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The United States puts more people in prison than any other country in the world, yet little is known about the ways this sad reality impacts the immediate family members of those who are incarcerated. An alarming new study is revealing the extent of the issue, showing that 45 percent of all Americans have had…
In what might be one of the most surprising departures from the Trump administration yet, Scott Gottlieb has tendered his resignation as commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, effective next month. The abrupt decision, initially reported by the Washington Post on Tuesday, comes in the middle of several public health initiatives pushed by Gottlieb’s…
In New York, Amazon’s (scrapped) plans for a Queens headquarters were ultimately received with a derisive Bronx cheer. Legislators in Arlington, Virginia, however, have been more welcoming, going so far as to offer the company up to $23 million just to do what it does best: be really goddamn big. An agreement between Arlington County…
The encryption war is quiet now, but the murky back-and-forth between Silicon Valley and Washington, D.C., is far from over. FBI Director Christopher Wray said on Tuesday that the encryption issue is “getting worse and worse” for law enforcement around the United States at all levels. It’s a common refrain for government officials over the…
In 2017, a report from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel revealed that TripAdvisor was deleting reviews that included details of sexual assault and rape. The company admitted it was removing reviews of this nature, and subsequently launched a system that labeled some hotels with these types of reports. But it looks like the travel website is…
I’ve loved the idea of folding gadgets ever since Arthur C. Clarke talked about flexible “SoftScreens” in books like, The Light of Other Days. A device that can be folded and crumpled without breaking? That’s my idea of the perfect gadget, and while the bendy Samsung Galaxy Fold and Huawei Mate X seem like they…
Last month, Canadian cryptocurrency exchange QuadrigaCX found itself in an unusual situation, even by the standards of this lawless, scam-happy industry: The only person with the passwords to the exchange’s trove of cold storage funds allegedly died, taking access to customers’ money to the grave with him. Now it seems many of the digital wallets…
Last month, the U.S. Army put out a call to private companies for ideas about how to improve its planned semi-autonomous, AI-driven targeting system for tanks. In its request, the Army asked for help enabling the Advanced Targeting and Lethality Automated System (ATLAS) to “acquire, identify, and engage targets at least 3X faster than the current…
Following the discovery of a bug that showed hundreds of Google accounts as being linked to unrelated individual users, Google has temporarily shut down Photos on Android TV. The mysterious software flaw demonstrated potential privacy concerns, and the company said a fix is in the works. According to Android Police, Google decided to pull the…
The National Security Agency has “quietly shut down” the mass surveillance program it implemented after the September 11, 2001 terror attacks to analyze metadata on domestic calls and text messages, the New York Times reported on Monday, citing an episode of the Lawfare podcast with “senior Republican congressional aide” Luke Murry. The Wall Street Journal…
Google’s bug-zapping Project Zero team has uncovered what it said was a “high-severity” flaw in the macOS kernel, Wired reported on Monday, and revealed the details on March 1 following the expiration of a 90-day period for Apple to patch the exploit. The vulnerability, known as BuggyCow, allows for attackers to bypass the protection built…
For too many people, moving the digits around in some variation of Patriots69Lover is their idea of a strong password. So you might expect something complicated like” “ji32k7au4a83” would be a great password. But according to the data breach repository Have I Been Pwned (HIBP), it shows up more often than one might expect. This…
In 2017, Google was accused of gender pay discrimination by the U.S. Department of Labor. Later that year, Google employees conducted their own informal salary review, finding that women were paid less than men. In January of last year, several women filed a class-action lawsuit against the company, alleging it underpays women. Which is why…
Ridesharing platform Lyft bought itself some goodwill in the wake of its initial public offering last week when SEC disclosures made it clear—as had been rumored—that the company would be distributing bonuses to select drivers. The number of drivers who might receive these benefits, however, may be vanishingly small. “Up to $10,000 in cash bonuses”…
House Democrats on Wednesday will introduce a bill to reinstate the net neutrality rules repealed by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in late 2017. In a letter to Democratic colleagues, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the bill, know as the “Save the Internet Act,” will be introduced on Wednesday morning at 11:15 am. Text of…
Once the vanguard of a new age of consumer bots, the cute but doomed “social robot” Jibo is now marching toward obsolescence in the most friendly way possible: By politely informing owners that their time together is coming to an end. Jibo owners have taken to social media to post videos of their bots saying…
A newly unveiled French tax proposal targets American internet companies like Amazon, a company notorious for paying zero federal taxes in the United States on multibillion-dollar annual profits. The French proposal promises to end tax avoidance at a time when Silicon Valley’s tax practices and tax avoidance schemes are coming under a close microscope around the…
Over the weekend, Facebook users were freaked out to learn that the social network allows “Everyone” to look them up with the phone number they provided for two-factor authentication (2FA) by default. This sneaky ad-targeting method disguised as a privacy tool really has no privacy benefits, but there’s still a way to protect yourself. The…
Apple is hiring an analyst, but not just any old analyst. It’s hiring someone to sift through the social media hellscape and parse just how customers really feel about its voice assistant Siri. The posting went live on March 1 and was initially reported by VentureBeat. In it, Apple says it’s looking for someone to…
The Chinese government has formally accused two Canadian citizens, Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, of spying and stealing “state secrets,” according to a new report in the Washington Post. The charges come on the heels of a Canadian court’s ruling on Friday that an executive for Huawei who’s been charged with fraud can be extradited…
