Technology | The Guardian

The in-game party where you can listen to DJs, do cartoonish challenges or hurl burgers while dressed as a banana is a mass-participation godsendMy son is dressed as a giant banana and he is throwing hamburgers at me. I am making my getaway on a solid gold quad bike. For once, neither of us has access to automatic weapons.No, our home schooling regime hasn’t taken a dark turn. This is Party Royale, the brand new Fortnite mode, where deadly violence is banned and where the emphasis is on messing about and engaging in non-lethal competitions – but mostly messing about. It’s only been live for a few days but already it feels like what the early-millennium online social experiment Second Life could have been if it had been built by game designers rather than Californian internet eggheads. Continue reading...

Resident Evil was reanimated, Coffee Talk brewed up a mindful treat and Final Fantasy VII made our dreams come trueThe desert-island alternate-life game that’s spawned a thousand memes, Animal Crossing offers a cute, stress-free and eminently controllable little world to escape into. Compelling and full of character, it gives plenty of reasons to come back every day. Continue reading...

PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC, Nintendo Switch (version reviewed); Megagon Industries

Long battery life, comfortable and secure ear hooks and great sound for exercisingApple’s revamped Powerbeats Bluetooth workout earphones take what was great from the firm’s true wireless earbuds and add a cable, longer battery life and cheaper price.The new £129.95 Powerbeats replace the older, more expensive Powerbeats 3, with redesigned ear hooks, cable guides and Apple’s H1 chip, which simplifies Bluetooth connectivity and gives them all the AirPods-like features Apple’s headphones have with iPhones. Continue reading...

Minicab firms aim to increase coronavirus protections after data shows drivers are one of the groups most at riskAddison Lee and Uber are to install partition screens in vehicles to protect staff and passengers from infection with coronavirus, after new data earlier this week revealed that male taxi drivers and chauffeurs are among those at highest risk of death from the disease.London’s largest private hire car operator, Addison Lee, claims to be the first in the industry to make the move, announcing that it would be fitting screens to all 4,000 vehicles in its fleet at a likely cost of hundreds of thousands of pounds. Continue reading...

The billionaire has defied shelter-in-place orders and styled himself as an anti-lockdown hero. This is how we got here

Chancellor says she was pained to learn outcome of inquiry pinning blame on Fancy BearAngela Merkel has said Russian hacking attacks on the Bundestag in which her emails were seized harmed efforts to build a trusting relationship with Moscow.Merkel told the German parliament on Wednesday that she had been pained to learn of the 2015 hack and the perpetrator. Continue reading...

Nintendo’s record-breaking new game has been embraced by a world in isolation. Its creators talk about how it was made for sharingAnimal Crossing has been a thing for almost 20 years, but this year it has exploded. You cannot scroll through any social media feed without seeing one of its benign, big-headed characters in a screenshot or video showing off someone’s beautifully tended desert island. Celebrities including Elijah Wood have been delighting fans by turning up to visit their towns. People who’ve rarely played games before have been picking it up as a lockdown distraction – including Lauren Laverne, who enthused about it on her Radio 6 Music show. US congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez picked it up a few days ago and has been visiting her Twitter followers.Since the latest game, New Horizons, came out on 20 March, it has become a cliche to say that this is the game we all need right now. But if the numbers are anything to go by – it’s been setting new records, selling 11m copies by the end of March – then it’s absolutely true. Continue reading...

Great screen, performance, battery life and health tracking – but held back by small nigglesSamsung’s Galaxy Watch Active 2 may not run Android, but it is the best Android-compatible smartwatch available.The Galaxy Watch Active 2 starts at £269, costing £289 as reviewed here, and is the firm’s 10th smartwatch. Samsung has been making smartwatches since 2013 and it shows – the Galaxy Watch Active 2 is the most polished this side of the Apple Watch Series 5. Continue reading...

Federal parliamentary committee examining rollout says fears over network are being exploited, particularly on social media

Each worker will get $1,000, more if they were diagnosed with a disorder as a result of the material they viewedFacebook has agreed to pay a settlement of $52m in a court case alleging the company failed to protect workers tasked with moderating disturbing content from the grave mental health impacts of the job.As part of the settlement, which was announced Tuesday, moderators will get a minimum of $1,000 each from Facebook with the potential for additional compensation if they have been diagnosed with mental health disorders, including PTSD. Continue reading...

The company said those who want to return to the office won’t likely do so until at least September and reopening will be ‘careful’

Those who stay home ‘will be on unpaid leave’, email says, as employees say company is using ‘threatening tactics’

CEO announces electric carmaker will begin production on Monday after company sues county over Covid-19 restrictionsElon Musk announced on Twitter that Tesla would resume production at its northern California factory on Monday afternoon, in defiance of a local public health order designed to slow the spread of coronavirus.“Tesla is restarting production today against Alameda County rules,” the billionaire CEO tweeted. “I will be on the line with everyone else. If anyone is arrested, I ask that it only be me.” Continue reading...

From separate share-houses in lockdown we tackle shared finances, work-life balance and goal setting – in a farming simulation“I’m going to the mines!” says a voice through my laptop.It’s my partner, Joel – albeit a pixelated version of him. I see him move swiftly out of the screen as I go back to my task of chopping down an oak tree, searching for wood and sap. Continue reading...

Carmaker sues authorities and threatens to move HQ out of California after factory stopped from reopening

Tesla sues state authorities over lockdown after Fremont factory stopped from reopening

Want something to show for the weeks you have spent in lockdown? These apps will help you achieve your aimsIn early April, one bullish American consultant suggested on Twitter that if people didn’t emerge from coronavirus quarantine having learned a new skill, gained more knowledge or having started something they’d been putting off, then “you didn’t ever lack the time, you lacked the discipline”.As the tweet was widely shared, it met mockery and anger in equal measure, as people noted that home schooling, financial worries, stress and/or illness are making this period anything but a delightful self-improvement holiday. Continue reading...

The tech giant has often been accused of mistreating workers, but our desire for instant gratification is part of the problemTim Bray resigned as an Amazon vice-president last week. “Who he?” I hear you say. And why is this news significant? Answers: first, Bray is an ubergeek who’s an alumnus of many of the outfits in tech’s hall of fame (including DEC, Sun Microsystems, the OED project at the University of Waterloo, Google’s Android team and, eventually, Amazon Web Services); and second, he resigned on an issue of principle – something as rare as hen’s teeth in the tech industry.In his blog, he wrote: “I quit in dismay at Amazon firing whistleblowers who were making noise about warehouse employees frightened of Covid-19.” It was an expensive decision. Bray said the decision to resign would probably cost him more than a million dollars in salary and shares, and that he regretted leaving a job he enjoyed, working with good colleagues. “So I’m pretty blue.” Continue reading...

As a delivery driver in a Blade Runner-style landscape, the thrill is to dip into client’s lives. Just don’t ask what’s in the packageThe city of Nivalis is, at once, arrestingly beautiful and awkwardly familiar. With its streaking hover cars and pink-humming katakana signs, the sparkling rain and homeless androids, it’s a cliche that invites cliches: “sprawling”, “neon-lit”, “Blade Runner-esque”. Still, overfamiliarity with the aesthetic does little to blunt the fierce appeal of Cloudpunk’s game world.In part that’s because this is a world constructed from tiny pixelated building blocks, which give the city and its distinct districts the feel of a basement Lego project that got wildly out of hand. As you sweep across its glowing vistas, weaving in, out, over, and under the local traffic, the tumbling blocks of houses below appear to plead to spill their secrets. The buzz when you first realise you can park up and gather them up on foot is exhilarating. But Cloudpunk also slips the constraints of its genre by virtue of its casting: you play, not as a monosyllabic hacker trying to topple a megacorp, or as an ex-cop trying to win back his badge, but as that humble hero of the hour: the delivery driver. Continue reading...

The wildly popular game gives players a place to socialize with others or simply escape while on lockdown for coronavirusAs shelter in place orders around the world have left many people trapped at home indefinitely, some have found a new place to meet up: inside the digital world of wildly popular Nintendo game Animal Crossing.Released in late March, Animal Crossing: New Horizons quickly became the top game in the US. In it, users explore a carefree pastel environment, growing fruits and flowers, catching bugs or fish to sell, and making friends with other characters in an open-ended simulation. Continue reading...

Cities like Barcelona want to use crisis to allow people to rent properties at decent ratesAirbnb has revolutionised travel and since it was founded in 2008 hundreds of thousands of property owners have used the holiday accommodation platform to make ends meet, make a living and, in some cases, make a killing.But while hosts, as they are known, are wringing their hands over the collapse of the travel industry and their loss of income, many city authorities are rubbing theirs at the prospect of thousands of holiday lets returning to the traditional rental market. Cities complain that the highly profitable holiday lets have driven up rents and forced out residents with the knock-on effect that local businesses no longer have a community to serve. Continue reading...

Juul, Yelp and hundreds of startups among tech firms cutting jobs while Amazon and Zoom see huge boosts

If the UK government wants to start easing the country's lockdown restrictions, it needs to get contact tracing right. But what does that mean? What would successful contact tracing even look like? Josh Toussaint-Strauss tries to find out with a little help from Christophe Fraser, an Oxford professor and infectious disease epidemiologist, and Alex Hern, the Guardian's UK technology editor

MPs and rights groups have warned lack of data protection could make UK app illegal

Coronavirus crisis has forced musicians and others to adapt, says founder of platformMusicians, artists and writers have turned to crowdfunding sites to make up for lost opportunities in lockdown, and their audiences have followed them, leading to a rise in contributions through platforms such as Patreon.Since mid-March more than 70,000 extra creators have joined Patreon, which allows fans to give monthly payments to artists in exchange for exclusive content or simply out of a desire to support someone whose work they appreciate. Continue reading...

My friend and colleague Tony Morgan, who has died aged 83 after contracting Covid-19, was one of the heroes of the early days of computers. As a computer engineer from the late 1950s, he was responsible for the installation of the pioneering Leo computers worldwide, including for the GPO (now BT) for telephone billing. After a 38-year career he remained an active member of the Leo Heritage Project, using his unrivalled knowledge to identify the company’s artefacts.Born in Kenton, near Harrow, Middlesex, to William Morgan, an architect, and Millie (nee Ferguson), Tony went to Harrow County grammar school and, after getting four A-levels, did his national service with the RAF, where he was trained as an air-radar fitter. Continue reading...

An online fitness class was hacked, prompting calls for greater security awarenessSixty children taking part in a fitness class on Zoom were subjected to footage of child sexual abuse streamed into the session by a hacker. The class was being hosted by a sports club in Plymouth, Devon.Devon and Cornwall police believe the hacker gained access to the virtual class after the details of the event were published on online forums. The force is trying to track down the hacker and is working with Plymouth city council’s social care team to identify everyone who saw the footage. Continue reading...

More protections needed before coronavirus app fully launched, says human rights committee

Sidewalk Labs’ CEO said unpredictabilities stemming from pandemic meant project was no longer feasibleGoogle’s affiliate Sidewalk Labs has abruptly abandoned its vision to transform Toronto’s waterfront into one of the world’s first “smart cities”.In a statement released on Thursday, Sidewalk Labs’ CEO, Dan Doctoroff, said that sustained unpredictabilities stemming from the coronavirus pandemic meant that the project was no longer feasible. Continue reading...

Xbox livestream showcases new titles designed to support the advanced features of the forthcoming consoleMicrosoft has revealed 13 games coming to its Xbox Series X console when the machine launches this winter. In an hour-long presentation, streamed live on Thursday, the company announced that well-known titles such as the recently announced Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, as well as Madden NFL 21 and Yakuza: Like a Dragon, will all be on Xbox Series X.Also featured was Paradox Interactive’s vampire adventure, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2. Codemasters presented its racer DiRT 5 complete with impressive lighting and mud splatter effects, and an option to run it in 4K at 60 frames-per-second or in a lower resolution at 120fps. Namco Bandai showed a new anime-style sci-fi thriller named Scarlet Nexus, about a group of psychic law enforcers. Continue reading...

The panel has the potential to reshape how Facebook shapes the world and possibly introduce a new era of social media governanceA new era of social media governance began Wednesday, when the first 20 members of Facebook’s long-awaited oversight board were announced. The international panel of free expression advocates, journalists, a former prime minister, a Nobel laureate, and law professors will have final say over certain content moderation decisions for the world’s largest social media platform, independent of Facebook’s executives and staff.This limited transfer of power to an independent entity represents something of a sea change for a company that has since its founding been under the tight control of CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who is chairman of the board and controls a majority of the company’s voting shares. Continue reading...

California workers say the company is pressuring sick employees to show up – and flouting a California law meant to protect them from Covid-19

World’s most popular video game to celebrate launch of new party mode with live event featuring Deadmau5 and Steve AokiFortnite developer Epic Games has announced that the game now has 350 million registered players. In a tweet published on Wednesday, the company also revealed that, during April, the online shooter was played for 3.2bn hours – a tally that is likely to have been boosted by global coronavirus lockdown measures.Now well into its third year of existence, Fortnite is continuing to attract a massive global audience, despite several newer rivals in the battle royale genre, including Apex Legends from Electronic Arts and a new Call of Duty mode, Warzone. Over time the game experience has constantly evolved and expanded, from a defensive shooter in which players fended off zombies, to the wildly popular competitive battle royale mode, to more recent modes and events that focus on building things, socialising online with other players, or attending one-off performances. Last month, one such series of in-game live events featuring rapper Travis Scott attracted more than 12 million spectators. Continue reading...

Wireless speaker firm revamps top TV audio line, plus Sonos 5 speakers and gen 3 SubThe wireless home-audio specialist Sonos is launching the first of its next-generation speakers with a new Dolby Atmos voice-controlled soundbar called Arc.Arc replaces the firm’s popular Playbar and Playbase as its top-end TV sound system, re-engineered to provide a wider, more powerful sound and built on the new S2 software platform, which is due to roll out to existing speakers soon. Continue reading...

New independent board, which includes ex-Guardian editor, will rule on freedom of expression issuesFacebook has announced the members of its new oversight board, an international committee of judges, journalists and academics who will help steer the company’s policy on freedom of expression.Among the 20 board members who have agreed to help set policy for the social network are Helle Thorning-Schmidt, the former prime minister of Denmark; the Nobel peace laureate Tawakkol Karman; and Alan Rusbridger, the former Guardian editor-in-chief. Continue reading...

Experts say NHS relying on ‘Android herd immunity’ to overcome Apple-related issues

Windows-maker updates top and cheapest PCs, and launches new headphonesMicrosoft is launching a revamped line of its most powerful and cheapest Windows 10 PCs, the Surface Book 3 and Surface Go 2, as it adjusts to continue operations during the pandemic.The new products, announced by blogpost rather than an event, are Microsoft’s premium computers competing directly with the likes of Apple and Dell, but with more novel designs. Continue reading...

Staff losing jobs receive email within hours of co-founder outlining plans in blogpost

iPad/iPhone (PC, Xbox One and PlayStation 4 versions forthcoming); E-Line MediaRealistic marine-diving game shines a light on the deep oceanA mellow and overtly educational game about marine wildlife, Beyond Blue is an opportunity to submerge yourself in the expansive beauty of the Western Pacific. Futuristic technology enables our marine scientist to scan creatures, track whale calls and withstand the crushing pressures of the deep ocean as she follows a pod of sperm whales through seascapes taken from the BBC’s Blue Planet II, from shallows to open ocean to the toxic deep-sea brine pool that gave me nightmares for weeks after seeing it on TV.Atmospheric though these watery places are, there’s no peril in this version of deep-sea diving, even when you try to manufacture it. Attempts to swim directly into the gaping mouth of a humpback or provoke a hammerhead shark yield nothing but the odd visual glitch. You can admire the impressively realistic sea life at leisure, panning drones around creatures to record their songs and examine their markings. Nonetheless, do not expect an entirely chill time beneath the waves. Inevitably for a game informed by the actual state of our oceans, there’s a touch of sadness here. Continue reading...

An update to integrate the Google-Apple framework should fix the issue, MPs toldAustralians running the Covidsafe contact tracing app on iPhones may not be recording all the data required if they don’t have the app running in the foreground or they are using an older model phone, the government has admitted.More than 5.1 million Australians have downloaded and registered to use the app on iPhone and Android devices, and, while the Android version works while running in the background (ie, not open on the screen), the iPhone version works best when the app is open on the screen and the phone is unlocked. Continue reading...

Worries public will not use app after security specialists and MPs raise concerns

At least six workers who have participated in protests or advocated for safer conditions have been fired during the pandemic

Tim Bray’s departure comes as company faces increased scrutiny and employee activism around its Covid-19 responseTim Bray, a top engineer and vice-president at Amazon, announced on Monday he is resigning “in dismay” over the company’s firing of employee activists who criticized working conditions amid the coronavirus pandemic.Bray’s resignation comes as Amazon faces increased scrutiny and employee activism surrounding its internal response to coronavirus. Amazon workers on Friday participated in a nationwide sick-out to protest against poor working conditions and inadequate safety protections, claiming the company has failed to provide enough face masks for workers, did not implement regular temperature checks it promised at warehouses, and has refused to give workers paid sick leave. Continue reading...

New keyboard replaces issue-prone Butterfly version, plus new chips and more storageApple has launched an updated version of its popular 13in MacBook Pro laptop with a revamped keyboard, more storage and faster chips.The 13in MacBook Pro now has Apple’s Magic Keyboard, replacing the ultra-thin Butterfly keyboard that suffered from multiple issues regarding noise, dust and malfunctioning keys. The new machine joins the larger 16in MacBook Pro and the recently released MacBook Air, completing the removal of the Butterfly keyboard from Apple’s product line. Continue reading...

Experts say Russia, Iran and China likely to be behind cyber-attacks on universities

It started as a photo-sharing platform, but quickly rose to become the most influential app of our generation. Now, a forensic new book reveals the struggles and eccentricities of the men behind InstagramOne day in the autumn of 2015, a small but significant change was implemented at the Instagram offices in Menlo Park, California. Employees arrived at work to discover the rubbish bins under each desk had disappeared. The bins had allowed people to work efficiently – no one had to stand up to throw away a coconut water carton or wasabi pea wrapper after they’d enjoyed the company’s free food. But the bins weren’t really Instagram’s – they were installed by Facebook, which had purchased the photo-sharing app for $1bn in 2012.Kevin Systrom, Instagram’s co-founder, didn’t like the bins. He didn’t like the cardboard boxes employees used to file papers and paraphernalia. He hated old, sagging birthday balloons. Instagram’s offices, he explained, after removing the bins, should represent its ethos. They should be beautiful, simple, pristine – much like the app itself. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Privacy experts say the breach in the SkillsSelect platform, which affects data going back to 2014, was ‘very serious’Privacy experts have blasted the home affairs department for a data breach revealing the personal details of 774,000 migrants and people aspiring to migrate to Australia, including partial names and the outcome of applications.At a time the federal government is asking Australians to trust the security of data collected by its Covid-Safe contact tracing app, privacy experts are appalled by the breach, which they say is just the latest in a long line of cybersecurity blunders. Continue reading...

From energy-saving bulbs to leak detectors, smart tech offers many benefits at the touch of a buttonAlmost everything in your home, from lights and thermostats to door locks and security cameras, can now be connected to the internet. With a few taps on an app or a voice command you can turn down your heating, let visitors into your home or check for leaks.But while many of these gadgets appear to be simply a way to impress visitors (“Hey Google, dim the lights and play some romantic music”), others can save you money. And at a time when many of us are working from home and running up bills during the day, this is likely to be their biggest selling point. Continue reading...