Four-fold rise since March edges towards all-time record as cryptocurrency gains greater acceptanceBitcoin, the world’s best known cryptocurrency, jumped above $17,000 to a three-year high on Tuesday as a growing number of investors backed it as an alternative to other assets.The currency climbed more than 4% to $17,492, its highest level since December 2017 and more than four times higher than the price in March when heavy selling sent its value below $4,000. Continue reading...
Users can disable features such as Smart Reply that use personal data to improve experienceGmail users will finally be able to easily opt out of “smart” features that use their personal data to improve the experience, the company has announced, as it seeks to reassure regulators around the world that it offers genuine user choice around how it processes data.Once it launches, a single setting on Gmail will ask users to decide whether to “turn off smart features” for their email accounts, disabling the personalisation that powers features including Smart Compose and Smart Reply. A second setting will also enable users to opt out of sharing their Gmail data with other Google services such as Maps and Assistant. Continue reading...
Tool that lets advertisers track users created without consent, says activist Max SchremsThe consumer rights activist Max Schrems has filed a formal privacy case against Apple, arguing that an ID generated by iPhones that lets advertisers track users violates privacy regulations.Schrems, whose lawsuit against Facebook led to a landmark ruling restricting data transfers from the EU to the US, has made the case through his privacy rights non-profit Noyb, which has filed formal complaints in Spain and Berlin against Apple. Continue reading...
by Samuel Gibbs Consumer technology editor on (#5AFJF)
Tried and tested neckband wireless earbuds have more cable than AirPods but at less than half the priceThe Beats Flex are Apple’s latest neckband Bluetooth earbuds, and bring many of the fancy features of its AirPods to headphones costing just one third of the price.The new Beats cost £49.99 and replace the £129 Beats X as the firm’s cheapest wireless earbuds, sitting below the £129.95 Powerbeats, and Apple’s £129 AirPods. Continue reading...
Nationals MP Anne Webster, her husband and not-for-profit group targeted by ‘disgraceful and inexplicable’ postsFacebook has apologised to Nationals MP Anne Webster over months-long delays in responding to reports of abuse she received from an online conspiracy theorist that led to an $875,000 defamation payout order.In September, federal court justice Jacqueline Gleeson ordered the payout to the first-term Mildura MP over Facebook posts in April by Australian conspiracy theorist Karen Brewer. The posts were shared hundreds of times and falsely accused Webster of being “a member of a secretive paedophile network” who had been “parachuted into parliament to protect a past generation of paedophiles”. Continue reading...
It’s a question that has raged since the 90s, with conflicting claims about the species of one of Nintendo’s best-loved charactersIn the Guide’s weekly Solved! column, we look into a crucial pop-culture question you’ve been burning to know the answer to – and settle it, once and for allOver the course of almost three decades playing video games and 15 years writing about them, I have seen a few recurrent questions that just refuse to die. Are video games art? (Yes, when they want to be.) Is Sonic better than Mario? (Obviously not: Sonic has only starred in about three good games since 1991.) Does playing games turn you into a sociopathic murderer? (No, but having to answer that question 4,000 times has certainly given me thoughts of mild violence.) But none has ever bothered me as much as this: is that Toad from Super Mario’s actual head, or is he wearing a mushroom hat? Continue reading...
by Samuel Gibbs Consumer technology editor on (#5AE2Y)
From Apple to Samsung, Amazon to Microsoft, there’s lots of options, starting from less than £100As the UK heads towards the holiday season, being able to easily entertain ourselves, read the news, play games and – more importantly than ever – video call our loved ones means having the right tablet can make a real difference.Unlike most laptops, tablets have fairly good video cameras, support apps and make it simple to fire up that Zoom call. Here are the best available across a range of budgets. Continue reading...
Research based on playing time data showed gamers reported greater wellbeingPlaying video games can be good for your mental health, a study from Oxford University has suggested, following a breakthrough collaboration in which academics at the university worked with actual gameplay data for the first time.The study, which focused on players of Nintendo’s springtime craze Animal Crossing, as well as EA’s shooter Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville, found that people who played more games tended to report greater “wellbeing”, casting further doubt on reports that video gaming can harm mental health. Continue reading...
Winner of international prize, which had a record number of entries this year, to be announced on ThursdayFrom a well-timed recyclable PPE glove to a wheel-based device to cut “invisible” pollution from tyres, 20 groundbreaking designs by students across the world are in the running to be named on Thursday as the international winner of the annual James Dyson award.The prestigious accolade brings with it a £30,000 cash prize – and gives winners a chance to turn their innovation into a commercial product with real-world impact. One in five previous winners have gone on to commercialise a wide range of exotic inventions, including bionic arms, origami-style clothing and bio-reactive food labels. Continue reading...
Adult clubs such as NSFW and Killing Kittens are reporting booming interest in video hook-ups. Remember when virtual get-togethers were about meetings or cocktail parties?The Zoom honeymoon is over. So are Houseparty dinners where you plan to eat the same thing at the same time, then flake and eat some Doritos, then realise that you don’t especially want to chew on screen. No more online cocktail parties, where conversation mysteriously cannot flow and everyone takes it in turns to tell an inconsequential anecdote that is short, but never quite short enough. No more FaceTime quizzes, where you lackadaisically Google the answers on your phone, because the goodwill entailed in joining the call in the first place was about all you had in you.The only thing that has survived, apparently, is the virtual sex party. Continue reading...
Exclusive: Union survey finds 17% of drivers for Uber and other services sexually harassed or assaulted by passengersUber and other rideshare drivers are earning an average of $12 an hour during the Covid-19 pandemic, and 17% have been sexually harassed or assaulted by passengers, according to a new survey of the gig economy.A survey of 230 workers – 93% of whom work for Uber – has revealed a range of violent assaults, threats, racism and sexual harassment experienced by drivers. Continue reading...
Given the problems involved in regulating the tech giants, the EU commission’s targeted investigation seems the smartest way to achieve resultsThe European commission has opened an antitrust investigation of Amazon, on the grounds that the company has breached EU antitrust rules against distorting competition in online retail markets. Amazon, says the commission, has been using its privileged access to non-public data of independent sellers who sell on its marketplace to benefit the parts of its own retail business that directly compete with those third-party sellers. The commission has also opened a second investigation into the possible preferential treatment of Amazon’s own retail offers compared with those of marketplace sellers that use Amazon’s logistics and delivery services.The good news about this is not so much that the EU is taking action as that it is doing so in an intelligently targeted manner. Too much of the discourse about tech companies in the last two years has been about “breaking them up”. But “break ’em up” is a slogan, not a policy, and it has a kind of Trumpian ring to it. The commission is avoiding that. Continue reading...
Having won in California, they will seek devastating victories elsewhereOne of the darker outcomes of 21st-century work life has been the predatory gig economy. Divorced from healthcare benefits and regular pay, millions of workers are told they are supposed to be lucky to drive passengers around in a car for ever-diminishing returns.Last week, there was hope that Proposition 22, a ballot measure that allows gig economy companies to continue treating drivers as independent contractors, would be defeated in California, an increasingly progressive state. But voters passed the measure overwhelmingly, thanks to obscene amounts of spending by Uber, Lyft, Seamless and DoorDash. Unleashing more than $200m – 10 times the amount of the proposition’s opponents, like labor unions – the coalition of tech giants easily drowned out those fighting for the rights of workers. Continue reading...
by Samuel Gibbs Consumer technology editor on (#5AARR)
Apple’s big update adds colour, iPhone-like icons, settings and apps, ready for new and old Macs alikeApple has just released Big Sur as a free update, marking the biggest redesign for macOS in years. The core system of every Mac computer is now equal parts traditional desktop computer and features many will be used to seeing from the iPad and iPhone.Big Sur marks the end of an era for the Mac’s software in more ways than one. For years Apple has been slowly blending the design and operation of its desktop and mobile software, bringing features from the iPhone or iPad to the Mac and vice versa. With Big Sur comes a significant step toward the goal of merging the two. Continue reading...
by Hannah Verdier, Hannah J Davies and Charlie Philli on (#5AAQ9)
Journalists Simran Hans and Tara Joshi offer smart analysis as well as nostalgia in Twenty Twenty. Plus: more ‘badman language’ and general larks with the Kurupt FM crewThe Art of Asking Everything
The coronavirus pandemic has left us living more and more of our lives online. But the place where we chat with friends, get our news and form our opinions is full of vile and dangerous conspiracy theories. Is the world’s biggest social network doing enough to combat them?
High-speed pods could eventually make New York-Washington trip in 30 minutesRichard Branson’s Virgin Hyperloop has completed the world’s first passenger ride on a high-speed levitating pod system, a key safety test for technology it hopes will transform human and cargo transportation.The Virgin Hyperloop executives, Josh Giegel, its chief technology officer, and Sara Luchian, the director of passenger experience, reached speeds of up to 107mph (172 km/h) at the company’s DevLoop test site in Las Vegas, Nevada, the company said on Sunday. Continue reading...
by Dan Sabbagh Defence and security editor on (#5A3G8)
Investment in robot warfare at heart of UK’s planned five-year defence reviewThirty thousand “robot soldiers” could form an integral part of the British army in the 2030s, working alongside humans in and around the frontline, the head of the armed forces said in a television interview on Sunday.Gen Sir Nick Carter said the armed forces needed “to think about how we measure effects in a different way” – and he called on the government to proceed with the previously promised five-year integrated defence review. Continue reading...
‘Stop the Steal’ group acquired 40,000 members after a similar group was shut down, then changed its name without explanationThousands of Donald Trump supporters have unwittingly found themselves in a Facebook group called “Gay Communists for Socialism”, after being tricked by its creators into joining what they thought was a pro-Trump election group.On Thursday, a Facebook group called “Stop the Steal”, a reference to the president’s false claims that Joe Biden is “stealing” the US election, was disabled by the social network for misinformation after gaining more than 350,000 members. Other groups emerged in its place, including a second “Stop the Steal” group that attracted more than 40,000 castaways from the original group. Continue reading...
If the system was really sophisticated, it would trigger a call to a dieticianI recently received a text asking me to verify whether I had made a recent purchase. This is something that happens a lot, as my bank is triggered by anything that doesn’t appear to be me. It will allow limitless funds to go on overpriced trainers, but block barbecue meats or Tottenham Hotspur merch. I am making this up, of course, as it seems entirely random what it double-checks, although I am sure there is a sophisticated algorithm that says things like: “Romesh doesn’t usually buy vegetables in January – he gets depressed and eats only pastries.”It is worse when I’m on tour. The bank gets extra suspicious because I make purchases in so many different towns, particularly since almost every one is curry. I spent the whole of my last tour on the phone trying to convince my bank it was actually me having vegetable jalfrezi for the 16th consecutive night. If the system were truly sophisticated, it would trigger a call to a dietitian. Continue reading...
Digital system automatically reduces electric bicycles’ power in built-up areasElectric bike motors will be shut down when entering residential or built-up areas of Amsterdam, under a government-funded project to cut road deaths from the increasingly powerful vehicles.The digital technology, which has been successfully trialled on a 4km stretch of bike lanes at Schiphol airport, was funded by the Dutch ministry of infrastructure and water management. Continue reading...
This enormous spaceship of a console comes with enough flagship features – from fast SSD and frame rate to 4K resolution – that you might overlook the hefty price tag
Conspiracy theories and misinformation have circulated widely before removal, watchdog findsTikTok has emerged as an unexpected source of misinformation about the US election, with numerous inaccurate or misleading posts circulating as tech companies battle to contain falsehoods from Donald Trump and others.
They’re superfast, they’re frictionless and you get access to Xbox Game Pass. But not much else, from the controller to the interface, has changed – and launching without a single new game is just bizarre
Feature on Facebook-owned app is designed to help people cut their digital footprintWhatsApp will soon have a disappearing message feature, designed to enable users of the chat app to cut down on their digital footprint.Once the update, which is rolling out from Thursday, hits phones, users will be able to set an option for each individual chat they are in – whether one-on-one or a group – to delete messages automatically seven days after they have been sent. Continue reading...
Richard Browning is pursuing the stuff of a million childhood dreams. But having built a working jetpack, will anybody use it?On a gloomy afternoon in a Sussex wood, a 21st-century superhero appears. Dressed in black, helmeted, a pack on his back and jets on his arms, he rises to a couple of metres above the ground, accelerates up above a grassy bank and then hovers in a swirling cloud of autumn leaves.No matter how many times you’ve watched a video on YouTube, nothing can quite prepare you for the sight of a human being in flight. It is the embodiment of a thousand myths, from Hermes and Peter Pan to Iron Man, as well as a million childhood dreams, and is the only correct answer to that old conundrum: which superpower would you choose, invisibility or flying? If it wasn’t for the roar of the jet engines and the smell of fuel, you would assume it was just a dream. Continue reading...
Funds have lain dormant since darknet site founder Ross Ulbricht was jailed in 2013A billion dollars worth of bitcoins linked to the shuttered darknet market Silk Road has changed hands for the first time in seven years, prompting renewed speculation about the fate of the illicit fortune.Almost 70,000 bitcoins stored in the account which, like all bitcoin wallets, is visible to the public, had lain untouched since April 2013. The website was shut down by an FBI raid six months after they were deposited, and they have not moved since. Continue reading...
Representation of characters from ‘uncivilised’ worlds and a nostalgia for colonial cultures have been problematic from the startWhen Black Lives Matter protests were raging following the death of George Floyd, the publishers of the tabletop role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons, pledged to take concrete steps to make their games more diverse. Wizards of the Coast promised to “share what we’ve been doing, and what we plan to do in the future to address legacy D&D content that does not reflect who we are today”. In addition, it also pulled several racist cards from the card game Magic: The Gathering, such as Invoke Prejudice, Jihad and Pradesh Gypsies.Perceptions of racism in fantasy go back to the origins of the genre. Is it a coincidence that D&D’s dishonourable, dark-skinned elves come from a matriarchal society, or that its savage orcs bear uncanny resemblance to a traditionally white, western conceptualisation of barbaric peoples from the “uncivilised” world? Although fantasy affords us every freedom to imagine new worlds and cultures, for the last 200-odd years, humans have mostly managed derivative facsimiles of our own. This includes reproducing the scourge of systemic racism. Continue reading...
Officials are warning about foreign interference – but unlike in 2016, the greater threat comes from the White HouseIt seemed like the nightmare of 2016 all over again. Continue reading...
An online competition has set up two bots to see if they can simulate a romantic rendezvous. But almost two weeks later things are not quite going to planName: Kuki and Blenderbot.Age: Hard to say exactly, mid-20s or thereabouts. Continue reading...
Secure messaging app pivotal to organisation of protests and spreading of news about repressionsIn a small Minsk apartment one evening last week, a group of people gathered to discuss plans for a Halloween party with a twist. There would be costumes, drinks and games, but the main event was a ceremonial funeral. The plan: to bury Alexander Lukashenko’s dictatorship.“Maybe we should bury a pumpkin with a moustache,” suggested one young woman. Continue reading...
Even before the Covid pandemic, loneliness had been deemed an official epidemic in several countries – and some companies have offered tech-based solutionsThis was the year we all began social distancing. But the ensuing isolation was already the norm for a rapidly growing population – and a major opportunity for many businesses. And as isolation has engulfed the globe like the virus itself, the business of loneliness is booming.Even before the pandemic, loneliness had been deemed an official epidemic in several countries. Rates of loneliness in the US have doubled over the past 50 years. In 2018, some 200,000 of the UK’s elderly hadn’t spoken to a friend or relative in a month, according to a government report, and 75% of the country’s general practitioners report seeing between one and five lonely patients each day. Continue reading...
New York University research into who sees the messages is laudable but its collection of personal data isn’tIt looked like another classic Facebook scandal: a report in the Wall Street Journal with the headline “Facebook Seeks Shutdown of NYU Research Project Into Political Ad Targeting”. The story was that Facebook was “demanding that a New York University research project cease collecting data about its political-ad-targeting practices, setting up a fight with academics seeking to study the platform without the company’s permission. The dispute involves the NYU Ad Observatory, a project launched last month by the university’s engineering school that has recruited more than 6,500 volunteers to use a specially designed browser extension to collect data about the political ads Facebook shows them.”Cue outrage, including, initially, from this columnist. Typical tech company bullying, etc, etc. The NYU project seemed like a thoroughly good idea. After the controversies about its role in the 2016 election, Facebook created an archive of political ads that ran on its platform, showing who sponsored an ad, when it ran and the location of people who saw it, but excluding information about the targeting that determines who sees the ads. The NYU researchers sought to provide journalists and others with a tool for searching political ads by state and contest to see what messages are targeted at specific audiences and how those ads are funded. Continue reading...
Shops, cafes and pubs now can keep logs of their visitors who use the QR code check-in on their phonesBusinesses across Australia are being encouraged or required to keep logs of who has been in their establishment in case of a Covid-19 outbreak.Many choose to use paper and pen to keep records, but increasingly QR code posters are up so people can check in via their phones. Continue reading...
Like an idiot, I ordered them to replace my almost identical old pair that I was now convinced were trashI have been known to be wildly inconsistent with my reactions to expensive items. I will happily overpay for a pair of jeans, and later that same day bemoan the state of the world when an ice-cream costs a fiver, despite both items having a similar manufacturing cost.My biggest blind spot is headphones. I have become convinced that I need a pair for different situations. So I have a pair for the gym (barely used, obviously), a pair for everything else, and then a pair of wireless earphones for situations in which I don’t feel like wearing headphones (or something; I can’t remember how I justified it to my family). Continue reading...
Moderators had to manually intervene to limit distribution of Hunter Biden reportFacebook moderators had to manually intervene to suppress a controversial New York Post story about Hunter Biden, according to leaked moderation guidelines seen by the Guardian.The document, which lays out in detail Facebook’s policies for dealing with misinformation on Facebook and Instagram, sheds new light on the process that led to the company’s decision to reduce the distribution of the story. Continue reading...
by Written by Frank Pasquale, read by Raj Ghatak and on (#59QK3)
Autonomous machines capable of deadly force are increasingly prevalent in modern warfare, despite numerous ethical concerns. Is there anything we can do to halt the advance of the killer robots? By Frank Pasquale Continue reading...
Judge declines to dismiss case against Huawei CFO but says assertion that US misrepresented evidence for extradition has ‘air of reality’A judge has blocked an attempt by Canada’s attorney general to dismiss parts of the extradition case against Huawei’s chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, according to a ruling released on Thursday.However, the judge sided with the attorney general in agreeing that Meng’s arguments were not strong enough to warrant an immediate dismissal of the case to extradite to the US for trial on fraud charges. Continue reading...
Google, Facebook and Amazon rally in third-quarter earnings reportsBig tech rallied on Thursday in earnings reports, largely shaking off the impacts of recent regulatory hearings and the coronavirus pandemic.Major tech firms added a combined $163bn to their market capitalizations ahead of the release of their earning reports on Thursday, more than the entire value of McDonald’s. Continue reading...
Company also used Argentine flag instead of Swedish one to represent countryAmazon’s launch of a Swedish retail site, its first in the Nordics, has caused embarrassment at the e-commerce company after a series of errors led to confusing, nonsensical and occasionally vulgar product listings scattered across the catalogue.To start with, Amazon chose the wrong flag: the Argentine flag appeared where the Swedish flag should have been placed on the country picker. It is unclear how the error happened: aside from copious use of blue, the two flags are not similar. Continue reading...
The apps feed a false promise of stability to immigrants and people of color. Instead, drivers receive low pay and no benefitsUber and Lyft want you to know they aren’t racist. It’s why Uber put up billboards all over the west coast saying: “If you tolerate racism, delete Uber.” It’s why Lyft is running ads featuring Maya Angelou’s “Lift up your eyes” poem over clips of Black passengers enjoying their service. It’s all to say – “We get it. We’re woke. We think Black Lives Matter just like you do. We’re with you in the struggle.”OK, Uber and Lyft. You want a seat at the anti-racism table? Let’s talk about race. Continue reading...
Technology | The Guardian