Twitter permanently suspends Infowars and Alex Jones' accounts, saying they violate “abusive behavior” rules, will suspend other accounts he registers or uses  —  After weeks of equivocation, Twitter permanently suspended the accounts of Infowars and its founder Alex Jones on Thursday …

British Airways says attack on its site, app from Aug. 21 to Sept. 5 exposed customers' personal and financial details, believes ~380K “card payments” breached  —  British Airways revealed on Thursday that hackers managed to lurk in its systems for two weeks, exposing around 380,000 card payments.

Twitter says it's testing a redesign of its desktop site with night mode, data-saving mode, bookmarks, and more; UI looks similar to Twitter on a mobile browser  —  Twitter is testing a redesign of its desktop website that adds a night mode, data-saving mode, bookmarks, and other new features, the company announced on Thursday.

Google announces an event for October 9 in NYC where it is expected to announce the Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL  —  Gosh, I wonder what it's announcing?  —  Google has sent out invites for an October 9th event that will almost certainly be the official announcement of the thoroughly leaked Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL smartphones.

Huawei includes benchmark detection tool in smartphones so scores don't reflect real performance; in response it says its competitors mislead consumers too  —  Does anyone remember our articles regarding unscrupulous benchmark behavior back in 2013?  At the time we called the industry …

Goldman Sachs CFO says reports about the company abandoning plans to open a cryptocurrency desk are “fake news”  —  - The price of bitcoin and other top cryptocurrencies tumbled after a report that the bank was ditching plans to launch a cryptocurrency trading desk.

Apple to launch a web portal by the end of 2018 for authenticated law enforcement officers to submit data requests and is developing an online training module  —  Apple this week announced it will be launching a dedicated web portal by the end of 2018 for authenticated law enforcement officers …

Amazon debuts next gen Fire HD 8 with hands-free Alexa, 16 GB storage, support for up to 400GB via microSD; available for pre-order today for $79, ships Oct. 4  —  An “all-new” Fire HD 8 tablet is on the way, but it's much more of a refresh than a major upgrade.

BMW debuts the AI-powered BMW Intelligent Personal Assistant for its cars, available from March 2019 in 10 countries, including US and UK, and May 2019 in China  —  At TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2018, BMW today premiered its digital personal assistant for its cars, the aptly named BMW Intelligent Personal Assistant.

Interviews and documents show IBM used NYPD surveillance footage in 2012 to develop object identification tech that could search by skin color and more  —  In the decade after the 9/11 attacks, the New York City Police Department moved to put millions of New Yorkers under constant watch.

Microsoft begins testing Cortana and Alexa support for the Xbox One, letting users power the console on and off and start games and apps  —  Microsoft's Xbox One is getting a whole lot easier to use.  The company today announced a new Xbox Skill for Cortana and Amazon Alexa …

DOJ announces hacking charges against a North Korean government spy, linked to the Lazarus Group, in connection with the 2014 Sony hack  —  The Justice Department will announce computer hacking charges Thursday against a North Korean government spy in connection with the 2014 attack …

Uber launching Uber Rent, which lets users book rentals from car sharing service Getaround, in SF this month, after originally saying it would launch in April  —  You may remember how Uber laid out its ambitions to become a multi-modal transportation company back in April …

Sources detail how Spotify has quietly signed direct licensing deals with some artists, a move that is worrying major record labels  —  For decades, the path to stardom in the music industry has usually gone through a major record company.  —  Almost every artist today who reaches the top of the charts …

Lyft launches a fleet of around 350 electric scooters in Denver, its first market, available for $1+ from 6AM to 8PM daily  —  The company is playing catch-up in a flush market, but it believes it can win by playing nice with cities  —  Lyft is the latest company to jump on the shared-scooter bandwagon …

Facebook says Joseph Chancellor, a psychology researcher tied to the Cambridge Analytica scandal, has left the company, but declines to say when or why he left  —  A Facebook psychology researcher who previously helped harvest millions of Facebook users' profiles for the controversial Trump …

Google gives YouTube TV subscribers the option of pausing their subscription for anytime between four weeks to six months  —  Pausing memberships isn't something that many subscription services offer, but YouTube TV is now joining that limited club.  In the (probably pretty rare) …

A look at the rise of smart home fitness equipment startups, such as Mirror, which recently raised $25M, and Tonal, which makes a weight-lifting machine  —  Paul Wright, a smiling, impeccably jacked personal trainer, stared at me from the large screen mounted to the wall.

Report: colleagues who have worked with Eddy Cue say he seems overextended and lacked much interest in Siri from the moment he gained responsibility  —  A new profile on Apple chief Eddy Cue has been shared online today by The Information, highlighting Cue's history and leadership at the company …

MasterClass, which offers online classes from well known experts for a $180 annual fee, raises $80M Series D led by IVP  —  Filmmaking taught by Martin Scorsese?  Comedy taught by Steve Martin?  Chess taught by Garry Kasparov?  Tennis taught by Serena Williams?  Cooking taught by Gordon Ramsay?

FTC seizes nine fake US military recruitment websites, including Army.com, that sold the personal details of potential recruits to for-profit schools  —  Today, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced it seized nine copycat websites set up to look like U.S. military recruitment pages.