Technology news

As a measles outbreak continues to spread in Washington state, Facebook is “exploring additional measures” to fight false anti-vaccine content on the platform, Bloomberg reports.
The news comes on the heels of criticism from Representative Adam Schiff, who sent Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg a letter about vaccine misinformation on Facebook and Instagram today. In the letter, first reported by Bloomberg’s Sarah Frier, Schiff voiced concerns that both Facebook and Instagram serve

The iOS Notes app is a simple, yet powerful tool. From remembering your grocery list, to jotting down random musings while on the bus, to celebrity apologies, over the years it's worked its way into our lives in a number of surprising ways.  
And, as of Feb. 14, we can add one more to that list: Stating your intention to declare a manufactured "national emergency" via your press secretary. 
That's right, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders just issued a statement saying

A mint condition original copy of Super Mario Bros. for the NES has sold for a whopping $100,150 at an auction, making it one of the most expensive games ever sold.
According to Heritage Auctions (which ran the auction), the NES game “set a world record for a graded game,” so it may not be the outright most expensive ever — just the most expensive copy that’s had its condition professionally graded and certified. That outsized price tag also is the reason that the copy w

Facebook and officials at the Federal Trade Commission are in discussions right now negotiating a multibillion-dollar fine to settle the agency’s investigation into the company’s past privacy practices, according to The Washington Post. It would be the largest fine the FTC has ever levied on a tech company. But according to the Post, the fine’s specific amount has yet to be determined.As it stands, the largest fine ever imposed by the FTC was a $22.5 million penalty on Google

Nothing screams "romance" more than Kenny G trapped in a room full of glass vases. 
Kim Kardashian West posted a video showing how Kanye went all out for her Valentine's Day present — surprising her with a room in their posh California mansion decorated with roses. Best of all he also brought in jazz love song icon Kenny G for a solo performance. Kenny G — who is best known for his smarmy '90s hits, crashing Katy Perry's house party, and being the "sad sax" guy — abso

White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders issued a statement today on the government funding bill on Twitter, which is pretty standard for the Trump administration. But the statement also happened to include news that the president still plans to declare a national emergency over building a border wall — and it was delivered not on official letterhead, but via a screenshot of the Apple Notes app. Even weirder: it’s got an errant black dot, a sloppy mistake from the iOS 12 screenshot

After more than a year of talk about returning humans to the Moon, NASA is asking the aerospace community to come up with designs for landers that can transport astronauts to the lunar surface. NASA’s goal is to test out these vehicles on the Moon as early as 2024 and then use them to take people to the lunar surface by 2028.
NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine and other top agency officials outlined the plan during a media roundtable today in Washington, DC. While Bridenstine has trumpete

There is likely no one more distraught over Amazon’s decision to cancel its plans to build a second headquarters in Long Island City, Queens than New York Governor Andrew Cuomo.
“Amazon chose to come to New York because we are the capital of the world and the best place to do business,” said Governor Cuomo in a statement after Amazon’s announcement on Thursday. “However, a small group [of] politicians put their own narrow political interests above their community.&r

Facebook monitors and tracks the locations of its users when the company’s security team finds that they are making credible threats on its social network, according to a report from CNBC today.
The company actively monitors its platform for threatening comments, the report said. That can include a nonspecific threat to a Facebook location or a direct one targeted at specific people. Once Facebook determines that a threat from a user is credible, the company uses data from its products to

The Apple Watch Series 3 is $199 at Amazon (usually $279), matching the lowest price that we saw during the Black Friday shopping holiday. This price will get you the 38mm model with GPS. In terms of colors available, Amazon currently offers a white sports band with the Apple Watch in a silver aluminum casing, and the black sports band with the device in a space gray aluminum case. If you’re looking for the larger 42mm Apple Watch Series 3, Amazon has it available in the same color and ma

There is a long and colorful history of cell carriers lying to their customers about speeds and sticking terrible names on products, but Brazilian carrier Claro may put them all to shame with its almost breathtakingly dishonest 4.5G network logo. It looks to be trying to pull the same kind of manipulation as AT&T’s 5G E network, just without any of the hard work involved (via Gustavo Santos on Twitter).@reckless just listened to the 5G Bonus Vergecast. What about this cellular provide

Amazon’s decision to drop plans for a New York City headquarters was so abrupt that its own employees had been meeting with local leaders just hours earlier to move the commitment forward. Now that the deal is off, New York tech leaders are trying to figure out what it means for the city’s tech scene.The decision to leave New York has been disappointing for local tech leaders like Julie Samuels, who runs Tech:NYC, a nonprofit that helps grow tech companies in the city. “This i

For those who love popular tabletop role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons and the hit Netflix series Stranger Things, you’re in for a real treat with this one.
We all remember the opening scenes of Stranger Things’ first season, which takes place in 1984: Mike, Will, Dustin, and Lucas sit around a small table in a basement acting out an enthralling section of a D&D campaign that would be called back to for the entirety of the series. It was a hit of nostalgia for many, and now

It was just a few months ago that Canon introduced its first full-frame mirrorless camera, the EOS R. The company’s previous mirrorless cameras gave you little reason to choose them over one of its DSLRs, but the EOS R was a sign the company was finally ready to prioritize mirrorless technology. The problem was the EOS R cost $2,300 – without a lens. It was also wasn’t as small as we’ve come to expect from mirrorless cameras – significantly larger than Sony’s

Amazon shocked everyone on Thursday when it announced it was halting plans to build a second headquarters in New York City's Long Island City neighborhood.
While local opposition celebrated the unexpected announcement, one supporter of the project  —  Mayor Bill de Blasio — was less than thrilled.You have to be tough to make it in New York City. We gave Amazon the opportunity to be a good neighbor and do business in the greatest city in the world. Instead of working with th

As movies become more heavily franchised, it’s inevitable that more sequels, spinoffs, and homages will require more knowledge of other movies — not just for viewers’ enjoyment, but for their comprehension. Look at the biggest movie franchise in the world today: nothing about Avengers: Infinity War, from the seriousness of its stakes to the tension-breaking comic relief, makes a lick of sense to people who haven’t seen at least three or four other Marvel movies first. (I

A sealed copy of Super Mario Bros. for the Nintendo Entertainment System has been sold at auction for over $100,000, Heritage Auctions announced on Thursday. That's some serious coin.
This copy of Super Mario Bros. not only contains one of the most popular games of all time, it also happens to be a pretty rare copy of said game. Not only is it in great condition, it is currently the only known copy of Super Mario Bros. that is sticker sealed. That explains why it broke the record for the highest

Roblox, a Minecraft-esque game played by millions of children, has reinstated Felix “PewDiePie” Kjellberg after incorrectly banning him earlier this week, supposedly because of confusion regarding a prohibited meme related to his name.
In a forum post, Roblox said the game began banning usernames that include the term “pewdie” back in December after a series of memes that incorporated the term became a negative occurrence within the community. Roblox stated that its trus

Even when Amazon loses, it still wins. 
The corporate behemoth announced Feb. 14 that it had abandoned its plan to open offices in Long Island City, Queens. In the face of local opposition to the proposed massive development and approximately $3 billion in government incentives, the company issued a statement bemoaning its newly found status as the unpopular kid in town — telling the world that it would take its ball and go home. 
But here's the thing: Even without New York bendi

Today is the final day to take advantage of Amazon’s discounted prices on Echo devices. You can get $50 off of the Echo Show and $30 off of the Echo or Echo Spot, and more. Several of these sale prices match the lowest that we’ve seen, and it might be some time until we see them this cheap again. A few of these models don’t ship until early March, but you’ll save some money if you’re cool with waiting a few weeks.
The second-gen Amazon Echo is $69.99 (usually $99.9

If you didn't have plans for your long Presidents Day weekend, it looks like your schedule will soon be full of plenty of train robbery and web-slinging. That's because two of the bestselling games of 2018, Red Dead Redemption 2 and Marvel's Spider-Man, are both on sale for $39.99 at Amazon and other retailers.
While 2018 will go down as one of the biggest years for video games, Red Dead Redemption 2 rode tall in the saddle above the rest with both critics and gamers. Now you can finally hop on

Millions of people who use the dating app Coffee Meets Bagel woke up on Valentine's Day to some unsetting news: their personal information had been compromised.
Coffee Meets Bagel reported a massive data breach affecting "approximately" six million users Thursday. That news of the hack just so happened to coincide with Valentine's Day is a fittingly cruel twist for the service that purports to be about making "authentic connections."
"With online dating, people need to feel safe. If they don't f

Herbert Hoover wasn't the only one who thought raccoons make great pets. 
Most people think of raccoons as devilish, garbage-eating jumbo-rodents. Or, one may think of popular animated characters like Meeko, Pocahontas' cunning sidekick. Either way, it's unlikely to imagine them playing fetch or eating marshmallows out of your hand. 
But that's not stopping some daring animal lovers from welcoming raccoons into their homes. SEE ALSO: Oreo, the animal inspiration for Marvel's Rocke

Microsoft has started testing an update to Windows 10 that it plans to release in 2020. It’s unusual for the company to test updates so far in advance, as Microsoft typically releases two updates per year and tests them with members of the public. Microsoft has not yet started testing its next 2019 update, codenamed 19H2, but Microsoft’s Windows Insider chief, Dona Sarkar, says additional testing is required for this new 2020 update.Due in the first half of 2020, and codenamed 20H1,

Valentine’s Day is a day to celebrate love, but that doesn’t have to be exclusive to just the people (or dogs) in your life. We’re celebrating our love of great deals today, too. 
Macy’s is on the same page — take an additional 10%, 15%, or 20% off merchandise that’s already been marked down as part of the store’s Valentine’s Day sale. To receive these extra savings, enter the promo code LOVE at checkout. 
As part of the deal, you’l

A report from cybersecurity company Agari claims to expose one corner of the multimillion-dollar romance scam industry: a Nigerian fraud ring it dubs Scarlet Widow. As with other romance scams, members of Scarlet Widow created numerous fake personas to bait lonely men and women into online relationships. The Agari report, not coincidentally published on Valentine’s Day, offers examples of how they hooked victims in one of the most common forms of online scams.
Scarlet Widow created profil

The Overwatch League is a huge bet that a video game can become the next big professional sport. Making its debut in January 2018, the e-sports competition features teams from around the world, backed by big-name owners from the NFL and other major sports leagues. It has managed to lure prominent sponsors like Toyota and Coca-Cola, and netted broadcast deals with Twitch and ESPN. Along the way, the league signed its first female player, others were suspended for toxic behavior, and the drama of

When Overwatch League expansion team Toronto Defiant played its first exhibition matches during a bootcamp in Korea, it didn’t go so well. The team, which included a mix of OWL veterans and up-and-coming players, struggled in early scrimmages, with few positives to draw from the performances. “It was a lot rougher than I had expected,” says Defiant head coach Beom-joon “Bishop” Lee. But there was still hope for the young squad. While the matches weren’t going

Getting screened for strains of the cervical cancer-causing human papillomavirus (HPV) can be difficult for many women, but not getting tested can have deadly consequences. In 2019, an estimated 4,250 women will die from invasive cervical cancer — a number that, the American Cancer Society notes, has not changed much in 15 years. To bring that number down, some companies are trying to bring HPV tests out of the doctors’ offices and into women’s homes.“Half of the cervica

Crackdown 3 is a game for action fiends, the sort who don’t want any of that pesky “story” or “depth” to get in the way of their next dopamine release. It may not be the smartest or most sophisticated game to come out this year, but goddamn is it fun. This is by far the most colorful of the games hitting the market this week. In fact, if Metro Exodus is a gritty, gloomy HBO special, then Crackdown 3 is a bright, playful Saturday morning cartoon. Good guys are good,

Revry CEO Damian Pelliccione couldn't have known that the Apple TV he bought in 2015 would change not just his life, but countless others'.
But, he tells me over the phone, it was the discovery that the App Store had "like, zero LGBTQ apps" that inspired him and three friends (Alia J. Daniels, Christopher Rodriguez and LaShawn McGhee) to start Revry, billed as "the first queer global streaming network."
SEE ALSO: 2019 might just be another good year for LGBTQ people in film
Even in an age when t

El Niño has arrived in 2019. So far, it's pretty weak. That doesn't mean it will stay that way. 
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced Thursday that this natural climate phenomenon — which is triggered by warmer temperatures in the equatorial Pacific Ocean and can significantly affect weather in the U.S. — will likely persist through the spring. But what happens next is still unclear.
"We don’t have a good handle on where this goes the

“Sentient Dairy Products, Rogue Werewolf Soldiers, Robots Gone Wild, Sexy Cyborgs, Alien Spiders And Blood-thirsty Demons From Hell Converge In An 185-minute Genre Orgy Of Stories Not Suitable For The Mainstream…” reads the tagline for David Fincher and Tim Miller’s short-film anthology Love, Death & Robots. (It’s apparently also an orgy of unwarranted capitalization.) The first trailer for the Netflix project has arrived, and it’s a blur of rapid cuts b

JPMorgan Chase has thrown its hat into the cryptocurrency ring, proposing to launch its own digital coin, as spotted by CNBC. It’s one of the few banks to consider launching cryptocurrency, and the initiative may be surprising given that CEO Jamie Dimon has said he doesn’t “really give a shit” about bitcoin.The CEO’s harsh views of bitcoin haven’t stopped his company from going ahead and creating a new digital token called the JPM Coin. It’s supposed to

"Are you swiping?" my best friend asks me over breakfast one morning. I gulp down a spoonful of woefully bland porridge and think for a moment about how to reply. 
The answer was no, I wasn't swiping. But in saying so, I was met with a bewildered expression. I'm reluctant to swipe these days, or just to date in general, due to a long, troubling pattern of power imbalances that have occurred in every single relationship I've had since I started dating when I was 15. 
Now, at age 30, my