Technology

A California judge is allowing a lawsuit against Visa to proceed, saying the company plausibly knew porn site operator MindGeek was monetizing sexual videos involving children. Judge Cormac Carney issued the ruling late last week in Serena Fleites v. MindGeek et al., rejecting Visa’s attempts to dismiss its portion of the suit. Carney says Visa plausibly “intended to help MindGeek monetize child porn” because it continued to offer payment processing services to the major tube site Pornhub despite knowing the site had failed to moderate videos of minors. The ongoing lawsuit asserts that MindGeek, Visa, and others violated a series of laws including the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) and the California Unfair Competition Law (UCL). The claims stem from a sexually ...

Amazon is partnering with select stores that we’re used to seeing in local shopping malls to offer same-day Prime deliveries. For now, this only applies to orders from PacSun, GNC, Superdry, and Diesel, but Amazon says it’s working on offering same-day deliveries from Sur La Table and 100% Pure in “the coming months.” The service is also limited to certain cities, which include in and around Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Las Vegas, Miami, Phoenix, Scottsdale, Seattle, and Washington, DC. If you’re located near any of these areas, Amazon says you can now browse through and order a curated selection of goods from local mall stores on Amazon’s site. Right now, Amazon’s selection of stores seems a bit slim. But if you need some vitamins or a pair of jeans in a pinch — and you haven’t hung out at t...

If you live in North America, it looks like it’ll be really difficult to get your hands on a Sega Genesis Mini 2. In a statement to Polygon, the company says that only a small fraction of the consoles will be available in the region compared to what was available for the Mini 1.0. Sega says that this reduction in stock is due to the continued semiconductor shortage affecting all kinds of consumer electronic goods since the pandemic slowed manufacturing down to a trickle and jammed up supply chains. You can still preorder the console for about $100 plus a $21 shipping fee on Amazon. The Sega Genesis Mini 2, the follow-up to 2019’s widely sought-after Sega Genesis Mini, will come with 50 games, including one that was previously unreleased (details on what it is haven’t yet been revealed) and...

Music is already a huge part of the user experience on TikTok, and it looks like the platform may be continuing to build on that relationship by launching a new app. According to patent filings discovered by Insider, TikTok parent company ByteDance has filed with the US Patent and Trademark Office to trademark “TikTok Music.” The trademark application for TikTok Music was first submitted in Australia in November. Per the filing, the app would enable users to buy, stream and download music, as well as create and share playlists. Users on TikTok Music would also be able to livestream audio and video, according to the filing. The company said that users could “live stream audio and video interactive media programming in the field of entertainment, fashion, sports, and current events,” differe...

Until recently, one of the most convenient ways to set a timer was to simply search for one on Google. Punch in a query like “10 minute timer,” and, hey presto, you’d get a ten-minute timer. But last month, reports started to emerge that this feature had disappeared from Google without warning. SEORoundTable was among the first to cover the missing timer on July 20th, citing tweets from around July 18th. Although there is no shortage of timers elsewhere on the web (or provided as stock apps on iOS and Android) Google’s built-in version was a simple, accessible alternative. And, as well as the timer, there was also a stopwatch feature built into the same widget for when you need to count up rather than down. The feature dates back almost a decade, having been introduced in 2013. We’re...

The coronavirus pandemic is now in its third year, which means that many former commuters are now in their third year of working from home. Even folks who are back in the office a few days a week are often working from home more than they did before the pandemic started. If your Wi-Fi is flaking out, slowing to a crawl, or dropping at inopportune moments, here’s how to get it back in business, ranging from free and simple to complicated and kinda expensive. Free options Test your connection Your first step is to understand the nature of the problem: is the internet bad throughout your home or just in certain areas or on certain devices? Does it cut out or slow down randomly throughout the day or only during certain activities? Is the problem your internet connection, your Wi-Fi signal, or ...

When we started working from home in March 2020, many of us who had not worked at home before may have begun with certain assumptions about what it would be like and what we would need. It’s now over two years later, and while we’re now able to spend time in the office, most of us are spending the majority of our working time at home. We asked The Verge staff members about what they’d learned about working at home. In response, people talked about the need to get away from the desk and to get away from work, the challenges of working in the same space with family, and various strategies for staying sane while staying in the house. Here’s what they told us. How I learned to stop worrying and love WFH OK, I’ll admit it — I’m stubborn. I spent two years of the pandemic waiting for things to r...

This morning, Disney released a new trailer for Andor, the next big Star Wars series on Disney Plus — and with it comes news that the show has been delayed by nearly a month. Andor was previously pegged for a premiere on August 31st, but the new clip says that it will debut with a “three-episode premiere September 21st.” The show is a prequel to a prequel, taking place before the events of the film Rogue One, which itself was set before the first Star Wars movie. It will once again star Diego Luna in the titular role of Cassian Andor, while the trailer also shows off the return of Forest Whitaker as Saw Gerrera. The news comes as the pace of Star Wars shows on Disney Plus has been ramping up. Obi-Wan Kenobi just wrapped up in June, and there are also series like Skeleton Crew, The Acolyte,...

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Tim Hortons, the Canadian fast food chain accused of using its mobile app to collect “vast amounts of sensitive location data” in violation of Canadian privacy laws, says it’s reached a proposed settlement in the resulting class action lawsuits, Vice reports. To make up for tracking users, recording their movements “every few minutes” even when the app was closed, the chain is proposing to give affected users… a free hot beverage and a free baked good worth a little under $9 CAD plus tax. Customers started receiving emails detailing the proposed settlement on Friday, and screenshots were posted to Twitter by James McLeod. “You are receiving this email in connection with a proposed settlement, subject to Court approval, of a national class action lawsuit involving the Tim Hortons app and th...