a threat to their privacy. "The British public is being forced to hand over sensitive personal data to unregulated age assurance providers if they want to have full access to platforms such as Reddit and Bluesky or to use dating apps such as Grindr," said James Baker, head of programming at Open Rights Group, in a statement ahead of the Online Safety Act coming into force. "The threats and harms of phishing and hacking are very real, and will cause people online harms," he added. Open Rights Group also criticized the fact that people aren't being given the right to choose how they verify their age. A number of verification methods exist, including age estimation via video selfie (a method gaming platform Roblox announced it was introducing last week), banking or credit card checks, third-party digital ID services, mobile carrier checks or photo ID matching. It's up to the individual service which method they want to adopt, which could leave people vulnerable to problematic privacy policies. As with many internet rules, there's always some level of tradeoff involved when making the online world safe. In many ways, the idea of age verification is "common sense," Mariana Olaizola Rosenblat, tech policy adviser at NYU's Stern Business School, wrote in a blog post this week. At the same time, she added, depending on regulations and methods chosen, age verification can introduce serious privacy, security and access risks. "In some cases, the systems employed are so flawed that they fail to protect minors while also excluding adults who should have lawful access," said Rosenblat. "Policymakers must understand and carefully weigh these tradeoffs before mandating age verification at scale." Many critics of age verification have also argued that verification will be ineffective due to the wide availability of VPNs and teens' ability to circumvent any rules attempting to limit their internet use. Whether age verification is truly effective at keeping kids safe online is a question that can only be answered as the Online Safety Act and similar legislation comes into force. In the meantime, I -- and possibly you -- will need to be prepared to prove our identities and our ages if we're to continue using the internet in the way we've become accustomed to using it.
Forbes
an hour ago
- Forbes
Centene Reports $253 Million Loss Amid Health Insurer Cost Struggles
Centene chief executive officer Sarah London on Friday July 25, 2025 said the company is ... More "disappointed by our second quarter results, but we have a clear understanding of the trends that have impacted our performance, and are working with urgency and focus to restore our earnings trajectory." In this photo, London speaks during the Forbes Healthcare Summit in New York, US, on Tuesday, Dec. 5, 2023. Photographer: Michael Nagle/Bloomberg Health insurer Centene reported a $253 million loss in its second quarter as the provider of government-subsidized benefits struggles to manage costs of its health plan members. The $253 million loss, or 51 cents a share, compares to a $1.1 billion in net income, or $2.16 a share, in the second quarter of last year, Centene disclosed Friday in its quarterly earnings report. Centene said premium and service revenues increased 18% to $42.5 billion from $36 billion in the year ago period. Centene, which has 28 million health plan subscribers, is seeing rising costs among health plan members in all three government-subsidized benefits it helps manage: Medicaid, Medicare Advantage and individual coverage under the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. "We are disappointed by our second quarter results, but we have a clear understanding of the trends that have impacted our performance and are working with urgency and focus to restore our earnings trajectory," Centene Chief Executive Officer Sarah M. London said in a statement accompanying the company's earnings report. "Despite the shifting landscape, we believe that the staying power of Medicaid, Medicare and the Individual Marketplace is as strong as it has ever been. Centene has significantly fortified our platform in service of these programs over the last three years, and as we move forward, we are focused on continuing to adapt with the market to deliver meaningful value to our members, our stakeholders and our shareholders over the long term." Centene, which planned to reveal its 2025 profit forecast during a call with analysts Friday morning, pulled its financial guidance earlier this month, citing an independent firm's analysis showing patients it provides health benefits for were sicker and needed more healthcare services than anticipated. On Friday, Centene said its health benefits ratio, which is the percentage of premium revenue that goes toward medical costs, jumped to 93% for the second quarter of 2025, compared to 87.6% in the comparable period in 2024. 'The (health benefits ratio) increase was primarily driven by a reduction in the company's net 2025 Marketplace risk adjustment revenue transfer estimate, increased Marketplace medical costs, higher medical costs in Medicaid driven primarily by behavioral health, home health and high-cost drugs, and an increase to the 2025 Medicare Advantage premium deficiency reserve based on the progression of earnings during the year (with higher earnings at the beginning of the year and lower at the end of the year, given cost sharing progression),' Centene said in its second quarter earnings report. Centene's cost struggles are only the latest among a parade of health insurance companies that have struggled in the last two years to control costs of subscribers in plans subsidized by the government. Just last week, Elevance Health, which sells Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans in 14 states, lower its profit forecast for the rest of 2025 due to rising costs in its Medicaid plans and individual policies it sells under the Affordable Care Act. In addition, Molina Healthcare lowered its earnings guidance for the rest of the year in the face of cost pressures in all three of the government-subsidized health insurance programs it helps manage: Medicaid, Medicare Advantage and individual coverage under the ACA, also known as Obamacare. And in May, UnitedHealth suspended its financial outlook for the rest of the year and replaced its top executive as the parent of UnitedHealthcare grapples with rising healthcare costs in its Medicare Advantage business. Medicare Advantage plans contract with the federal government to provide health benefits to seniors. Medicare Advantage plans also contributed to struggles last year for Humana and CVS Health, which elevated a new chief executive in part to help gain control of its struggling Aetna health insurance business. CVS is also exiting the individual health insurance business, leaving about 1 million Aetna members in 17 states looking for new coverage in 2026.
