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Mercedes already has its own Mercedes Pay system that allows users to purchase items or services from the car, but now the automaker has teamed up with Visa to make the process easier and more widely available via the new feature Mercedes Pay+. Instead of having to key in a pin or use a phone, all that’s required for authentication is a fingerprint scan. Models available with fingerprint sensors include the EQS and EQE electric vehicles, as well as the S-Class, GLC-Class, and C-Class.

At present, Mercedes Pay+ can be used to pay for various digital services like improved navigation features or remote connectivity, as well as on-demand vehicle hardware upgrades like rear axle steering with a larger steering angle. Eventually, payments will be expanded to other car-related services, such as fueling, Mercedes said.

From Make payments from your Mercedes with just a fingerprint:

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The users of the platform will use a unique identification and wallet service, denominated “Multi Magic Passport,” that will allow them to make payments and to move their personal data, including avatar status, items, and NFTs (non-fungible tokens), between these metaverses.

From Japan Metaverse Economic Zone:

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one of the other goals of the regulation—to establish a market for data and facilitate data exchange between companies—has not been reached to date.

This lack of action has led to the potential for further regulatory activity to define an agenda for how to uplift the data capabilities of European companies, create a market for data, and regulate activities around AI. These activities are typically summarized as the EU digital strategy.

From The EU digital strategy: The impact of data privacy on global business | McKinsey.

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The EU digital strategy comprises several acts:

The Data Governance Act creates a new way of managing data to increase trust in and facilitate data sharing.
The Digital Markets Act creates fair and contestable markets for innovation, growth, and competitiveness in the digital sector.
The Digital Services Act creates a safer digital space where the rights of all users of digital services are protected.
The Data Act regulates access to data in B2B, B2C, and B2G (business-to-government) relationships and while switching between cloud providers.
The AI Act enacts stringent regulations of (high-risk) AI systems and prohibition of certain practices.
According to current plans, these acts will only become effective during or after Spring 2023, but an end to the alignment process is foreseeable. While the five acts are currently in draft status and further changes to the regulation can be expected, there is a clear trend toward stricter regulatory guardrails for data and AI.

From The EU digital strategy: The impact of data privacy on global business | McKinsey.

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Stefan Thomas, a German-born programmer living in San Francisco, is facing a daunting challenge as he tries to remember his password to access his digital wallet containing 7,002 Bitcoins. The value of his Bitcoin holdings has surged to over $232 million, making his search for the password even more urgent.

From Lost Password Could Cost Programmer $232M in Bitcoins | Tokenhell.

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Overall, this paper introduces novel language modelling techniques that accommodate more diverse human preferences and demonstrates the potential for LLMs to assist humans in finding common ground with those holding different views.

From DeepMind & UCL Fine-tune a 70B Parameter LM to Generate Statements Agreeable to Humans with Diverse Opinions | Synced:

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“Regardless of their nationalities, three-quarters of the smugglers live in the UK. They are happier there. They rent houses under someone else’s name and drive cars without a licence.”

From Channel crossings: People smugglers are ‘settling in Britain, renting houses and investing profits in UK businesses’ | World News | Sky News:

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n 2022, stablecoin settlements reached $7Trillion but Tether accounted for 57% of the volume settled as USDC continued to grow.
To put things in perspective, in 2022 AMEX processed $1 trillion, Mastercard $2.2 Trillion and VISA $12Trillion. Already, Stablecoins have settled on-chain more than the Mastercard, American Express, and Discover networks.

From Stablecoin Showdown: The USD-Pegged Battlefield | by Efi Pylarinou | Feb, 2023 | Medium:

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In prime position in the charismatic church of St Helen’s Bishopsgate lie the remains of Sir Thomas Gresham, one of the most influential and enigmatic figures the City of London has ever produced.

Gresham, who lived from roughly 1519 until 1579, was hugely rich, with a palatial home in Bishopsgate where Tower 42 is today, yet he died heavily in debt. The story of his grave just about sums him up. Gresham manoeuvred to have his tomb located in what was his home parish church by promising an endowment to build a steeple – a promise Professor John Guy, one of his recent biographers, says “he never made good”.

From Vic Keegan: Sir Thomas Gresham, the City’s first “true wizard” of global finance – OnLondon:

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This is hardly a new perspective. Back in 2019, the security expert Brian Krebs put it plainly: Phone numbers stink for security and authentication. They stink because most of us have so much invested in these digits that they’ve become de facto identities. At the same time, when you lose control over a phone number — maybe it’s hijacked by fraudsters, you got separated or divorced, or you were way late on your phone bill payments — whoever inherits that number can then be you in a lot of places online.