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Article called online gaming ‘spiritual opium’ in what many fear is latest target of regulatory interference

Reclusive US novelist’s agent confirms he did not share his opinions about kombucha and SoundCloudCormac McCarthy is known for his sparse punctuation and distinctive writing style, the violent and pessimistic themes of his work, and his reclusive public persona. So it was surprising to see the novelist on Twitter, sharing bons mots about kombucha and SoundCloud for an audience of thousands.But it was the real Cormac McCarthy – at least, according to Twitter, which gave the account, registered in 2018 under the misspelled name “CormacMcCrthy”, a blue tick marking it as a “verified user”. Continue reading...

PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series S|X; Neon Giant/Curve Digital

After Havana shut down online access for 72 hours, the battle is on to keep the country connectedCubans used to joke about Napoleon Bonaparte chatting to Mikhail Gorbachev, George W Bush and Fidel Castro in the afterlife. “If I’d have had your prudence, I’d never have fought Waterloo,” the French emperor tells the last Soviet leader. “If I’d have had your military might, I’d have won Waterloo,” he tells the Texan. Turning last to Castro, the emperor says: “If I’d have had Granma [the Cuban Communist party daily], I’d have lost Waterloo but nobody would have known.”The joke no longer does the rounds. With millions of Cubans now online, the state’s monopoly on mass communication has been deeply eroded. But after social media helped catalyse historic protests on the island last month, the government temporarily shut the internet down. Continue reading...

The company had told me I could leave penalty-free, but it is threatening me with debt collectorsCan you please help me as BT is chasing me for £348 in early termination fees despite previously telling me that it would forgo these charges. The broadband service provided to my house had always been poor but after I had open-heart surgery four years ago, I needed a service that worked. After repeated attempts by BT to improve matters, I eventually switched to Sky, which improved matters somewhat.At the time, BT said I could leave penalty-free, and staff told me to ignore any bills that were sent. However, the company’s most recent letter said it will pass the matter to debt collectors if the bill is not paid with seven days.

To every age dogged with pollution, accidents and congestion, the transport solution for the next generation seems obvious – but the same problems keep coming backIn the 1890s, the biggest cities of the western world faced a mounting problem. Horse-drawn vehicles had been in use for thousands of years, and it was hard to imagine life without them. But as the number of such vehicles increased during the 19th century, the drawbacks of using horses in densely populated cities were becoming ever more apparent.In particular, the accumulation of horse manure on the streets, and the associated stench, were impossible to miss. By the 1890s, about 300,000 horses were working on the streets of London, and more than 150,000 in New York City. Each of these horses produced an average of 10kg of manure a day, plus about a litre of urine. Collecting and removing thousands of tonnes of waste from stables and streets proved increasingly difficult. Continue reading...

Last month, billionaire after billionaire hopped into spacecraft to reach the final frontier. Shivani Dave speaks to Robert Massey, the deputy executive director at the Royal Astronomical Society, to understand what, if any, positives might come from what has been called ‘the billionaire space race’, or if the money and resources spent on space exploration should be redistributed to focus on the challenges being faced on Earth Continue reading...

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok failing to act on most reported anti-Jewish posts, says studyThere has been a serious and systemic failure to tackle antisemitism across the five biggest social media platforms, resulting in a “safe space for racists”, according to a report.Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok failed to act on 84% of posts spreading anti-Jewish hatred and propaganda reported via the platforms’ official complaints system. Continue reading...

Announcement is first time an independent and official authority has corroborated Pegasus project findingsFrench intelligence investigators have confirmed that Pegasus spyware has been found on the phones of three journalists, including a senior member of staff at the country’s international television station France 24.It is the first time an independent and official authority has corroborated the findings of an international investigation by the Pegasus project – a consortium of 17 media outlets, including the Guardian. Forbidden Stories, a Paris-based nonprofit media organisation, and Amnesty International initially had access to a leaked list of 50,000 numbers that, it is believed, have been identified as those of people of interest by clients of Israeli firm NSO Group since 2016, and shared access with their media partners. Continue reading...

Biden’s recent executive order makes taking action on the strict rules imposed by manufacturers a priority, affecting workers across several industriesA tractor. A refrigerator. A smartphone. A ventilator. They may not seem to have much in common, but in fact they all share increasingly high tech features. And when they break, they need fixing.Yet, thanks to strict rules imposed by manufacturers, our ability to do so remains extremely limited. Companies frequently withhold the information and tools needed to repair devices from consumers, with some warranties outright banning third parties from tinkering with products. Continue reading...

LA-based Arc Boat company announces $4.25m seed fund to start work on 475-horsepower craftA team of former SpaceX rocket engineers have joined the race to build the first commercial electric speedboat.The Arc Boat company announced it had raised $4.25m (£3m) in seed funding to start work on a 24ft 475-horsepower craft that will cost about $300,000. Continue reading...

Amazon, Google, Apple and Microsoft all reported record-breaking profits amid a pandemic bonanza but recent Biden administration moves suggest US tech’s easy ride is overBig tech provided the world with some startling numbers this week. In the last three months Amazon’s sales have averaged over $1.2bn a day. It took the company less than four seconds to earn the $52,000 the average American makes in a year. Apple is now sitting on nearly $200bn in cash, more than this year’s expected sales of Covid 19 vaccines.The coronavirus shook the world economy to its core but for the US tech giants it has proven a bonanza of historic proportions. Continue reading...

Now the reach of the Israeli firm’s smartphone-hacking software has been revealed, the US and Apple may take action

(Nifflas Games; Triple Topping; PC, Mac)

Wade can tell you the best pram for a tall parent; Matthew knows which cleaner has superior suction power. But how do you become a respected reviewer on the wild west of the internet?

Federal court judge says allowing artificial intelligence systems, as well as humans, to be inventors is ‘consistent with promoting innovation’An artificial intelligence system is capable of being an “inventor” under Australian patent law, the federal court has ruled, in a decision that could have wider intellectual property implications.University of Surrey professor Ryan Abbott has launched more than a dozen patent applications across the globe, including in the UK, US, New Zealand and Australia, on behalf of US-based Dr Stephen Thaler. They seek to have Thaler’s artificial intelligence device known as Dabus (a device for the autonomous bootstrapping of unified sentience) listed as the inventor. Continue reading...

Latest thin, light and adaptable Windows 10 machine looks great, is fast and has a nine-hour batterySamsung’s latest Galaxy Book Pro is a fast and versatile Windows 10 laptop that has a gorgeous-looking OLED screen.Available as a standard laptop costing from £1,099 ($999) or one with a screen that folds back on itself called the Galaxy Book Pro 360 for an extra £100 ($200). It is the successor to 2020’s Galaxy Book Flex and follows a similar theme: good 13.3in screen, 360-degree folding hinge and thin metal body available in a distinctive royal blue colour. Continue reading...

Firebug investigates whether a work of fiction was in fact a criminal confession. Plus: Gen Z influencers vent in Pressed, and a high-profile witness speaks outFirebug

• Tech and retail giant continues to ride pandemic boom• Share price falls 5% in after-hours tradingAmazon’s sales topped $100bn for the third quarter in a row as its profits for the three months surged to $7.8bn.The Seattle-based tech and online retail giant reported sales of $113bn for the three months between April and June – over $1.4bn a day. The figure was up from $88.9bn in the second quarter of 2020 but slightly lower than Wall Street had expected, and triggered a 5% slide in its share price in after-hours trading. Continue reading...

With data showing downloads dropping, four people talk about the pressures they face

Boss’s Twitter rant against Uber Eats risks backfiring, as experts warn online outbursts can damage companies’ reputationChief executives are being warned to “think twice before they tweet” after the boss of takeaway company Just Eat Takeaway was told his Twitter spat with Uber threatened to undermine the firm’s reputation.Jitse Groen this week became the latest in a growing list of chief executives to be rebuked by customers, investors and even regulators over ill-judged tweets. Continue reading...

Switch/PS4/PC; Capcom

Up for discussion in the Guardian tech newsletter: Scandalous revelations in An Ugly Truth … the relentless march of the silicon transistor … and the dangers of link smutWhat makes Facebook Facebook? I’m not talking about the technology here, or the app, but the company itself: why is Facebook so scandal-prone, so controversial, and so aggressive? That was the question I had going in to An Ugly Truth, a new book from the New York Times reporters Sheera Frenkel and Cecilia Kang. Continue reading...

Anschutz Corporation, which made billions drilling oil, is building a 732 power line to carry renewable energy to cities including Los Angeles and PhoenixSome days, the wind rips across Wyoming’s southern plains at 70mph. Cottonwood trees bend, tall grass lies flat and 18-wheel trucks tip over along Interstate 80. It only takes a breeze of about 6mph to get the long white arms of an electricity-generating wind turbine turning, at full speed they can power thousands of homes.As one of the US’s windiest states, Wyoming has enormous potential to help power the country’s green revolution, but renewable energy in the west has long been dogged by a fundamental problem of transmission. Wind and solar farms tend to be located in remote areas separated from populated cities by hundreds of miles of rugged terrain, a tangle of government regulations and resistance from landowners who don’t want power lines buzzing over their yards. Continue reading...

Orbán’s likely challenger demands action over claims journalists and politicians were potential targetsHungary’s opposition has called for ministerial resignations from Viktor Orbán’s far-right government over allegations it selected journalists, media owners and opposition political figures as potential targets for invasive Pegasus spyware.The allegations, published last week by the Guardian and other members of the Pegasus project consortium, were backed up in a number of cases with forensic analysis of mobile devices carried out by Amnesty International, which showed phones had been infected with Pegasus, sold by the Israeli company NSO Group. Continue reading...

New petrol and diesel cars will be banned in the UK from 2030, and sales of electric vehicles are rising fast. But with drivers reliant on charging points how practical is the greener option? One writer finds outRange anxiety hits hard on the A9 in the Highlands of Scotland. For the uninitiated, this is the fear that an electric vehicle (EV) won’t reach its destination before running out of power. I’m driving through some of Britain’s loveliest landscape – mountains, rivers, lochs and firths – but I hardly notice. I’m focused hard – on the road in front, but mainly on two numbers on the dashboard. One is how far it is in miles to where I’m going; the other is the range in miles remaining in the battery. Sometimes, especially on downhill stretches when what is known as “regenerative braking” means the battery is getting charged, I tell myself it’s going to be OK, I’ll make it. But going uphill the range plummets. Squeaky bum time.Plus, I’ve read Michel Faber’s Under the Skin. I know what happens to men stranded on the A9. To range anxiety add the fear of being processed and eaten by aliens. Continue reading...

Advertisers on Instagram, Facebook and Messenger will no longer be able to market to under 18s based on their interestsFacebook will impose more control on the types of ads that children as young as 13 are exposed to on Instagram and other platforms, as new research finds Australian alcohol companies are not restricting their social media content from reaching younger users.Facebook announced on Wednesday that, starting in a few weeks, Instagram will stop advertisers marketing to teens under 18 based on their interests. Only their age, gender and location will be able to be used to target ads to them. Continue reading...

‘Perfect positive storm’ for big tech as pandemic fuels huge quarterly sales and stock market gainsGoogle, Apple and Microsoft reported record-breaking quarterly sales and profits on Tuesday night as the firms continue to benefit from a pandemic that has created a “perfect positive storm” for big tech. Continue reading...

In new column Internet wormhole, Guardian Australia writers take you to their favourite corner of the web. First up: an inviting – and voyeuristic – YouTube seriesLooking back to early pandemic times, it was probably Architectural Digest’s video tour of Dakota Johnson’s Hollywood home that nudged me down the YouTube hole of celebrity house tours.Like many millennials my Instagram feed is at any given moment peppered with aspirational content from sites like The Design Files and a stream of homogenous pastel-hued influencers. But sitting housebound with my partner and cat in our rented, single bedroom flat, the Fifty Shades of Grey star’s whimsical tour of her tastefully decorated mid century Hollywood home and kitchen stocked with unreasonable quantities of limes (“I love limes, they’re great and I like to present them like this in my house,” she explained) offered a welcome hit of late night escapism from the more foreboding stuff unfolding across the internet in March 2020. Continue reading...

Researchers are looking for volunteers for a study into whether search results really are influenced by previous browsing history

A global shortfall of semiconductors has affected the Tesla supply chain as well as car manufacturers across the worldTesla made a profit of more than $1bn in the last three months even as it struggled to keep up with demand for electric cars in the face of a global chip shortage.The company announced Monday that it has made a profit of $1.14bn in its second quarter, 10 times what it made a year ago and its eighth quarter of back-to-back profits. Continue reading...

French president reportedly spoke to Naftali Bennett to ensure ‘proper investigation’ after Pegasus projectEmmanuel Macron has reportedly spoken to the Israeli prime minister, Naftali Bennett, to ensure that the Israeli government is “properly investigating” allegations that the French president could have been targeted with Israeli-made spyware by Morocco’s security services.In a phone call, Macron expressed concern that his phone and those of most of his cabinet could have been infected with Pegasus, hacking software developed by the Israeli surveillance firm NSO Group, which enables operators of the tool to extract messages, photos and emails, record calls and secretly activate microphones from infected devices. Continue reading...

Experts warn of danger of untraceable funds if companies accepting payments in cryptos go bustThe government could face “limitless” losses as a result of businesses that accept payments in untaxed and untraceable cryptocurrencies going bust, an insolvency expert has warned.A growing number of companies, including the ethical cosmetics firm Lush and office-sharing firm WeWork, have begun taking payments for goods and services in cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, alongside debit payments, credit or cash. Continue reading...

Worldwide concern over the use of invasive spyware sold to autocratic regimesThe Pegasus project investigation has reverberated across the world; claims about the use of invasive spyware, and the governments that use the technology, have provoked demonstrations, political outrage and calls for industry regulation.Here, Guardian reporters pull together the impact of the investigation, which has put a spotlight on the government customers of the Israeli company NSO Group. Continue reading...

The Pegasus project has raised new concerns about the Israeli firm, which is a world leader in the niche surveillance marketIn 2019, when NSO Group was facing intense scrutiny, new investors in the Israeli surveillance company were on a PR offensive to reassure human rights groups.In an exchange of public letters in 2019, they told Amnesty International and other activists that they would do “whatever is necessary” to ensure NSO’s weapons-grade software would only be used to fight crime and terrorism. Continue reading...

New podcast Manatomy encourages famous men from Chris Hoy to Tim Minchin to open up about their insecurities. Plus: Mark Steel and Marina HydeManatomy

Kaseya’s universal key can free the files of hundreds of organizations, ending the worst of the attack’s falloutThe software company at the center of a huge ransomware attack this month has obtained a universal key to unlock files of the hundreds of businesses and public organizations crippled by the hack.Nineteen days after the initial attack over the Fourth of July weekend, the Florida-based IT management provider, Kaseya, has received the universal key that can unlock the scrambled data of all the attack’s victims, bringing the worst of the fallout to a close. Continue reading...

HSBC, PlayStation and others affected on Thursday in issue possibly related to Akamai Edge DNSThe websites of HSBC, ITV and Waitrose were among those hit by a widespread outage that briefly caused disruption on Thursday afternoon.Major online banking services – including Barclays, TSB, the Bank of Scotland, Tesco Bank and Sainsbury’s Bank – were either entirely or partially inaccessible for a short period. Continue reading...

When I heard my number was on a leaked data list, I wasn’t surprised. Reporters have never been more vulnerableWhat does the new age of surveillance mean for the work of investigative journalists? Last year, I was preparing to fly from London to a country in the Middle East for a sensitive reporting trip. I wasn’t worried about my own safety – but now I have to take extraordinary measures to protect the security of my data.Bringing my own laptop or personal phone was out of the question. Instead I bought a completely new phone. I made sure not to sign into any of my accounts from the phone, and I did not save any numbers in the blank address book. Before I left, I created a temporary email address specifically for this trip, where sources could reach me. Continue reading...

Chest-mounted video camera and vibrating wristbands developed by US team reduce collisions by 37% in small studyVibrating wristbands could help visually impaired people to avoid collisions when out and about, a study indicates.According to the NHS, about 360,000 people in the UK alone are registered as blind or partially sighted, with long canes and guide dogs among the methods used to help individuals avoid obstacles. Continue reading...

AlphaFold program’s prediction of nearly 20,000 human protein structures now free for researchersLast year the artificial intelligence group DeepMind cracked a mystery that has flummoxed scientists for decades: stripping bare the structure of proteins, the building blocks of life. Now, having amassed a database of nearly all human protein structures, the company is making the resource available online free for researchers to use.The key to understanding our basic biological machinery is its architecture. The chains of amino acids that comprise proteins twist and turn to make the most confounding of 3D shapes. It is this elaborate form that explains protein function; from enzymes that are crucial to metabolism to antibodies that fight infectious attacks. Continue reading...

It bills itself as the ‘digital currency for the MAGA community’ but data shows most of the magacoin is allocated to its self-styled creatorMore than 1,000 people have so far signed up to the pro-Trump cryptocurrency magacoin, including conservative media personalities and Republican figures, the Guardian can reveal.The news comes after poor security configuration in a website associated with magacoin exposed the email addresses, passwords, cryptocurrency wallet addresses and IP addresses of users who have bought in to what its promoters describe as the “digital currency for the MAGA community”. Continue reading...

Guardian Australia picture editor Carly Earl explains the dos and don’ts of taking pictures of the July 2021 full moon, which is also known as the buck or thunder moon.When a full moon rises, many people will pull out their mobile phones to try and get an Instagram-worthy photograph, but unfortunately the moon is really challenging to get a great photo of.Two reasons: it is very far away and unless you have a telephoto lens (which makes the moon appear closer than it is) it will always appear as a very small glowing dot in the frame. Continue reading...

Workers for app companies call for better wages and protections for those seeking to unionizeHundreds of Uber and Lyft drivers have joined other app-based workers across the US for a day-long strike to protest against poor working conditions and demand the right to organize. Continue reading...

The founder of the electric carmaker says coins are mined using at least 50% renewable power, sending the price up sharplyTesla will most likely restart accepting bitcoin as payment once it conducts due diligence on the amount of renewable energy used to mine the currency, the founder and boss of the electric carmaker, Elon Musk, has said.Musk sent the price of bitcoin into freefall in May when he said that Tesla would stop accepting the cryptocurrency for payment because it the so-called mining of the coins used too much fossil fuel-generated electricity. Continue reading...

22-year-old faces multiple charges in connection with attacks on accounts of politicians and celebritiesA 22-year-old British citizen has been arrested in Spain in connection with a July 2020 Twitter hack that compromised the accounts of high-profile politicians and celebrities, the US Justice Department said on Wednesday.It named the British man as Joseph James O’Connor and said he faced multiple charges. He was also accused in a criminal complaint of computer intrusions related to takeovers of TikTok and Snapchat accounts, including one incident involving sextortion, as well as cyberstalking a 16-year-old juvenile. Continue reading...

Popular overseas, vaccine badges are rolling out locally on online dating platforms like Bumble. But with access to a Covid jab still a concern, one CEO urges caution

Up for discussion in the Guardian tech newsletter: Spotlight on Apple security … shake-up in the video game market … online age verification … and space tourismYou will, by now, have heard about Pegasus. It’s the brand name for a family of spyware tools sold by the NSO Group, an Israeli outfit of hackers-for-hire who sell their wares to intelligence agencies, law enforcement, and militaries around the world. Continue reading...