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A scene from “The Office.”

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If you’ve watched HBO’s “Silicon Valley” or NBC’s “The Office,” you’ve seen several examples of obnoxious aggression and manipulative insecurity exhibited by leaders. 

It almost goes without saying that actual managers shouldn’t look to mimic Michael Scott, or the command-and-control culture dramatized on television. Instead, leaders should strive for what former Apple and Google executive Kim Scott calls the radical candor approach, showing that you care personally while challenging directly.

While the concept is simple, Scott told CNBC Senior Media & Tech Reporter Julia Boorstin at the recent Disruptor 50 Connect event in San Francisco that she views it as radical because it can be difficult to show you care while challenging a peer at the same time.

“It’s rare that we do both at the same time, especially with feedback at work, but really feedback in any part of your life,” Scott said. “It’s a matter of existential dread.”

Avoiding the fear of providing honest feedback

That fear often keeps leaders from providing feedback that fits into the radical candor bucket, instead moving towards three types of negative feedback that Scott outlined in her “Radical Candor” book: Obnoxious aggression, or praise that doesn’t feel sincere and feedback not delivered kindly; ruinous empathy, or feedback that tries to spare someone’s short-term feelings but doesn’t tell them what they need to know; or manipulative insincerity, actions like backstabbing or passive aggressiveness, which Scott said is the worst kind of feedback failure.

Scott said that the challenge for CEOs and leaders is balancing the desire to be “compassionately candid without being ruinously empathetic,” something that can be solved by soliciting feedback.

“At the core of radical candor is a good relationship between manager and employee, between peers, and up, down and sideways,” she said. “It’s about a good relationship, and there are few things that are more destructive to a good relationship than a power imbalance, so if you have power, I recommend learning how to lay it down, learning how to solicit feedback from people, and prove to them that it’s not only safe for them to tell you what they really think, but that they’ll be rewarded.”

Being tough but fair

Amid recent leadership scandals as well as the broader societal changes that have occurred, leaders will worry about upsetting workers when providing firmer feedback, but that is no excuse for being a poor communicator, Scott said.

“What’s happening now is we suddenly became aware of a bunch of things that we should have been aware of before, but we were not, and people have retreated to manipulative insincerity, where they’re neither caring nor challenging,” Scott said. “They’re so concerned about their reputation as leaders that they’re saying nothing, and I get this question with some frequency from CEOs who tell me they’re not going to give feedback to certain people on their team because ‘I will get in trouble with HR.'”

Scott said it requires leaders who are willing to “challenge directly, even further than you may be comfortable going,” while also being aware of how what you’re saying is landing.

“Despite everything you might read on social media, most of us do actually care personally, but we’re so worried about not upsetting someone or hurting their feelings or offending them, we fail to tell them something they’d be better off knowing,” she said.

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South Korea says DeepSeek transferred user data to China and the U.S. without consent

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April 24, 2025

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South Korea says DeepSeek transferred user data to China and the U.S. without consent

Jaap Arriens | Nurphoto | Getty Images

South Korea’s data protection authority has concluded that Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek collected personal information from local users and transferred it overseas without their permission.

The authority, the Personal Information Protection Commission, released its written findings on Thursday in connection with a privacy and security review of DeepSeek.

It follows DeepSeek’s removal of its chatbot application from South Korean app stores in February at the recommendation of PICP. The agency said DeepSeek had committed to cooperate on its concerns. 

During DeepSeek’s presence in South Korea, it transferred user data to several firms in China and the U.S. without obtaining the necessary consent from users or disclosing the practice, the PIPC said.

The agency highlighted a particular case in which DeepSeek transferred information from user-written AI prompts, as well as device, network, and app information, to a Chinese cloud service platform named Beijing Volcano Engine Technology Co.

While the PIPC identified Beijing Volcano Engine Technology Co. as “an affiliate” of TikTok-owner ByteDance, the information privacy watchdog noted in a statement that the cloud platform “is a separate legal entity and has no relation to ByteDance,” according to a Google translation.

According to PIPC, DeepSeek said it used Beijing Volcano Engine Technology’s services to improve the security and user experience of its app, but later blocked the transfer of AI prompt information from April 10.

OpenAI calls for U.S. DeepSeek ban

DeepSeek and ByteDance did not immediately respond to inquiries from CNBC. 

The Hangzhou-based AI startup took the world by storm in January when it unveiled its R1 reasoning model, rivaling the performance of Western competitors despite the company’s claims that it was trained for relatively low costs and with less advanced hardware. 

However, the app’s rising popularity quickly triggered national security and data concerns outside China due to Beijing’s requirement for domestic firms to share data with the PRC. Cybersecurity experts have also flagged data vulnerabilities in the app and voiced concerns about the company’s privacy policy. 

PIPC on Thursday said it had issued a corrective recommendation to DeepSeek, which includes requests to immediately destroy AI prompt information transferred to the Chinese company in question and to set up legal protocols for transferring personal information overseas.

When the data protection authority announced the removal of DeepSeek from local app stores, it signaled that the app would become available again once the company implemented the necessary updates to comply with local data protection policy.

That investigation followed reports that some South Korean government agencies had banned employees from using DeepSeek on work devices. Other global government departments, including in Taiwan, Australia, and the U.S., have reportedly instituted similar bans.

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Adobe to launch mobile app for AI image generation tool as OpenAI steps up rivalry

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April 24, 2025

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Adobe to launch mobile app for AI image generation tool as OpenAI steps up rivalry

Adobe’s new artificial intelligence image models, Firefly Image Model 4 and Firefly Image Model 4 Ultra, can generate hyper-realistic pictures in response to user prompts.

Adobe

LONDON — Adobe plans to launch a mobile version of its artificial intelligence image generation tool Firefly, stepping up a challenge to OpenAI as the Microsoft-backed startup advances its efforts on visual applications for the technology.

The design software giant said Thursday at its MAX creativity conference in London that it will release Firefly on both iOS and Android “soon,” without giving a specific date.

“Creative people think on the go,” Alexandru Costin, vice president of Adobe Firefly, told CNBC in an interview. “One of the visions we have is for the Firefly mobile application to become a creative partner that sits with you all the time.”

Costin said that one way creatives could use its upcoming mobile app was to ask it to sketch up some ideas about an ad campaign while commuting to the office, so that by the time they arrive at work they’ve got a mood board to help them develop their thinking.

Adobe also announced the launch of its latest AI models, Firefly Image Model 4 and Firefly Image Model 4 Ultra, and said its new Firefly Video Model for video generation is now generally available.

The company said the new systems are capable of generating hyper-realistic pictures and videos in response to textual prompts in a “commercially safe” way, blocking the inclusion of any intellectual property.

Competition from OpenAI

It marks Adobe’s latest push to incorporate AI into its creative tool suite and comes as the company is increasingly facing competition from well-funded AI firms such as OpenAI and Runway.

Last month, OpenAI released a native image generation feature that went viral online for its ability to produce anime images in the style of animation studio Studio Ghibli and recreate people as toy dolls.

The tool saw such huge levels of demand that OpenAI boss Sam Altman warned it was melting the company’s GPUs (graphics processing units). “It’s super fun seeing people love images in ChatGPT. But our GPUs are melting,” Altman said on March 27.

While Adobe’s Costin conceded that the competitive environment is heating up, he said the company isn’t shying away from partnering with the competition. For example, Adobe has partnered up with the likes of OpenAI, Google and Runway to add their AI image generation tools to Firefly.

“Competition is great,” Costin told CNBC. “We think there will be models with different personalities and capabilities.”

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British fintech Revolut tops $1 billion in profit as revenue jumps 72%

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April 24, 2025

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British fintech Revolut tops billion in profit as revenue jumps 72%

Revolut CEO Nikolay Storonsky at the Web Summit in Lisbon, Portugal, Nov. 7, 2019.

Pedro Nunes | Reuters

LONDON — British fintech firm Revolut on Thursday announced it topped $1 billion in annual profit for the first time, a major milestone for the company as it readies the launch of its U.K. bank later this year.

Revolut, which offers a range of banking and financial services via an app, said that net profit for the year ending Dec. 31, 2024, totaled £1.1 billion ($1.5 billion), up 149% year over year. Revenues at the company increased 72% year on year to £3.1 billion, driven by growth across different revenue streams.

Revolut’s wealth unit — which includes its stock-trading business — saw outsized growth, with revenue surging 298% to £506 million, while subscriptions turnover jumped 74% to £423 million.

Revolut also saw significant growth in its loan book, which grew 86% to £979 million. Coupled with a jump in customer deposits, this contributed to a 58% increase in interest income, which totaled £790 million.

UK bank rollout

Revolut’s financial milestone arrives at a critical time for the almost decade-old-firm. The digital banking unicorn has been preparing a transition to becoming a fully operational bank in the U.K. after securing a banking license last summer.

It was granted a banking license with restrictions in July 2024 from the U.K.’s Prudential Regulation Authority, bringing an end to a lengthy application process that began back in 2021.

The restricted license means that Revolut is now in the “mobilization” stage, where it is focusing on building out its banking operations and infrastructure in the run-up to a full launch. The period typically lasts about 12 months.

Revolut is still awaiting approval from regulators to transfer all 11 million of its U.K. users to a new banking entity this summer. Once fully up and running, the firm will be able to begin offering loans, overdrafts and mortgages, opening up the path to new income streams.

‘Customers trust banks’

Victor Stinga, Revolut’s chief financial officer, told CNBC on Thursday that the company’s aim is to formally launch its U.K. bank later this year.

“As you can imagine, at this scale, it’s a thorough process, and we just pay a lot of attention to it,” Stinga said. “We work very closely on a close contact with the PRA [Prudential Regulation Authority] and the FCA [Financial Conduct Authority] on it. We feel like we’re making great progress on it.”

Stinga said that a big advantage of becoming a bank in the U.K. is ability to start accepting deposits protected by government guarantees. Licensed banks are covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme, which means their customers can claim up to £85,000 if a lender goes out of business.

“Customers trust banks, so it means customers on this transition will use Revolut as a primary bank account,” Stinga said.

Lending is arguably “the biggest roadmap item that this unlocks,” Revolut’s CFO said, adding that the firm is looking at launching credit cards and personal loans, similar to the products it already offers in the European Union under a separate EU banking license.

Francesca Carlesi, Revolut’s U.K. boss, previously told the Wall Street Journal that Revolut views its journey to becoming a U.K. bank as a crucial step in its global expansion and eventual IPO. “My main strategic focus is making Revolut the primary bank for everybody in the U.K.,” she told the WSJ.

It has a steep hill to climb — rivals Monzo and Starling have had a lengthy head start on Revolut. Monzo obtained its full banking license in 2017, while Starling was granted its own permit in 2016.

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