Category Archives: Technology

WhatsApp to impose new limit on forwarding to fight fake news

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Restrictions on frequently forwarded messages intended to disrupt false Covid-19 claims

WhatsApp is to impose a strict new limit on message forwarding as the Facebook-owned chat app seeks to slow the dissemination of fake news, the company has announced.

If a user receives a frequently forwarded message – one which has been forwarded more than five times – under the new curbs, they will only be able to send it on to a single chat at a time. That is one fifth the previous limit of five chats, imposed in 2019.

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YouTube to suppress content spreading coronavirus 5G conspiracy theory

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Site will reduce recommendations of videos promoting misinformation

YouTube will reduce the amount of content spreading conspiracy theories about links between 5G technology and the coronavirus that it recommends to users and actively remove videos that breach its policies, the company has said.

Content that is simply conspiratorial about 5G mobile communications networks, without mentioning coronavirus, is still allowed on the site. YouTube said those videos may be considered “borderline content” and subjected to suppression, including loss of advertising revenue and being removed from search results on the platform.

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Twitter deletes 20,000 fake accounts linked to Saudi, Serbian and Egyptian governments

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Accounts also linked to Honduras and Indonesia violated policy and were ‘targeted attempt to undermine the public conversation’

Twitter has deleted 20,000 fake accounts linked to the governments of Serbia, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Honduras and Indonesia, saying they violated company policy and were a “targeted attempt to undermine the public conversation”.

Yoel Roth, the head of site integrity, said the removal of the accounts was part of the company’s ongoing “work to detect and investigate state-backed information operations”.

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Zoom says engineers will focus on security and safety issues

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Video app has seen a surge in popularity for both work and private use during lockdown

Zoom, the hit video conferencing platform, will freeze new feature development and shift all engineering resources on to security and safety issues, its founder has said..

The move comes as the company battles the damage caused by a string of minor scandals ultimately related to the same scrappy approach that enabled it to capitalise on the wave of global lockdowns in the first place.

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Jack Schofield, Guardian’s Ask Jack tech columnist, dies at 72

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Paper’s editor says Schofield was ‘one of the first true computing experts in British journalism’

Jack Schofield, the Guardian’s former computer editor and author of its technology advice column, Ask Jack, for almost 20 years, has died aged 72.

Schofield was taken to hospital following a heart attack on Friday night and died on Tuesday afternoon.

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New blood test can detect 50 types of cancer

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System uses machine learning to offer new way to screen for hard-to-detect cancers

A new blood test that can detect more than 50 types of cancer has been revealed by researchers in the latest study to offer hope for early detection.

The test is based on DNA that is shed by tumours and found circulating in the blood. More specifically, it focuses on chemical changes to this DNA, known as methylation patterns.

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Scientists develop AI that can turn brain activity into text

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Researchers in US tracked the neural data from people while they were speaking

Reading minds has just come a step closer to reality: scientists have developed artificial intelligence that can turn brain activity into text.

While the system currently works on neural patterns detected while someone is speaking aloud, experts say it could eventually aid communication for patients who are unable to speak or type, such as those with locked in syndrome.

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Revealed: Saudis suspected of phone spying campaign in US

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Exclusive: Whistleblower’s data suggests millions of tracking requests sent over four-month period

Saudi Arabia appears to be exploiting weaknesses in the global mobile telecoms network to track its citizens as they travel around the US, according to a whistleblower who has shown the Guardian millions of alleged secret tracking requests.

Data revealed by the whistleblower, who is seeking to expose vulnerabilities in a global messaging system called SS7, appears to suggest a systematic spying campaign by the kingdom, according to experts.

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Trolls exploit Zoom privacy settings as app gains popularity

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‘Zoombombers’ broadcast explicit imagery or abuse other users in video hangouts

Working and socialising from home has brought new risks to everyday life, as webcam meetings and chatroom cocktail hours contend with privacy invasions, phishing attacks and “zoombombings” – uninvited guests abusing the popular video service to broadcast shocking imagery to all.

Public Zoom hangouts have become a popular way to spend time for isolated remote workers, who are joining calls with names such as “WFH Happy Hour” to spend time in the company of others.

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Trump’s deluge of Facebook ads have a curious absence: coronavirus

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Campaign ads continue to focus on the southern border even as pandemic has killed hundreds of Americans

As the reality of the coronavirus crisis took hold in the US, Donald Trump’s Facebook campaign remained focused on a different “crisis” – the supposed threat of immigrants entering the US through the southern border.

Related: Facebook to remove misleading Trump 'census' ads

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Spring-heeled: concept that could see Usain Bolt rocket to 50mph

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Prototype of revolutionary running device being worked on by scientists at US university

A wearable spring-based contraption that attaches to the legs has the potential to boost human running speeds by 50%, according to researchers who hope to build the first prototype over the next year.

Scientists came up with the concept after computer models showed that it was possible to dramatically increase the amount of energy people put into each running step by enabling them to do work when their feet are in the air.

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Mobile phone industry explores worldwide tracking of users

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Talks about global data-sharing to counter coronavirus will raise privacy concerns

The mobile phone industry has explored the creation of a global data-sharing system that could track individuals around the world, as part of an effort to curb the spread of Covid-19.

The Guardian has learned that a senior official at GSMA, an international standard-setting body for the mobile phone industry, held discussions with at least one company that is capable of tracking individuals globally through their mobile devices, and discussed the possible creation of a global data-sharing system.

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Energy storage boom stalls in Europe

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Slowdown in large-scale clean energy projects started before coronavirus crisis due to lack of state support

Europe’s energy storage boom stalled last year due to a slowdown in large-scale schemes designed to store clean electricity from major renewable energy projects, according to the European Association for Storage of Energy (Ease).

A new study by consultants Delta-EE for Ease found that the European market grew by a total of 1 gigawatt-hours in 2019, a significant slowdown compared with 2018, when the energy storage market exceeded expectations to grow by 1.47GWh.

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PlayStation 5 specifications revealed – but design is still a mystery

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Sony confirms custom AMD RDNA 2 graphic processor, solid state drive and innovative 3D audio – without showing the new console

Sony has revealed the full technical specifications of its PlayStation 5 console.

In a blogpost, followed by a lengthy online technical briefing by lead system architect Mark Cerny, the company confirmed that the machine will feature custom versions of AMD’s Zen 2 central processor and RDNA 2 graphics unit, the latter operating at 10.28 Tflops. System memory will be 16GB. The machine will support advanced visual effects such as real-time ray tracing and will have a solid state drive (SSD).

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Facebook says spam filter mayhem not related to coronavirus

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Social network restores posts that were wrongly removed as system went haywire

A Facebook spam filter that went haywire on Tuesday evening and began removing many perfectly acceptable posts was unrelated to coronavirus, the company has said.

All the removed posts have been restored, a Facebook executive said, attributing the removals to an automated system. Despite the fact that many of the removed posts were related to the coronavirus, the company says that was simply a coincidence owing to the fact that so many posts on the site are related to the pandemic.

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Amazon to suspend non-essential shipments to UK and US warehouses

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The company is prioritising five categories of goods which it classifies as essential products

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    • Online retail giant Amazon is stopping sellers from sending non-essential items to its UK and US warehouses until 5 April, to make space for vital items needed by its customers during the coronavirus outbreak.

    Amazon wrote to its third-party sellers, some of whom use the company’s logistics to store and dispatch their products, to inform them that stocks of medical supplies and certain household items are running low due to increased demand from online shoppers.

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    TikTok ‘tried to filter out videos from ugly, poor or disabled users’

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    Documents from the Incercept show social media app put pressure on moderators

    TikTok moderators were told to suppress videos from users who appeared too ugly, poor or disabled, as part of the company’s efforts to curate an aspirational air in the videos it promotes, according to new documents published by the Intercept.

    The documents detail how moderators for the social video app were instructed to select content for the influential “For You” feed, an algorithmic timeline that is most users’ first port of call when they open the app. As a result, being selected for For You can drive huge numbers of views to a given video, but the selection criteria have always remained a secret, with little understanding as to the amount of automation involved.

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    British American Tobacco circumventing ad ban, experts say

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    BAT seems to be running accounts to promote e-cigarettes after crackdown on hiring influencers

    British American Tobacco (BAT) is marketing e-cigarettes and heated cigarettes with pictures of attractive models and using hashtags such as “I dare you to try it”, despite a crackdown last year after it paid social media influencers to promote its products.

    BAT had come under fire after hiring young models to sell its products despite having an explicit policy banning under-25s from appearing in adverts.

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    Apple fined record €1.1bn by French competition regulator

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    Tech giant conspired with wholesalers Tech Data and Ingram Micro to align prices, says watchdog

    Apple has been fined a record €1.1bn (£990m) by antitrust regulators in France for engaging in anti-competitive agreements with two wholesalers. The penalty imposed on the US tech giant is the largest ever handed out to a company by the Autorité de la Concurrence.

    Commenting on the move, Isabelle de Silva, head of the French competition watchdog, said: “Apple and its two wholesalers agreed to not compete against each other and prevent resellers from promoting competition between each other, thus sterilising the wholesale market for Apple products.”

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    UK ministers will no longer claim ‘no successful examples’ of Russian interference

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    Change of official line is first admission that Kremlin may have distorted UK elections

    Ministers have been told they can no longer say there have been “no successful examples” of Russian disinformation affecting UK elections, after the apparent hacking of an NHS dossier seized on by Labour during the last campaign.

    The dropping of the old line is the first official admission of the impact of Kremlin efforts to distort Britain’s political processes, and comes after three years of the government’s refusal to engage publicly with the threat.

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