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The Federal Trade Commission warned the public on Wednesday that people impacted by the 2017 Equifax data breach could get "far less" than the $125 payout originally promoted on the website for the Equifax settlement.

On July 22, the FTC announced that Equifax had agreed to a $575 million settlement in connection to a massive 2017 data breach at the consumer credit reporting agency. The FTC alleged that Equifax had failed to protect the personal information – including Social Security numbers, birthdates, and addresses — of about 147 million people.

The settlement went viral last week when the public learned that people affected by the breach had the option to receive a payout as part of the settlement. Eligible people could choose to receive free credit monitoring for up to 10 years — or a check or debit card for $125.

On Wednesday, however, the FTC issued a statement warning that people hoping for the full $125 payout may be disappointed, and encouraged people to choose the credit monitoring option instead. The FTC explained that the funds set aside for the cash payouts are capped at $31 million — and because the response to the settlement has been "overwhelming," people are likely to receive much smaller payouts.

"The response to the Equifax settlement has been enormous, and there has been a lot of attention on the cash reimbursement alternative to the free credit monitoring," Peter Kaplan, the deputy director of the FTC's Office of Public Affairs, said in a statement obtained by TIME. "The FTC website has received millions of visitors to equifax@ftc.gov. The settlement fund will pay up to $31 million for these alternative reimbursement claims, and the amount will be divided among affected consumers who select this option, up to $125."

The FTC has warned that this amount may be "nowhere near" $125.

"You can still choose the cash option on the claim form, but you will be disappointed with the amount you receive and you won't get the free credit monitoring," the FTC also said.

The agency is now strongly encouraging the public to choose the credit monitoring option instead, which it argues is a "much better value." The program would guarantee participants at least four years of monitoring from the three credit bureaus: Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion.

If you've already opted for the cash option and have changed your mind, all is not lost: The FTC says that the settlement administrator will reach out to the people who have selected a cash option, and give them the option to switch.

"Frankly, the free credit monitoring is worth a lot more – the market value would be hundreds of dollars a year," the FCC said in a blog post. "And this monitoring service is probably stronger and more helpful than any you may have already, because it monitors your credit report at all three nationwide credit reporting agencies, and it comes with up to $1 million in identity theft insurance and individualized identity restoration services."

To learn if you've been affected by the breach, visit this link to see whether you are eligible for one of the settlement options. Affected people can still file a request for the cash payout or free credit monitoring on the Equifax Settlement Website.

(WASHINGTON) — The Federal Reserve is cutting its key interest rate for the first time in a decade to try to counter threats ranging from uncertainties caused by President Donald Trump's trade wars to chronically low inflation and a dim global outlook.

The central bank cut its benchmark rate — which affects many loans for households and businesses — by a quarter-point to a range of 2% to 2.25%. It's the first rate cut since December 2008 during the depths of the Great Recession, when the Fed slashed its rate to a record low near zero and kept it there until 2015.

The economy is far healthier now despite risks to what's become the longest expansion on record.

The Fed repeats a pledge to "act as appropriate to sustain the expansion," wording that markets have seen as a signal for possible future rate cuts.

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Today is National Avocado Day, and in honor of this special occasion, Chipotle is gifting us all with the best kind of burrito surprise: free guac. "Our guac has a massive following of super-fans and what better day to celebrate our iconic side than on National Avocado Day?" said Laurie Schalow, Chipotle's Chief Corporate Reputation Officer.

When placing an order online or through the Chipotle app, you can add guacamole to your entrée of choice for no extra cost. (The much-favored condiment usually costs an extra $1.95.) But just remember, you can only get one serving of free guac per regular-priced entree — and the offer is only available today, July 31.

To add on to this avocado party, Chipotle has also announced that starting July 26, they will be holding a second official TikTok challenge — which they are calling #GuacDance — in conjunction with the free guacamole promotion. #GuacDance is meant to encourage customers to "show off moves dedicated to everyone's favorite fruit," a Chipotle press release explains. (If you need choreography inspiration, consider this classic guacamole-themed Vine.) The hashtag challenge partnership with TikTok is the first for a restaurant brand, Chipotle says.

Their first challenge, the #ChipotleLidFlip, premiered in honor of Cinco de Mayo, and garnered attention on Twitter and TikTok, with over 240 million views on the video sharing platform. The "Lid Flip" was made famous by a Chipotle employee who introduced the viral "signature burrito bowl flip," according to Chicago Food magazine.

A Seattle woman was arrested Monday in connection with a massive Capital One data breach affecting 100 million people in the U.S. and 6 million people in Canada. This occurred just days after credit bureau Equifax settled to pay up to $700 million in restitution after its 2017 data breach.

The FBI arrested Paige Thomas, a software engineer, for stealing sensitive information including social security numbers, credit scores, balances and contact information off servers storing Capital One data, according to the Department of Justice. She shared information about the theft on GitHub, a software development platform.

Capital One issued a statement saying no credit card account numbers or log in credentials were compromised and neither were 99% of social security numbers, but added that about 140,000 credit card customer's social security numbers were compromised, along with 80,000 linked bank account numbers of secured credit card customers.

"While I am grateful that the perpetrator has been caught, I am deeply sorry for what has happened," Richard D. Fairbank, Capital One Chairman and CEO, said in a public statement. "I sincerely apologize for the understandable worry this incident must be causing those affected and I am committed to making it right."

As Capital One has offered to provide free credit monitoring for anyone affected by the breach, cyber security experts are urging consumers to be proactive in protecting their private information.

"We all need to practice a certain amount of self defense because companies and the government aren't there to do as complete a job as we would otherwise like," Eugene H. Spafford, professor and executive director emeritus at the Center for Education and Research in Information Assurance and Security at Purdue University, tells TIME. "[The data breach] does illustrate that there is an underlying, ongoing issue with how organizations collect and protect our personal information. And consumers should be worried about that."

Here are four things experts say consumers can do if they fear their data has been breached.

Accept credit monitoring

Credit monitoring and identity protection will be made available to every one of the millions of people affected by the Capital One data breach.

With credit monitoring, any changes to credit will be reported to the individual, for example if an account is opened under the individual's name. Utilizing credit monitoring doesn't impact a credit score.

Spafford urges people to accept credit monitoring, especially those whose credit is already in a vulnerable position.

"For them this is especially problematic," he says. "If their information is taken and used, if they're somewhat at the borderline it's going to be very difficult for them to recover."

The three main credit bureaus, Equifax, Experian and TransUnion, offer free yearly credit reports. Spafford recommends consumers take advantage of the reports and request reports from one of the three bureaus every four months.

Freeze your credit

Along with credit monitoring, individuals can request a credit freeze from all three credit bureaus, so that anyone attempting fraud such as opening an account in someone else's name or make changes to information like an address will have to provide a pin or a password to the credit bureau in order to do so. Credit can continue to be built even while it is frozen, but creditors who do not already have access to the credit score will not be able to access it unless it is temporarily unfrozen by the individual owner.

Those interested in freezing their score can call the three bureaus at: Equifax at 800-685-1111, TransUnion at 888-909-8872 and Experian at 888-397-3742.

A credit freeze has no impact on credit scores and doesn't prevent from requesting yearly credit reports. It is also free to lift the credit freeze when requested by the individual.

Be proactive about cyber security

Shira Rubinoff, President of social media monitoring program SecureMySocial and cybersecurity incubator Prime Tech Partners, says there are several ways a person can secure their online data before a breach ever occurs.

Don't fall victim to phishing scams by giving personal information over the phone, and don't click on emailed links from unrecognized sources. Avoid reusing the same password and enable two-step verification where possible.

"People haven't really understood that they can take ownership of their own security in different ways," Rubinoff tells TIME. "Security is only as strong as its weakest link."

If someone calls asking for personal information, ask for a phone number to call back to, hang up and verify if the caller is legitimate, she says. Similarly, when an email is requesting personal information, call the bank or agency to verify that the email is legitimate.

Urge your lawmakers to hold companies accountable

Spafford says many companies aren't spending as much as they should on cybersecurity.

"There isn't a huge amount of incentives for large organizations like Equifax or Capital [One] to fully secure that data because it's expensive and it's difficult," he says. "So as a result, people need to be somewhat defensive."

At least 21 states so far in 2019 have proposed legislation that would step up cyber protections for consumers. Many are attempting to expand the definition of personal and sensitive information to include biometric information and passwords. States like New York now require a wide variety of agencies and businesses to disclose a data breach to the individuals affected.

"Although there are a lot of things going on in the political arena at the moment, this is one of those things that could stand some greater regulation at either state or federal level," Spafford adds. He believes agencies like the Federal Trade Commission needs to step in to help secure private information.

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If you're waiting for a $125 check or debit card from the Equifax settlement, you might be disappointed. Most people who were affected by the company's massive 2017 data breach may receive a much smaller chunk of change.

The settlement is the result of a 2017 breach in which the personal data of 147 million U.S. consumers – including social security numbers, birth dates and addresses- was exposed to hackers. Because the company failed to protect this personal data, the company was forced to shell out $700 million as part of a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and various state attorneys general.

While some of this money is going to fines, about $425 million is going to assist the people affected by the data breach to compensate them for time dedicated to dealing with identity theft and up to $20,000 for expenses incurred because of the breach.

Everyone who is affected by this breach will have the option to chose between having your credit monitored, for free, for 10 years, or getting a $125 payment in the form of a check or debit card.

If you dig into the details about the program, however, only $31 million of the $700 million settlement will go to consumers who choose to receive a payout.

As it says in the settlement's FAQ section: "If there are more than $31 million in claims for time spent during the initial claims period…, all payments for time spent will be reduced and distributed on a proportional basis."

If you do the math, it means that there's only enough money for 248,000 people to receive $125, in what is known as Alternative Reimbursement Compensation.

At the same time, it might be difficult to prove that your data was mishandled as a result of the Equifax breach and to receive the up to $20,000 available for out-of-pocket expenses. As CNBC reports, it can be difficult to link identity theft to a specific data breach. These funds are separate from the $31 million set aside for the Alternative Reimbursement Compensation program, and are handled differently. If this compensation exceeds the funds set aside for this section of the program, Equifax will add up to $125 million to pay for claims.

As a part of the settlement you can still have access to identity restoration services for the next seven years, which includes access to a call center for assistance. So even if you're not satisfied with the payout you receive, it may be worth bookmarking the Equifax settlement's website — just in case.

If you'd still like the chance to get some compensation, check if you can check if you were affected by the breach here. You can file a claim on Equifax's data breach settlement website until January 22, 2020.

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(SAN FRANCISCO) — President Donald Trump has vowed to slap tariffs on Apple's Mac Pros if the company shifts production of the computer from Texas to China.

The pledge made in a Friday tweet rebuffs Apple's attempt to shield its products from taxes being imposed on goods made in China as part of Trump administration's trade war with the world's most populous country.

Apple recently sent a letter to the Trump administration warning that the U.S. economy and its ability to compete will hurt if its products are hit with the tariffs.

The Cupertino, California, company has been assembling its Mac Pros in Austin, Texas since 2013, but a report surfaced last month that Apple plans to shift production to a factory near Shanghai.

Apple is reportedly moving Mac Pro production because it is having trouble finding enough skilled labor to assemble the computer in Texas.

Apple didn't immediately respond to a request for comment Friday, but has previously said the Mac Pro will continue to be designed and engineered in California. The company hasn't said where the computer will be assembled in the future though. Trump demanded in his tweet that they continue to be made in the U.S if Apple doesn't want to be exposed to a 25% tariff on electronics made in China.

Just hours later, Trump once again asserted the U.S. should have first dibs over the companies headquartered here. In a tweet, he vowed to retaliate against France for the new digital tax the country is imposing on big tech companies that sell online advertising.

If anyone taxes the companies, Trump wrote in a tweet , it should be the U.S. He stuck in a dig about French wine, writing "I've always said American wine is better than French wine!"

Investors appeared unfazed by Trump's sparring with one of the world's biggest and most powerful companies. Apple's stock edged up $1.22 to $208.24 in Friday's midday trading.

The reaction probably would have been different had Trump made it clear that the tariffs will be applied to Apple's top-selling product, the iPhone, which has long been assembled in China. Mac computers, on the other hand, now represent a relatively small part of Apple's business, unlike the company's early years when the computers were its marquee products.

Mac computers held a 6% share of the worldwide personal computer market during the second quarter of this year, ranking well behind China's Lenovo as well as HP and Dell in the U.S., according to the research firm Gartner Inc.

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Air travel is becoming a test of physical endurance. Seats have shrunk, legroom has vanished — and the airlines aren't done with you yet.

Cebu Air, the Philippines' biggest budget carrier, last month said it was moving kitchens and bathrooms on some of its new A330neos to cram in a record 460 seats, 20 more than the plane's current maximum. It's part of a broader push, particularly in Asia, to stuff more people into jets flying the most popular routes, according to aviation researcher Landrum & Brown.

"It's all a matter of squeezing as many passengers as they can," said Mathieu De Marchi, a Bangkok-based consultant at the firm. "It's only going to get worse over the next decade."

Even if paying customers are less happy, packing more of them into cabins has helped turn around the U.S. aviation industry in recent years. In Asia, where 100 million people fly for the first timeevery year, the strategy is now the bread and butter for low-cost carriers serving an exploding middle class that cares more about price than comfort.

Asia's demand has led to industry shortages of almost everything, from pilots and mechanics to airports and runways (to say nothing of leg room). Carriers go to great lengths to avoid buying more aircraft and having to pay for extra landing rights at airports that are close to bursting.

Buying bigger planes is one way to deal with the problem, as AirAsia Group Bhd. is doing. The Malaysian budget carrier in June said it was changing an order for hundreds of aircraft to a larger model that carries 50 more passengers and flies about 600 miles (1,000 kilometers) further.

Another tactic is simply bolting in more chairs. European low-cost carrier Ryanair Holdings Plc led the charge in 2014 when it ordered high-density jets from Boeing Co. with eight more seats than normal. Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd., once a hallmark of comfort, in 2017 started cramming an extra seat into each economy row on its Boeing 777-300s, at the cost of about an inch of personal space for each passenger.

Less legroom is now the industry norm. In the early-2000s, rows in economy used to be 34 inches (86 centimeters) to 35 inches apart; now 30 to 31 inches is typical, though 28 inches can be found on short flights, according to Washington D.C.-based advocacy group Flyers Rights. Seats have narrowed, too, from about 18.5 inches to 17 inches on average.

Where someone's personal space starts and ends can be contentious, especially when there's not much space to begin with. It's no surprise that air rage most commonly occurs in economy class. Flights have been forced to make unscheduled landings because passengers were bickering over reclining seats.

Janet Bednarek, an aviation historian at the University of Dayton, Ohio, says smaller seats are less controversial in Asia, partly because Asians tend to have slighter builds than Americans or Europeans.

"Where people are smaller on average it is not as big an issue," she said. "Many people are willing to put up with discomfort in exchange for low-price tickets."

Your Tiny Economy Airline Seat May Soon Stop Shrinking

And prices have come down. Some international flights cost less than half of what they did a decade ago, according to Australia's Qantas Airways Ltd. Competition from low-cost carriers has forced airlines everywhere to lower fares and charge for things that were once free. Among the new extras one can buy: space.

A one-way ticket to Shanghai from Manila, a four-hour flight, can cost less than $100 on Cebu Air. But there's another price to pay: Seats on the planes are just 16.5 inches wide, less than the width of two hand spans and short of the 18-inch minimum that the manufacturer, Airbus SE, says is comfortable.

Cebu doubled down in June with a $6.8 billion order for Airbus jets that includes 16 higher-capacity A330neos. Airbus says the plane is designed to fit 260 to 300 passengers in a typical layout that has first-class, business and economy cabins. For "higher-density configurations" — code for bare-bones economy — the planes fit as many as 440, the manufacturer says.

Cebu is planning for 460, once the layout is certified.

In an email, Cebu Chief Executive Adviser Mike Szucs said "customer comfort and experience will be a primary consideration" but airfares are "always an aspect consumers are conscious about."

Aviation website Simple Flying sums up the situation: "This will make for one interesting long-haul."

–With assistance from Chloe Whiteaker.

(WASHINGTON) — A top executive for Juul Labs said that his company never intended its electronic cigarettes to be adopted by underage teenagers, as House lawmakers on Thursday accused the company of fueling the vaping craze among high schoolers.

Co-founder James Monsees testified that Juul developed its blockbuster vaping device and flavor pods for adult smokers who want to stop. He acknowledged statistics showing "a significant number of underage Americans are using e-cigarettes, including Juul products."

"Juul Labs isn't big tobacco," Monsees told members of a House subcommittee, adding that "combating underage use" is the company's highest priority.

Thursday's hearing marks the first time Juul has been called before Congress, despite growing scrutiny from parents, politicians and public health advocates. Federal law bans the sale of e-cigarettes to those under 18.

Drawing from some 180,000 documents collected from the company, House Democrats peppered Monsees with questions about the early ads and marketing that they contend led to the current wave of underage vaping by U.S. teens.

"We must trace the origins that led to this epidemic," said Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois, who chairs the economic subcommittee of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform.

The Democrat convened two hearings this week after launching an investigation last month into Juul's marketing, technology and business practices. The privately held company has grown into a multibillion-dollar business on the success of its small, discrete vaping device and nicotine pods.

Krishnamoorthi questioned Monsees about what he said were similarities between the design of the original Juul device and packaging for Marlboro cigarettes. He cited minutes from a 2016 Juul board meeting that mentioned a settlement with Philip Morris International, which sells Marlboros outside the U.S., to remove triangle and diamond shapes from Juul branding. Monsees said Juul paid "zero dollars" as part of the settlement.

"There was never any intent," to copy Marlboro, Monsees said. "The last thing we wanted was to be confused with any major tobacco company."

Last year, Altria, the parent company of Marlboro-maker Philip Morris USA, bought a 35% stake in Juul.

During his testimony, Monsees reiterated past steps taken by Juul, including shutting down its Facebook and Instagram pages and pulling several of its flavored pods out of retail stores to keep Juuls out of the hands of teens.

Monsees said he understands the negative scrutiny of his company, but assured lawmakers Juul's aim is to "eliminate cigarettes for good."

"This is an industry that has done wrong for a truly long period of time," Monsees said. "We are changing that from the inside out with products delivered by innovative people and a company that is 100% committed to changing the fabric of this market."

Neither Juul nor any vaping product is approved yet to help smokers quit.

Later in the hearing, lawmakers questioned Juul's chief administrative officer, Ashley Gould, about documents they said showed Juul offered $10,000 to some schools for anti-vaping educational programs. Gould said Juul only gave funding to six schools or youth programs and discontinued the program in 2018 after learning that tobacco companies had funded similar anti-smoking programs decades ago.

E-cigarettes typically heat a flavored nicotine solution into an inhalable aerosol. They are largely viewed as less harmful than traditional paper-and-tobacco cigarettes and some adult smokers use them as an alternative source of nicotine.

On Wednesday, Stanford University Professor Robert Jackler, an expert in tobacco advertising, testified that Juul's early promotions — including youthful models, colorful advertising and launch parties across the U.S. — mimicked tactics pioneered by cigarette makers. Jackler said Monsees, a Stanford alumnus, had personally credited the professor's research on tobacco advertising with shaping Juul's marketing in a meeting last year.

Monsees told lawmakers the comment was misinterpreted. Instead, he said Juul had learned the "bad actions" of those companies and what "not to do," from Jackler's archive of tobacco advertising.

Juul grew out of graduate work by Monsees and co-founder Adam Bowen, both Stanford design students.

The company's rise has closely tracked an explosion of underage vaping. Last year, 1 in 5 U.S. high school students reported using e-cigarettes in the last month, according to government survey figures. Juul has become a scourge in U.S. schools with students vaping in restrooms, hallways and even classrooms.

Another committee member, Rep. Katie Hill, D-Calif, said that internal Juul documents indicate the company had at one point sought to aggressively use social media to market its products, with potentially hundreds of social media influencers. Influencers are social media users that have large online followings and established credibility with their audience, according to Hill. She said the company told the subcommittee ahead of the hearing that it used influencers sparingly.

Monsees said that he wasn't familiar with the contracts she cited and told Hill the company had tried "a number of different things."

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration gained authority to regulate e-cigarettes in 2016, but the agency has repeatedly postponed a deadline for vaping companies to submit their products for health and safety review. Earlier this month, a federal judge sided with public health groups who sued the FDA and ruled that vaping companies must submit their products for review by next May.

In the span of just a few days, the federal government announced settlements relating to two massive privacy breaches that occurred over the last few years, fining Facebook $5 billion for mishandling consumer data, and Equifax $575 million for actions related to a data breach that exposed the personal information of 147 million consumers.

But the fines take very different forms. Almost half of the Equifax settlement is going to consumers harmed by the breach, who are eligible for at least $125; some will get as much as $20,000 for time and money spent protecting their identity in the wake of the violation. The entirety of the Facebook fine, by contrast, goes to the U.S. Department of the Treasury.

Why are consumers getting money in the Equifax settlement and not in the Facebook deal? It has to do with federal law, and who lost what in each situation, experts say.

In the Equifax case, consumers allegedly lost time and money by trying to protect their personal information in the wake of the data breach. Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, which regulates Equifax and other credit reporting agencies, the federal government can require that those consumers be compensated.

But in the Facebook case, it is difficult for the government to use current law to prove any individuals suffered a big loss. Facebook allegedly allowed the political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica to access users' personal data, and allowed consumer phone numbers initially acquired for security reasons to be used for advertising purposes. But from a legal perspective, "the people affected by Facebook didn't lose anything," said Justin Brookman, the director of Consumer Privacy and Technology Policy at Consumer Reports. They might have seen some targeted ads that violated their privacy, but putting a price tag on that is tricky.

Instead, Facebook was fined because it was found to have violated a 2012 deal with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which was meant to prevent Facebook from misrepresenting how it used consumers' personal information. The FTC fine, approved in a 3-2 vote by its commissioners, also found that Facebook violated Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act, which allows the government to enforce against unfair and deceptive trade and business practices. Rather than compensating consumers who were harmed, though, the settlement requires Facebook to become more transparent about how it uses consumer data going forward. (The $5 billion fine is the world's biggest-ever privacy fine so far.)

The Facebook settlement isn't the end of the government's potential actions against the company. Going forward, the Department of Justice will be able to take legal action against Facebook if the company violates the most recent settlement. Individual states can also bring their own lawsuits against Facebook by alleging it violated state laws. Consumers can also potentially file private litigation alleging Facebook engaged in deceptive practices.

Some advocates say the different remedies for Facebook and Equifax underscore the need for more robust federal laws governing what companies can and can't do with consumer data. Though California passed a sweeping privacy law that goes into effect next year, Congress has not been able to agree on how to proceed with a federal law regulating consumer data use. "We definitely need privacy laws in this country," Brookman said. "Most countries around the world have privacy laws requiring transparency and choices around access to data."

The tricky part is what that regulation would look like, and who would gain from it. Some leaders, including current California governor Gavin Newsom, suggest that tech companies should pay a "data dividend" and compensate consumers for the use of their data. But groups like Consumer Reports argue that rather than encouraging data collection, the government should stop that collection in the first place. California's law, for example, allows consumers to delete the personal information that businesses have collected about them.

Regulation can't just focus on tech companies, says Pam Dixon, the executive director of the World Privacy Forum, a research and advocacy group. Banks and other companies also have access to consumer data; many privacy problems stem from retail payments. And regulating technology doesn't work, she argues, because technology changes so quickly — a law governing how, say, Facebook uses data might be as useless in a few years as one that regulated MySpace a few years ago. Instead, Dixon advocates for setting standards for privacy, but says that federal law-setting has lagged. Senator Mark Warner introduced a bill in April that would regulate the methods used by some big websites to convince users to hand over their data, but it has not made much headway. "Congress has hit a road block here," Dixon said.

That's why some scholars say that regulators should use existing laws to hold companies more accountable for privacy violations. Antitrust scholar Dina Srinivasan says that antitrust law could be used to rein in a company's data practices while providing consumer compensation, for example. A German competition authority used antitrust principles to rule that Facebook could not gather user data when people are using independently owned apps, for instance. History suggests that companies are more likely to violate users privacy once their competition has disappeared, Srinivasan said. "The actual mechanism of competition can work to restrict a company's ability to violate user privacy," she said.

There are signs the government is already moving in that direction. Earlier this week, the Justice Department announced it was launching an antitrust review of major online platforms, including Google, Amazon, and Facebook. "Without the discipline of meaningful market-based competition, digital platforms may act in ways that are not responsive to consumer demands," said Assistant Attorney General Makan Delrahim in a statement. The announcement, however, made no specific mention of data privacy.

On a recent Tuesday, Neal Fachan walked down a dock in Seattle's Lake Union and boarded a blue and yellow Harbour Air seaplane, alongside six other tech executives. He was bound for Vancouver to check on the Canadian office of Qumulo, the Seattle-based cloud storage company he co-founded in 2012. With no security lines, it was an easy 50-minute flight past snow-capped peaks. Later that day, Fachan caught a return flight back to Seattle.

Fachan began making his monthly Instagram-worthy commute when Qumulo opened its Vancouver office in January. Other passengers on the seaplanes go back and forth multiple times a week. Fachan says his company expanded across the border because Canada's immigration policies have made it far easier to hire skilled foreign workers there compared to the United States. "We require a very specific subset of skills, and it's hard to find the people with the right skills," Fachan says as he gets off the plane. "Having access to a global employment market is useful."

In the fractious battle over immigration policy, most of the attention has been directed at apprehending migrants at the southern border. Some tech executives and economists, however, believe that growing delays and backlogs for permits for skilled workers at America's other borders pose a more significant challenge to the U.S.'s standing as a wealth-creating start-up mecca. The risk of losing out on the fruits of innovation to Canada and other countries that are more welcoming to immigrants might be a bigger problem for our economic future than a flood of refugees. Half of America's annual GDP growth is attributed to rising innovation.

"Increasingly, talented international professionals choose destinations other than the United States to avoid the uncertain working environment that has resulted directly from the agency's processing delays and inconsistent adjudications," testified Marketa Lindt, president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, at a House hearing last week about processing delays at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). Lindt's organization finds that USCIS processing time for some work permits has doubled since 2014, a fact cited in a May letter signed by 38 U.S. Senators on both sides of the aisle asking USCIS to explain the processing delays.

The backlogs in processing have particularly benefited our neighbor to the north. Canada has adopted an open-armed embrace of skilled programmers, engineers and entrepreneurs at the same time the U.S. is tightening its stance. Research shows that high-skilled foreign workers are highly productive and innovative, and tend to create more new businesses, generating jobs for locals. So each one who winds up in Canada instead of America is a win for the former, and a loss for the latter. "Really smart people can drive economic growth," says Robert Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a think tank in Washington, D.C. funded in part by cable, pharmaceutical, television, and tech companies. "There are not that many people in the world with an IQ of 130, and to the extent that we're attracting those people rather than the Canadians doing so, we're better off."

With the unemployment rate hovering below at or below four percent for the past 18 months, tech companies are long used to battling for talent by offering $100,000-plus starting salaries and perks like onsite gyms and all the kombucha you can drink. Recruiting foreign talent is one way for them to find new hires. There are a number of ways companies can hire skilled workers from India, China, and other countries, including applying for L-1 and H-1B visas, which allow foreigners to temporarily work in the United States. Demand for these visas, which are awarded by lottery, is intense. Since 2004, 65,000 H-1B visas are issued annually: this year's ceiling was hit in only four days. (The government allows 20,000 additional visas for workers who have a master's degree or PhD from a U.S. university.)

Amid the wider crackdown on immigration under the Trump Administration, the application process for employment-based visas appears to have gotten even tougher. The government denied 24% of all initial H-1B applications in 2018, up from six percent in 2015, according to an analysis of data from the National Foundation for American Policy, a pro-immigration think tank. It's not just H-1B applicants who are experiencing delays. Applicants for all employment-based green cards now have to appear in person at a field office, a new policy that has created long delays, according to the American Immigration Lawyers Association, which says immigration officials under Trump are focusing more on enforcement than on processing legal applications for benefits. And despite a backlog of 5.7 million cases in 2018, USCIS has been providing surge resources to Immigration and Customs Enforcement field offices across the country, diverting more staff away from processing visa applications.

Canada's policies, in contrast, offer an alluring alternative. Canada permits companies with offices in the country to hire skilled foreign workers in positions such as computer engineers, software designers, and mathematicians, and have their visas processed within two weeks. These workers can soon after apply to be permanent residents and, within three years, become full-fledged citizens. (The path to permanent residency for foreign workers in the U.S., by contrast, can take decades.) Officials at the Canadian consulate in Seattle work with two to three companies a week trying to set up offices in Canada.

"The visa process is just completely unpredictable for us, and we were wrestling with it for so long, we decided we needed to have some certainty," says Thor Kallestad, the CEO of DataCloud, which uses technology to help mining companies better assess land potential. He already had offices in Silicon Valley and Seattle, but decided to open up shop in Vancouver and close his Silicon Valley office so he could more easily hire foreign workers. "In the U.S., we just couldn't get clear answers about what the process looked like, what we as a company needed to do to rectify it."

The Canadian option offers workers more certainty — and a near-guaranteed path to citizenship — while many U.S. skilled workers have no idea when and if they will get approved to stay in the United States. Given the choice, talented entrepreneurs with cutting-edge companies are choosing Canada. "They really make it easy to come in and start a business," said Nat Cartwright, one of the founders of Finn.AI, an artificial intelligence company that powers virtual assistants for banks around the world. Cartwright and her two business partners, who are from Australia and India, met in business school in Spain. When they graduated, they considered locating their new company in Silicon Valley, but ultimately chose Vancouver because they knew they would qualify for a start-up visa there, and that they would be able to quickly hire AI experts from around the world. Of the company's 60 workers, 60% were born outside Canada. Seven of Cartwright's business school classmates from Spain have since relocated to Canada.

Canadian officials have deftly responded to the changing climate in the U.S. In 2017, the Trudeau government announced Global Skills Strategy, the program that allows companies to get work permits for foreign talent in less than two weeks. Their spouses can also receive work permits; the U.S. Department of Homeland Security this year proposed revoking work permits of the spouses of skilled foreign workers in the U.S. In 2018, the Trudeau government also made permanent the Start-Up Visa program, which allows immigrant entrepreneurs to live and work in the country provided their start-up has secured funding from venture capitalists or angel investors. A similar start-up visa program in the United States was approved in the last days of the Obama administration, but the Trump administration is in the process of ending it. "By helping Canadian companies grow, this strategy is creating more jobs for Canada's middle class and a stronger Canadian economy," said Ahmed Hussen, Canada's Somali-born Minister of Immigration, earlier this year.

Even the biggest American tech companies are expanding their Canadian operations in a quest for high-skilled labor. Software engineer Janko Jerinic moved to Canada after attending an Amazon recruiting fair in his home country of Serbia. He wanted a job in New York or Seattle, but his wife hoped to work as well, and an Amazon recruiter said it would be hard for her to get a visa. The recruiter steered the couple to Vancouver, where Jerinic has worked for Amazon since 2015. The office, which opened in 2013, rapidly grew from about 500 people when he started to triple that now. A map in Jerinic's Vancouver office shows employees' places of birth. There are hundreds of pins from places like India, Russia, Brazil, and Belgium. But "you have to use a flashlight to find people from Canada," he jokes. Amazon said in April 2018 that it was building a 416,000 square foot office in downtown Vancouver that will open in 2022; it plans to hire 3,000 more people there.

That technology companies are growing across America's border has big implications for the U.S. economy. Since World War II, the U.S. has been the epicenter of the entrepreneurial universe. But America's entrepreneurial dominance is waning. While 95% of global start-up and venture capital activity took place in the United States in the mid-1990s, today it's about half, according to a report from the Center for American Entrepreneurship (CAE), a nonprofit that advocates for start-ups and is funded by banks and financial institutions. And the number of start-ups still paying employees a year after their founding fell 42% between 2005 and 2015, the most recent year for which there is data available.

The innovation economy creates jobs outside of tech, too. Research by the Berkeley economist Enrico Moretti suggests that every high-paying tech job created in an economy results in five more openings, including positions like lawyers, nurses, and hairdressers. The United States allows about 140,000 immigrant skilled workers to become permanent residents annually; Canada, a company with one-tenth of the population, welcomed 160,000 skilled workers on the track to permanent residency in 2017 and hopes to get that number to nearly 200,000 by 2021. Its goal of making immigrants 1% of its population by 2021 would increase annual GDP growth by 0.6%, with immigrants driving one-third of that expansion, according to a report by the Conference Board of Canada.

Making it easier for high-skilled immigrants in the United States could help jump-start America's innovation economy, said Ian Hathaway, a Brookings Institution fellow who studies entrepreneurialism and technology. Immigrants are twice as likely as native-born Americans to start businesses. Immigrants or children of immigrants founded almost half of America's Fortune 500 companies. More immigration could also bring benefits beyond the country's traditional tech hubs, boosting businesses in the countryside and suburbia that are short on skilled tech talent. Most of the start-up activity that has occurred since the Great Recession has been concentrated in only 20 counties, a startling contrast to the economic recovery of the 1990s, when new businesses were sprinkled across the country.

VannTech, a recruiting platform, recently brought 126 Brazilian workers to a company in the Canadian prairies whose native workers kept moving to Toronto and Vancouver. The platform has 70,000 skilled tech workers looking to relocate to Canada and Europe; it does not help these people go to the United States because the process is too difficult, said Ilya Brotzky, VannHack's CEO. "If U.S. companies are putting 5,000 tech jobs in Canada, when they could be putting them in places like St. Louis or Indianapolis, that's a huge deal to those local economies," says Atkinson.

At the same time, Trump himself has advocated for rethinking the system. In 2017, he backed the Raise Act, a bill introduced by Senate Republicans that would have cut legal immigration in half, while also establishing a points system designed to give priority to skilled workers and investors. While the bill would not have dramatically increased the number of visas available to in-demand workers, it did signal a preference for skilled workers over other migrants. The bill stalled out after opposition from politicians whose constituencies include agriculture and tourism companies, which rely heavily on unskilled immigrants. Trump reintroduced the merit-based immigration idea this year in a Rose Garden speech, and his staff is considering a new immigration plan that would revamp the current system to prioritize skills over family ties. "We want immigrants coming in," he said in May. "We cherish the open door that we want to create for our country, but a big proportion of those immigrants must come in through merit and skill."

Harbour Air, the seaplane company, used to fly buyers in and out of remote log booms across the Pacific Northwest. As that business waned, the company pivoted to tourism. Now, pilot Reggie Morisset says that tech industry demand is filling up planes once again. When the Vancouver-Seattle route launched last year, tech companies bought tickets in bulk so their employees could easily go back and forth between Canada and the United States, he said. "It's catching fire," he said. "If anything, it is just going to get busier."

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After the enormous 2017 data breach that revealed the private information of millions of people, credit bureau Equifax plans to pay millions to those affected.

The company recently settled to pay up to $700 million in restitution and fines to settle with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. $425 million will go to those who were affected by the breach, which exposed social security numbers of nearly 150 million people.

The website where those affected can file a claim is now live.

To find out if you were one of the people impacted by the breach, Equifax has set up a tool to check.

If you were affected, you'll have access to free credit monitoring and identity theft protection for up to 10 years. If you don't want the credit monitoring, you can simply get a $125 payment.

Anyone who had expenses as a result of the breach, such as losses, accountant fees or freezing a credit report, can get a payment of up to $20,000.

"This comprehensive settlement is a positive step for U.S. consumers and Equifax as we move forward from the 2017 cybersecurity incident and focus on our transformation investments in technology and security as a leading data, analytics, and technology company," Equifax Chief Executive Officer, Mark W. Begor said in a statement about the settlement.

Equifax's disclosure of the 2017 breach sparked off intense criticism as it came to light that the credit bureau knew about the hack almost five months before it initially claimed and three senior executives sold off almost $2 million of their shares in the company before it went public with the information.

(Bloomberg) –– Tesla shares plummeted after a worse-than-expected loss and yet another major management change cast fresh doubts on the electric-car maker's future.

Despite delivering a record number of vehicles in the second quarter, Tesla lost $1.12 a share, a bigger deficit than any analyst projected. While Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk is hoping to earn a profit in the three months ending in September, he told shareholders he'll prioritize other goals.

Then, for the second time already this year, Musk dropped a bombshell about a senior executive role change on a Tesla earnings call. Co-Founder J.B. Straubel, who's been with Tesla since before the billionaire CEO joined the board 15 years ago, is leaving the chief technology officer job and becoming an adviser.

The weak results and Straubel's step back risk undermining Musk's bid to sustainably make money building and selling electric cars. Tesla's stock fell as much as 13% in pre-market U.S. trading Thursday, after a 20% decline this year through Wednesday.

The earnings miss is "calling into question the path to profitability from here," Ryan Brinkman, an analyst at JPMorgan, wrote in a report. He said Tesla is counting on selling more lower-priced Model 3s to make money, but posited that the car "may be structurally unprofitable."

More: Straubel Leaving CTO Role After $30 Million in Tesla Share Sales

While Tesla posted profits in the second half of last year, 2019 has been turbulent. A disastrous first three months of deliveries gave way to a surge in the second quarter. Demand was driven by the lower-margin Model 3, which ramped up in the U.S. and started sales in China and Europe.

"Record second-quarter deliveries resulting in a larger-than-expected loss is a clear example that the company will be challenged to recreate the successful U.S. sales model in foreign markets where incumbent, established and well-funded automakers enjoy home-team favor," said Kevin Tynan, an analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence.

In a letter to shareholders, Musk said he's still aiming for positive third-quarter earnings, but will focus on delivering more cars, expanding capacity and generating cash. On the conference call with analysts, the CEO said he expects to be "probably around break-even this quarter, and profitable next quarter."

Musk's Blindsides

The departure by Straubel from the CTO role he's had since 2005 reinforces Musk's reputation for blindsiding investors. He revealed the departure of Chief Financial Officer Deepak Ahuja in a similar fashion in January.

Straubel, 43, has overseen Tesla's energy business, its Supercharger network and its battery plant in Nevada. He stressed that he's not "disappearing," and Musk immediately announced a replacement. Drew Baglino, the vice president of technology who appeared on stage with Musk and Straubel at Tesla's annual shareholder meeting in June, will take over.

"I love the team and I love the company and I always will," Straubel said. "Drew and I have worked closely together for many years and I have total confidence in Drew. I am not going anywhere."

Read more: Tesla's Solar Sales Slip as Comeback Eludes Ex-Rooftop King

Straubel is "probably the second-most important person at Tesla," Alexander Potter, an analyst at Piper Jaffray, wrote in a report to clients. "Even though he is retaining 'adviser' status, his departure is nonetheless likely to rattle investors."

Margin, Model Y

Tesla's automotive gross margin shrank to 18.9% in the second quarter, from 20.6% in the year-earlier period. The decline was driven by the lower average selling price of the company's vehicles, as deliveries of the Model 3 more than quadrupled the combined total for the costlier Model S and X.

Tesla expects to launch the all-new Model Y crossover by the fall of 2020. Because of the large market for SUVs and their higher prices, the company sees the vehicle being more profitable than the Model 3, which is selling for about $50,000.

Musk, 48, is eyeing an end-of-year start date for production in China and wrote in the letter to shareholders that the largest auto market in the world "poses a strong long-term opportunity."

Tesla is building a battery and vehicle plant on the outskirts of Shanghai, and depending on how quickly it ramps up, the company is targeting production of half a million cars over the next 12 months.

"It's difficult for people to really feel an exponential," Musk said on the call. "Tesla is expanding at an exponential rate."

When music streaming company Spotify launched in India, the company made a promotional video with artists from across the world welcoming local users to the platform. One of the videos caused a social media frenzy in the country. It was of Korean boyband BTS uttering the Hindu greeting "Namaste." BTS mania, it turned out, had made it to the subcontinent.

When Spotify launched its audio streaming platform in 2008, it revolutionized the way people listened to music, offering them millions of songs at their fingertips. It first listeners were in its native Sweden, but Spotify quickly branched out to the U.K. in 2009 and arrived in the U.S. in 2011.

Today Spotify, named one of TIME's Genius Companies of 2018, has 207 million listeners and 96 million subscribers around the world. In 2018, Cecilia Qvist, Spotify's global head of markets, led the company's expansion into 17 new countries, including Romania, Israel, Vietnam and several places in the Middle East and Africa. The Indian launch, which came earlier this year, gave it potential access to another 400 million smartphone users.

Here's what Qvist has to say about the company's growth plans, what's trending musically, and the all-conquering power of K-Pop.

What are you listening to right now?

I'm very much on back catalogue at the moment, so Fleetwood Mac. And given my role, I often try to listen to the artist or playlist that is trending, so "Señorita" by Shawn Mendes.

Spotify operates in 79 markets. Which of those was the most challenging to get into and why?

For bigger markets like India, in which we launched in February, we spend more time researching because of the size and complexity of the market. I'd define India as more a continent than a country. We launched in five languages, we also made sure the narrative was localized and appealed to the local audience.

When you're entering new markets, how do you ensure the offering is relevant and culturally appropriate?

Being culturally relevant means that you have to have people on the ground. We have more than 100 editors around the globe that make sure we lean into what is happening in the market and resonate with users.

What's the most unique feature you've offered in a new market?

The karaoke feature in Japan. It's a great example of leaning into something that was trending. It was a must have.

Can you tell us about plans for your podcast business?

We acquired Anchor, Gimlet and Parcast. We announced a partnership with Higher Ground, the production company of former President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama. We have more than 250,000 podcasts right now. Over time, we expect that 20% of the content on our platform will be non-music.

You just launched Spotify Lite, an Android-only app that runs quickly on older phones and slower networks. Tell us about that.

As we saw our business expanding into more emerging markets, we came across new types of users where they have a variety of phones, where network was not as good and where data plans are expensive. That's why we created Spotify Lite.

There's been a lot of discussion about the role of tech companies in regulating harmful content online. How is Spotify looking at the issue?

We don't allow any hate content on our platform, period. We're always enhancing our technology and will continue to invest to discover anything that is related to that type of content on the platform. For us, it's a continuous improvement. It's not a challenge unique to Spotify, it's an industry challenge across the board. There are a many industries that have gone through this and come out on the other side.

Read More: Spotify Ends 'Hateful Conduct' Policy That Banned R. Kelly From Playlists

What have you learned as you've expanded across the world?

Now streaming is a global phenomenon, this technology that doesn't respect any boundaries. I think that BTS, Blackpink and a few others, how they travel on the platform, has been interesting to see. That's the cool part, we can help artists spread the word around the world.

Right now, the rising story is K-pop around the world. When BTS was at the Grammys I think everyone wondered "Who are they?" But for us, it was like "There they are."

What's the most listened to playlist globally?

Today's Top Hits currently has 23.7m followers. Discover Weekly is the one that everyone uses and genre playlists like K-Pop Daebak are growing like crazy too.

What has surprised you about a country you've launched in?

In the Philippines, Christmas starts almost in the summer. The Christmas music comes on in early September and it just keeps going. The Philippines loves Christmas.

—This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

(SAN FRANCISCO) — Facebook says it is under antitrust investigation by the Federal Trade Commission. The company made the announcement just hours after the agency slapped it with a record $5 billion fine and new oversight on its privacy practices.

Facebook said Wednesday that it was informed of the FTC's antitrust investigation in June. On Tuesday, the Department of Justice also announced a broad antitrust probe of technology companies. Though that agency didn't name any companies, broad antitrust concerns have long swirled around Apple, Amazon, Facebook and Google. Facebook also faces various probes in Canada and Europe as regulators seek to crack down on the growing power of these U.S. technology companies.

Following on Facebook's public disclosure, the FTC confirmed the antitrust probe, but would not give details such as how long the probe has been underway.

Facebook's business, so far, seems unharmed. On Wednesday, the company reported stronger-than-expected revenue but lower earnings for the second quarter. The results were boosted by higher advertising revenue and an ever-growing user base, though net income declined due to one-time expenses — mainly the FTC fine.

Facebook said it earned $2.6 billion, or 91 cents per share, in the April-June period. That's down 49% from $5.1 billion, or $1.74 per share, in the same period a year earlier. Adjusted earnings were $1.99 per share. Analysts, on average, were expecting adjusted earnings of $2.11 per share, according to a poll by FactSet.

Facebook booked $2 billion in one-time expenses to pay for the remainder of the FTC fine after setting aside $3 billion in the first quarter. The $5 billion fine, announced Wednesday morning, stems from the FTC's investigation into Facebook's privacy violations following the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

Revenue rose 28% to $16.9 billion from $13.2 billion. Analysts were expecting $16.5 billion.

Facebook had 2.41 billion monthly active users as of June 30, an increase of 8% from a year earlier.

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Facebook agreed to pay a record $5 billion to resolve a U.S. investigation into years of privacy violations, a settlement that increases the board of directors' responsibility for protecting users' data while changing little about the company's lucrative advertising business.

The agreement, announced Wednesday by the Federal Trade Commission, will for the first time end Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg's final authority over privacy decisions, creating an independent privacy committee of directors on the company's board, according to an FTC statement.

The accord will also require Facebook to keep a tighter leash on third-party apps, perform regular sweeps for unencrypted passwords and refrain from using telephone numbers obtained for security purposes for advertising. It also calls for the company to conduct privacy reviews of new offerings and submit to new privacy certifications and assessments.

The agreement, which was approved by the FTC's Republican majority by a vote of 3-2, does little to alter Facebook's structural data collection practices, which are at the heart of its business model. While the fine is steep, it's far from devastating for Facebook, which reported sales of almost $56 billion in 2018. It had set aside $3 billion in anticipation of the fine.

"The magnitude of the $5 billion penalty and sweeping conduct relief are unprecedented in the history of the FTC," Chairman Joseph Simons said in a statement. "The relief is designed not only to punish future violations but, more importantly, to change Facebook's entire privacy culture to decrease the likelihood of continued violations."

While the fine is the largest ever imposed by the FTC for a privacy violation, it didn't satisfy the agency's two Democratic commissioners, Rebecca Kelly Slaughter and Rohit Chopra, who voted against it.

"When companies can violate the law, pay big penalties, and still turn a profit while keeping their business model intact, enforcement agencies cannot claim victory," Chopra said in a statement. He said the settlement did little to empower the board to represent users rather than shareholders on privacy while releasing the company and executives from accountability for a broad array of potential misdeeds.

Slaughter said that given Facebook's repeated violations, the FTC would have been more likely to change the company's behavior by suing it and its CEO.

The deal is also unlikely to mollify critics in Congress and among privacy advocates who have called for accountability for Zuckerberg, fines that represent a greater share of the company's revenue and the unwinding of Facebook's acquisition of Instagram and WhatsApp.

The FTC probe stems from the March 2018 disclosure that Cambridge Analytica, a consulting firm hired by Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, improperly obtained data on tens of millions of Facebook users from a researcher who collected personal data through a third-party quiz app. The app not only collected its users' data, but also information on their friends, affecting millions of consumers.

The Cambridge Analytica scandal dealt a blow to Facebook's reputation at a time when the company was already under fire for allowing Russian agents to exploit its platform to try to influence the 2016 election. The company's battered reputation caught up with it earlier this month, when lawmakers railed against Facebook's plan to introduce a digital currency. Sherrod Brown of Ohio, the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, called the company "dangerous."

The FTC also announced separate settlements with the now-defunct political consulting firm, its former CEO Alexander Nix, and an app developer who worked with the company, Aleksandr Kogan.

The agency's investigation went far beyond issues around Cambridge Analytica. The FTC alleged violations going back to 2012, the same year that Facebook finalized an earlier consent order over privacy lapses. Four months after that accord, the FTC said, Facebook removed a disclosure that information users shared with friends could get sucked up by the apps those friends used — while allowing the practice to continue.

Facebook also announced in 2014 that it would stop letting outside app developers collect data of users' friends, according to the FTC. However, the company told developers they could continue the practice for a year if their apps were already on the platform — and failed to stop the sharing until mid-2018 or later. The company also often limited enforcement of its policies against third-party developers if they were making Facebook money, the FTC alleged.

Under the settlement, Facebook will have to report data compromises to the FTC if more than 500 users are affected, terminate apps that fail to certify their compliance with company policies and provide greater notice of its use of facial recognition. Facebook had misled users to think they could opt in to a facial recognition feature, even though it was turned on by default, the FTC said.

Compliance with the order will be managed by an independent committee on Facebook's board of directors, which Zuckerberg will not appoint. Zuckerberg, and a designated compliance officer approved by the independent committee, must certify compliance both with the privacy program and the larger order. False certification will "subject them to individual civil and criminal penalties," the FTC said.

Facebook spent months negotiating the settlement with the FTC, and any future potential violations would likely require similar deliberation and delay. That makes it a weaker burden on Facebook than Europe's General Data Protection Regulation, which for small violations penalizes companies 10 million euros, or 2% of the violator's worldwide annual revenue, whichever is higher.

While the new agreement removes a major burden weighing on the Menlo Park, California-based company, it is still grappling with investigations by other authorities in the U.S. and the European Union. European officials are pursuing multiple data-protection investigations, while the city of Washington, D.C., is suing the company over Cambridge Analytica, and the New York State attorney general, Letitia James, has announced that her office is looking into the company's harvesting of some users' email contacts.

In addition, a federal judge in California in May declined to dismiss lawsuits brought on behalf of tens of millions of users who blame the company for allowing their private information to be shared in the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

The FTC itself is also poised to continue scrutiny of Facebook. As part of a broad agreement with the Justice Department dividing oversight of four of the biggest tech companies, the agency will take responsibility for a potential antitrust investigation into the company. One area of focus is likely to be its acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp.

And the Justice Department's antitrust division disclosed plans Tuesday to scrutinize tech platforms following mounting criticism across Washington that the companies have become too big and powerful. The department didn't specify which firms it would look at but strongly suggested Facebook, Alphabet Inc.'s Google and Amazon.com Inc. were in the cross-hairs.

–With assistance from Sarah Frier.