An anonymous reader quotes a report from Wired: While TikTok operates in the United States under new ownership, Apple has deployed technical restrictions to block iOS users in the United States from downloading other apps made by the video platform’s Chinese parent organization ByteDance. ByteDance owns a vast array of different apps spanning social media, entertainment, artificial intelligence, and other sectors. The leading one is Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, which has over 1 billion monthly active users. While most of those users reside in China, iPhone owners around the world have traditionally been able to download these apps from anywhere without using a VPN, as long as they have a valid App Store account registered in China.

That’s not true anymore. Starting in late January, iPhone users in the U.S. with Chinese App Store accounts began reporting that they were encountering new obstacles when they tried to download apps developed by ByteDance. WIRED has confirmed that even with a valid Chinese App Store account, downloading or updating a ByteDance-owned Chinese app is blocked on Apple devices located in the United States. Instead, a pop-up window appears that says, “This app is unavailable in the country or region you’re in.” The restriction appears to apply only to ByteDance-owned apps and not those developed by other Chinese companies.

The timing and technical specifics suggest the restriction is related to the deal TikTok agreed to in January to divest Chinese ownership of its U.S. operations. The agreement was the result of the so-called TikTok ban law passed by Congress in 2024, which also barred companies like Apple and Google from distributing other apps majority-owned by ByteDance. The Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act states that no company can “distribute, maintain, or update” any app majority-controlled by ByteDance “within the land or maritime borders of the United States.”

The law was primarily aimed at TikTok, which has more than 100 million users in the U.S. and had been the subject of years of debate in Washington over whether its Chinese ownership posed a national security risk. But ByteDance also has dozens of other apps that at some point were also removed from Apple’s and Google’s app stores in the U.S.. Now it seems like the scope of impact has reached even more apps that are not technically designed for U.S. audiences, such as Douyin, the AI chatbot Doubao, and the fiction reading platform Fanqie Novel.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Netflix’s library of streamable party games is expanding today with a custom version of Overcooked! All You Can Eat. Netflix launched its cloud gaming program with games like Lego Party and Tetris Time Warp, but Overcooked feels a bit unique because it features a roster of Netflix-affiliated characters from KPop Demon Hunters and Stranger Things.

For the uninitiated, Overcooked plays like a more manic version of Diner Dash, where teams attempt to prepare food together in increasingly elaborate kitchens filled with obstacles. The original version of Overcooked! All You Can Eat was released in 2020, and includes DLC and stages from previous versions of the game. Netflix’s version bundles in the same content, and “10 Netflix celebrity chefs” including “Dustin, Eleven, Lucas, and the Demogorgon from Stranger Things,” and “half-dozen faces from KPop Demon Hunters,” like “Mira, Rumi, Zoey, Jinu, Derpy and Sussie.” Like Netflix’s other streaming games, playing Overcooked also requires you to use a connected smartphone as a controller.

Offering a growing library of streaming games is part of Netflix’s new strategy under Alan Tascan, a former executive from Epic Games. Tascan took over as Netflix’s President of Games in 2024, and appeared to start revamping the company’s plans not long after, cancelling the release of several mobile games and reportedly shutting down its AAA game studio. Netflix is also continuing to adapt video games into content for its platform. For example, A24 is reportedly developing a game show based on Overcooked for the streaming service.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/netflixs-version-of-overcooked-lets-you-play-as-huntrx-212515187.html?src=rss

Seen here looking like a great candidate for being the last thing a person ever sees, this is a video of Youtuber Current Concept designing, 3D printing, and testing a 3-barrel revolver that shoots model rockets. Now THIS — this is the exact sort of dangerous fun I aspire to get into on weekends. But do I? Noooooo, by the time I’ve finished the list of chores my girlfriend made it’s time to go to work Monday morning with no sleep. I can’t go on like this. “You mean with the imaginary girlfriend?” At least she has three boobs.

darwinmac writes: Mozilla is working on a huge redesign for its Firefox browser, codenamed “Nova,” which will bring pastel gradients, a refreshed new tab page, floating “island” UI elements, and more. “From the mockups, it appears Mozilla took some inspiration from Googles Material You (or at least, the dynamic color extraction part of it) because the browser color accent appears influenced by the wallpaper setting,” reports Neowin. “Choosing a mint-green desktop background automatically shifts the top navigation bars to match that exact shade.”

Mozilla has a habit of redesigning Firefox every few years. Before “Nova,” there was the “Proton” redesign in 2021, the “Photon” redesign in 2017, and the “Australis” redesign in 2014. Nova is still in early development, so it might take a year or two before it appears in an official stable Firefox release. Neowin adds: “Not every redesign project ends well for Mozilla, though. You might remember 2012’s Firefox Metro, an ambitious attempt to build a custom browser for Windows 8s touch-first interface. The team built it to operate both as a traditional desktop application and as a touch-optimized Metro app. The whole thing was scrapped in 2014 after two years in development due to a dismally low user adoption rate (a preview version of the software had been released a year earlier on the Aurora channel).”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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If old-school Atari games like Pac-Man, Centipede, and Asteroids unlock a deep childhood nostalgia for you, check out the My Arcade Atari Gamestation Go. This handheld gaming device is packed with 200 games and is currently on Woot for an all-time low price of $129.99 (originally $179.99).

My Arcade Atari Gamestation Go

$129.99
at Woot

$179.99
Save $50.00

$129.99
at Woot

$179.99
Save $50.00

CNET praised the devices “crazy array of controller options,” though it cautioned that some games you might remember fondly have actually aged quite poorly.

While there aren’t detachable controllers, the 7-inch screen is bigger than the original Nintendo Switch, and it has the classic D-pad and shoulder buttons as well as a rotating dial, a physical number pad, and a trackball wheel. It comes with a sturdy kickstand, an HDMI port, three USB-C ports, a headphone jack, and a micro-SD slot for side-loading games. Although you can update the system via built-in wifi, you can’t buy or download additional titles on an app store, limiting you to the pre-loaded games.

While nostalgia is the main draw of this rechargeable console, keep in mind that performance and pacing might feel different if you’re used to modern games on contemporary consoles, reminding us that not all early games have aged well. That said, there are still a ton of options to choose from that will likely include your favorites, making the My Arcade Atari Gamestation Go worth it for classic gaming enthusiasts, especially at $50 off.

The command line is hot again. For some people, command lines were never not hot, of course, but it’s becoming more common now in the age of AI. Google launched a Gemini command line tool last year, and now it has a new AI-centric command line option for cloud products. The new Google Workspace CLI bundles the company’s existing cloud APIs into a package that makes it easy to integrate with a variety of AI tools, including OpenClaw. How do you know this setup won’t blow up and delete all your data? That’s the fun part—you don’t.

There are some important caveats with the Workspace tool. While this new GitHub project is from Google, it’s “not an officially supported Google product.” So you’re on your own if you choose to use it. The company notes that functionality may change dramatically as Google Workspace CLI continues to evolve, and that could break workflows you’ve created in the meantime.

For people who are interested in tinkering with AI automations and don’t mind the inherent risks, Google Workspace CLI has a lot to offer even at this early stage. It includes the APIs for every Workspace product, including Gmail, Drive, and Calendar. It’s designed for use by humans and AI agents, but like everything else Google does now, there’s a clear emphasis on AI.

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The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency has ordered federal agencies to patch three critical iOS vulnerabilities that were exploited over a 10-month span in hacking campaigns conducted by three distinct groups.

The hacking campaigns came to light on Thursday in a report published by Google. All three campaigns used Coruna, the name of an advanced hacking kit that amassed 23 separate iOS exploits into five potent exploit chains. While some of the vulnerabilities had been exploited as zero-days in earlier, unrelated campaigns, all had been patched by the time Google observed them being exploited by Coruna. When used against older iOS versions, the kit nonetheless posed a formidable threat given the high caliber of the exploit code and the wide range of capabilities.

The case of the promiscuous 2nd-hand zero-days

“The core technical value of this exploit kit lies in its comprehensive collection of iOS exploits,” Google researchers wrote. “The exploits feature extensive documentation, including docstrings and comments authored in native English. The most advanced ones are using non-public exploitation techniques and mitigation bypasses.”

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Nintendo of America is suing the US government, including the Department of Treasury, Department of Homeland Security and US Customs & Border Protection, over its tariff policy, Aftermath reports. The video game giant already raised prices on the Nintendo Switch in August 2025 in response to “market conditions” but has so far left the price of the newer Switch 2 console unchanged.

Nintendo’s lawsuit, filed in the US Court of International Trade, cites a Supreme Court ruling from February that confirmed lower courts’ opinions that the Trump administration’s global tariffs were illegal. Nintendo’s lawyers claim that the video game company has been “substantially harmed by the unlawful of execution and imposition” of “unauthorized Executive Orders” and the fees Nintendo has already paid to import products into the country. In response, the company is seeking a “prompt refund, with interest” of any fees that its paid.

Engadget has reached out to Nintendo of America about its lawsuit and will update this article if we hear back.

While taxes and other trade policies are supposed to be set by Congress, President Donald Trump implemented a collection of global tariffs over the course of his first year in office using executive orders and the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), a law that gives the President extended powers over trade during a global emergency. The Trump administration has positioned the tariffs as a way to punish enemies and bargain with trade partners, but many companies have passed the increased price of importing goods onto customers.

Developing…

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/nintendo/nintendo-is-suing-the-us-government-over-trumps-tariffs-191849003.html?src=rss