Techmeme
December 31, 2013, 12:55 PM

Top News

Jay Hathaway / Daily Dot:
The NSA has nearly complete backdoor access to Apple's iPhone  —  The U.S. National Security Agency has the ability to snoop on nearly every communication sent from an Apple iPhone, according to leaked documents shared by security researcher Jacob Appelbaum and German news magazine Der Spiegel.
Matthew Panzarino / TechCrunch:
Apple Says It Has Never Worked With NSA To Create iPhone Backdoors, Is Unaware Of Alleged DROPOUTJEEP Snooping Program  —  Apple has contacted TechCrunch with a statement about the DROPOUTJEEP NSA program that detailed a system by which the organization claimed it could snoop on iPhone users.
iFixit:
Mac Pro Late 2013 Teardown  —  After making its debut during the WWDC 2013 Keynote, the reimagined, reformulated Mac Pro finally arrived at iFixit's doorstep.  Join us as we turn the (very) Late 2013 Mac Pro inside-out.  Step 1 — Mac Pro Late 2013 Teardown The new Mac Pro has been released …
Mat Honan / Wired:
I, Glasshole: My Year With Google Glass  —  An anecdote: I wanted to wear Google Glass during the birth of our second child.  My wife was extremely unreceptive to this idea when I suggested it.  Angry, even.  But as we got a bit closer to the date, she began to warm to it and eventually landed somewhere …
Ernesto / TorrentFreak:
Pirate Bay Uploads Surge 50% in a Year, Despite Anti-Piracy Efforts  —  2013 has been an eventful year for The Pirate Bay, to say the least.  —  The site celebrated its tenth anniversary, but with pressure from copyright holders mounting, it had to switch domain names no less than six times.
Chris Vallance / BBC:
Cash machines raided with infected USB sticks  —  The thieves focused on high value notes to minimise the time they were exposed  —  Researchers have revealed how cyber-thieves sliced into cash machines in order to infect them with malware earlier this year.
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
jessica lessin:
Paul Graham:
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
Sprint Wants To Revive Nextel As A Business Brand, Merge Boost + Virgin Mobile Into ‘Sprint Freedom’  —  It was only six months ago that Sprint decommissioned and shut down the Nextel iDEN push-to-talk network, and while the carrier has no plans to bring that legacy service back, the brand is another story.
Sam Thielman / Adweek:
Netflix Knocks a Dollar Off Its SD Streaming Service for New Users  —  Netflix has cracked down on password sharing this year (the streaming service has a $12-per-month plan if you want to stream on four devices simultaneously), but it looks like there's a new tier to its pricing plan …
Mike Rose / Gamasutra:
Days of the holiday mobile game gold rush are fading, says new report  —  Although this holiday period saw the biggest spike in mobile app and game downloads to date, the rate at which mobile is growing has slowed significantly, according to a new report from Flurry.

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Earlier Picks

Jordan Kahn / 9to5Mac:
Joe Weisenthal / Business Insider:
Aimee Groth / Quartz:
Florian Mueller / FOSS Patents: