Technology news

Scarlett Johansson, the highest-paid actress in Hollywood, knows a thing or two about unwanted nudes making their way onto the internet. In 2012, a hacker was sentenced to 10 years in prison after leaking nude photos of her and other celebrities, setting an example to warn future thieves.
But there may be nobody to arrest, nobody even to sue, when it comes to deepfakes: AI-generated videos that seamlessly stitch Johansson and other celebs’ faces onto the bodies of porn stars having sex.No

2018 was a year that cried out for a simple, effervescent throwback tune we could use to forget our present troubles. No one could have guessed we'd find it in a movie that was all about the successful eradication of 50 percent of humanity. 
But that's exactly what happened this May when Avengers: Infinity War topped the movie charts, and sent a 42-year-old track bouncing up the music charts in its wake. With Infinity War newly available on Netflix as of last week, we're just a-movin' and a

Ultima Thule — an uncharted world over 4 billion miles away — is coming into view.
On Monday, planetary scientists released a fuzzy image of Ultima Thule, snapped the day prior by the New Horizons exploration spacecraft from some 1.2 million miles away. Previously, New Horizons swooped by Pluto in 2015, capturing the icy, mountainous world in unprecedented detail.
Increasingly rich, detailed images of Ultima will start arriving on January 2, but already the deep space object looks el

Given the simple structure of A Series of Unfortunate Events’ plots, it must have been tempting for Netflix to try to extend the series as long as it could. Sure, author Daniel Handler only penned 13 books in the Unfortunate Events series, but the setup of his plot could inspire any number of additional schemes where the scheming Count Olaf (Neil Patrick Harris) dons some ridiculous costume to try to steal the inheritance of the Baudelaire orphans. But series developers Mark Hudis and Bar

Are you enjoying Bandersnatch, the first choose-your-own-adventure interactive episode of the oft-delightfully dystopian Black Mirror? Good, because it may be the only new episode you’ll be seeing for a while. Executive producer and co-creator Annabel Jones has confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter that Bandersnatch took such an “enormous” amount of effort that it wound up pushing back Black Mirror’s fifth season.
Black Mirror Season 5 is now due in 2019, a Netflix spokesp

Although music streaming has been an integral part of daily life for what seems like ages, both the music industry and tech companies have consistently and frustratingly been behind the curve. So in many ways, 2018 felt like the first year that both sectors embraced innovation in the world of music streaming in ways that will meaningfully affect its future. There were substantial developments on the consumer side, but this year was more impactful for artists, many of whom rely on streaming plat

As the holidays wrap up, so, too, do the constant deliveries. But not before one Reddit user got quite a surprise: Amazon's picture-proof alert for his delivery captured his package in mid-air, flying toward his front door. 
That's quite a toss, to be honest, and even better photo-capturing skills.
SEE ALSO: UPS delivery driver spots a doorbell camera and busts out a little dance
And for those skeptical that maybe the package is just wedged into the door for a unique perspective that simply

Netflix's new horror movie Bird Box has taken the internet by storm, which is a little surprising considering horror is really not for everyone.
It's especially not for us, two scaredy-cats who do not like to watch horror movies for the simple fact that we don't like to be scared. 
But with so much fervor swirling around Bird Box (over 45 million users have watched so far), we decided to give in to the hype for the sake of all the other wimps out there and see if Bird Box is actually too sp

After a twenty year hiatus, tomorrow will finally see the 95 year long copyrights of works released in 1923 expire. These 1923 films, books and songs will effectively be the first to enter the public domain in the US since 1998, and Duke University notes that it will include such classics as Charlie Chaplin’s The Pilgrim, Jacob’s Room by Viginia Woolf, and the song Charleston (based on the popular dance of the same name).Welcoming classic works to the public domain was an annual New

If you spent anytime on the internet this holiday season, you likely saw friends and family sharing a photo matching their face with their celebrity look-alike. If they didn’t share the photo, it very likely was made publicly available anyway.
The Twinning app created by Popsugar has been inadvertently making the photos uploaded by its users publicly available via an unsecured web address where the pics were stored. 
TechCrunch discovered the data leak on Monday when it noticed an Ama

As 2018 comes to a close, it’s hard not to look back at the year with some bitterness.Okay, okay, 2018 wasn't complete trash for everyone. But for all the highs, there were an equal amount (if not more) lows that made the year kind of suck.We're not here to be a Debbie Downer and dredge up all the bad moments 2018 threw at us, so instead we're using this very last day of the year to cleanse the past and ring in 2019 in Mashable style: by burning it all away 🔥.Armed with our new lit

Leaks of a potential Nokia-branded phone with five cameras on the rear have been appearing for months, but a new video suggests that the device could be officially unveiled soon. Evan Blass first posted a photo of the rumored Nokia 9 PureView on Twitter earlier today, and now mysmartprice has published what looks like a promotional video for the unannounced device.
The Nokia 9 PureView looks very similar to the existing Nokia 8 Sirocco, except for the rear. The video shows off a wild penta-lens

The war between electric car startup Faraday Future and its main investor, Chinese real estate conglomerate Evergrande, appears to be over. Evergrande announced on Monday that it has agreed to restructure its $2 billion investment in Faraday Future. The conglomerate will walk away with full control over Faraday Future’s efforts in China, and both sides will drop all ongoing litigation against each other, according to a release posted to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.Faraday Future will rec

Headphones did not have the most auspicious start to 2018. Back in January, it seemed like a diversity of competing voice assistants, wireless audio protocols, and idiosyncratic control schemes would lead to a fragmented mess of a market. Everyone wanted wireless headphones, and the providers of those devices were keen to establish some sort of a walled-garden effect around their particular product.
The demand for more technologically advanced headphones has only increased over the course of th

Even our vocabulary needs a fresh start for 2019.
This has been a rough year in so many ways, even for the words we use — and particularly for those that President Donald Trump is constantly tweeting out. That's why one group is proposing we ban the word "collusion." 
Lake Superior State University has unveiled the 44th edition of their annual "List of Words Banished from the Queen’s English for Mis-use, Over-use and General Uselessness" and while it's heavy on cliches, it also

It's a bird, it's a plane — it's a...surveillance drone?
For the first time in history, the New York Police Department will fly a drone over Times Square to monitor the crowd during the annual New Year’s Eve celebration. The drone will surveil the event alongside more than 1,200 cameras in order to assist around 7,000 police officers who will be on duty, according to the Associated Press.
The remote-controlled quadcopter will never fly directly over the crowd and will be tied to a bu

The power of Celine Dion's love for Lady Gaga is strong and, um, not subtle.
The singer recently attended a Gaga concert in Las Vegas and revealed how much of a Gaga stan she is.
I mean just look at that incredible arm span.Yes @celinedion!! 👏👏👏👏🎉 THE Queen of Vegas showing support for our newest superstar, @ladygaga!Gaga gave her a big shout-out from the stage & said Celine… https://t.co/JdvxyKd6yD… #WomenSupportingWomen #LadyGaga #Celin

Amazon is planning a Whole Foods expansion in the U.S., according to a report by The Wall Street Journal published this weekend. The goal is to put more customers within the range of Amazon’s two-hour Prime Now delivery service, including those in suburban areas outside cities, as well as those in regions where the grocer has yet to establish a presence.
Currently, Amazon’s Prime Now delivery service offers two-hour delivery in over 60 U.S. cities, and thirty minute-plus grocery pick

New Year's is always a mess. It starts with such high expectations and then the ball drops, it's midnight, and you have no way to get home without spending a small fortune on a hard-to-find taxi or surging ride-hailing trips.
While it's near impossible to avoid a costly ride home soon after midnight or right when the bars and parties shut down, you have some cost-saving options.
SEE ALSO: Uber and Lyft IPOs will make a lot of people rich. But what about the drivers?
First the obvious: If you hav

As 2018 comes to a close, it's only a matter of time before New Year's resolution posts start rolling into your timelines. 
But the barrage of empty promises and half-hearted resolutions on social media just make me want to scale back on my social media usage altogether. Forget hitting the gym more or learning new skills. From subtweeting less to toning down my finsta, here are 10 social media resolutions I will probably (not) follow through with in 2019. 
SEE ALSO: Your New Year's res

A worrying number of popular Android apps share user data with Facebook without user consent, new research from Privacy International shows (via Financial Times). 
Here's the worst part: Staying off Facebook doesn't protect you from this.  
SEE ALSO: Veteran tech journalist Walt Mossberg quits Facebook, because yeah
Privacy International, a London-based charity that focuses on improving people's personal privacy, examined 34 popular Android apps, each installed from 10 to 500 million t

Computer and home theater setups have at least one thing in common: The out-of-the-box speakers that come with both are just not that good. 
Thankfully, there are plenty of speaker setups to choose from to give your computer's audio that extra punch. And better yet, it doesn't just have to be for a desktop.
It should be noted that the best quality speakers are typically going to be for a traditional desk setup rather than a laptop. The right speakers will deliver booming audio, and might ev

I thought the worst thing about Popsugar’s Twinning tool was that it matched me with James Corden.
Turns out, the hundreds of thousands of selfies uploaded to the tool were easily downloadable by anyone who knew where to look.
The popular photo matching tool is fairly simple. “It analyzes a selfie or uploaded photo, compares it to a massive database of celebrity photos to find matches, and finally gives you a ‘twinning percentage’ for your top five look-alikes,” acc

Well, you did it. You made it through 2018. And whether you're a bit battered and bruised or had your best year ever, there's no denying that 2019 is swiftly rolling in.
Start the new year off right: With big savings. We're rounding up the best deals from Amazon, Walmart, Best Buy, Macy's, and more on tech like smart home devices and 4K TVs, kitchen products like Instant Pot's multi-cookers, and Amazon video streaming and home security devices. 
In addition, we also found great deals on Ude

Dana Stalder Contributor Dana Stalder is a general partner at Matrix Partners and invests in fintech, consumer marketplaces and enterprise software.More posts by this contributorFinancial technology startups emerged as serious challengers to financial servicesin 2017 New rules for hiring executive candidates Allen Miller Contributor Allen Miller is a venture captialist at Matrix Partners. He's excited by bold entrepreneurs building great companies across categories, especially in fintech. More

Being a newscaster is high pressure, reading the news live every day and knowing that if you slip up it'll be there for the internet to see.
And that's exactly what happened to Brianna Clark, an anchor on Kentucky's WPSD, who badly mangled the name of Deidre Mengedoht, a Louisville police officer who was killed in a Christmas Eve car crash.
Where her very off-the-mark pronunciation came from is a mystery — a painful, cringe-inducing mystery. But it's very unfortunate timing.
The Louisville

Like porn, Internet Boyfriends are hard to define — but also like porn, you know them when you see them. And 2018 was downright lousy with them.
Some were fresh faces we'd never encountered before. (Well, most of us. We see you, Lady Who's Been Crushing On Winston Duke Since Person of Interest.) Others were guys we'd known about for years, but started seeing in a whole new light. And still more were dudes we already loved, but somehow came to love even more within the past 12 months.
SEE A

In 2018, tech needed government more than ever. We were surrounded by problems that the industry couldn’t solve on its own, whether it was Russian trolls, growing monopoly fears, or the ever-escalating pace of cybersecurity failures.
Unfortunately, in the second year of undivided Republican control, the US government was too busy punching itself in the face. This year saw unprecedented dysfunction in even the most basic mechanisms of government, a point driven painfully home by the ongoin

Picture the keypad of a telephone and calculator side by side. Can you see the subtle difference between the two without resorting to your smartphone? Don’t worry if you can’t recall the design. Most of us are so used to accepting the common interfaces that we tend to overlook the calculator’s inverted key sequence. A calculator has the 7–8–9 buttons at the top whereas a phone uses the 1–2–3 format. Subtle, but puzzling since they serve the same functio

What a year it's been for the royal family! 
While 2018 has been a mean old year for us mere mortals, those whose blood runs blue have had a festive year with not one but two weddings and some pretty major announcements. 
Now that the year is coming to an end, it's time to look back at the most memorable royal family moments from 2018. 
1. *The* wedding 
Two different royals may have tied the knot in 2018, but the first wedding of the year was also the most spectacular.