The Verge

Jeff Bezos, his brother Mark and Oliver Daemen walk off New Shepard’s landing pad as Wally Funk, 82-year-old aviation icon and the mission’s fourth passenger, remains in awe at the size of New Shepard, the suborbital rocket they all launched to space on. | Joey Roulette/The Verge A record-setting flight Continue reading…

Image: Nintendo After months of speculation and a sea of rumors, Nintendo officially announced the next iteration of its popular gaming console: the Nintendo Switch OLED model. The upcoming device serves more as a midlife update than anything else, a refinement of the 2019 model as opposed to the more powerful “Switch Pro” that was rumored (and may still launch).On sale for $350 starting October 8th, the aptly-titled Nintendo Switch OLED model is the next iteration of what has become one of the best-selling consoles over the last two years. It’s outfitted with a 7-inch 720p OLED display, a new dock with a wired Ethernet port, and an improved kickstand that seems to take a cue directly from Microsoft’s Surface Pro tablets. It also offers 64GB of... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Chrome’s latest update for iOS will let you secure your incognito tabs with Touch ID, Face ID, or a passcode (via MacRumors). When the new feature is rolled out to you, you can turn it on by navigating to the settings menu, then tapping “Privacy,” then “Lock Incognito tabs.” I just updated the app and the option wasn’t there for me, so you might have to wait just a bit until you can flip it on. Google first revealed it was testing this new privacy feature in February.The update brings a few other handy features to Google’s mobile browser, including the ability to take a full-page screenshot of a website. You can use it by snapping a screenshot with the button combination specific to your device, tapping the screenshot preview, and then... Continue reading…

Facebook is announcing a new setting that allows you to limit how much potentially sensitive content shows up in your Instagram Explore tab. According to Facebook, the new Sensitive Content Control setting will let you “see more or less of some types of sensitive content,” which may be “upsetting or offensive.” How much content the three levels, “Allow,” “Limit (Default),” and “Limit Even More” will or will not show is pretty vague, and we’ve reached out to Facebook for clarification.On the support page for Sensitive Content Control, Instagram says that sensitive content could include sexually suggestive or violent posts, as well as posts that promote things like tobacco or pharmaceutical use. Facebook is clear that this setting is... Continue reading…

HBO Max Minis shown on a mobile device. | Image: HBO Max HBO Max has partnered with Snapchat to bring full-length episodes of its series to the social media platform. With HBO Max Minis, users will be able to stream the pilots of select series with up to 63 other Snapchatters.The feature was announced today and is offered through Minis, which launched late last year and hosts third-party app experiences within Snapchat. Minis allow users to do anything from meditate with Headspace to buy movie tickets with friends through Atom. And now, HBO Max Minis will allow anyone on Snapchat to view entire episodes of more than a dozen series from the streaming service for free, including pilots from Lovecraft Country and Game of Thrones. With synchronized playback, everyone watching the title will be... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Netflix revealed that its initial efforts in gaming will be focused on mobile games and that the games will be included with users’ Netflix subscriptions, the company announced as part of its second-quarter earnings report on Tuesday. The news comes just days after the company said it hired former EA and Oculus exec Mike Verdu to head up its gaming work.Here is exactly what Netflix said about gaming, from its letter to investors:

Fortnite is hosting a second round of its animated short film festival, dubbed “Short Nite 2,” — a successor to the game’s original Short Nite festival that developer Epic held earlier this year.According to Epic, Short Nite 2 will feature “a series of animated, online shorts by up-and-coming-creators,” which, like the original event, will air on the game’s combat-free Party Royale mode. Short Nite 2 will kick off on Friday, July 23rd, at 2PM ET, and last for about 40 minutes. If you can’t make the debut, the short films will continue to play nonstop until 2PM ET on July 25th.Another short film festival is on its wayThe developer hasn’t announced the full list yet, but it’s highlighting that the stream will feature two Gildedguy... Continue reading…

Jason Alexander as Jeff Bezos. | Image: Jon Stewart Jon Stewart shared a video promoting his upcoming Apple TV Plus show, The Problem with Jon Stewart, and it’s an odd one: the three-minute and ten-second clip shared on Twitter is a comedy skit roasting the recent billionaire space race, starring Jason Alexander as Jeff Bezos and a mop as Richard Branson. There are also a lot of dick jokes.Here’s the clip, if you’re curious:

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Sony sleuths just stumbled onto a surprise in Japan: the company has quietly kicked out a new version of the PlayStation 5 Digital Edition that’s listed as 300 grams lighter than the original (via PSU). That’s fully two-thirds of a pound, bringing the mammoth console down from well over the eight-pound mark to just slightly under it.How, you might ask? Well, that’s the question!According to Sony’s official manual (PDF) and quick start guide (PDF), as spotted by PS5sokuhouInfo on Twitter, the only differences between the new CFI-1100B and the original CFI-1000B are that change in weight and a new thumbscrew for the PS5’s vertical stand so you don’t need a screwdriver or coin to get it set. Image: Sony A new... Continue reading…

The updated Venmo app without the global social feed. | Image: Venmo Venmo announced it's removing its global social feed on Tuesday, the payment app’s notorious feature that allows strangers to potentially view payments you make and receive on Venmo (via Bloomberg).Now Venmo’s social elements will be limited to your actual friends on the app in the “friends feed” without you having to toggle any features in the app. The company buried the change in a blog post detailing an update to the Venmo app. Venmo writes:

Photo by Adam Schultz President Joe Biden will nominate Jonathan Kanter, an ardent Google critic and competition lawyer, to lead the Justice Department’s antitrust division, as first reported by Bloomberg on Tuesday.Kanter has a long history of representing companies in competition cases against Google, and he opened his own law firm last year. If confirmed by the Senate, Kanter would take the helm on a slate of cases against big tech companies led by the Justice Department, including a monopoly lawsuit filed against Google last October. The case accuses the search giant of creating an illegal monopoly in the digital ads market.“Jonathan Kanter is a distinguished antitrust lawyer”“Jonathan Kanter is a distinguished antitrust lawyer with over 20 years of... Continue reading…

Dutch startup Lightyear has found a manufacturing partner to build its solar-powered electric car, the Lightyear One. Finnish contract manufacturer Valmet Automotive signed a letter of intent with the startup this week, and the two companies plan to start building prototypes together in early 2022, with an eye on midyear for the beginning of production of nearly 1,000 vehicles. A second vehicle meant for mass production is yet to be announced.Lightyear was founded in 2016 by a team of engineers who had competed together in the World Solar Challenge, a race held every few years in the Australian outback that’s meant to advance the idea of solar-powered cars. The startup showed off the first prototype of the Lightyear One in 2019. It’s a... Continue reading…

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge Google has started selling a new bundle that gives you some premium entertainment to go along with the company’s Chromecast streaming gadget. For $64.99, you’ll get both the Chromecast with Google TV and three months of HBO Max. The device usually retails for $49.99, and HBO Max’s ad-free tier costs $14.99 per month, so you’re basically getting two months of the service for free.As usual with this sort of thing, the deal is only available for new subscribers of HBO Max; existing customers are out of luck. Google is offering the bundle beginning today, and it’ll be available for the rest of the year. The company is limiting each customer / Google account to three devices, but it’s not like you can stack the HBO Max offer, so there’s not... Continue reading…

Team Great Britain trains ahead of the Tokyo Olympics. | Photo by Harriet Lander / Getty Images The Olympians streaming into Tokyo this week are about to be faced with the hottest games in decades, with temperatures around 90 degrees Fahrenheit and suffocating humidity. Many athletes and sports physiologists have had their eye on the summer temperatures in Japan for years and have been planning to help athletes acclimate to the heat.In the weeks leading up to the games, female Olympians may have had to spend more time preparing for the heat than their male counterparts. Some early studies show that it can take twice as long for female athletes to adjust than male athletes. The information is limited, though, because until only a few years ago, most of the research on how to prepare to compete in hot environments was only done on... Continue reading…

Starting on August 9th, Canada is planning on opening its borders to vaccinated Americans after the country stopped allowing nonessential travel in March 2020 (via The Washington Post). According to the Canadian government’s announcement, the new travel rules will apply to US citizens and permanent residents who are currently living in the country and who have been fully vaccinated with one of the approved COVID-19 vaccines, as well as unvaccinated children who are traveling with a vaccinated guardian.The announcement does say that the change will only happen if conditions in the country are still good — meaning that if Canada sees a spike in cases between now and August 9th, the border reopening may be reconsidered.It won’t be as... Continue reading…

GIF: Blue Origin After landing from his little jaunt to the edge of space, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos thanked the people who let him do it. “I want to thank every Amazon employee, and every Amazon customer, because you guys paid for all this,“ he said.No, really, he said that.

Google is updating Chrome for Android’s permissions controls to make per-site permissions easier to access and manage. The update, available to Chrome on Android users, makes it faster to change what information a site can and cannot access. Tapping the lock button, then tapping Permissions will show a list of what the site is allowed to access, along with toggles to enable or disable them as you want. Google also says that there’s an upcoming feature that will let you “forget” the site from your browsing history, which is in the same vein as its recent feature allowing you to wipe the record of your last 15 minutes of browsing. GIF: Google A view of the updated permissions controls. Google is also introducing... Continue reading…

When Microsoft announced Windows 11 in June, it revealed that Microsoft Teams would be integrated directly into the operating system and that you’d be able to connect with other people via a new Chat window. The first preview for the new operating system didn’t have that new functionality, but Microsoft is starting to roll it out in a limited way starting Tuesday with the newest Windows 11 preview for Windows Insiders.The rollout of all of the promised features will happen over time, Microsoft’s Brandon LeBlanc said in a blog post. “In this first stage, you’ll be able to sign in, add contacts, and connect via individual and group chats,” he said. “Over the coming weeks, we will enable audio and video calling, meetings, screen sharing... Continue reading…

Apple Arcade’s recent expansion means that the subscription service is now home to plenty of classic games — and things don’t get much more classic than Tetris. Today, Apple announced that Tetris Beat, which mashes up the classic block-dropping puzzler with a rhythm game featuring music from the likes of Alison Wonderland, is coming to Arcade “soon.”There’s no word on a specific release date, but Beat features 18 exclusive songs, split-screen support if you’re on an Apple TV, and spatial audio for those listening with AirPods. It looks to be yet another inventive take on the game, following the likes of the battle royale Tetris 99 and Tetsuya Mizuguchi’s meditative Tetris Effect.The news is also part of a solid run for Apple Arcade.... Continue reading…

Photo by Cameron Faulkner / The Verge YouTube viewers will soon have a new way to throw their support — and money — behind their favorite creators. A new tool called Super Thanks that lets you tip creators is now being tested on the platform.The feature lets users applaud a creator by choosing from one of four price points between $2 and $50 (or the regional currency equivalent). When a user purchases one of these four options, they’ll see a celebratory animation on-screen and a colorful comment with their name appear below the video in the comments section. Creators themselves will be able to respond to these messages in the same way they can on regular comments. Image: YouTube YouTube’s new Super Thanks feature shown on a mobile device. YouTube... Continue reading…

Tweetdeck redesign preview | Image: Twitter Kayvon Beykpour said in a March interview with The Verge that Twitter does know TweetDeck still exists and the company is working on an overhaul “from the ground up.” Today, Twitter posted a single image of the reworked app, explaining that it represents a preview going into testing with a few “randomly-selected” people from the US, Canada, and Australia. If you can’t wait to see it yourself, Jane Manchun Wong explains how you can opt in to the test right now with a simple browser tweak.

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge If you’re a video creator on TikTok, then your comment section could be really frustrating, especially if somebody leaves a comment that completely misinterprets what you’ve been saying (to say the least). You could send a text reply or simply create another video, but according to TikTok, now you have a third option: you can reply to your comments using video rather than text.(Note: since this is something specifically for creators who want to video-reply to comments, we haven’t been able to test it yet. If / when we do, we’ll let you know.)To add a video to a comment on one of your existing TikTok videos:

Presentation director Masato Miyazaki on animating the likes of Lady Dimitrescu Continue reading…

Image: Sony Sony has just announced two new high-end home theater audio systems, both of which include HDMI 2.1 passthrough ports that offer full support for features like 8K video, 4K gaming at 120Hz, Dolby Vision HDR, eARC, and more.First up is the HT-A7000 Dolby Atmos 7.1.2-channel soundbar. Priced at $1,299.99, the soundbar has two HDMI 2.1 inputs, so theoretically you could run both a PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X into this thing and play each console to its full potential.Positioned as Sony’s latest flagship soundbar, the A7000 has two up-firing speakers for Atmos, two beam tweeters, and five front speakers for wider surround. There’s a built-in dual subwoofer, but if you need deeper bass, you can pay extra for a standalone sub; Sony’s... Continue reading…

Illustration by William Joel / The Verge Beginning next year, Verizon will join AT&T and T-Mobile in preloading Android Messages as the default texting app on all Android phones it sells. It’s the final step for making RCS Chat — the next-gen standard designed to replace SMS — the default experience for Android. In the US, that only leaves one large cohort that will not use RCS as a default SMS replacement: iPhone users.Verizon has also said it will fully support interoperability between carriers, so in theory the improved images, video, read receipts, and group chats should just work — assuming everybody you’re texting with is also using Android Messages.Verizon was the last of the big three US carriers to get on board with Google’s latest strategy to push RCS as the new... Continue reading…

Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images Jeff Bezos launched to the edge of space Tuesday morning with three fellow passengers and landed safely in a Texas desert aboard his space company’s crew capsule. The NS-16 mission marked Blue Origin’s first to carry humans and kicked off commercial service for the company’s space tourism business. Flying Bezos, the richest man in the world who founded Blue Origin in 2000, sent a signal to prospective space tourists that the company’s suborbital New Shepard rocket is safe to fly and open for business.The six-story-tall New Shepard booster lifted off under clear skies at 9:12AM ET on Tuesday from its remote launch site in Van Horn, Texas, with the company’s gumdrop-shaped RSS First Step crew capsule fixed on top. Bezos, his brother Mark,... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Adobe’s Premiere Pro is now ready for everyone using an M1 Mac. Support for Apple’s new chips is rolling out today, after launching in beta in December. Adobe says there are speed increases throughout the app, from a 50 percent faster launch to 77 percent faster “editing,” whatever that giant term encompasses.Apple released its first computers with M1 chips in November. Though they’re able to run apps that were built for machines with Intel processors, programs had to be updated to take full advantage of the M1’s speed improvements. Getting Adobe on board was always going to be a necessity — its apps are critical creative tools for many industries — and fortunately, Adobe has been fairly quick to get updates out the door for its biggest... Continue reading…

Camera uploads should now be faster and more reliable. | Image: Dropbox Dropbox is getting a slew of interface tweaks alongside new tools and features. One of the more useful inclusions is a new file conversion feature, which lets Dropbox users convert images between different formats like JPEG and PNG, and files into PDFs. Support for video conversion is coming soon. Dropbox is also adding new features to its password manager.Automatic camera backups from mobile, which will now be available to users on Dropbox’s free tier, are also seeing some improvements. Dropbox says uploads should now be faster and more reliable, and on iOS there’s now an option to specify exactly which folders should be automatically backed up (the feature is coming to Android later this year). There’s also the option to have photos... Continue reading…

Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge Apple’s AirPods Max over-ear headphones are more affordable than ever today at Best Buy and Amazon. Normally around $500 in recent weeks, each color option costs $455 (Best Buy has each color for this price, while Amazon’s selection is a little more spotty). It’s pricier than many competing noise-canceling headphones from the likes of Sony and Bose, but these have unrivaled build quality and materials, as well as solid performance in just about every regard. This price drop makes its minor flaws a little more excusable, like that it requires a $35 cable if you want to listen to music with a wire, and that its carrying case isn’t so great. The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD is the latest remaster to hit the Nintendo... Continue reading…

Photo by James Bareham / The Verge A new report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman says the 2021 iPhone may have an always-on display similar to Apple’s Watch, and which Android phones have had for some time. Gurman wrote in his Power On newsletter that the phones will have improved battery life, a smaller notch on the screen, better video recording, a 120Hz refresh rate, and a faster A15 chip.It isn’t the first time a leak has suggested Apple is working on always-on screens for upcoming iPhones. Leaker Max Weinbach hinted earlier this year that Apple may use the same kind of low temperature polycrystalline oxide (LTPO) panels that its Watches have on future iPhones.That’s in keeping with Bloomberg’s previous reporting that “at least one” of the four new iPhones will... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge A sweeping investigation by 17 media outlets found that NSO Group’s Pegasus software was used in hacking attempts on 37 smartphones belonging to human rights activists and journalists, The Washington Post reported. The phones were on a leaked list of numbers discovered by Paris journalism nonprofit Hidden Stories and human rights group Amnesty International, according to the Post. The numbers on the list were singled out for possible surveillance by countries who are clients of NSO, the report states, which markets its spyware to governments to track potential terrorists and criminals.Pegasus can extract all of a mobile device’s data, and activate the device’s microphone to listen in on conversations surreptitiously, as The Guardian n... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Facebook continued its pushback Saturday against President Biden’s comment that social media platforms were “killing people” with COVID-19 misinformation, in a blog post from its vice president of integrity Guy Rosen. The post states that the “facts tell a very different story to the one promoted by the administration in recent days.”“At a time when COVID-19 cases are rising in America, the Biden administration has chosen to blame a handful of American social media companies,” Rosen wrote. “While social media plays an important role in society, it is clear that we need a whole of society approach to end this pandemic. And facts — not allegations — should help inform that effort.”(The post was titled “Moving Past the Finger Pointing:... Continue reading…

Photo by James Vincent / The Verge Online-only British supermarket Ocado has had to cancel some customers’ delivery orders after a Friday robot collision at one of its warehouses caused a fire, the company said.The fire at the company’s Erith warehouse east of London “appears to have been caused by the collision of three bots on the grid,” the company said in a statement on Sunday. No one was injured, and the damage was limited to less than 1 percent of its grid, according to Ocado.The grocer’s warehouses are populated with washing machine-sized robots that move products around on a grid system. The Verge’s James Vincent wrote about Ocado’s plans in a 2018 feature story. He described the process:

You’re not having deja vu. Six years after launching a line of Linux game consoles that went down as one of the biggest tech flops of the past decade, Valve is trying once again. Only this time, its Steam Machine dreams and unusual touchpads have been rolled into a 7-inch handheld PC that looks and works like a Nintendo Switch.It’s called the Steam Deck, and you can read all about its specs, extensive controls and TV docking station right here.I’m not deluding myself into thinking it’s a Switch-killer. (Even if the Steam Deck’s $399 starting price might seem close to Nintendo’s $350 Switch with OLED screen, you’re not getting Mario, Zelda and Metroid on a Steam Deck.) But having watched Valve closely over the past nine years, I don’t... Continue reading…

One of the most powerful new features in iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and macOS Monterey, is Focus mode.At its core, a Focus mode is a more customizable version of Apple’s existing Do Not Disturb and is accessed from the same menu on iOS, iPadOS, and macOS. But Focus modes are far more customizable, allowing for more granular triggers for when you’re filtering out notifications.

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Since 2019, Amazon has sold nearly 400,000 hair dryers that could shock someone if they fell into a pool of water, 24,000 carbon monoxide detectors that didn’t actually detect carbon monoxide, and an unspecified number of “children’s sleepwear garments” that didn’t meet flammability requirements, according to the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).Now, the US safety regulator wants to force Amazon to recall those products. This past week, it sued the company in a case that could be the latest to hold Amazon accountable for products offered by its third-party sellers. But here’s the thing: Amazon has already recalled these specific products. They’re no longer for sale.Amazon says, and the CPSC acknowledges, that the giant... Continue reading…

TurboTax parent company Intuit has opted out of the IRS Free File Program. | Getty Images Intuit, the parent company of tax filing software TurboTax, is exiting an IRS program that allows many Americans to file their taxes for free. The IRS partners with the Free File Alliance, a nonprofit coalition of tax software companies that offer no-cost tax filing services for the Free File program. Intuit says in a blog post on its website that part of the reason it’s leaving Free File— which is available to 2020 filers with adjusted gross income of $72,000 or less— is the “restraints” of the program.“With the Free File program surpassing its founding goals of e-file and free tax preparation, and due to the limitations of the Free File program and conflicting demands from those outside the program, we are not able to continue in the... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Tesla has started offering a monthly subscription for its Full Self Driving package for $199 per month (h/t Electrek). Tesla owners who bought the since-discontinued Enhanced Autopilot package can get the FSD subscription for $99 per month, according to Tesla’s support page. Until now the automaker had sold its FSD package for a one-time fee of $10,000, but the monthly subscription lets users test-drive (literally) the FSD features without a long-term commitment. Tesla owners can cancel their monthly FSD subscription at any time, according to the terms on the Tesla website.Only Teslas that have the FSD computer hardware 3.0 (HW3) or above plus either Basic or Enhanced Autopilot configurations are eligible to subscribe to FSD; other... Continue reading…

Photo by PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images The spectacle of launching billionaires into space is the beginning of a long road ahead Continue reading…

Zoom weddings soared during the pandemic | Illustration by Grayson Blackmon Virtual weddings, one of the more endearing traditions to emerge during last year’s pandemic-related lockdowns, are no longer legal in New York now that Gov. Andrew Cuomo has lifted his April executive order. First reported by the New York Times, the order Cuomo signed was meant for a state of emergency, and he rescinded the EO effective June 25th.New York state law requires that a couple planning to wed “must state in the presence of an authorized public official or authorized member of the clergy and at least one other witness that each takes the other as his or her spouse.” So in order to keep Zoom and other virtual weddings legal, new legislation would be necessary.Zoom weddings allowed brides and grooms to keep their wedding... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge California’s legislature has voted unanimously to approve a $6 billion plan to build a statewide open access fiber network (h/t ArsTechnica). The state will provide $3.25 billion to hire a third party to build and maintain a so-called “middle-mile” network, which won’t bring internet directly from backbone infrastructure to customers, but rather to connection points, leaving the last mile to be handled by internet service providers (ISPs). The legislation provides $2 billion for last-mile infrastructure lines to connect residences and businesses to local networks.Making the middle-mile network open access will allow “non-discriminatory access to eligible entities on a technology and competitively neutral basis, regardless of whether the... Continue reading…

A good camera system and top-notch features, but it’s priced too high to recommend Continue reading…

Photo by Andrew Marino / The Verge A cornucopia of audio tech spread across two desks Continue reading…

The second-gen Google Nest Hub | Photo by Dan Seifert / The Verge Though we’re hitting the sleepy, dog-days of summer and there aren’t any big sale events on the horizon, there are still plenty of great deals out there if you know where to look. This week we found bargains on bundles of Google’s Nest Hub and Nest Thermostat, HyperX’s excellent gaming headset, the best Chromebook you can get right now, and Amazon’s kids-focused Fire HD tablets. Check them out below.For a limited time, you can pick up a Google Nest Hub (second-gen) and a budget-friendly Nest Thermostat for $167 through BuyDig’s official storefront on eBay. If you prefer a smart speaker over a thermostat, BuyDig is also offering the same Hub model with a Google Nest Audio for $140, more than $100 off what they would cost if you were to... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge When you’re using WhatsApp your messages are encrypted end-to-end, which means prying eyes can’t easily see what’s in them as they travel back and forth. However, if you keep a backup stored in the cloud, authorities can use a search warrant to have Google Drive or iCloud hand over access to the data. But WABetaInfo has reported previously that WhatsApp is working on the technology to independently encrypt your backups in the cloud, and says that in the most recent beta update on Android (2.21.15.5), the system has been enabled.Opting in should keep your chat history and media securely backed up, with the significant caveat that if you forget your passcode / lose the 64-digit recovery key, then they’ll be locked away permanently — even... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Fakespot, known for its web browser extensions that try to weed out fake product reviews, suddenly no longer has an iPhone or iPad app — because Amazon sent Apple a takedown request, both Amazon and Fakespot confirm, and Apple decided to remove the app.The giant retailer says it was concerned about how a new update to the Fakespot app was “wrapping” its website without permission, and how that could be theoretically exploited to steal Amazon customer data. Fakespot founder Saoud Khalifah told The Verge that Apple abruptly removed the app today without any explanation. Apple confirms it removed the app, but disputes the circumstances.The new Fakespot app launched just over a month ago, and I can confirm it let you log in to Amazon,... Continue reading…

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images The White House escalated its fight against vaccine misinformation on Friday, with President Biden directly criticizing Facebook and other platforms for allowing vaccine misinformation to spread — and consequently raising the ongoing death toll from the deadly pandemic.Asked for a message to platforms like Facebook, Biden replied, “They’re killing people ... the only pandemic we have is among the unvaccinated, and they’re killing people.” The White House did not immediately respond to a request for clarification of the president’s comments.The full exchange is embedded below:

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Two California residents have been indicted for allegedly planning to firebomb the offices of California’s Democratic governor in Sacramento after the 2020 election, and had also discussed bombing Facebook and Twitter, federal court records show.The pair, who were indicted on conspiracy charges as well as illegal possession of firearms and explosives, were part of an anti-government militia with a strong pro-Trump agenda called the Three Percenters. The conspirators’ texts alluded that their planned actions would send a message to tech companies like Facebook and Twitter days after they banned Trump from their platforms.Texts recovered by the FBI indicated that the two men believed President Trump won the 2020 election, and that they... Continue reading…