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Sony's PlayStation and Sony Entertainment networks were taken down over the weekend by a distributed denial of service, or DDoS, attack. The hackers, who call themselves the "Lizard Squad," also forced authorities to divert a plane Sony Entertainment president was on by tweeting that there might be ...
A mother in Walnut Creek, California, recently placed an expensive order for baby formula and diapers that never arrived. Subsequent investigation showed that the package had been delivered but snatched from her doorstep. That's a common enough story in this era of e-commerce, but this one has a hap...
Google has acquired Jetpac, according to a statement that appeared Friday on the Jetpac website. Jetpac is the creator of a handful of apps, including City Guides, which analyzes Instagram photos and then automatically creates guides based on the collected data. That information translates into a lo...
Facebook has begun labeling some of the satirical news articles that appear in users' news feeds with a tag designed to prevent readers from mistaking the content for genuine news. The social network's "[Satire]" tag is apparently part of an experiment that's been under way for a month or so. "Folks...
A deluge of hateful tweets after the suicide of actor Robin Williams earlier this week forced his daughter Zelda to publicly quit Twitter and Instagram. "We will not tolerate abuse of this nature on Twitter," Del Harvey, the company's vice president of trust and safety, said in a prepared statement....
Millions of users were unable to access the Web Tuesday, according to reports. The websites of eBay, Amazon, Autotrader, LinkedIn, Time Warner and Verizon were among those hit. The problem is due to a combination of factors: router configuration; the explosive growth of connected devices; and IPv4 r...
The NSA is working on a new program codenamed "MonsterMind" that will automate the monitoring of traffic patterns on the Internet to look for attacks, whistleblower Edward Snowden revealed. When it detects an attack, MonsterMind will automatically block it from entering the U.S. cyberinfrastructure....
The Wikimedia Foundation on Wednesday released its first-ever transparency report -- and along with it a protest against Europe's "right to be forgotten" law. Wikimedia is the nonprofit owner of Wikipedia and other sites. "Last week, the Wikimedia Foundation began receiving notices that certain link...
A routine scan of a Texas man's Gmail by Google has led to his arrest on child pornography possession and promotion charges. John Henry Skillern, 41, of Houston was arrested by police July 30 following a tip by Google. He has been charged with one count each of child pornography possession and child...
News that two Carnegie-Mellon CERT researchers have developed an inexpensive way to breach the Tor network has the project, privacy advocates, and probably criminals who use the network equally concerned. The Tor Project posted has advised relays to upgrade to Tor 0.2.r.23e or 0.2.5.6-alpha to close...
LittleBits, the maker of what might best be thought of as electronic Lego kits, last week launched cloudBit, a module that provides users with access to the Internet. LittleBits offers modules that are used, like Legos, to build gizmos with electronic capabilities. The modules are held together by m...
OkCupid has admitted carrying out psychological experiments on its users. Because OkCupid doesn't really know what it's doing, it needs to experiment to see what works and what doesn't, cofounder Christian Rudder wrote in a blog post. Every Internet company needs to test different things with users,...
Bubblews, a social media platform that offers to pay users for their posts, last week moved out of its testing phase, which began in 2012. It emerged with a new look designed to attract users who might be dissatisfied with other social media offerings. Bubblews is attempting to build a self-sustaini...
Like many other tech companies, Twitter is largely made up of white, male employees, pointing to a lack of diversity in the industry. The company revealed statistics about its organizational demographics, noting that almost 60 percent of Twitter's U.S. employees self-identify as white. Just under 30...
Facebook this week launched a feature that allows users to save content from their News Feed that they might want to read or watch later. Called "Save," it is designed help users who may be inundated by links to articles, music clips and videos to separate the wheat from the chaff. "Every day, peop...