John Lister

Facebook is to tell Apple users that it needs to track them to benefit businesses. It's a response to new Apple rules that mean users must opt-in to some forms of tracking. The messages, currently being tested, will pop up when users access Facebook ... on an iPhone or iPad. According to copies seen by CNBC, it reads as follows: Allow Facebook to use your app and website activity? Get ads that are more personalized Support businesses that rely on ads to reach customers To provide a better ads experience, we need permission to use future activity that other apps and websites send us from this ... (view more)

Apple is to let iPhone owners unlock their phone using Face ID even while wearing a face mask. But the setting is only available to people who also use an Apple watch. Facial recognition is now the primary way to unlock an iPhone rather than use a ... fingerprint or typing in a code. That's proven problematic in a time when people are increasingly wearing face masks in public places as a measure to reduce the risk of transmitting diseases. Unlocked Watch Allows Masked Match It was technically possible for Apple's system, Face ID, to "recognize a face" using a combination of the exposed top half ... (view more)

Long-time Hotmail and Outlook users may face a choice between seeing old messages deleted or paying $70 a year. Microsoft is legitimately enforcing storage limits but critics say it didn't do enough to remind users they were approaching those ... limits. The policy affects users of Outlook.com, with those most likely to be affected being Hotmail users that migrated over back in 2013 when Hotmail closed. As part of the move, users could keep their old Hotmail address, but were subject to a 15GB storage limit as with all other Outlook users. That includes both sent and received messages and file ... (view more)

Twitter is asking volunteers to add notes explaining why posts are misleading. It calls it a "community-driven approach to help address misleading information on Twitter." The company appears to believe that using volunteers will make it easier to ... address quickly-spreading misinformation rather than rely on paid staff. It says the project, dubbed Birdwatch, won't involve labeling posts as "true" or "false". It also won't involving hiding or removing any posts as already happens after staff review reports of users breaching the site's guidelines. Volunteers Will Reach Consensus Birdwatch will ... (view more)

Google believes it's found a way to replace privacy-breaching cookies while still letting advertisers find success. It's testing a way to effectively combine data from thousands of users to target ads. Cookies fall into two main types: first and ... third party. First-party cookies are generally uncontroversial as they simply identify a user on a website, including any previous activity such as website preferences. For example, a premium website could let somebody log in to an account and then use cookies so they don't have to log in again for a set period such as a week. Third-party cookies are ... (view more)

Ransomware infections used to be about forcing victims to pay to regain access to their files. Now it appears more and more scammers are treating it as an exercise in blackmail. A new cybersecurity report says 18 known ransomware gangs have switched ... their focus to threatening to publish stolen data unless the victim pays up. That's led to some businesses paying the ransom even though they had access to backups in order to restore their files. Traditionally ransomware has been about file encryptions. Scammers get access to a victim's computer or network through malware, then the infection " ... (view more)

Mysterious algorithms could harm online shoppers by aiding collusion according to a newly-published paper. Because the effects are personalized, it could be tricky to prove wrongdoing. The claims come in a researched paper published by the United ... Kingdom's Competition ... (view more)

A dating app has removed – and then replaced – a filter for political views among potential partners. Bumble discovered some users were taking advantage of the filter to "entrap" people involved in the recent breach of the US Capitol. Bumble is a dat ...ing app that works like several others in that it shows users potential matches in their geographic area. If two users both indicate an interest in each other's profile, they can begin communication. However, unlike most such services, with a male-female match, only the woman can initiate contact and begin an exchange of messages. Users can filter ...ref="/news/10884/dating-app-politics-filter-turned-against-rioters" class="more-link">view more)

Google and Facebook could have to pay a fee to show content from Australian news organizations. The proposed laws have upset not just the tech giants, but the United States government. The Australian proposals follow a government investigation that ... concludes the two companies have too much control in the media market. It pointed to several regional newspapers closing and advertising revenue falling for publications at the same time Google and Facebook benefit from using news extracts on Google News and in Facebook posts. No Surprise Algorithm Changes Under the laws, Google and Facebook would ... (view more)

World Wide Web creator Tim Berners-Lee wants to rethink the way people control online data. He says his "pods" proposal would bring the online world closer to his original vision of the web. Berners-Lee has launched an open-source project and ... associated business to try to counter what he sees as the web's biggest problem: major companies collecting user data and exploiting it as a core part of their business. His new idea is "pods", or personal online data store. This would involve users having a space on a server that acted like a digital safe and contained a range of data. This could be ... (view more)