John Lister

Google is set to pay a fine of more than $2.5 billion for unfairly favoring its own shopping comparison service in search results. But critics say the fine is too small to have a serious effect on the company. A European Union court has rejected an ... appeal by Google against a 2017 fine imposed by the European Commission for breaking antitrust rules. The case involved the way the main Google Search service handled queries about products. As well as relevant product pages on retailer and manufacturer sites, the results list would often include relevant pages on price comparison services. Google ... (view more)

Google says Chrome will be faster and use less memory with the latest updates. That may not be enough to bring back users who've switched away though. The browser has received three key updates, the first being to the "omnibox." That's the single ... box at the top of the browser used both for typing website URLs and inserting search terms. When users start typing a term, they will now see suggestions, which update as users type more characters. The theory is that they will be able to click on a term and start the search more quickly than typing the term in full. (Source: t3.com ) The ... (view more)

The US government has blacklisted an Israeli company that made spyware used by national governments. NSO Group's tools have reportedly been used against diplomats, journalists and political activists. The move is as much a political signal as a ... practical measure. NSO being added to the group means US businesses must apply for a license to supply it, which will likely be refused. This would primarily affect cyber researchers who sell it information about known vulnerabilities. Although there's no immediate ban on US organizations using NSO's services, it's now clearly frowned upon. Threat To ... (view more)

The Better Business Bureau has warned the public to ignore text messages that appear to be wrong numbers. It says it's the first step in an ongoing scam using automated chat bots to scam people. The scam is not particularly sophisticated in ... principle but uses automation to play the numbers game. In the current form it tries to take advantage of base desires, though the BBB warns the format could change. According to the warning, one example of the opening text message reads: "Hey is this John? It's Amanda. We chatted on Tinder before when I came to visit my cousin but we never met if I recall ... (view more)

A change giving Apple users more control over their data has cost four major tech companies nearly $10 billion in lost ad revenue according to one estimate. But the drop is nowhere near as big as Facebook had warned. The change, which took effect in ... April, affects a tag called Identifier for Advertisers that links to a specific iPhone. It lets advertisers combine data from multiple sources and build up a picture of the device owner's interests, helping them better target advertising. Individual apps must now ask for permission (via an on-screen prompt) to access the tag, giving users greater ... (view more)

A company that sells location data has apologized after some details were collected without permission. Huq says the data remained anonymous despite the lack of consent. The company's business model is to partner with app developers to collect ... location data, aggregate it, then sell the overall details to clients. These included businesses trying to figure out patterns in where potential customers will be, and local governments that want to know which areas are busy at what times, for example to prioritize repairs of street lighting. (Source: bbc.co.uk ) The problem appears to be that Huq ... (view more)

Using the average phone a year longer would have the same environmental impact as taking 636,000 cars off the road each year according to campaigners. It's a claim that's sparked calls to end the habit of manufacturers to produce a new model every ... year. The calls come in the run-up to a major climate change conference, but remains unclear what incentive gadget-makers have to respond. The 636,000 cars figure comes from the Public Interest Research Group, whose campaigns include giving consumers a right to repair devices. It told The Register that an average of 416,000 US cellphones are ditched ... (view more)

The United States is the third safest country for cyber crimes according to a newly-published study. However, the methodology means that might not reflect the actual risk to users. The figures come from Seon, a security company that specializes in ... automatically detecting online fraud. That makes the results (and the decision to publish them) a little surprising as such a company would have an obvious interest in suggesting cyber crime is a particularly big risk in larger, wealthier countries full of potential customers. Overall the results showed Denmark as the safest country, just ahead of ... (view more)

Intel says a shortage of computer chips could last until 2023. It's particularly bad news for video game players but could make it harder to buy affordable PCs. Pat Gelsinger, Intel's CEO, says the shortage is likely at its worst point now. He says ... the situation should improve throughout next year, mirroring his counterpart at AMD who believes supply should pick up in the second half of next year. However, Gelsinger believes it will be 2023 before production is back at a point where supply can meet demand. (Source: eurogamer.net ) Shutdown Means Slowdown The shortage is largely a result of ... (view more)

A browser that promotes privacy as its key feature is ditching Google as its default search engine. Brave will instead use its own search service, though users are free to change back. Although Brave is based on the same Chromium code as Google ... Chrome, it's marketed towards users worried about privacy. By default it blocks all third-party ads and tracking tools. Until now, the browser has used well-known search engines as the default search tool. These include Google in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom and DuckDuckGo in Germany. However, Brave has been developing its own ... (view more)