WhatsApp is rewriting its privacy policy as a result of a huge data protection fine earlier this year. From a report: Following an investigation, the Irish data protection watchdog issued a $253.29m fine — the second-largest in history over GDPR — and ordered WhatsApp to change its policies. WhatsApp is appealing against the fine, but is amending its policy documents in Europe and the UK to comply. However, it insists that nothing about its actual service is changing. Instead, the tweaks are designed to “add additional detail around our existing practices”, and will only appear in the European version of the privacy policy, which is already different from the version that applies in the rest of the world. “There are no changes to our processes or contractual agreements with users, and users will not be required to agree to anything or to take any action in order to continue using WhatsApp,” the company said, announcing the change. The new policy takes effect immediately.
In January, WhatsApp users complained about an update to the company’s terms that many believed would result in data being shared with parent company Facebook, which is now called Meta. Many thought refusing to agree to the new terms and conditions would result in their accounts being blocked. In reality, very little had changed. However, WhatsApp was forced to delay its changes and spend months fighting the public perception to the contrary. During the confusion, millions of users downloaded WhatsApp competitors such as Signal.
Dead Satellites and spent rocket parts tend to float around in earth’s orbit flying around at up to 28,000 kilometers per hour, which could easily damage or possibly destroy current communication satellites and the ISS. Recycling it seems isn’t just for those on the ground—an Australian company Neumann Space is working on an “In-space electric
In early 2003, it seemed like The Matrix was poised to become the next Star Wars—a sci-fi franchise with enough fan enthusiasm and in-universe lore to endure for decades. The first film, a box office hit in 1999 that only became more popular on DVD (becoming one of the first “must-own” titles and arguably, and…
If you own an Android device, there’s a good chance it’s powered by one of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processors. Snapdragon is nearly ubiquitous with Android phones and tablets (with some exceptions, of course), especially at the high end of the performance spectrum. In recognition of this, Qualcomm is embarking on a bold rebrand of Snapdragon
A group of physicists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has released a new study that involves lasers and a cloud of lithium atoms going dark as part of the Pauli blocking theory. This is the first observation of Pauli blocking’s effect as it relates to how atoms scatter light.
As demonstrated by Kate Bishop, Hawkeye, and Black Panther, the best part of new characters coming to Marvel’s Avengers are the story missions. These introduce us to the newcomers, giving us insight into their background and motivations, and provide a whole bunch of original content into an underweight game.…
Next year’s Sundance Film Festival will mark a momentous return to Park City, Utah, after in-person festivities were cancelled last year. But Sundance isn’t giving up on the digital platforms it used to stream films and bring cinephiles into a VR social hub last January. As part of its New Frontier exhibition, Sundance plans to expand The Spaceship, its virtual venue where attendees can chat together and explore VR and mixed reality art installations.
In an effort to connect Sundance’s in-person attendees with its global online audience, the Festival will also launch a “Biodigital Bridge” in Park City. Shari Frilot, Sundance’s Senior Programmer and Chief Curator of New Frontier, describes it as a human-scale screen where physical and digital attendees will be able to interact with each other. Developed together with the immersive studio Active Theory, the bridge will offer basic chat support, but it’s mostly a way for Sundance-goers to see how other attendees enjoy the event.
Sundance New Frontier curator Shari Frilot.
Sundance Film Festival
Frilot says New Frontier has been pushing the concept of biodigital experiences for several years now, mostly through an exploration of how technology can intersect with our lives. Think of the way that an app like Uber, or even Google Maps, has reshaped the way we navigate physical spaces. But now that the pandemic has forced us to rely on our tech more than ever — Sundance wouldn’t have been possible without it last year, after all — the term seems practically prescient. It’s more than just a buzzword: Frilot says she’s interested in exploring the technology that best serves humanity, or Team Human, as media theorist Douglas Rushkoff put it.
Last year, I found Sundance’s online platform last year to be a fascinating way to explore the festival and interact with fans. The core of the experience is the aforementioned Spaceship, which allows attendees on computers and VR headsets to mull about together. On a laptop or desktop, it resembles a stripped down version of Second Life. You walk around as simplistic avatars, and if you choose, you can also flip on your webcam, which fills your avatar’s head with a live video feed. Since Sundance’s platform is built on WebXR, a way to deliver virtual reality over the web, you can enter that same space in VR by slipping on any headset and visiting Sundance’s website.
Sundance Film Festival
Compared to SXSW’s VR platform, which looked beautiful but mostly felt like a virtual wasteland, it was clear that Sundance got something right last year. After isolating for most of 2020, being able to see many of my cinephile friends in VR made last year’s Sundance feel special. So for next year, Frilot says, the festival is going even further. The Spaceship will be upgraded with a new Cinema House, where attendees on computers and VR headsets can view events livestreamed from Park City, as well as room-scale discussions.
On the ground, Sundance will also have a new space called The Craft, which will let in-person attendees visit New Frontier exhibits, artist discussions and panels. There will also be VR headsets to use, though the festival is also encouraging people to bring their own gear if they’ve got it. Sundance hasn’t finalized its list of New Frontier exhibits yet, but Frilot tells me many artists are optimizing for the Oculus Quest 2, so fest-goers can experience their work without being connected to a PC. But there will likely still be pieces that demand a serious VR rig. Sundance’s famed Egyptian theater will also host some New Frontier performances, which will occur both on the ground and virtually on the Spaceship.
You’ll need a $50 Sundance Explorer Pass to access all of these virtual goodies, which is double what it cost last year. It’s a shame to see the price jump so quickly, but it’s also reflective of the deeper commitment the festival is making in its digital platforms. Notably, the Explorer Pass is also open to people around the world, whereas Sundance’s virtual screenings are limited to U.S. attendees.
“[The virtual platform] is not just this thing that we’re trying, we’re actually doubling down on this,” Frilot says. “This points to the vital landscape of how cinema and storytelling is going to manifest [going forward]. We’re here to not only contribute to it, but to meet it and support it.”
Shin Megami Tensei V takes place in two Tokyos—both are real, despite what the angels will tell you on their worst days. Bodies and ghosts alike still pump through streets, subway stations, and the city’s other familiar arteries. They cross long-forgotten leylines, producing a new arcane geometry—all cell phones,…
Web hosting company GoDaddy said on Monday email addresses of up to 1.2 million active and inactive Managed WordPress customers had been exposed in an unauthorized third-party access. From a report: The company said the incident was discovered on Sept. 6 and the third-party accessed the system using a compromised password.
For those who haven’t jumped on the Instant Pot bandwagon yet, the holiday shopping season is a great time to buy one because you’ll find most models on sale. We’re a few days out from Black Friday but the six-quart Instant Pot Duo Plus is already half off, bringing it down to a record low of $59. The higher-end Instant Pot Pro Crisp, which includes an air-fryer lid, is also down to an all-time low of $170.
The Instant Pot Duo Plus is better for most people, and certainly better for Instant Pot newbies. It combines nine cooking methods in one device: pressure cooking, slow cooking, sautéing, rice cooking, yogurt making, steaming, warming, sous vide cooking and sterilizing. It also has a number of quick-cooking modes, including slow cook, soup, eggs and rice, that can be activated with just one button press. All that is to say that this one device can prepare a bunch of different foods in various ways, without much hassle on the part of the home cook. The inner pot is made of food-grade stainless steel and is dishwasher safe, too, so cleanup is a breeze as well. And with this model’s six-quart capacity, you’ll be able to make a full meal for a mid-sized family or a group of visiting friends easily.
Air frying is a big trend right now and thankfully you don’t have to buy a dedicated air fryer to get those results. A few Instant Pot models have an air fry mode, but they require a special lid. The Instant Pot Pro Crisp is one such model that comes with the necessary lid (along with the standard multi-cooker lid) and it’s $80 off right now, bringing it down to $170. This model has 11 cooking modes, the two included lids plus additional accessories like an air fryer basket and a dehydrating/broiling tray. It’s also an eight-quart machine, making it even better than the discounted Duo Plus for large families and gatherings.
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After years of rumors, in September of 2014, the Apple Watch was officially revealed and while it was Apple’s first in-house digital wearable, 26 years earlier Seiko’s WristMac could actually be considered the first true Apple Watch. It was a digital watch that was years ahead of its time with capabilities that earned…
The latest version of Google’s Messages app seems to fix a long-standing issue for Android users: it finally displays reactions sent via Apple’s iMessage correctly. As reported by 9to5 Google, the app now turns Tapbacks into emoji.
Until now, Messages has converted Tapbacks into “fallback” text. So, if an Android user sent a message to an iPhone owner reading “see you in ten?” and their iOS buddy used the thumbs up reaction, Messages displayed that response as its own line of text (i.e. “liked ‘see you in ten?'”). That often made conversations far messier than they needed to be, especially in group chats.
Google brought emoji reactions to Messages on RCS-compatible Android devices last year, but there are some differences from iOS Tapbacks. While Apple uses a heart icon, a “ha ha” label and other punctuation, Google uses emoji. So, the Android app appears to convert the heart into a face with heart eyes, “ha ha” into a laughing face and so on. Some nuance might get lost in translation, but it’s still far cleaner than Google’s previous method of displaying Tapbacks.
Word of the change first emerged via 9to5 Google‘s deep dive into the latest Messages beta. Google is now rolling out the update. We’re not quite at the stage where iMessage is on Android, but at least Google is playing a little nicer with iOS.
In disclosures to the Securities and Exchange Commission, web registrar and hosting company GoDaddy has revealed that it discovered it had been hacked. The company says that it discovered an “unauthorized third party” had gained access to its Managed WordPress hosting environment. Anything up to 1.2 million users have seen their email address and customer number exposed, as well as admin passwords for both WordPress sites hosted on the platform, as well as passwords for sFTPs, databases and SSL private keys.
The document says that GoDaddy believes that the breach first occurred on September 6th, 2021, and the investigation is currently ongoing. Demetrius Comes, Chief Information Security Officer, says that GoDaddy is currently working with law enforcement and a private IT forensics firm. In addition, it says that it has reset the relevant credentials and will work with users to issue new SSL certificates. Comes ends his statement by saying that the company will, perhaps a little too belatedly, “learn from this incident” and will take steps to prevent such a breach happening in future.
This is far from the first time that GoDaddy has been spoken in the same sentence as a security breach in recent years. In 2018, an AWS error exposed data on GoDaddy servers, and in 2020, 28,000 user accounts were breached by an unauthorized individual. Later last year, GoDaddy was also referenced as part of a hack that took down a number of sites in the cryptocurrency space.
Smartwear hasn’t quite had its moment. Innovators like Hexoskin and Omsignal, not to mention huge companies like Adidas and Ralph Lauren, have struggled to make an impact, demanding a lot of money for dedicated shirts and sensors, while contending with mediocre accuracy, polarizing style choices and not many compelling reasons to exist. As Adam Crofts, founder of the startup Prevayl, puts it, there have been a lot of lessons to learn from other companies’ mistakes. He’s hoping to get it right.
Prevayl, whose first products launch in the UK later this month, combines a small tracking sensor with a line of fitness “smart” shirts, from crop tops through to vests and compression shirts, in addition to a companion app (of course) and an online community. Usually, that means something approximating a forum, but according to the company’s website, it’s created “a members-only private community designed for amateur athletes and the sporting elite.”
It’s limited its first wave of users to 700 people. The audience seems to be, well, the fittest friends and acquaintances you know. The ones that know what they can benchpress, their fastest 5K time, or their VO2 Max. The latter is not a haircare product.
Prevayl’s sweet spot is this area between amateur athlete and biometric obsessive, and it’s approaching the fitness tech fight with style. It has a slick promotional video featuring pro athletes, a moody black logo and a surprisingly slick, well designed app. (Seriously, it amazes me how poor most entry-level fitness apps can still look.) And the shirt? Well, it looks good on the athletes.
At a preview event in London, the team set me up in one of their first shirts, ahead of a planned launch early next year. It feels like a premium, luxury sports tee. It’s breathable, soft to the touch and tight. An elasticated band across the chest on all of the garments houses the conductive sensors, connected with graphene-augmented knitted electrodes. The fibers connecting these sensors look like metallic shoelaces and are machine washable. The shirt can go straight into a warm laundry wash; you just need to ensure you’ve taken the sensor out from the tiny pocket on the front of the clothing.
Mat Smith/Engadget
There’s no need to fasten the sensor in place, as it comes in contact with the conductive fabric as soon as it’s in the front of the shirt. The sensor itself is an evolution from the chunky haphazard sensor unit design of smartwear’s past. The sensor has a plastic stopper that protects the USB-C charging port, while the charging cable is a small, machined aluminum clasp that magnetically folds in on itself.
The company makes everything here in-house, and Crofts believes this is why Prevayl can do things differently. “Usually, it’s been tech [companies] trying to make clothing or visa versa.” The company’s approach to the clothing itself was “style led” design. Prevayl’s head office has entire machines and technicians dedicated to knitting the clothing part of the equation.
Despite the sensor itself being so small, it’s packed with tech. There’s a “clinical-grade” ECG, that tracks your workout with four times the frequency of Polar heart rate monitors. It also monitors breathing frequency, motion and even body temperature. There’s even a bioimpedance sensor, which can be used for body composition scans, but there didn’t seem to be any feature that takes advantage of that yet. Prevayl is trying to do it all.
The company puts all this biometric data to use through many of the features and guidance you’ve seen on other fitness devices and services. Like Whoop, the system can be used to gauge whether your body has fully recovered from a workout; like MyZone’s traffic light system, it color-codes your workout effort into five categories, measuring both how hard you’re working out and when your heart rate has recovered. This is all in addition to tracking your heart-rate, caloric burn and more. Within the app, you can even see an accurate cardiogram of your heart as it beats away.
Mat Smith/Engadget
One of the bigger challenges, which many fitness trackers and wearables struggle with, is ensuring a decent level of accuracy. Crofts mentioned multiple times during our interview that the company has been obsessed with gathering data.
The company worked with the UK’s University of Salford to validate the accuracy of its ECG unit. The team also recruited professional athletes, including British Olympic and Paralympic athletes and professional sportspeople, to test its prototypes and offer up crucial data for the team to chew over. The next stage is testing with more typical gym-goers, weekend warriors and the marginal gain-chaser, kicking off this month.
Even sized at a large, my tee felt a little too snug. I know many of us aren’t fans of the compression fit, but this, a tank top and crop top are the only options for now. Fortunately, Prevayl is working on loose fit and long-sleeved options, which I’d find more appealing. More colors, beyond Personal Trainer Black (my name, not theirs), are also incoming. The issue remains, though: If you wanted to use this system frequently, you will need more than one top. Or to do a daily laundry run.
As the sensor is removable, this should strip away some (most?) of the cost of additional shirts. But Prevayl wants to invade the luxury sportswear segment and that means prices to reflect that ambition. To begin with, it will cost you at least £120, which is roughly equivalent to $160. This starter kit includes a sensor priced at £60, and a tank top. Not including the sensor, the Smart Tank will cost £60, while the Smarts Sports Bra will be £65. The Smart T-Shirt, which I tested, will cost £70. The impressive specs and tight app integration will go up against the expensive cost of entry.
Judging from my demo with Prevayl’s team (and my own early testing), the product is already looking polished. I spoke with a fitness professional at my local gym who, conveniently, had also tested out Prevayl. She noted that any new smartwear product would have to fight against incumbent chest straps and fitness trackers. Unlike a smartwatch, it’s nearly impossible to wear this top in tandem with a chest strap from another manufacturer. People are creators of habit — especially when it comes to exercise. People swear by Strada or their Apple Watch because it’s familiar and consistent. At this early stage, Prevayl’s online community isn’t yet live.
For now, the company is focusing on the UK and Ireland, but Prevayl’s spokesperson told me that the US will be a priority. I’m planning to test the smart shirt further, but I might have to invest in more items if I want to get serious about using Prevayl regularly.
With Grogu off to Jedi school and soon to be forgotten, The Mandalorian has given Star Wars fans another iconic character to obsess over with the return of Boba Fett. Not only is he getting his own spin-off series, but next month Columbia will introduce a new line of winter wear inspired by the bounty hunter’s unique…
As console game prices keep heading north, preordering games or buying them on launch date makes less and less financial sense. Especially when the same game could be available for 30% or more off the list price in a few months—by which point those game-breaking bugs will also have been fixed. If you’ve been feeling…
A year ago, the next generation of console gaming was supposed to have arrived. The Xbox Series X (and Series S) and PlayStation 5 strode boldly onto the scene, with massive chassis and even bigger promises of games with better graphics, shorter loading times, and revolutionary new breakthroughs. But a year in, and that next generation of gaming has yet to arrive. From a report: There are still too few consoles, and more importantly, too few games that truly take advantage of them, leaving the first year of the PS5 and Xbox Series X more of a beta test for the lucky few who have been able to get ahold of one, rather than the proper start of a new era of gaming.
A complicated mess of factors have led to the next-gen bottleneck. The physical consoles themselves are still nigh-impossible to buy, which naturally limits the number of customers who own them and can buy games for them. That in turn means that there’s little incentive for developers to aim for exclusive next-gen titles that truly harness the power of the PS5 or Xbox Series X. Why limit yourself (and your sales) to the handful of next-gen console owners when there are millions of Xbox One and PS4 customers to whom you can sell copies of games? Adding to the mess has been the fact that industry-wide delays (many of which are due to similar pandemic-related issues as the broader supply chain problems) have also seen tons of next-gen optimized or exclusive games moved out to 2022 and beyond. Meaning even if you can get ahold of a console, there are still relatively few blockbuster titles to actually play on them.
It’s frustrating to run out of space on your desktop or laptop, but you can turn to storage devices for extra room and now’s a good time to look for them if you’re getting short on space. Black Friday deals have already popped up on some of our favorite models, including those from Crucial. The 1TB MX500 internal SSD is on sale for $85, which is 15 percent off its normal price and only a few dollars shy of a record low. The 2TB model is down to $168 as well, and if you don’t need that much extra space, you can pick up the 500GB version for only $53.
The MX500 should fit into most computers thanks to its 2.5-inch design, and it supports sequential read speeds of up to 560 MB/s and sequential write speeds of up to 510 MB/s. It also comes with AES 256-bit hardware encryption as well as integrated power-loss immunity, the latter of which should protect your data even if your power gets cut unexpectedly.
If you’re looking for an internal drive that’s a bit more high-end, or one that works with the PS5, Crucial’s P5 Plus in 1TB is down to $145, which is 19 percent off its regular rate and an all-time low. This drive made it into our PS5 SSD guide because, even at its normal price, it’s a solid budget option for the console as long as you’re willing to supply your own heatsink. It’s an NVMe PCIe SSD with read speeds up to 6,600 MB/s and write speeds up to 5,000 MB/s, and it’s optimized for high-performance gaming and computing.
For those with tighter budgets who still want to expand their PS5 storage options, Crucial’s X6 external drive in 1TB is 38 percent off right now, bringing it down to $80. Yes, you can use portable SSDs with the console, but there are some limitations: when connected to a PS5, an external drive can only be used to play PS4 titles or store PS5 games. That means you can move a PS5 title out of cold storage when you want to play it, which may be best if you have slower internet speeds impeding your ability to download games quickly. We like the X6 for its fast 540 MB/s read speeds, durable design that’s shock, drop, vibration and temperature resistant and its compatibility with a wide range of devices.
All products recommended by Engadget are selected by our editorial team, independent of our parent company. Some of our stories include affiliate links. If you buy something through one of these links, we may earn an affiliate commission.
Traditionally, Mac’s window management features have lagged behind Microsoft Windows. And with Windows 11’s new Snap Layouts feature, it might seem like Windows is racing forwards yet again—but that’s not entirely the case. The Mac offers pretty good window management features; they’re just not as obvious as the…
A new Hawkeye clip teases familial strife for Kate Bishop. The CW teases what’s coming on The Flash, Riverdale, Legacies, and more. Get a glimpse of the penultimate episode of Doctor Who: Flux. Plus, Noomi Rapace heads to historical horror in You Won’t Be Alone. To me, my spoilers!
