Defying “armies of lobbyists,” the U.S. Senate voted 52-47 to block the Trump administration’s repeal of net neutrality rules. All members of the Democratic caucus and three Republicans voted in favor of a resolution that would undo the FCC’s December 2017 decision to deregulate the broadband industry. If — and it’s a big if — the resolution is approved by the House and signed by President Trump, internet service providers would have to continue following rules that prohibit blocking, throttling and paid prioritization. Here’s a profile of FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, the nerdy conservative ideologue who orchestrated the net neutrality repeal. [Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica]
Recode Daily: After a close U.S. Senate vote, net neutrality lives to fight another day
Plus, Mark Zuckerberg will testify in person before the EU Parliament; will your business be ready for GDPR by May 25?; and salad leaders stress over whether to chop or not to chop.
Mark Zuckerberg has agreed to appear in person before the EU Parliament to answer questions about Facebook’s data practices and policies as early as next week. Unlike Zuckerberg’s April trip to Washington, D.C., this meeting will be a private, closed-door meeting. It’s possible that a public hearing with EU regulators could happen down the line. [Kurt Wagner / Recode]
Buying fake Facebook accounts is easy and affordable — 30 minutes and a little bitcoin can buy you an army of believable Facebook users. And though Zuckerberg told Congress this April that “you’re not allowed to have a fake account on Facebook,” a vast web of fake-account marketplaces continues to thrive in plain sight online, available to any interested marketer, scammer or troll. [Charlie Warzel / BuzzFeed]
Elon Musk tweeted that self-driving Tesla crashes shouldn’t be front-page news because there are many more human-driven fatalities. But that’s not an accurate comparison. And right now, there is no definitive means of quantifying how safe autonomous technology truly is, or how much safer than a human driver a robot driver needs to be for it to be ready to hit public roads. [Johana Bhuiyan / Recode]
Is your business ready for GDPR? The EU’s new data protection rules take effect next Friday, May 25, and a recent survey found that 91 percent of American businesses lack awareness surrounding the details of the GDPR, while 84 percent don’t understand its implications for their specific business. Here’s what U.S. companies need to do to prepare their consumer data practices in time. [Nancy Harris / Recode]
Media companies can’t get enough of this Saturday’s royal wedding. Not only are the nuptials of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle one of the few worldwide spectacles that people will still watch live, it offers TV networks, internet newsrooms and glossy magazines something even more rare: An epic news event they can actually plan for. The last royal wedding — Prince William and Kate Middleton, in 2011 — drew 23 million viewers in the U.S. and nearly three billion globally. [Shirin Ghaffary / Recode]
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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.
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