emily: i'm emily chang in san francisco and this is "bloomberg technology." drivers for uber and lyft turned off their apps on wednesday to protest what they say were declining wages at a time when both companies are raking in billions of dollars. both companies enter the public market. facebook's blockchain bet. employees and may

announce a new product, a type of cryptocurrency, later this year. a new report says hackers co-opted tools of the nsa. how a china linked group turned the table. first, our top story. a big week for uber. ipo is oftenn bumpy and simmering tensions are flaring again. across in major cities the u.s. and u.k. went on strike wednesday over low wages and unstable conditions. in march, the company pinched itself to investors and the company -- and protesters attempted to picket the roadshow. joining us now, the coo of fountain, a company that works with gig economy companies. tech'sth us, bloomberg

eric newcomer. how big are the protests and where are they happening? eric: this is all over the world, designed to really draw drivers aheadver of the pricing and listing on friday. this is a global effort, i think. there are questions about the effect. these people can still get cars. but certainly the presence has been made known. caroline: anecdotal -- emily: anecdotally, it sounds like it hasn't really crippled the app, correct? uber by its very nature, can be responsive to a strike. drivers pay would go up if there aren't enough of them on the marketplace. there are different places. the app is perfectly operational. emily: the reality is that there

are more gig economy companies, more workers in demand. how do you think a strike like ?his will affect uber micah: i think this is more of a pr exercise anecdotally, my wife was able to use an uber this morning to get to the airport. i think the more interesting question than the impact of a one-day strike is whether or not driver retention or gig economy worker retention over the course of the next couple of years will suffer. the best pay, the best wages, best work and lifestyle to offer. emily: a couple of quotes from drivers. "i'mver for uber saying, striking because they have broken their promise time and again. uber cut our rates and tried to tell us we would be earning more

even though we were making less." a lyft driver said, if something happens to my vehicle, even the wear and tear, these companies are getting rich. we need to give drivers a fair share of the revenue. what is uber saying about this today? eric: i think they are trying to take a sympathetic ear to drivers. they are not shouting down these protesters. i think they understand that it is always sort of a challenged relationship. how bringingbout down driver subsidies or incentives as uber talks about them, could further irritate drivers. i think that is going to be a challenge because obviously uber is a company that lost $3 billion in operating losses last last $10 billion over the

three years, and yet drivers, clearly from these protests, feel underpaid. solving those two problems, one, drivers who don't feel like they make enough and come on the other hand, trying to make money is going to be a huge challenge for uber. emily: talk about the ripple effects this could continue to have on the gig economy. could they make more if they are a delivery driver for post-may torque doing tasks for task rabbit. >> as they are able to build a stable business model and then get the model in place that will retain drivers and workers, whenever those workers do, wait -- wages, i expect, will fluctuate. some of these companies may find they need to raise wages in

order to keep these workers on over the course of the time period they need to be working to be profitable. i expect that some companies who have more margin to spend on labor will find labor costs going up over time. some may have less margin. i think we will see over time some of these gig economy companies get driven out of business as we see whether or not consumers are willing to pay the higher prices that may be imposed by higher costs. emily: do you think they will be driven out of business given demand for their services? >> no. capital, uber is about to get fresh capital. this is also their core business. they are in a situation where they have to figure that out. gig economy workers as part of

the core but they may not have the same advantages, or companies that have either been developed as a strategic add-on to a company that has a profitable core business, a grocery company or something like this. these companies will adjust from uber and lyft. corbyn, head of the labour party and the u.k., saying that uber cannot be allowed to get away with huge payouts for their ceos. stand with these workers on strike today across the u.k. and world asking you not to use uber between 7:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m. today but, uber has only one ceo, how much does that ceo make? when you are looking at many of these employees who are about to get rich on an ipo, is it easier to understand their position? received 45er ceo

million last year. he is august the getting very well compensated for his job. it is a striking contrast to how much a driver is getting paid. obviously, uber has a political problem, especially on the left. obviously, alexandria ocasio-cortez tweeted about this, bernie sanders has been talking about it. i definitely think, throughout this democratic primary, i wouldn't be surprised if candidates keep talking about uber. obviously, this is a great moment to talk about it. sort of a vulnerable moment for the company, not the press that it wants right now. there is going to be this liberal conversation in the democratic primary and i think that will be a moment to talk about labor in america and obviously uber is sort of central to that story. i don't think this is going away once uber becomes public. then, it is just whether that

conversation can turn into some sort of legislation that can change uber's business or if it is just talk. emily: the conversation will certainly continue as the strike continues to unfold. eric newcomer and micah rowland, thank you very much. kicked off a bond offering that could make it the biggest week in months. they plan to sell bonds in as many as eight parts to help fund the $33 billion acquisition of red hat. coming up, facebook has a plan to start making money off whatsapp. and it is making london the center of what it hopes will soon be a global phenomenon. that is next. if you like bloomberg news, check us out on the radio, the bloomberg app, bloomberg.com, and in the u.s. on sirius xm.

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emily: ever since facebook acquired whatsapp in 2014, the question is been, how do you monetize it? turnay is by trying to into a mobile payments platform. we now know they are trying to use london to drive the global expansion of whatsapp for mobile payments. facebook has designs on using whatsapp to transfer its very own cryptocurrency. here to talk all about it, our fin tech reporter julian new york and here in studio, kurt wagoner. what is facebook doing here

exactly? kurt: this is kind of an office expansion. they are going to add 100 employees in london, working on whatsapp, on payments, security features. whatsapp is a global platform, huge in india, europe. they think this is maybe a better recruiting ground for them to launch this payments initiative. emily: how does it work? kurt: right now it is being tested, and only in india. imagine you are sending money to friends, family. you want to do that anyway that is secure but also convenient. you're probably texting with these people, messaging with them. you can add a payments feature on top of that. this: the other part of story, facebook working on launching its own cryptocurrency. how does that make sense? julie: i think this may be a way

for them to do more cross-border, something they are looking at. cross-border with blockchain, something that could work fairly well if you have other players coming into it. to have people actually use whatsapp and this sort of facebook calling or whatever they might call it to send money to family and friends in other countries, and have that is one stable currency. it could actually be a good thing but if you think that, this isn't the first time facebook has tried to make payments work. there's a reason they want to people on thisrt team. there are other companies out there that are very competitive in this space. payments is just cutthroat in general. it is going to be a long shot but they do have smart people on

this team. about theys talk hired david markets, the former ceo of paypal, to run messenger, that he went off to work on this secretive initiative. he has, as we understand it, hired a bunch of former paypal employees. who are these people? julie is the expert on the paypal stuff. she had a great feature this morning on bloomberg. david is starting to bring over these people who he used to work with at paypal, who are obviously payments experts to say, this is a really hard problem. facebook has not nailed this, not been able to plant a flag, if you will come in the payments space. you want to bring over people who have built this stuff before. are these former

paypal employees? to be a lot going of people outside of what bloomberg people of heard of other than david markets. people working on bloomberg payments, fraud protection. things that they will need to industry knowledge on if they want to get this off the ground and actually make it work. for viewers to trust -- to trust using this. protecting against fraud as well, this is something people might want to hack into, misuse, that they know going into it that they will have to protect against. how does this fit into the broader strategy and broader challenges facebook is facing in general? kurt: i think 99% of facebook revenue comes from one business model, which is that they show people targeted ads.

this is obviously a new opportunity for them. there has been a lot of talk about should they diversify that business, where candidate diversify that business? it is a feature people are using all around the world. but there is also some untapped ofential for them in terms that this is something they are not there is some hope from investors to figure out, what does the company do that is not advertising? emily: thank you. allen'sp, byron entertainment studios picking up momentum after securing another tv deal. how the comedian and former tv host is expanding into broadcasting. check us out on twitter and follow our breaking global news network tictoc on twitter. this is bloomberg. ♪

fiber network owners i/o -- zayo group is going private. the price represents a 14% premium to the closing price tuesday. the company has been under pressure from activist investors. comedian turned businessman byron allen is building an entertainment empire. after taking part in sinclair broadcast group's acquisition of fox's regional sports networks last week, he announced plans to stations.v own several already syndicated shows and acquired the weather channel last year but this marks the first foray into tv.

allen to n with discuss. >> when the assets became available, i reached out to the head of his -- of disney saying we have interest. something else became available that we started to pursue, and large asset. it didn't work out. it was tribune. we were very interested in buying tribune broadcasting. star prevailed, they are a tremendous organization. we turned our attention to what is next. had nothat the rsn's been concluded. i'm a big fan of rupert murdoch's. i think i've read everything about him. i've always told him when i run into him that i'm his illegitimate son. ellisonstory, larry asked rupert murdoch, tell me

about television. he said, i can tell you everything you need to know in 30 seconds. he said, sports. that is it. that is the ultimate leverage. these are some of rupert's best work. when it became available, we said, what can we do? we have a great relationship with sinclair. >> you sold your first show to them. i sold my first television show, entertainers with byron allen," he was one of my first buyers. two stations, i think pittsburgh and baltimore. i called every television station from my table and asked them to carry my show for free. 14 minutes of commercial time, i will keep seven minutes, you get seven minutes. >> you were alongside them in this deal.

we know what sinclair -- the financing. in,n: what i did, i put personally, a small amount which i can't disclose. >> $10 million, $100 million? byron: small is relative. i put in a small amount personally because allen media does have debt and we have investors in our debt and i would never invest capital of allen media of something we don't control 100%. we love the idea, the platform. ofdoesn't fit the profile allen media but i, personally, will do it. it is literally a personal investment. but, allen media has to have a seat at the table in providing content. they immediately said, this is perfect. you have been providing content for us for over 25 years.

media, upside for allen none of the downside. allen media is something i own 100% of. obviously it is very key to me. when you have stakeholders in the form of debt, you want to be very careful. we see in this opportunity to provide content. whether it is the weather channel, which i bought last year -- i bought that from bain and blackstone and comcast. the weather channel is phenomenal, iconic. there's a lot we can do with the weather channel and these rsn's. there's a lot we can do in terms of documentaries, biographies, and maybe even sports leagues. >> i'm trying to get my head around the unifying theme. you have some local television stations you bought on monday. obviously the weather channel

last year. concept for entertainment studios? where does this company go? byron: i have always said my goal is to build the biggest media company in the world. >> in terms of market cap, viewers? byron: top line revenue, size, scale. i've always made that clear. that is it, every day. >> do you think the market is there to do it, to roll up enough companies? byron: some of it is debt, some equity, some free cash flow. some is that you just have to be very clever in the moves you will make. i started this company from the dining room table 26 years ago and i could barely pay my phone bill. there were days they turned off my phone. there were days i didn't eat. there were days i was calling from a payphone. we just kept plugging away. finally, we kept selling show

after show. we ended up with one of the largest privately held television libraries in the world and i was able to go to verizon and convince them to let me use my library to launch networks. we launched seven networks with them, then we bought our eighth network, the weather channel. we have a phenomenal streaming service that we were able to capture in the weather channel amazing, local now, an streaming service. emily: that was entertainment studios chairman and ceo byron allen. coming up, when it comes to cyber warfare, the nsa is known for its dominant position. so then how did hackers steal its cyber tools and put them to nefarious use? we will discuss. u.s. securities and exchange commission chair jay clayton breaks down the ipo requirements. this is bloomberg. ♪

at comcast, we didn't build the nation's largest gig-speed network just to make businesses run faster. we built it to help them go beyond. because beyond risk... welcome to the neighborhood, guys. there is reward. ♪ ♪ beyond work and life... who else could he be? there is the moment. beyond technology... there is human ingenuity. ♪ ♪ every day, comcast business is helping businesses go beyond the expected, to do the extraordinary. take your business beyond.

>> this is "bloomberg technology" i'm emily chang and san francisco. leaked toolsckers onto the internet. those tools were co-opted by nefarious groups and used in global malware attacks. member the ransomware attack? it turns out a different group of hackers had access to those tools over a year before all of that went down. they were put to use. this is all according to a report released by symantec.

have severale guests. what exactly happened here? >> thank you for having us. what we found was that the tools that were released in 2017 have been previously used over a year prior and early 2016 by a group called buckeye. this is significant because we did not believe that those tools were used by anybody except the original authors of the tools. allegedly, the nsa i anybody. this completely debunked that. for the first time, we were able to see in reality and we had evidence to the fact that a tool that was created by one attacking group or one set of hackers was repurposed and reused by a different group

originating from a different side of the globe. emily: this effectively turned a group of hackers into a more dangerous group. other cybersecurity firms exhibiting this to china. >> correct. this just shows the way that this becomes a global cybersecurity and cyber threats are becoming a -- another weapon in countries -- tools for espionage and trade secrets. it looks like a different industries were targeted to hear. thatunderscores the way technology is very much at the center of an arms race right now. in key areas of technical innovation? we are seeing this played out time and time again. 5g comes to mind.

the u.s. is telling other countries to be on its side when it comes to what kind of technology they use. there are other under the surface ways that this war is being played out. through cybersecurity and cyber espionage. emily: i know symantec is not directly calling out china here. other companies are. why not? >> attribution to a specific group or a country is not really the place where symantec finds itself. technology can lay breadcrumbs ofre you can identify pieces things that come together. i think the last mile in attribution is really the job of or public enforcement agencies. while we can somehow tell you that a person for a certain computer was used for an attack,

there is no way for semantic to tell you whether the person operating the computer belonged or theecific agency computer was being used by someone else. we leave that aspect to law enforcement and other public sector agencies. emily: whoever is behind it, as i understand it, it was an nsa attack on their computers than that enabled them to steal the tools then use them for their own and. is that correct? >> yes. until now, it was a theoretical belief that if one attacker group attacked another then somebody who was watching what be able toring would learn and repurpose those attack tools themselves. theywas the first time have been able to take that theoretical knowledge and provide some evidence as to what is really happening.

through a series of analysis, we have been able to prevent the only way the book i was able to repurpose these tools created and put out there are the shuttle brokers -- shadow brokers was if they had visibility into somebody getting attacked or one of the networks at the receiving end of the tools themselves. a neweally puts out impact for the rest of the world which is -- a couple of things. is involvedency who in a pensive attacks is now going to be looking at their own playbook and saying if the adversity can watch and use these tools, what is our responsibility to the end-users? use against our adversaries can be used against our constituents as well. there is a conversation going on about how well do we balance the

offenses capabilities versus defensive responsibilities that these agencies have. >> it shows that u.s. industries and other industries outside the u.s. are caught in the middle of this tug-of-war. semantic and that on the head. is the u.s. responsibility to u.s. industry when it comes to -- we found this being played out on your servers in your system. how forthcoming can they be and how much information sharing does the u.s. want to have with u.s. industries? how much do u.s. industries want to share with the u.s. government? how much can they and should they work together to combat this? emily: is this an indictment of the u.s. cyber defenses? at this point, and the nsa do anything? can they counter attack or get these tools back? i don't believe this is an

indictment of the nsa or any other national agency. national agencies have a mandate and they will use whatever tools are available from a legal perspective to achieve that mandate. as onto theirvery existing mandate is another factor that they need to consider when they use some of the tools that they actually have. when it changes the risk that some of their tools exposed to their own constituents who they are trying to protect. there is no similar bullet out here because of these attacks are perpetuated for national time,es but at the same they have a responsibility or risk which is being inherited. how do we solve that problem? to your other question about can these tools be brought back?

been released publicly cannot be brought back. what can be done is another assessment before the next set of attacks take place with the understanding that the adversaries are watching and will learn. how can we achieve our purposes of the goals mandated by the national mandate or what is it that we can do to protect our end-users as well? emily: that's a fascinating stuff. thank you. while sticking with hacking, one of the largest crypto exchanges says hackers stole 7000 bitcoins worth for $40 million. they pulled off the heist using a variety of techniques in a large-scale security breach. the exchanges says it will use an emergency insurance fund to cover losses. a security review will be conducted. coming up, and electric car

company is coming after tesla. will the u.s. and china stand in the way? this is bloomberg. ♪

emily: a swedish electric car is going after tesla. they are setting up a new research and development center in england. manufacturingntly ae only hybrid and unveiled

new one today. joining us to discuss is their ceo. give us an overview of your cars coming out on the market. you have a hybrid, -- a sedan, and an suv. and exclusive collectors car that we produce every year, it is a luxurious exclusive sports car. is a fullrent to that electric car. with a u.s. price of $55,000. a very competitive offer for a powerful 300 kilowatt long-range car.

us is a greatfor designs -- the pure progressive design. because wen town have an android powered entertainment system. using android. why did you choose google? for the benefit of our customers to have this incredible artificial intelligence of android google assistant. it is the smoothest way of integrating your digital life that you are used to into your car. again, google maps. the google place store and all of those. emily: you are opening a new research and development center in the u.k.. what is the strategy there?

especially given the political upheaval as the result of brexit or lack of brexit? factat doesn't change the that they are great engineers. they are people who know how to engineer sports cars that are lightweight. it will accelerate our way to market and obviously, low-volume production. we think it is a brilliant addition. is it fair to say you are coming for tesla? is an intriguing offer with a company that is offering the great design, our android system. you can trust and rely on our promises because we have the whobone of great parents know how to produce cars.

with the supply chain when it comes to spare parts. into us athigh trust on what we promise. emily: let's talk about your parents, although and a japanese carmaker. how much that impact your plan, your production, is it something that you are preparing for? >> we have prepared for that. our business plan is conservatively planned on the chinese tariffs and place right now. $55,000 is based on existing tariffs. we support free trade. we live with the fact -- emily: it is difficult to find out what is happening between the u.s. and china right now. there are reports that the chinese are backtracking.

president trump is threatening tariffs as of friday. what would you like to see happen? how would you like to see this resolved? beyond my wishes. that if we saw improvement that is great. if not, we are prepared for what is in place now. the cars will look for to hit the market. thank you so much. toseveral tech companies had the public market this year, they will be required to disclose important financials disclosing growth and losses. does reporting that kind of information discourage companies from going public? u.s.t down with the securities and exchange chair. >> think it is the right approach which is to give us all of the information about your company when you are going

public. that is the correct approach. should we have the same amount of disclosure for our largest companies that we do for the small and medium-sized companies? probably not. the mega global companies, they need to provide us with more information than the start of i/o tech does. what we are trying to do now is to say can we scale our disclosure requirements in a way that makes it more accessible to the medium-sized and small size companies? fileery quarter, you information with the sec. what about doing it every six months as opposed to every quarter? do you have a view on whether that is a good or bad idea? markets first for information. investors thirst for it. they want information on a regular basis. i don't expect the quarterly reporting will go away anytime soon. if you borrow money from a bank

at the same time as you are selling stocks, the bank will want quarterly information. i don't know many loan documents that have semiannual information. the real question for us is, do you need to do something as extensive every quarter? as we require today? people take this quarterly report that would be filed in june and they compare it to march. all they really want to know is what is in the press release and what are the changes? and yet we make people file a very large document. we might be able to do something that is more streamlined on a quarterly basis. >> you can catch the full interview on the team at rubenstein show. apples big push. that's coming up next.

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emily: apple's global retail push continues. they know have plans for a store in india. blocked fromn opening stores in india because they don't meet local sourcing requirements. now, they are moving manufacturing into the country. tell us about where things stand. for the past several years, apple has talked a big game in india. tim cook has in there and met with celebrities. government leaders, actors and

actresses. the reality of the situation is not so positive. they have completely failed in india and have 1% market share. even though it is the fastest growing smartphone economy. now, they are looking to open up their first door there in mumbai. region inously a big india. hopefully that could turn things around. know wheree specifically in the mumbai they are looking? >> major districts on par with that avenue in new york. narrowing it down to a short list. i think it will be sometime before the store opens to the public. questionen was my next might we actually expect to see this open? i would imagine sometime in

2020. we are at the shortlist process. then they will have to strike and goo build the store through a hiring process. building these complex stores takes time. complex industry. we have heard that to be the target for apple for the past few years. they seem to be on pace for that. income,ou have lower cheaper smartphone competitors. how well will apple compete in this market? >> as of right now, apple is a completely non-viable option in india. the consumers there want phones that have a really high technical features. they care about megapixels and a processor speeds. they care about bigger screens

but they want it at a very low price point. an oldere 10 are iphones, the pricing is still two times or three times the price of competing phones from other companies. apple to compete at a mass-market level in india, they will have to bring the phone prices down considerably. we have seen evidence that they have been doing that in terms of lowering india prices for the iphone x. you listen to tim cook on the earnings calls, and previous years he sounded more optimistic about india. this past week, he was straight up and said this is not going to be a short-term success. this is a long-term play. the question is, how long-term will it be? india become the next china for apple if they pull this off? >> yes.

this is going to take five years to 10 years before they have any real penetration in india. it will require a big ramp-up of regional stores and offices. products and services geared toward the market in india. so much for you your reporting on this. that does it for this edition of usoomberg technology" join on tictoc on twitter. this is bloomberg. ♪

welcome to "bloomberg daybreak: australia" >> here are the top stories. u.s. stocks extend a global selloff as investors question whether washington and beijing will strike a trade deal. negotiations are said to resume with china warning it will retaliate if the u.s. hikes tariffs. disney's tops