Technology

The personal data of hundreds of thousands of Instacart users is being sold on the dark web for around $2 per person, according to a report from BuzzFeed. The publication says information including “names, the last four digits of credit card numbers, and order histories” appearing to belong to 278,531 Instacart accounts is available to buy. (Though it’s impossible to verify that this number doesn’t include duplicates or incorrect data.) BuzzFeed did confirm with two Instacart users that the order date, transaction amount, and credit card numbers included in the cache matched their recent purchases. The data also includes users’ emails addresses. It’s not clear what the source of the data is Instacart denies that there’s been a data breach of its systems, but says it’s investigating the iss...

You know that chumbox of weird garbage that appears at the bottom of most news sites, including this one? You know the one! It’s labeled “Promoted stories” or “Around the web.” It’s got headlines like: “1 Weird Trick to Lose Weight,” “You Won’t Believe What [STAR NAME HERE] Looks Like Today!,” and “Throw this vegetable out!” There are two major players in the field — Taboola and Outbrain — and the Justice Department has approved their merger. Why are they called chumboxes? Well, chum is fishbait — you throw decomposing fish guts, blood, and bones into the water to lure other fish. A chumbox is like this but for humans online. You won’t BELIEVE why publishers are using them These chumboxes exist because they’re more lucrative than other kinds of advertising: you add them to your site — that...

China has successfully launched its first major interplanetary mission to Mars. The launch begins a long seven-month journey through deep space, and once the mission reaches the Red Planet, China could become just the second nation ever to land and operate a rover on the Martian surface. Called Tianwen-1, China’s mission consists of a Martian orbiter, lander, and rover. The trio launched on top of the Long March 5 from China’s Wenchang Spacecraft Launch Site in the early morning hours of July 23rd. The Long March 5 is one of China’s most powerful rockets, and this mission marked just the fourth launch ever for this type of vehicle. China sends its first mission to Mars. Tianwen-1 was launched from Wenchang towards the red planet on a voyage that will last until next year. #Mars pic.twitter...

Microsoft’s AI-powered “eye contact” feature for the Surface Pro X is finally starting to roll out, months after it was originally announced for the ARM-powered Surface laptop last year. The new feature is rolling out now as part of Windows 10 Insider Preview Build 20175, which means that it likely isn’t too far from a broad release. According to Microsoft, the new feature relies on the “artificial intelligence capabilities of the Microsoft SQ1 processor” to adjust where your eyes are looking in a video call or chat to make sure that you always appear to be making eye contact with the camera — even if the lens is off to the side or you’re looking down at your display. When enabled, the eye contact correction will automatically apply to any app that uses the front camera (like Zoom, Skype, ...

The New York Times has acquired the audio production company behind the popular podcast series Serial, which is widely credited with helping popularize the modern narrative podcast movement. The company, called Serial Productions, was formed in 2017 by Sarah Koenig, Julie Snyder, and Ira Glass after the success of the podcast’s initial season three years prior, and the team has gone on to produce two follow-up seasons of Serial and a standalone podcast called S-Town. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. As part of the deal, The Times is entering into what’s being described as an “ongoing creative and strategic alliance” with This American Life, the syndicated radio program from which Serial was originally spun off and for which Glass still works as a host. The parent company of This Ameri...

Twitter believes the perpetrators of last week’s unprecedented attack on the company accessed the direct message (DM) inbox of an elected official in the Netherlands, the company said Wednesday evening. The revelation comes as part of the company’s ongoing investigation into last Thursday’s attack that allowed attackers to hijack the accounts of some of the service’s most high-profile users, including politicians Barack Obama and Joe Biden, to tweet a bitcoin scam. In total, Twitter said it believes attackers accessed the DMs of up to 36 of the 130 targeted accounts, including that elected official. Twitter has “no indication” that other elected officials had their DMs accessed as part of the attack, however. We believe that for up to 36 of the 130 targeted accounts, the attackers accessed...

Thirteen years after the game’s original release, the question “But can it run Crysis ” continues to be an in-joke among gamers, referring to whether any new piece of hardware is powerful enough to run Crytek’s graphically demanding game. Now, we have proof that Nintendo’s handheld Switch is capable of the task; Eurogamer’s Digital Foundry, an outlet renowned for their technical breakdowns, created a video that shows the differences between every version of Crysis released thus far and how the Nintendo Switch runs the game. I myself was kind of shocked that Crytek managed to create a competent port of Crysis Remastered on Switch. It’s not all good, though. Here are a few takeaways from Digital Foundry’s video: It’s fairly crisp for a Switch game! While the game can sometimes drop to an ugl...

Samsung’s August Unpacked event is getting closer, and today, there’s a thorough spec dump for the standard Galaxy Note 20. We’ve already gotten the full rundown for the top-tier Note 20 Ultra, but now we can get a fuller picture for just what differences there are between the two — and the sacrifices Samsung made on the “smaller” phone. WinFuture has published the specs, just as it did for the bigger upcoming Note. The most significant downgrade is definitely the screen. The regular Galaxy Note 20 will have a 6.7-inch, 1080p display that tops out at a very traditional refresh rate of 60Hz. (The Note 20 Ultra is believed to have an enormous 6.9-inch 3200 x 1440 display that runs at 120Hz like the Galaxy S20.) On the plus side, images make clear that the Note 20 has a flatter display than t...

Microsoft posted fiscal fourth quarter earnings on Wednesday, beating Wall Street expectations on both sales and profit for the past three months amid the economic downturn caused by COVID-19. In fact, it appears many of Microsoft’s various divisions are benefiting from the effects of the pandemic, with the shift to remote work and shelter-in-place orders around the world pushing people toward gaming, video conferencing, and other virtual pastimes. “The last five months have made it clear that tech intensity is the key to business resilience. Organizations that build their own digital capability will recover faster and emerge from this crisis stronger,” Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said in a statement. He goes on to say Microsoft is in the unique position of being able to “help every organi...

Tesla turned a profit of $104 million in the second quarter of 2020 despite shutting down its electric vehicle factory in Fremont, California, for roughly seven weeks because of the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, Tesla has now been profitable for four straight quarters for the first time in company history — an elusive benchmark the company has long sought. But perhaps more importantly, Tesla says it has a “site selected” for its next Gigafactory in the US. During a call with investors, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced the factory would be located in Austin, Texas. He described it as an “ecological paradise… with birds in the trees, butterflies, fish in the stream.” The factory will also be open to the public, he said. The company is on track to receive several tax incentive packages f...

Tesla will build its next US factory in Austin, Texas, CEO Elon Musk announced today, wrapping up a months-long search for a location to build the upcoming Cybertruck. Construction work is “already underway,” Musk said. “It started this weekend.” Tesla was recently granted tens of millions of dollars in tax breaks from the county in Texas where the factory will be built, and from a local school district. The company was also considering Tulsa, Oklahoma, and Musk said Tesla would keep it in mind for future projects. The factory will be open to the public, Musk said. ‘It’s going to basically be an ecological paradise.” Developing… You Deserve to Make Money Even When you are looking for Dates Online. So we reimagined what a dating should be. It begins with giving you back power. Get to ...