Technology | The Guardian

Court hearing follows arrest of man in Northamptonshire over alleged hacking and theft of 3,000 imagesThe Duchess of Cambridge’s sister has taken high court action against a “person or persons unknown”.Pippa Middleton is listed as the claimant in a case to be heard in London on Wednesday. The case is listed as “Middleton & anr v The Person or Persons Unknown”. Court officials identified the claimant as Pippa Middleton but gave no indication of what the case was about. Continue reading...

Scientists create polymer sheets that can be programmed to change shape over time, which could be used to make the next generation of medical implantsThe delicate flower bud bursts into life, opening layer after layer of brightly coloured petals, first large and red, then small and purple, and finally the innermost ones - tiny and orange.But as convincing as the bloom may seem, it is not a work of nature. Scientists created the flowering bud after learning how to make polymer sheets that can be programmed to change shape over time.

From the must-have big names to the quirky indie games, here are some of the treasures we found at the UK’s biggest games eventThousands of people filled the halls of the NEC in Birmingham for this year’s EGX to play hundreds of new and unreleased games. While a few big names had an appropriately big presence, the indie-themed Rezzed zone was bigger than ever, and the quirky Leftfield Collection – as always – boasted some of the most interesting games on show. Here are our favourites of all shapes and sizes. Continue reading...

National data protection authority blocks recent privacy changes made by social network and commands existing shared data and phone numbers be deleted for 35 million usersThe German data protection agency has ordered Facebook to stop collecting user data from its WhatsApp messenger app and delete any data it has already received.The social network announced in August that it would begin sharing data from its 1 billion-plus user base, including phone numbers, from WhatsApp users with Facebook for the purpose of targeted ads. It gave users the option of opting out of the data being used for advertising purposes, but did not allow them to opt out of the data sharing between WhatsApp and Facebook. Continue reading...

The SpaceX founder has become the face of entrepreneurial space exploration – and ambition. What does the established space science community think of him?Entrepreneur Elon Musk has set himself an ambitious timeline for the colonization of Mars. The South Africa-born magnate estimates that his private space company, SpaceX, will launch its first manned mission in 2024 – one decade sooner than Nasa’s ambitions.Musk will grace the 67th International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara, Mexico, on Tuesday, unveiling his plans to send humans to Mars in a keynote talk titled Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species. He will outline what SpaceX deems to be a “good approach” for establishing a city on the red planet. Continue reading...

Financial backing of pro-Trump trolls causes rift with VR games developers as Palmer Luckey attempts to backtrackDevelopers of virtual reality games are pulling their support for Oculus after the involvement of its co-founder Palmer Luckey in a pro-Trump and anti-Clinton group was revealed.

Deep learning needs to become more efficient if it is going to move from using data to categorise images of cats to diagnosing rare illnesses“Is data the new oil?” asked proponents of big data back in 2012 in Forbes magazine. By 2016, and the rise of big data’s turbo-powered cousin deep learning, we had become more certain: “Data is the new oil,” stated Fortune.Amazon’s Neil Lawrence has a slightly different analogy: Data, he says, is coal. Not coal today, though, but coal in the early days of the 18th century, when Thomas Newcomen invented the steam engine. A Devonian ironmonger, Newcomen built his device to pump water out of the south west’s prolific tin mines. Continue reading...

TV and MLS have played a part in popularizing the beautiful game Stateside, but video games’ influence on the American soccer fan cannot be underestimatedFor Kelvin Garcia, growing up in a Dominican family from New York City meant two sports took priority. “As a Latino kid in the Bronx, all I ever played was basketball and baseball,” says Garcia, who now lives in Texas. As a boy, soccer was barely on Garcia’s radar. He remembers working at a sports camp with European counselors during the 2010 World Cup and wondering what the excitement was about. As a basketball fan, he was more interested in whether LeBron was going to the Knicks.Nowadays, Garcia cannot go a day without talking about his love for Antonio Conte’s Chelsea and their title chances. Continue reading...

Google is old enough to drink, buy cigarettes and vote in the UK. But does it know its date of birth?What’s that Google? It’s your 18th birthday today? Happy birthday Google! You’re now old enough to drink in Britain. Though the existence of Google Plus suggests you’ve been quietly breaking that law for a while now.Sorry to nitpick though, but are you sure it’s your birthday? Only, there’s been some confusion over that in the past. Right now, on 27 September, you have one of your merry “Google doodles” up on your homepage wishing yourself a happy birthday (also, Google, that’s a little sad? Are you OK? Normally we rely on our friends to wish us a happy birthday rather than buying our own cards). Continue reading...

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27 September 1954: The age of a clerical army engaged in a welter of repetitive calculation is over and done withWhen Lyons Electronic Office (“Leo” for short) came into regular operation at the beginning of this year, it marked a new era in clerical functions. The age of a clerical army engaged in a welter of repetitive calculation was over and done with. The new age sees that same clerical army engaged not in mathematical drudgery but in the more interesting and stimulating work of interpreting figures rather than merely producing them. The effect in a large business is immediate and widespread. No longer does management need to conduct its high level operations as the result of history and hunches. “Leo” provides, almost for the asking, up-to-the-minute figures of sales, stocks, and production and all those various “breakdowns” and analyses which were previously impossible owing to the time and labour involved in their preparation.

Each rumored sale would have advantages except ABC News-owner Disney, which poses the risk of causing competitors to refrain from using the platformTwitter is being sold to Disney. No, Microsoft. No, Salesforce. No, Alphabet. The troubled, often controversial microblogging service is suddenly the prettiest tech company at the dance, with suitors clandestinely announced through media outlets including Bloomberg and CNBC throughout the weekend and into Monday morning. None have yet confessed they are serious.Twitter closed at $18.63 per share on Thursday, the day before the rumors started; by the time the bell rang on Monday afternoon, the stock had reached heights of $23.37, up further than the stock has been since January. Continue reading...

The company has rolled out a self-driving fleet in Pittsburgh. But passengers might not be aware of how experimental the pilot still isAnyone requesting an Uber ride in a 12-sq mile area in the center of Pittsburgh might now be randomly allocated a self-driving Ford Fusion rather than a human-operated vehicle.But passengers riding in Uber’s computer-controlled cars today might be surprised at just how experimental the technology is. According to documents obtained by the Guardian under public records laws, until as recently as June anyone not employed by Uber riding in one of its autonomous vehicles (AVs) had to sign a legal document waiving the company of any liability for their injury or death. Continue reading...

California’s Customer Records bill has been welcomed by actors’ union SAG-AFTRA as a welcome challenge to age discrimination in the film industry

A prank video destroying an iPhone 7 has gone viral, getting nearly 10m views and complaints from users apparently tricked into drilling a 3.5mm hole into their device. The video claims that users can add a headphone jack to their iPhone, an element left out of the model. The uploader (YouTube/ TechRax) has seven separate videos showing him destroying iPhone 7s and his Twitter bio reads ‘Ukrainian who specialises in smashing technology for your pleasure’.

Sir Bradley Wiggins’s reputation is at stake after the Fancy Bears group of hackers alleged he had taken prohibited substances. Wiggins claims the substances were taken with a therapeutic use exemption, which allows athletes with pre-existing conditions to compete

Prank video destroying new Apple smartphone receives 10m views, with some seemingly tricked into making 3.5mm hole in the bottom of their devices

The $22bn messaging app has changed its name to reflect the fact that it is ‘a camera company’ now. But will it succeed where Google Glass failed?Name: Snap Inc.Age: Two days old. Continue reading...

Facebook, Apple, Amazon and Google have priorities ranging from taxes to trade and national security in this year’s electionsWhen US presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump take the stage at Hofstra University in Long Island, New York, for their first formal, head-to-head debate on Monday night, they will undoubtedly be watched carefully by senior executives of – and lobbyists for – the country’s largest technology companies.Both candidates have been vocal on some key issues near and dear to the hearts of technology companies – such as global trade. As Dean Garfield, president and CEO of the Washington DC-based technology industry advocacy group the Information Technology Industry Council (ITIC), points out, it is unusual for trade agreements such as the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) to take center stage in a presidential election. Continue reading...

Autonomous Lexus SUV could not prevent accident that caved in front and rear passenger-side doors, setting off airbags and forcing it to be towed awayOne of Google’s self-driving cars was involved in one of the worst autonomous vehicle accident yet, when a driver ran a red light and collided with the passenger side door of the modified Lexus SUV.The driver of the vehicle passed through a red light as one of Google’s fleet of autonomous Lexus SUVs passed through a green light on Friday afternoon. The collision, which occurred at the intersection between El Camino Rea and Phyllis Ave in Mountain View, California, caused the Google car’s airbags to be deployed, and caved in its front and rear right-side doors. Continue reading...

Behind many Instagram accounts featuring filtered selfies and sunkissed beaches is a second account reserved for close friends and full of wilfully unattractive shotsSocial media has given us many things: selfies, shelfies, belfies; this week Miranda July liveblogged her dentist visit. It has also given us online status anxiety, a pervasive fear of missingout and may be affecting our mental health. Recently, it has produced the curious conceit of the dual Instagram account; in which users have two Instagram accounts, one reserved for their close friends, and another for anyone who wishes to follow them.“Rinstagram” and “Finstagram”, then. Account users have their real-Instagram (their rinsta) which has high follower numbers and offers a more polished and performative visual narrative. Think classic Instagram. Filtered selfies. Pleasing photos of food. Drink poised in air, quixotic rural or seaside landscape in the background. Their fake-Instagram (their finsta) is a second Instagram account reserved for their close friends. With low follower numbers (followers are usually kept in the low double figures), they use this account to share more candid pictures of their lives – often wilfully unattractive ones, pulling faces and the like.

The place to talk about games and other things that matter

Ryan Avent is right to warn that we may be heading towards a world without work (Journal, 19 September). Unfortunately, mainstream economists are not listening. Indeed, in the past, automation has not caused lasting unemployment. Instead, it has made products and services cheaper, which raises demand for them and other products, and eventually creates new jobs. But past rounds of automation replaced human and animal muscle power. That was fine for the humans, who could go on to jobs that were often more interesting and less dangerous, using their cognitive faculties instead of just muscle power. It didn’t work out so well for the horse.Related: A world without work is coming – it could be utopia or it could be hell | Ryan Avent Continue reading...

Dish with reflector as large as 30 football pitches will listen for signs of intelligent life and is one of several ‘world-class’ projectsThe world’s largest radio telescope has begun operating in south-western China, a project Beijing says will help humanity search for alien life.The five-hundred-metre aperture spherical radio telescope (acronym: Fast), nestled between hills in the mountainous region of Guizhou, began working about noon on Sunday, the official news agency, Xinhua, reported. Continue reading...

CEO says firm, which makes Dulux paint, is committed to UK but desires quick, no-nonsense approach to Brexit negotiationsAkzoNobel, one of Europe’s biggest industrial companies, has called for “quick clarity” over the UK’s future relationship with the EU.Ton Büchner, the chief executive of the company, which makes Dulux paint and employs 45,000 people, said staff had sought reassurances about the company’s future in the UK but that he was committed to its existing investments. Continue reading...

It began life as an app for sharing self-deleting photos with friends. These days, however, it’s a hugely popular social network. Here’s our crash courseSnapchat is used by more than 150 million people every day, according to latest estimates. Yet 2016’s big story with this social app is that those users are no longer just teenagers.Snapchat has expanded to older smartphone owners, and evolved well beyond its roots as an app for private sharing of self-deleting photos.In 2016, it is as much a public social network, not to mention a new form of television, with its own daily menu of news and entertainment. Continue reading...

The screenwriter on a great festival, shock horror Train to Busan, hacking TV drama Mr Robot and immersive theatre to die forBorn in London in 1970, screenwriter, producer and author Goldman began her writing career aged 16 when she left school and became a journalist, initially working as a showbiz reporter for the Daily Star. That same year she met Jonathan Ross in a nightclub, married him in Las Vegas aged 18 and went on to have three children with him. While the children were young, Goldman published several nonfiction guides for teenagers and, in 2000, her first novel, Dreamworld, before making the switch to films as co-writer on 2007’s Stardust. The movie was the first of several successful screenwriting collaborations with Matthew Vaughn, namely Kick-Ass (2010), X-Men: First Class (2011) and Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015). Her latest project is an adaptation for director Tim Burton of Ransom Riggs’s Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, in cinemas this week. Continue reading...

Gentler designs with an emphasis on teamwork are fuelling a boom in board game sales. Why, in the golden age of video games, are we choosing to play with counters round a table? Below, the best of the new waveIt’s a bright Thursday morning in Oxford, and the Thirsty Meeples cafe on Gloucester Green market is thrumming with activity. As we sit at a sun-warmed window table, the maitre d’, Gareth, introduces himself and presents a list of recommendations.First, he suggests Forbidden Desert. It is not a cocktail. “You have all crash-landed in a desert where you are searching for a lost civilisation,” explains Gareth, who sports a purple Thirsty Meeples “Game Guru” T-shirt. “A sandstorm hits, and you have to find all the pieces of a mythical flying ship to escape.” Next he offers up Escape: The Curse of the Temple, in which we’ll become “Indiana Jones-type people” who have to flee a crumbling ancient tomb. “Or,” Gareth says, “how about fighting fires?”. Last, he recommends Flash Point, in which I, my wife and two sons would rescue people from a burning building. Pull enough of them from the flames and we all win. But if a certain number are lost to the inferno, we lose. We choose Flash Point. Continue reading...

Apple’s AirPods may have grabbed the headlines but they’re only part of a whole ‘hearable’ revolutionEarlier this month, the internet got in a froth about Apple’s decision to drop the 3.5mm analogue audio jack from the new iPhone. Users took to Twitter to vent their outrage, while tech analysts, such as Paul Erickson at IHS Technology, suggested that the removal was money-driven: “It should be noted that wireless models are the highest revenue-generating products within the headphone market,” he told the Financial Times.Further disapproval was directed at Apple’s replacement for wired earphones, the AirPod, essentially a wireless earphone and microphone – “like a tampon without a string” according to the Guardian – while the writers of US late-night talkshow Conan created a satirical Apple ad featuring the devices plopping from users’ ears to floor and being eaten by their pet dogs. Continue reading...

Microsoft’s road-racing sim steps up a gear, DC’s Dark Knight returns to rule the streets of Gotham, but an intriguing new shoot-’em-up is too much like hard workPC/Xbox One, Microsoft; cert: 3

This lightweight MTB is agile and strong, perfect for muddy trails or longer ridesAfter the hottest and driest September in a century, it’s hard to believe we’ll ever have fun in the mud again… So when the rain arrives you want to be ready, and the Reaction range of mountain bikes is a great place to begin. Made by Cube, the much-lauded German manufacturer, the all-carbon range starts at £1,249 and tops out at almost £2,000. But unless you are a pro trail racer, the entry-level GTC is all you’ll ever need in a lightweight hardtail MTB. It’s balanced, responsive and very agile. At its core is its super-stiff frame, which uses the firm’s ‘Grand Tour’ composite. The tapering top tube combines with the race-light wheels to give you a wonderful sense that you could skip across gloopy bogs all day. It has decent front shox and reliable disc brakes, too. An easy rider for the hard stuff (cube.eu).Price: £1,249

Subaru’s sturdy Forester is so robust and uncompromising that it pays to have calloused palms before you drivePrice: £25,495

Photos of Duchess of Cambridge and her children, George and Charlotte, reportedly among those stolen

Spectacles, which record 10-second clips that can be sent to smartphones, expected to be available in US in time for ChristmasUndeterred by the failure of Google Glass, Snapchat has decided to launch its own pair of glasses that can record video.The picture and video messaging app is expected to release its Spectacles sunglasses in the US in time for Christmas, priced at about $130 (£100). Continue reading...

Ardit Ferizi struggles to explain why he sent extremist group the details of hundreds of US government and military officialsA hacker who helped Islamic State by providing the names of more than 1,000 US government and military workers as potential targets was sentenced on Friday to 20 years in prison.The sentence was much higher than the six-year term sought by defense lawyers, who argued their client, Ardit Ferizi, meant no real harm and was not a true Isis supporter. Continue reading...

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan may feel good about donating $3bn to medical research, but it’s a drop in the oceanSo, is $3bn a lot of money? Of course it is. Is $3bn enough to banish or manage all disease in the world within the next 84 years? Of course it isn’t. Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan have announced a plan to invest £3bn in medical research over the next 10 years. They claim this sum will enable them to play a key role in curing, preventing or managing all disease by the end of this century.Related: No Such Thing As a Free Gift: The Gates Foundation and the Price of Philanthropy by Linsey McGoey – review Continue reading...

Following the Fifa Interactive World Cup, EA Sports franchise finds new ways to tap in to expanding, and highly valuable, online marketThis year, a Fifa football tournament took place that included no superstar players or teams from the global sport; in fact, there was no pitch and no ball.Despite these disadvantages, live coverage of the final was shown in more than 100 countries to an audience of about 5 million and generated 40m comments on Facebook and Twitter. That’s how sporting success is measured nowadays. Continue reading...

The breach, relating to Queensland businesses, is one of 14 the Australian Bureau of Statistics has reported to the Information Commissioner since 2013The Australian Bureau of Statistics inadvertently released contact names linked to more than 5,000 Queensland businesses in what was described as a “human error”.The breach is one of 14 the ABS has reported to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner since 2013, and was released to Guardian Australia under freedom of information laws. Continue reading...

With Salesforce and Google’s parent company Alphabet rumored to be possible buyers, an acquisition could bring fresh ideas on how to refine what it can offerYou could say it in less than 140 characters: Twitter may be for sale, according to the latest speculation on Wall Street reported by both Reuters and CNBC.Both Alphabet, which is Google’s parent company, and Salesforce were rumored to be possible suitors for Twitter, and the final sale price is likely to be around $22 per share, according to Morningstar analyst Ali Mogharabi – putting the value of the company close to $15.5bn. He also believes the victor is likely to be Google, which is a better strategic fit. Continue reading...

Under the name NimbleRichMan, Oculus founder secretly funded Reddit users dedicated to electing Trump by flooding threads with negative Clinton memesIt’s hard to love a 20-something multi-millionaire, but Palmer Luckey’s introduction to the mainstream consciousness helped cement his image as the good kind of tech industry titan: the adorkable garage tinkerer we can root for.There he was on the cover of Time magazine, barefoot and leaping, his arms floppily akimbo, his face obscured by a virtual reality headset, and a wire extending down his back like the rattail hairstyle he might have worn if he had been born a decade earlier than he was, in 1992. Continue reading...

Biggest data breach in history complicates Verizon’s $4.8bn takeover of Yahoo, with executives refusing to give reassurances that they would press aheadThe future of Yahoo, once the darling of the internet, was plunged into crisis on Thursday following the revelation that it has suffered the biggest data hack in history – and took two years to notice.

Yahoo confirmed on Thursday that the personal data of 500million Yahoo accounts was stolen in 2014. The hack is one of the largest on record. Passwords and identity details were taken, but allegedly no financial information was stolen. Yahoo was sold for $4.8bn to telecommunications giant Verizon in July, who said they only heard about the breach after the merger deal between the two companies. Continue reading...

Passengers on IndiGo flight spotted smoke coming from the overhead luggage compartment but there was no damage to the plane and the flight landed safelyA Samsung Galaxy Note 2 smartphone started smoking during a commercial flight in India on Friday, India’s aviation regulator said.Passengers on board the IndiGo flight spotted smoke filtering from the overhead luggage compartment and alerted the cabin crew. Sparks and smoke were seen coming from the Samsung Galaxy device, the airline, owned by InterGlobe Aviation, confirmed in an emailed statement. Continue reading...

Online retailer fined £65,000 and ordered to pay £60,000 costs for despatching batteries and aerosols for airmailAmazon UK has been found guilty and fined £65,000 for breaking aviation safety laws after repeatedly trying to send dangerous goods by airmail.A judge at Southwark crown court in London said on Friday that Amazon knew the rules, had been warned repeatedly, but had failed to take reasonable care. Although the risks from the goods sent for shipment by air were low, Judge Michael Grieve QC blamed the breaches on “systemic failure” at the online retailer. Continue reading...

Transport for London admits exempting English speakers from the test would disproportionately affect BAME applicantsAnyone hoping to drive a private-hire taxi in London could be forced to take a written English test after Transport for London admitted that exemptions for English speakers would hit black and minority ethnic people hardest.TfL is introducing new rules from 1 October requiring taxi drivers to pass English exams costing £200 to obtain or renew a private hire licence. Continue reading...

Shares in Twitter rose by 21% in early trading after CNBC reported the firm had ‘received expressions of interest from several technology or media companies’Twitter shares surged more than 20% on the New York stock exchange on Friday morning, following reports that the social media company has received takeover approaches from Google, Salesforce and other technology companies.

The ISPs, which outsourced their webmail to Yahoo, have yet to directly notify users whether their accounts are affectedMillions of BT and Sky customers are affected by the hack of half a billion Yahoo accounts, thanks to the internet service providers’ decisions to outsource their webmail hosting to the Californian technology firm, which revealed on Thursday that it was hacked in 2014.Related: Yahoo hack: what to do to protect your account Continue reading...

Users should log in to their account, change their password, as well as check for any signs of misuseIf you have a Yahoo account, it’s imperative you act quickly to ensure it, and your other internet services, are secured.Information including names, addresses, secret answers and passwords was stolen from Yahoo at some point in late 2014 and showed up for sale on the dark web in August this year. Yahoo says the “vast majority” of passwords were secured using an algorithm called bcrypt, which renders it impractically expensive for an attacker to try to break, but the company has not given any way of checking which passwords were in the minority not protected that way. Until they do, you should assume your password is unprotected, and act accordingly. Continue reading...

With fashion week coverage dominated by Gigi Hadid, the most powerful brands are now to be found walking on the catwalksThe most powerful women of the catwalk circuit are no longer to be found on the front row or in the industry boardrooms – but on the catwalks themselves. A tiny elite of models who have become social media superstars wield influence and commercial clout the like of which the supermodels of the 1990s could only have dreamed of.Milan fashion week has long been ruled by luxury brands, but this week a new brand leapfrogged Prada and Gucci to dominate coverage: that of 21-year-old Gigi Hadid, whose stratospheric rise in modelling is inseparable from the 23 million followers she has on Instagram. (To put this figure into perspective, consider that Donatella Versace has 858,000 followers.) This week Hadid, the star of MaxMara’s advertising campaign, walked in their catwalk show along with her 19-year-old sister Bella. The pair also starred on the catwalk for Fendi, designed by Karl Lagerfeld.