Technology

Pre-installed system apps on Android phones from three popular Chinese vendors, as well as third-party apps, are reportedly transmitting personal user information without notification or consent.  Researchers at universities in the United Kingdom examined the Chinese version of the Android OS distributions run by Xiaomi, Realme and OnePlus headsets, experimenting …

Ready for some deals to get you over the hump? The latest version of Amazon’s Fire TV Cube is selling for $124.99 at Amazon, Best Buy, and Target. That saves you $15 on Amazon’s highest-end streaming device, which sports speedy performance, hands-free voice control using Amazon Alexa, and Wi-Fi 6E …

I first noticed a friend who was single using a reverse image search to learn more about a prospective real-life date she met through a virtual date.   She had a few of his photos and was able to learn the origin and confirm a lot about the lucky guy using …

The president attempted to rally bipartisan support to finally resolve a number of long-standing privacy, safety, and competition issues facing the tech industry. Over the more than hourlong address, Biden called on Congress to pass new rules protecting user data privacy and boosting competition in the tech industry. “Pass bipartisan …

Many times, I think Siri just doesn’t understand me. That may be true and not her fault. It turns out I may not have been asking Siri the right questions to make my life easier – until I learned these shortcuts. Putting these five Siri tricks into play will have you …

I’m coming to you from Microsoft’s campus in Redmond, where just a few hours ago, Microsoft announced that the next version of the Bing search engine would be powered by OpenAI, the company that makes ChatGPT. There’s also a new version of the Edge web browser with OpenAI chat tech …

The United Nations activated its emergency mapping satellite service in the wake of the horrific earthquakes that devastated Turkey and Syria on Monday.  More than 5,300 people were reported dead as of Tuesday, with the death toll from the disasters expected to rise. The magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck west of …

Microsoft is holding a surprise event at its Redmond headquarters today, where it’s expected to focus on its OpenAI partnership and introduce a version of Bing with ChatGPT. Unlike most of Microsoft’s events over the past few years, this special press event will be held in person and not livestreamed …

Vacation rental site VRBO wants you to have a fun Super Bowl bash – just not in one of its thousands of listed properties. The deployment of what it’s calling a “new unauthorized event prevention technology” is responsible for blocking over 500 event-related bookings in the first 12 months of …

And speaking of new Eras, my colleague Chris Welch has a scoop on Sonos’ upcoming speaker lineup set to debut in the coming months. We now know that they’re set to be branded as “Era,” with specific models including the Era 300 and Era 100. The former will apparently focus …