Canadian authorities are investigating shady face recognition company Clearview AI on the grounds that its scraping of billions of photos from the web might violate privacy laws, Reuters reported on Friday. | Continue reading
In an effort to undo decades of building design and urban planning that’s made spaces inaccessible to those with mobility challenges, 62-year old Rita Ebel is spending part of her golden years building wheelchair ramps out of colorful Lego bricks in an effort to improve the small … | Continue reading
The devices we use every day are increasingly voice-controlled or internet-connected, even if they probably shouldn’t be. If you’re also one of those folks that’s morbidly curious about which of these devices are hiding behind bullshit privacy policies to collect reams of data on … | Continue reading
The advent of the personal computer wasn’t just about making these powerful machines available to everyone, it was also about making them accessible and usable, even for those lacking a computer science degree. Larry Tesler, who passed away on Monday, might not be a household nam … | Continue reading
Deepfake technology continues to weird me out. It seems just a matter of time until it changes how we experience visual media. These just look so damn persuasive, and I have to imagine they’re only going to get better. Or worse, depending on how you look at it. | Continue reading
Authorities in Puerto Rico announced that the island's government had been a victim of a million dollar online scam. It started when a hacker got into a government employee's email account. The hacker proceeded to ask for money from various agencies. | Continue reading
Robo Revenge is a new service offered by DoNotPay, a robot lawyer app. The service helps individuals sue their robocallers for up to $3,000 per call using an automated process. People on the Do Not Call Registry are entitled to this payout under U.S. law. | Continue reading
Aside from pockets of overt racism, one of the more weirdly unpleasant corners of Twitter comes from its “promoted” content. What ostensibly started as a tool for big-name brands to drive the “reach” and “impact” of whatever message they might be promoting, it’s since devolved in … | Continue reading
It’s no secret that the U.S. trails behind plenty of other countries when it comes to data protection legislation. Today, Senator Kristen Gillibrand has published a bill proposal that would create an independent Data Protection Agency that would act as a regulator tasked with pro … | Continue reading
In a quote in Politico’s new technology-focused publication, Protocol, Xbox Chief Phil Spencer said something seemingly earth-shattering for any gamer: It isn’t Nintendo or Sony that Microsoft views as primary competitors in the gaming space, but Amazon and Google. That sounds de … | Continue reading
By prodding a tiny brain region linked to consciousness, scientists caused anesthetized monkeys to suddenly become awake and alert. This fascinating result is providing new clues about the brain and how it produces conscious awareness—insights that could potentially lead to thera … | Continue reading
There are lots of valid reasons to be worried about how deep learning techniques could potentially be used to manipulate footage for nefarious reasons. But as Denis Shiryaev demonstrates by upscaling some old black and white film footage from 1896, those AI-powered tools can also … | Continue reading
When most of us think of how the concept of “data” has been skewered by the press, we’re probably thinking about an app’s location data tipping off our home address, or apps like Grindr tipping advertisers off about our sexuality. What’s less scrutinized, both by the public and b … | Continue reading
Top Trump ally and consistent encryption scaremonger Senator Lindsey Graham is working on a bill that could coerce tech companies to stop providing end-to-end encryption by threatening them with massive legal liability, The Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive T … | Continue reading
Google has announced it’s launching an “experimental social video sharing app” called Tangi for short, 60-second tutorials. | Continue reading
A newly proposed House authorization bill would push back NASA’s deadline to land humans on the Moon to 2028 instead of 2024, while also calling for a crewed landing on Mars in 2033. Reactions to this proposal have been mixed, with NASA’s chief Jim Bridenstine unhappy about the w … | Continue reading
The workers of Mechanical Turk, Amazon’s on-demand micro-task platform, say they have encountered mutilated bodies, graphic videos of botched surgeries, and what appeared to be child pornography. They say they have been asked to transcribe Social Security numbers and other perso … | Continue reading
Since Google morphed into a new company called Alphabet last year, there’s been an apparent bloodbath for the tech giant’s popular (and costly) “moonshot” projects. These longer-term, riskier ventures are suddenly being held to account for the amount of money they were losing. Th … | Continue reading
In a stark reminder that you rarely actually own anything you buy digitally, Electronic Arts’ iOS Tetris games will not only be disappearing from the App Store on April 21, but the games themselves will no longer be playable on iPhones and iPads—even if you paid for them. | Continue reading
I ordered it on eBay. When the four-ounce envelope arrived from New York three days later, it looked innocuous enough. It contained a finger-sized black plastic box, a small black antenna to screw onto that box, and two glass fuses. It was designed to fit into a car’s 12-volt e … | Continue reading
Facebook said a "technical issue" was to blame for translating Chinese President Xi Jinping's name as "Mr Shithole" on its platform. The "Mr Shithole" references appeared in Burmese to English translations during Xi's visit to Myanmar. | Continue reading
Journalist firebrand Glenn Greenwald has been charged with cybercrimes by federal prosecutors in Brazil, according to a new report from the New York Times. Greenwald recently helped expose corruption in the Brazilian government through a series of stories at the Intercept that in … | Continue reading
Planned obsolescence is the bane of consumer electronics. On that front, Sonos has stood out as one of the few tech companies that build longer-lasting products. In fact, the company is keen to point out that 92 percent of all the products it has ever shipped are still in use tod … | Continue reading
As many reasons as there are for loving my smartphone, there are just as many reasons I hate it, but they all boil down to how dependent I am on this device that devours my attention. I’m bombarded by annoying notifications, and then when the phone dies because I’ve been futzing … | Continue reading
European researchers are working on a system that can churn out breathable oxygen from simulated samples of moon dust. | Continue reading
I don’t know if there is a single holy grail for keyboard nerds. Every nerd is different. But some switches, the IBM Beam Spring, are so beloved that even the most curmudgeonly keyboard fan thinks of them wistfully. “It’s the ultimate clicky switch as far as I’m concerned,” one m … | Continue reading
You enter a cave. At the end of a dark corridor, you encounter a pair of sealed chambers. Inside each chamber is an all-knowing wizard. The prophecy says that with these oracles’ help, you can learn the answers to unanswerable problems. But there’s a catch: The oracles don’t alwa … | Continue reading
Democratic candidate for president and former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg’s campaign cybersecurity official has resigned, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal. | Continue reading
Spectrum customers who are also users of the company’s home security service are about a month away from being left with a pile of useless equipment that in many cases cost them hundreds of dollars. | Continue reading
Motherboard on Thursday revealed that a “secretive” U.S. government vendor whose surveillance products are not publicly advertised has been marketing hidden cameras disguised as seemingly ordinary objects—vacuum cleaners, tree stumps, and tombstones—to the Federal Bureau of Inves … | Continue reading
Microsoft had “no security measures” on a program that had humans transcribe user voice recordings from its Skype video calling service and Cortana assistant, the Guardian reported on Friday, even when those workers were located in China. | Continue reading
HP might finally be changing its printer business plan according to a new note by Morgan Stanley analysts. Typically HP sells printers for super cheap and then charges exorbitant prices for the required ink, leaving consumers paying hundreds a year if they want to keep this print … | Continue reading
The successful launch of 60 new Starlink satellites means SpaceX now operates more commercial satellites than any other company in the world. It’s a major milestone for the Elon Musk-led company, which still needs to show it’s capable of responsibly managing its burgeoning megaco … | Continue reading
In the last twenty years, fandom and mass culture have basically merged. Fans and fandom spent the 2000s fighting for legitimacy and proving their combined worth. And corporations? Well, they spent the 2010s learning how to co-opt fandom to silence critics, manipulate press, and … | Continue reading
Apple just entered an exclusive partnership with Richard Plepler, one of the chief architects of HBO’s last two decades of success. According to the New York Times, Plepler’s new production company has a five-year exclusivity deal with Apple’s TV+. If Apple’s entertainment execut … | Continue reading
In a deal that made few ripples outside the energy industry, two very large but relatively obscure companies, Rockwell Automation and Schlumberger Limited, announced a joint venture called Sensia. The new company will “sell equipment and services to advance digital technology and … | Continue reading
Scientists have uncovered a new kind of electrical process in the human brain that could play a key role in the unique way our brains compute. | Continue reading
Scientists have uncovered a new kind of electrical process in the human brain that could play a key role in the unique way our brains compute. | Continue reading
In her first public statement since a top United Nations official equated her imprisonment to torture, former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning reaffirmed her pledge to remain in jail rather than testify before a grand jury investigating WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. | Continue reading
On Monday, Microsoft announced that it had taken control of 50 domains associated with a hackers believed to be operating out of North Korea. Unsealed court documents show that the domains include “hotrnall.com,” “office356-us.org,” and “mai1.info,” among other copycat URLs. | Continue reading
This week, hacktivist and security engineer Lance R. Vick tweeted an enticing proposition along with a gut-punch headline: “Colleges are turning students’ phones into surveillance machines, tracking the locations of hundreds of thousands,” read the Washington Post link. The repor … | Continue reading
Ring and its parent company, Amazon, are facing a class-action lawsuit over allegations of negligence, invasion of privacy, breach of contract, and unjust enrichment for the allegedly lax security standards that have left thousands of cameras vulnerable to hacking. This comes on … | Continue reading
People dealing with painful migraines will soon have a new treatment available. This week, the Food and Drug Administration approved a unique drug meant to shorten acute migraine episodes. It’s the latest treatment for a condition that’s historically had few. | Continue reading
A group of U.S. lawmakers on Monday raised concerns about the proposed sale of the .org top-level domain to a private equity firm by the organization created to manage it, a deal that has drawn significant scrutiny from digital rights groups and nonprofits since it was first ann … | Continue reading
It’s time to look ahead to the coming year and all things that will be happening in space exploration. With new missions to Mars, a probe returning to Earth with samples taken from an asteroid, and even more batches of Elon Musk’s Starlink satellites going into orbit, it’s going … | Continue reading
A Chinese hacking group believed to operate on behalf of the Beijing government has learned how to bypass two-factor authentication (2FA) in attacks on government and industry targets, ZDNet reported on Monday. | Continue reading
Lonesome George, the last of the Pinta Island tortoises, died in 2012. George’s story is the perfect extinction story. It features a charismatic character with a recognizable face, an obvious villain, and the tireless efforts of naturalists. | Continue reading