Internet

Facebook is killing a privacy feature designed to restrict who can find users through the social networking site's search tool. The firm defended the move by saying only a small percentage of its members actually used the feature. The feature, which ... is called "Who can look up my Timeline by name?", allowed Facebook users to customize who could find their profile through a search of the social network's database. For people who wanted to keep their profile information off-limits to employers, strangers, and enemies, it was deemed a highly useful feature. 'Small Percentage' Could Include ... (view more)

An ebook firm has suspended sales of all self-published books in the United Kingdom, regardless of their content. It follows a media scandal over titles involving explicit material. The scandal began when a national newspaper ran a front-page story ... accusing a major retail chain, WH Smith, of carrying particularly illicit material. The headline of the story turned out to be something of an exaggeration. The material wasn't being sold in stores, but was available online. It also turned out to involve the content of books rather than images or movies. eBooks Unappetizing But Not Illegal The ... (view more)

A new service aims to connect people with a real doctor through their Internet-connected device. It's called telemedicine, and for some people it could be the most efficient way to receive a diagnosis and access a prescription. The service is being ... offered by American Well, which says it's the first company to connect patients to doctors via live video chat sessions. American Well (AW) is by no means the first 'telemedicine' company -- Teladoc, First Stop Health, and Apogee Doctor On Call all connect patients with doctors using a phone line -- but AW is the first firm to allow medical ... (view more)

Almost one in six American adults do not use the Internet -- even occasionally -- according to a new study. But only around one-third of the "offliners" say they have no interest in ever using the world wide web. The figures come from the Pew ... Internet and American Life Project, which regularly surveys the public about online issues. In a study carried out in May 2013 and published this week, Pew spoke to 2,252 Americans aged 18 or over. (Source: pewinternet.org ) Of these, 15 per cent said 'no' to the question of whether they use the Internet "at least occasionally." This only left ... (view more)

The percentage of Internet users who say they're worried about how much of their personal data is made available to third parties -- often without their permission -- is on the rise. It's also been revealed that the vast majority of Internet users ... have taken some action towards removing their personal information from the web. The figures come from the Pew Internet ... (view more)

Facebook is planning to use profile pictures to automatically recognize users when they appear in photos taken by somebody else. The firm has also made it clear to users that it has every right to use members' pictures in its own advertisements ... without compensating them in any way. The proposed changes are detailed in a Facebook post that, following a court order, more clearly explains how the site uses data from its users. Facebook already uses facial recognition software but in a more limited manner. Once you have been "tagged" in a photograph (that is, somebody has labeled you as being one ... (view more)

Storing files in the cloud is becoming the 'go to' method for backing up important data. But what if the 2 gigabytes (GB) of storage offered by Dropbox or the 7GB offered by SkyDrive just isn't enough? New service 'SurDoc' has an answer: 100GB free ... cloud storage. However, that's only for the first year. Dropbox, SkyDrive Storage Limits Disappointing There are a number of cloud storage services on the web these days, but most have pretty modest limits on how much you can store for free. Dropbox's limit is a paltry 2GB, with additional room running at least $9.99 per month. Box and SugarSync ... (view more)

Several high-profile online services, including Netflix, have been temporarily unavailable due to a problem at Amazon. It's another demonstration of the risks involved in having so many sites dependent on a single service provider. The problem took ... place on Sunday, August 25, and affected movie site Netflix and photo service site Instagram. Other affected sites included video sharing site Vine and vacation rental service Airbnb. These sites were either intermittently unresponsive or completely inaccessible. (Source: techspot.com ) The problem: Amazon's cloud services system was experiencing ... (view more)

Researchers in the United States have developed a tool that can help you get more balanced political information on the Internet. But it's not yet proven that it can change your mind. The idea is to counter the "echo chamber" effect. The theory is ... that people tend to look at online news sources and follow social media users who share their own views and attitudes. As a result, people tend to see a similar viewpoint all of the time, in turn reinforcing their prejudices and meaning they never have to see material that might challenge their stance. Over the long term, they get the false ... (view more)

Researchers in the Middle East say Twitter could be a useful tool in predicting violent riots. The Qatar Computing Research Institute says that although you can't read too much into a single 'tweet' from a single user, when you gather the data from ... thousands of users you can detect certain trends. By piecing that data together, researchers say they can predict when and where violence will occur. To test the theory, the Qatar researchers developed what they call the 'Political Polarization Index'. They analyzed all Twitter posts by Egyptian users and gave each user a rating between 0 and 1 ... (view more)