Technology | The Guardian

He started posting YouTube videos when he was 15. Ten years and 11 million subscribers later, the vlogging superstar and his girlfriend Zoella are looking to diversifyWho is Alfie Deyes? “That’s a tricky one,” he – Deyes – says. Not because he doesn’t know who he is, but because I’ve told him I’m asking on behalf of my mum, who’s never heard of him: how would he explain his job to her? “I think I’ll just say: ‘I’m a 25-year-old content creator who loves making things happen, whether that’s things that people expect, or things people don’t expect.’”I say I’m asking for my mum, but if I’m honest I wasn’t 100% sure who he was myself; and if you’re over 35, chances are you don’t know, either. It’s not hard to get up to speed with his work, though, and by the time we meet I feel I know Deyes pretty well. I’ve shared some of the lovely life he has with his lovely girlfriend Zoe, also a content creator. I’ve met some of their lovely friends, their dog Nala, a black pug (no lovely for you, Nala, I’m afraid), and the lovely orange Aga in the kitchen of their lovely home. I know that Alfie won’t be working out until the summer this year, just doing a bit of bouldering at the local climbing centre. I know he used to have a special place under the mattress where he stuffed his bogeys, and that he wees sitting down. Continue reading...

News site says it wants to ensure its efforts are a ‘net positive’ for community, as some journalists doubt program’s effectivenessFacebook’s controversial factchecking program has lost one of its major US partners. The news website Snopes.com announced on Friday it was cutting ties with the social network.The departure of Snopes, which has collaborated with Facebook for two years to debunk misinformation on the platform, doesn’t come as a surprise. Numerous journalists working for Facebook’s factchecking initiative have said the partnership was failing to have an impact. Continue reading...

Tech giant said it will build facility after speaking with president – but no mention of job creationTaiwanese tech giant Foxconn Technology said Friday it would build a heavily subsidized $10bn factory in Wisconsin days after the company appeared to be backing away from those plans.Related: 'It's a huge subsidy': the $4.8bn gamble to lure Foxconn to America Continue reading...

New study from Stanford and NYU finds logging off causes ‘small but significant improvements in wellbeing’Despite all the scandals of the past year, here we are, still on Facebook, a couple of billion of us spending about an hour a day in its iron grip. Now a new study suggests it’s making us feel bad.That’s in part because we may be addicted. Want to feel better? Delete Facebook. As some experts have said, the system of rewards set up by Facebook and other social media platforms is akin to gambling or substance abuse cravings. Sean Parker, an early Facebook executive, explained that the thought process behind driving user engagement is akin to delivering “a little dopamine hit”. Continue reading...

Social network’s demise has confused many Google users. We answer the key questionsGoogle is finally closing the social network it set up in an ill-fated attempt to take on Facebook, the company has confirmed. Google+ will be shut down for good on 2 April, with all profiles and pages to be deleted on that day.Related: Google to shut down Google+ after failing to disclose user data leak Continue reading...

We look at what to expect when 5G is rolled out in 2020 and how it could both help and hinder our livesLast month in Las Vegas, the Consumer Electronics Show showcased some of what we can expect from the tech world in 2019. This year’s CES was memorable for several reasons, from an intelligent toilet to banned sex toys. But one term kept popping up throughout the four days of the exhibition: 5G.Most of us will have to wait until 2020 to see what 5G can do, but after 10 years in a 4G world, we’re still not totally prepared for the potential consequences of this next generation of wireless communication. Continue reading...

Information commissioner also launches data protection audit after Brexit violations

Vault festival, London

A big screen with a hole-punch notch, a cracking 48MP camera, great performance and batteryThe Honor View 20 made by Huawei, the Chinese manufacturer at the centre of a political storm, offers a top-notch experience including a great camera for £500 – less than half the price of an iPhone XS.The company is at the centre of allegations of violating sanctions and theft of trade secrets, but it’s undeniable that it has produced some excellent phones at affordable prices over the last year. The View 20 is Honor’s attempt to show that is has the beans to step out from the shadow of just being Huawei’s cheaper sub-brand with a top-flight phone of its own. Continue reading...

South-east Asia has three countries in the top five, while Japan comes in lastSouth-east Asia is one of the most internet-addicted regions on the planet, with the Philippines topping the global list with an average 10 hours and 2 minutes of screen time every day.The country was joined in the top five by Thailand and Indonesia, according to findings in a new report on online habits released by HootSuite and We Are Social. Continue reading...

Company had profit of $3.03bn, up from $1.86bn the previous year, as Bezos says Alexa devices helped performanceAmazon, the world’s largest company by market capitalisation, reported improved earnings and profits late on Thursday.Related: From books to bullets: inside Amazon's push to 'defend' America Continue reading...

Move comes after Facebook exploited loophole to harvest data about apps installed on people’s iPhonesApple has left Facebook’s campus in disarray after the company revoked the social network’s permission to build or run employee-only applications, according to reports. Employees were reportedly left unable to read cafeteria menus, call for inter-office transport or use versions of the social network’s own apps.The move came on Wednesday, the day after it was revealed that Facebook had allegedly exploited a loophole in Apple’s approval system to bypass rules that banned the harvesting of data about what apps are installed on a user’s phone. Facebook Research, an app the company paid users as young as 13 to install that routed their iPhone traffic through the company’s own servers, had been built using an enterprise developer certificate (EDC) issued by Apple to companies that need to build applications for internal use. Continue reading...

Tay’s mobile was taken and his password changed. How can he get back into his inbox?Somebody stole my phone and changed my email password. I’ve tried to recover it, but I don’t have the phone number linked to my account because my phone was stolen. What should I do? TayFirst, recover your phone number, which is much more important than the phone. Continue reading...

This horror thriller shocked the games industry with its tense world of terror – and its monstrous vision is as fearsome as everA father and daughter are driving through a remote area of America when a ghostly figure steps into the road, forcing the car to swerve wildly. As the man regains consciousness, he realises the car is a wreck and his daughter is missing. Shocked and confused, he staggers into the nearby town of Silent Hill, where his nightmare truly begins.Loaded with dread, this scene could be the opening of a nasty horror movie. In fact, it’s the setup to the classic video game Silent Hill, launched on this day 20 years ago by the Japanese gaming company Konami. Alongside Capcom’s Resident Evil, the title helped popularise the survival horror genre of action thrillers, which are characterised by tense exploration, expressionistic camera angles, fiendish environmental puzzles and limited access to weaponry, making every encounter with a monster a mortal challenge. Continue reading...

PC; Failbetter Games

In 2004, the social network site was set up to connect people. But now, with lives increasingly played out online, have we forgotten how to be alone?‘Thefacebook is an online directory that connects people through social networks at colleges. We have opened up Thefacebook for popular consumption at Harvard University. You can use Thefacebook to: search for people at your school; find out who are [sic] in your classes; look up your friends’ friends; see a visualization of your social network.”On 4 February 2004, this rather clunky announcement launched an invention conceived in the dorm room of a Harvard student called Mark Zuckerberg, and intended to be an improvement on the so-called face books that US universities traditionally used to collect photos and basic information about their students. From the vantage point of 2019, Thefacebook – as it was then known – looks familiar, but also strange. Pages were coloured that now familiar shade of blue, and “friends” were obviously a central element of what was displayed. However, there was little on show from the wider world: the only photos were people’s profile pictures, and there was no ever-changing news feed. Continue reading...

Fourth-quarter results beat expectations for earnings and revenue as profit hits $6.88bn, up from $4.27bn a year beforeFacebook closed the book on its scandal-plagued year on Wednesday, with strong fourth-quarter financial results that beat analyst expectations for earnings and revenue.The results highlighted how divorced Facebook’s business success is from its public reputation, which suffered another blow on Wednesday when Apple punished the app maker for violating its rules with a program that paid users as young as 13 to install an app that surveilled them. Continue reading...

Program that enrolled users as young as 13 prompts Apple to ban Facebook from publishing some appsFacebook paid users as young as 13 to install an app that gave the company access to everything their phone sent or received over the internet. In response, Apple has revoked Facebook’s ability to publish certain apps, in a move that could have far-reaching implications for both companies.Facebook has been accused of exploiting a loophole in Apple’s privacy regulations to publish the iPhone app, which provided it with data it used to keep ahead of youth trends. Continue reading...

Electric car firm slashed 7% of workforce this month and ex-employees say more experienced staff were targetedAlan Ochoa worked at Tesla’s Fremont plant in California for four years. He was laid off recently along with his entire department in quality control, many of whom were also long-time employees. “I have no idea how they expect to run without us,” said Ochoa.The electric car company releases its latest financial results on Wednesday and analysts are not expecting good news. On 18 January, founder Elon Musk sent out a mass email to employees announcing 7% of the company’s workforce were being laid off, in addition to cuts to temporary and contracted employees, and warning of a “very difficult” road ahead. Continue reading...

Extradition case in Canada drags on as Donald Trump prepares to meet Beijing’s top trade envoy in WashingtonThe chief financial officer of Huawei, Meng Wanzhou, has made her first appearance in a Canadian court in more than a month, part of a high-stakes dispute that threatens to cast a pall over this week’s US-China trade talks.Meng, the daughter of the Chinese telecoms company’s founder, attended the hearing in British Columbia supreme court on Tuesday, just two days before Donald Trump and Chinese vice premier Liu He are scheduled to meet in Washington. Continue reading...

Company blames iPhone sales and a downturn in China for reduced revenue, a day after it scrambled to fix FaceTime glitchApple reported its first decline in revenues and profits in over a decade on Tuesday.Weak iPhone sales and a downturn in China reduced the tech company’s revenue by 4.5% to $84.3bn in the three months ending 29 December compared with the same period last year. Profits fell slightly to $19.97bn. Continue reading...

Indictments packed with emails and transactions allegedly showing how technology giant carried out criminal conspiraciesThe twin criminal indictments against Huawei unveiled by US authorities on Monday are packed with emails and financial transactions allegedly showing how the Chinese technology giant carried out criminal conspiracies.But the finer points of the 23 charges are less important than the overall shot they deliver across China’s bows. The US considers Huawei to be an arm of the Chinese state – and their devices to be potential spying equipment for Beijing. Continue reading...

In the wake of Apple’s FaceTime privacy bug, we should learn from the superstar who predicted such breachesIt’s hard to convince people to take data safety seriously. Installing updates, changing passwords, refusing permissions: it can be exhausting, and it’s hard to stay motivated when the work seems endless. That’s why Taylor Swift is the information security icon the world needs.The superstar has long spoken out about her desire to stay secure. More than a typical celebrity’s fondness for the sort of privacy that involves massive propertes to defeat the long paparazzi lenses, Swift has frequently shown a keen understanding of why – and how – digital security is important to her. In a Rolling Stone interview in 2014, she revealed that she kept the only full version of her forthcoming album, 1989, on her iPhone – and would only play it on headphones, for fear of wiretaps. “Don’t even get me started on wiretaps. It’s not a good thing for me to talk about socially. I freak out … I have to stop myself from thinking about how many aspects of technology I don’t understand.” The article continues: “‘Like speakers,’ she says. ‘Speakers put sound out … so can’t they take sound in? Or’ – she holds up her cellphone – ‘they can turn this on, right? I’m just saying. We don’t even know.’” Continue reading...

EU commissioner warns internet firms in clampdown ahead of European electionsFacebook and its new head of global affairs, Nick Clegg, stand accused by Brussels of taking a “patchy, opaque, and self-selecting” approach to tackling disinformation.The description was said to apply to a number of internet companies by the EU commissioner, Sir Julian King, at the publication of a progress report on the attempt to clamp down on fake news before May’s European elections. Continue reading...

Firm disables Group FaceTime over serious glitch which can also turn on video without people’s knowledgeApple has made the group functionality on its FaceTime application temporarily unavailable as it rushes to fix a glitch that allowed users to listen in on the people they were calling when they did not pick up the call. Under certain circumstances, the glitch also allowed callers to see video of the person they were calling before they picked up.The Guardian confirmed the existence of the bug, which was first reported by 9to5Mac. It turned the phone of the recipient of a FaceTime call into a microphone while the call was still ringing. If the recipient of the call pressed the power button on the side of the iPhone – an action typically used to silence or ignore an incoming call – their phone would begin broadcasting video to the initial caller. Continue reading...

Telecom says it won’t invest further in network that can’t be upgraded to 5GTPG Telecom’s $2bn plan to build Australia’s newest mobile network looks to be in tatters because of the federal government’s ban on using equipment from China’s Huawei.TPG, which in 2017 paid $1.26bn for mobile spectrum and has already spent $100m of the $600m construction cost, said on Tuesday it had opted to use Huawei equipment before the government banned its inclusion in 5G networks on security concerns. Continue reading...

After rogue drone sightings halt flights, startup seeks permission to test tracking system at Sunday’s game

Irish commission that regulates site requests urgent briefing on platforms mergerFacebook’s plan to merge WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook Messenger could raise significant data protection concerns, according to the Irish commission that regulates the social network in the EU.The Data Protection Commission has asked for an urgent briefing with Facebook Ireland so it can assess the proposals, it said in a statement. “The Irish DPC will be very closely scrutinising Facebook’s plans as they develop, particularly insofar as they involve the sharing and merging of personal data between different Facebook companies. Continue reading...

Dublin operations centre to target political misinformation ahead of EU elections in MayFacebook will tackle political misinformation in the run-up to the EU elections this May with a new “war room” based in Dublin, the company’s incoming communications chief, Nick Clegg, has announced.In his first speech as Facebook’s top public face, Clegg said the company would be setting up an “operations centre focused on elections integrity, based in Dublin, this spring”. The centre will build on the company’s previous experience running an “elections war room” in its US office, where it coordinated efforts to police the platform during the US midterm and Brazilian presidential elections. Continue reading...

In 2013, Steam players were first offered the option to pay for unfinished games. We uncover the fate of that first wave of titles – some of which were never released

Social media network says the change was part of crackdown on third party plug-insFacebook has restricted the ability of external political transparency campaigners to monitor adverts placed on the social network, in a move described as an “appalling look” by one of the organisations affected.WhoTargetsMe, a British group dedicated to scrutinising adverts on the social network, has said its activities have been severely restricted by recent changes made by the social network. The change has also hit a similar programme by the US investigative journalism site ProPublica, affecting both groups’ ability to collect data on why users are being targeted by political campaigners. Continue reading...

Many question marks hang over the telecom but the Chinese tech monolith is far from finishedThe Chinese telecom company Huawei is at the centre of an increasingly tense standoff between China and the US.What began as a trade spat and grievances over corporate intellectual property theft has developed into a global standoff involving “hostage diplomacy”, death sentences and allegations of Chinese espionage. Continue reading...

Fiscal experts fear HQ relocation could be start of an exodus of companies from post-Brexit UKThe decision by technology giant Dyson to relocate its headquarters to Singapore could see the company enjoy significant tax benefits, depending on where it registers the intellectual property for its next generation of products, a leading tax expert has claimed.Dyson sent shockwaves across the business and political worlds last week when it announced the relocation from Wiltshire, which will see two senior executives move to Singapore. Chief executive Jim Rowan insisted the decision was nothing to do with Brexit or tax but rather to “make us future-proof”. Continue reading...

The company is already warning its investors about this week’s results. Can it pull off one more comeback?In 1997, as it was attempting to resuscitate itself from corporate near-suicide, the tech company Apple ran a series of adverts imploring punters to “Think Different”.One used old footage of former heavyweight champ Muhammad Ali, shadow-boxing at a camera and mocking his observer. “Back up, sucker. Back off,” he yells, before changing his taunt. “Come get me, sucker. I’m dancing. I’m dancing.” Continue reading...

Even in ‘Sainsbury’s Orange’, Renault’s hottest hatch is raising temperatures everywhereRenault Mégane RS 280

Site’s move comes amid continuing pressure over its role as a platform for misinformation and extremismYouTube will recommend fewer videos that “could misinform users in harmful ways”, the company announced on Friday, in a shift for a platform that has faced criticism for amplifying conspiracy theories and extremism.The change concerns YouTube’s recommendations feature, which automatically creates a playlist of videos for users to watch next. The recommendations are the result of complex and opaque algorithms designed to capture a user’s interest, but they have become a locus of criticism when YouTube directs people to potentially harmful and false content that they would not have otherwise sought out. Continue reading...

Merger of three platforms would allow users to text each other without switching apps

Forthcoming multiplayer sci-fi shooter Anthem represents a puzzling change of pace for its developer, BioWare. But when you play, it starts to make sense …Forty years after Space Invaders, video games are still coming up with new ways to shoot aliens. Anthem is a multiplayer game set on a planet whose gods abandoned it mid-creation, leaving a pantheon of mutated creatures to ravage the beautiful environment and threaten the humans who share it. Clad in a nimble mech-suit with flying jets and a portable arsenal of guns, you soar out over the gorgeous overgrown planet with three other players and hold off the aliens, discovering majestic ruins from the dawn of creation.Anthem is one of many online games competing for players’ long-term attention, designed to be played every day or every week by groups of friends together. But it is made by BioWare, a developer known for role-playing games that immerse a lone player in a rich fantasy that they alone control. Why has the studio decided to make something so different? It is undeniably a risk: the strengths of good single-player games – an absorbing narrative, player choice, the ability to take your time and explore at your own place – do not transfer well to the shared world of multiplayer games. Continue reading...

Staff discussed what to do with high-spending children before deciding to refuse refundsFacebook has settled a class action lawsuit that had accused it of allowing children to run up huge bills on their parents’ credit cards as part of a concerted effort to maximise revenues.Court documents obtained by the US-based Center for Investigative Reporting, initially sealed as part of a lawsuit filed in 2012, revealed Facebook staff discussed what to do with the “whales”, as they referred to the high-spending children, before deciding to refuse refunds. Continue reading...

Hbomberguy’s marathon 57-hour gaming session attracted the attention of the industry and celebrities alike. We meet the man trying to counter the tide of the manosophere and alt-rightPlaying a video game for 57 hours sounds like either heaven or hell, depending on who you are. But when it generates massive online buzz, garnering the attention of a sitting US congresswoman and Hollywood celebrities, and nets a charity for trans kids $340,000, it’s safe to assume you’ve done something good for the world. The person responsible for playing those hours, “Hbomberguy” – real name Harry Brewis, a YouTube essayist – did not set out to get the attention of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Chelsea Manning, Mara Wilson and other popular figures. But he did.When I spoke to Brewis, he was still stunned by the attention but he seemed upbeat and elated by the experience. Continue reading...

Jordan Erica Webber chats to roboticist Heather Knight about why she builds performing robots. What can cyborg cabaret and robot standups teach us about human-robot interaction?This week, Jordan Erica Webber chats to a computer scientist who programs robots to help them become more likeable, making it easier for humans to welcome them at work or at home.Heather Knight directs the Charisma* Robotics Lab, whose goal is to borrow methods from the performing arts to produce more charismatic robots. She also created Marilyn Monrobot, a robot theatre company with comedy performances, and the annual Robot film festival. Continue reading...

Six-wheeled robots launching in US can autonomously follow route and dodge pedestriansAmazon’s drone delivery service may be missing in action but the company has not given up on its dream of robots delivering parcels.It is launching Amazon Scout, a service employing six squat six-wheeled delivery robots, across Snohomish County, Washington, just north of its Seattle HQ. Continue reading...

Pa wants the screen image to be true to the print image, but his budget is only £300I read your answer about the best computer monitor for under £200. I’m looking for a monitor for serious photo editing. I want to get as true to what the print will be like (when printing via online printers). My budget is about £300. PaSad to say, prints can never look like screen images. Screens are bright and display colours using combinations of red, green and blue pixels (RGB). Prints don’t light up so they can’t have the same brightness or contrast range, and they’re printed using cyan, yellow, magenta and black inks (CMYK). Continue reading...

A new series asks prospective partners to exchange their mobiles. It’s the perfect fodder for our tech-craving times ... and also oddly charming“I don’t know if you want me to talk about that picture,” rugby lad Shaquille asks politics student Demi. “You’ve got something in your mouth …” His date looks mortified. And so begins Phone Swap, a new dating show in which two singletons exchange phones with potential partners.Now I know what you’re thinking: if you were going on a programme where someone had to look through your phone, wouldn’t you clean it up a little? Check your camera roll, add some things to make you look like a better person – meditation sounds, language apps? But alas, it really does appear that the show-makers stopped their charges having a quick blitz … or perhaps Demi just forgot to bin her nudes. Continue reading...

What happens to those caught up in the toxic lies of conspiracy theorists? The Guardian spoke to five victims whose lives were wrecked by falsehoodsConspiracy theories used to be seen as bizarre expressions of harmless eccentrics. Not any more. Gone are the days of outlandish theories about Roswell’s UFOs, the “hoax” moon landings or grassy knolls. Instead, today’s iterations have morphed into political weapons. Turbocharged by social media, they spread with astonishing speed, using death threats as currency.Together with their first cousins, fake news, they are challenging society’s trust in facts. At its most toxic, this contagion poses a profound threat to democracy by damaging its bedrock: a shared commitment to truth. Continue reading...

Canada’s ambassador to China said Meng Wanzhou had ‘good arguments on her side’, in part because of Trump’s remarksUS efforts to extradite a Chinese telecoms executive from Canada may have been stymied by remarks on the case made by Donald trump, according to Canada’s top diplomat in Beijing.Huawei’s chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, was detained at the request of the US on 1 December in Vancouver, over alleged violations of US sanctions on Iran. She is currently under house arrest and the US justice department has until 30 January to file a formal extradition request. Continue reading...

NICE recommends use of programs on smartphones for young people aged five to eight

Consumer finance journalist drops action as firm agrees to give £3m to anti-scam projectThe consumer finance journalist Martin Lewis is dropping his lawsuit against Facebook over its repeated failure to prevent scam adverts from using his name and image, after the company agreed to donate £3m to set up an anti-scam project with Citizens Advice and launch a UK-specific one-click reporting tool.Related: Facebook rolls out fact-checking operation in UK Continue reading...

Some of the Musk Foundation’s grants have benefited AI research, his brother’s charity, his children’s school and his fight against LA traffic