technology news
This Tweet Crashes Twitter on iPhones
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Technology
Stripe Is Silently Recording Your Movements On Its Customers’ Websites
Michael Lynch, blogger and former software engineer at Microsoft and Google, discovered that the payment processing platform Stripe and its official JavaScript library records all browsing activity on its customers’ websites and reports it back to the company.
FCC To Approve 5G Network Despite Military Saying It Will Harm GPS
Pai says power limits and guard band will prevent interference with GPS.
Yes, Section 215 Expired. Now What?
On March 15, 2020, Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act—a surveillance law with a rich history of government overreach and abuse—expired. Along with two other PATRIOT Act provisions, Section 215 lapsed after lawmakers failed to reach an agreement on a broader set of reforms to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
How Google Plans to Push Its Coronavirus Tracing Feature to Android Phones
Android has a notoriously patchy update cycle, so Google is using another method to push a new coronavirus tracing feature to phones without user interaction.
The Challenge of Proximity Apps For COVID-19 Contact Tracing
As part of the nearly unprecedented societal response to COVID-19, such contact tracing apps raise difficult questions about privacy, efficacy, and responsible engineering of technology to advance public health. Above all, we should not trust any application—no matter how well-designed—to solve this crisis or answer all of these questions.
Google-Fitbit Merger Would Cement Google’s Data Empire
Google buying another tech company isn’t new. But Google’s proposed acquisition of Fitbit poses an extraordinary threat to competition and user privacy.
MIT-Based Team Works to Rapidly Deploy Open-Source, Low-Cost Ventilator For As Little As $400 In Parts
Clinical and design considerations will be published online; goal is to support rapid scale-up of device production to alleviate hospital shortages.
Comcast Wins Supreme Court Case Over Interpretation of Civil Rights Law
Comcast has won a US Supreme Court case against Byron Allen’s Entertainment Studios Networks (ESN), dealing a major blow to Allen’s attempt to prove that Comcast’s refusal to carry ESN channels was motivated by racial bias.
Elections: Early warning system to fight disinformation online
A new project is an effort to combat the rise of coordinated social media campaigns to incite violence, sew discord and threaten the integrity of democratic elections.
AT&T Waives Data Cap During Coronavirus; Comcast Keeps Charging Overage Fees
Ars Technica asked 10 ISPs if they’ll waive caps as pandemic forces people to stay home.
This Company Made a Version of Android That Runs on the iPhone
Corellium was already getting sued by Apple. This probably won’t help things.
This Website Yells at You Every Time You Touch Your Stupid Face
If you’re trying to stop touching your face to keep from spreading coronavirus, being shamed by a website might help.
A Major Synth Company Created This Fake Product to Attack a Journalist
Behringer issued a half-hearted apology after attacking a critic with a bizarre video that many saw as anti-semitic.
Marsquakes and ancient magnetic fields: InSight’s first data (PHOTOS)
Last year, we activated the first useful seismograph on Mars.