Techmeme
August 12, 2019, 2:00 AM

Top News

Wall Street Journal:
The FBI is seeking an early alerting tool that scans public data from social media to monitor threats to the US, which may violate Facebook and Twitter policies  —  Agency solicits vendor proposals to collect data from Facebook, other social media to head off safety threats
Jon Fingas / Engadget:
Twitch reverts Tyler “Ninja” Blevins' channel to offline mode after he calls Twitch out for using it to promote other streamers, including a porn broadcast  —  Ninja (aka Tyler Blevins) has largely avoided any bad blood between him and Twitch following his jump to Mixer, but that apparently didn't last long.
Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet:
Researchers: security flaws in 40+ kernel drivers from 20 vendors including Intel, AMD, and Huawei, can give hackers improperly elevated privileges on Windows  —  Affected vendors include the likes of Intel, AMD, NVIDIA, ASRock, AMI, Gigabyte, Realtek, Huawei, and more.
Charlie Warzel / New York Times:
The dueling hashtags on Twitter, blaming the Clintons and Trump for Jeffrey Epstein's death, are a grim testament to our deeply poisoned information ecosystem  —  With each news cycle, the system grows more efficient.  Even on an internet bursting at the seams with conspiracy theories and hyperpartisanship …
Megan Eckstein / USNI News:
US Navy to replace touchscreen throttle and helm controls on destroyers with mechanical ones, after finding that touchscreens contributed to a deadly collision  —  SAN DIEGO - The Navy will begin reverting destroyers back to a physical throttle and traditional helm control system in the next 18 to 24 months …
Andy Greenberg / Wired:
Teen hacker Bill Demirkapi on finding bugs, that exposed 5M student records across 5,000 schools, in educational software from providers Blackboard and Follett  —  A FEW SHORT decades ago, the archetypal hacker was a bored teenager breaking into his school's network to change grades, à la Ferris Bueller.
Javier Espinoza / Financial Times:
Private equity firm KKR to acquire German payments group Heidelpay, which is used by 30K+ merchants for online and mobile payments, for €600M+  —  KKR has won the race to buy German payments group Heidelpay for more than €600m in a fresh sign of investor appetite for companies that offer digital alternatives to cash.
Rebecca Keegan / Hollywood Reporter:
Inside Netflix's government lobbying efforts, which have shifted in recent months to align more with Hollywood studios and less with Silicon Valley  —  Rather than align itself with the tech giants under increasing Washington pressure, the streamer has joined forces with the studios …

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Earlier Picks

The Block:
Mishaal Rahman / XDA Developers: