Google Pixel 8A leak reveals seven years of security updates

Image: Android Headlines

We’ve already seen a bunch of images revealing what Google’s Pixel 8A might look like, but now, leaked marketing materials shared by Android Headlines give us an even better picture of what we can expect. The promotional images suggest that the budget-friendly Pixel 8A will come with seven years of security updates.

But the materials don’t indicate whether the phone will come with seven years of Android OS upgrades, something its flagship Pixel 8 and 8 Pro have. Still, the seven years makes a big difference from Google’s previous policy for Pixel phones, which only provided five years of security updates and three years of Android OS upgrades.

Image: Android Headlines

There isn’t a mention of Android OS upgrades.

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Columbia University has a doxxing problem

Protesters wanted to expose Columbia; Columbia exposed its students.

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Lego is bringing summer vibes with K.K. Slider and new Animal Crossing sets

The new sets include a Town Hall and Dodo Airlines airport. | Image: Lego

Good news for those of us who love Animal Crossing and Legos. Starting August 1st, Lego is launching two new Animal Crossing sets and a minifig of one very special canine crooner.

Lego teased the news on its X account, which shows K.K. Slider doing his thing and a brief glimpse of the two new sets. (Amusingly, Lego notes that the K.K. Slider minifigure does not actually move or sing. Bummer.) K.K. Slider is part of a fall-themed Town Hall set, which includes Isabelle and Audie. There’s also a small truck, snack stand, and some foliage to go along with K.K. Slider’s concert setup. The other set is of a Dodo Airlines airport, complete with a control tower, dock, and airplane. Granted, hordes of your turnip-hungry friends won’t be flying...

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One year with the Light Phone 2

The first time I used the Light Phone 2’s GPS, I drove to Los Angeles for a date. I ended up parked in a red zone, hyperventilating to the rhythm of my hazard lights. All I did was get lost, and yet, I was seconds away from puking all over myself. (I didn’t, thank goodness.) I should have picked a lower-stakes event to test-drive the navigation feature, but I assumed it would work as well as Google Maps. I was wrong.

The Light Phone’s GPS was awful a year ago. It often thought I was on a surface street instead of the adjacent freeway, or vice versa, so it would incorrectly tell me to keep going or take an exit that didn’t exist and not register my actual location until a few minutes later — if it registered that at all. It also took...

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DJI might get banned next in the US

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

After moving to ban TikTok in the US, the federal government could target the China-based DJI next. A report from The New York Times highlights a bill advanced by the House of Energy and Commerce Committee last month that could ground DJI’s fleet of drones across the country.

If passed, the Countering CCP Drones Act would add DJI drones to the FCC’s list of equipment covered by the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act of 2019. This bars communications equipment or services that “pose a national security risk” from running on US networks. It also prevents companies from using federal funding to purchase banned equipment. Chinese companies such as Huawei and ZTE are already included on the FCC’s list.

Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY)...

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Tesla’s Autopilot is under investigation again following ‘recall’ software update

Crashes involving post-fix Tesla vehicles have prompted the NHTSA to look into how effective the Autopilot updates were. | Photo by Sebastian Gollnow / picture alliance via Getty Images

Tesla can add yet another investigation into its Autopilot feature to what’s already piling up to be a pretty bad year for the company.

On Friday, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) revealed it was opening a new probe to assess whether the recall fix Tesla implemented for over 2 million cars back in December actually did enough to address safety concerns surrounding its Autopilot driver assistance system.

That recall was prompted by a previous investigation NHTSA raised in 2021 that reviewed hundreds of collisions and 13 fatalities allegedly involving Tesla’s Autopilot feature. NHTSA has now closed that same probe following Tesla’s recall notice, finding that the name “Autopilot” may “lead drivers to believe that...

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New EU regulations target Shein’s counterfeit fashion problem

Image: The Verge

Shein, one of the most popular online shopping platforms, will be required to comply with strict regulations under the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA), the European Commission announced today.

The fast-fashion company reported having more than 45 million average monthly users in the EU, earning it the designation of a “very large online platform” (VLOP). The label applies to the biggest tech companies like Amazon, AliExpress, Meta, and TikTok and requires them to comply with rules around content moderation and user privacy and safety. In February, the European Commission handed down more general rules that apply to all platforms except the smallest.

The European Commission specifically noted new requirements for Shein around illegal...

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Tesla’s Autopilot and Full Self-Driving linked to hundreds of crashes, dozens of deaths

Image: Owen Grove / The Verge

In March 2023, a North Carolina student was stepping off a school bus when he was struck by a Tesla Model Y traveling at “highway speeds,” according to a federal investigation that published today. The Tesla driver was using Autopilot, the automaker’s advanced driver-assist feature that Elon Musk insists will eventually lead to fully autonomous cars.

The 17-year-old student who was struck was transported to a hospital by helicopter with life-threatening injuries. But what the investigation found after examining hundreds of similar crashes was a pattern of driver inattention, combined with the shortcomings of Tesla’s technology, resulting in hundreds of injuries and dozens of deaths.

Drivers using Autopilot or the system’s more advanced...

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What’s next with AI?

Illustration by Diana Young

Consumers are already putting AI tools to use for both productivity and creativity. But what’s next?

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How to stop being reminded of memories you don’t want to be reminded of

Image: The Verge

Last year, on a perfect spring day that also happened to be my birthday, I took a car trip to a beautiful area of New York state. It was a lovely day. The new foliage was just coming out and flocks of migrating birds were flying overhead — just the right day for a bunch of photos and good memories.

Unfortunately, my reason for traveling upstate wasn’t for the flora and fauna, but to attend the funeral of my best friend. I took lots of photos on that day: of other friends who attended the service, of the river paths and local parks that my best friend and I used to walk together, and of the home she used to share with her parents, now empty. I took all of those photos because I knew it was probably the last time that I would visit that...

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Sony’s PlayStation Portal handheld is back in stock at multiple retailers

It’s not the Vita comeback we were hoping for, but the Sony’s portable remote player is still a handy companion. | Photo by Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge

We may be out of the scarcity woods as it pertains to the PlayStation 5, but some of its accessories can still be hard to track down. Take the PlayStation Portal, for instance, which has been difficult to come by since it arrived on the scene in mid-November. Thankfully, Sony’s handheld remote player is available once again at Best Buy and Sony’s PlayStation Direct storefront, where you can currently pick it up for its full retail price of $199.99.

The Portal isn’t the Nintendo Switch or Steam Deck killer some thought it might be, but it remains a handy tool for gamers who can’t play on their primary TV or just want the ability to enjoy games throughout their home. If you’re not already caught up on what it is, it’s essentially an...

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Baltimore coach accused of using AI voice cloning to try to get a high school principal fired

Image: The Verge

A former athletic director of a Baltimore high school has been arrested and charged withusing an AI voice cloning service to frame the school’s principal.

The Baltimore Banner reports that Baltimore police believe a purported recording of Pikesville High School principal Eric Eiswert making racist and antisemitic comments was faked. Experts told The Baltimore Banner and Baltimore police that the recording, which circulated through social media in January and briefly resulted in Eiswert’s suspension, has a “flat tone, unusually clean background sounds, and lack of consistent breathing sounds or pauses.”

Baltimore police traced the recording to Dazhon Darien, a former athletic director at the school whose name was also mentioned in the...

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Google will finally put Keep reminders in Tasks, where they always belonged

Illustration: The Verge

The reminders you’ve jotted down in Google Keep will soon show up in Tasks. Google says the long-requested integration is coming over the next year, allowing you to see, edit, and complete your Keep reminders across Tasks, Calendar, and Assistant.

The change will make Tasks the central hub for all to-dos and reminders, hopefully making them far easier to manage. It’s something my colleague David Pierce suggested when talking about Google’s upgraded Keep app last year, saying, “Now, Google, make Keep reminders show up in Tasks. It’s right there!”

Image: Google

Even though Tasks doesn’t support location-based reminders like Keep does, Google states (referring to Keep) that you can still “add time or location-based...

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Microsoft’s Surface and Xbox hardware revenues take a big hit in Q3

Image: The Verge

Microsoft just posted the third quarter of its 2024 fiscal financial results. The software maker made $61.9 billion in revenue and a net income of $21.9 billion during Q3. Revenue is up 17 percent, and net income has increased by 20 percent.

This is the second quarter in a row that Microsoft is including its additional revenue from its Activision Blizzard acquisition that’s pushed gaming to be Microsoft’s third-largest business last quarter, above Windows. This time around it’s back into fourth place, thanks to stronger than expected Windows OEM revenue this quarter.

Investors are also looking to see signs of revenue from Microsoft’s big AI investments over the past year, especially on the Azure OpenAI side, where the company charges...

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The ‘Hollywood Con Queen’ gets a new documentary from Apple TV Plus

Apple TV+

Before AI meant you could impersonate someone’s voice with just a snippet of audio, con artists needed actual skill to impersonate famous figures. Take Hargobind Tahilramani, who allegedly impersonated such powerful Hollywood women as Amy Pascal, Kathleen Kennedy, and Wendi Deng Murdoch. Now, it’s a documentary from Tiger King’s Chris Smith.

The scam artist dubbed “the Con Queen of Hollywood” sent victims to Indonesia, then extracted cash for what seemed like normal expenses, promising reimbursements. The reimbursements never appeared. Scott Johnson at The Hollywood Reporter first broke the story in 2018, then followed it, eventually writing a book. The Apple TV Plus documentary is based on that work. It premieres on May 8th.

In 2020, T...

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All the news about EV charging in the US

An EVgo charging station that has each DC fast-charging cable option including CCS, CHAdeMO, and Tesla’s NACS. | Image: Umar Shakir / The Verge

Tesla’s NACS plug and Supercharger network might help solve North America’s EV charging fragmentation problem, but EV buyers are still feeling uncertain.

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CISA ransomware warning program will launch this year

Illustration: Beatrice Sala

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, an arm of the Department of Homeland Security, is rolling out a program that warns organizations about potential ransomware attacks, CyberScoop reports. The program is currently running as a pilot and will be fully operational by the end of 2024. About 7,000 organizations have signed up for the pilot.

So far, CISA has issued 2,049 warnings since the pilot was launched in January 2023. “The warning pilot is focused on reducing the prevalence of ransomware by using our vulnerability scanning tools to let businesses know if they have vulnerabilities that need to be patched,” CISA Director Jen Easterly told CyberScoop. To get alerts, organizations need to sign up for CISA’s cyber hygiene...

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TCL’s entry-level Q6 QLED TV has fallen to a new low price for a limited time

The Q6 isn’t known for top-tier gaming specs and ultra-deep black levels, but it offers a lot of TV for just $450. | Image: TCL

Here at The Verge, we spend a lot of time reporting on pristine, high-end TV sets — including the latest panels from Sony, LG, and Samsung. That said, not everyone is in the market for a picture-perfect OLED panel or one purpose-built to reduce glare. Thankfully, TCL’s 65-inch Q6 QLED is a more economical option, one you can grab at Amazon and Best Buy today for $449.99 ($250 off), its lowest price to date.

Despite being TCL’s entry-level Q Class panel, the Q6 offers a lot for its budget-friendly price tag. The quantum dot-enabled 4K panel is bright and color-accurate, with solid black levels and vivid color that should shine no matter what you’re watching. It features Google’s terrific TV interface and built-in Chromecast functionality...

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BlizzCon 2024 has been canceled

Photo by Joe Scarnici / Getty Images

Blizzard has announced it will not hold BlizzCon, the publisher’s annual fan convention, this year. “After careful consideration over the last year, we at Blizzard have made the decision not to hold BlizzCon in 2024,” Blizzard wrote on its website.

Instead of BlizzCon, Blizzard wrote that it would be holding other, smaller events throughout the year and mentioned participating in other trade shows, such as Gamescom. Additionally, 2024 marks the 30th anniversary of World of Warcraft, with Blizzard stating that it’s planning “multiple, global, in-person events” as well as sharing updates for WoW’s 10th expansion, The War Within,and Diablo IV’sfirst expansion, Vessel of Hatred.

Despite this year’s cancellation, Blizzard says the event...

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Spyware dealers could face visa restrictions

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

The State Department will soon impose visa restrictions on people who it says have been involved in the development of spyware. In a press release issued on Monday, the department said it is taking steps to bar 13 people “who have been involved in the development and sale of commercial spyware or who are immediate family members of those involved” from entering the United States.

“These individuals have facilitated or derived financial benefit from the misuse of this technology, which has targeted journalists, academics, human rights defenders, dissidents and other perceived critics, and U.S. Government personnel,” the department’s release read.

The looming visa restrictions are the result of a policy implemented by Secretary of State...

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Garry’s Mod is taking down decades of Nintendo-related add-ons

Image: Facepunch Studios

The popular physics sandbox game Garry’s Mod is pulling all of its Nintendo-related add-ons following copyright takedown requests from the gaming giant. On Wednesday, the developers of Garry’s Mod made a post on Steam saying users “may have noticed that certain Nintendo related workshop items have recently been taken down,” adding that “this is not a mistake,” as the takedowns came from Nintendo.

“Honestly, this is fair enough. This is Nintendo’s content and what they allow and don’t allow is up to them,” the post reads. “They don’t want you playing with that stuff in Garry’s Mod — that’s their decision, we have to respect that and take down as much as we can. This is an ongoing process, as we have 20 years of uploads to go through.”

I...

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This self-transforming Megatron is as badass as it is expensive

Megatron. | Image: Robosen

Three years later, Hasbro’s self-transforming, dancing, driving, talking, and attacking Optimus Prime finally has a villain to fight. Megatron, the leader of the Decepticons, is about to arrive. For $1,200 — $899 through May 25th — its robot partner Robosen has created what could be the best auto-converting Transformer yet.

Just to make sure you’re getting it: this bot automatically transforms itself into a badass remote-control tank with a gigantic auto-extending cannon that can actually fire projectiles — then stands up and speaks over 270 phrases from original Megatron voice actor Frank Welker while doing all sorts of tricks.

Here, bask in the glory of childhood imagination become real:

View this post on Instagram ...

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Google is updating Android TVs to fix a big Gmail privacy problem

Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge

Google is working on a fix to block crafty individuals from gaining access to the emails of accounts logged in to some Android TV units. The Android TV operating system, which is preloaded on many smart TVs on the market, could allow people with physical access to get into Gmail and other services associated with the owner’s account, as reported by 404 Media.

Since Android TV is just Android under the hood, it treats the owner’s Google account login as a persistent one, allowing them to automatically log in to allowed apps from the Play Store. Chrome is not allowed by Google to install on Android TV, but there’s a workaround that could get it installed, allowing easy access to Gmail, Drive, and other services — as demonstrated by...

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Cities are ending their ShotSpotter contracts, but the sensors themselves are staying

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Chicago and Mobile, Alabama, are cutting ties with ShotSpotter, the controversial gunshot detection company — but the sensors that notify police about shootings probably aren’t going anywhere, according to a new report from Wired and South Side Weekly.

Internal ShotSpotter emails reviewed by Wired and South Side Weekly reveal that the company hasn’t removed its sensors from other cities that have ended their contracts, including San Diego, California, and San Antonio, Texas. Per the report, ShotSpotter doesn’t sell its sensors but instead the software that alerts police that a shooting may have taken place. After a city’s contract with ShotSpotter lapses, the sensors occasionally remain installed. In some instances, police continue...

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Reddit is back after a widespread outage

Image by Alex Castro / The Verge

Reddit stopped working for most users this afternoon. For nearly an hour, the site didn’t load and displayed an error message reading, “Oops, something went wrong, please try again later.”

At 12:52PM ET, the platform made an update on its status page, saying, “An issue with a Reddit backend has impacted many users on our site.” The site later said it had “identified the issue” and is “remediating it.” The outage appears to have started around 12:45PM ET, with Downdetector recording a massive spike of outage reports at that time.

Screenshot by Emma Roth / The Verge

Reddit seems to have dealt with issues earlier today as well. Its status page says it resolved another issue at around 12PM ET. Now that Reddit’s back...

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Threads will now automatically filter out offensive words from your feeds

Illustration: The Verge

Just like Instagram, Threads will now automatically filter out potentially offensive words, phrases, or emoji by default. In a post on Thursday, Instagram head Adam Mosseri announced that the new Hidden Words feature will apply to both your “Following” and “For You” feeds, along with search results, profiles, and replies to your posts.

If you want to cast a wider net over the content Threads filters out, you can add specific words, phrases, or emoji to hide by tweaking the option inside the app’s settings. Meta notes that you can turn Hidden Words on or off at any time. Instagram started letting users filter out abusive words from their comments in 2016 before extending the feature to DMs.

Image: Threads

A...

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EPA administrator Michael Regan on undoing the toxic legacy of power plants in the US

EPA administrator Michael Regan during the EPA’s “Journey to Justice” tour on November 16th, 2021. | USEPA photo by Eric Vance

The Verge spoke to EPA administrator Michael Regan about the agency’s new rules for power plant pollution.

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The Fossil-size hole in Wear OS

For Fossil, the juice wasn’t worth the squeeze. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

When Fossil announced it was leaving the Android smartwatch space, I wasn’t surprised. The signs had been there for a while. What I didn’t expect was how sad it made me feel. Fossil’s smartwatches had never been the best. Their battery life was meh, health tracking could be iffy, and before Wear OS 3, the company was often let down by Google’s neglect. But now that Fossil has called it quits, it’s left a massive vacuum in the Wear OS ecosystem. Who, if anyone, can fill that void? Is there even a point when Google and Samsung dominate that space?

It’s been a few months, and I’m still not sure there’s a real answer.

Throughout Wear OS’s dark days — back when it was Android Wear, even — Fossil soldiered on. It continued to make...

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The fight for net neutrality is forever

Looking back on a decade of coverage.

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FCC votes to restore net neutrality

Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos from Getty Images

The Federal Communications Commission voted 3–2 to restore net neutrality rules, reversing a repeal ushered through during the Trump administration.

Net neutrality is the idea that internet service providers (ISPs) should not be able to discriminate against different kinds of content by blocking or throttling connection speeds or offering paid prioritization for different internet traffic. The FCC has sought to accomplish this by reclassifying ISPs as common carriers under Title II of the Communications Act, giving the agency more regulatory authority over them.

Democratic FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel said in remarks ahead of the vote that internet access went from a “nice to have, to need to have.” She added that, “Broadband is now an...

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