Technology

Venmo has added new privacy controls for friend lists following a jaw-dropping incident where BuzzFeed News was able to track down President Joe Biden’s Venmo account because of the app’s leaky privacy protocols. App researcher Jane Manchun Wong discovered earlier on Friday that Venmo was working on the new controls. “We’re consistently evolving and strengthening the Venmo platform for all of our customers. As part of these ongoing efforts, we are enhancing our in-app controls providing customers an option to select a public, friends-only, or private setting for their friends list,” a Venmo spokesperson said in a statement to The Verge. To find the new controls, tap the hamburger icon while on the main feed, then tap “Settings,” “Privacy,” and then “Friends List.” The Friends List menu app...

Twitch has received a “batch” of new takedown notices from music publishers over copyrighted songs in recorded streams (known as VODs), the company said in an email to streamers today. The notice may be worrying for some streamers who were affected by the waves of takedowns that hit last year, because if a user gets three copyright strikes on their channel, they will be permanently banned from the platform, according to Twitch’s policies. With this advance warning, it seems Twitch is trying to get ahead of a sudden flurry of takedowns and give streamers some time to remove potentially offending VODs. “We recently received a batch of DMCA takedown notifications with about 1,000 individual claims from music publishers,” Twitch said in an email Friday, which was sent to a Verge staffer. “All ...

Amazon just dumped an $8 billion-plus chunk of change on MGM, a studio best known for James Bond and its logo of a roaring lion. The acquisition offers an opportunity for Amazon to spin the spy films into a big perk for its streaming services. But it’s hard to believe that dropping billions for the studio’s content library is actually going to prop up Amazon’s streaming services — at least on its own. Amazon already has a fully functioning studio arm that produces content for its Prime Video service. While it’s got a few hits here and there — Jack Ryan immediately comes to mind — Amazon has, for the most part, struggled to reach the Stranger Things-level of viewer enthusiasm that its rivals often enjoy. The company also owns IMDb TV, a free and ad-supported streaming service that’s actuall...

The Verge is deeply invested in doing service journalism; we report on companies’ misdeeds, we review expensive products to tell you whether they’re worth your hard-earned money, and speak to industry leaders to get their insights on the issues affecting their companies and their customers. It is in that vein that we brainstormed some ideas for social media theme parks in Florida. See, the Sunshine State passed a law this week that blocks social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter from “knowingly” deplatforming politicians and even algorithmically ranking content, with fine ranging from $25,000 to $250,000 per day (The law, which is a mish-mash of broad speech regulations, has already been challenged in court by the tech companies’ trade organizations, which called it “a frontal assa...

The lawyers of Elizabeth Holmes, ex-CEO of disgraced blood testing startup Theranos, have 112 questions for prospective jurors at Holmes’ fraud trial — including how often they check social media and whether they subscribe to Netflix. As The Wall Street Journal reported, Holmes’ attorneys have just filed a proposed jury questionnaire for her upcoming fraud trial. The extremely detailed 45-page document outlines every possible way Holmes fears a jury could be biased, and part of that apparently involves gauging exactly how online each juror is. Among other questions, jurors are asked: “Do you have an account on any social media platforms? If yes, please identify the platform(s).” “How frequently do you use the platform(s) listed above?” (Answers range from “multiple times per day” to “almos...

As the COVID-19 pandemic scales down in the United States, debates around the origins of the virus — and speculations that it came from a lab in China, not an animal — rumbled back to life. And they’re diverting attention to the wrong places. Focusing on where the virus came from is a distraction from the rest of the urgent work governments and health agencies around the world need to do in order to end this pandemic and prepare for the next one. We don’t need a consensus on the origins of COVID-19 in order to take steps to strengthen global public health. That doesn’t mean finding out where the coronavirus came from isn’t important. It’s one of the pieces of information that could give us tools to prevent a similar situation from happening again. Saying that the coronavirus came from a la...

Apple’s AirPods Pro cleverly solve one of the trickiest parts of earbud design with a unique button — even if it’s not technically a button at all. Officially referred to as the “force sensor” (a title that makes the button sound far more interesting than it actually is), it’s technically nothing more than an indented portion of the AirPods Pro’s stems, with some fancy hardware that measures not just capacitive touch but also pressure. But the faux-buttons solve one of the most annoying things about earbuds: how to control them. A smart solution for a more recent problem The issue of controlling truly wireless earbuds is a relatively new one. Older in-ear headphones often included a row of buttons on their wires, which allowed for volume and playback controls to be placed in a spot that’s ...

Shortly before Darren Springer interviewed for a job at the Burlington Electric Department (BED) in 2016, the city proudly proclaimed that it would become a “net zero energy city” by 2030. That meant no more gas or oil to heat residents’ homes and swapping out gas-powered cars for electric vehicles and more public transportation. “That’s got to be one of the most ambitious goals anywhere” “I said, that’s got to be one of the most ambitious goals anywhere in the country,” Springer, who is now BED’s general manager, tells The Verge. “That was one of the things that drew me to this work at Burlington Electric.” Since then, he’s worked to get the city on track to meet that goal. And while the target might have been unheard of in 2016, it’s now just one early example of the splashy renewable en...

NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter ended its sixth flight test on Mars earlier than planned last week after bugging out mid-flight, the rotorcraft’s chief pilot wrote in a blog post on Thursday. The four-pound mini helicopter was aiming to fly farther than any of its previous excursions to test out its scientific reconnaissance capabilities, as the latest trial in an extended test campaign to demonstrate a new mode of transportation on another world. Last Saturday, Ingenuity powered up and rose 33 feet from the Martian surface to travel a distance of roughly two football fields along a preprogramed flight path, all the while snapping photos of a “region of interest” on Mars during flight. As it buzzed along at about nine miles per hour toward the end of the first 150-meter leg of its journey, a g...

Lenovo’s Yoga Pad Pro is a new 13-inch Android tablet that can easily double as an external monitor, Gizmochina reports. It will be available to buy in China for 3,299 yuan (around $517) on May 31st. It’s not tricky to get most tablets on the market to work as a second monitor, but for the most part you’re limited to using them with specific devices. Apple’s iPads can be used as external monitors thanks to their built-in Sidecar feature, for example, but this only works if you’re using them with a Mac. But the Yoga Pad Pro has a full-on Micro HDMI port built into its grip, meaning you can plug basically any HDMI device into it and use the Yoga Pad Pro as a 13-inch monitor. And yes, that absolutely includes a Nintendo Switch. The Lenovo Yoga Pad Pro.Image: Lenovo Its built-in stand doubles ...

Merle Dandridge, an actor who’s had a long career in television and theater, will be reprising her role of Marlene in HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation, according to Variety and Deadline. Dandridge’s casting is particularly notable because actors in video games are rarely presented with the opportunity to play their characters in live action outside of the motion capture stage. Marlene is integral to how lead characters Joel and Ellie join together and head off on their zombie road trip in the first place. It’s unknown how much of the game’s story will carry over to the television adaptation, but Dandridge’s situation is unique. Both Troy Baker’s Joel and Ashley Johnson’s Ellie were recast for executive producer and writer Craig Mazin’s take on the critically acclaimed video game. Pedro Pasc...

Here’s something you don’t see every day: a brand-new Sony product launching first on Indiegogo. Motion Sonic is, in the words of Sony’s campaign, “effects gear to control sound in sync with your motion for playing music.” The Motion Sonic device itself is a small capsule that can slot into differently shaped rubber wristbands, sort of like a Fitbit. There’s a band that attaches to your wrist for use cases like playing guitar, and another wraps around the back of your hand and is better suited to playing keys. What it actually does is allow you to link hand motions to specific musical effects. For example, you could set it to add a delay effect when you move fingers from left to right, or to bend pitch as you roll your wrist. These effects are all created and saved on an iOS app, then you ...