Samsung updates its Galaxy Book Pro line with 1080p webcams

Here’s the Galaxy Book 2 Pro.

Samsung has announced two updates to its premium Galaxy Book line: the Galaxy Book 2 Pro and Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360. The devices will start at $1,049.99 and $1,249.99 respectively; they hit shelves on April 1st with preorders beginning on March 18th. A budget-oriented Galaxy Book 2 360, a convertible version of the regular Galaxy Book, will also ship April 1st with a starting price of $899.99.

Both Pro models come in 13.3-inch and 15.6-inch sizes, while the regular Book 2 360 is only a 13.3. As you can probably guess from the names, the Galaxy Book 2 Pro is a clamshell while the Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 is a 2-in-1 convertible with a touchscreen and S Pen support.

Here’s the Galaxy Book 2 Pro’s keyboard, which is backlit...

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Go read this report about how researchers used Google Maps to track the invasion of Ukraine

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

This report from The Washington Post details how a team of researchers used a combination of Google Maps and radar imagery to track the movement of Russian troops, tipping them off to an invasion of Ukraine before the general public got word of the situation.

According @googlemaps, there is a "traffic jam" at 3:15 in the morning on the road from Belgorod, Russia to the Ukrainian border. It starts *exactly* where we saw a Russian formation of armor and IFV/APCs show up yesterday.
Someone's on the move. pic.twitter.com/BYyc5YZsWL

— Dr. Jeffrey Lewis (@ArmsControlWonk) February 24, 2022

When Dr. Jeffrey Lewis, a professor at California’s Middlebury Institute of International Studies, noticed particularly bad traffic at 3:15AM near the...

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TCL’s 30 Series adds five new budget handsets in Europe starting at €139

Five affordable 30 Series handsets. | Image: TCL

TCL, the Chinese manufacturer best known for its lineup of smart TVs, has announced five new affordable Android smartphones as part of its 30 Series. Unlike the TCL 30 XE 5G and TCL 30 V 5G announced earlier this year for the US market, the five new handsets are focused on Europe, and their starting prices range from €139 to €249.

At the top of the new lineup is the TCL 30 5G, the only one of the new phones to support 5G. It’s got a 6.7-inch 1080p OLED display with a 13-megapixel selfie camera in a small teardrop notch, and around back it has a trio of cameras including a 50-megapixel main camera, a 2-megapixel depth sensor, and a 2-megapixel macro camera. It’s powered by a MediaTek Dimensity 700 chipset with a 5,010mAh battery, and...

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Chinese phone brands are carrying the torch for Europe’s biggest mobile show

Photo by LLUIS GENE/AFP via Getty Images

Next week sees Mobile World Congress return to Barcelona, two years after the COVID-19 pandemic forced the cancellation of the world’s biggest mobile phone trade show, and one year after the show took place without many of its largest exhibitors in attendance. Not everyone is making a return to this year’s in-person event (Sony, Lenovo, and some media outlets including The Verge aren’t attending) but it almost feels like the show is back to full strength.

But it’s also an event that’s going to show off exactly how much the smartphone industry has shifted in recent years. As it stands, all the show’s biggest hardware announcements appear likely to come from Chinese brands like Oppo, Honor, TCL, Xiaomi-sub-brand Poco, and Huawei, rather...

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Pokémon Scarlet and Violet are coming to the Switch later this year

Surprise! There are even more Pokémon_games on the way. At a livestreamed event on Sunday morning, The Pokémon Company teased two new titles: Pokémon Scarlet and Violet. The games are expected to launch on the Nintendo Switch in late 2022, and the brief teaser looked reminiscent of 2019’s Pokémon Sword and Shield._The games are described as an “open-world adventure” and developer Game Freak says they “take a new evolutionary step in the Pokémon main series.” You can get a glimpse of the new starters in the image below.

Here’s the official description:

Trainers can explore an open world where various towns with no borders blend seamlessly into the wilderness. Pokémon can be seen everywhere in this wide-open world — in the...

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Killing Eve rights itself and makes Eve the star again

Anika Molnar/BBCA

Sandra Oh finally has something to do

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Russia suspends Soyuz rocket launches over European sanctions

Roscosmos will withdraw all 87 employees from the Guiana Space Centre. | Photo by Sergei Savostyanov\TASS via Getty Images

Russian space agency Roscosmos has announced that it’s temporarily halting Soyuz rocket launches in French Guiana due to sanctions imposed by the European Union, according to a report by Space.com.

“Roscosmos is suspending cooperation with European partners in organizing space launches from the Kourou Cosmodrome and withdrawing its personnel, including the consolidated launch crew, from French Guiana,” a translated tweet from the agency reads on Twitter. Roscosmos says it’s working on a plan to withdraw all 87 of its staff from the Guiana Space Center in Kourou, who assisted with Soyuz rocket launches for Roscosmos and other Russian companies.

⚡ «В ответ на санкции Евросоюза в отношении наших предприятий Роскосмос приостанавливает...

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US and Europe will block some Russian banks from SWIFT

Photo by Stanislav Krasilnikov\TASS via Getty Images

A coalition of NATO-aligned countries has committed to new measures meant to sever Russia from the global financial system, countries announced in a joint letter today. The letter, signed by the United States, UK, Canada, and European allies, lays out new measures to isolate Russia’s central bank, and announces a new trans-Atlantic task force to freeze the foreign assets of sanctioned individuals.

In a dramatic escalation, the order also blocks select Russian banks from using SWIFT — the international payment system employed by banks to send money around the world.

SWIFT, which stands for The Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, is a cooperative company based in Belgium, whose owners include many of Europe’s...

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YouTube bans ads on RT and other Russian channels

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

YouTube is blocking state-backed Russian media outlets from advertising and earning money on the platform, as first reported by Reuters. As Russian troops continue to invade Ukraine, YouTube told Reuters it’s “pausing a number of channels’ ability to monetize on YouTube, including several Russian channels affiliated with recent sanctions.”

RT will be restricted in Ukraine due to “a government request”

YouTube spokesperson Farshad Shadloo told Reuters that YouTube will recommend Russian state-run media to users less often. Some of these channels — including RT — will also be restricted in Ukraine due to “a government request,” perhaps in response to Ukraine digital minister Mykhailo Fedorov’s call for YouTube to block Russian propaganda...

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How Ukrainians are fundraising in cryptocurrency

Illustration by James Bareham / The Verge

More than $15 million has been donated so far

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Some Russian bank customers have been cut off from Apple Pay and Google Pay

Financial sanctions from several countries bar some card payments through Google Pay and Apple Pay. | Photo By Lea Suzuki/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images

Customers at a number of banks in Russia can no longer use their bank cards with Google Pay and Apple Pay due to newly-imposed financial sanctions on the country, as reported by Insider. According to a press release from Russia’s Central Bank, affected financial institutions include VTB Group, Sovcombank, Novikombank, Promsvyazbank, and Otkritie FC Bank.

Sanctions issued by the EU target 70 percent of Russia’s banking network

While customers can still use bank cards from these institutions within Russia, they’ll no longer work abroad or when making online payments to stores and services belonging to countries that issued sanctions on Russia. This also includes card payments through Apple Pay and Google Pay, although the Central Bank says...

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Twitter pauses ads in Ukraine and Russia amid growing conflict

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Twitter is putting a temporary hold on advertisements in Ukraine and Russia to ensure the visibility of public safety information.

We’re temporarily pausing advertisements in Ukraine and Russia to ensure critical public safety information is elevated and ads don’t detract from it.

— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) February 25, 2022

“We’re temporarily pausing advertisements in Ukraine and Russia to ensure critical public safety information is elevated and ads don’t detract from it,” Twitter said in a tweet. In the thread, the platform outlines several measures it’s taking to protect users. This includes a suspension on “some” tweet recommendations from people users aren’t following, as well as search and home timeline prompts...

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Super Pumped is a bumpy Uber ride that gets lost on its way to being interesting

Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Travis Kalanick and Uma Thurman as Arianna Huffington in Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber. | Showtime

The Fight For Uber is Super Pumped’s first chapter

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Facebook blocks Russian state media from advertising on the platform

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Facebook is blocking state-run Russian media outlets from advertising and monetizing content on the platform amid the ongoing conflict in Ukraine (via Reuters).

1/ We are now prohibiting Russian state media from running ads or monetizing on our platform anywhere in the world. We also continue to apply labels to additional Russian state media. These changes have already begun rolling out and will continue into the weekend.

— Nathaniel Gleicher (@ngleicher) February 26, 2022

“We are now prohibiting Russian state media from running ads or monetizing on our platform anywhere in the world,” Nathaniel Gleicher, Facebook’s head of security policy announced on Twitter. “These changes have already begun rolling out and will continue into the...

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Philips’s color-changing Gradient Lightstrip has dropped to an all-time low at Amazon

When paired with the Hue Hub and the Hue TV sync box, the Philips Hue Gradient Lightstrip is a colorful TV bias light. | Image: Signify

Philips Hue smart lighting has long been one of the preferred smart home accessories for passionate aficionados and newbies alike. That’s because the lights are relatively easy to start off your home automation with, expansive enough to build off of, and they just look cool.

If you’re already invested in the Hue ecosystem, you can pick up the fancier Philips Hue Gradient Lightstrip for $212.49 at Amazon right now when you clip the on-page coupon for 15 percent off. The discount brings the colorful, 65-inch LED strip down to an all-time low price, saving you nearly $38. Unlike Philip’s standard lightstrips, these can display a multitude of colors simultaneously, making them a great fit for mounting behind your TV as a bias light.

Keep...

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Valve ‘more than happy’ to help Microsoft bring PC Game Pass to Steam

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Valve CEO Gabe Newell is open to Microsoft launching its PC Game Pass service on Steam. In an interview with PC Gamer, Newell says Valve has no plans for an Xbox Game Pass competitor, but that it would be happy to work with Microsoft to bring PC Game Pass to Steam.

“I don’t think it’s something that we think we need to do ourselves, building a subscription service at this time,” Newell said. “But for their customers it’s clearly a popular option, and we’d be more than happy to work with them to get that on Steam.”

Microsoft and Valve have held discussions about bringing PC Game Pass to Steam, but it’s clearly early days and may never happen. “We’ve talked to people there quite a bit about that topic,” says Newell. “If your customers...

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The US has sanctioned the head of Russia’s largest social network

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

On Thursday, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Biden administration imposed sweeping sanctions on Russian banks, energy and infrastructure companies, and a number of individual Russian elites.

The US Department of the Treasury provided the full list in a press release, which divided sanctioned entities into two categories: “major Russian financial institutions” and “elites and families close to Putin.”

Among the sanctioned individuals is Vladimir Kiriyenko, CEO of VK Group, the parent company of Russia’s biggest social network VKontakte. While he isn’t being sanctioned specifically for his work with the VK group, the result still forbids one of the country’s most powerful tech executives from doing business with any US entity.

T...

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Russia blocks Twitter as Ukraine invasion escalates

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

As the invasion of Ukraine enters its third day, Russia has blocked access to Twitter in an apparent effort to stifle the flow of information, according to a report from the internet monitoring group NetBlocks. Beginning Saturday morning, NetBlocks saw failed or heavily throttled connections across every major Russian telecom provider, including Rostelecom, MTS, Beeline, and MegaFon. Russians are still able to access Twitter through VPN services, but direct connections are restricted.

Journalists on the ground in Russia have confirmed the block. A BBC reporter described access as “severely restricted,” saying “this message got through, but took a while.”

The motivation behind the restrictions is unclear, but comes amid a broader...

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Mobile World Congress organizers will ban some Russian firms from the show

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

Mobile World Congress organizers will ban some Russian companies from the world’s largest mobile technology show which will run from February 28th to March 3rd, _Reuters_reports.

The Russian Pavilion will not exhibit the country’s mobile products this year at the Barcelona-based event because of international sanctions imposed upon Russia after it invaded Ukraine, event organizers wireless industry association GSMA said.

Although the GSMA strongly condemned the invasion, its chief executive John Hoffman told _Reuters_there are no plans to cancel or reschedule the conference. However, he added “it’s an evolving situation” that they “will continue to monitor.”

While Hoffman also said a “handful, a few” of Russian firms and their executives...

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Where’s your Steam Deck preorder email? Valve explains

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

Valve’s $400-and-up portable gaming PC the Steam Deck went on sale this morning... but you didn’t get an email from Valve, I’m guessing? I didn’t either — and as Valve’s just now explaining, that’s because they’re going out in small batches rather than all at once; the next batch won’t be arriving until Monday, March 7th; and then they’ll go out in weekly batches each Monday, presumably through the month of June.

Did you have a reservation for Q1 2022? You should see your email by the end of March. Q2 2022? They’ll start in April, when I’ll hopefully get mine since I ordered on the very first day (but who knows, the reservation website had a lot of trouble that morning).

And if your reservation says “After Q2 2022,” Valve says stay...

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AT&T begins testing and deployment of discreet 5G radios on city street lamp posts

Installing an Ericsson Street Radio small cell | Image: AT&T

AT&T today announced it’s field testing new 5G small cell radios that can hide on top of street lamp posts. The new radios were born out of a partnership between AT&T, mobile technology manufacturer Ericsson, and urban solutions provider Ubicquia.

“It is virtually unseen from street level,” wrote Gordon Mansfield, AT&T’s VP of mobility access & architecture, in a company blog post. Mansfield touted that these new low- / mid-band 5G radios can be deployed within 15 minutes on street lamps. “No long wires and big, bulky boxes – a true aesthetic improvement,” Mansfield wrote.

Anything that helps 5G blend in is a good thing since there’s also “ground furniture” and being a target of vandalism to worry about. These new small cell radios are...

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Ukrainian leader calls on Tim Cook to block Russian users from the App Store

Photo by Pierre Crom/Getty Images

In an open letter published Friday afternoon, the Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine, Mykhailo Fedorov, called on Apple to stop supplying products and services to Russian users as a response to the country’s ongoing invasion.

“I appeal to you,” Fedorov wrote in the letter, published through his Twitter account, “to stop supplying Apple services and products to the Russian Federation, including blocking access to App Store!”

I’ve contacted @tim_cook, Apple's CEO, to block the Apple Store for citizens of the Russian Federation, and to support the package of US government sanctions! If you agree to have the president-killer, then you will have to be satisfied with the only available site Russia 24. pic.twitter.com/b5dm78g2vS

— Mykhailo Fedorov...

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Nvidia confirms it’s investigating an ‘incident,’ reportedly a cyberattack

Nvidia is confirming to The Verge, Bloomberg,Reuters, and others that it’s investigating an “incident” — hours after The Telegraph reported that the graphics chipmaking giant had experienced a devastating cyberattack that “completely compromised” the company’s internal systems over the past two days.

“We are investigating an incident. Our business and commercial activities continue uninterrupted. We are still working to evaluate the nature and scope of the event and don’t have any additional information to share at this time,” reads a statement via Nvidia spokesman Hector Marinez.

Even The Telegraph’s sources aren’t suggesting that Nvidia has necessarily had any data stolen or deleted, and there’s no current suggestion that the...

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Vergecast: reviews for the Steam Deck and Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

Every Friday, The Verge publishes our flagship podcast, The Vergecast, where co-hosts Nilay Patel and Dieter Bohn discuss the week in tech news with the reporters and editors covering the biggest stories.

This week is a pretty gadget-heavy episode about some heavy gadgets. Senior reports editor Sean Hollister starts the show with his review of the Steam Deck, the latest portable gaming system. Sean explains how it was the hardest review he's done and why he decided to give it a 6.5 score, despite the amount of fun he had using it.

Verge reviewer Allison Johnson continues the gadget talk with her review of Samsung’s Galaxy S22 Ultra, including improvements on the camera, using the software, and whether this is the end of the “slab...

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The Verge wins its first National Magazine Award

Illustration by Micha Huigen

The Verge was recognized yesterday by the American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME) with an ASME Award for Photography and Illustration for “Best Digital Illustration” for its “Verge 10” illustration by Micha Huigen. Our “Verge 10” series celebrated the 10th anniversary of The Verge and included more than 20 stories looking back at our last 10 years and ahead to the future. One of those stories, “What The Verge Covered in Our First 120,000 Stories” by Jacob Kastrenakes, received an additional nomination for “​​Best Illustrated Story” for the art by Kristen Radtke.

“This is our first ASME award, and we couldn’t be happier it was for the incredible illustration that accompanied ‘Verge 10,’” says Verge editor-in-chief Nilay Patel. “The...

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Twitter now lets you place content warnings on individual tweets

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Twitter is giving all users access to the content warning feature it tested last year. The feature lets you obscure individual photos and videos behind warnings for nudity, violence, and “sensitive” content, rather than adding a blanket warning to all multimedia tweets. It’s available on Twitter’s Android and iOS apps as well as its web client.

Users can put a content warning on posts by adding a photo or video, tapping to edit it, and then hitting a flag icon that will bring up the options listed above. You can tag multiple warnings for an individual piece of media, and you can add a warning to one image or video in a tweet but not another — although in the latter case, Twitter appears to place a single warning over both of them.

The...

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How Android 12 lets you control your phone with facial gestures

An accessibility feature that was introduced with Android 12 allows you to control your screen using facial gestures: raise eyebrows, smile, open mouth, look up, look left, look right. This feature, called “Camera switches,” uses the phone’s camera to watch for these gestures and allows them to signal simple screen operations. These operations include: go to the next actionable screen object, select an object, go to the previous object, touch and hold, scroll forward, and scroll backward; you can also pause the camera switch itself.

It’s not a long list: it only includes six facial gestures and not all that many actions. However, it’s a beginning, and it could be useful if you can’t use your hands to work your phone’s screen.

If you do...

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Microsoft tests new Quick Settings Bluetooth device list for Windows 11 Insiders

Photo by Tom Warren / The Verge

Microsoft is rolling out its latest test build of Windows 11 to its Insiders, and the update is promising to make Bluetooth devices simpler and easier to access. Windows 11 Build 22563 will surface a list of Bluetooth devices right into the Quick Settings menu of the taskbar, complete with visible battery levels for supported devices. This new Bluetooth list allows users to connect to new devices and disconnect to current devices without having to open the full Bluetooth settings menu. It takes a small cue from the way Windows 11’s Quick Settings already handles Wi-Fi networks or selecting an audio source.

This is the latest update to come to Windows 11 after just recently bringing new touch gestures and Start menu folders. Bluetooth has...

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Elden Ring’s character creator fails Black players

Most of you playing Elden Ring are probably knee-deep in the Lands Between, getting your shit rocked by that asshole on the horse, but my mind hasn’t left the game’s first menus. Though the many classes present a paralyzing wealth of options, it’s not the question of what class to play that has me stuck. It’s the character creator. I’m stymied by the bizarrely incongruous system that allows for an unprecedented level of control of every minute detail of facial feature but only has one kinky hair option.

I didn’t expect much from Elden Ring’s character creator. FromSoftware games have a bit of a reputation for being kinda bad at character creation, especially regarding skin. In Bloodborne, skin colors and textures were distinctly...

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Valve made a bite-sized new Portal game for the Steam Deck

I just put up a 4,000-word review of Valve’s Steam Deck portable gaming PC, which just went on sale to the first batch of early adopters today. But the company had a surprise announcement too — Aperture Desk Job, a new bite-size experience set in the Portal universe that’ll be a free download March 1st. It’s designed to introduce new Steam Deck buyers to the handheld’s incredible array of controls, and it involves... toilets and chairs.

Assuming you’re not already halfway through the video teaser atop this post, here’s how Valve tries to thread the needle between our rampant desire for Valve to remember how to count to three and the potential disappointment that Valve has not yet managed it:

Aperture Desk Job reimagines the...

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