Recode Daily: Kara Swisher’s new podcast, why Snap will get acquired

Christine Blasey Ford testified under oath to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee that she believed Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh was going to rape her at a party in high school more than 30 years ago, charges that Kavanaugh then vehemently denied in his own sworn testimony. Republican senators sat quietly, ceding their question time to Arizona sex-crimes prosecutor Rachel Mitchell, while Democrats largely used their own allotted time to applaud Ford’s courage. The Senate committee will vote on Kavanaugh’s confirmation today. Meanwhile, the White House delayed a meeting between President Donald Trump and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein until next week, claiming that the meeting was delayed to avoid interfering with the Kavanaugh hearing. [Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Nicholas Fandos / The New York Times]

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The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is suing Tesla CEO Elon Musk for fraud, accusing him of misleading investors when he tweeted in August that he had “funding” secured to take Tesla private at $420 a share. Musk did not file any kind of formal SEC documents alongside the tweet, but his claim still sent Tesla’s stock soaring, and the stock halted trading shortly thereafter. The SEC now says that Musk violated multiple SEC rules, and called the tweeted statement, in which Musk claimed he had “funding secured” to take Tesla private, “false and misleading”; its suit seeks to block Musk from serving as an officer or board member for any public company. [Kurt Wagner and Theodore Schleifer / Recode]

Facebook confirmed that it uses phone numbers that users provided it for security purposes to also target them with online ads. When a user gave Facebook a phone number for two-factor authentication or in order to receive alerts about new log-ins to a user’s account, that phone number became targetable by an advertiser within a couple of weeks.[Kashmir Hill / Gizmodo]

Today we’re excited to launch a new podcast: Pivot with Kara Swisher and Scott Galloway. With great power comes great scrutiny! New episodes on Fridays. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify | Overcast | or read the transcript here →

Cargo, which makes boxes of items like gum, phone chargers and snacks that ride-hail drivers can sell to their passengers — they call it “in-car commerce” — has raised a $22.5 million Series A round led by Peter Thiel’s Founder’s Fund. The New York-based startup supplies drivers with transparent cases, and riders can pay using the usual array of mobile payment services. In July, Cargo partnered with Uber as the company’s exclusive in-car commerce provider. [Paul Sawers / VentureBeat]

Top stories from Recode

How Facebook could screw up Instagram.

Let’s hope it doesn’t.

[Dan Frommer]

Why Snap will get acquired before 2020, probably by Amazon.

On the debut episode of their new Pivot podcast, Kara Swisher and Scott Galloway also discuss the Instagram co-founders’ dramatic exit and “tech bias.”

[Kara Swisher and Scott Galloway]

This is cool

Is that what you’re wearing? Scenes from the World of WearableArt Competition.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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