Privacy technologies

Privacy technologies

Phones are always within easy reach, offering instant access to the world, social media, and messages from friends and family. Even if you're not being pinged with notifications, the temptation to scroll through an app or two is always there.

Mohamed sued Alphabet, noting that the list didn't even contain his name. Rather, his name was merely similar to "one or more Muslim or Middle Eastern names on the list," his lawsuit stated. He also said he only sued because he couldn't get a human at Waymo to actually address his issue. However, he dropped his lawsuit after Waymo instituted a process for users to request Waymo workers to conduct an audit of their ban.

A phone app has been launched showing people the “safest” walking route, based on factors including street lights, CCTV and crime statistics. The Safest Way app is available in York, London and Northern Ireland, with developers hoping to expand it further across the UK. It is free to use, with no registration required, and is part-funded by Ordnance Survey.

Microsoft is "streamlining" access to Copilot within its productivity applications and updating the keyboard shortcut to activate the assistant. "We heard from many of you that you're unsure how to start engaging with Copilot," the company says, though it did not elaborate on where it had heard this. On its Microsoft 365 Copilot feedback forum, the top-voted request was for more granular agent availability controls.

Yarbo now plans to completely remove the remote backdoor access that could have let bad actors reprogram the robot over the internet. Yarbo customers will be able to decide whether that feature even gets installed in the first place, co-founder Kenneth Kohlmann pledges to The Verge.

“Personal Computer,” meanwhile, is designed to bring those capabilities to your own device. It does so by allowing AI agents access to local files, applications, and connectors, as well as the web, in order to handle the individual user's personal, multi-step workflows.

“Today, we're introducing a new enforcement type that we plan to roll out over the next few weeks,” Clancy shared in a post on X. “For channels identified as persistently viewbotting, we will apply a cap to the streamer's CCV [concurrent views] for a fixed period of time, on all of the Twitch surfaces.” Clancy added that the cap would be based on “historical data regarding that creator's non-viewbotted traffic” and that the limits will increase in duration with repeated violations.

Berkeley has abandoned at least temporarily a plan to bulk up its police surveillance network with new video cameras, drones and software supplied by the firm Flock Safety. The City Council voted 8-1 Thursday to pull the plug on a proposed $2 million surveillance network expansion sought by police, though it did not close the door on contracting with Flock for the technology in the future. In the short term, the council renewed Berkeley's lease of 52 of the tech giant's automated license plate readers for up to another year, at a cost of up to $200,000.

Google announced that Chrome's Android app will now allow users to share their approximate location with websites, providing more privacy without sacrificing functionality. Users can still choose to share their precise location if they prefer.