Microsoft is stuffing pop-up ads into Google Chrome on Windows again

Screenshot by Tom Warren / The Verge

Microsoft is once again injecting pop-ups into Google’s Chrome browser in a bid to get people to switch to Bing. The software giant first introduced malware-like pop-up ads last year with a prompt that appeared over the top of other apps and windows. After pausing that notification to address “unintended behavior,” the pop-ups have returned again on Windows 10 and 11.

Windows users have reported seeing the new pop-up in recent days, advertising Bing AI and Microsoft’s Bing search engine inside Google Chrome. If you click yes to this prompt, then Microsoft will set Bing as the default search engine for Chrome. These latest prompts look like malware, and once again have Windows users asking if they are legit or nefarious. Microsoft has...

Continue reading…

Uber and Lyft to leave Minneapolis over ‘deeply flawed’ pay rules

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Uber and Lyft are pulling their services out of Minneapolis after the city council passed an ordinance that will increase drivers’ pay. Both companies say they will no longer offer ridesharing services in the city when the ordinance goes into effect on May 1st.

The ordinance, which guarantees drivers a minimum rate of $1.40 per mile and 51 cents per minute while carrying a rider, was first passed last week but later vetoed by Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey. The City Council voted 10–3 to override the veto on Thursday.

Lyft spokesperson CJ Macklin calls the ordinance “deeply flawed,” as the rates were determined before the state released a study detailing how much drivers would have to be paid to earn Minneapolis’ $15.57 per hour minimum...

Continue reading…

Doctor Who’s new season streams in May

Ncuti Gatwa as The Doctor, and Millie Gibson as Ruby Sunday. | BBC / Disney Plus

Doctor Who’s most recent Christmas Special gave us a interesting taste of what showrunner Russell T Davies has been dreaming up for Ncuti Gatwa’s run as the time traveling alien, and it won’t be long until we get to see what’s coming next.

Disney Plus announced today that Doctor Who season 14 starring Ncuti Gatwa as the Fifteenth Doctor and Millie Gibson as his companion Ruby Sunday will premiere with two new episodes on May 10th in the US and internationally, except for the United Kingdom. UK viewers will be able to stream the new episodes via BBC iPlayer beginning at 12AM on May 11th (GMT) before it is available on BBC One later in the day. In a press release about the new season, Davies teased that the Doctor and Ruby’s adventures...

Continue reading…

How to make an Apple Vision Pro Persona

Samar Haddad for The Verge | Photo by Apple

Now that you’ve got your $3,500 Apple Vision Pro, gone through the tutorial, and gotten the hang of things, it’s time to do the next best thing: make a Persona.

Personas are Apple’s name for a digital avatar of yourself for video calls. Or, in Apple’s words, a “natural representation of you that you can use to connect with others.” Aside from FaceTime, your Persona is also used with the EyeSight feature — you know, the ghostly eyes that appear on the Vision Pro’s front display. It’s created using image captures and 3D measurements of your head, face, upper body, and facial expressions.

But before you go run off and make a Persona, there’s one thing to keep in mind. Right now, Personas are in beta which means... they look kind of cursed....

Continue reading…

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Fold 16 review: setting the bar for foldables

Its beautiful 16-inch OLED display morphs into a 12-inch laptop, but do splurge for the ‘optional’ keyboard and folio.

Continue reading…

Mercedes is trialing humanoid robots for ‘low skill, repetitive’ tasks

Mercedes also eventually plans to assess how Apollo handles delivering totes of kitted parts. | Image: Apptronik

Mercedes-Benz is the latest automotive company to trial how humanoid robots could be used to automate “low skill, physically challenging, manual labor.” On Friday, robotics company Apptronik announced it had entered into a commercial agreement with Mercedes to pilot how “highly advanced robotics” like Apollo — Apptronik’s 160-pound bipedal robot — can be used in manufacturing. The news follows a similar pilot announced by BMW in January.

Apptronik says that Mercedes is exploring use cases like having Apollo inspect and deliver components to human production line workers. Neither company has disclosed any figures for the agreement or how many Apollo robots are being trialed.

According to Apptronik, humanoid robots would allow vehicle...

Continue reading…

FCC clamps down on confusing ‘hidden fees’ in your cable TV bill

The ruling aims to make it easier to accurately compare subscription prices against other providers. | Illustration by Hugo Herrera / The Verge

Cable and satellite TV providers will need to ensure they show the total price of subscription plans as a “prominent single line item” — including costs described as extra fees — under a rule adopted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Thursday. The FCC says the new rule (pdf) for “all-in” pricing will make it easier for customers to compare prices against competing providers and streaming services by eliminating the “misleading practice of describing video programming costs as a tax, fee, or surcharge.”

“No one likes surprises on their bill,” said FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel in a separate statement (pdf). “The advertised price for a service should be the price you pay when your bill arrives. It shouldn’t include a...

Continue reading…

Are we really going to ban TikTok?

Image: Alex Parkin / The Verge

The TikTok ban might be for real this time. Nearly four years after the first attempt to get the ByteDance-owned company either sold or barred from the US, a new bill is flying through congressional votes, and President Joe Biden has already said he’ll sign it if it comes to his desk.

On this episode of The Vergecast, we talk about what’s inside the Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act (everybody calls it PAFFACAA, just kidding; nobody calls it that, everybody just calls it “The TikTok Ban”) and what we know about TikTok’s connection to China. The answer: not a lot! But four years in, Congress seems more convinced than ever, and that might mean something. Or it might not. We spend a long time debating...

Continue reading…

The wedge-shaped M1 MacBook Air lives on — at Walmart, for $699

Walmart’s selling them for $699 with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

When Apple stopped selling the M1 MacBook Air last week to make way for the new M3 version, I mourned the loss of the M1 Air’s iconic wedge shape. But perhaps that was a bit premature. Walmart just announced that for the first time, you’ll be able to directly buy the M1 MacBook Air from its online store for a discounted $699. The retailer also said the M1 Air is coming to select retail stores soon.

Looking at Walmart’s site, these M1 Airs are being sold new, which makes the $699 price compelling (Best Buy will also deliver a new one for $999 if you prefer to pay full price). That said, you only get to choose the base model, which comes with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. I’d normally bristle at 8GB of RAM in 2024 — but the drop to $699...

Continue reading…

Supreme court to hear case on how the government talks to social media companies

Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos via Getty Images

On Monday, the Supreme Court will hear a case that could upend how social media platforms deal with posts containing anything from vaccine misinformation to election threats.

At the moment, various arms of the US government will communicate directly with platforms for all sorts of reasons. For example, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) might email directly with someone at Facebook during a global pandemic, especially if Facebook wants to set up an information hub for its users. (You can imagine similar scenarios for voter misinformation, election integrity, and all kinds of public emergencies.)

The core question at issue in Murthy v. Missouri is whether the government can flag potentially harmful posts to social...

Continue reading…

Anker’s latest sleep buds promise to block out snoring partners for longer

Anker’s new Soundcore Sleep A20 earbuds in a charging case. | Image: Anker

Anker is revamping its sleep-focused true wireless earbuds with the new Soundcore Sleep A20 model. It’s announcing the earbuds today to coincide with what is apparently “World Sleep Day” but you won’t be able to buy a pair of the earbuds until its Kickstarter launches on April 16th. Or, if you’d prefer to buy them through more traditional means, they’ll be available via Amazon from May 20th. They’ll ultimately sell for $149.99, but Kickstarter is pricing them at $89.99 for early birds.

Like with the previous A10 earbuds, there’s no active noise cancellation here. Instead, the earbuds are equipped with what Anker calls “Twin-Seal eartips” which it claims can block out three times the noise of typical silicon eartips. The earbuds are also...

Continue reading…

Ampler introduces an all-road electric bike alongside series refresh

Curt Anyroad in silver. | Image: Ampler

Ampler — one of our favorite European e-bike makers — is back with a 2024 model refresh that includes a new all-road variant of the sporty Curt.

The Curt Anyroad is available with either a high- or low-step frame, the latter being easier to step through when sitting on a fully loaded bike. Both are otherwise identical, offering wider tires, fork mounts for some light gear bags, and a new 10-speed pedal-assisted drivetrain. That should make it suitable for more terrain but it lacks any kind of suspension for dampening bumps. The all-road edition takes the Curt up from a feathery (for an e-bike) 14.4kg (about 32 pounds) to 16.9kg, and still fits riders from small to large. Prices start at a tax-inclusive €3,690 (about $4,000). Shipments...

Continue reading…

The FCC has finally decreed that 25Mbps and 3Mbps are not ‘broadband’ speed

Illustration by Grayson Blackmon / The Verge

“I think our new threshold, frankly, should be 100Mbps. I think anything short of that shortchanges our children, our future, and our new digital economy.” That’s what FCC commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel argued nine years ago — now, it’s finally happening.

Today, the FCC has changed its definition of “broadband” to mean download speeds of 100 megabits per second and upload speeds of 20 megabits per second. It had been stuck at 25Mbps/3Mbps since 2015. As recently as 2021, outgoing FCC chairman Ajit Pai claimed we still didn’t need more than that.

These definitions matter, because they let the FCC report whether it’s failing or succeeding to close the broadband gap — and how much to regulate (or throw money at) broadband providers to...

Continue reading…

The best instant cameras you can buy right now

Image: Kristen Radtke / The Verge

We found the best cameras for your budget and needs.

Continue reading…

CIA allegedly made fake social media accounts to troll the Chinese government

Image: The Verge

The CIA allegedly launched a secret operation to troll Chinese officials and turn public opinion against them through leaked intelligence and negative news on social media.

Reuters reports the operation began in 2019 and was also aimed at causing paranoia within Xi Jinping’s government. CIA agents reportedly made fake social media accounts to spread rumors, such as allegations that Communist Party members hid ill-gotten wealth outside the country, and criticize Chinese government initiatives, like saying a program financing infrastructure projects in other countries was corrupt.

The CIA declined to comment to Reuters,which could not confirm whether the program is still in place. Reuters said the operation, authorized by then-President...

Continue reading…

Pornhub shuts down in Texas to protest age verification law

Photo Illustration by Adrien Fillon/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Pornhub has disabled its site in Texas in response to the state’s online age verification law. The site now displays a message to users in the state that says having to provide an ID when accessing an adult website “is not an effective solution for protecting users online.”

Last year, Texas enacted a previously blocked age verification law (HB 1181) that requires users to upload photos of their government IDs (or use another third-party verification service) before accessing a pornographic website. The law also requires porn sites to display health warnings that claim porn impairs “human brain development,” among other unproven issues. Texas sued Pornhub’s parent company Aylo in February, alleging that Pornhub failed to comply with the...

Continue reading…

Max annual plans are up to $60 off ahead of March Madness

With Max, you can stream sports as well as shows and movies like Wonka and The Last of Us_._ | Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge

Whether you’re looking for cheap cable-free ways to watch the NCAA championship games or are simply worried about Max’s forthcoming password-sharing crackdown, today’s Max deal arrives at the perfect time. Right now, Max is taking an additional 30 percent off of its annual subscription for one year, for a total 40 percent discount compared to the cost of a monthly subscription. The annual plans start at $69.99 ($30), which is like paying $5.83 per month, but you can go ad-free for $104.99 ($50 off) while the Max Ultimate Ad-Free tier is down to $139.99 ($60 off). Even better, new, returning, and existing subscribers are eligible for this deal, so everybody can save.

The main difference between the plans is that the ad-free tiers let you...

Continue reading…

Google I/O 2024 is happening on May 14th

Google I/O 2024 will be on May 14th.

Google’s next I/O developer conference will kick off exactly two months from now on May 14th. Just like last year, the I/O 2024 keynote will be “broadcast in front of a limited live audience” and available for anyone to watch virtually.

This year’s I/O will likely focus on AI, especially now that Google released its new flagship AI model, Gemini, and its smaller version, Gemma.

The Gemini bot’s image generator caused a controversy that Google CEO Sundar Pichai called “completely unacceptable” after its attempt at creating pictures showing diversity had some unintended consequences. Throw in the flubbed facts from Google’s Bard launch last year, and while the company has a lot of AI advances to celebrate, it will also have to explain...

Continue reading…

The FTC and DOJ think McDonald’s ice cream machines should be legal to fix

Image: iFixit via YouTube

The Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice’s antitrust division filed a comment with the US Copyright Office asking for an expanded exemption to copyright law for the right to repair certain devices. The comment was submitted on Thursday, amid the Copyright Office’s deliberations over whether to issue new exemptions to Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), a law that prohibits breaking software copy protection. Under Section 1201, repairing your own devices can often become a copyright violation.

Exemptions to DMCA Section 1201 are issued every three years, as per the Register of Copyrights’ recommendation. Prior exemptions have been issued for jailbreaking cellphones and repairing certain parts of...

Continue reading…

Spotify says its iPhone app updates in the EU are getting held up by Apple

Image: Nick Barclay / The Verge

Even after Apple was hit with a $2 billion fine in the European Union over years-old complaints from Spotify about its App Store rules, Spotify says Apple is stonewalling updates issued in compliance with that very ruling. In an email to the European Commission obtained by The Verge, Spotify writes that Apple has “neither acknowledged nor responded to Spotify’s submission” to bring subscription pricing information into the app, preventing it from updating the app at all for its users, even to put out fixes for bugs or add other features.

On March 5th, Spotify submitted an update to Apple that puts links to Spotify’s website, along with pricing information for different subscription options, directly in the EU version of its app, without...

Continue reading…

Netflix is bringing back Black Mirror in 2025

Image: Netflix

A seventh season of Black Mirror is on the way. Netflix has confirmed that Charlie Brooker’s sci-fi anthology will return in 2025 and that the new season will be six episodes long.

There aren’t many details yet, of course. But the company does say that, while it’ll otherwise consist of new stories, one of the episodes will be a sequel to “USS Callister” from season 4, which starred Jesse Plemons. “Robert Daly is dead, but for the crew of the USS Callister, their problems are just beginning,” the description reads.

The show’s return will mark a relatively brief hiatus, at least by Black Mirror standards. Season 6 premiered last year and included some strong episodes, covering everything from space-themed horror to a paparazzi thriller to...

Continue reading…

Super Soaker spiritual successor Spyra just shrank its USB-C water blaster

The SpyraGo electric water blaster | Image: Spyra

Would you pay $180 for a USB-C water blaster that blasts an entire shot glass full of liquid every time you pull the trigger? That’s been Spyra’s pitch for the past six years, but today it’s revealing a new toy that costs (and weighs) less than a third of its previous products.

The new SpyraGo will cost just $54 when it arrives on March 26th, a price finally low enough to tempt me! It’s five inches shorter, between one and two inches slimmer, and importantly weighs just three pounds fully loaded. (The SpyraThree weighs nearly nine pounds at full capacity.)

Image: Spyra

The catch, unfortunately, is it’s also far less powerful: instead of firing shot-glass-sized 30 milliliter water “bullets,” the new SpyraGo will...

Continue reading…

Microsoft launches Copilot Pro worldwide with a one-month free trial

Image: Microsoft

Microsoft is expanding its $20 monthly Copilot Pro subscription to more markets today, after launching the AI-powered assistant for consumers in January. The expansion sees Copilot Pro available in 222 countries in total, and Microsoft is launching a free one-month trial to entice consumers to subscribe to its AI vision of the future.

Copilot Pro includes priority access to the latest OpenAI models, the ability to build your own Copilot GPT, and access to Copilot inside Office apps if you’re already a Microsoft 365 Personal or Home subscriber. Now, Microsoft is also unlocking Copilot Pro inside the Office web apps, so you don’t need a separate Microsoft 365 subscription to use the chatbot inside Word, Outlook, and other free web apps.

T...

Continue reading…

CBP wants to use AI to scan for fentanyl at the border

In his State of the Union address last week, President Joe Biden urged Congress to pass a bipartisan immigration bill “with the toughest set of border security reforms we’ve ever seen.” The bill would have, among other things, funded “100 more high-tech drug detection machines to significantly increase the ability to screen and stop vehicles from smuggling fentanyl into America.”

The high-tech drug detection machines are actually just X-rays — really high-res ones, but X-rays all the same. The idea isn’t just to get better machines but to scan more vehicles at ports of entry, with an end goal of 100 percent. And to achieve that, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) will eventually deploy artificial intelligence so officers can scan and...

Continue reading…

Wooting built the best gaming keyboard — now a new model introduces ‘Rappy Snappy’

Image: Wooting

Wooting’s 60HE is widely regarded as one of the best, if not the best, gaming keyboard on the market. That’s all thanks to Rapid Trigger, a feature that speeds up how quickly you can activate a key to respond in games like Valorant or Counter-Strike 2. Now, Wooting is launching the 80HE, a larger keyboard with an 80 percent layout. It comes with a new “Rappy Snappy” feature that combines with Rapid Trigger to make it even faster to pull off moves like strafing and bunny hopping in games.

“Rappy Snappy is our new spin on Rapid Trigger, so it compares two keys together and the one that gets pressed the furthest is prioritized,” explains Wooting CEO Calder Limmen. “You could, for example, use it on your A and D keys to make counter strafing...

Continue reading…

The SEC is sick of Elon Musk’s attempts to delay its Twitter investigation

The SEC claims that Musk “has done everything he can to delay the completion of this matter.” | Image: Kristen Radtke / The Verge; Getty Images

The officials assessing whether Elon Musk violated federal securities law during his acquisition of Twitter are growing tired of his alleged attempts to stall their investigation. In a new filing on Wednesday, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) accused Musk of trying to “misrepresent” the scope of its investigation, claiming that he “persists with baseless constitutional objections” against its attempts to make him testify.

The SEC has been scrutinizing Musk since 2022 over his delay in disclosing a substantial stake in Twitter. Musk had purchased before initiating his acquisition of the social media platform on April 14th. According to the SEC, while Musk testified twice that year, he has since fought against a third and...

Continue reading…

The latest Prince of Persia, Returnal, and other PS hits are up to 50 percent off

You can buy Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown for just $30. | Image: Ubisoft

What’s with all the good PlayStation deals lately? First, the disc-based and discless versions of the PS5 “slim” dropped to an all-time low (with a digital copy of Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, no less). Now, Sony is taking up to 80 percent off a ton of PlayStation games through March 27th as part of its Essential Picks sale, which drops digital copies of newer hits like Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown to $29.99 ($20 off) and both Final Fantasy XVI and Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora to $41.99 ($28 off).

Hundreds of other older games are on sale, too, so you’ll likely find something that’ll strike your fancy if none of the newer games do. Right now, for example, you can challenge yourself for hours on end with either Returnal or Demon’s Souls,...

Continue reading…

Google says Chrome can now protect you better while preserving your privacy

Illustration: The Verge

Google has added real-time browsing protection to Chrome that it claims should protect your privacy. The feature, which Google says hides your visited URLs, is now available on the default Standard mode of Safe Browsing on Chrome.

For years, Chrome’s Safe Browsing feature has automatically added potentially unsafe URLs to a list Google stores on your device. Every time a user visits a site, Google checks the URL against that list and issues a warning. The problem is that Google only updates this locally stored database every 30 to 60 minutes. Given most dangerous sites exist for less than 10 minutes nowadays, a lot of unsafe sites slip through the cracks.

Safe Browsing’s opt-in Enhanced protection mode deals with this by using Google’s...

Continue reading…

Intel’s new Core i9-14900KS arrives today for $699 with boosts up to 6.2GHz

Image: Intel

Intel is launching its flagship Core i9-14900KS processor today, with clock speeds that boost all the way up to 6.2GHz. That’s 200MHz more than the previous Core i9-13900KS that launched last year and was the first desktop processor to break the 6GHz barrier at stock speeds.

This new Core i9-14900KS will be priced at $699, the same as the previous 13900KS, and will be available in stores today. The 6.2GHz max turbo frequency is an out-of-the-box boost, so there could be room for overclocking to push these speeds even further. The 14900KS has the same 24 cores found on the 14900K, with eight performance cores and 16 efficiency ones. It does run at a 150-watt base power, though, instead of the 125 watts found on the 14900K.

Other than the...

Continue reading…

Join The Verge at the 2024 Chicago Humanities Spring Festival

Illustration by Emmett Mottl

The Verge is thrilled to announce that we are once again partnering with the Chicago Humanities Festival for a day of in-person conversations exploring the evolving intersection between art and artificial intelligence. The Verge’sprogramming will take place on Saturday, April 13th, in the ballroom located within the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, starting at 11AM CT — and you can purchase your tickets now!

Our sessions will explore how AI is reshaping the realms of art, film, and digital content creation. With introductory explainers providing context and information for newbies to AI, Verge experts David Pierce, Emilia David, and Mia Sato will navigate crucial conversations on how generative AI systems impact the art world,...

Continue reading…