The COVID-19 pandemic has created a frenzy for news and information that is nearly unprecedented in the smartphone era, with a major side effect of misinformation. Now, major tech companies are making it easier to ask for advice about novel coronavirus from their respective digital assistants. Results may vary, but Apple and Google are the most useful at the moment.
With group chats, arguments tend to devolve from a dispute between two people to a giant debate amongst all members. But before things get out of control, Telegram has a feature that can help.
Smartphones are inherently bad for privacy. You've basically got a tracking device in your pocket, pinging off cell towers and locking onto GPS satellites. All the while, tracking cookies, advertising IDs, and usage stats follow you around the internet.
With Android 10, there are now three options when an app asks to access your location: Allow, Deny, and Allow While In Use. That last one prevents apps from seeing your location unless you're actively using them, and it's the default now. But when you first update, most of your apps will still be allowed to access your location in the background — at least, until you do something about it.
Is your Instagram feed a bit cluttered? Maybe you're seeing posts from people you don't even recognize. Perhaps the content isn't interesting. Whatever the case, it's common after years of having an account to follow too many users whose posts just aren't doing it anymore. Luckily, Instagram has an easy way for you to purge unwanted accounts from your following list.
Having your iPhone's display orientation go from portrait to landscape while lying down in bed can get pretty annoying, especially while chatting with others within Messages. If you have a jailbroken device, however, you can easily remedy this headache by way of a free tweak.
After drawing attention from nostalgic Gen Xers for its Motorola Razr reboot with a foldable screen, Lenovo has a new augmented reality smartglasses concept that the company hopes will also turn some heads.
Lenovo has done a great job preventing leaks of their new Moto RAZR. We've seen a few images here and there, but for the most part, we knew very little about the long-rumored phone. But with the announcement date just around the corner, an FCC filing has given us a look at the new RAZR from almost every angle.
The home bar first introduced on the iPhone X is a handy visual guide as you get accustomed to using gestures like swiping up to unlock or going back to the home screen. As you master the gestures, however, the home bar becomes less of an aid and more of an obstruction that you can't remove or resize, unless you've jailbroken your iPhone.
Android is moving away from navigation buttons. Even with the transparent navigation bar on the Galaxy Note 10+, it still takes up space on the screen that could otherwise be used to show content. What's great about the Galaxy Note 10+ is that you can remove it, without installing one app.
The Pixel's "Flip to Shhh" feature may not be groundbreaking, but it is useful. Third-party apps are copying it for other phones because it's so convenient. But it's not enabled by default and it's fairly hidden in the settings. So to take full advantage of your Pixel's feature set, you should learn how to use Flip to Shhh.
Beyond spotlight-grabbing features like Dark Mode and computer mice support that iOS 13 contains, Apple has also made its mobile platform more user-friendly for people that exhibit sensitivity to on-screen animations. If you've always found the transitional effects between app pages jarring, your iPhone now has a setting to help with that, preventing possible motion sickness and anxiety.
In general, the internet can be a cruel place, and Instagram is no exception. Most of the time, the platform is a fantastic way to share and view unique and creative content, to reach an audience of both fans and friends. People can step out of line and harass or bully others on posts to the detriment of the entire community. However, this type of commenting won't be sustainable for much longer.
If you're worried about the security of your Mac, there are easy measures to prevent the most dangerous attacks. Named after the tactic of accessing an unattended computer in a hotel room, we can thwart "evil maid" attacks with Do Not Disturb and LuLu, free macOS tools by Objective-See that keep an eye on unattended computers and flag suspicious network connections that indicate a malware infection.
As the premiere app for chatting and video calls, it only makes sense for Skype to provide a dark theme to help prevent eye strain and minimize battery drain. Not only that, it has to also keep pace with popular messaging apps like Facebook Messenger that also have the feature built-in.
Text conversations and group chats can sometimes devolve to random and nonsensical chatter that bombard you with annoying notifications. Naturally, this can get distracting and prevent you from focusing on more pressing matters. Fortunately, Samsung Messages has a feature built in to minimize distractions whenever conversations go out of hand.
So far, the iOS 12.3 public betas have been on the heels of the developer betas by just over a day each time, but not anymore. Apple just pushed out iOS 12.3 public beta 4 today, April 29, just hours after the same dev version came out, meaning it's only been six days since iOS 12.3 public beta 3 was released.
Stories make sharing your day-to-day highlights fun on Instagram. However, other than choosing who to hide stories from, by default, stories don't have much privacy control, especially if your Instagram account happens to be public. Instagram recognizes this flaw, which is what its "Close Friends List" is all about.
There's always an iPhone in our list of top phones for privacy and security, due in large part to advanced security measures like Face ID, consistent iOS updates, and easy ways to prevent unwanted access and excessive data sharing. However, some of those options actually do the opposite and hinder security. It all depends on how you use your iPhone, but you should at least know everything available.
As the go-to browser for millions worldwide, Chrome makes web surfing a breeze with its simple interface and Google integration. But many websites are starting to ask if they can send you notifications, and this can interrupt your browsing. Thankfully, you can completely disable these prompts if you prefer.
Apple released the official iOS 11.2.6 update Monday for iPhones, which comes just under four weeks after Apple pushed iOS 11.2.5 to users. This latest update was released off Apple's normal release schedule to quickly patch the "Telugu" character bug that causes erratic behavior when viewed in apps.
While iOS 11.3 doesn't have as many new features as iOS 11.2, there's still a lot to love about Apple's latest update for iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch, even if some of the best features we were expecting didn't make the cut.
Some of the things that make Waze such a great navigation app are also its biggest downsides. Real-time data shows where individual users are, and the app automatically gathers traffic info that other drivers may encounter. These elements ensure that road conditions are as up-to-date as possible so that everyone gets to their destination safely, but it's certainly not ideal if you're a privacy-minded user.
On July 20, 1969, humans set foot on the moon for the first time. But some say our microbes beat us there. With the Space Age came new questions about microscopic invaders from outer space and concern about where we are leaving our microbial footprints. The questions are even more relevant today.
In late June, the biggest measles outbreak to strike Minnesota since 1990 seemed to be winding down. Today, public health officials announced a new confirmed measles case in the area.
Cytochrome P450 (P450s) are proteins found in nearly all living organisms, which play roles that range from producing essential compounds and hormones to metabolizing drugs and toxins. We use some of the compounds synthesized by P450 in plants as medical treatments, but the slow growth and limited supply of these plants have put the drugs' availability in jeopardy and jacked up prices.
Apple just jumped on the auto-play bandwagon with their revamped App Store in iOS 11. Now, when you visit an app or game page that has a video trailer, it will automatically play. This can not only get pretty annoying, but it can eat up your precious data. Luckily, there's a way to restrict these auto-playing videos to Wi-Fi only — or disable them altogether.
What would it be like to have clothing that killed microbes? Or paper that repelled pathogens? A research team from Rutgers University has developed a prototype out of metalized paper to zap the bad guys without being super expensive. Sound good? Read on.
Some types of bacterial infections are notoriously tough to treat — and it's not all due to antibiotic resistance. The bacteria themselves are rugged and hard to penetrate with drugs.
The Galaxy S8's Always On Display is a fantastic feature that gives you a brief overview without having to wake up your phone. But AOD now has a virtual home button, which kinda ruins the sleek look and can even cause screen burn-in.
Chrome version 56 is here to help you stop accidentally clicking ads when you're scrolling or tapping a link in a webpage on your phone. That's right, annoying page jumps while a site's still loading will finally come to an end with this new update.
If there's one thing entertainment companies love, it's rebooting aging franchises. But design firm Globacore Interactive Technologies appears to have taken rebooting to the next level by remaking the classic '90s game Lemmings specifically to work on the HoloLens, Microsoft's mixed reality headset.
Any parent with a rambunctious child who may have at one point racked up a hefty bill on their Kindle or Android device can now breathe a sigh of relief. One, Jack Black has had it happen to him too, and two, Amazon will be refunding up to $70 million of in-app purchases made by children after downloading apps from the Amazon AppStore.
There have been mumps outbreaks in three different US colleges so far this year as instances of the illness are on the rise, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
There's now more reasons to make sick workers stay home—a new game theory study suggests adequate hand washing and other illness-aversion tactics aren't as useful as we thought to keep you from getting infected when a virus or bacteria is circulating.
Rabbits have been a persistent problem in Australia for over 150 years. Now the Peel Harvey Catchment Council (PHCC) and Peel-Harvey Biosecurity Group have released a strain of the rabbit haemorrhagic disease virus (RHDV), called RHDV1 K5, to reduce the number of pests in the Murray region of New South Wales.
As many as 700 species of bacteria live on our teeth and in our mouth, and just like the microbiomes inhabiting other parts of our bodies, they change in response to diseases and other health conditions.
Sleep lets our body processes rest and restores us for the next day, so a bad night's sleep can ruin the following twenty-four hours and even make us feel sick. Now, new research published in the journal Sleep cements the idea that loss of sleep actually leaves us vulnerable to sickness.
No one can dispute the evolutionary success of bugs. The oldest insect fossils were found encased in crystallized mineral silica in Scotland in 1926, and they're between 396 and 407 million years old.
If maintaining privacy is an ongoing battle, the front line is your smartphone. Apple included several new security features in iOS 10, but at the same time, some of the best new functionality comes with potential privacy trade-offs that everyone needs to understand.
