Techmeme
May 25, 2018, 3:20 AM

Top News

Gary Horcher / KIRO:
After allegations Alexa recorded a private conversation and sent it to a person in contact list, Amazon says the case was extremely rare, is taking steps to fix  —  A Portland family contacted Amazon to investigate after they say a private conversation in their home was recorded by Amazon's Alexa …
Jason Del Rey / Recode:
Amazon says the Echo that recorded a private discussion interpreted background conversation as action confirmation, leading to recording and sending to contact  —  A couple says their device secretly recorded a private conversation of theirs and sent it to an acquaintance.
Bloomberg:
Sources: Essential, a startup co-founded by Android creator Andy Rubin, is considering selling itself and has canceled development of a new smartphone  —  - Company cancels development of second version of smartphone  — Startup has spent over $100 million on product development
Jeremy Horwitz / VentureBeat:
Apple wins $538.6M from Samsung in iPhone patent retrial: $533.3M for infringement of Apple's design patents and $5.3M for infringement of its utility patents  —  Nearly six years after a federal jury awarded Apple over $1 billion in damages against Samsung for infringing on iPhone design patents …
Facebook:
Facebook will check images and text, who is being targeted, and any linked websites in issue ads as it begins to apply new policies  —  Political advertising serves an important purpose.  It helps candidates share their views with the public more broadly, and it can help encourage people to get involved in the political process.
Twitter:
Rob Leathern / Facebook:
Sean Hollister / CNET:
Valve says Apple revoked its approval of the Steam Link app for iOS due to “business conflicts with app guidelines” and denied Valve's appeal  —  So much for easily playing PC games on your iPhone.  —  If you were hoping to stream PC games from your powerful gaming rig to your iPhone or iPad …
Gabe Rivera / Techmeme News:
Sign up now for Techmeme's new newsletter, which goes out daily at 5pm Pacific  —  Today we're launching Techmeme's first newsletter.  Sign up here!  It goes out Sunday through Friday around 5pm Pacific/8pm Eastern and, like Techmeme.com, summarizes the day's top tech news and commentary …
Jason Koebler / Motherboard:
Documents from a “bendgate” lawsuit show Apple's tests found iPhone 6 and 6 Plus were 3.3x and 7.2x more likely to bend than 5S; Apple later made changes to fix  —  Apple publicly maintained that there were no engineering issues with the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus …
Janko Roettgers / Variety:
Vevo is shuttering its Android, iOS, and Windows Mobile apps and website to refocus on YouTube following resignation of several execs and significant layoffs  —  Major-label owned Vevo is giving up on plans to build its own music video platform outside of YouTube's control …
Zack Whittaker / ZDNet:
An API bug on T-Mobile's staff-facing website, since fixed, let anyone gain access to customer addresses, account PINs, and other details using a phone number  —  Exclusive: The exposed lookup tool let anyone run a customer's phone number — and obtain their home address and account PIN, used to contact phone support.
David Shepardson / Reuters:
US NTSB report on Uber's self-driving car that killed a pedestrian in March in AZ says the car failed to identify the pedestrian or brake until it was too late  —  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An Uber Technologies Inc [UBER.UL] self-driving vehicle that struck and killed a woman in Tempe …
City Attorney of San Francisco:
San Francisco announces new regulations requiring scooter startups like Lime, Spin, and Bird, to halt operations by June 4 and apply for permits by June 7  —  New city law halting unpermitted scooter operations in effect June 4, scooter permitting system now activated
Shannon Liao / The Verge:
Pornhub launches a free VPN, called VPNHUB, with unlimited bandwidth, available on iOS, Android, Mac, and Windows, alongside $13/month ad-free premium VPN  —  Pornhub is launching its own VPN service today with free and unlimited bandwidth.  The VPN is supposed to help users avoid ISP throttling and geographic limitations.

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Earlier Picks

Bloomberg:
Nick Statt / The Verge: