Techmeme: Android Action Bar overflow changes could mark beginning of the end for hardware menu button (Stephen Schenck/Pocketnow)

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December 11, 2013, 1:00 AM

Top News

The Switch:

NSA uses Google cookies to pinpoint targets for hacking — The National Security Agency is secretly piggybacking on the tools that enable Internet advertisers to track consumers, using “cookies” and location data to pinpoint targets for government hacking and to bolster surveillance.

More: CNET, The Verge, Freedom to Tinker, The Next Web and Yahoo! News

Tweets: @mstem, @mattbuchanan, @eff, @csoghoian, @dhh, @juliaangwin, @emptywheel, @katecrawford and @jcstearns

The Switch:

New documents show how the NSA infers relationships based on mobile location data — Everyone who carries a cellphone generates a trail of electronic breadcrumbs that records everywhere they go. Those breadcrumbs reveal a wealth of information about who we are, where we live, who our friends are and much more.

More: VentureBeat and The Verge. Tweets: @ashk4n, @kataclyst, @mattblaze, @mattblaze, @fborgesius and @mattbuchanan

Matthew Panzarino / TechCrunch:

Twitter Apps Updated With New Swipeable Design And Photo Support In Direct Messages — Today, Twitter has announced an update to its apps that bring a renewed focus on direct messaging. The app now features a direct link to DMs in the tab bar and allows you to send photos inside direct messages.

More: Twitter, Wired, SlashGear, 9to5Mac, MacRumors, 9to5Google, iMore, iClarified, MobileSyrup.com, TUAW, Engadget, AppleInsider, The Next Web, iDownloadBlog.com and Electronista

Tweets: @andylevy, @panzer, @mattbuchanan, @caseynewton and @mikeisaac

John Herrman / BuzzFeed:

Why Twitter Just Joined The Backchannel Wars

More: Computerworld, PC Magazine, The Verge, iPhone Hacks, VentureBeat and Los Angeles Times

Tweets: @jwherrman, @panzer, @parislemon, @buzzfeed, @parislemon, @benedictevans and @mikeisaac

See also Mediagazer

Tom Warren / The Verge:

Nokia's “Normandy” phone uses a forked variant of Android, a la Kindle Fire — This is Nokia's Android phone — Codename Normandy is ‘full steam ahead’ — Nokia has been building its own Android phone according to multiple sources familiar with the company's plans.

More: Ars Technica, Engadget, Phandroid, TechSpot, SlashGear, WMPoweruser, Gizmodo, Android and Me, TechnoBuffalo, Android Beat, Pocket-lint, PhoneArena, Droid Life and MobileSyrup.com

Stephen Schenck / Pocketnow:

Android Action Bar overflow changes could mark beginning of the end for hardware menu button — When Android started making the move away from hardware buttons, and giving manufacturers the option to present users with fully on-screen virtual buttons, it sounded like we were moving towards …

More: Android Police, Android Beat, Gotta Be Mobile and Droid Life

Emil Protalinski / The Next Web:

Glassdoor: Twitter dethrones Facebook as the best tech company to work for, ending three-year streak — Career website Glassdoor today released its sixth annual Employees' Choice Awards, a list of the 50 best places to work for in the coming year. Twitter was elected the number one tech company …

More: GeekWire, SiliconBeat, VentureBeat, Marketing Land and Business Insider

Tweets: @tonyw and @ober

Ernesto / TorrentFreak:

The Pirate Bay Moves to .AC After Domain Name Seizure — A few hours ago Pirate Bay users were shocked to discover that their favorite torrent site was no longer loading. — Without warning the nameservers were removed from thepiratebay.sx domain, making it impossible to load the site in places where DNS entries were not cached.

More: Kotaku, Motherboard, Polygon, Plagiarism Today, Inquirer, Softpedia News, Ars Technica and Daily Dot. Tweets: @an0nylulz

Dan Ackerman / CNET:

Dell joins the Chromebook club with the Dell Chromebook 11 — This 11-inch laptop, running Chrome OS, is targeted at schools. — Dell is officially announcing its first Chromebook on December 11. The system, to be called the Dell Chromebook 11 (HP also has a system called the Chromebook 11) …

More: PC World and Engadget

Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:

Vuzix develops Google Glass-like smart glasses — but with superior optics and standard eyeframes — Vuzix says it has superior optics for augmented reality glasses. The M2000AR is aimed at industrial markets. — Vuzix is unveiling an optical technology for smart glasses today …

More: PR Newswire, LAPTOP Magazine, Ubergizmo, Quartz and SlashGear

Danny Sullivan / Search Engine Land:

Yahoo Tells SEC: 31% Of Our Revenue Comes From Microsoft — Yahoo has revealed in a US Securities & Exchange Commission filing that nearly one-third of its revenue last quarter — 31% — came from its search deal with Microsoft, according to a Bloomberg report.

More: Bloomberg, BGR, ZDNet and SiliconBeat

Tweets: @dannysullivan and @sengineland

Brian X. Chen / New York Times:

New York Asks Cellphone Carriers to Explain Why They Rejected Antitheft Switch — SAN FRANCISCO — New York State's top prosecutor is investigating why American cellphone carriers have yet to embrace antitheft software on Samsung smartphones, raising questions about possible coordination among the biggest carriers.

Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch:

Google Makes Creating Online Exhibitions Easy For Anyone With Google Open Gallery — Google has been working with museums to populate its Google Cultural Institute, an online collection of virtual exhibitions from around the world. Today, it's opening up that project to anyone who wants …

More: Engadget, Google Europe Blog, SiliconBeat, CNET, CNET, Softpedia News, The Next Web and 1001 Noisy Cameras

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

NimbleTV Brings TV Everywhere to New York, Without Permission From the TV Industrial Complex — Want to watch the TV you've already paid for, anywhere you want to watch it, whenever you want to watch it? — You can't. * But NimbleTV says it can change that.

More: The Verge, Mashable, SlashGear, VentureBeat and DSLreports

Yun-Hee Kim / China Real Time Report:

Google Scraps Plan to Build Hong Kong Data Center — Internet giant Google Inc. has scrapped a plan to build its own data center in Hong Kong and will instead expand its facilities in Taiwan and Singapore. — “While we see tremendous opportunity and potential in Hong Kong …

More: The Next Web, Digits, VentureBeat, The Register and Softpedia News

Jonathan Mayer / Web Policy:

Three hops from one phone number may let NSA analyze sizable proportion of US phone records — MetaPhone: The NSA Three-Hop — Co-authored with Patrick Mutchler. — MetaPhone is a crowdsourced study of phone metadata. If you own an Android smartphone, please consider participating.

More: SlashGear, Daily Dot and emptywheel

Tweets: @glynmoody, @jeff_kaye, @jonathanmayer, @neiljrubenking, @ashk4n and @eff

Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica:

FCC halts AT&T plan to raise Internet prices on Sprint and other rivals — The Internet. It's just a series of tubes. — Kendrick Erickson — The Federal Communications Commission yesterday halted a plan by AT&T to raise prices for “special access” customers, a potential rate hike …

More: GamePolitics blogs and DSLreports

Chris Welch / The Verge:

Mad Catz now shipping its $249.99 ‘Mojo’ Android game console — Mad Catz has officially joined the crowded field of Android-based game consoles. The company has announced that its $249.99 Mojo box is now shipping. The device — which we previewed back at E3 in June …

More: IntoMobile, WebProNews, Thomson IR, Android Community, The Droid Guy, SlashGear, Droid Life, Liliputing and Android Police

Emil Protalinski / The Next Web:

Firefox 26 arrives with Click to Play for Java, new Home screen plus Bing and Yahoo search options on Android — Mozilla today officially launched Firefox 26 for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. Additions include Click to Play turned on by default for all Java plugins, more seamless updates on Windows …

More: The Mozilla Blog, CNET, Engadget, TechCrunch, Threatpost, ZDNet, IntoMobile and eWeek. Tweets: @privacydigest

Dan Goodin / Ars Technica:

“We cannot trust” Intel and Via's chip-based crypto, FreeBSD developers say — Developers of the FreeBSD operating system will no longer allow users to trust processors manufactured by Intel and Via Technologies as the sole source of random numbers needed to generate cryptographic keys …

More: The Register, InfoWorld, Gigaom and FierceCIO:TechWatch News. Tweets: @bascule

Matt Rosoff / CITEworld:

JAMF scores $30 million to keep helping Apple invade the enterprise — When JAMF Software started in 2002, Apple was still a bit player in the enterprise: The art department might've had a few Macs running Illustrator or Photoshop, but most companies were full of PCs running Windows.

More: Business Insider, Venture Capital Dispatch, JAMF Software, VentureBeat, PE Hub Blog, bizjournals and Volume One Magazine. Thanks:@mattrosoff

Rip Empson / TechCrunch:

With $3M From Andreessen And Others, Doctor On Demand Launches To Bring A $40 (Virtual) House Call To Healthcare — Adam Jackson and former Stanford physician and White House fellow Dr. Pat Basu want to help modernize healthcare by bringing the house call back — mobile-style.

More: The Next Web, AllThingsD, PandoDaily, PC World, Business Insider, Businessweek and VentureBeat. Thanks:@wauckward

Bloomberg:

Foxconn Said to Target Wearables With New Startup Fund — Foxconn Technology Group, maker of Apple Inc. iPhones and iPads, is launching an investment fund to finance startups developing new kinds of wearable computers, according to two people familiar with the project.

More: Tech in Asia, The Next Web and SlashGear. Tweets: @tculpan

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