NEWSWORTHY
Winking and driving: License plates in Australia to get emoji
Motorists in northeastern Australia can soon an emoji added to their license plates. It will be positive vibes only on the morning commute after a Queensland firm announced that from March drivers can add smiling, winking or laughing characters to their plates. The state's largest automotive ...
It was one of the most infamous companies in Japan, rocking the nation with a corporate scandal that ousted a prime minister and then nearly collapsing under a mountain of debt. Now, Recruit Holdings Co. is back, reinvented by a group of employees who quietly ...
From photos to personal posts and private messages, social media users leave a long digital trail behind them. Who owns that data when they die? With about 1 in 3 people worldwide estimated to have a social media account, the question has become more pressing ...
Lawmakers back bill to isolate Russian internet from foreign servers
Lawmakers have backed a bill that could cut off Russia's internet traffic from foreign servers, a move that critics call a step toward censorship and possibly an isolated network like in North Korea. The bill passed its first reading by 334 votes to 47 on ...
Security agencies in Australia using vast decryption powers before planned review
Australian security agencies have begun using sweeping powers to access encrypted communications, even before conducting a promised review to address concerns from the likes of Google, Apple and Facebook. The powers were granted under a decryption law that was rushed through Parliament in December amid ...
MPs told to reset passwords as Australia investigates attempted hack of national parliament
Australian authorities are investigating an attempt to hack into the national parliament's computer network, two senior lawmakers said Friday, but there is no evidence yet that any data has been accessed or stolen. In one of Australia's most high-profile cyberattacks, Tony Smith, the speaker of ...
Unicode's new emoji aims to help break bloody taboo surrounding periods
Women and girls will be able to use an emoji to chat about their periods from next month, which will help to end the shame around menstruation, a child rights group said on Wednesday. Coding consortium Unicode, which distributes emoji across mobile devices, said it ...
Japan to allow online medication consultations with pharmacists from 2020
Pharmacists will likely be allowed to hold online consultations with patients about their medication from April 2020, reflecting the rising demand for in-home medical care among the country's rapidly graying population, officials said Tuesday. The central government already allows doctors to conduct online consultations, and ...
Learning to talk again: Two-week blackout gives Tonga taste of life without internet
A two-week cyber blackout caused financial headache and social heartache in remote Tonga, but it also forced residents of the Pacific island kingdom to rediscover the art of offline communication. The sudden internet outage on Jan. 20 brought an abrupt halt to many businesses and ...
Guaido and Venezuelan opposition targeted by internet censors as providers muzzle media
Opposition leader Juan Guaido's calls for Venezuelans to abandon Nicolas Maduro's government are booming across the world outside, but the self-declared interim president is having a harder time delivering his message at home. Watchdog groups in Venezuela and abroad say Guaido's efforts to reach citizens ...
Hackers or state actors could use 'deepfake' medium with devastating consequences
If you see a video of a politician speaking words he never would utter, or a Hollywood star improbably appearing in a cheap adult movie, don't adjust your television set — you may just be witnessing the future of "fake news." "Deepfake" videos that manipulate ...
14-year-old Arizona student's FaceTime bug discovery could rattle Apple
At the heart of Apple's shocking FaceTime bug, which allowed just about anyone to turn an iPhone into a live microphone, stands a 14-year-old boy who stumbled upon the eavesdropping flaw more than a week before Apple took action. "The thing that surprised me the ...
