In Ubisoft’s forthcoming game, London has become a surveillance state run by authoritarian populists – and its citizens must come together to fight backThe virtual London of Watch Dogs Legion, the forthcoming sci-fi open world adventure by Ubisoft Montreal, is sometimes uncanny in its accuracy.For instance, while evading the police, and the private military forces working alongside them in the game’s dystopian future, I was able to use my knowledge of the layout of the real world’s Broadcasting House, headquarters of the BBC, to duck down a side street and avoid a drone that had been dogging me since Trafalgar Square. Continue reading...

Dominic Rushe has caught over 11,000 Pokémon, walked 1,841km in Poké-land, and doesn’t plan to stop anytime soon

Chair of Financial Stability Board says company’s plans could spark closer scrutiny of cryptocurrenciesFacebook’s Libra cryptocurrency is facing increasing skepticism from international regulators days after ambitious plans for it were unveiled by the social media company.On Tuesday, Randal Quarles, chair of the Financial Stability Board (FSB), a policy coordinator for G20 countries, said Facebook’s plan to expand into retail payments could lead regulators to take a closer look at such financial instruments. Continue reading...

Interpreting a spoken request isn’t magic, rather it has taken a team of underpaid, subcontracted linguists to make the technology possible“Do you believe in magic?” Google asked attendees of its annual developer conference this May, playing the seminal Lovin’ Spoonful tune as an introduction. Throughout the three-day event, company executives repeatedly answered yes while touting new features of the Google Assistant, the company’s version of Alexa or Siri, that can indeed feel magical. The tool can book you a rental car, tell you what the weather is like at your mother’s house, and even interpret live conversations across 26 languages.But to some of the Google employees responsible for making the Assistant work, the tagline of the conference – “Keep making magic” – obscured a more mundane reality: the technical wizardry relies on massive data sets built by subcontracted human workers earning low wages. Continue reading...

PC, Nintendo Switch; DeadToast Entertainment/Devolver Digital

New ‘influence operations’ will openly advertise participation in debate instead of hiding itThe next wave of “influence operations” like those that Russia used to target the 2016 US election will aim to destabilise debate by making voters think bots are everywhere, Facebook’s head of cybersecurity policy has said.Nathaniel Gleicher, who runs the company’s response to politically motivated malfeasance on its platform, said groups such as Russia’s Internet Research Agency (IRA) were increasingly trying to manipulate public perception of themselves. “Not running a large network of fake accounts but just playing on the fact that everyone thinks there are large networks of fake accounts out there,” he said. Continue reading...

Landmark ruling set to change the way media companies engage with the social media giant

Feature-packed new software is out in beta, though users are reporting ‘tons of rough edges’Apple has released the public beta version of its much-anticipated free iOS 13 software update for iPhones and the first edition of its new iPadOS for tablets.Those eager to try the latest features, including the new dark mode, faster Face ID, Memoji stickers and smarter photo organisation, can now install iOS 13 on a compatible iPhone or iPadOS on their Apple tablet. Continue reading...

Carmaker to have 25 electrified models on sale by 2023 as strict new EU rules loomBMW is accelerating its push away from the internal combustion engine towards battery technology, as the German carmaker seeks to double the number of electric and hybrid vehicles it sells in the next two years.The company will have 25 electrified models on sale in 2023, two years earlier than previously planned, it announced on Tuesday. More than half of the vehicles will be fully electric. Continue reading...

Australian judge finds media companies have a responsibility to ensure defamatory remarks are not posted on social media

Vivian Ho befriended an electronic arm and grappled with a defunct tea maker during a trip through Silicon ValleyAround the world, an industry has emerged around automating food service through robotics, raising questions about job security and mass unemployment while also prompting praise for streamlining and innovation.In the epicenter of Silicon Valley, where innovation is exalted beyond all else, this industry has played out in various forms, from cafes, burger shops and pizza delivery to odd vending machines. Continue reading...

When computer assistants reply in female voices, are they saying that women lack power in their world?Within two years there will be more voice assistants on the internet than there are people on the planet. Another, possibly more helpful, way of looking at these statistics is to say that there will still be only half a dozen assistants that matter: Apple’s Siri, Google’s Assistant, and Amazon’s Alexa in the west, along with their Chinese equivalents, but these will have billions of microphones at their disposal, listening patiently for sounds they can use. Voice is going to become the chief way that we make our wants known to computers – and when they respond, they will do so with female voices.This detail may seem trivial, but it goes to the heart of the way in which the spread of digital technologies can amplify and extend social prejudice. The companies that program these assistants want them to be used, of course, and this requires making them appear helpful. That’s especially necessary when their helpfulness is limited in the real world: although they are getting better at answering queries outside narrow and canned parameters, they could not easily ever be mistaken for a human being on the basis of their words alone. Continue reading...

The original cryptocurrency hits 15-month high as traders bet move will legitimise sectorThe price of bitcoin has surged above $11,000 (£8,600), its highest level in 15 months, amid renewed hype over cryptocurrencies after Facebook said it was planning to launch a digital currency next year.Bitcoin has risen in value by almost $2,000 in the week since the US technology firm revealed plans to create a cryptocurrency called Libra, in a move that could radically reshape the financial landscape with far-reaching implications for governments and central banks around the world. Continue reading...

Social video app uses machine learning ‘to automate the un-fun parts of video editing’A new app from the former head of video-sharing app Vine hopes to repeat the success of the cult social network by making it easier to shoot and edit short clips.Trash hopes that its secret weapon will be “computational cinematography”: the app, which entered closed beta on Monday, uses machine learning “to automate the un-fun parts of video editing”, automatically processing video to cut together short clips with a consistent mood and feel. Continue reading...

Tech firm’s communications chief says it found no evidence of Russian interferenceNick Clegg, Facebook’s head of communications, has dismissed allegations that misuse of the social network influenced the Brexit referendum result.Speaking on the BBC’s Today programme on Monday, the former deputy UK prime minister said the company’s investigations had found no evidence of Russian involvement in the campaign, unlike when it ran a similar inquiry into the 2016 US election. Continue reading...

By framing deepfakes as a tech problem we allow Silicon Valley to evade responsibility for its symbiotic relationship with fake news

Leyland Cecco and Lilian Edwards join Jordan Erica Webber to talk about the latest delays in plans to build a smart neighbourhood in Toronto. Continue reading...

Move could affect competition and data privacy, warns Bank for International SettlementsFacebook’s plan to operate its own digital currency poses risks to the international banking system that should trigger a speedy response from global policymakers, according to the organisation that represents the world’s central banks.Although the move of big tech firms such as Facebook, Amazon and Alibaba into financial services could speed up transactions and cut costs, especially in developing world countries, it could also undermine the stability of a banking system that has only just recovered from the crash of 2008. Continue reading...

Deepfake – the ability of AI to fabricate apparently real footage of people – is a growing problem with implications for us allThere exist, on the internet, any number of videos that show people doing things they never did. Real people, real faces, close to photorealistic footage; entirely unreal events.These videos are called deepfakes, and they’re made using a particular kind of AI. Inevitably enough, they began in porn – there is a thriving online market for celebrity faces superimposed on porn actors’ bodies – but the reason we’re talking about them now is that people are worried about their impact on our already fervid political debate. Those worries are real enough to prompt the British government and the US Congress to look at ways of regulating them. Continue reading...

From the Oculus Quest and Valve’s pricey Vive Pro to Nintendo’s family-friendly kits, a guide to what’s on offer in the world of virtual realitySix years after the first iteration of the Oculus Rift kickstarted the modern era of virtual reality, the now Facebook-owned company is back with not one but two new entries, joining a raft of big names from Valve’s Vive to Sony’s PlayStation VR and even Nintendo.With more options than ever to suit budgets, play styles – and games and experiences actually worth paying for – there’s never been a better time to don a headset and step into a new reality. Here’s a quick guide to five of the best on the market. Continue reading...

They started out as a joke – doctored videos of celebrities doing unlikely things, from a Nicolas Cage cameo in Friends to Mark Zuckerberg boasting about ‘stolen’ data. But as the technology improves, could deepfakes swing an election? Continue reading...

Marissa Fuchs posted photos of disbelief, but marketers were sent itinerary months beforeA public proposal is a risky thing to attempt. For every couple whose love for each other is perfectly in tune, there is a partner who has woefully misjudged their lover’s desire for public attention, grand romantic gestures, or simply marriage full stop.So Gabriel Grossman might have been taking a huge risk when he and his girlfriend, the Instagram influencer Marissa Casey Fuchs, embarked on not just a public proposal, but a 48-hour-long surprise holiday scavenger hunt, exhaustively documented by the couple on their respective Instagram accounts. What if she’d said no? Or decided that this precious moment was too personal to be shared with her audience of 193,000 people? Continue reading...

Chris Hughes says involvement of private companies is threat to autonomy of nation statesOne of Facebook’s co-founders has warned the social network’s plans for a digital currency called Libra could allow corporations involved in the scheme to wield power over nation states.Chris Hughes, whose role in the early days of Facebook has given him a net worth estimated at $430m (£340m), said global regulators should intervene to slow the progress of the cryptocurrency. Continue reading...

Customers urged to stop using limited number of machines sold between 2015 and 2017Apple is recalling some of its 15in MacBook Pro laptops over a battery fire risk.The company said on Thursday that a limited number of its largest laptop line, sold between September 2015 and February 2017, contained batteries that “may overheat and pose a safety risk”. Continue reading...

We spent two weeks with a 5G phone to find out if it really lives up to the hypeThe future of mobile phones is finally here. You can go out and buy a 5G phone, and if you happen to be in one of the six cities across the UK in which EE’s 5G network is up and running, you can get the blistering mobile broadband speeds we’ve been promised will revolutionise our mobile lives, again. But should you?I’ve spent the past two weeks equipped with the OnePlus 7 Pro 5G on first-out-of-the-gate EE’s 5G network. I streamed 2K HDR movies, downloaded whole albums in seconds and generally used it like I would on my extremely fast 350Mbps home wifi – data caps be damned. Continue reading...

The Big Apple has long had an infatuation with flying over the city, but there’s a risk in choosing the air over driving congested streetsWhile those taking a taxi from Manhattan to John F Kennedy airport this summer can expect a 90-minute-plus crawl at rush hour, more elite New Yorkers will have access to a new eight-minute ride – with a familiar brand attached.Scheduled to launch on 9 July, UberCopter – yes, that Uber, will offer a helicopter service between a heliport adjacent to Wall Street and JFK, from $200 per person each way. Continue reading...

With Mars in the 12th house at the time of the announcement, the new cryptocurrency should ultimately succeedWhen Facebook announced its cryptocurrency Libra, which shares its title with an astrological sign for people born approximately between 23 September and 23 October, people had a lot of questions.Will this upend the traditional banking system? Is Facebook going to sell my financial data to advertisers? And most importantly, what does an astrology-adjacent cryptocurrency name mean for us all? Continue reading...

San Francisco-based company sold shares in direct listing, following Spotify’s method, potentially ushering in new era of stock market salesWorkplace messaging service Slack became the latest hot technology company to sell its shares to the public on Thursday, soaring 50% higher than expected on its debut.The San Francisco-based company’s shares started trading on the New York stock exchange at $38.50 – well above the $26 guide price – and closed at $38.62 valuing the company at over $24bn, making a billionaire of co-founder Stewart Butterfield and potentially ushering in a new era of stock market sales. Continue reading...

Actions such as shares and likes down nearly 20%, though user numbers still growingFacebook usage has plummeted over the last year, according to data seen by the Guardian, though the company says usage by other measures continues to grow.Since April 2018, the first full month after news of the Cambridge Analytica scandal broke in the Observer, actions on Facebook such as likes, shares and posts have dropped by almost 20%, according to the business analytics firm Mixpanel. Continue reading...

Everything you need to know about the next big augmented-reality game before its 21 June release dateHarry Potter: Wizards Unite will bring a little magic into the world tomorrow, as fans will be able to step into the world of the Boy Who Lived thanks to the augmented-reality smartphone game.Players use their phones to tackle something called the Calamity, which has tossed all sorts of dangerous magic – Confoundables – into the everyday world of muggles. Exploring the real world around them, they’ll run into familiar forms for fans of the Potterverse, such as pixies guarding screaming Howler letters or Hogwarts students trapped by vines. Casting spells on them by tracing lines on the phone’s screen will send them back where they belong, adding to the player’s collection of magical objects fished from the streets. Continue reading...

Cities say short-term holiday lettings market is contributing to soaring long-term rentsTen European cities have demanded more help from the EU in their battle against Airbnb and other holiday rental websites, which they argue are locking locals out of housing and changing the face of neighbourhoods.In a joint letter, Amsterdam, Barcelona, ​​Berlin, Bordeaux, Brussels, Krakow, Munich, Paris, Valencia and Vienna said the “explosive growth” of global short-stay lettings platforms must be on the agenda of the next set of European commissioners. Continue reading...

Reeling from a Dropbox price hike, Kate wants somewhere cheaper to store her 500GB of photos and filesI’ve just received notification that my Dropbox account is going up in price to more than £90 a year. I like Dropbox’s interface and ease of use from the mobile app, but £90 seems steep for what I require. What cheaper options do I have for securely storing about 500GB of photos and files? KateMost of us just evolve the way we do things by making convenient short-term decisions. A price jolt should prompt you to rethink how you are storing your data, where you are storing it, and why. Different people have different devices and different needs, so I can’t pick the best strategy for you or anybody else. However, I can give you a few things the think about. Continue reading...

After ordering and checking my credit rating several times, I can’t reverse the damage to my ratingI ordered two new smartphone contracts for myself and my wife. My wife decided to go for a different handset, so I cancelled her contract and reapplied.On the delivery day, I called to find out when it was coming, only to be told the order had been cancelled. No one could tell me why. Continue reading...

Board rejects all 13 shareholder proposals to address a range of issues even as workers protest outside eventAlphabet, the parent company of Google, failed to pass several proposals to address sexual harassment, antitrust issues and diversity policies at its annual shareholder meeting, despite hundreds of employees protesting outside the event.The annual meeting comes as Alphabet faces growing pressure from shareholders and employees, including over its handling of sexual harassment allegations, ethical concerns surrounding its artificial intelligence systems, its widespread reliance on and treatment of contract workers and its operations in China. Continue reading...

Epic bosses admit ignoring data protection rules and claim not to know how long users play forA Commons committee was left baffled as video game executives appeared to deny making money from their own games, admit to ignoring regulations governing data protection and age restrictions, and claim ignorance over how much time their own users were spending on games.Representatives from Epic Games, makers of Fortnite: Battle Royale, and EA Games, the publisher of the Fifa series of football games, appeared as witnesses in front of the Commons Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport committee as part of its inquiry into immersive and addictive technologies. Continue reading...

Nintendo Switch; Brace Yourself Games/Nintendo

Apple CEO Tim Cook called on Silicon Valley to take responsibility for the damage it has caused in a recent commencement speech at Stanford

Human rights committee launches inquiry into right to privacy and digital revolutionWidespread data collection practices lead to self-censorship and discrimination even though most users are not fully aware of how much their privacy is being infringed, a parliamentary committee has been warned.On Wednesday, the human rights committee, beginning its inquiry into the right to privacy and the digital revolution, published evidence from privacy and data protection organisations including the Information Commissioner’s Office, Liberty and Privacy International. Continue reading...

Cybersecurity team ordered to access journalists’ email accounts, document suggestsThe report from Agnes Callamard, the UN special rapporteur, sets out in forensic detail concerns about the behaviour of Saudi Arabia, both before and after the murder of the dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi.It also details the potential threats posed to journalists and academics by the kingdom’s use of intrusive spyware. Continue reading...

After a full week of glitzy announcements and hundreds of game teasers, the Guardian’s E3 correspondents pick their best of the show Continue reading...

Guardian investigation finds drivers who have experienced range of safety issues say companies offer little to no supportOne month into driving for Lyft around Atlanta, Alicia Dukes was sexually assaulted by a passenger on 21 April after she drove him to a gas station and back to his apartment.“He first asked me if I had any change because he wanted to leave a tip. He ended up finding a $5 bill in his pocket and gave it to me. He then proceeded to ask me if I wanted to come into his house and drink with him. I said no, I’m working right now, can you please leave,” Dukes told the Guardian. Continue reading...

According to a Guardian survey through Blind, employees are already facing negative consequences or predict problemsTechnology workers of Chinese descent say that they are experiencing backlash due to the US-China trade war and fears over Huawei, according to a survey commissioned by the Guardian through Blind, an app allowing anonymous workplace communication.“With the trade war against China and especially the Huawei case I feel like a target more and more every day,” an anonymous Amazon employee wrote in a comment on the app, which is popular among technology employees and verifies employment through work emails. “I can’t even feel comfortable about being Chinese because so many Americans see China as a threat now.” Continue reading...

Funds to support development of 20,000 new homes as San Francisco Bay Area grapples with homelessnessGoogle will invest $1bn in housing throughout the San Francisco Bay Area, a region plagued by a housing and homelessness crisis that has in part been fueled by the tech industry.The announcement comes as the tech giant prepares to expand beyond its headquarters in Mountain View and its offices in San Francisco to new campuses in San Jose and Sunnyvale. The $1bn would go toward supporting the development of 20,000 new homes over the course of 10 years, or roughly 68% of the number of units the Bay Area needs to build each year in order to meet population growth. Continue reading...

Facebook claims it wants to reach people without access to a bank account, and that Libra is the best wayOn Tuesday, Facebook announced a digital currency called Libra that will roll out for use in 2020 and allow the platform’s billions of users across the globe to make financial transactions online.The new technology threatens to change the landscape of banking and is already the subject of scrutiny, as Facebook faces increasing calls for regulation and antitrust measures. Continue reading...

Digital currency will let billions of users make transactions, but is already facing opposition from US lawmakers amid privacy concerns•Facebook’s Libra launch will extend its global domination•All you need to know about Facebook’s new cryptocurrencyFacebook has announced a digital currency called Libra that will allow its billions of users to make financial transactions across the globe, in a move that could potentially shake up the world’s banking system.Libra is being touted as a means to connect people who do not have access to traditional banking platforms. With close to 2.4 billion people using Facebook each month, Libra could be a financial game changer, but will face close scrutiny as Facebook continues to reel from a series of privacy scandals. Continue reading...

Cryptocurrency could wipe out many businesses and further concentrate corporate powerEvery week, dozens of people walk into the Sunshine convenience store in Charlottesville, Virginia, to send money to relatives in other countries. They use a service called MoneyGram, one of the two largest firms (the other being Western Union) that facilitate the conversion of US dollars into the currency of the receiving person, charging between $9.99 and $49.99 (£7.97 and £39.89) for each transaction.Many of the patrons of Sunshine alert their relatives of these transactions through WhatsApp, the encrypted messaging service owned by Facebook and used by more than 1.5 billion people around the world. Continue reading...

Smallest, cheapest Samsung flagship has most of what makes the S10 line good, but with a flat screen and one camera fewerThe Galaxy S10e is Samsung’s attempt to offer a flagship smartphone experience in a smaller body and at a lower cost, which mostly works.The formula is simple: take the same processor, reduce the memory a little and squeeze it into a smaller, less complicated body. Continue reading...

Rights group argues powers of MI5 and GCHQ to obtain and store data breach human rights“Bulk hacking” powers exploited by the intelligence services to access electronic devices represent an illegal intrusion into the private lives of millions of people, the high court has been told.In its latest challenge to the 2016 Investigatory Powers Act (IPA), the civil rights organisation Liberty has argued that government surveillance practices breach human rights law. Continue reading...

The Pokémon Company has announced the 2020 launch of Pokémon Sleep, a mobile game that will reward users based on how well they slumber. Jordan Erica Webber looks at why sleep experts are worried about the idea. She is joined by Dale Berning Sawa and Laura Dale Continue reading...

When Radiohead were held to ransom by hackers, they shrugged and put 18 hours of unheard material online for free. But for other artists, having music leaked can be devastatingIn 1997, Radiohead imagined a future in which technological dependency and out-of-control consumerism had merged to form a dark, digital void. OK Computer, the band’s third album, painted prescient pictures of riot police at political rallies and anxious lives lived in suburbs surrounded by endless motorways. The digital advances promising to bring us together, it seemed to warn, would instead corrode and cause chaos.Last week’s big Radiohead news wouldn’t have sounded out of place on that album’s technosceptic vision of tomorrow. The band had been hacked, guitarist Jonny Greenwood revealed on Tuesday, and 18 hours of unreleased music from their OK Computer sessions stolen. Pay $150,000, they were warned, or this archive would be uploaded to the internet for free. The only thing more frustrating to frontman Thom Yorke than the situation, fans joked, was the fact he hadn’t thought to mention sinister cybercriminals holding people to ransom on OK Computer in the first place. Continue reading...