Kate Conger

Tech News

Lawmakers Introduce ‘Honest Ads Act’ to Govern Online Political Advertising [Updated]

Senate lawmakers on Thursday unveiled their first major legislative effort to increase transparency in online political advertising, called the Honest Ads Act. Sponsored by Senators Mark Warner, Amy Klobuchar, and John McCain, the bill attempts to align rules for online advertising with those broadcast on television and radio airwaves. “We understand that election security is … Continued

Tech News

Twitter Has New Rules for Violent and Sexual Content

Twitter’s downward spiral into a platform where abuse thrives has been well-documented over the years, but harassment on Twitter is in the news again this week because the company suspended actress Rose McGowan after she tweeted about sexual abuse in Hollywood. In response, CEO Jack Dorsey promised to introduce stricter rules against harassment—and it looks … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

Google Makes It Easier for At-Risk Users to Lock Down Their Accounts

Google is rolling out a fancy new security feature today that’s designed to protect users who face significant risk of having their accounts hacked—election and campaign officials, victims of intimate partner violence, and others seeking additional security. It’s called the Advanced Protection Program, and it’s designed to ensure that no one but you can access … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

How Apple Says It Prevented Face ID From Being Racist

When Apple debuted its new facial recognition unlock system, Face ID, in September, the company faced questions about how it would sidestep the security and bias problems that have undermined similar facial recognition systems in the past. Senator Al Franken was one of the many people curious about how exactly how Apple was going to … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

Microsoft and Justice Department Will Square Off in Supreme Court Over Critical Privacy Case

The US Supreme Court has agreed to hear arguments in a critical case over data privacy, the outcome of which will likely determine how easily law enforcement can gain access to information stored in tech companies’ overseas data centers. Microsoft will go head-to-head with the Justice Department, arguing that the agency cannot use a warrant … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

Justice Department Drops Request for Names of People Who ‘Liked’ Anti-Trump Facebook Page

In a court hearing today, the Department of Justice dropped its request for the names of an estimated 6,000 people who “liked” a Facebook page about an Inauguration Day protest, the American Civil Liberties Union said. The ACLU challenged several warrants related to protests against President Trump’s inauguration on Friday, one of which included the … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

Equifax Takes Webpage That Reportedly Pushed Adware Offline [Updated]

Equifax has taken down a webpage that offered credit report assistance, a spokesperson told Gizmodo. The move follows a report that the page was directing visitors to install fake Adobe Flash updates containing adware. “We are aware of the situation identified on the equifax.com website in the credit report assistance link,” the spokesperson said. “Our … Continued

Tech NewsSocial Media

Lawmakers Plan to Release Russian-Bought Facebook Ads

The Russia-funded political ads that ran on Facebook during the 2016 election will be shown to the public, members of the House Intelligence Committee said on Wednesday. House and Senate committees are investigating ads that ran on Facebook, Twitter, Google, and other platforms in an effort to determine how Kremlin-backed trolls organized their misinformation campaigns … Continued

Tech News

Waymo Is Trying to Force Uber to Hand Over Its Self-Driving Car Source Code

Uber and Waymo have been locked in a legal fight for months over the companies’ self-driving car technology—and now Waymo is asking a judge to compel Uber to hand over the source code that pilots Uber’s fleet of autonomous vehicles. The request comes on the heels of an damning due diligence report released last week, … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

Judge Orders Limitations on Sweeping DreamHost Warrant Seeking Info on Anti-Trump Site

A judge ordered the web hosting company DreamHost to redact identifying information about visitors to a website used to coordinate a protest during President Trump’s inauguration, imposing further limits on an extensive warrant obtained by the Justice Department that initially aimed to collect visitors’ IP addresses. Chief Judge Robert E. Morin of the Superior Court … Continued

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Self-Driving Cars Are Super Duper Safe, Self-Driving Car Companies Say

Self-driving test vehicles are already on the roads in several states, including California, Arizona, and Massachusetts, but the futuristic world of robot cars on every street hasn’t materialized quite yet. People are still freaked out by the idea of getting in a car that doesn’t have anyone behind the wheel—and so companies in the autonomous … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

Apple Says It Fixed High Sierra’s Password Leaking Problem

Time to install those updates! Last week, we warned you that a bug in High Sierra made it possible for an attacker to extract passwords from Apple’s Keychain in plaintext. The bug was discovered and reported by Synack head researcher Patrick Wardle in early September, and now Apple has issued a patch for the issue. … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

Researchers: Uber’s iOS App Had Secret Permissions That Allowed It to Copy Your Phone Screen

To improve functionality between Uber’s app and the Apple Watch, Apple allowed Uber to use a powerful tool that could record a user’s iPhone screen, even if Uber’s app was only running in the background, security researchers told Gizmodo. After the researchers discovered the tool, Uber said it is no longer in use and will … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

Tech Companies Will Testify at Senate Hearing on Russian Election Interference [Updated]

Facebook and Twitter will send representatives to testify at a Senate hearing next month on Russian interference in the US presidential election, sources at the companies told Gizmodo. Facebook turned over 3,000 ads linked to a Kremlin troll farm to Senate staff earlier this week and has briefed staffers on the Russian ad campaigns that … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

All 3 Billion Yahoo Accounts Affected in Catastrophic Breach

The Yahoo breach was already considered to be the largest known hack of user data when it was counted at 1 billion affected accounts. Now, that record-breaking breach has tripled in size. All Yahoo accounts were affected by a catastrophic breach in 2013, the company confirmed today. Yahoo had previously placed the total at over … Continued

Tech News

The Due Diligence Report on Otto and Anthony Levandowski Is Finally Public

Waymo’s trade secret lawsuit against Uber has so many twists and turns, it’s hard to keep up with it all. But there’s one key document that both sides of the case have been fighting over for a long time—the due diligence report Uber commissioned when it was considering the acquisition of Anthony Levandowski’s self-driving truck … Continued

Tech News

Why We’re Fighting To Keep The Courtroom Open During The Waymo-Uber Trial

Since Waymo sued Uber in February, alleging a massive theft of trade secrets related to its self-driving car technology, Gizmodo and our sister site Jalopnik have aggressively covered the case. Waymo’s claims are damning—the Google-incubated company says one of its leading engineers downloaded tens of thousands of confidential documents before quitting his job and then … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

Welp, There Are 2.5 Million More People in the Equifax Breach Than We Thought

The massive Equifax hack just keeps getting worse. The company announced today that it lost personal information belonging to 2.5 million more people than it initially reported, bringing the total number of American consumers impacted by the breach to 145.5 million. Mandiant, the cybersecurity forensics firm hired by Equifax to investigate the hack, completed its … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

Equifax Was Warned About Vulnerability But Failed To Patch It

Equifax’s former CEO Richard Smith—who “retired” after a massive data breach at his company resulted in the theft of personal information for more than 143 million people—is set to testify before a Congressional subcommittee on consumer protection tomorrow. Smith will be expected to explain exactly how Equifax bungled its response to the hack, and his … Continued

Tech NewsPrivacy & Security

Apple’s Firmware Updates Were Borked, Security Firm Says

Apple touts its closed ecosystem as a security advantage. Because it tightly controls its hardware and software, Apple can push security updates much more quickly than an open system like Android. But researchers at Duo Security say that Apple’s security update system hasn’t been working exactly as intended, with thousands of Macs not getting proper … Continued