Tech news, analysis, culture, business, security, and more
Investigators arrested a suspect this morning for the murder of tech C.E.O. Fahim Saleh, 33. Saleh’s personal assistant, Tyrese Devon Haspil, 21, is expected to be charged with second degree murder, along with other crimes, according to two officials who spoke with New York Times. Saleh was discovered by his sister in his Lower East…
In the days since we saw some of Twitter’s highest-profile accounts taken over for what appears to be a massive cryptocurrency scam, we’ve come up with more questions than we’ve gotten answers. How, exactly, was that one Twitter employee actually involved? What sort of technical protections has the company come up with to keep this…
A couple months ago, rumors started to swirl about an upcoming Lenovo gaming phone with a funky side-mounted pop-up cam, and now based on a listing on JD.com, it seems those rumors were true. In the listing first noticed by 91mobiles, the Lenovo Legion Gaming Phone Pro looks to feature some serious hardware including Qualcomm’s…
You can change which DNS server your devices use which could help you get a faster, more secure internet connection in the process.
Today is World Emoji Day, a “holiday” that is apparently a thing. To celebrate, both Google and Apple have shared some new emoji coming to Android 11 and iOS this year. For iOS, yesterday Apple previewed to Emojipedia 13 new emoji, including a dodo, a matryoshka doll, piñata, a tamale, anatomical heart, beaver, boomerang, lungs,…
Sex tech made a splash as a new category at CES 2020—an event that was somehow just months ago—but it was specifically Lora DiCarlo’s Baci toy that dominated the show floor. The award-winning Baci is launching today alongside the company’s new virtual sexual wellness coaching service—because, you know, staying at home is boring and there…
The U.S. recorded 77,255 new cases of coronavirus on Thursday, setting a depressing new world record. The U.S. has the worst outbreak on the planet right now, but it’s probably more accurate to say this new record was broken last week. Why? The largest private testing lab in the country is currently averaging more than…
A handful of Peacock’s titles have or are shortly set to vanish from the brand new streaming service that officially rolled out this week. Here’s why that’s happening so soon after its launch. Titles that appeared on the service for its Wednesday launch date were not there as of Thursday, including the original Fast &…
HBO Max announced today that it’s making a new series based on the popular relaxation app, Calm. The 30-minute, 10-episode series, A World of Calm, will feature the same story time narration style that the app is known for, plus “mesmeric imagery,” HBO says. HBO is working on its new show in collaboration with Nutopia,…
It’s been weeks since Mark Zuckerberg pledged to wipe voter suppression from the site, thanks, perhaps, to a grim internal civil rights audit which called Facebook’s measures to curb voter suppression and racism “reactive and piecemeal,” or, maybe, the ad boycott. How’s it going over there? Not great, according to ProPublica. In an inspection of…
Donald Trump’s reelection campaign manager and magically impotent “digital wizard” Brad Parscale has gone to that big dumping ground for washed-up Trump lackeys in the sky. Trump’s catastrophic handling of the novel coronavirus pandemic; the implosion of the economy; myriad scandals; and threats to send the military to shoot protesters against police racism and brutality…
An apparent cryptocurrency scheme that bombed Twitter Wednesday saw the accounts of high-profile brands, crypto exchanges, businesspeople, celebrities, and politicians compromised in an unprecedented hack that raises serious concerns about the security flaws of the platform and what information could have been jeopardized in the incident. Right now, details about the specifics of the hack…
TikTok is facing a widespread crackdown due to security concerns, which has left Facebook an opening to take down the rival social network. The company will use Instagram to do it, just like it did with Instagram Stories to keep Snapchat at bay. Instagram launched a new TikTok-esque feature, Reels, in India earlier this month following TikTok’s…
For the past two weeks, US officials have been grilling TikTok and other China-based tech giants over potential concerns surrounding the data security of Americans who use these apps, not to mention the national security implications of these apps’ alleged allegiance to the Chinese government. Now, it’s looking like the tech giants based on American…
While no one likes being jerked around on the phone, the amount of spam and robocalls we’re forced to endure is only expected to increase, so today T-Mobile introduced a new collection of tools and apps designed to prevent annoying calls from hitting your phone. In a livestream hosted today, T-Mobile detailed its new Scam Shield…
Microsoft has been testing its Project xCloud game streaming platform throughout the past year, and today Microsoft announced xCloud will leave beta and become available to the public in September as an addition to Xbox’s $15 a month Game Pass Ultimate. Just don’t get too attached to the xCloud name though, because while Microsoft has…
Maybe you’ve got friends coming over to watch a movie, or you need your family to watch this one really great YouTube video. Or maybe you’ve just got a slideshow of photos to show off to no one at all because some of us are still stuck at home in the midst of a pandemic.…
Even in the best-case scenario for the 2020 election, in which America flushes Donald Trump out of office and we can feel like we’ve showered for the first time since 2015, the toilet plume of this presidency will likely hang over us for years to come. After numerous reports on QAnon adherents currently running for…
Are you a frontline worker dealing with new stresses or irresponsible management? Is working (or not working) from home starting to take a psychological toll? How are you coping with reopening? Submit a story using this Google form or send me an email with the subject line “My Covid Story” and provide as much detail as…
Gather the coins in your couch cushions and whatever’s left of your Trump bucks. On August 6, 2020, you can bid for over 50 life-size animatronic dinosaurs on AbleAuction. This is not a drill. I repeat: this is not a drill. The listing, which was spotted by BoingBoing, says that this treasure hoard of robot…
