It brings a range of improvements for travelers, mostly related to consumer protection.
The maximum civil penalty for airline consumer violations has been raised from $25,000 to $75,000, plus the bill makes it easier for passengers to file complaints.
It also says that within six months, a rule will be made making it easier for families to sit together on planes. That would include prohibiting airlines from charging passengers to seat a child under 14 next to an accompanying adult.
The bill says the FAA Administrator will decide within 60 days whether to mandate minimum seat dimensions on planes for safety reasons.
Safety is a prime focus of the bill, with an increased scrutiny of aircraft production.
Senate Commerce Committee Chair Maria Cantwell said: "Plane manufacturers will see more safety inspectors on factory floors and tougher safety standards from the FAA."
Notably, the bill also has new rules about cockpit voice recorders — which comes after criticism from the chair of the NTSB over January's Alaska Airlines blowout.
The data from the voice recorder in that incident was lost because it wasn't retrieved within two hours, so the NTSB called for increasing the holding time to 25 hours, in line with European requirements.
The bill says that all newly manufactured aircraft must have cockpit voice recorders that retain the last 25 hours of information, which will apply to all planes within six years.
"The bipartisan Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization is a big win for travelers, the aviation workforce, and our economy. It will expand critical protections for air travelers, strengthen safety standards, and support pilots, flight attendants, and air traffic controllers," Biden said in a statement.
He added: "Passengers shouldn't have to jump through endless hoops just to get the refunds that they are owed, and corporations shouldn't rip off hardworking Americans through hidden junk fees."
Elon Musk said Neuralink is accepting applications for the second person to get a brain implant.
Noland Arbaugh became the first person to have the device implanted earlier this year.
Neuralink reportedly wants to have thousands of people using its device by the end of the decade.
Elon Musk's Neuralink is ready to put its chip in another person's head.
He said that the brain implant startup wa now searching for the second person to receive Neuralink's "Telepathy" implant, after the device was successfully implanted into its first patient earlier this year.
"Neuralink is accepting applications for the second participant. This is our Telepathy cybernetic brain implant that allows you to control your phone and computer just by thinking," Musk posted on X.
"No one better than Noland (Arbaugh) himself to tell you about the first," he added.
30-year-old Noland Arbaugh, who was paralyzed from the neck down after a diving accident, described the neural interface at the time as "life-changing," allowing him to surf the web, post on social media, and play video games using thought alone.
Neuralink was kind enough to open their doors for me to tour their headquarters a few weeks back. It was an amazing experience and a day I'll never forget. This was at a company wide meeting at the end of the day. Thank you to everyone who made this possible. Hope y'all enjoy!… pic.twitter.com/YNa2Jtjhnk
However, Neuralink's first human trial didn't go completely smoothly. The company said last week that some of the tiny threads the device uses to interface with the brain, each thinner than a human hair, moved out of position a few weeks after the surgery.
The malfunction rendered the implant less effective, and the company reportedly considered removing it completely.
Arbaugh told Bloomberg he "cried a little bit" when he began noticing a delay between his thoughts and the computer cursor.
Neuralink said in a blog post that it made tweaks to Arbaugh's implant, enabling it to work effectively again.
The startup may not struggle to attract applicants for its latest human trial. Thousands of people reportedly expressed interest in having part of their skull removed and a brain chip inserted when Neuralink began recruiting last September.
It's reportedly planning to operate on 11 people this year and is targeting more than 22,000 users by 2030, Bloomberg reported.
Neuralink did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider, made outside normal working hours.
An employee at the company's Hong Kong office was subject to the scam.
moodboard/Getty Images
Scammers used deepfakes to trick an employee at engineering firm Arup into handing over $25 million.
The Hong Kong office employee believed that they were on a video call with the company's CFO.
Deepfake scams are becoming more prevalent with advancements made in AI.
Scammers used deepfakes to trick an employee in the Hong Kong office of a major international corporation earlier this year, costing the firm $25 million.
News of the scam was first reported in February, but the company involved was not named.
However, on Friday the Financial Times reported that Arup, the engineering company behind buildings like the Sydney Opera House and Apple's California headquarters, was the victim of the scam.
Back in January, an employee in the finance department of the company's Hong Kong office attended a video call with what they believed to be the company's CFO and other staff members.
But everyone else on the call was actually an AI-generated deepfake made using publicly available video and audio recordings, Hong Kong public broadcaster RTHK reported, citing police.
Acting senior superintendent Baron Chan told RTHK that on the video call, the employee was instructed to transfer HK$200 million ($25.6 million), split over 15 transactions, to five local bank accounts.
After around a week, the employee realized it was a scam when they contacted the company's headquarters.
The investigation is ongoing, and no arrests have been made so far, the Financial Times reported.
Arup did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider but told the FT in a statement that it had "notified the police about an incident of fraud in Hong Kong," adding that the incident involved "fake voices and images."
"Our financial stability and business operations were not affected and none of our internal systems were compromised," Arup said.
Deepfakes are becoming more prevalent as advancements in AI open up new ways for malicious actors to target companies and individuals.
Hong Kong authorities have also warned people about a deepfake scam going around of Elon Musk, where fraudsters are using the billionaire's likeness to trick people into investing in its crypto software.
It's not the only time scammers have used deepfakes of the Tesla CEO to steal money. Earlier this year, a woman in South Korea said scammers used a deepfake of Musk to trick her into handing over $50,000, which she believed would be invested on her behalf. She even had a video call with someone she thought was Musk, where he expressed his love for her.
Deepfakes have also been used in romance scams, which use fake online personas to gain their victim's trust before tricking them into handing over money.
More Gen Zers and millennials are becoming HIFIs — high income, financially insecure. They're spending lots of money on lifestyle and luxury.
Thomas Barwick / Getty Images
HIFIs are people who are high income, financially insecure.
They're predominantly made up of millennials and Gen Zers who want to exude wealth.
However, lifestyle creep and inflation could be hurting their financial futures.
Many Americans want to look wealthy. And to do that, some are taking inspiration from their favorite celebrities, or hoping to keep up with rapidly changing trends. Either way, they're spending a fortune.
People who fall into this category are HIFIs, individuals who are high income, financially insecure. They're predominantly made up of millennials and Gen Zers, per Sherwood News, who want to exude "old money" or "quiet luxury" but who are struggling to keep up with their lifestyle creep.HIFI is the latest acronym to describe a facet of the American economic experience, joining the ranks of DINKs, HENRYs, and ALICEs.
HIFIs are redefining spending norms at their own expense
Sherwood News reported that many HIFI consumers' steep spending began during the pandemic. Stimulus checks provided young people with additional income, and, because people were staying home, they spent more money on online shopping instead of restaurants, recreation, or vacations.
The "buy now, pay later" feature on credit cards, Amazon, and other online platforms is fueling these shopping sprees, per a 2024 Adobe report. Shoppers feel like items are more affordable when they can pay in installments, according to the report.
Many Americans also haven't cut back on their pandemic-era shopping habits — even as they renewed their social spending with the reopening of restaurants and vacation destinations.
Additionally, there are social reasons for HIFIs behavior: people want to feel rich.
Per a Schwab survey of 1,000 Americans in 2023, younger generations tend to measure their wealth in comparison to their peers. If a friend or social media personality owns something, Gen Zers and millennials don't want to miss out.
Some will buy the same piece of expensive clothing item or accessory they see on celebrities or social media, while others will search for dupes.
In fact, millennials and Gen Zers were responsible for a 22% gain in luxury spending in 2022, according to a Bain & Co. report published in January 2023.
But for many, this spending culture isn't sustainable.
HIFIs are increasingly facing an economic disconnect. Although they're affluent, their income often isn't enough to overcome luxury spending and the high costs of daily life.
Many HIFIs struggle to afford rising housing and food costs but still spend a sizable amount of their income on recreation and personal care. And, financial and fintech news firm Pymnts found in its February/March report that 36% of millennials in US cities making $200,000 or more a year are currently living paycheck to paycheck.
Are you a HIFI? Are you open to sharing how you fit recreation and luxury spending into your budget? If so, reach out to this reporter at allisonkelly@insider.com.
This makes him pretty recognizable in San Francisco — too much so for his liking.
He says "the inability to just be mostly anonymous in public is very, very strange."
Sam Altman is one of the best-known names in AI, but he wasn't prepared for just how much he'd be recognized in public.
The OpenAI CEO reflected on the privacy and anonymity he's lost as a result of his job during an episode of the podcast The Logan Bartlett Show, published Tuesday.
"The inability to just be mostly anonymous in public is very, very strange," he said. "I think if I had thought about that at the time, I would've said, 'Okay, this will be a weirder thing than it sounds like,' but I didn't really think about it. It's like a much weirder thing. It's a strangely isolating way to live."
He continued: "I was like, 'AI's going to be really important, OpenAI's going to be a really important company.' I didn't think I would not be able to go out to dinner in my own city."
Though OpenAI has shone a bigger spotlight on Altman, he was far from anonymous in Silicon Valley before. He was president of the startup accelerator Y Combinator for several years before taking the helm at OpenAI in 2019.
Later in the podcast episode, Altman discussed his dramatic ousting from OpenAI last year. He said he was living in an "adrenaline-charged state" and didn't eat or sleep much during that time.
Altman was fired in mid-November after OpenAI's board at the time announced a "deliberate review process" showed he was "not consistently candid in his communications with the board." Altman, however, was brought back less than a week later, and the board has since changed.
The Chinese government unveiled a raft of measures to stimulate its embattled housing market.
It will remove the floor on mortgage rates, offer cheaper housing loans, and lower down payments.
Overbuilding has led to supply far outpacing demand, leaving developers short of cash and deep in debt.
Chinese authorities just announced their biggest effort yet to shore up the troubled housing market.
In a slew of statements on Friday, the People's Bank of China said it would remove the nationwide floor on mortgage rates for first-time and second-time homebuyers, lower interest rates on housing loans, and reduce minimum down payments in a bid to boost demand.
The central bank will also set up a 300 billion yuan ($42 billion) relending program for public housing, which it expects to fuel an extra 500 billion yuan of bank lending, Bloomberg reported, citing official comments at a briefing.
Moreover, the Chinese government will push local officials to purchase empty homes from developers and turn them into affordable housing, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported, citing comments from Vice Premier He Lifeng.
He said the new policies were in the public interest and supported economic development. The moves follow the release of official data for April showing the biggest month-on-month decline in home prices in a decade.
Overbuilding is a huge problem in China's property sector. Excess inventory has reached gargantuan levels with a former top official estimating last year that there are enough spare homes to house 3 billion people — more than double the nation's population.
China's housing woes have weighed on its economic growth and sown discontent. Millions of people are facing unemployment or pay cuts as construction work dries up and cash-strapped developers default on loans.
The online world has never been more saturated with brands selling products. And with consumers making purchasing decisions across multiple touchpoints, advertisers need to meet them across the entire marketing funnel to really drive impact and significant business results.
TikTok's unique placement at the intersection of entertainment and commerce is transforming how brands connect with their audiences. Let's rewind a few years when we saw the sell-out success of products like Ocean Spray and Little Moons. Since then, we've seen the exponential growth of #TikTokMadeMeBuyIt, proving that the platform has revolutionized how consumers discover products and shop — playing a valuable role in all stages of the purchase journey. In fact, 65% of TikTok users are likely to buy a product that they previously saw on TikTok in the future,[1] and 61% of users have made a purchase either directly on TikTok or online after seeing an ad on TikTok.[2]
Crafting full-funnel strategies with TikTok can enable your brand to unlock its full potential by improving marketing efficiency and agility, and driving brand salience. Want to find out how? We've broken down the key elements of three common marketing scenarios — launching a product, implementing an always-on strategy, and capturing peak season sales — and used brand examples to show you how to effectively consolidate multiple ad formats and objectives into single campaigns to drive demand and action.
It's been a pleasure to work with the team at TikTok to develop our content and targeting strategy. The impact of a full-funnel campaign structure on our performance can't be overstated. Tom Donegan, senior paid social manager at PureGym
Take your products from just out to sold-out: See how Sephora did it
Sephora implemented a full-funnel strategy on TikTok to generate brand awareness and increase online sales for their new line in Spain. 60% of their budget for this campaign was allocated to increasing reach, with a first phase focusing on TikTok's Top Feed Ad product, which was enhanced using the Pop Out Showcase Interactive Add-On. This was followed by a consideration phase, which featured In-Feed Ads optimized for video views and landing page views objectives supported by TikTok's Display Card Add-On.
The campaign's final phase focused on conversions and utilized TikTok's newest conversion product, Video Shopping Ads. The brand optimized its ads toward high purchase intent and directed its target audience directly to the product catalog to encourage purchasing.
Thanks to this strategy, Sephora's campaign achieved its best ROAS results to date. The total number of complete payments increased by 40% compared to similar campaigns run by the brand, and there was a 29% decrease in cost-per-action.
Brand takeaways:
Bundle multiple ad formats to drive impact
Use premium placements such as Top View & Pulse to maximize awareness on launch day
Leverage Reach & Frequency buying to deliver maximum reach and awareness
Get game-changing results with an always-on strategy: See how PureGym did it
PureGym wanted to increase consumer consideration and grow its member base, all while reducing its cost per acquisition. Knowing that the most successful content on TikTok is content that is created specifically for the platform, the brand utilized the TikTok Creative Exchange Programme to develop 20 pieces of creator-led content that leveraged trending sounds, special effects, and Interactive Add-Ons. The brand then developed a full-funnel always-on strategy consisting of reach, traffic, and conversion campaigns that utilized a suite of ad solutions, including In-Feed Ads and Spark Ads.
The campaign reached more than 10.9 million people in the UK, delivering over 173 million video views and over 26,000 new joiners to the gym, and as a direct result of their test-and-learn approach, PureGym reduced their cost-per-completed-payment by 77%. PureGym proved that an always-on approach and the right mix of ad formats are key to driving long-term success on the platform and real business results.
Brand takeaways:
Run campaigns for longer periods to see the best results
Use a nurture strategy, rather than optimizing directly for conversions
Scale budgets over time as performance improves
Harness the seasonal shopping state of mind: See how ghd did it
ghd France wanted to capitalize on the holiday season and drive qualified traffic and sales to their website. The brand initially implemented a nurturing phase in order to gain awareness of its special offer using TikTok's In-Feed Ad solution.
Once this top-funnel phase was over, ghd France utilized Video Shopping Ads (VSA) with an efficient retargeting system to pinpoint users who had visited the ghd France website and/or added a product to their basket. The VSA format includes a CTA on creatives that either leads users to the advertiser's website or product catalog. By doing this, advertisers significantly improve the quality and speed of the shopping experience and are more likely to drive sales.
This campaign was a success for ghd France, driving a 4.88x increase in conversions, an 80% reduction in cost per acquisition, and an impressive return on ad spend of 23x.
Brand takeaways:
Build audiences in advance, giving them time to scale
Start campaigns early, to pick up on demand
Incorporate learnings from past campaigns
There's a TikTok solution for every objective
TikTok's solutions enable brands to combine creative entertainment and commerce across the entire marketing funnel, powering a seamless customer journey from discovery to purchase and beyond. Find the solutions that work for your brand here.
Close-up of the new Silverado EV WT plugged into a charging station.
General Motors
Chevrolet is ready for the new wave of EV customers.
The stalwart Detroit brand is ready to close the gap with Tesla.
The electric Silverado and Equinox are about to join Chevy's growing EV lineup.
Chevrolet is just getting started on its takeover of the electric car market, says Steve Majoros, the brand's chief marketing officer.
The longtime Chevy executive sat down with Business Insider at a Tuesday press event for the launch of two electric vehicles that underpin the automaker's future plans: the long-awaited Silverado electric pickup truck and the electric Chevy Equinox.
Despite this gloomy backdrop to the day, Majoros is fired up. He starts the conversation by musing at how long this moment has taken to arrive (the electric Silverado was first teased in a Super Bowl ad in 2022) and how exciting it is to see GM's EV ambitions come to fruition.
While Chevy and other legacy car brands spent the better part of the past decade playing catchup with Tesla, executives have promised that their century of manufacturing expertise would eventually close the gap.
"Sometimes you see things as these discrete pieces and wonder how they're all going to snap together, and then all of a sudden it's like, 'Wow, the puzzle pieces really came together here,'" Majoros said.
Chevrolet is done playing catchup with Elon Musk
While Chevrolet isn't exactly new to the EV market (the electric Chevy Bolt has been on sale since 2016), the stalwart Detroit brand has spent the better part of the last decade lagging behind Elon Musk's Tesla.
Early adopters favored techy startup brands like Musk's over dinosaurs like GM and in the time the Chevrolet spent selling a single electric model in the US, Tesla released a slew of new models, including its affordable Model 3 and Model Y vehicles, which compete directly with the Bolt.
Tesla also beat Chevrolet to the punch on an electric pickup truck, launching the Cybertruck late last year.
But the tides finally are turning in Chevrolet's favor, Majoros said, as EV shoppers gravitate to more practical options and legacy brands.
"Customers will say 'if it doesn't haul or tow or fit my kids or have the safety features I want, I'm tapping out,'" Majoros said. "I don't care if it runs on electricity, gas, or hamsters."
GM is a second-half team
GM has always been a second-half team, Majoros said, and he thinks the Chevy brand is perfectly situated to meet a new wave of electric car shoppers.
"Momentum is a true force, whether it's autos, sports, whatever," Majoros said. "We've got some momentum, so let's see how the second half unfolds."
Recent studies on a new cohort of electric car shoppers show that they are more inclined to consider purchasing an electric car from a legacy brand. After years of a virtual monopoly on the EV market, shoppers are growing tired of Tesla and looking for fresher options.
"For people weighing the pros and cons they can look at Chevrolet and see a product they know and trust," Majoros said.
The livestream portal is installed in New York and in Dublin.
Brendan McDermid/Reuters
The Dublin-New York video portal has shut down again as it's tech fails to stop inappropriate behaviour.
It was meant to bring people together in joy, but ended up bringing out the worst in people.
Here are some other examples of fun but ultimately ill-fated tech projects.
A livestream video portal aimed at bringing people together across Dublin and New York went viral this week for all the wrong reasons.
What started out as a touching display of cross-Atlantic connection — people could wave at those 3,000 miles away and unite with long-distanced loved ones — soon devolved into chaos.
People were seen flashing their naked body parts, holding up pornographic videos to the screen, and showing photos mocking 9/11.
The inappropriate behavior prompted Dublin City Council to close the portal overnight on Monday. Its preferred solution involved updating the technology to blur inappropriate behavior, but that wasn't enough.
A spokesperson for Dublin City Council told Business Insider that the portal has now closed again until the end of the week while organizers look for another solution.
It's not the only ill-fated technology that was originally designed to bring people together. Here are some other examples.
The hitchhiking robot that met a tragic end
hitchBOT was a hitchhiking robot.
picture alliance/Getty Images
A hitchhiking robot was sent out into the world in 2015 but didn't survive for long in Philadelphia.
Instead, the hitchBOT relied on the kindness of strangers to transport it from one place to the next. It managed to make its way across Canada and Europe but ended up being vandalized in the streets of Philadelphia.
Microsoft's evil chatbot
In 2016, long before ChatGPT and rival AI models existed, Microsoft trialed an AI chatbot called "Tay." It was meant to respond to users' queries on Twitter in a casual, jokey way.
But it quickly turned into a crazy racist bot — spewing out responses that denied the holocaust, supported genocide, and used racist slurs.
People quickly turned on food delivery robots designed to help them
A tiny food delivery robot made by Starship Technologies.
Facebook/Starship Technologies
A food delivery robot made by Starship Technologies was set up to make life more convenient for people. But in return, people took to kicking it as it passed by.
While the majority of people responded fondly to the tiny robots, a few used to as an anger management tool, Starship Technologies cofounder Ahti Heinla told BI in 2018.
Kate Winick says she faced rejection from many jobs after disclosing her pregnancy.
LaylaBird/Getty Images
Kate Winick, a former Peloton director, faced job rejections after disclosing her pregnancy.
When she told prospective employers about her pregnancy, she said they didn't invite her to final interviews.
"I was incredibly naive to think that in 2024, it was finally possible to become a mom without taking a hit to your career."
Kate Winick was five months pregnant and "terrified" when she was laid off from her job at Peloton, she said in a recent LinkedIn post.
She spent the next three months applying for jobs. However, after disclosing her pregnancy to potential employers, she found that they all declined to bring her in for a final interview.
Candidates don't need to disclose pregnancy during the hiring process, and in fact, it's illegal at a federal level to refuse to hire someone because they're pregnant.
However, the ex-Peloton director chose to tell her future employers about her pregnancy, as she says she'd internalized the idea pregnancy would mean a loss to the company, but was ensured that it wouldn't hurt her job prospects.
"Many people (all of them men) told me it would be fine, companies just want to hire the right people, invest in talent for the long term," she said in the LinkedIn post.
However, despite having over a decade of experience, she found that the advice she received about disclosing her pregnancy didn't ring true.
"100% of the companies I told went from scheduling interviews to declining to bring me in for a final round," she wrote.
She found herself subject to what is commonly referred to as the "motherhood penalty," an umbrella term for the disadvantages women can experience after having children, which encompass pay, promotions, and hiring.
"I was incredibly naive to think that in 2024, it was finally possible to become a mom without taking a hit to your career. I know no woman whose trajectory hasn't been affected, temporarily or permanently, " she wrote.
In an email to Business Insider, she added: "We have to stop pretending that being a stay-at-home mom is the default for American families.
"We need policies that support women having both children and careers," she said.
Research has shown that motherhood can still cause a hit to women's careers.
Last year, Harvard Professor Claudia Goldin won the Nobel Prize in Economics for her 16-year-long research into this topic. She found that of graduates from top MBA schools, female MBA graduates who choose to have children faced more career setbacks than their male counterparts — including less job experience, more career interruptions, and a decline in earnings.
Pregnancy can also present a hurdle for those who have freelance jobs, and have an income reliant on short-term contracts.
For some, remote work during the pandemic presented an opportunity to conceal their pregnancy. Anna Wexler, an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania, previously told BI that concealing her second pregnancy during the pandemic meant that her career had been less affected than during her first pregnancy.