| Joseph Cox / Motherboard: |
Investigation shows how easy and affordable it is to obtain cellphone customers' real-time location data, as T-Mobile, Sprint, and AT&T peddle it to middlemen — T-Mobile, Sprint, and AT&T are selling access to their customers' location data, and that data is ending up in the hands … | Dieter Bohn / The Verge: |
Google makes over a dozen announcements for Google Assistant at CES, including Google Assistant Connect for third-party developers and flight check-ins — Today, Google is showing off auto-translation on smart display speakers, letting you naturally talk to each other with the speaker acting as the translator automatically.| Greg Kumparak / TechCrunch: |
Google Assistant is coming to Google Maps on iOS and Android today, will help users with navigation, music, and replying to texts, now with auto-punctuation — We've known for a while now that Google Assistant (the company's voice powered AI, a la Siri or Alexa) would eventually be built right into Google Maps.| Lauren Goode / Wired: |
Google debuts Interpreter Mode in Google Assistant for smart displays and speakers to translate languages in real time for people in the same physical space — OVER THE PAST year Google has been making its virtual assistant, the eponymous Google Assistant, more capable of handling … | Nick Statt / The Verge: |
| Mark Zuckerberg: |
| Axios: |
Amazon is quietly piloting a program for brands like Folgers to pay to send free samples to Amazon users, who are likely to enjoy them based on order history — Amazon is quietly piloting a program to let brands like Maybelline and Folgers pay to send free samples to consumers … | Salvador Rodriguez / CNBC: |
Over a dozen ex-Facebook employees detail how the company's leaders and stacked ranking performance reviews foster a culture where any dissent is discouraged — - More than a dozen former Facebook employees detailed how the company's leadership and its performance review system has created a culture where any dissent is discouraged.| Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch: |
IBM unveils its first commercial quantum computer, a 20-qubit system that combines quantum and classical computing parts but is still lacking breakthrough speed — At CES, IBM today announced its first commercial quantum computer for use outside of the lab.| Edgar Alvarez / Engadget: |
Twitter says it is launching a program to let a limited set of users try out new conversational features with their followers in the coming weeks — Twitter is launching a new program to let users reshape how conversations on its site look and feel, the company announced today in an interview with Engadget at CES 2019.| Theodore Schleifer / Recode: |
Sources: self-driving startup Aurora is raising $500M+ at a $2B+ valuation in a round led by Sequoia — Aurora's appeal is predicated on three well-credentialed founders from Google, Tesla, and Uber. — The startup Aurora — which is not yet two years old but has made waves … | Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat: |
Self-driving vehicle startup Udelv debuts the Newton, its delivery van using Baidu's Apollo platform, and says some Walmarts in AZ will trial deliveries with it — Udelv has had an eventful 2018 — and that's putting it lightly. In September, the Carson, California autonomous car startup inked … | Kate Rooney / CNBC: |
Plaid, which links US bank accounts to popular fintech apps like Venmo and Robinhood, is buying competitor Quovo, source says for ~$200M — - Plaid, which links one quarter of U.S. bank accounts to popular fintech apps, is buying a similar data company called Quovo.| Sarah Frier / Bloomberg: |
Customers have been annoyed by Samsung's deal to pre-install Facebook on devices, including Galaxy phones, because the app can only be disabled, not deleted — - Galaxy owners take to Twitter to complain about permanent app — Pre-install deals are common, but privacy concerns are rising| Rita Liao / TechCrunch: |
Chinese startup Nreal unveils Light, consumer AR glasses about the size of a pair of sunglasses, slated to launch mid-2019 for ~$1,000 — A former Magic Leap engineer believes the problem with most consumer-facing augmented headsets on the market is their bulky size.| Melissa Eddy / New York Times: |
Twenty-year-old German man admits to stealing and publishing data on hundreds of lawmakers, journalists, and other figures from every party except far-right AfD — BERLIN — A 20-year-old German student took advantage of passwords as weak as “Iloveyou” and “1234” to hack into online accounts … | Russell Brandom / The Verge: |
Yubico unveils the first Lightning security key for iPhones, which has received Apple's approval and is slated to launch this year — The Apple-approved device is currently in private preview, aiming to launch sometime this year — Yubico has announced a new version of its popular Security Key … | Taylor Lorenz / The Atlantic: |
Instagram accounts were allegedly coordinating sharing of child porn using hashtags, then a viral campaign spotlighted it, and finally Instagram banned the tags — A hashtag war has been brewing on Instagram between users who appear to be trading child pornography and the memers intent on stopping them.| Andrew Ross Sorkin / New York Times: |
Lambda School, which trains students online to be software engineers in exchange for a share of future income, raises $30M Series B from Bedrock, GV, YC, others — Income Sharing Agreements are gaining the attention of higher education and Wall Street. One early success story is getting a boost from venture capital.| Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge: |
Comcast now offers Xfinity customers additional security protection on home networks for $5.99/month with xFi Advanced Security, which can quarantine devices — Better internet protection, for a price — Comcast has announced a new service as part of its Xfinity xFi internet platform at CES 2019 … | Brian Heater / TechCrunch: |
Lenovo debuts the first non-Amazon Fire tablets with Alexa, the 10.1" Smart Tab M10 and P10, coming this month with a smart dock for $200 and $300 respectively — Lenovo knows a good smart assistant when it sees one. The company was one of the first to team with Google on a third-party smart display … | New York Times: |
A Facebook ad campaign associating Roy Moore with calls for a state alcohol ban during Alabama's Senate race was a false flag operation by Democratic activists — The “Dry Alabama” Facebook page, illustrated with stark images of car wrecks and videos of families ruined by drink … | Washington Post: |
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| Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge: |
| Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet: |
| Ben Thompson / Stratechery: |
| Janko Roettgers / Variety: |
| Sam Kim / Bloomberg: |