Facebook's seemingly never-ending string of privacy and security scandals continues today. The company has announced a security flaw in its photo API that has affected as many as 6.8 million users. This bug potentially exposed user photos to apps that use the photo API, even in some cases impacting photos that were never posted.
To attain the most fully-inclusive all-out secure experience on a smartphone, one must dispense with apps. Over the past several years, it's become clear that surviving as an app developer, social networking brand, etcetera, one must monetize the user, rather than the content one provides to the user. As such, if you're the sort of person that doesn't like being tracked, it's time to take some precautions.
There is no stopping the 5G revolution, especially since everyone seems to be on board. From network operators to smartphone manufacturers to silicon makers, everyone seems to be hellbent on pushing the fifth generation cellular technology to businesses and consumers. With all the marketing and hype, there’s bound to be some confusion and questions. What is 5G, what is it for, and will really make our lives better? Here are some answers to those questions and more.
This morning Microsoft confirmed that the rumors were, indeed, true, that they'd be working with the Chromium open source project for Microsoft Edge. "Today we’re announcing that we intend to adopt the Chromium open source project in the development of Microsoft Edge on the desktop to create better web compatibility for our customers and less fragmentation of the web for all web developers," said Microsoft Corporate VP Joe Belfiore.
Facebook may have successfully overthrown Google as one of the most reviled and distrusted tech companies today. Although it certainly had its fair share of controversy, it wasn’t until the Cambridge Analytica fiasco this year that it became the target of intensified scrutiny and, of course, internal leaks. The latest comes from leaked emails published by a UK Parliament committee that reveals, among other things, discussion on what may be interpreted as misuse of Android’s app permissions system.
Facebook has announced that its Stories feature is now available to all Groups on its platform across the globe. The new availability is an expansion of the support Facebook launched in a limited fashion earlier this year. With it, any Group member can create stories to share with the community and react to other users' group stories.
Facebook has packed in a lot of features over the years, and many of them seem to have been forgotten just as quickly as they appeared. Today, the company is announcing that it's dusting off once of its older features, Collections, and updating it for the gift giving season. If you previously didn't know what Collections were, you certainly aren't alone, so you can consider this your official introduction to the feature.
Back in 2017, eBay launched a new program called Authenticate that does pretty much what it says on the tin. The program has gone through some changes since the beginning, but these days it essentially serves as a consignment service sellers can use to authenticate high-end handbags and watches so buyers can purchase with more confidence. Today, eBay announced that Authenticate will be expanding to include diamond and gemstone jewelry as well.
Quora is one of those silent successes of the Internet. It doesn’t always make headlines but it has become one of the biggest sources of information on the Web.Next to Wikipedia, of course The service has now hit headlines but, unfortunately, not in a good way. Its user data was compromised, in other words, it was hacked. This is what the company says was taken and what you should do, maybe even if you weren’t affected at all.
Tumblr just announced they'd be banning adult content completely on the 17th of December, 2018. Efforts to remove adult content from Tumblr will be largely automated - so there's room for mistakes. As such, as a Tumblr user, you might want to familiarize yourself with the process of appeals.
It’s an inescapable fact of modern life that more and more people are using the cloud to both store content as well as share them. The cloud, however, requires an Internet connection by its very nature. The bigger the files, the better the network quality required. Internet quality, however, varies and it can make such cloud-based conveniences actually more inconvenient. That is why in India, Google is trying out a new Google Photos Express backup to take the pain and hassle out of keeping photos in the cloud.
![Hangouts Chat, Meet to be available to all before Hangouts death [UPDATE]](https://c.slashgear.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/google-hangouts.jpg)
Hangouts is dead. Long live Hangouts Chat and Hangouts Meet! Google has always had a rather “colorful” history when it came to messaging apps and services and there are no signs it’s going to be anything less soon. Rumor has it that Hangouts, as most consumers know it, will be retired in two years. But not before it’s replaced by not one but two Hangouts, merging what was split into two back into one.