Technology | The Guardian

Set in a new region, Galar, the new Pokémon games for Switch will be released later this yearNintendo has unveiled two new Pokémon games for its Switch console: Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield. Introduced in a short online broadcast by Junichi Masuda and Shigeru Ohmori at Pokémon’s developer, Game Freak, they feature a painterly, impressionistic world that juxtaposes urban and natural environments, continuing the series’ long-running theme of human interaction with nature.The region of Gallar is clearly Britain-inspired; it’s all little ivy-coloured cottages in the villages and austere London-style buildings in the cities. The setting has already prompted a slew of creative nicknames from fans on Twitter, among them Pokémon Greggs/Pokémon Nandos. Continue reading...

Mentions of game including hidden message comparing Xi Jinping to Winnie-the-Pooh also scrubbed from social media site WeiboTaiwanese horror game Devotion has been removed from sale globally, following a backlash after a hidden message referencing Chinese president Xi Jinping and Winnie-the-Pooh was discovered in-game.Devotion, by the Taiwanese indie developer Red Candle Games, was released on 19 February and was initially popular among horror enthusiasts. However, the discovery of a number of hidden jokes – allegedly critical of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) – has ignited a firestorm of online criticism. Continue reading...

‘China’s Apple’ finally lands in the UK with cut-price top-spec phone with a slide-out selfie cameraAfter several years of threatening Xiaomi has finally entered the UK with a series of good-value smartphones starting from £99 including the range-topping Mi Mix 3. But has “China’s Apple” delivered something new, or just another forgettable Chinese smartphone?At first glance the £499 Mi Mix 3 looks fairly boring. The front has a giant display, just like the rest. The back appears shiny glass, just like the rest. It’s got polished metal sides, just like most. But pick up the phone and you realise it’s hiding more than one secret. Continue reading...

Our hard drives are full of all kinds of clutter, but you can’t hold those files in your hands to see if they spark joyLeaving a long-term relationship, you find yourself standing on the precipice of a life yet unlived; all of a sudden the accumulated trinkets and tchotchkes of​ your life together exist only to mock you in your unspoken grief. There’s no better time to get into getting rid of stuff.After she emptied our house of all ​that she wanted, I emptied it a second time, of everything that we had grown to want together. I embraced the spartan wisdom of Marie Kondo’s The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up – the self-help manual de rigueur for people who want to want less. Like a barren arctic island basking in my daily hour of sunlight, I proudly embraced an aesthetic of Scandinavian noir-chic, telling anyone within earshot that the drab palette and multiple timber-veneer Arkelstorp side tables were the trappings of a new and more mature me, a me that was as comfortable owning six oversized beige floor lamps and playing at underwear origami as I was being alone. Continue reading...

SEC asks judge to act after car boss allegedly breached deal to pre-approve his messagesThe US financial regulator has asked a judge to hold Tesla’s billionaire boss, Elon Musk, in contempt of court for tweeting misleading information in breach of a deal that saw him fined $20m (£15.2m) for inaccurate tweets last year.The Securities and Exchange Commission said Musk had “once again published inaccurate and material information about Tesla to his over 24 million Twitter followers”, according to court papers filed on Monday night. Continue reading...

From Pokémon Snap to Fatal Frame, photography has long been popular in games – but some developers are taking the idea furtherPeople love to take pictures in video games. As the game worlds we explore have become more beautiful, players have become more interested in photographing them and sharing the results. It is almost standard for open-world games in particular to include photo modes, which allow players to mimic real-world photographers by adjusting the framing, brightness and exposure. Selfie modes, meanwhile, let you add filters and change characters’ facial expressions, from Link in The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker to Arthur Morgan in Red Dead Redemption 2. There is even an augmented-reality photo mode in Pokémon Go, which lets players take posed photos of digital Pokémon in the real world.Some games take it a step further, incorporating photography as an interaction within the game. One of the earliest examples is Gekibo: Gekisha Boy, a 1992 Japanese game that almost made it to Europe a decade later as Polaroid Pete, before its release was cancelled. It plays like a side-scrolling shooter but with a camera for a gun. The cartoonish subjects users can photograph include extraterrestrials, racist caricatures and women in various states of undress. Continue reading...

Device has eight-inch flexible screen that folds all the way round the outside of the phoneThe Chinese smartphone maker Huawei has followed Samsung’s lead by unveiling a super-luxury 5G phone with a folding screen called the Mate X with a price tag of €2,299 (£1,995).Introduced at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Sunday, the Mate X has a flexible OLED display that covers both the front and back of the device, and which unfolds outwards to become an eight-inch (20cm) tablet screen. Continue reading...

As digital billboards record customers’ reactions to advertisements tailored to them, just who is safeguarding Australians’ privacy?

Sensitive data sent to social media giant from ‘at least 11’ platformsFacebook is battling fresh controversy on both sides of the Atlantic amid claims that it has been receiving highly personal data from third-party apps.The swirl of bad news around the company comes after its chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, was criticised for meeting the culture secretary, Jeremy Wright, having refused to appear before an influential parliamentary committee in Westminster. Continue reading...

Fortnite, PUBG, Call of Duty … look closely and these games’ virtual battlefields have much in common. The people who created them explain whyA group of people drop on to a large island. For the next 20 minutes they must search buildings for useful weapons and equipment, before fighting to the death. As the match progresses, the playable area contracts, forcing the competitors closer together. The last person standing wins.This is of course battle royale, a new type of online shooting game currently being enjoyed by over 200 million people across the globe. The current craze started with Day Z: Battle Royale, a modification of the zombie survival game DayZ developed by lone designer Brendan Greene, later updated as PlayerUnknown’s Battle Royale. Its popularity caught the attention of Korean developer Bluehole, who employed Greene to oversee development of a full game. PUBG was launched as a beta in early 2017 and by December, it had 30 million players. Continue reading...

Funded by elites, researchers believe they’re closer than ever to tweaking the human body so we can live forever (or quite a bit longer)China’s first emperor ordered his subjects to search for the elixir of life in a quest for immortality. In 16th century France, nobles would drink gold in a bid to extend their lifespans. Gilgamesh, the Sumerian king at the heart of humanity’s earliest epic poem, found a magic herb, but a snake ate it. In 2015, a woman on the MTV series True Life: I’m Obsessed With Staying Young bathed in pig blood.In 2019, the quest for everlasting life is, largely, though not always, more scientific. Funded by Silicon Valley elites, researchers believe they are closer than ever to tweaking the human body so that we can finally live forever (or quite a bit longer), even as some worry about pseudoscience in the sector. Continue reading...

Order follows report that Facebook may access highly personal information including weight, blood pressure and ovulation statusNew York’s governor, Andrew Cuomo, has ordered two state agencies to investigate a media report that Facebook may be accessing far more personal information than previously known from smartphone users, including health and other sensitive data.The directive to New York’s department of state and department of financial services (DFS) came after the Wall Street Journal said testing showed that Facebook collected personal information from other apps on users’ smartphones within seconds of them entering it. Continue reading...

Communications between senior figures, including Mark Zuckerberg, shed new light on data useDocuments posted online Friday appear to be confidential internal Facebook communications that reveal new details of the company’s treatment of user data.About 60 pages of un-redacted exhibits from a lawsuit between Facebook and Six4Three, an app developer, were posted anonymously on GitHub on Friday. They include emails between various Facebook executives, including CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and a “highly confidential” 2012 memo detailing various policy matters. Continue reading...

Workers say augmented reality headsets provided to US army risk ‘turning warfare into a simulated video game’Microsoft workers are calling on their employer to cancel a $480m contract to provide the US army with augmented reality (AR) headsets, saying they “do not want to become war profiteers”.“We did not sign up to develop weapons, and we demand a say in how our work is used,” reads a petition being circulated inside the company, a copy of which was published on Twitter on Friday afternoon. More than 50 employees had signed the letter as of Friday afternoon, according to an employee. Continue reading...

Epic Games will host the year’s biggest video gaming event when the battle royale phenomenon’s top players go head to headThe details of the first Fortnite World Cup have been announced by developer Epic Games.After 10 online qualifiers, the finals will be held in New York from 26-28 July, where the top 100 solo players and the top 50 two-person teams from around the world will compete for a prize pool of more than $30m (£23m). The top solo player at the end of a weekend of battle will earn $3m. Continue reading...

PC, Xbox One, PlayStation 4; BioWare, EA

Authors say outdated laws fail to protect vulnerable users from smartphone gamblingSmartphone gambling apps are more dangerous than fixed-odds betting terminals (FOBTs) for people with addiction problems because opportunities to lose money are “just a tap away”, a study suggests.Gambling games on smartphones have surged in popularity in recent years, allowing high-stakes betting within the palm of its users’ hands, with video game-style play making them appear “harmless” and introductory offers providing incentives to sign up. Continue reading...

As pressure mounts on Facebook to explain its role in promoting anti-vaccine misinformation, Pinterest tries different approachOn Wednesday morning, Adam Schiff, the powerful chair of the House intelligence committee, joined journalists around the world in a nascent Twitter meme: he searched “vaccine” on Facebook and posted a screenshot of the results.Schiff’s search results were indeed alarming: autofill suggestions for phrases such as “vaccination re-education discussion forum”, a group called “Parents Against Vaccination”, and the page for the National Vaccine Information Center, an official-sounding organization that promotes anti-vaccine propaganda. And while search results on Facebook are personalized to each user, a recent Guardian report found similarly biased results for a brand new account. Continue reading...

Head of sales and marketing Doug Bowser to become COO after popular leader retiresNintendo of America’s president and COO, Reggie Fils-Aime, who has led the company for the past 13 years and become a well-known and liked figure among Nintendo’s fans in the US, is to retire in April, the company has announced. He will be replaced by Doug Bowser, who is currently senior vice-president of sales and marketing.Unlike most video game company executives, who remain at a distance from the actual business of game creation and marketing, Fils-Aime has regularly appeared at events and in Nintendo’s own broadcasts to talk directly to fans. His endearing personality, willingness to engage in goofy stunts and odd turns of phrase have made him a cult figure with Nintendo’s fans: at 2004’s E3 video game conference, he introduced himself on stage with the now-infamous words “My name is Reggie, I’m about kickin’ ass, I’m about takin’ names, and we’re about makin’ games.” Continue reading...

Epic Games joins Nestlé in abandoning video site over comments section scandalThe maker of Fortnite has pulled adverts from YouTube amid concerns that promotions for the video game, which is popular with children, were appearing alongside comments posted by paedophiles.Epic Games confirmed it had withdrawn its adverts from the Google-owned site, joining Nestlé in temporarily abandoning it due to the latest scandal over inappropriate content. Continue reading...

Folding tablet hybrid shows Asia, not US or Europe, is leading the way in innovationSamsung has placed its stake in the ground with its Galaxy Fold smartphone-tablet folding phone that is spectacular in every way, even in price, and pitches itself years ahead of its arch-rival, Apple.Nearly a decade in the making, everything about the Galaxy Fold shouts next generation. It has a standard 4.6in phone screen on the front, but open it up like a book and you reveal a single large 7.3in screen that literally folds in half. No lines, no wrinkles, no visible crinkles. It’s a level of luxury and innovation not seen before, and it comes with a truly eye-watering price tag of $2,000. But no one said breaking boundaries was cheap. Continue reading...

Publisher of the Haynes workshop manuals that fuelled a boom in DIY car repairsJohn Haynes, who has died aged 80, created a publishing empire out of the enormous success of the car workshop manuals that bore his name. In all, 200m have been sold since 1966, covering the maintenance and repair of more than 1,000 different models.His formula was simple: dismantle and rebuild a car, illustrate with clear black and white pictures and diagrams, then describe the process in detail, in a language that the lay person can understand. With the familiar yellow and red logo, impressive cut-away drawings, fault diagnosis and step-by-step approach to every possible task – be it changing a bulb or dismantling and rebuilding a complete engine – the Haynes manuals captured the DIY ethos of the 1960s, 70s and 80s: a more self-reliant time, when maintaining the family saloon was still a bastion of male pride and the vehicles most people drove were simple, logical and analogue. Continue reading...

The obsession with fasting overlaps with a trend for what is often termed ‘biohacking’ – the idea that your body is a system that can be quantified and optimized

Steve doesn’t watch TV and wants to stop paying the UK licence fee, but now it applies to smartphones, consoles and the BBC iPlayer app on all devicesI have a TV set for streaming videos from my NAS, but I have given up on the BBC, and I never watch ITV, Channel 4 and certainly not 5. What exactly do I need to do to stop paying a TV Licence fee? Is unplugging my aerial enough? SteveIn the old world of analogue broadcasting, this was an easy question. “Watching TV” just meant feeding a broadcast signal to a box containing a TV tuner and a cathode ray tube. If you did that in the UK then you needed a TV licence. In today’s digital world, however, you may need a TV licence if your only device is a smartphone. Continue reading...

Federal agencies investigating breach, reported to be a ransom demandHackers have “scrambled” patient files at a Melbourne heart specialist clinic in what was reportedly a ransom attempt.The Australian Cyber Security Centre has confirmed it’s providing advice and assistance to the Melbourne Heart Group, which leases practice space from the Cabrini hospital in Malvern. Continue reading...

As site grapples with flood of fake news, former Snopes editor says CEO’s crowdsourcing comments show he has ‘learned nothing’Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg revealed that he is considering crowdsourcing as a new model for Facebook’s third-party factchecking partnerships.In the first of a series of public conversations, Zuckerberg praised the efforts of factcheckers who partnered with Facebook following the 2016 presidential election as a bulwark against the flood of misinformation and fake news that was overtaking the site’s News Feed. Continue reading...

Smartphone-tablet hybrid has standard 4.6in phone on the outside and a 7.3in screen that unfolds on the insideSamsung has unveiled the final design and name for its cutting-edge Galaxy Fold phone that has a screen that folds in half and costs $1,980.The new device will be released on 26 April in the US and 3 May in Europe, after nearly a decade in the making. The Galaxy Fold literally folds in half like a book to use as a phone with a 4.6in screen on the outside, and unfolds to reveal a large 7.3in screen to use as a tablet on the inside. Continue reading...

The all-screen Galaxy S10 and S10+ are joined by the cheaper S10e, with the S10 5G launching later in the yearThe world’s biggest smartphone maker, Samsung, on Wednesday launches its new Galaxy S10 range, with triple-cameras, ultrasonic in-display fingerprint sensors and becoming the first mainstream phone to have one-terabyte of storage – enough to hold 300,000 selfies.The Galaxy S10 unveiling is the South Korean firm’s most important this year, as it fights intense competition from China’s Huawei and arch-rival Apple. The S10 comes in three versions initially priced at £669 for the entry level S10e and £899 for the top-end S10+, which compares with the £899 Huawei is charging for its similar Mate 20 Pro, and £1,099 for the top-end Apple iPhone XS Max. Continue reading...

When Max Benwell found out someone was using his photos to approach women online, he decided to track down the trickster – setting up a fake Instagram account and changing his gender on Tinder along the way Continue reading...

Serpentine gallery, London

Zhejiang issues draft regulation to combat soaring rates of nearsightednessA Chinese province plans to ban teachers from assigning homework to be completed on mobile phone apps as part of efforts to preserve students’ eyesight.Zhejiang, in the east of the country, issued a draft regulation last week and sought public comment. It is one of several provinces considering such measures. Continue reading...

Ren Zhengfei hits back at criminal indictments he calls politically motivatedThe US cannot crush Huawei, the company’s founder has insisted, as he hit back against criminal indictments levelled at the firm and allegations that it poses a security threat.Washington has warned allies off using Huawei products in recent weeks. But Ren Zhengfei, whose daughter Meng Wanzhou – a fellow senior Huawei executive – is among those charged by US prosecutors, told the BBC on Monday that the firm would survive the pressure. Continue reading...

Foreign ministry spokesman says speculation and sanctions will only ‘poison the atmosphere for cooperation’China has hit back at suggestions it was behind a sophisticated cyber attack on Australia’s political parties, warning “irresponsible” and “baseless” speculation will heighten tensions.The prime minister, Scott Morrison, revealed on Monday cyber experts believe a state actor was responsible for the attack, which also targeted the networks of federal parliament, but didn’t say which country. Continue reading...

iOS, PC, Nintendo Switch; Memory of God/Fellow Traveller

A Commons report lays bare horrifying abuses. But the UK is no closer to regulating the far-too-powerful tech industryDeath threats, bullying, mental torture, privacy invasion, election rigging, fake news, monopoly abuse: as was said of a medieval pope, this is merely to suppress more serious charges. It is hard to recall the social media of 15 years ago and its offer of universal love, democracy and global peace. Britain’s parliament has finally caught up, and today’s Commons report is at least unequivocal. A menace stalks the land, and must be curbed.Some of the report’s accusations are astonishing. Facebook “purposefully obstructed” the committee. Its boss, Mark Zuckerberg, who “continues to choose profit over data security,” held parliament in contempt. His rambling empire is portrayed as lying, thieving “digital gangsterism”. Yet British electoral law is puny. It is “unfit for purpose,” leaving elections “vulnerable to foreign influence, disinformation and voter manipulation”. Not a week passes without evidence that cybersecurity is inadequate and public services have been left vulnerable to hacking. Continue reading...

Damian Collins warns of ‘deepfake films’ showing doctored footage of politiciansOnline disinformation is only going to get more sophisticated, the chair of the committee investigating disinformation and fake news, Damian Collins, has warned.Related: Facebook labelled 'digital gangsters' by report on fake news Continue reading...

As Facebook turns 15, Jordan Erica Webber explores how the social media giant has transformed over the yearsThe Guardian’s UK technology editor, Alex Hern, joins Jordan Erica Webber to provide a history lesson on Facebook through the lens of one of its first investors. They speak to Roger McNamee, who suggests the social network and its creator have lost their way from the original dream.Webber then meets Victoria Nash, the deputy director of the Oxford Internet Institute, to examine the safety of the apps frequently used by the generation of teenagers who have grown up alongside Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Continue reading...

Broadcasters tell ACCC that Facebook and Google algorithms should be regulated and they should pay fair rate of ad revenueFacebook should be compelled to identify trusted sources of Australian news and be more transparent about what it chooses to appear in its news feed, TV broadcasters have told the competition watchdog’s inquiry into digital platforms.The free-to-air TV industry has also asked for tax breaks for Australian news producers – a “news production tax offset” – and a new regime to ensure Facebook and Google are accountable for paying local content producers a fair rate of advertising revenue. Continue reading...

Scott Morrison says Liberals, Labor and Nationals affected by ‘malicious’ cyber activityAustralia’s major political parties have been targeted by a “sophisticated state actor”, according to Scott Morrison, as part of a breach of the Parliament House computer network.The head of the Australian Cyber Security Centre, Alastair MacGibbon, says agencies were unsure what material had been taken in the incident because the rapid remediation efforts had removed some of the forensic evidence. Continue reading...

At 108 pages and covering a wide terrain, comprehensive report damns FacebookWeighing in at 108 pages, the final report of the parliamentary committee investigating disinformation makes devastating reading for Facebook, which is accused of greedily squeezing as much profit out of user data as possible, while deceiving or obstructing anyone daring to scrutinise the company’s activities.The committee’s inquiry has covered an extraordinary amount of terrain in its 18-month lifespan, from Russian election interference to cash-for-passport schemes, and the report is similarly comprehensive. Continue reading...

Parliament’s report into fake news raises many questions, but will the government act?Facebook is an out-of-control train wreck that is destroying democracy and must be brought under control. The final report of parliament’s inquiry into fake news and disinformation does not use this language, precisely, but it is, nonetheless, the report’s central message. And the language it does use is no less damning.Facebook behaves like a “digital gangster”. It considers itself to be “ahead of and beyond the law”. It “misled” parliament. It gave statements that were “not true”. Its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, has treated British lawmakers with “contempt”. It has pursued a “deliberate” strategy to deceive parliament. Continue reading...

US has pressured its allies not to use Chinese group amid fears of cyber espionageUK security chiefs have advised that the risk of using Huawei technology in the new superfast 5G could be contained despite US warnings about opening the telecoms network up to Chinese cyber-espionage, according to sources.The US has reportedly been pressuring the UK and other allies not to use Huawei technology for critical infrastructure, arguing that it could be too risky when the Chinese state is engaged in spying. Continue reading...

Once the stuff of science fiction, technology that enables people to talk using different languages is now here. But how effective is it?Noise, Alex Waibel tells me, is one of the major challenges that artificial speech translation has to meet. A device may be able to recognise speech in a laboratory, or a meeting room, but will struggle to cope with the kind of background noise I can hear surrounding Professor Waibel as he speaks to me from Kyoto station. I’m struggling to follow him in English, on a scratchy line that reminds me we are nearly 10,000km apart – and that distance is still an obstacle to communication even if you’re speaking the same language. We haven’t reached the future yet.If we had, Waibel would have been able to speak in his native German and I would have been able to hear his words in English. He would also be able to converse hands-free and seamlessly with the Japanese people around him, with all parties speaking their native language. Continue reading...

Westminster will also urge investigation into foreign meddling in UK electionsFacebook cannot be trusted to regulate itself and must be subject to sweeping new legislation, a parliamentary report will announce on Monday.It will also call on the government to launch an independent investigation into foreign interference in British elections since 2014. The Digital, Culture, Media and Sport select committee will publish what is expected to be a landmark report into fake news and disinformation at midnight on Sunday night. Continue reading...

When Seamas O’Reilly responded to all his emails for a week using only Smart Reply, our columnist’s messages suddenly became spookily jaunty. Did his friends spot the difference?The philosopher Jeremy Bentham was famed for his panopticon, a hypothetical circular prison that was designed in such a way that its inmates never knew whether or not they were being observed. This would, his theory went, encourage prisoners to presume they were always being watched, and thus act accordingly. No true version of the prison was ever really built, and the word itself only now lives on due to its prodigious utility within breathless op-eds about surveillance culture, mostly written by people who’ve already overused references to Orwell and Kafka.The genius of today’s boring dystopia has been to offer this surveillance as a feature, not a bug; to cast that all-seeing-eye not as a malevolent shadowy jailer, but as the world’s most boring personal assistant. Nowhere is this truer than with Gmail smart replies, the pocket panopticon that now resides in every inbox. Not only can it see what you’ve already read and written, it has some great ideas on how to make your next contribution, too. But how well does it really know us? How deeply does its unsleeping, lidless eye scan our thoughts and deeds? And could I use this information, the knowledge of a god, to create a stronger, better, smarter me? Seeking answers, I stopped resisting and spent an entire week surrendering to its every whim. Continue reading...

As Mazda’s record-breaking MX-5 turns 30 it is still as young and fun as it was in 1989 – only the price has slowed downMazda MX-5

Company is not paying any taxes for the second year in a row, due to various unspecified ‘tax credits’ and executive stock optionsAmazon has had a bad week but there is some comfort for the tech titan – it will not pay a single cent in income tax on the $11.2bn of profits it made last year.Related: Amazon cancels plans for New York headquarters after fierce opposition Continue reading...

Abrupt collapse of company’s plans seen as a milestone victory for leftwing insurgents over Democrats who backed the dealAmazon picked a tough moment to come to New York.Progressive groups were in the ascendant and they turned their fire on an obvious target: a plan to lure a company run by the world’s richest man with $3bn in subsidies and tax breaks. Continue reading...

Social media platforms under pressure by US congressman to crack down on anti-vaccine propaganda, citing Guardian investigationsFacebook enables advertisers to promote content to nearly 900,000 people interested in “vaccine controversies”, the Guardian has found.Other groups of people that advertisers can pay to reach on Facebook include those interested in “Dr Tenpenny on Vaccines”, which refers to anti-vaccine activist Sherri Tenpenny, and “informed consent”, which is language that anti-vaccine propagandists have adopted to fight vaccination laws. Continue reading...

Surveillance at concerts is just the beginning, as fears grow around an unregulated, billion-dollar industry