Jack Hadfield

Articles by Jack Hadfield

Kim Dotcom Wins Settlement from New Zealand Police for 2012 Raid

Kim Dotcom, the founder of the now defunct file-sharing site Megaupload, has won an undisclosed settlement from the New Zealand police over their dawn raid on his house in 2012 which saw him arrested as part of an FBI investigation into his websites.

The Associated Press

Researchers Say Dating Apps Like Tinder Easily Hacked

Researchers from the Moscow-based Kaspersky Lab have discovered that using simple exploits, they could uncover sensitive data, like location and message history, for users of 9 dating apps for iOS and Android, including Tinder, Bumble and OK Cupid.

Leon Neal/Getty Images

China Hurtles Past US in Race to Build Quantum Computers

China’s recent advances in quantum technologies, including the launch of a quantum satellite and the announcement of a $10 billion quantum computing center, have Western scientists concerned as to whether the United States and its allies will be able to match them in developments.

AP Photo/Andy Wong

Democrats Push for Ban on Political Ads from Foreign Companies on Social Media

Democrats in both the House and the Senate want to put a ban on political advertisements on social media that are paid for by foreign companies, sending a letter to the FEC asking them to consider new rules about online advertising. The letter came two weeks after Facebook revealed to Congress that a Russian account had paid for 3,000 ads between June 2015 and May 2017.

Facebook plans to invest $1 billion into original content for streaming

Google to Refund Revenue from Fake Advert Traffic

Google announced in a blog post that it will issue refunds to companies whose advertisements were viewed by bots instead of humans; some of its advertising partners will do the same.

The Associated Press

Social Media Companies to Face Fines in UK for Failing to Remove Terror Content

In her speech at the UN in New York Thursday, the British Prime Minister, Theresa May, warned social media companies that if they do not clamp down on terrorist on their sites, she will introduce new legislation that would make them liable for any extremist content posted; failure to remove it would result in fines.

The Associated Press

Report: Hackers Snuck Malware in Privacy Software CCleaner Update

Hackers installed a backdoor system into the popular security application CCleaner, according to reports. Version 5.33 was issued back on August 15, and was undetected until September 13. According to Avast, the parent company of Piriform, around 2.27 million users ran the affected software.

Hackers behind the $81 million heist from the Bangladesh central bank have likely been inv

Virginia Board of Elections Scraps Touch-Screen Voting Machines

Virginia’s State Board of Elections has decided to scrap the current generation of electronic voting machines, judging them to be too vulnerable to hacking, ordering them to be replaced before the state’s gubernatorial election on November 7 of this year.

hackers

Spanish Regulator Fines Facebook $1.4 Million for Privacy Breach

The Spanish Data Protection Agency (AEPD) has fined Facebook 1.2 million euros, or just over $1.4 million dollars, for breaching the country’s data protection and privacy regulations. The fine follows an investigation into how the social media giant collects, stores and uses data which found it did not obtain the proper user consent necessary beforehand.

Kim White/Getty Images

Uber Faces FBI Probe Over Secret ‘Hell’ Program

Uber has confirmed that it is cooperating with the FBI who has launched an investigation into its “Hell” software, over concerns it illegally tracked the positions of Lyft drivers, its major competitor in the ride-sharing business.

The Associated Press

Facebook Explains How Users’ Accounts Are Handled After They Die

In a post on Facebook’s Newsroom, Monika Bickert, director of global policy management, explained the process employed by the social media company for the treatment of profiles for users who have passed away, something that most social networking sites do not take into account.

More than 3,500 visitors flocked to a recent one-day expo at Amsterdam's historic central

YouTube CEO Claims Discrimination Rampant In Tech Industry

The CEO of YouTube, Susan Wojcicki, responded in Fortune to the recent viewpoint diversity memo by James Damore. She claimed that she had faced massive discrimination for being a woman working in the technology industry, and that implicit biases still exist within it, despite exact claims to the contrary in Damore’s memo.

In this Tuesday, Feb. 28, 2017, file photo, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki speaks during the i

Breitbart’s Schilling, Nate Church on Esports: ‘The Next NFL’

Breitbart Tech’s gaming expert Nate Church joined Curt Schilling, himself a long-time gamer and former development studio founder, on Schilling’s show Whatever It Takes to discuss the growing phenomenon of eSports, with its huge presence in Asia and rapid growth in the United States.

AP Photo/Jacques Brinon, File

Compulsory Age Checks to Watch Internet Porn Coming to UK in 2018

The commencement order of the Digital Economy Act of 2017, which gained Royal Assent in April, has started a nine-month countdown to the introduction of compulsory age verification checks that British citizens will have to complete before they are allowed to view online pornography.

online

Report: Google Paying Academics Who Write Favorable Papers

According to a report by the Campaign for Accountability, Google has paid researchers that produced papers and projects painting Google in a positive light, including at least one who did not disclose that he had received any funding from them.

Press Association via AP Images

Spotify Virtue Signals Against Trump Travel Ban

Spotify has launched an artistic collaboration called “I’m with the banned,” in an effort to protest against President Trump’s travel ban, which was recently put back into effect after a previous court order against it was struck down.

The Associated Press

Obama Foundation To Push For Improved Digital Citizenship

Glenn Brown, the Chief Digital Officer of the Obama Foundation, announced in a blog post that the Foundation was requesting input from ordinary citizens on what they thought the best model of “digital citizenship” was, and how they could push the concept forward.

The Associated Press

Robot-Produced Artisanal Pizza Now Deliverable in Under 4 Minutes

Based out of Silicon Valley, Zume Pizza uses robots to produce freshly-baked, artisanal pizza. With their new van, which contains on-board ovens, they can deliver their pizza to customers as quickly as four minutes after it was ordered.

Internet rumours that swirled around a pizza restaurant in Washington became a shocking ca

New AI Technology Learns How to Read Minds

Scientists at Carnegie Mellon University have created a machine learning technology that utilizes brain activation patterns to identify complex thoughts and sentences, which is, in effect, an ability to “mind read.”

Machine Learning A..I. technology will be more accurate than the coin operated fortune tel

NSA Creates GitHub Account To Share Projects

The National Security Agency has recently joined the code-sharing site, GitHub, uploading many of their projects as open-source to share with programmers across the world. This is the latest step in the trend of the NSA, a usually secretive organization, opening itself up to society at large.

The Associated Press

Report: Walmart Orders Vendors Not to Use Amazon Web Services

According to multiple tech companies, Walmart is telling vendors that they are not allowed to run any applications for the retail giant using Amazon Web Services, and should instead use alternate solutions, such as Microsoft’s Azure.

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Netflix Flip-Flops on Net Neutrality

After Netflix CEO Reed Hastings dismissed net neutrality as an issue that was only important to “the Netflix of ten years ago” at a conference two weeks ago, the company’s Twitter account sent out a tweet claiming they would “never outgrow” the cause.

Ethan Miller/Getty Images

New Bill Aims to Stop Child Heatstroke Deaths in Cars with Technology

As the temperature increases in the coming months across the country, incidents of children being trapped in hot cars is set to increase. More than 700 children died from heat exhaustion in cars in 1998; 12 have already lost their lives this year alone. The HOT CARS Act of 2017 would require cars to be fitted with a system that alerts the driver if a child is left in the back seat after the engine is switched off.

AJ Mast / AP Images for Dorel Juvenile Group