Tarantino sues Gawker over script

27 January 2014 Last updated at 21:32 ET

US director Quentin Tarantino has sued gossip website Gawker for contributory copyright infringement after it posted a link to a leaked screenplay.

A link to The Hateful Eight script remained on Gawker's Defamer blog on Monday despite demands from Tarantino's lawyers to take it down.

They argued the site had effectively cost him royalties he might earn from the eventual publication of the script.

But Gawker said posting a link was part of its job to provide information.

"News of the fact that it existed on the internet advanced a story that Tarantino himself had launched, and our publication of the link was a routine and unremarkable component of our job: making people aware of news and information about which they are curious,'' the site's editor-in-chief John Cook said.

In a post, Gawker added it would be fighting the case, adding that, to its knowledge, "no claim of contributory infringement has prevailed in the US over a news story".

The lawsuit seeks damages of $1m (£603,000) against Gawker as well as $1m against the anonymous file-sharing site where the leaked script was hosted.

'Project abandoned'

Tarantino has previously published scripts of his films, a practice that in the past has earned him hefty royalties and advances.

"There was nothing newsworthy or journalistic about Gawker Media facilitating and encouraging the public's violation of [Tarantino's] copyright in the screenplay, and its conduct will not shield Gawker Media from liability for their unlawful activity," the lawsuit states.

The lawsuit also alleges the leak was originally only limited to a few people, and The Hateful Eight script did not appear online until after Gawker posted an item encouraging anyone who had a copy to leak it to them.

The writer-director blasted the leak last week in an interview with entertainment industry website Deadline.com and said he would abandon the project as a film.

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Multi-material 3D printer launched

26 January 2014 Last updated at 20:53 ET

The world's first multi-material full-colour 3D printer has been launched by Stratasys, the owner of the MakerBot range of printers.

It features "triple-jetting" technology that combines droplets of three base materials, reducing the need for separate print runs and painting.

The company said the Objet500 Connex3 Color Mutli-material 3D Printer would be a "significant time-saver" for designers and manufacturers.

It will cost about $330,000 (£200,000).

By incorporating traditional 2D printer colour mixing, using cyan, magenta and yellow, the manufacturer says multi-material objects can be printed in hundreds of colours.

While the base materials are rubber and plastic, they can be combined and treated to create end products of widely varying flexibility and rigidity, transparency and opacity, the company said.

Stratasys marketing manager Bruce Bradshaw told the BBC: "This will help industrial designers reduce the time it takes to bring prototypes to market by 50%."

The firm's rival 3D Systems recently announced its own multi-material high-end 3D printer, the ProJet 5500X - but it offers a smaller range of colours: black, white, and certain shades of grey.

This limitation may not be a problem for businesses that only want to model and study the shape and behaviour of their designs and are willing to leave decisions about colour to a later point in the manufacturing process.

'Level of creativity'

Even so, Duncan Wood, publisher of specialist 3D printing magazine TCT, told the BBC: "This is groundbreaking stuff. Being able to produce single products incorporating materials of different rigidity and colour has been the holy grail of 3D printing to date.

"This is industrial-grade technology that will afford designers a level of creativity they've never had before."

Minneapolis-based Stratasys bought Israeli multi-material specialist Objet in April 2012.

Last year it bought MakerBot, the consumer 3D printing company.

Stratasys' latest industrial 3D printer was launched at SolidWorks World in San Diego, California.

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US makes Bitcoin exchange arrests

27 January 2014 Last updated at 14:28 ET By Dave Lee Technology reporter, BBC News

The operators of two exchanges for the virtual currency Bitcoin have been arrested in the US.

The Department of Justice said Robert Faiella, known as BTCKing, and Charlie Shrem from BitInstant.com have both been charged with money laundering.

The authorities said the pair were engaged in a scheme to sell more than $1m (£603,000) in bitcoins to users of online drug marketplace the Silk Road.

The site was shut down last year and its alleged owner was arrested.

Mr Shrem, 24, was arrested on Sunday at New York's JFK airport. He was expected to appear in court on Monday, prosecutors said.

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New York's state banking regulator, Benjamin Lawsky: "There are always going to be bad apples in any industry."

Mr Faiella, 52, was arrested on Monday at his home in Cape Coral, Florida.

Bitcoin exchanges are services that allow users to trade bitcoins for traditional currencies.

Mr Shrem is accused of allowing Mr Faiella to use BitInstant to purchase large quantities of bitcoins to sell on to Silk Road users who wanted to anonymously buy drugs.

Continue reading the main story

Bitcoin is often referred to as a new kind of currency.

But it may be better to think of its units as being virtual tokens that have value because enough people believe they do and there is a finite number of them.

Each bitcoin is represented by a unique online registration number.

These numbers are created through a process called "mining", which involves a computer solving a difficult mathematical problem with a 64-digit solution.

Each time a problem is solved the computer's owner is rewarded with bitcoins.

To receive a bitcoin, a user must also have a Bitcoin address - a randomly generated string of 27 to 34 letters and numbers - which acts as a kind of virtual postbox to and from which the bitcoins are sent.

Since there is no registry of these addresses, people can use them to protect their anonymity when making a transaction.

These addresses are in turn stored in Bitcoin wallets, which are used to manage savings. They operate like privately run bank accounts - with the proviso that if the data is lost, so are the bitcoins contained.

The authorities said Mr Shrem was aware that the bitcoins were being used for such purchases, and therefore he was in violation of the Bank Secrecy Act.

The Act requires financial institutions in the US to alert authorities to any suspicious activity that may suggest money laundering is taking place.

Emily Spaven, managing editor of news site Coindesk, told the BBC: "Since the closure of Silk Road and arrest of alleged owner Ross Ulbricht, we always knew more arrests would follow.

"It is unfortunate Silk Road continues to make the headlines in association with Bitcoin - this is the dark side of Bitcoin, which the vast majority of digital currency users have no association with."

'Feigning ignorance'

Following the arrests, James Hunt, from the US Drug Enforcement Agency, said in a statement: "Hiding behind their computers, both defendants are charged with knowingly contributing to and facilitating anonymous drug sales, earning substantial profits along the way.

"Drug law enforcement's job is to investigate and identify those who abet the illicit drug trade at all levels of production and distribution, including those lining their own pockets by feigning ignorance of any wrong doing and turning a blind eye."

Mr Shrem is a founding member and the current vice chairman of the Bitcoin Foundation, a trade group set up to promote Bitcoin as an alternative currency.

"We are surprised and shocked by the news today," said a spokesman for the organisation.

"As a foundation, we take these allegations seriously and do not condone illegal activity."

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The BBC's Rory Cellan Jones explains how Bitcoin works

BitInstant was one of the largest Bitcoin exchanges on the internet.

However, the service has been inaccessible for some time, explained Mike Hearn, another board member at the Bitcoin Foundation.

"Charlie's impact on the Bitcoin community has been hovering near zero for a long time now," Mr Hearn told the BBC via email.

"If the allegations are true, it's part of a phase of Bitcoin's life that the project is rapidly leaving behind (and good riddance)."

'Deeply concerned'

BitInstant's investors include Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss - the twins who previously sued Mark Zuckerberg claiming he had stolen their idea for Facebook.

In a statement issued to the BBC, the twins said: "When we invested in BitInstant in the fall of 2012, its management made a commitment to us that they would abide by all applicable laws - including money laundering laws - and we expected nothing less.

"We are obviously deeply concerned about [Mr Shrem's] arrest. We were passive investors in BitInstant and will do everything we can to help law enforcement officials.

"We fully support any and all governmental efforts to ensure that money laundering requirements are enforced, and look forward to clearer regulation being implemented on the purchase and sale of bitcoins."

Follow Dave Lee on Twitter @DaveLeeBBC

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Apple shares plunge on flat earnings

27 January 2014 Last updated at 18:22 ET

Shares in tech giant Apple fell close to 9% in after-hours trading after the firm reported flat profits of $13.1bn (£7.9bn) during the October to January quarter.

While the earnings beat expectations, the firm lowered it sales outlook for 2014, worrying investors.

Apple said it sold a record 51 million iPhones and 26 million iPads.

"We are really happy with our record iPhone and iPad sales," said Apple boss Tim Cook in a statement.

Apple said it expected revenue of between $42bn and $44bn for 2014, slightly less than had been forecast.

China scrutiny

Crucially for analysts, the firm said revenue rose by 29% in the greater China region, which includes China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, compared to the same period last year.

On a conference call to discuss the earnings, Mr Cook said: "We really turned in a stellar quarter in greater China."

Apple announced a deal with the world's biggest mobile phone network, China Mobile, in December, and many investors had been closely watching the earnings for hints on the company's performance in the region.

Apple's phones have been available on China Mobile since 17 January.

"Last week was the best week for activations we've ever had in China," said Mr Cook, while noting that iPhones are only available on China Mobile in 16 cities at the moment.

By the end of the year, Apple hopes to expand its offerings to more than 300 cities.

Global woes

However, Apple said sales in the rest of the Asia-Pacific region fell 9%, and that profits were hurt by currency fluctuations, particularly with the Japanese yen.

Apple also reported a sales dip in the Americas as well.

This was partially due to stronger than expected sales of the more expensive iPhone 5S.

Apple executives said on the call that it took the firm some time to change its supply chain to provide the US market with more of those phones compared with the cheaper iPhone 5C, primarily aimed at Chinese consumers.

Apple also noted that some US carriers changed their upgrade policies, which hurt sales in the region, as consumers became more reluctant to upgrade aging iPhones.

Sales of iPods - Apple's once iconic music player - fell 55%.

"I think all of us have known for some time that iPod is a declining business," said Mr Cook.

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Smartphone sales 'top one billion'

27 January 2014 Last updated at 21:38 ET

More than one billion smartphones were shipped last year, with Samsung extending its lead as the world's biggest vendor, a new survey has showed.

According to market research firm IDC, 1.004 billion smartphones were shipped last year, marking a 38.4% increase from the previous year.

South Korea's Samsung accounted for the bulk of that figure, followed by Apple and China's Huawei.

Smartphones made up more than half of the 1.8 billion mobile phones sold.

Continue reading the main story

"Start Quote

Among the top trends driving smartphone growth are large screen devices and low cost"

End Quote Ryan Reith Program Director, IDC

IDC said this was the first time more than one billion smartphone units were shipped in a single year.

"Among the top trends driving smartphone growth are large screen devices and low cost," said Ryan Reith, program director with IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker.

"Of the two, I have to say that low cost is the key difference-maker."

"Cheap devices are not the attractive segment that normally grabs headlines, but IDC data shows this is the portion of the market that is driving volume," he said.

"Markets like China and India are quickly moving toward a point where sub-$150 smartphones are the majority of shipments, bringing a solid computing experience to the hands of many."

Smartphone Global Market Share
Ranking	Vendor	Sales
Source: IDC Worldwide Mobile Phone Tracker
1.	Samsung	31.3%
2.	Apple	15.3%
3.	Huawei	4.9%
4.	LG	4.8%
5.	Lenovo	4.5%

South Korea's Samsung extended its market dominance with 42.9% growth, the IDC survey said.

Apple, however, saw its market share decline, posting slower growth than the overall market with 12.9% growth.

A separate survey released by Strategy Analytics posted slightly differing figures.

It said there were 990 million smartphones shipped last year, from an overall figure of 1.7 billion mobile phones.

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NSA 'gets data from Angry Birds'

28 January 2014 Last updated at 05:42 ET

US and British spy agencies routinely try to gain access to personal data from Angry Birds and other mobile applications, a report says.

A National Security Agency (NSA) document shows location, websites visited and contacts are among the data targeted from mobile applications.

It is the latest revelation from documents leaked by Edward Snowden.

In a statement, the NSA said it was not interested in data beyond "valid foreign intelligence targets".

"Any implication that NSA's foreign intelligence collection is focused on the smartphone or social media communications of everyday Americans is not true," the statement said.

Continue reading the main story

From the very start, the Snowden revelations have thrown a spotlight on the tech sector as well as the intelligence agencies.

In some cases, it was clear they were complying with laws - for instance providing metadata - but having to do so secretly. That is something they have now won the right to disclose at least a little more.

In other cases, it appears that some companies might have been doing more than they strictly had to leading to awkward questions.

And in other cases, the intelligence agencies appear to have been hacking into the companies - for instance their internal data links - without knowledge or permission.

The more publicity that this has all attracted the more the companies have distanced themselves from government with expressions of anger and calls for more transparency.

In the case of the latest Angry Birds and Squeaky Dolphin revelations, it appears that NSA/GCHQ are effectively piggybacking off customer data that companies designing software - whether Rovio or Google - collect themselves and without the companies knowing.

This will anger the companies, not least because it may throw a spotlight on just how much personal information they collect from ordinary people who may not have known about it in the past.

'Golden nugget'

The report, published by the New York Times, ProPublica and the Guardian, says the NSA and Britain's GCHQ have worked together since 2007 to develop ways to gain access to information from applications for mobile phones and tablets.

The scale of data gathering is unclear.

But the reports suggest data is gained from a variety of mapping, gaming and social networking applications, using techniques similar to the ones used to intercept mobile internet traffic and text message data.

The documents also reveal the two agencies are increasingly convinced of the importance of mobile applications data.

The joint spying programme "effectively means that anyone using Google Maps on a smartphone is working in support of a GCHQ system" one 2008 document from the British intelligence agency is quoted as saying.

Another GCHQ report, in 2012, laid out how to extract information from Angry Birds user information from phones on the Android operating system. The game has been download 1.7 billion times across the world.

The British spy agency said it would not comment on intelligence matters, but insisted that all of its activities were "authorised, necessary and proportionate".

Another NSA document described a "golden nugget" - a perfect scenario where NSA analysts could get broad selections of information from the applications, including networks the phone had connected to, documents downloaded, websites visited and "buddy lists".

Other applications mentioned by the documents include the photo-sharing site Flickr, movie-based social network Flixster and applications that connect to Facebook.

Developers are responsible for the information generated from each application, but there was no suggestion firms were actively agreeing to give the spy agencies data.

Two-year rule

On Monday, the justice department announced it had reached agreement with five major internet firms over their request to share information about how they responded to orders from the NSA and other agencies.

Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, Facebook and LinkedIn had previously sued the US government over being able to disclose to the public more information on what they have released to intelligence agencies.

Under the compromise announced, the firms will be able to release:

• the number of criminal-related orders from the government
• the number of secret national security-related orders from government investigators, rounded to the nearest thousand
• how many national security-related orders came from the foreign service intelligence and the number of customers those orders affected
• whether those orders were for just email addresses or covered additional information
• alternatively they can opt to issue a report that provides less detail but lets them state the number of national security and intelligence orders in batches of 250

As part of the deal, the firms will delay releases of the number of national security orders by six months.

But tech firms cannot reveal government surveillance of new technology or new ways to communicate that they create for up to two years.

This caveat has been criticised by Ladar Levison - the founder of Lavabit, the secure email service that Edward Snowden used - who said the provision would undermine confidence in start-ups.

"While our courts are allowed to keep ethically dubious court order secret, it will remain impossible to trust private data to American companies," he told the New York Times.

Apple was quick to take advantage of the new rules.

It has revealed that it received between zero and 249 national security orders between 1 January and 30 June affecting between zero and 249 accounts.

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Prince fans' shock at $22m action

28 January 2014 Last updated at 06:58 ET By Dave Lee Technology reporter, BBC News

Fans of Prince have expressed shock at the musician's $22m (£13m) legal action against 22 people for posting copies of live performances online.

Court documents list the individuals said to have distributed bootleg recordings using Facebook and blogs.

"Doing things like this is making him lose more and more fans," wrote one fan on a major Prince fan forum.

However, other fans rushed to defend the singer's right to protect his vast back catalogue of material.

The action, filed earlier this month, reads: "The defendants in this case engage in massive infringement and bootlegging of Prince's material.

"For example, in just one of the many takedown notices sent to Google with respect to Doe 2 (aka DaBang319), Prince identified 363 separate infringing links to file-sharing services, with each link often containing copies of bootlegged performances of multiple separate musical compositions."

The documents go on to outline a range of blog sites and Facebook profiles where live renditions of classic Prince tracks such as Purple Rain and Little Red Corvette could be downloaded, or where links to such material could be found.

Frustrated fans

Fans on the long-established Prince.org forum suggested that although the action was surprising, it was not out of character for Prince. The 55-year-old has often used legal battles to crack down on unauthorised distribution of his music.

Bootleg recordings are a bone of contention within his fan base, who are, on the one hand, frustrated that the material has not been made commercially available, but also sympathetic to Prince's actions.

"I don't wish for the infringers to be ruined," wrote one fan, Javi.

"But I wish they do get punished enough so that this becomes a lesson for others. I appreciate Prince's music and Prince himself enough to be against people who go against his rights as an artist."

In 2007, Prince launched a legal action against the Pirate Bay, a well-known website offering links to pirated material. The case was never followed through.

The Pirate Bay has since been blocked by internet service providers in many countries around the world following court orders brought on by the music industry.

Prince recently announced a short stint of London shows, and a new album - PlectrumElectrum - that will be released later this year.

Follow Dave Lee on Twitter @DaveLeeBBC

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Car-share firm faces lawsuit

28 January 2014 Last updated at 07:51 ET

Lift-sharing company Uber is facing a lawsuit over the death of a child, killed by one of its drivers.

It is the first case of its kind and will raise questions about how such firms are regulated.

Six-year-old Sofia Lui was knocked down in San Francisco on New Year's Eve while crossing the road with her family.

The family holds Uber responsible because the driver was using the firm's app at the time of the accident.

Hands-free

They say the phone-based app, which drivers use to find passengers, contributed to the death of their daughter.

Drivers "must respond quickly to a user request for service by physically interfacing with the app, thereby leading to distraction", the lawsuit states.

The fact an Uber driver must tap a screen at least once to accept a fare meant it violated state laws that specified only hands-free telephone communication could be used when driving, it added.

Uber says it cannot be held responsible for the accident because the driver, Syed Muzzafar, did not have a passenger at the time.

It adds its function is simply to connect a buyer and seller and therefore it is not responsible for what happens between them.

It describes its drivers as freelancers.

Legal precedent?

Writing in Forbes magazine, lawyer Robert Wood, from law firm WoodLLP, said: "The entire business model of Uber, Lyft and Sidecar is in its infancy.

"The courts may say they are simply not responsible."

He said parallels with other cases involving delivery vehicles were likely to be taken into account.

"One might argue that an Uber passenger assumes the risk of ride sharing by signing on," he said.

"But what about a pedestrian hit in a crosswalk?

"The pedestrian hasn't agreed to any kind of arrangement with Uber."

Because the driver did not have a passenger at the time of the accident, it is not covered by the firm's insurance.

While Uber has not commented on the lawsuit directly, it did issue a statement following the girl's death.

"Our hearts go out to the family and victims of the tragic accident that occurred in downtown San Francisco on New Year's Eve," the firm said.

It added that the driver's account was "immediately deactivated".

New taxis

Uber was set up five years ago and now operates in more than 50 cities. It has a valuation of $4bn (£2.4bn).

It is not the first time the firm has come under scrutiny.

Last year its safety was questioned when a driver and passenger got into a fight.

It emerged that the driver had had a history of clashes with the law.

The publicity led the firm to review the background checks it does on its drivers.

Earlier this year the San Francisco Cab Driver Association said that nearly one third of the city's licensed taxi drivers have stopped driving taxis to drive for ridesharing services.

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GCHQ 'spied on Facebook and YouTube'

28 January 2014 Last updated at 08:46 ET By Leo Kelion Technology reporter

YouTube video views, Facebook "likes" and Blogger visits are among activities GCHQ has monitored in real-time, according to the latest Snowden leaks.

Details of an alleged GCHQ programme codenamed Squeaky Dolphin have been published by NBC News.

It reports that the UK cyber-spy agency showed off its abilities to the US National Security Agency in 2012.

Facebook has since started encrypting its data, but Google's YouTube and Blogger services remain unencrypted.

Continue reading the main story

From the very start, the Snowden revelations have thrown a spotlight on the tech sector as well as the intelligence agencies.

In some cases, it was clear they were complying with laws - for instance providing metadata - but having to do so secretly. That is something they have now won the right to disclose at least a little more.

In other cases, it appears that some companies might have been doing more than they strictly had to leading to awkward questions.

And in other cases, the intelligence agencies appear to have been hacking into the companies - for instance their internal data links - without knowledge or permission.

The more publicity that this has all attracted the more the companies have distanced themselves from government with expressions of anger and calls for more transparency.

In the case of the latest Angry Birds and Squeaky Dolphin revelations, it appears that NSA/GCHQ are effectively piggybacking off customer data that companies designing software - whether Rovio or Google - collect themselves and without the companies knowing.

This will anger the companies, not least because it may throw a spotlight on just how much personal information they collect from ordinary people who may not have known about it in the past.

Both firms have said that they did not give GCHQ permission to access the data.

The alleged operation's leaked logo - showing a dolphin holding a canister branded GTE - appears to refer to Global Telecoms Exploitation, a GCHQ division believed to be capable of collecting data from fibre-optic cables.

According to an earlier leak, published by the Guardian, GCHQ has been tapping fibre-optic cables to create a "buffer" of information it could search through since at least 2011, as part of a scheme called Tempora.

The paper said that by 2012 the agency had tapped more than 200 cables - including transatlantic communication links - and was able to process phone and internet data taken from up to 46 of them at a time.

GCHQ declined to comment on the specifics of the latest report.

However, the prime minister has previously said that: "I'm satisfied that the work these agencies do is not only vital but is properly overseen."

Real-time activity

The NBC report is based on a presentation entitled Psychology: A New Kind of Sigdev [signals development]. It was part of the trove of documents former NSA contractor Edward Snowden passed to journalist Glenn Greenwald, who contributed to NBC's report.

The papers refer to the use of Splunk Dashboard to provide real-time analysis of how people use YouTube, Facebook and Blogger.

Splunk is commercially available software designed to let organisations "listen" to their own data.

Examples that GCHQ is said to have shown off include:

• a table showing how many people based in the city of Lagos looked at a specific job vacancies blog over a 24-hour period
• a graph showing how many London-based internet users "liked" links about former Defence Secretary Liam Fox on Facebook over a week-long period
• a pie chart highlighting 20 trending YouTube video tags a day before planned anti-government protests in Bahrain

Although the examples provided do not identify specific users, NBC suggests this would have been possible to do if GCHQ had access to such data.

"We have long been concerned about the possibility of this kind of snooping, which is why we have continued to extend encryption across more and more Google services and links," a spokesman for Google told the BBC.

"We do not provide any government, including the UK government, with access to our systems. These allegations underscore the urgent need for reform of government surveillance practices."

A spokesman for Facebook added: "Network security is an important part of the way we protect user information, which is why we finished moving our site traffic to HTTPS [encryption] by default last year, implemented Perfect Forward Secrecy, and continue to strengthen all aspects of our network."

Twitter also targeted

US and UK officials have stressed that while they may scoop up a lot of data, their actual use of it is targeted.

"All of GCHQ's work is carried out in accordance with a strict legal and policy framework which ensures that our activities are authorised, necessary and proportionate, and that there is rigorous oversight, including from the secretary of state, the Interception and Intelligence Services Commissioners and the Parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee," a spokeswoman from GCHQ said.

"All our operational processes rigorously support this position."

Other details included in the latest leaks include:

• GCHQ agents referred to a study that indicated Firefox users were those most prone to neuroticism, while Internet Explorer users were those most likely to be conscientious but least open to new experiences
• An earlier GCHQ operation dubbed Blackhole involved exploiting what used to be unencrypted data from Twitter in order to identify users and target them with propaganda

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Billionaire apologises for Nazi slur

28 January 2014 Last updated at 09:30 ET

A leading venture capitalist has apologised for comparing a row about free buses for tech workers in Silicon Valley to the persecution of the Jews in Nazi Germany.

It follows a month of protests in San Francisco over what some residents see as the negative impact of tech workers.

In an open letter to the Wall Street Journal, Tom Perkins described a "rising tide of hatred" of the rich.

His comments were criticised on Twitter.

In the letter Mr Perkins, who is a billionaire, said: "I would call attention to the parallels of fascist Nazi Germany to its war on its '1%', namely its Jews, to the progressive war on the American 1%, namely the 'rich'.

"This is a very dangerous drift in our American thinking. Kristallnacht was unthinkable in 1930; is its descendant "progressive" radicalism unthinkable now?" he added.

He later said he regretted using the word Kristallnacht but his message about a new type of class warfare remained true.

Kristallnacht - also referred to as night of broken glass - was a series of attacks against Jews in November 1938.

Mr Perkins, who headed up venture capitalist firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers before his retirement, was condemned by his old firm, which tweeted: "We were shocked by his views... and do not agree".

Shuttle stops

The protests over the way tech workers commute to their jobs began in December when a bus taking people to Google's campus had its window smashed by activists.

Similar protests have been held at bus stops around the city, with protesters complaining an influx of rich technology workers is driving up costs in the city.

The buses have become a symbol of such gentrification.

"Big tech exploits San Francisco's cultural diversity and public infrastructure to lure workers here," said the Heart of the City collective, which has organised the protests, in its own open letter also published this week.

"Real estate speculators capitalise on the influx of high-wage earners by evicting long-time residents to rent units at inflated rates, commanding up to 20% more around tech shuttle stops," it added.

It is demanding that tech companies fund affordable housing initiatives and public transit service improvements.

The tech firms based in Silicon Valley, including Google, Twitter and Apple, use the buses to take about 17,000 people to and from the area each day.

Those behind the scheme say such buses ease congestion on already clogged roads in the city.

To ease the tensions, San Francisco's transport agency has imposed fees and restrictions on the shuttle buses.

The bus operators will have to pay $1 (60p) per stop per shuttle, netting an average of between $80,000 and $100,000 per operator each year.

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