Techmeme
February 12, 2020, 8:10 AM

Top News

Chris Velazco / Engadget:
Hands-on with Samsung's new S20 lineup: 120Hz refresh rate makes the screens stand out, the Ultra is significantly bigger, and the cameras are ambitious  —  If you were planning to buy a premium Android smartphone this year, you can rest easy knowing they'll all come with more or less the same things.
Dieter Bohn / The Verge:
Samsung announces the 6.2" Galaxy S20, 6.7" Galaxy S20 Plus, and 6.9" Galaxy S20 Ultra, with starting prices ranging from $1,000 to $1,600, coming March 6  —  Samsung has announced its latest flagship phones: the Galaxy S20, Galaxy S20 Plus, and Galaxy S20 Ultra.
Bojan Pancevski / Wall Street Journal:
US officials claim Huawei has, for over a decade, been able to covertly access mobile-phone networks globally through back doors designed for law enforcement  —  Trump administration ramps up push for allies to block Chinese company  —  U.S. officials say Huawei Technologies Co …
Kadhim Shubber / Financial Times:
The FTC is asking Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft about acquisitions from the past decade that were small enough to not be reported to the gov't  —  FTC to review acquisitions made by Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft  —  The Federal Trade Commission …
Andrew Morse / CNET:
Flipboard launches Flipboard TV, an in-app feature that offers professional short-form video, for $2.99/mo; will be a Galaxy S20 exclusive for first 3 months  —  Flipboard , the popular news aggregator app, is introducing a new subscription video service.  Called Flipboard TV …
Ben Schoon / 9to5Google:
Samsung announces Galaxy Z Flip with a foldable 6.7" FHD+ AMOLED display, 3,300 mAh battery, dual front-facing cameras, coming February 14 starting for $1,380  —  Foldable phones still feel like a dream, but to kick off the 2020 smartphone season, Samsung is hoping to change that.
Alex Hern / The Guardian:
UK proposes plans to put media regulator Ofcom in charge of regulating social media, with a focus on removing illegal content and minimizing “harmful” content  —  Ministers unveil plans to block harmful content, while guaranteeing free speech  —  Ofcom will be put in charge …
Juli Clover / MacRumors:
Malwarebytes detected 11 threats per endpoint for its Mac users in 2019, up from 4.8 threats per endpoint in 2018, while PCs saw 5.8 threats per endpoint  —  Antivirus software developer Malwarebytes today shared its State of Malware Report for 2020 [PDF], which suggests that Mac malware is growing much more common.
Sean Hollister / The Verge:
Nvidia says that Activision Blizzard has removed its catalog of games like Overwatch, WoW, and Call of Duty from Nvidia's cloud gaming service GeForce Now  —  A bad precedent for cloud gaming  —  Nvidia's GeForce Now feels like one of the very best ways to get a free taste of cloud gaming …
Mary Jo Foley / ZDNet:
Microsoft shows how containerized and dual-screen apps will work in Windows 10X with a new emulator and SDK and also refreshes its Android-based Duo SDK  —  Microsoft is delivering its promised Windows 10X emulator and SDK, plus a refresh of its Android-based Duo SDK as its next milestones along its dual-screen device path.
Peter Kafka / Vox:
The T-Mobile + Sprint deal is good for you if you like paying more for your wireless plan  —  The Department of Justice has blessed  /LightRocket via Getty Images  Competition among the four big wireless carriers kept prices low for years.  Now the Trump administration, along with a federal judge …
BBC:
China launches an app that uses its vast surveillance network data to let users check if they have come into close contact with coronavirus carriers  —  China has launched an app that allows people to check whether they have been at risk of catching the coronavirus.
Hired:
State of Software Engineers 2019: global demand for AR/VR engineers up by 1,400%, gaming developers up 146%, security engineers up 49% but slower than in 2018  —  Overview  —  The worldwide process of digital transformation, while something of a buzzword, reflects a critical truth: every company is now a technology company.
More: ZDNet
Emily McCormick / Yahoo Finance:
Lyft reports Q4 revenue of $1.02B, up 52% YoY, an adjusted EBITDA loss of $130.7M vs $251.1M in Q4 2018, and 22.9M active riders, up 23% YoY  —  LYFT) reported fourth-quarter results that beat consensus expectations, topping $1 billion in quarterly revenue for the first time as riders grew more than expected.
Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
Reuters launches a new Reuters Fact Check business unit and blog and partners with Facebook to review news headlines, deepfakes, and user generated content  —  Eye-witness photos and videos distributed by news wire Reuters already go through an exhaustive media verification process.

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