Category: Laptops

• US-provided Bradleys keep Ukrainian troops alive, but still get knocked out by Russian defenses.
• Bradley Fighting Vehicles have been useful for combat missions, The Washington Post reported.
• But Bradleys, like any other combat vehicle, can’t drive over the treacherous minefields stalling Kyiv’s counteroffensive.

US-provided Bradley fighting vehicles are proving to be a useful asset for Ukrainians on the battlefield. Kyiv’s troops have seen the benefits of the Bradley fighting vehicles, including agile maneuverability, fire power, and strong armor. 

But they’re still getting snared in Russia’s formidable defensive lines, with some Bradleys falling useless against land mines and heavy artillery, according to The Washington Post. 

Earlier this week, a Ukrainian platoon commander in the 47th Brigade posted on Facebook praising the Bradley for protecting him and his team from heavy artillery shelling during a combat mission. 

“Bradley saved our lives again,” Oleh Sentsov, the commander, wrote, noting the team had only experienced wounds from shrapnel. 

Bradley infantry fighting vehicles are operated by a three-person crew — a driver, commander, and gunner. They can carry six other passengers. While they’ve often been misidentified as tanks — a Bradley’s 25mm automatic gun is much smaller than the powerful 120mm cannon on an Abrams tank, for example — a Bradley’s strength lies in its balance between strong firepower and reliable transportation of troops. 

They’re hardly invincible. Bradleys are being ripped apart by Russia’s extensive fields of landmines, the Post said. Those bombs, such as the TM-62 anti-tank blast mine, have slowed Ukraine’s ongoing counteroffensive and often forced troops to travel by foot. 

When Bradleys need to be repaired, the time can vary depending on how bad the mine damage is, the Post reported. Supply lines for parts or replacement vehicles can also impact how many Bradleys Ukraine is able to use at a given time. 

The US agreed to give Ukraine 50 M2A2 Bradleys in January after Germany and France transferred other fighting vehicles to Kyiv’s reserves. At the time, the Bradleys were the first shipment of Western-made armored vehicles to Ukraine since Russia’s full scale invasion in February 2022. 

• Shein and Temu are battling it out for the title as the world’s favorite shopping app.
• The fast-fashion companies have filed separate lawsuits against one another. 
• Shein alleged Temu infringed on its trademark and Temu alleged Shein violated antitrust laws.

Shein and Temu are battling it out for the title of the world’s favorite shopping app. In the process, both companies have filed separate lawsuits against one another. 

In December, Shein’s parent company sued its e-commerce rival, Temu, alleging that Temu created fake accounts on Twitter under Shein’s name and trademark. Shein recently sued Twitter to release data about the accounts in question. 

Now Temu is fighting back with its own lawsuit against Shein, filed last week. It alleges that Shein violated antitrust laws by intimidating manufacturers not to work with the company, Reuters reported. 

The e-commerce companies have much in common, including their target audience — Gen Z.  And they have much to fight about, as evidenced by the myriad of lawsuits they’ve filed against each other. Still, their legal issues don’t seem to be getting in the way of their growth. 

Shein is a Chinese-owned fast-fashion company based in Singapore that works with roughly 6,000 manufacturers in China to produce apparel quickly and cheaply. The company, which launched in 2018, uses AI technology to identify trends and an online-only model to churn out thousands of garments in record time. 

In 2022, Shein was valued at $100 billion, but after a slump in sales last year, its valuation dipped to $66 billion, the Wall Street Journal reported. The company is rumored to be eying an IPO, although the company has denied the reports. 

Temu is a subsidiary of a Chinese commerce company, Pinduoduo, that sells heavily-discounted products in a wide range of categories, from apparel to home goods. When Temu launched in the US last September, it set a goal to surpass Shein in total merchandise value within a year, Bloomberg reported. The app skyrocketed in popularity after airing a Super Bowl ad and it overtook Shein’s title as the most downloaded app on Apple’s iOS app store in 2023, Bloomberg reported.

Competition between the two ecommerce companies really seemed to heat up over the last few months. In May, Shein opened up its marketplace to third-party sellers and in June began selling categories beyond apparel into home, beauty, and electronics. In the same month, US spending on Temu was 20% higher than on Shein, Bloomberg reported. 

In Shein’s lawsuit against Temu, the company alleged that Temu attempted a deliberate scheme to impersonate the Shein brand by creating fraudulent Twitter accounts. Shein also alleged that Temu contracted influencers to make disparaging comments about Shein. Not to be confused with the Shein influencer factory tour, which sparked controversy. 

In Temu’s lawsuit against Shein, the company alleged that Shein forced clothing manufacturers to sign agreements not to work for its rival. The filing says this makes prices higher for customers and hinders growth in the fast-fashion market. 

“Since our launch in September 2022, Temu has been the target of Shein’s unlawful exclusionary tactics, including, but not limited to, forcing exclusive-dealing arrangements on Temu’s merchants, threatening and thwarting merchants from engaging with Temu, and punishing merchants for engaging with Temu by imposing extrajudicial fines,” a Temu spokesperson said. “Even worse, Shein unilaterally changed its contract with merchants, forcing merchants to purportedly assign their IP rights to Shein, so that Shein can enforce its ill-gotten rights against the very same merchants on the Temu platform.” 

In a statement to Insider, a Shein spokesperson said Temu’s lawsuit was “without merit, and we will vigorously defend ourselves.”

Do you have a story to share about working or shopping at Temu and Shein? Reach out to this reporter at jortakales@insider.com or call (646) 768-4742 using the Signal app.

• Russia has its own defense alliance, the CSTO, intended to mimic NATO and promote Russian power.
• But experts told Insider it’s never really worked, and is actually making Putin look weak.
• The CSTO has only once sent troops when called upon, and divisions have grown since the invasion of Ukraine.

In 2002, Russian President Vladimir Putin established a new organization widely viewed as his attempt to set up a NATO rival, made up of countries that were once part of the Soviet Union.

His goal, experts told Insider, was to create a union that projected Russian power, echoed NATO, and maintained Russia’s control over its nominal allies.

But the Collective Security Treaty Organization has never been strong, and its cracks have only deepened since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

“I don’t think it ever struck anybody as a very effective organization,” Thomas Graham, cofounder of Yale University’s Russian, East European, and Eurasian studies program, told Insider.

Putin wanted his own version of NATO

Putin has long viewed NATO as a threat to Russia, even citing it as an excuse for his invasion of Ukraine.

Experts say the CSTO is his attempt to copy it. 

The alliance is currently made up of Russia, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan, none of which, apart from Russia, could be considered a military powerhouse.

The alliance has also lost members, something that has never happened in the seven-decade history of NATO. Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Uzbekistan have all left the CSTO, and another member, Armenia, is threatening to leave.

Alexander Cooley, an expert on former Soviet states at Columbia University, said that “the CSTO tried to sort of mimic some parts of NATO,” like its rapid reaction forces.

But he said the alliance has “weakened” amid recent conflicts and is vulnerable to changing perceptions.

“The status of it rises and falls depending upon the discontents of its members,” he said.

The CSTO is supposed to operate like NATO, where if one member is attacked, it’s as if all were — but the workings of the alliance so far suggest this principle is not applied.

The CSTO “wants to say it’s NATO-like, but the kind of territorial defense aspect of NATO has not been put in practice when leaders have appealed to it,” Cooley said.

The alliance has “kind of made the rules up as it was going along as to its scope, its exact mission,” he said.

Last year, Armenia called on the CSTO for help during border clashes with neighboring Azerbaijan, and its decision not to send troops infuriated Armenia’s prime minister.

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan called its response “depressing” and “hugely damaging to the CSTO’s image both in our country and abroad.”

He also physically distanced himself from Putin in a group photo in November, and refused to sign a draft declaration during a CSTO summit.

In May, he said Armenia could leave the alliance if its benefits to his country weren’t proven.

Putin’s failed efforts to project power 

According to Cooley, the CSTO isn’t Putin trying to re-form the Soviet Union but is about projecting Russian power.

Russia leading organizations like the CSTO is part of its “self-identification as a great power,” he said, adding that in Putin’s mind “great powers lead alliances and organizations.”

But it’s also about control.

The CSTO is for Moscow “a tool of statecraft, a tool of its sort of influence and its attempt to preserve, influence, and control the post-Soviet space,” he said.

Graham said the CSTO also allows Russia to justify keeping a military presence in these countries, as it can say it’s doing so for their own security needs.

Putin wants to repel Western militaries from the region, and the CSTO was created as a response to the presence of Western militaries in central Asia, Cooley said.

But the problem with forming an alliance to project power, both experts said, is that when it goes badly, it can make you look weaker.

Making Putin look weak

Member complaints and Russia’s struggles in Ukraine have frustrated the alliance’s illusion of power, the experts said.

Cooley said the alliance has the potential to be a “power enhancer” when it acts, but is instead a liability when there’s conflict — like there is now.

He added that though the CSTO is “nominally a NATO-style alliance,” its dealings with its own members have actually weakened the position of leadership Russia wants to portray for itself.

Russia wants to look strong, Cooley said, “But in practical terms, you’ve seen Russia unable to sort out the actual security concerns of some of its members.”

Graham gave the most damning assessment of the alliance: “How many people really know about the CSTO? Or really cares about it?”

CSTO has failed to achieve its own goals

CSTO members have asked the alliance for help multiple times, but it has only actually involved itself once.

Cooley pointed to the CSTO not intervening when Armenia recently asked for help, saying this highlighted how Russia doesn’t want to “pick sides in local disputes,” even when CSTO members actively ask it to.

Cooley said this shows how the alliance has failed to operate like NATO.

“It aspires to be an alliance and uses alliance-like language and NATO sorts of terms, but when push comes to shove it can’t commit to actually defend most members from what are their most pressing security threats,” he said.

It also shows how the CSTO is not “very active in guaranteeing the security” of its members, Graham said.

The one time the CSTO did intervene was in January 2022, when it sent a small force into Kazakhstan at the government’s request, after rioters demanded new leadership for the country.

The riots ended shortly after, and the experts said CSTO forces did little, and were there simply to project support for the government.

Cooley said Russia’s actions were instructive: rather than deploying troops to help countries defend themselves, it only helped during “a regime-support kind of operation.”

Cooley said the CSTO hasn’t even been very effective in terms of keeping Western militaries out of the region.

He noted that “the US and other NATO countries openly use central Asian countries as hubs for logistical support.”

The US also continued to have military bases in some CSTO countries long after the alliance was founded, and Russian efforts to limit Western military presence “didn’t really do much of consequence,” he said.

Most CSTO members are militarily small

The CSTO was born out of Russia’s attempts to keep control of former Soviet countries after the collapse of the USSR in 1991.

While most former Soviet states signed a 1992 collective security treaty — except for Ukraine, which wanted its own military – Putin, as Russia’s president in 2002, wanted “something more along the lines of NATO, and that became the CSTO,” Graham said.

But part of its struggles come from just how small many of its members actually are, militarily.

NATO, led by the US, is made up of many of the world’s most powerful militaries.

When it comes to the CSTO, Graham said the difference between Russia and the other members “are just vast,” and the alliance can’t do much “beyond what the Russians themselves are prepared to do.”

Cooley also questioned how much additional power the alliance really gives Russia.

He said Russia’s control is there because these states are small, weak, and simply “don’t have a lot of other options” other than relying on Russia.

But it looks more splintered since the invasion

Even so, the alliance has been visibly weakened since Russia launched its war in Ukraine. 

CSTO country leaders have committed a series of apparent snubs against Putin since Russia failed to quickly overrun Ukraine.

This includes Tajikistan’s president demanding more respect in front of Putin in October, Kazakhstan seeking closer ties with the West and denying Russia’s request to send troops at the start of the invasion, and Armenia’s bitter complaints.

When it comes to Armenia, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan “has sort of reached his breaking point,” Cooley said.

“He’s just calling things out as they are. It’s like: ‘Well, if you’re not gonna defend us and keep making excuses, What’s the point of this thing?”

Experts previously told Insider the invasion of Ukraine left Russia’s reputation as a security provider in the region in tatters, and highlighted existing divisions in the alliance.

“I think [the CSTO’s] weaknesses have been exposed by the invasion, but I don’t think it was particularly effective to begin with, in terms of operational issues,” Cooley said.

He also said that members criticizing the alliance will always be “significant,” but that some of the recent comments made by CSTO leaders were being blown out of proportion. This includes Kazakhstan’s foreign minister saying in April 2022 that his country would not recognize Russian-backed separatist republics in Ukraine, he said.

Cooley said those comments were consistent with Kazakhstan’s existing position, where it doesn’t recognize separatist entities outside of the UN system.

He also said that CSTO members states’ desires for closer ties with the US weren’t new. “They’ve always wanted both good ties with the EU and with the US,” he said.

But this just shows how badly Putin has failed in his goals for the CSTO from the start. “Putin, geopolitically, wants them on his side,” Cooley said.

Russia’s regional power is weakening

CSTO countries have close ties to Russia, including economic ones.

But changes in the region threaten Russia’s influence, the experts said. 

Central Asia’s “dynamics are changing,” according to Graham, with China strengthening its position in a way that could potentially “undermines Russia’s broader influence in the region.”

He also said Turkey was increasing its influence there, partly because Russia is distracted by Ukraine. And that CSTO countries “have incentives to look elsewhere — something the United States could exploit if it were so inclined at this point.”

“You’re seeing the slow erosion of Russian influence,” Graham suggested, adding: “It’ll play itself out over many, many years.”

Graham also said the invasion of Ukraine meant Putin is less and less able to deal with CSTO members’ complaints.

“Russia is facing challenges across the entire former Soviet space, and its engagement in Ukraine is eroding the capabilities and resources that needs to deal with those effectively,” he said.

Russia’s war in Ukraine, in short, could be another nail in the coffin for the country’s attempts to set up its own regional rival to NATO.

• Warren Buffett and his wife Astrid attended the very-rich-people gathering in Sun Valley, Idaho.
• Apparently, Astrid was grumbling about a $4 coffee — and that’s not even the most relatable part.
• A bunch of Warren’s old quotes are popping up on social media now, and I feel seen.

Astrid Menks is not impressed with the rising price of coffee, apparently.

According to a report from the New York Post, Menks, whose husband is Warren Buffet, the seventh-richest person in the world, was charged $4 for a cup of coffee while at a conference known as “summer camp for billionaires.” And grumbles were heard.

The report was disappointingly sparse on details but that’s OK, I’ve written the entire scene in my head as fan fiction. And you cannot convince me that Warren wasn’t grumbling along with her.

That’s because Warren Buffett is all of us, except with $115 billion in his bank account (sort of). And I’m not the only one who thinks so.

While he hung out in Sun Valley, Idaho, wearing athleisure and presumably chatting to Bill Gates about whatever billionaire besties chat about, Twitter was cheering up our timelines by resurfacing a bunch of his most relatable moments.

In one clip, which is apparently quite famous, he compared bad communication skills at work to “winking at a girl in the dark.” We’ve all been there.

—Stephen Davies (@stedavies) July 17, 2023

Another quote reminds us to prioritize keeping our work profitable and enjoyable. As a journalist, this is only 50% relatable, but reading through billionaire quotes is not a bad day at the metaphorical office. Now I just need to crack the making-billions-of-dollars part…

—Investment Wisdom (@InvestingCanons) July 17, 2023

As someone with a bad habit of forgetting that I have a three-glasses-of-wine maximum on a schoolnight if I want to be semi-human the next day, this one, about what we don’t learn from our past mistakes, really spoke to me.

—Investment Wisdom (@InvestingCanons) July 17, 2023

This factoid, about a six-year-old Warren Buffett starting a business selling chewing gum, is maybe less relatable in its details, but who among us has not at some point worked in retail?

—Jon Erlichman (@JonErlichman) July 11, 2023

And finally, the most relatable of them all. Baby Buffett read everything he could find about how investing works, and still got it wrong.

It turns out you shouldn’t be trying to predict stock fluctuation, but instead just buy a whole business. Who knew!

—Matt Allen (@investmattallen) July 11, 2023

In a sea of wildly unrelatable billionaires, Buffett is bucking the trend. And I’m now learning he’s been doing it for a while: apparently, he still lives in a modest house in Omaha that he bought in 1958 for about $31,500. 

Here’s hoping he’s not planning to take up cage fighting any time soon.

• Ron DeSantis’ campaign has spent nearly half of its raised funds for the Republican primary.
• At the same time, the campaign has had to lay off members of their large 90-person staff.
• Now, the DeSantis campaign has roughly $9 million left for the primaries, the New York Times reports.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ campaign for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination is burning through cash, campaign finance documents reveal, forcing his team to lay off staffers.

DeSantis initially amassed an impressive $20 million in donations during the first six weeks of his campaign. But The New York Times reports that the campaign has already spent about $8 million of that — leaving the team with just $9 million left to spend on the primary. The remaining $3 million can only be spent in the general election in the event DeSantis wins the Republican nomination, according to the Times.

While DeSantis can continue raising money, $14 million of that total came from large donors who gave the maximum legal amount to his campaign and can’t donate again, NBC News reports. And with small donations proving to be a challenge for several Republican candidates, according to NBC News, future fundraising efforts may not be as fruitful for DeSantis.

The Times called DeSantis’ finances and team downsizing an “ominous” sign for his chances in the Republican primary, especially as he trails candidates like former President Donald Trump in public polls.

With only a little more than half his funds left, DeSantis’ campaign laid off several employees. While the Times reports the exact number is unknown, one staffer told the outlet it was fewer than 10 people. Payroll is one of the campaign’s largest expenses, coming in at $1 million to pay about 90 staffers.

Other costly expenditures include DeSantis’ travel budget, which came in at $1.3 million, as well as expenses for an online donation-processing company, which cost almost $1 million. 

• Robert F. Kennedy Jr. baselessly claimed COVID-19 may have been “ethnically targeted” to spare certain groups.
• He said Caucasians and black people were most susceptible, and Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people were most immune.
• RFK Jr., who is running for president, is a long-time vaccine skeptic and conspiracy theorist.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. baselessly claimed that COVID-19 may have been “ethnically targeted” to spare Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people.

The long-time vaccine skeptic and conspiracy theorist, who is running for president as a Democratic primary challenger, made the comments during a press event in New York City on Tuesday, per The New York Post.

“COVID-19, there is an argument that it is ethnically targeted. COVID-19 attacks certain races disproportionately,” Kennedy said.

“COVID-19 is targeted to attack Caucasians and black people. The people who are most immune are Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese.”

“We don’t know whether it was deliberately targeted or not, but there are papers out there that show the racial and ethnic differential and impact,” Kennedy claimed but did not cite any specific sources.

He further claimed that China was spending hundreds of millions of dollars developing “ethnic bioweapons,” and said the US was also developing similar weapons.

The origins of COVID-19 are still unknown, with one hotly contested theory being that the virus might have escaped from a laboratory in Wuhan, China. Whether or not that theory is correct, there is no known evidence suggesting the virus was made to target specific ethnicities.

Kennedy built a reputation as a prominent anti-vaxxer long before the pandemic, but his impact reached new heights when the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020.

One report identified him as being one of 12 people who were responsible for the spread of most disinformation about COVID-19 online.

He has also baselessly promoted a range of conspiracy theories, including that Wi-Fi causes cancer and that antidepressants are to blame for school shootings.

Members of the Kennedy dynasty previously told Insider that they would not support Kennedy’s long-shot bid presidential campaign due to his anti-vaccine views.

The Anti-Defamation League responded to Kennedy’s claims about COVID-19 being ethnically targeted in a statement to The Post.

“The claim that COVID-19 was a bioweapon created by the Chinese or Jews to attack Caucasians and black people is deeply offensive and feeds into sinophobic and anti-semitic conspiracy theories about COVID-19 that we have seen evolve over the last three years,” they said.

• Civil rights groups warn that Threads will “become as toxic as Twitter” without better moderation.
• In a letter, the groups urged Mark Zuckerberg to implement more rigorous moderation standards. 
• They said hateful speech and disinformation has already been rising on the brand-new platform. 

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg needs to better moderate his new Threads platform, or it could “become as toxic as Twitter,” civil rights, digital justice, and pro-democracy groups warned in an open letter to Zuckerberg and the head of Instagram, Adam Mosseri.

The letter — led by Free Press, Accountable Tech, and Media Matters for America — says the groups have already seen indications that “new users have been testing the boundaries of the platform’s moderation and enforcement.”

The letter cites “neo-Nazi rhetoric,” “election lies,” “bigoted slurs,” “COVID-19 conspiracies,” and more as examples of hateful speech that they have seen rising on Threads, which launched last week. 

Meta’s press team did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment. 

“Meta must implement basic moderation safeguards on Threads now or the platform will become as toxic as Twitter,” Nora Benavidez, senior counsel at Free Press, said in a press release about the letter.

She added that it’s imperative for Meta to establish better content moderation in the lead-up to the 2024 election to prevent the spread of hateful speech and disinformation. 

The civil rights groups also accused Meta of “purposefully not extending Instagram’s fact-checking program to the platform and capitulating to bad actors.” 

• You can already buy followers for Instagram’s Threads.
• Insider viewed several websites offering to sell followers for Threads accounts.
• Instagram has long battled troves of fake followers, purchases likes, and bots. 

We are now a week into the existence of Threads and there’s already a robust menu of followers you can buy on the internet.

From an offer of $7.50 for 100 followers, to $1,900 for 50,000 followers on Instagram’s Threads app, paid engagement services and bot farms are pouncing on a new market, according to a review of a handful of sites by Insider.

Instagram has long battled bots and juiced engagement on the app. The platform has been deleting fake followers and likes for years, and Instagram even has a section about this behavior in its community guidelines. 

“Help us stay spam-free by not artificially collecting likes, followers, or shares, posting repetitive comments or content, or repeatedly contacting people for commercial purposes without their consent,” Instagram’s community guidelines page reads.

According to the influencer-marketing platform HypeAuditor, on average, about 13.8% of influencers’ Instagram followers are categorized as “suspicious” accounts. HypeAuditor defines suspicious accounts as any Instagram page that appear to be bots or “use specific services for likes, comments, and followers,” the company told Insider.

While the follower count metric still holds some weight, especially when it comes to securing and negotiating brand deals as an influencer, it isn’t so clear how important follower count will be for Threads.

To start, followers aren’t as prominently showcased on Threads as they are on Instagram (or Twitter, for that matter). The number itself is at the bottom of the bio and appears muted when stacked with other vibrant buttons and text. And when it comes to algorithms, ranking on Threads is more dependent on what content someone interacts with.

“We do rank posts lightly and show recommendations (posts from accounts you don’t follow) in feed, which is particularly important for a new app before people follow enough accounts,” head of Instagram Adam Mosseri wrote in a recent Thread reply.

Buying an influx of spam followers on Threads could very well do nothing to help an account grow or find success as a creator.

Meta did not respond to Insider’s request for comment.

Our experts choose the best products and services to help make smart decisions with your money (here’s how). In some cases, we receive a commission from our partners; however, our opinions are our own. Terms apply to offers listed on this page.

Overall bank rating

Pros and cons

The Sallie Mae High-Yield Savings Account pays a competitive interest rate, with a $0 minimum opening deposit and no monthly service fee. It’s a good option if you want an online high-yield savings account from a well-known company.

The Sallie Mae SmartyPig Account pays a high interest rate — just not quite as high as the Sallie Mae High-Yield Savings Account. Still, it’s a good choice if you want a savings account that helps you actively save. You can save for individual savings goals within the account, such as “Emergency Fund” or “Vacation,” and set a deadline for each.

Although Sallie Mae doesn’t have a checking account, you can set up automatic transfers from an external account to this one, so you’ll stay on top of your savings goals.

You’ll need at least $2,500 to open a CD with Sallie Mae. If you don’t have that much money, you can find a bank that requires less.

Sallie Mae’s CD rates are pretty competitive, but the best CD rates are still at other online banks.

Sallie Mae pays a competitive rate on its money market account, and unlike most banks, there is a $0 minimum deposit.

The main draw of a money market account over a savings account is that the former makes it easier to access your savings. Sallie Mae does this by sending you paper checks, but it doesn’t send you a debit or ATM card as some banks do. 

How Sallie Mae Bank works

Sallie Mae is an online bank that offers savings accounts, a money market account, and CDs. Sallie Mae doesn’t have a checking account, which can make it difficult to access your savings quickly.

The Sallie Mae mobile app has received 4.5 out of 5 stars in the Apple store and 3.8 out of 5 stars in the Google Play store.

You can speak with a live customer service representative Monday through Friday, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. ET. Sallie Mae doesn’t offer customer support on weekends, and there’s no live online chat feature.

Your deposits are FDIC insured for up to $250,000, or $500,000 for a joint account.

Is Sallie Mae trustworthy?

The Better Business Bureau gives Sallie Mae an A+ rating. A strong BBB score indicates a company responds effectively to customer complaints, is transparent about business practices, and is honest in advertising.

Sallie Mae doesn’t have any recent public scandals, so you may decide you’re comfortable keeping your money with this bank.

Sallie Mae vs. Ally

If you’re planning on opening a checking account in addition to a saving account, Ally will be your strongest option. Ally is the only one out of the two that offers a checking account. 

The Ally Savings Account also has the benefits of both the Sallie Mae High-Yield Savings and SmartyPig accounts. It pays a little more than SmartyPig, but it also lets you save for individual goals through Savings Buckets.

If you want to open a CD, the better choice may come down to which term length you open.

Sallie Mae vs. Marcus

If you’d like to open a money market account, Sallie Mae will be your default choice because Marcus doesn’t have one. 

Marcus has lower minimum deposits for CDs than Sallie Mae, as well as more CD variety — you can open a Marcus No-Penalty CD or a Marcus 20-month Rate Bump CD, which gives you the option to increase your rate once during your term.

• Some major corporations are limiting their employees’ access to OpenAI’s ChatGPT. 
• Companies like Amazon and Apple have expressed concerns that AI may put them at-risk of data leaks.
• Here are 14 companies that have issued bans or restrictions around the buzzy AI chatbot. 

Workers are using OpenAI’s ChatGPT to write code, generate marketing materials, and create lesson plans to save time and boost productivity. But some big companies are restricting its employees from using the AI chatbot. 

While some companies are hiring employees with ChatGPT expertise, others are putting the brakes on integrating the AI into their employees’ workflows because of privacy concerns over feeding the tech confidential data. 

After all, privacy concerns have been a major pain point for OpenAI. At the end of June, a proposed class-action lawsuit was filed against the ChatGPT-maker over claims the company stole “massive amounts of personal data” to train ChatGPT. The lawsuit claims that Sam Altman’s company “secretly” used proprietary data to train its large language models so that its AI can chat like a human. 

OpenAI has yet to respond to the lawsuit, nor did the company respond to Insider’s request for comment about it.

Despite these concerns, some companies are excited about ChatGPT’s potential to bolster their bottom lines. For instance, Genies, an AI-avatar startup, is requiring its employees to learn how to apply ChatGPT to their jobs — an early sign that businesses are warming up to the idea of AI-assisted work.  

To see which companies are cautious about ChatGPT integration, Insider compiled a list of major ones that have issued bans or restrictions on how its workers can use the AI. 

Here are 14 companies that have imposed restrictions on ChatGPT: