Technology news

False advertising is not a good look, Samsung.
Photographer Dunja Djudjic is accusing the world’s largest smartphone maker of using one of her photos and presenting it on their website as a photo taken with its Galaxy A8 Star phone. 
In a post on DIY Photography, Djudjic explains how Samsung is using her photos, taken with a DSLR camera, to showcase the Galaxy A8’s portrait mode. The photographer made the discovery after noticing one of her pictures uploaded to the photo communi

Not many of us will get a chance to see a rocket launch live from this angle in our lifetimes, but at least we can see the photos.
European astronaut Alexander Gerst managed to photograph the launch of three new crewmembers to the International Space Station from his post aboard the orbiting laboratory.
The pictures, taken Monday, show the Soyuz rocket carrying the three new space station residents as it ascends to orbit just after launch.Congratulations to the Russian Space Agency @roscosmos an

5G, 5G, 5 gee.
To most people, 5G is merely the successor to 4G LTE — the next generation of cellular connectivity for your phone. 
And yes, that's what 5G will be for most people as carriers worldwide begin deploying the high-speed wireless connectivity starting in 2019.
But that's also a serious mischaracterization of 5G because it isn't just faster cellular service that'll enable you to stream high-resolution videos, games, and VR. 
5G is virtually a complete overhaul of conne

Ad Content from AmazonToday, technology receives more than just a casual mention in most parenting handbooks and mommy blogs. Parents of elementary school-age kids are in a particularly befuddling spot as their kids begin dabbling in digital devices both at school and at home. In some cases, parents report that their kids know how to navigate tech better than they can. At the same time, parents aren’t always sure how to introduce their kiddos to technology in a way that’s balanced, e

The US Secret Service has revealed plans for a test of facial recognition surveillance around the White House, with the goal of identifying “subjects of interest” who might pose a threat to the president. The document was published in late November, but the American Civil Liberties Union publicized its existence today. It describes a test that would compare closed circuit video footage of public White House spaces against a database of images — in this case, featuring employee

The Treasury Department today released a 70-plus-page report on the Postal Service’s finances, part of a task force review ordered by the Trump administration after the president publicly bashed mail deals between the service and Amazon.The review, a detailed examination of the service’s “unsustainable” business model, credited e-commerce platforms with contributing to an increase in package volume and revenue, but said future increases in package delivery won’t be

Google has made several custom apps for the Pixel and Pixel XL, and its latest one appears to be an app called Sounds that was just uploaded to the Play Store, as spotted by 9to5Google. However, the link to the app is only accessible if you have a Pixel.
The app listing describes Sounds as a way for users to customize their alarms, ringtones, and notifications. It’s an updated version of the Sounds menu found in Pixel settings. As you test out each sound, the app uses colorful visualizati

Verizon today announced that its first 5G — and I mean real, proper 5G NR — hotspot device will launch to consumers in 2019. The hotspot was developed in collaboration with Inseego and utilizes Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 855 chip and Snapdragon X50 5G modem.The two companies plan to showcase the hotspot running on a very small-scale deployment of Verizon’s actual 5G NR network in Hawaii at Qualcomm’s technology summit. (The event is being used to conduct tests of the &l

Snapdragon 855. That’s the name of Qualcomm’s new flagship processor for mobile phones, the company just announced at its Snapdragon Technology Summit in Hawaii.
The announcement was expected — Qualcomm launched its predecessor, the Snapdragon 845, at the same conference almost exactly one year ago. But the new 855 isn’t just another spec bump — it’s the chip that will almost certainly appear in the first wave of 5G phones. Qualcomm has said this new platform

As the fight against climate change heats up, Cove.Tool is looking to help tackle carbon emissions one building at a time.The Atlanta-based startup provides an automated big-data platform that helps architects, engineers and contractors identify the most cost-effective ways to make buildings compliant with energy efficiency requirements. After raising an initial round earlier this year, the company completed the final close of a $750,000 seed round. Since the initial announcement of the round ea

Now that smartphones are capable of taking photos that can, in some instances, rival those of DSLRs, companies seem to be getting more and more comfortable swapping actual DSLR photos into their advertising. The problem is, most phone cameras are still far from DSLR quality, so it’s rarely a fair representation. And Samsung is the latest to get busted trying to pass one off.
Over at DIYPhotography (which we spotted via Daring Fireball), writer and photographer Dunja Djudjic says that she

As more video viewing behavior moves to on-demand streaming services, some companies will understandably get craftier about how to continue generating advertising revenue that would otherwise have come from old-school commercials. AT&T and Hulu are both apparently now considering a new type of ad that would run when you pause a video, like a TV show on DirectTV or a movie on Hulu, according to a report from Variety.“As binge-viewing happens more and more, it’s natural they are g

Electric car startup Faraday Future plans to furlough hundreds more employees as a result of an ongoing cash crunch during a battle with its main investor, the company announced on Twitter today. The startup originally placed hundreds of employees on furlough, or unpaid leave, in October, reducing its US headcount from around 1,000 to about 600. At least 250 more employees are being furloughed today, multiple sources tell The Verge.Faraday Future had laid off workers and cut salaries before the

The New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission voted on Tuesday to set a minimum pay rate for drivers who work for app-based companies like Uber and Lyft.
This new rule will go into effect in 20 days, and it will require drivers to be paid at least $27.86 an hour, which translates to $17.22 after expenses. According to a study from TLC, most drivers currently earn around $11.90 an hour. This change increases the yearly earnings of drivers by $9,000.
This change increases the yearly earnings of

Most discussions about online harassment begin and end with Gamergate, but online harassment campaigns were well underway in the 1990s. They’ve evolved to include life-threatening tactics, including doxxing and swatting. Caroline Sinders, a research fellow at the Digital Harvard Kennedy School and an expert in machine learning, joins Nilay Patel and Casey Newton on The Vergecast to talk about the origins online harassment, how platforms like Twitter and Facebook can be better designed to

If you’ve been waiting for cheaper third-party GeForce RTX 20-series graphics cards to arrive since the Founders Edition was unveiled a few months ago, B&H Photo’s discount on the RTX 2080 might be a sign that this trend is close to kicking into gear.
Until supply runs out, you can get Zotac’s GeForce RTX 2080 AMP GPU for $699 — $100 cheaper than its usual price. You’ll also get a free digital copy of Battlefield V with purchase. According to Zotac’s prod

The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) was hacked during the 2018 midterm elections, according to a report from Politico. Republican officials said that hackers had access to four senior NRCC aides’ email accounts for “several months,” until a security firm discovered the intrusion in April. The NRCC launched an internal investigation and alerted the FBI, but it did not inform any Republican legislators until this week.
“The NRCC can confirm that it was t

The New York Police Department announced today that it has acquired 14 drones and plans to utilize them in policing efforts across New York City, in a move that has garnered backlash from civil advocacy groups that are concerned about the department’s motives.
In the announcement, the NYPD said that there are 29 officers who are trained to use the unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The drones are anticipated to be used to police large events in the city, like concerts, and in hostage situat

It’s been a long wait for Apple to give its blessing to third-party USB-C to Lightning cables. At the moment, if you want to get a cable that allows your iPhone to fast charge, then you’ll have to opt for Apple’s own model, which currently starts at $19. However, MacRumors reports that Apple is now permitting third-party USB-C to Lightning cables to be manufactured, meaning that we could see cheaper models released as early as February or March of next year.
The need for a dec

Today, Google is holding a developer conference in London for Flutter, a new development environment for developing mobile apps for both Android and iOS. Google calls Flutter a “portable UI toolkit,” and Paul Miller has called it “a Frankenstein’s monster of various Google projects.” The big announcement is that it’s coming out of beta, and it has hit 1.0, opening the door for developers who have been waiting for something more official before adopting it.
In

I dig on my employer Oath,and then Tencent Music notes and a major loss for the NYC ecosystem and what it means for open source.
TechCrunch is experimenting with new content forms. This is a rough draft of something new – provide your feedback directly to the author (Danny at [email protected]) if you like or hate something here.
My three word Oath? I’m with stupid
It goes without saying that this piece about my employer is my work alone, doesn’t reflect management’s v

Facebook announced today that it’s rolling Group Stories out globally, after initially debuting them last year. The feature allows Group members to contribute to a collaborative story. The company’s also launching reactions in Group Stories, so users can respond to other people’s contributions with a variety of emoji as they watch.A group story will show up at the top of a Group’s page, and users can contribute by clicking the “add” button next to it. They ca

Apple’s arrival on Amazon’s online store is a recent development, though we’re already seeing that partnership pay off for those who are interested in picking up the latest iPad. Both the 32GB and 128GB versions of the 9.7-inch iPad that came out earlier in 2018 are $40 off of their original price points.
We saw prices drop as low as $249 for the 32GB iPad during Black Friday. While this discount doesn’t come close to that, $289 is still a nice price for this tablet, whi

Just a day after the release of the PlayStation Classic, the Retro Gaming Arts YouTube channel has discovered that you can access the emulator’s settings menu by plugging a keyboard into a free USB slot and hitting the Esc key. Doing so reveals a host of settings for the built-in open-source PCSX ReARMed emulator, potentially allowing access to options, including save states, controls, and cheats.The discovery has raised hope that some of the criticisms of the retro console, such as a lim

Google CEO Sundar Pichai will testify before the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, December 11th at 10AM ET, a committee spokesperson confirmed to The Verge. The hearing was originally scheduled for Wednesday, December 5th, but it was postponed due to scheduling conflicts with former President George H.W. Bush’s funeral events.Pichai is anticipated to face intense questioning from Republican lawmakers who are concerned with the Silicon Valley giant’s algorithms and how they may

More evidence has emerged that the e-scooter sharing market faces a bumpy ride, as news circulates that authorities in Madrid have revoked licenses for all three operators in the city.
Lime,Wind and Voi, are being given a maximum of 72 hours to remove scooters from the city’s streets, whilst I understand it follows a recent change in mobility laws in Madrid that stipulate where and at what speed e-scooters can be driven.
Specifically, e-scooters can only operate in designated bike lanes an

Last year, composer Will Patterson released a curious concept album: it featured nine tracks from The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, but the classic chiptune bleeps were replaced with analog synthesizers. It lent an iconic soundtrack a new, more intense feeling. Now Patterson is back, taking the same approach to reimagine the music of another SNES game, Secret of Mana. “It all started as a weekend project,” he tells The Verge, “but it became more popular than my own pop

Bose has officially announced a consumer release of Frames, its augmented reality sunglasses that use sound instead of sight to relay information. At launch, the glasses will mainly be focussed on using a built-in microphone and open-ear headphones to interact with Siri and Google Assistant. Next year, however, Bose hopes to launch its own augmented reality platform for apps after shipping 10,000 pairs of the glasses to AR developers in 2018.We had a chance to try out a couple of example apps e

Epic Games, the developer of Fortnite and the widely used game-making software Unreal Engine, is about to start selling other companies’ games, too. Epic is launching a new online store like Valve’s Steam that will similarly feature third-party games, marking yet another substantial threat to Steam’s dominant position as the lead distributor of PC titles. Epic’s store, which is set to launch soon, will start with a select number of PC and Mac games, and it will open up t

Coming on the heels of an announcement that Samsung will offer a 5G phone on Verizon next year, AT&T has announced that it will also offer the same 5G flagship from the Korean phone manufacturer sometime in spring 2019.
That makes the upcoming Samsung phone the second 5G device for AT&T, following the already-announced Netgear Nighthawk 5G Mobile Hotspot “puck” that the carrier will launch its network with. Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Tech Summit starts today, so odds are we

The next chapter for Niantic’s Pokémon Go involves borrowing another popular element from the game series’s main installments: battling. The new trainer battles feature has been a long time coming. It was first teased with the game’s announcement more than three years ago, and it’s taken the company quite a while to get it in working shape. Niantic released some new details about the feature last week on Twitter, but at a recent press event in San Francisco, the d

Of the many Persona spinoffs, the Dancing All Night series is, inarguably, the strangest. Persona is a lengthy role-playing game series with a heavy focus on dungeon crawling and social simulation. Its dancing games chuck all that aside in favor of rhythm-based gameplay. Why let your favorite characters save the world when you can instead watch them breakdance in a wizard hat?
Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight and Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight, released simultaneously, are two halves of the sam

As Wikipedia becomes more powerful, it’s facing a new vandalism problem. In recent weeks, the user-moderated online encyclopedia has experienced a string of rogue edits, most infamously when a user changed Donald Trump’s lead picture to an image of a penis, an attack that was repeated for days afterwards. Most of these edits were made from old editor accounts, which were often left unused for months or years. But the more troubling breaches came from administrator accounts, three of

As marijuana legalization spreads and stigma recedes, older narratives claiming that copulation and cannabis don’t mix are falling by the wayside. Today, marijuana lube products fill internet storefronts, and there’s no end to claims that weed enhances sex, despite research that draws far more nuanced conclusions. Though it’s unclear whether cannabis goods really make sex better, bigger-picture studies suggest that the combination of sex and marijuana will have major implicati