GM & Honda Partner on EVs; WWDC Announced by Apple; Comcast Rolling out 6E WiFi Routers; Germany Busts Biggest Dark Web Marketplace

General Motors and Honda have announced a partnership to co-develop affordable electric vehicles. According to techcrunch.com these vehicles should hit North America in 2027. The partnership centers around using the General Motors Ultium EV platform and both automakers’ heavy duty manufacturing capabilities. The exact terms of this partnership are not available at this time, and Honda is not specifying which vehicles will use GM’s Ultium EV platform or Honda’s own e:Architecture platform. This partnership is about scale. Together, Honda and GM have among the most robust manufacturing and distribution processes available and, depending on the exact terms, should be able to leverage these strengths to quickly and efficiently flood the market with EVs. Of great interest is their intent to get EVs out into people’s hands for $30,000 or less!

Comcast has announced that it’s starting to send out the xFi Advanced Gateway, a Wi-Fi 6E router the company announced at CES 2022, to customers that subscribe to Xfinity Internet Gigabit and Ultrafast plans. Until this point, many routers that support the new, higher bandwidth Wi-Fi standard have been far too expensive for most budgets (think $500 to $1,500, though there are now some in the $300 price range) — but Comcast’s is $14 per month, the company’s standard fee for equipment rental. Theverge.com says the new gateway includes built-in support for Zigbee, and Comcast has also said it will support Matter, a smart home standard slated to come out later this year. Comcast’s biggest pitch for the xFi Advanced Gateway is that it can handle traffic at faster-than-gigabit speeds. 

 WWDC 2022, the developer show from Apple, will start on June 6, and will again be almost entirely online. Appleinsider.com notes that the Monday keynote, when Apple usually discusses its biggest changes, will be a pre-recorded video stream, similar to the last two presentations. Though not a fully on-stage affair, expect Apple CEO Tim Cook introducing other executives to speak about Apple’s operating systems in an information-dense and slickly-produced video.After the keynote, Apple will be sharing updates via online sessions, with video presentations from key  Apple employees. In addition to the online conference, Apple will be hosting a special day for developers and students at Apple Park on June 6, to watch the keynote and the State of the Union videos. Apple will be supplying details about applying for attendance via its Apple Developer site soon.

 German federal police, working with US law enforcement have seized Hydra Market, billed as the world’s largest and longest-serving dark web marketplace. Engadget.com reports that it allegedly accounted for about 80 percent of all dark web-linked cryptocurrency transactions and had taken about $5.2 billion in crypto since 2015. It had roughly 17 million user accounts and 19,000 sellers. The seizure included both the servers and crypto wallets holding about $25 million in Bitcoin. This won’t stop dark web criminal operations, but it could disrupt them for a while, and might serve as a reminder that even the larger digital black markets can fold with little warning.