Bloomberg

The largest US telecommunication companies are slowing internet traffic to and from popular apps like YouTube and Netflix, according to new research from Northeastern University and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. The researchers used a smartphone app called Wehe, downloaded by about 100,000 consumers, to monitor which mobile services are being throttled when and by whom, in what likely is the single largest running study of its kind. Among US wireless carriers, YouTube is the No. 1 target of throttling, where data speeds are slowed, according to the data.

Antitrust restrictions placed on Comcast after its takeover of NBCUniversal are due to expire in a few days. But that doesn’t mean the Justice Department is done scrutinizing the company. The department’s antitrust division wrote a letter Aug 14 to Comcast warning that it would continue to monitor developments in how the company handles TV programming and distribution. It also asked for notice by Aug 29 of any changes that the cable giant plans to make when the decree runs out on Sept 1. Comcast’s acquisition of NBC won the approval of regulators more than seven years ago.

A backlash against the app stores of Apple and Google is gaining steam, with a growing number of companies saying the tech giants are collecting too high a tax for connecting consumers to developers’ wares. Netflix and video game makers Epic Games and Valve are among companies that have recently tried to bypass the app stores or complained about the cost of the tolls Apple and Google charge. Grumbling about app store economics isn’t new.

White House Counsel Don McGahn’s July 17 call to Federal Communication Commission Chairman Ajit Pai over the decision to send the $3.9 billion merger between Sinclair Broadcast Group and Tribune Media to an administrative law judge wasn’t improper, Chairman Pai said: “It was pretty unusual, and it was the first time we got a status inquiry of that kind.” Chairman Pai, when asked if McGahn’s call was improper, said, “Oh, not at all. It was just a big old status inquiry.”

Russia’s social-media trolling operation began stepping up its Twitter presence to new heights in late July 2017 -- more than eight months after sowing discord and disinformation in the 2016 presidential election. The burst of activity -- revealed in a new, comprehensive dataset of nearly 3 million tweets -- had an overriding focus over the ensuing three months: popularizing headlines and news stories that were originally authored by a US-based news site called Truthfeed that supports President Donald Trump and specializes in hyper-partisan, factually incorrect stories.