Crunch Hype

Hackers siphoned off thousands of Healthcare.gov applications by breaking into the accounts of brokers and agents tasked with helping customers sign up for healthcare plans. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) said in a post buried on its website that the hackers obtained “inappropriate access” to a number of broker and agent accounts, which […]

Amazon has signed a new deal with Apple that will allow the retailer to increase the selection of Apple products on its site, according to a report from CNET, which Amazon also confirmed. The deal will give Apple-authorized resellers the ability to sell a wide range of devices on Amazon — including Apple’s recently launched […]

The worm has turned, it seems. Emulators, which let people run old console games on their computers, were once the scourge of the gaming industry. Now Sony is using one of the very pieces of software the industry decried as the basis for its PlayStation Classic retro console.

The tech scene in São Paulo is an absolute delight, and we’re honored to have seen such an amazing turnout at the Startup Battlefield Latin America. In case you missed it, we’ve put together a little recap of the event below. Editor’s Note: We will embed videos from the event as soon as they’re available. […]

A Utah man has pleaded guilty to computer hacking charges, after admitting to knocking several gaming services offline five years ago. Austin Thompson, 23, launched several denial-of-service attacks against EA’s Origin, Sony PlayStation and Valve’s Steam gaming services during the December holiday season in 2013. At the time, those denial-of-service attacks made it near-impossible for […]

This week, I’ve tried to do something new at TechCrunch with this experimental column — getting obsessed about a topic broadly in tech and writing a continuous stream of thoughts and analysis about it. With my research consultant and contributor Arman Tabatabai, we’ve covered two topics: Form Ds, the filing that startups usually submit to […]

In addition to plans to launch its own Netflix rival, Disney+, next year, the company says it also plans to increase investment in its other streaming service, Hulu. Thanks to its buyout of 21st Century Fox, Disney now own 60 percent of the TV streaming service, which it gives it “considerable say” in how Hulu […]

iPad magic pro#iPad #magic #mac #apple #iphone #magician #gadget #ガジェット #マジック #手品 #art #表参道 #Tokyo #iPadpro pic.twitter.com/DdfNupZhQE — Shinya Uchida(内田伸哉) (@shinyamagician) November 7, 2018 TechCrunch editor Matthew Panzarino’s more conventional iPad Pro review is a must-read if you’re thinking of forking out for the device — tricks not included. Review: The iPad Pro and the […]

LinkedIn, the Microsoft-owned social network for the working world with some 580 million users, took a big step into professional development and education when it acquired Lynda.com for $1.5 billion and used it as the anchor for LinkedIn Learning. Now, with 13,000 courses on the platform, LinkedIn is announcing two new developments to get more […]

This Sunday is November 11, an auspicious date within the Chinese tech community because it marks Singles’ Day, the world’s largest online shopping day. This year is particularly poignant because it will be the tenth edition of the annual event — also known as Double Eleven — since it was created by Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce […]

Disney Imagineering animatronics wizard Dr. Martin Buehler is a legend in the robotics world. His work leading development of the galloping Big Dog quadruped at Boston Dynamics both inspired and terrified a new generation of makers. But after playing in the worlds of fantasy and science fiction that consumers can’t buy, Buehler has been poached […]

Black Friday giveaways have become a tradition for online sneaker marketplace GOAT. Today it’s announcing the details of this year’s campaign, which will be its first to incorporate augmented reality. Director of Communications Liz Goodno described this as “the largest digital sneaker event of the year.” The company says it will be offering more than […]

Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast, where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This week was a blast. Connie and I were in the studio with our guest, True Ventures’s Tony Conrad, while Danny repped the other side of the country, dialing in from New York. It was another week shaped […]

UnitedMasters came out of stealth about a year ago with a plan to help artists have a more direct relationship with their customers and fans and, more importantly, retain more control over their actual recordings. With $70MM from Alphabet, A16z, Floodgate and 20th Century Fox — as well as founder Steve Stoute, the former President […]

A report by England’s children’s commissioner has raised concerns about how kids’ data is being collected and shared across the board, in both the private and public sectors. In the report, entitled Who knows what about me?, Anne Longfield urges society to “stop and think” about what big data means for children’s lives. Big data practices […]

Netflix has persuaded everyone’s favorite naturalist, David Attenborough, to voice its forthcoming original nature documentary series, Our Planet, which is slated to put conservation squarely in the frame, not just offer glorious animal eye-candy. It’s a timely moment to focus on conservation with climate change posing existential threats to global biodiversity — unless humans act to […]

Still crying in your Red Bull because you missed the deadline to compete in Startup Battlefield at Disrupt Berlin 2018? Don’t despair. You have one more chance to step onto the Main Stage and go head-to-head against some of the best pre-series A startups across Europe. How? Grab an exhibitor’s table in Startup Alley. Every exhibitor […]

Xiaomi’s expansion into Europe continues at speed after the Chinese smartphone maker announced plans to open its first retail store in London. The company is best known for developing quality Android phones at affordable prices and already it has launched devices in Spain, Italy and France. Now, that foray has touched the UK where Xiaomi […]

Attention coders, designers and all other builders: the TechCrunch China Hackathon is returning to Shenzhen, the city known as the hardware capital of the world, this month and we want you to take part! So if your inner being is to code, design, build and hack cool things; if you want to have fun with others like […]

Walmart has just announced its plans to launch what it’s calling an Intelligent Retail Lab inside one of its stores in Levittown, New York. The idea is to test both associate and customer experiences. For example, Walmart wants to use artificial intelligence to better identify when items are running low on stock so that it […]

TouchBase is selling a line of VC trading cards, featuring Paul Graham, Marc Andreessen, Mary Meeker and Bill Gurley.

SpaceX's planned communication satellite constellation, known as Starlink, will now be targeting a much lower orbit than originally planned, at least for over a thousand of the satellites, the company revealed in an FCC filing. The move should help mitigate orbital debris and provide better signal for the company's terrestrial users as well.

Organizers of the massive walkouts at Google last week are — rightfully so — not letting up on their demands. Earlier this morning, Google CEO Sundar Pichai responded to some of their demands, outlining how Google is getting rid of forced arbitration for sexual harassment and sexual assault claims, offering more transparency around those investigations […]

Blockchain technology will eventually impact many industries, but there is still a long way to go before blockchain technology can realize its true potential. Here are the three most important challenges facing more widespread adoption of blockchain technology.

Roku’s ad-supported free streaming channel is expanding. No, not to more platforms — it already did that. But rather, it’s expanding its content lineup. While before the channel offered free-to-stream movies and news, it will now feature live and linear sports and entertainment content, the company says. As of earlier this year, The Roku Channel […]

We knew Disney was building its own on-demand streaming service, à la Netflix or HBO GO, but we didn’t know the name. Now we do. Disney’s new streaming service will be called Disney+. While there’s been a few rumored names (it was misreported, at one point, to be “Disney Play”), word of this name comes […]

Photographers are tricky to get gifts for because every one of them has preferences they may already have spent years indulging. But we have blind spots, we photographers. We will spend thousands on lenses but never buy a proper camera bag, or properly back up our shots, or splurge for a gadget that makes certain […]

High-speed futuristic transportation company Virgin Hyperloop One is changing up its leadership. CEO Rob Lloyd has left after three years at the helm and Jay Walder, who ran bike-sharing operator Motivate, is now heading up Virgin Hyperloop One, the company said Thursday. Sir Richard Branson, who stepped down as chairman in October, has been replaced […]

Former Intel Capital managing director Lisa Lambert has launched National Grid Partners.

AdRoll Group announced today that it has acquired Growlabs, a two-year-old startup with business-to-business sales tools and data. While AdRoll is best known for its retargeting technology for consumer advertising, it’s been building out a suite of B2B marketing technology under its RollWorks business unit, which launched earlier this year. The company says that by […]

Vine — the much loved and mourned short video hosting platform — will return, kind of, sort of. Co-creator Dom Hofmann announced on Twitter today that its spiritual successor is set to arrive next spring. Details? We don’t have many. Though Hofmann did give us a name — Byte — and logo to match. From […]

Fifteen startups spent the day presenting onstage in São Paulo, Brazil. For the finalists, that meant presenting twice — once in the initial rounds, then again for our finalist judges. This was all part of Startup Battlefield Latin America, an event that we put on in partnership with Facebook’s FB Start program. After a full day […]

Facebook must exert constant vigilance to prevent its platform from being taken over by ne'er-do-wells, but how exactly it does that is only really known to itself. Today, however, the company has graced us with a bit of data on what tools it's using and what results they're getting — for instance, more than 14 million pieces of "terrorist content" removed this year so far.

By now, Brex, the young startup that is trying to reinvent corporate credit and charge cards, is well-known in Silicon Valley. The tender age of the company’s co-founders, Henrique Dubugras and Pedro Franceschi, the big-name backers, the $125 million Series C announced last month, the aggressive billboard advertising in San Francisco and the company’s torrid […]

When the initial buzz of Portal finally dies down, it’s the timing that will be remembered most. There’s never a great time for a company like Facebook to launch a product like Portal, but as far as optics go, the whole of 2018 probably should have been a write-off. Our followup headline, “Facebook, are you […]

Google today announced that Chrome will soon get a new feature that aims to stop mobile subscription scams. Those are the kind of sites that ask you for your phone number and that then, unbeknownst to you, sign you up for a mobile subscription that’s billed through your carrier. Starting with the launch of Chrome […]

There's a new group focused on supporting black investors.

Material Impact, a Waltham, Mass.-based firm that says it “transforms materials into companies that make an impact,” has closed its debut fund with $110 million in capital commitments from a range of university endowments, foundations, family offices and fund-of-funds. In a sea of fundraising announcements, it’s tempting to shrug off the development. Another new venture […]

Abbyy has been around for a long time helping companies with scanning and workflow tools, but like many older vendors it has been looking for ways to extend its traditional business model. One way to do that is by teaming up with robotics process automation companies like UIPath. Today, the company announced it has launched […]

On the heels of Tinder’s plans to go more casual, Facebook is today expanding access to its own dating service, Facebook Dating. First launched two months ago in Colombia for testing purposes, the social network is today rolling out Facebook Dating to Canada and Thailand. The company is also adding a few new features to […]

This time last week, Google employees held massive walkouts across the country to protest the company’s handling of sexual harassment in the wake of a damning New York Times piece. This morning, CEO Sundar Pichai sent a note to employees about the events that was also shared via the company’s blog. “We recognize that we […]

Nintendo has sold over 22 million Switch consoles since launch, with plans to sell another 20 million this fiscal year. That said, Nintendo hasn’t seemed too focused on building out its portfolio of non-gaming apps. Thus far, only Hulu has managed to get aboard the Switch train. But today, YouTube joins the mix. Switch owners […]

Another autonomous ride-hailing test project has popped up in the U.S. This time, Daimler and Bosch, one of the largest automotive tech and hardware suppliers in the world, are partnering to pilot a robotaxi service in San Jose, California. The program will use automated Mercedes-Benz S Class vehicles, the German automaker’s full-sized luxury flagship sedans, the company […]

Amazon today launched an Alexa app for Windows 10 PCs on the Microsoft Store. The voice application allows PC owners to speak to Alexa to set reminders, timers, alarms; create lists and to-dos; track their calendar appointments; get news, weather and other information; play music; listen to podcasts and audiobooks; control the smart home, and […]

Datacoral aims to make it easier for enterprises to build data products by abstracting away all of the complex infrastructure to organize and process data. The company today announced that it has raised a $10 million Series A financing round led by Madrona Venture Group, with participation from Social Capital, which also led its $4 […]

Today, Google Cloud announced Kubeflow pipelines and AI Hub, two tools designed to help data scientists put to work across their organizations the models they create. Rajen Sheth, director of product management for Google Cloud’s AI and ML products, says that the company recognized that data scientists too often build models that never get used. […]

IAC is changing the way its business is organized, the company reported during its Q3 2018 earnings on Wednesday. The company’s video platform Vimeo and DotDash (previously About.com) will become their own separate segments at IAC starting in Q4. That means they’ve reached the point their revenues can stand on their own. The company beat on […]

First, a couple of quick follow-ups to our coverage of Form Ds yesterday, and then a deeper dive into the challenges SoftBank is facing with regards to its revenue in Japan. Finally, some notes on recent articles we have read. We are experimenting with new content forms at TechCrunch. This is a rough draft of […]

There’s a new Sony PS4 Pro and it’s much quieter than the original. Right now, it’s only available in a Red Dead Redemption bundle but eventually, it will likely be available as a standalone product, too. The new CUH-7200 version reportedly dropped the console’s noise from 50 decibles to 44 decibels though as EuroGamer notes, […]

I’ll admit that I’ve been caught up in the Bose hype. I’ve worn qBoseSony WH-1000XM3, a pair of wireless/wired cans that truly give everything else I’ve tried a bad name. These $349 headphones come with a USB cable, audio cable, international audio adapter, and a compact case that holds the whole thing in a tight […]