Technology news

Image: The Verge OpenAI is testing a ChatGPT app for Windows — but it’s only available to paid users for now. You can download an early version of the app from the Microsoft Store.
Just like the Mac version of the app, ChatGPT on Windows lets you ask the AI-powered chatbot questions in a dedicated window that you can keep open alongside your apps. You can quickly access the app by using the Alt + Space shortcut.
Today, ChatGPT Plus, Enterprise, Team, and Edu users can start testing a

Image: Activision Activision says it has “disabled a workaround to a detection system” in Modern Warfare III and Call of Duty: Warzone that led to legitimate players getting banned by the Ricochet anti-cheat system. The company says the problem “impacted a small number of legitimate player accounts,” and all accounts affected were restored.
However, zebleer, who runs the Phantom Overlay store selling cheats, claims the problem is much bigger than Activision’s post m

Image: Zens Qi2 chargers are quite prevalent these days, and come in all kinds of shapes and sizes, so why not make one exclusively for Europeans with outlets above their kitchen countertops and a neat assortment of olive oils?
Zens may have figured out the key to a truly wire-free wireless charger with its new Wireless Charging Adapter. It’s a lot like most Qi2 / MagSafe chargers, capable of charging an iPhone at up to 15W, but it skips the usual wire between the outlet and magnetic pad t

Project Turntable for Adobe Illustrator is capable of rotating vector images without warping the design elements. | Image: Adobe Adobe has been working on some experimental tech that could help speed up concept and planning work for graphic designers and audio engineers. Some of the “sneaks” previewed during Adobe’s MAX event include tools that can turn sketches into a variety of polished designs, and a feature for rotating 2D art as if it were a 3D object.
“Project Turnt

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge Netflix says subscribers spend an average of two hours each day using Netflix, marking an increase from last year, according to the company’s third-quarter earnings report released today.
“Programming for such a large, engaged audience, with so much variety and great quality, is hard,” Netflix’s letter to investors says. “It’s why streaming services which lack our breadth of content are increasingly looking to bundle th

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Last year, YouTube axed Premium Lite, its cheaper version of YouTube Premium, but the company has been testing a new version of the subscription in Australia, Germany, and Thailand, YouTube confirmed to Android Authority.
The company confirmed the tests to The Verge as well, with spokesperson Jessica Gibby saying that it has been testing a “different version” of the subscription with “some users in Australia, Germany and Thailand for seve

Gen 2 Rivian vehicles can animate a red scanner light up front like KITT from Knight Rider. | Image: Rivian Rivian’s getting into the Halloween spirit by adding new “car costumes” to its electric vehicles that can theme out its screens to look like the Time Machine interface from Back to the Future or KITT from Knight Rider. (It’ll animate red KITT-like scanner lights on the front of the car, too.) There’s also a non-IP-specific “Haunted” theme that disp

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg offered a second buyout round to employees who don’t agree with his actions, according to a report from 404 Media. In a message to employees seen by the outlet, Mullenweg gave employees until October 17th to decide whether they would resign in exchange for nine months of pay.
“New alignment offer: I guess some people were sad they missed the last window. Some have been leaking to the press and ex-employees,” Mullenw

McLaren’s Chromed out F1 car. | Image: McLaren McLaren is updating the version of Google Chrome on its F1 racecar. By that, I mean: McLaren’s got more Google Chrome logos and chrome finish than usual on the F1 car it’s bringing to the US Grand Prix at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas, this weekend.
McLaren’s MCL38 continues the tradition of rocking Google-colored wheels and logos, butlike last year’s special British Grand Prix version, the livery for thi

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge The Federal Police of Brazil announced the arrest of the hacker linked to a breach that leaked 2.9 billion records that included sensitive personal information, including some Social Security numbers. The data from that hack, which came to light in August, was put for sale on the dark web in April by an entity identifying themselves as USDoD.As pointed out by Bleeping Computer, according to a machine translation of the department’s press release,

Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge Unity hasn’t had the easiest go of things as of late, but as part of its efforts to get back in the good graces of game developers, the company has released Unity 6 globally. In addition to new features like tools that let developers to target mobile web, the game engine maker is also promising that it will dedicate “long-term” resources to “to enhance feature sets and deliver new functionality while maintaining ease of upgrade an

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty Images Apple Pay will now include Klarna as an option at checkout. The addition of the buy now pay later (BNPL) service comes just months after Apple shut down Pay Later, its own BNPL service launched in 2023.
Klarna lets users purchase products with four interest-free installments. Even though BNPL services like Klarna are rising in popularity, surveys suggest the services may lead to overspending. Image: Apple
These loans are also harder to track because

Illustration: The Verge Google is making a big change to company leadership. In a memo to staff posted on Thursday, Google CEO Sundar Pichai announced that Prabhakar Raghavan, the senior vice president in charge of search, ads, and other important segments, will now take on the role of chief technologist.“Prabhakar has decided it’s time to make a big leap in his own career,” Pichai writes. “After 12 years leading teams across Google, he’ll return to his computer sci

Illustration by Kristen Radtke / The Verge; Getty Images The European Union has reportedly warned X that it could use the revenue of several companies owned by Elon Musk to calculate fines levied against the platform for violating social media laws. European regulators may take the annual revenues of Musk’s other companies — including SpaceX, Neuralink, xAI, and the Boring Company — into account to calculate fines, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg.
X is being inve

Illustration: Beatrice Sala The FBI has arrested an Alabama man who is accused of hacking the Securities and Exchange Commission’s X account in January. The indictment (PDF) alleges that 25-year-old Eric Council Jr. worked with co-conspirators to take control of the account and post a fake message from SEC Chair Gary Gensler about Bitcoin ETFs that caused the price of Bitcoin to jump by more than $1,000 momentarily.
To carry out this scheme, Council is accused of creating a fake ID using t

Image: Jack Bullard for The Verge
In Stardew Valley, you can usually only speak to characters a few times per day. This limitation has led to a number of mods that add things for them to say so that players can spend more time with their virtual pals. But like many games, Stardew recently turned to AI, resulting in the addition of a mod with the ability to have theoretically endless conversations with your favorite farm companion.
“The reception has been a lot better than I initially thoug

SETIA ALAM, KUALA LUMPUR, MALAYSIA - 2024/07/21: A charging plug seen attached to BYD car 6 at the EvX expo. | Photo” Getty Images Automakers aren’t doing enough to identify and prevent human rights abuses along supply chains for EV batteries, Amnesty International warns in a new report.The charity ranked 13 of the world’s largest EV manufacturers, giving each a score based on its human rights policies and practices. BYD, one of the leading companies in global EV sales, an

The park expansion is still under construction, but some early illustrations (pictured) give us an idea of what to expect. | Image: Universal Universal’s Florida resort will open new worlds themed around franchises like Harry Potter and Super Mario on May 22, 2025. The announcement sets a date for the new park expansion, dubbed “Epic Universe,” which consists of four new worlds connected via a centralized hotel and shopping distinct called Celestial Park.
The lineup includes Su

Laura Normand / The Verge Donald Trump said Apple CEO Tim Cook called him to discuss the billions of dollars that Apple has been fined in the European Union. Trump made the statement during his appearance on the PBD Podcast — and said that he won’t let the EU “take advantage” of US companies like Apple if reelected.
“Two hours ago, three hours ago, he [Cook] called me,” Trump said. “He said the European Union has just fined us $15 billion... Then on top

Sorry, Chris Redfield, but Leon S. Kennedy is still Resident Evil’s best protagonist. | Image: Capcom The Silent Hill 2 remake just came out for those looking for a nostalgic scare, but if you’re in need of heebie-jeebies on a budget, the Resident Evil 4 remake is just as capable. It’s down to $21.99 ($8 off) at Amazon for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S. That’s the lowest price we’ve seen for a physical copy, and it’s just in time for Halloween and to remin

Amazon’s 2024 lineup includes a new note-taking Kindle Scribe, a faster Kindle Paperwhite, an upgraded entry-level model, and the apt-titled Colorsoft. Earlier this week, Amazon refreshed its entire Kindle lineup while adding a new color model to the mix. The updated entry-level Kindle ($109.99) and Kindle Paperwhite ($159.99) are available now, while the Kindle Colorsoft Signature Edition and updated Kindle Scribe will launch on October 30th and December 4th, respectively.We’ve yet

Ferrari F80. | Image: Ferrari Ferrari’s new F80 hypercar can record the track it is driving on and will boost the driver at the right time during the next lap. The “Boost Optimization” feature reads the straights and curves of the circuit and, with no further action from the driver, delivers more power to its hybrid system to help achieve the best lap time possible.
You can use Boost Optimization in “Performance” mode to get a consistent amount of electric power for

The latest update to the Philips Hue app adds the ability to customize the intensity and color of lighting effects. | Image: Signify Philips is introducing four new lighting effects through its Hue app including an underwater option simulating the glimmer of light beneath the waves. The added effects are part of a new app update, spotted by Hueblog, that also introduces the ability to customize the lighting effects already available through the app, as well as any new effects Philips introduces

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Instagram is launching several new features designed to protect teens from sextortion scams, which occur when scammers threaten to share intimate images of victims unless they receive a payment or more photos.
One guardrail that’s rolling out soon will prevent people from screenshotting or screen recording disappearing images or videos sent in a private message. If the sender enables replays of the image or video, Instagram will block people from ope

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Instagram is launching several new features designed to protect teens from sextortion scams, which occur when scammers threaten to share intimate images of victims unless they receive a payment or more photos.
One guardrail that’s rolling out soon will prevent people from screenshotting or screen recording disappearing images or videos sent in a private message. If the sender enables replays of the image or video, Instagram will block people from ope

A warming world will — and is already having — a profound impact on the things we all depend on: shelter, food, water, energy, medicine. Most nations have committed to drastic cuts in greenhouse gas emissions to dial back the planet’s thermostat.  But true sustainability is not just about emissions. We will need to transform the way all industries operate — from agriculture to transport and health — to meet the SDGs. The great green transition necessitates inn

Image: Netflix Seven years after Simon Stålenhag’s The Electric State was picked up for a live-action adaptation, and a few weeks after first-look images were revealed, we finally have the first trailer. The clip sets up what seems like a big battle in a retrofuturistic world — but it’s hard not to focus on the cartoonish tech and robots, which feel like goofier takes on Stålenhag’s distinctive art.
The Netflix adaptation is being directed Avengers-returnees A