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The revelation that U.S. prosecutors have prepared an indictment against Julian Assange, a fact the government inadvertently made public Thursday evening, has again fanned the flames of speculation over what class of crimes he might be charged with should British authorities finally capture and hand him over to the United States. Legal experts have long…
Democrats and Republicans can agree on at least one thing: The spam robocall situation has gotten entirely out of hand. Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey, a Democrat, and Senator John Thune, a South Dakota Republican, introduced a bill on Friday that aims to ramp up the penalties on illegal robocalls—and stop them from reaching your phone…
Back before the Pixel line was a thing, Google’s Nexus phones were prized for their solid builds, stock software (with day-one updates), and affordable prices. But after several generations of Pixels with flagship price tags, it’s seemed like making affordable phones was something Google left in the past. That may change, however, because a Russian…
Canadian scientists have identified microscopic creatures that are so unlike anything seen before, they had to create an entirely new branch on the evolutionary tree of life to slot them in. A new paper published this week in Nature offers the first genetic analysis of hemimastigotes—a rare and poorly understood group of single-celled microorganisms. Biologists…
Filmstruck and its Criterion Channel are set to be shuttered at the end of this month, but it appears a viral online petition along with some high-profile celebrity endorsements from the likes of Christopher Nolan and Guillermo Del Toro may have changed some executives’ minds. In an announcement today, Criterion said its own standalone service…
Sometimes words aren’t enough, and that’s where emojis come in. But even then, there are times you just can’t find the perfect little pictograph that encapsulates your exact mood. Even the slightly more expressive kaomoji can fail you when you need them most. So why not build your own? Like an emoji that captures what…
A recently published Facebook patent application imagines an unnerving way to use your data. The company filed for a patent that explores piecing together information about a user’s entire household based on the pictures they upload, presumably for targeted advertising. And yes, Instagram photos were also cited in the filing. The patent application was originally…
A new survey from Pew Research has given us some insight into how Americans are feeling about our algorithm-driven society, and the verdict is, we aren’t loving it. One question in particular shows that social media companies could help the public feel more comfortable if they would just lose the political campaign ads altogether. Pew…
Over the last seven years, Affetto, a “child-type android” created by researchers at the University of Osaka, has become far more lifelike. In 2011, Affetto was a taut-skinned doll with a moving mouth and eyes—no more lifelike than an animatronic Cabbage Patch Kid. Today, the robo-boy can convey emotion with skin that seems to contort…
North Korean state media announced today that the country’s leader, Kim Jong Un, recently oversaw tests of a “newly developed ultramodern tactical weapon.” The new report is extremely light on details, but it’s a reminder that very little has actually changed in the U.S.-North Korea relationship since President Donald Trump took power. Both countries have…
Following an earlier report that the Justice Department was looking to prosecute WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, the Washington Post has now reported that Assange may have been charged under seal in a revelation that appears to have stemmed from a mistake in a court filing. The circumstances by which this information was disclosed, if indeed…
Following recent research that found U.S. telecom companies were throttling video streaming services like Netflix and YouTube, three Democratic senators are now calling for a response from those major mobile carriers in letters to their respective company heads. Citing a multi-university study that collected data on the practice using an app called Wehe—which was developed…
Last year, consulting megafirm Accenture inked a nearly $300 million contract with Customs and Border Protection to help the agency recruit around 7,500 staffers over a period of five years. The tech industry’s complicity with CBP and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)—agencies widely criticized as helping enact President Trump’s nativist agenda—has led to widespread employee…
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission has authorized part of SpaceX’s application to build and launch more than 7,500 satellites, according to a press release. These would make up part of a proposed constellation of almost 12,000 satellites designed to improve internet connectivity. Satellite communications currently rely on satellites in geostationary orbit, 36,000 kilometers (22,369 miles)…
Android 9 Pie was released more than three months ago, but Samsung phones, including the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy Note 9, still aren’t running the latest software. As Samsung works on updating its devices to Android 9 in the coming months, today we learned there’s one really annoying change in policy that will be waiting…
On Thursday, the Burlington County Prosecutor’s Office in New Jersey announced formal charges against the three people involved in a viral GoFundMe campaign that raised $400,000 last year to help a homeless man get on his feet. Authorities said that “the entire campaign was predicated on a lie.” At a press conference this afternoon, prosecutor…
The Federal Communications Commission just made a move to make global location positioning even more global by opening the doors to Europe’s system. The European Union has its own brand of GPS called Galileo, which it launched in 2016 so that it could provide positioning services independently of the U.S. system (GPS), Russia’s GLONASS, and…
Today, Facebook set up a press conference addressing a bombshell report from The New York Times that alleged, among other things, that the company contracted a Republican opposition research firm called Definers to run interference on the company’s image, a job which reportedly included leaning on George Soros conspiracy theories. On the call, Mark Zuckerberg…
It can be hard to know if and when you might have been impacted by a data breach. That is, unless you’re a Firefox Quantum user. Today, Mozilla announced it’ll alert desktop users when they stumble upon a site that’s recently reported a breach. Basically, if you happen upon a site that’s been breached in…
Artificial Intelligence researchers used a neural network to create fake fingerprints that could be a hacker’s dream tool. Five researchers, led by Philip Bontrager of the New York University engineering school, developed what they have called “DeepMasterPrints.” The Guardian reported that the research was presented at a biometrics conference in Los Angeles in October. As…
