Technology

Amazon has agreed to pay a total of $30 million in penalties for privacy violations related to its Ring and Alexa devices, according to an announcement by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The penalties consist of $25 million for allegedly ... retaining children's data without deletion and $5.8 million for failing to limit employee and contractor access to Ring security videos. (Source: cnet.com ) The settlements do not require Amazon to make any admission of legal wrongdoing. (Source: theguardian.com ) Amazon Accused of Retaining Kid's Data The FTC accused Amazon of preventing parents from ... (view more)

A US lawyer is facing disciplinary sanctions after relying on ChatGPT for legal "research." It led to his side presenting a legal argument that referred to several non-existent cases. Steven A Schwartz was providing support for the legal team of a ... man suing in a personal injury case. His side wanted to provide evidence of similar cases that had set a precedent, with this evidence helping support their argument that their case was strong enough to proceed. (Source: nytimes.com ) The opposing legal team questioned the argument saying they were unable to find the cases in question. That led to ... (view more)

Apple's highly anticipated mixed reality headset is set to make its debut at the upcoming Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC). Priced at any eye-watering $3,000, the product is expected to revolutionize the way we experience virtual reality (VR) ... and augmented reality (AR). With its unique features and seamless integration with Apple's ecosystem, the Reality Pro headset promises to be a game-changer. A Paradigm Shift in VR and AR For years, VR and AR have remained separate entities, detached from our everyday devices like smartphones and laptops. Here's the difference between the two: ... (view more)

Amazon has unveiled home devices for receiving its satellite broadband service. It hopes to offer service by late next year but hasn't yet revealed pricing. Satellite Internet is one of the major ways tech firms are attempting to solve the problem ... of high-speed Internet access in rural areas. Installing fiber cable there doesn't usually make financial sense to profit-driven businesses because there aren't enough potential customers to justify the cost of installing it and/or paying for the parts to install it in non-densely populated areas. Such locations are also often outside the range of ... (view more)

Microsoft and Google have both put plenty of effort into artificial intelligence in recent months. After an initial wow factor, they've been plagued with a host of problems. Interest in AI-text shot up with the public release of ChatGPT, a tool that ... can not only simulate conversations with the user and answer questions, but also write articles and other text in a variety of styles. While it appears extremely clever, it's effectively an extremely souped-up version of the auto-predict feature many phones offer when sending text messages. ChatGPT is produced by an independent developer called ... (view more)

The market for smartphones, tablets and PCs will shrink for a second straight year according to a newly-published forecast. The phone slump could mean the lowest number of units leaving manufacturers since 2009. Gartner, which produced the figures, ... says factors behind the trend include the economy, changing consumer behavior, and a lack of innovation. The forecast isn't for sales but rather shipments: that is, the number of devices which manufacturers send to retailers. It's affected by both recent sales and forecast for future sales. For example, shipments may drop if retailers have a ... (view more)

Changes to a major rival of Bitcoin have reduced energy use by 99 percent. The drop in computer processing for Ethereum has been likened to the amount of electricity used by a "mid-size country." The change has come after the Ethereum blockchain ... switched from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake, a sentence that makes little sense to most normal people. To break it down, a blockchain is a digital list of transactions. The key is that it doesn't exist as a single copy but rather multiple copies across all the computers of all users. In theory at least, this means it can't be edited or falsified ... (view more)

Researchers say they used a single five-mile cable to transmit twice the amount of data that's currently used by the entire Internet. While it could one day mean faster connections for users, the main benefit of the research could be more ... energy-efficient data centers. The project involved the Technical University of Denmark and the Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg. They explored the way most high-speed data connections today involve encoding signals to transmit as light. The key was combining a single laser with a specially-designed optical chip. This breaks the light into 223 ... (view more)

Additive manufacturing is the process of creating an object by building it one layer at a time - similar to a 3D printer. The method was initially geared at quick prototyping, producing pieces for testing and iterative design. However, during the ... past five years, engineers from all over the world have begun to concentrate on finding appropriate uses for final products and realizing the full potential of additive manufacturing. There are hundreds of potential products in every business, whether it be healthcare, aerospace, automotive, logistics, or consumer goods. Using sliced computer aided ... (view more)

Phones and tablets sold in Europe from 2024 may need to use USB-C charging ports in a blow to Apple. The rules could affect handsets around the world depending on how manufacturers respond. The rules would come through a European Union directive, ... which means all 27 EU countries would need to pass the measures into their national laws. Although the draft directive has been published, they won't take force until the European Parliament has voted to adopt them. The logic is that the rules would let users have a single charger for all small portable devices, including any new ones they buy. That' ... (view more)