Techmeme
March 18, 2020, 11:50 AM

Top News

Apple:
Apple unveils new 11" and 12.9" iPad Pro with a lidar scanner for depth-sensing, backlit keyboard and trackpad, available to order today for $799+ and $999+  —  New Magic Keyboard Designed for iPad Pro Features a Floating Design, Backlit Keyboard and Trackpad, Delivering the Best Typing Experience Ever on iPad
Apple:
Apple launches new MacBook Air with a Magic Keyboard featuring scissor-style keys, 13.3" display, Touch ID, and 10th-gen Intel Core CPUs, starting at $999  —  The Most Popular Mac Now Has Up to 2x Faster Performance, the New Magic Keyboard and Twice the Storage
Tim Hardwick / MacRumors:
Apple updates Mac Mini with double the storage capacity in standard configurations, with the $799 base model now coming with a 256GB SSD  —  Apple today updated the Mac mini so that standard configurations now come with double the storage capacity.  —  The $799 configuration now comes …
Washington Post:
Sources: the US government is in active talks with Facebook, Google, and others to use location data from Americans' smartphones to stem COVID-19's spread  —  The U.S. government is in active talks with Facebook, Google and a wide array of tech companies and health experts …
Joe Tidy / BBC:
Israel approves emergency measures, it says lasting 30 days, for its security agencies to track the mobile phone data of people suspected to have COVID-19  —  The Israeli government has approved emergency measures for its security agencies to track the mobile phone data of people with suspected coronavirus.
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Slack unveils a new design with an updated navigation bar, collapsible sections within the sidebar, improved ways to respond to threads and mentions, and more  —  It arrives today, and it's more customizable and simplified  —  Slack is unveiling a big redesign to its communications app …
Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet:
Kevin Roose / New York Times:
This pandemic has generated a surge in online community building, creating cautious optimism that our virtual efforts can offset some in-person losses  —  We've always hoped that our digital tools would create connections, not conflict.  We have a chance to make it happen.
Alfred Ng / CNET:
HHS waives penalties for the use of non-HIPAA compliant video chatting services, like FaceTime and Skype, for telehealth during COVID-19 outbreak  —  The coronavirus crisis is pushing the US government to loosen one of its only laws on data privacy.  The Department of Health and Human Services …
Lindsey O'Donnell / Threatpost:
Study: Microsoft Edge sends frequent hashed IDs tied to hardware to its back-end servers, making it one of the least private browsers available  —  Microsoft Edge is one of the least private web browsers — even more so than other popular browsers like Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox — according to academic researchers.
David Shepardson / Reuters:
Facebook says it plans to award $100M in cash grants and ad credits for up to 30,000 small businesses in 30+ countries to address COVID-19's economic impact  —  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Facebook Inc said Tuesday it plans to award $100 million in cash grants and ad credits for up to 30,000 small businesses …
The Information:
Zheping Huang / Bloomberg:
Chinese video sharing app Likee is looking to expand in the US, following in the footsteps of TikTok, as the app's MAUs grew to 115.3M, up 208%, in Q4  —  - Likee was a breakout hit in 2019 and is keeping momentum up  — Operating out of Singapore may ease U.S. regulator concerns

Sponsor Posts

Meta:
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Zoho:
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Genesys:
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