10 things in tech you need to know today

Good morning! This is the tech news you need to know this Friday.

1. Facebook could be quietly building a cryptocurrency for WhatsApp. According to Bloomberg, the Silicon Valley tech giant is reportedly trying to build a "stablecoin" pegged to the value of the dollar.
2. Amazon accidentally sent 1,700 Alexa recordings to the wrong person, including audio from in the shower. A German magazine reported on Thursday that someone requested their personal data from Amazon and was shocked to discover 1,700 audio files of someone he didn't know talking to Alexa.
3. Snap employees will not receive cash bonuses for the second straight year, Cheddar reports. Instead, individual employees may receive performance-based bonuses in the form of stock options.
4. Someone is spreading an Amazon smear campaign as cloud giants compete for a $10 billion defense cloud contract. Bloomberg reported that there's a dossier going around Washington, D.C. saying that Amazon and Pentagon officials engaged in activities that gave Amazon an unfair edge in the bidding for a $10 billion cloud contract with the Pentagon.
5. State-sponsored Chinese hackers infiltrated IBM and Hewlett Packard Enterprise to steal their clients' secrets. Sources familiar with the cyberattacks told Reuters that the hackers were part of a Chinese campaign known as "Cloudhopper."
6. A major British airport was forced to shut down for more than 24 hours by someone flying drones over the runway. Gatwick Airport, the second-biggest airport in the UK, was forced to close leaving thousands stranded.
7. Facebook shut down fake news sites spreading false information about the Bangladesh opposition days before national elections. Facebook's head of cybersecurity policy told the AP that the fake pages and accounts were created by Bangladeshis with government ties.
8. An anonymous Amazon worker claimed in a column that warehouse workers were fired via text last Christmas. According to the anonymous worker, texts were then sent out asking employees to volunteer for overtime.
9. Employees at vaping startup Juul may receive multibillion-dollar bonuses after the company raised $12.8 billion from the tobacco giant Altria. Juul will reportedly spend $2 billion on bonuses, averaging out at $1.3 million per employee.
10. It looks like office chat app Slack is banning some users because of Iran sanctions, even if they don't live or work in Iran. Ethnically Iranian users and users who have traveled to Iran found out on Wednesday that their Slack accounts had been shut down.

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