When Yahoo announced that a billion users were affected by its 2013 hack, the internet weathered a collective cold sweat. But the story isn't quite done yet. The internet company's parent firm Oath today released "new intelligence" regarding the breach. "Subsequent to Yahoo's acquisition by Verizon, and during integration, the company recently obtained new intelligence and now believes, following an investigation with the assistance of outside forensic experts, that all Yahoo user accounts were affected by the August 2013 theft," Oath, also a subsidiary of Verizon, confirmed in a press release. That's three-billion users. While Oath confirmed that the orchestrators of the hack...
Ever spent hours doodling the letter G on some random famous person's birthday? Google may have a job for you all the way in San Francisco, USA. Google Doodles is looking for an International Junior Doodle Artist to join its team and provide some insights into non-US cultural experiences. The team says it would prefer applicants from South or Southeast Asia and the Middle East, but it will be accepting applications from around the world. The #GoogleDoodles team is looking for a Jr. Doodler w/ international experience to join our team! 👀 details → https://t.co/6YS1Zedj7k pic.twitter.com/pnnTaSzX41 — Google Doodles (@GoogleDoodles) September 28, 2017 Advertised on none other...
Today is Google's 19th birthday. I bet you're probably feeling really old right now. But like the first season of Friends, the company only gets better with age. That is especially true if you're considering its Google Doodles. Rolling back all 19 years into one novel Doodle, the company is today debuting its Birthday Surprise Spinner. Open the page, and the spinner begins its whirring. When it stops, it'll give you the option to open one of 19 games or activities from previous Doodles. This includes golden oldies like its Pac-Man Google Maps mashup, and its Which animal are you? Earth Day quiz....
Three women have filed a lawsuit against Google claiming systemic pay discrimination, according to The Guardian. The former employees claim the company consistently pays men more for doing similar work as women in similar conditions. They also allege that Google denies women opportunities for advancement. The class-action complaint, filed on behalf of all women employed by the company in California in the last four years, could see more employees stepping up as it continues. Leading the charge is former employee Kelly Ellis, who has provided detailed evidence of Google's alleged pay gap. Ellis says that when she was first hired, Google placed her in a "Level 3" job, typically reserved for...
Today at its headquarters in Cupertino, Apple announced a refreshed product lineup including a number of new iPhones, a new Apple TV and a shiny new Apple Watch, and Twitter users were (sure enough) reporting live from their armchairs. For all the technical specifications and more, you might want to visit our sister site Gearburn. But over here, we took a deeper, introspective look at social media's reaction to Apple's launch event, from start to finish. Sit back, and enjoy the memes, joy and jibes from the bleachers. The buildup... The hype pre-event was palpable, with many readying getting those stacks of dollars. #AppleEvent Tim...
At its first product launch event at the new Steve Jobs Theatre, Apple debuted a slew of new devices. One of them was the Apple Watch Series 3. But while you can catch all the technical specs of the Watch over on Gearburn, on Memeburn we're more concerned by one particular detail: Apple Music will be available on the device. Apple punted its music service's 40-million tracks, which will all be streamable from the wrist, thanks to the Watch's new electronic SIM system, that can connect to cellular networks. While the electronic SIM was only demoed using an AT&T network, this is...
Google Maps' traffic overlay is reporting abnormally high traffic movements in Florida, Georgia and South Carolina for a Thursday as residents prepare for Hurricane Irma's imminent landfall. Current forecasts suggest that the storm will strike Miami, and skirt along Florida's spine into Georgia. This has also prompted Florida authorities to issue evacuation orders for certain areas. Georgian authorities have today announced mandatory evacuation in effect from Saturday morning. MUST READ: Memeburn's extensive coverage of Hurricane Irma Traffic movements are heaviest on the interstates' right-hand side suggesting an exodus. Movements around Atlanta, Charleston and Jacksonville are markedly heavier than normal. ows Interstate-75 (upper left),...
Tropical weather is seemingly all social media users in the western hemisphere can talk about this week. With three named storms currently swirling in various regions of the Atlantic Ocean, it's unsurprising really. But how are the various regions and countries reacting to these storms in terms of search and online activity? To satisfy our curiosity, we hit up Google Trends, the company's extensive digest of how its users search for information online. We compared search requests between "Harvey", "Irma", "Tropical Storm Jose" and "Tropical Storm Katia" in a number of countries over a period of 30 days, a week and...
Judging by this article's comments section, people are really, really not warming to Google News's redesign. But don't ditch the service just yet. There is hope if you prefer the old layout. A website dubbed "The Old G News" is seemingly reviving the old version of Mountain View's news aggregation tool. And it's almost as though nothing as changed. According to a Reddit post by a user claiming to be the site's owner, the service is "more like a http proxy" than a complete Google News remaster. "I get your request and I forward it and give it back to you. No...
A Google employee has come under fire for releasing a ten-page-long document on why diversity in the workplace is dangerous. The document, which was first reported by Motherboard, was circulated internally at Google before being released publicly by Gizmodo. In it, the author outlines how men and women differ biologically -- and how the company's diversity efforts should be examined in regards to its "costs and benefits". They argue that women are more people-oriented, anxiety-prone and less ambitious, and conclude that the workplace should not be made more comfortable for them because male employees would suffer. The document also claims that there are notable IQ differences between different groups of people...
Google Play Store has made it easier for users to spot the "lower quality" apps on its platform from the genuinely useful. According to a new blog post, the company is actively focussing on privileging apps that exhibit stellar stability, and penalising those that show "excessive battery usage, slow render times, and crashes". "As part of our continued effort to deliver the best possible Google Play experience, we recently enhanced our search and discovery algorithms to reflect app quality," Google Play's product manager Andrew Ahn explains. Google Play rewards well-built apps by pushing them further up search listings "This results in higher quality apps...
YouTube's head of music Lyor Cohen has confirmed that YouTube Red and Google Play Music will be merging into one streaming service, according to a report from The Verge. Speaking at a panel in New York, Cohen acknowledged that the services provide similar offerings and that it was important to combine them. YouTube's streaming services are complicated. YouTube Red costs US$9.99 a month, and includes an ad-free experience, offline watching, and access to original Red content. It also provides access to Google Play Music. Google Play Music offers ad-free music streaming, the ability to make playlists, and offline listening. It costs the same, and a...
South Africans are slowly taking over the US entertainment industry. First Trevor Noah's big gig on The Daily Show, and now Apple's Beats 1 has recruited Black Coffee to host a radio show on its platform. The news broke early Wednesday, but only began impacting South Africans later that evening when the DJ formally announced the move on Twitter. Subsequently the hashtag (and name of the upcoming show) #Beats1BlackCoffee began trending. He becomes the first South African to host a show on Apple's live streaming radio service which launched in mid-2015. I'm the newest @Beats1 host. Hear the sounds of global underground...
Google has launched SOS Alert for search that provides information on ongoing emergencies. The SOS Alerts pop up whenever someone searches for the name of an event or location. It provides information like maps of the damage, top stories, and even statements from local authorities when available. If the user is close by, the Alert will provide emergency numbers. Users may even be sent a notification if their Google app is up-to-date and location is on. For those removed from the situation, information on where to donate might be provided. Google says that both natural and human-caused emergencies will be included The feature has also been implemented...
Google's parent company Alphabet isn't having the smoothest year on record thus far, but that hasn't stopped it from making even more money this quarter. The company today revealed its latest quarterly financial figures for Q2 2017, a quarter that has seen another marked increase in numbers behind dollar signs. "With revenues of $26 billion, up 21% versus the second quarter of 2016 and 23% on a constant currency basis, we're delivering strong growth with great underlying momentum, while continuing to make focused investments in new revenue streams," the company's CFO Ruth Porat told investors in a letter. For comparison, the company...
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