Technology news

Trials for AI lie detection at border patrol checkpoints are set to begin soon in the EU. The program, called iBorderCtrl, will run for six months at four border crossing points in Hungary, Latvia and Greece with countries outside the European Union, as reported by Gizmodo.
iBorderCtrl is an EU-funded project that uses AI in order to facilitate faster border crossings for travelers. The system has users fill out an online application and upload some documents, like their passport, before a virt

JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon says he doesn’t “really give a shit” about bitcoin, his latest harsh comment on the popular cryptocurrency. Dimon spoke out about bitcoin yesterday at an Axios conference, after keeping silent for a period of time following an apology for calling bitcoin a “fraud.”
Last September, Dimon called out bitcoin in searing comments, added that, “It won’t end well. Someone will get killed.” But by January, he had backpedalled, sa

CBS continues to embrace online video streaming, introducing a second standalone network today that will be dedicated entirely to entertainment news.According to TechCrunch, the new streaming network is called ET Live, and is a project from CBS Interactive and Entertainment Tonight, which is owned by CBS TV. The streaming service is free of charge, but supported by ads — meaning you’ll have to sit through ads just like traditional TV. Unlike the Entertainment Tonight television show

As podcasting has matured as a medium, it’s grown to cover almost every genre and style imaginable, from old-school tech talk and true crime, to sci-fi and sobering historical deep dives. It’s also proven extraordinarily adept at horror, with both fictional podcasts and real-life tales offering a variety of scares, chills, and unsettling encounters. Much like traditional radio dramas, there’s a distinct intimacy to the format, one that allows talented storytellers to unnerve a

By now, filmmakers and game designers have jump-scares down to a science. All it takes to really startle an audience is a combination of unsettling music, a protagonist or avatar creeping up on something they probably shouldn’t approach, and a big blare of sound and something moving rapidly at the screen. The formula works just about every time, to the point where a painfully clunky horror movie like Rings can get away with startling audiences just by having an umbrella open up on-screen

Dag Reckhorn, Faraday Future’s senior vice president of global manufacturing — and the last of the company’s five “founding executives” — resigned Wednesday, according to an internal email obtained by The Verge. The news comes after investor trouble sparked two wild weeks of layoffs and salary cuts that quickly turned into furloughs and executive departures at the EV startup, and a co-founder calling the company “effectively insolvent.” Reckhorn s

In the days leading up to the US midterm elections on November 6th, Amazon’s Alexa will be able to tell users information about voter registration deadlines, polling information, and give real-time election results. Following the election, Alexa will also be able to give more details on the outcome, including how many seats each party gained, and information on specific candidates.
Alexa will be sourcing its replies from a couple of different partners Amazon’s teamed up with. In the

Spotify is returning to Roku’s streaming players and Roku TVs beginning today after a fairly long absence from the platform. Devices running Roku OS 9 (which has also just started rolling out) and TVs on OS 8.2 can head to the channel store and download the Spotify app. Aside from simply launching it from the home screen with a remote, the new Spotify for Roku app can also play tunes through Spotify Connect, so you can control playback from other devices like your smartphone.Spotify remov

Spoilers ahead for the American TV remake of Heathers.
It should come as no surprise that the marathon release of Paramount Television’s Heathers fell apart. The embattled TV remake of the 1988 film comedy has been delayed repeatedly over the past year, as a wave of school shootings and terrible advance reviews made the show’s tongue-in-cheek look at high school violence seem like a public relations disaster. Paramount attempted to sell off the series, then heavily recut it, merging

Honor announced a pair of wireless earbuds today called the FlyPods and the FlyPods Pro, and they’re nearly a carbon copy of Apple’s AirPods, down to the charging case. Honor’s parent company Huawei released a pair of AirPods clones earlier this year, called the Huawei FreeBuds, and was supposed to release its successor alongside the Mate 20, but plans seem to have changed. According to Gizmochina, the FreeBuds Pro 2 have been rebranded as Honor’s FlyPods Pro.
The FlyPod

Titancould put an end to stock market FOMO. The app chooses the best 20 stocks by scraping top hedge fund data, adds some shorts based on your personal risk profile and puts your money to work. No worrying about market fluctuations or constantly rebalancing your portfolio. You don’t have to do anything, but can get smarter about stocks thanks to its in-app explanations and research reports. Titan wants to be the easiest way to invest in stocks for a mobile generation that wants an affordab

In 1988, the summer A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master was released, New Line Cinema sued BMG, the music label of DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince. The rap duo’s second album He’s the DJ, I’m the Rapper had been released earlier that year, and they made a video for “Nightmare on My Street,” a tribute, in the pair’s signature goofy style, to the Elm Street dream demon himself, Freddy Krueger. Originally, they’d been in talks to produce the v

Leading e-cigarette companies have admitted in meetings with the Food and Drug Administration that vape flavorings appeal to kids, and suggested ways that the agency could regulate those products, according to an FDA statement today. But public health experts say not to expect the industry to come up with useful ways to police itself.After years of public health officials warning that young people were using e-cigarettes in alarming numbers, the FDA is crafting regulations to prevent kids and t

Twitter has updated a portion of its reporting process, specifically when you report a tweet that you think might be coming from a bot or a fake account masquerading as someone or something else. Now, when you tap the “it’s suspicious or spam” option under the report menu, you’ll be able to specify why you think that, including an option to say “the account tweeting this is fake.”Twitter announced the change through its official safety account today, and it&r

Fortnite’s monster-fueled “Fortnitemares” event is coming to an end this weekend, and it looks like it will end with a bang. Developer Epic Games announced today that the Halloween event will end on Sunday, and that a one-time-only occurrence will happen in-game that day at 1PM ET. “Login early and be in-match to witness the one-time event,” the developer tweeted.
“Fortnitemares” kicked off last week, and it represented a dramatic change for the game, f

“Genetic privacy” is a complicated concept, and a new study finds that decoding how people feel about the idea is equally complex.Genetic data can be collected for medical purposes, like genetic testing for hereditary diseases, by the government for identification purposes, or submitted to private companies that promise to tell you more about yourself and your ancestry. But increasingly, researchers are realizing that people’s expectations for how their data might be used aren

In recent days, both Vice News and Business Insider have put Facebook’s political ad transparency efforts to the test ahead — and the results are not good. Yesterday, Vice was able to easily game the “Paid for by” disclosure on political ads, getting false disclosures approved in the name of all 100 sitting US senators. Facebook approved the ads after the purchaser was able to verify their own identity with a postcard showing that they were a US resident. From there, the

Electric scooter sharing company Lime has pulled a number of Segway Ninebot scooters from its fleet after learning that a manufacturing defect could result in batteries “smoldering or, in some cases, catching fire.”
According to the company’s statement, it first learned of the issue in August. Working independently and with Segway, Lime created software to identify the scooters with these batteries, and deactivated them once identified. A Lime representative speaking to The Wa

Well over a year into the Nintendo Switch’s life, it’s still exciting and surprising to see huge console games like Wolfenstein or Diablo make their way to the tablet. There’s something inherently captivating about having an experience of that scale in the palm of your hands, or to be able to jump back and forth between your TV and tablet while using the same device. But the Switch has also proven itself to be a great place for smaller games, particularly from indie developers

Nomad has a new wireless charger out today, an updated version of the company’s existing Base Station charger that adds an additional integrated Apple Watch charger, and it might just fill the void of Apple’s seemingly indefinitely delayed AirPower charger.
The Apple Watch addition is the main difference from the original Base Station, along with a$20 price bump up to $119.99. The Base Station itself still has a lovely looking aluminum and leather base with three charging coils, all

Apple wants to attract big-name game developers to create games with its computers and iPads, specifically the new iPad Pro, in mind. That means the company needs to pitch the device (a tablet that most wouldn’t list as a go-to portable gaming device) to a different crowd. Part of the way that Apple conveys that message is by dunking on consoles like Sony’s PlayStation or Microsoft’s Xbox by using a specific phrase in its presentation, as it did yesterday: “It provides a

Apple’s new iPad Pros are here, and if you haven’t already heard, one of the biggest changes is the switch to USB-C (and only USB-C) —unlike Apple’s iPhones, which feature Lightning as their single port.
Many people — myself included — have taken the time to rant about how Apple refuses to put USB-C on the iPhone. It’s a decision that would have allowed basically every major Apple device to share a charger with each other and with practically every othe

Phones with foldable screens have felt like they’re on the cusp of arriving for years, but outside of a couple of concept designs and trailers, we have yet to see one receive a proper release. However, Royole Corporation could be about to win the race with the FlexPai, a tablet-sized phone that can be bent into a shape the size of a small paperback book.Before you get your hopes up that the era of foldable smartphones is finally upon us, you should watch the below video featuring the devi

Chinese phone maker ZTE is launching the Blade Max 2S and the Blade Max View, two smartphones with lower-end specs for $180 and $200, respectively. Both phones have 6-inch 2160 x 1080 LCD screens with 18:9 aspect ratios, 1.4GHz processors, 4,000mAh batteries, and 32GB of storage.The Blade Max 2S has 2GB of RAM, and the Blade Max View has 3GB. For $20 more, the Max View offers dual 16-megapixel and 2-megapixel rear cameras and Android Nougat, while the Max 2s has a single 13-megapixel rear camer

Hyper has a new USB-C hub, and it’s a pretty clever twist on the usual hubs we’ve seen. Instead of plugging your charger into a separate hub, the HyperDrive USB-C Hub Attach attaches (get it?) to the charger for a more seamless setup than a dangling dongle.It’s similar to the TwelveSouth’s PlugBug, which attaches to the plug end of Apple’s MacBook chargers to add USB Type-A ports for charging. But the HyperDrive USB-C Hub Attach goes a step further by actually serv

Netflix has released the first look of Henry Cavill as Geralt of Rivia for its upcoming take on The Witcher. Lauren Schmidt Hissrich is adapting Andrzej Sapkowski’s beloved fantasy novels for the streaming service.Since their release, they’ve inspired graphic novels, board games, and, of course, the acclaimed video game series from CD Projekt Red. In The Witcher’s world, monster hunters known as witchers fight supernatural beings with the help of special powers and body modifi

Trump strategist Steve Bannon has resurfaced in an unlikely place: the tech conference circuit. He is currently scheduled as the keynote speaker at the 15th International Conference on Advances in Computer Entertainment Technology (or ACE2018), to be hosted at the University of Montana in December. The conference is co-located with the Fourth International Congress on Love and Sex with Robots, although Bannon does not have any apparent connection to that gathering.
The broader scientific commun

Apple released iOS 12.1 yesterday, adding support for a second SIM card to the iPhone XS and XR through the use of a digital eSIM. Apple may have technically added support for eSIM cards, but none of the major US carriers are ready for it. According to a report from MacRumors, AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile are all delaying their adoption of eSIM until later this year. (Sprint wasn’t included in Apple’s original announcement, but it told PCMag that it will support eSIM at some poin

Fortnite is almost as popular as Mario and Zelda amongst Switch owners, according to Nintendo. During the company’s most recent financial briefing, Nintendo revealed that Epic’s battle royale game has been installed on “nearly half” of all Switch systems. The company also notes that the game is popular globally, “not just in the US and Europe but also in Japan.”
While Nintendo didn’t reveal a specific number of downloads, the Switch has currently sold j

Not long ago, Tetsuya Mizuguchi, the legendary game designer behind musical classics Rez and Lumines, was on vacation with his family in Hawaii. When he looked out the window of his Airbnb, his view was dominated by a lush, green golf course. As he stared outside, he couldn’t help but see very specific shapes in the grass. “I found a tetromino in the golf course,” he says.
What Mizuguchi experienced is something known as “the Tetris effect,” a condition where peopl

Amazon regularly hosts deals on its own devices, though we’re seeing the best price yet on the Amazon Fire TV Cube at HSN. Normally $119.99, it’s being offered for a limited time at $59.99.
The Fire TV Cube is usually much more expensive than Amazon’s other 4K streaming options, the new Fire TV Stick 4K, which runs for $49.99. If you have the chance to grab the Fire TV Cube at a discount, you should probably jump at the opportunity. It can intelligently bridge the gap between

Science fiction tends to be an expensive genre. Bringing the elaborate worlds of Star Wars, the futuristic dystopia of Blade Runner 2049, or the exotic planets and creatures of the Alien franchise to life costs significant money, which naturally encourages studios to greenlight movies that feel like familiar safe bets. And that leads to different versions of the same story being told time and again.
That’s why independent and low-budget science fiction movies are such a vital creative pla

Honor’s Magic 2 phone is finally official. The handset, which features a bezel-less screen that slides down to reveal a front-facing camera, was previously teased with a short trailer that showed it being used to drum out a beat on a table. (Honor has yet to confirm whether drumming damage will be covered under warranty.)The main event here is the sliding design, which can be used to automatically open the camera app when the 16MP selfie camera is revealed. The design means that the 6.39-

The testy relationship between Falcon and Winter Soldier is one of the most underrated aspects of Marvel’s Cinematic Universe, and Disney is reportedly looking to continue working on that relationship with a new limited series.Both Falcon (Anthony Mackie) and Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan) will star in a limited series for Disney’s new streaming service, according to Variety. The limited series is expected to receive six to eight episodes, according to the report, but it’s un