3 Wine Aroma Kits Tested: Aromabar, Aromaster, and Le Nez du Vin

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3 Wine Aroma Kits Tested: Aromabar, Aromaster, and Le Nez du Vin

Is your schnoz a schlub? Strengthen your sniffer by teaching it to discern common wine aromas with one of these training kits.

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Roku Premiere Plus Review (2018): Affordable 4K HDR Streaming

Roku brings the price of 4K TV streaming down to new lows, with a few caveats.

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BBC News - Technology

Facebook sued over video viewing figures

Legal action brought by advertisers claims the social network knew about problems in metrics in 2015.

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The story behind your PlayStation username

PlayStation's long-awaited new feature means weird and embarrassing names will be no more.

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TechNewsWorld

6 Tips for Managing Data Before an Emergency Strikes

Think about planning for a natural disaster emergency that might affect your home. You'd likely store some water, flashlights, food, blankets and other essentials. The key element of your planning would be proactivity. You'd do all of the work before an emergency occurred, not during the actual crisis. If your supplies were used up after the emergency passed, then you would restock before the next disaster might strike. Protecting data requires a similar approach: putting in place as many safeguards as you can before anything bad happens.

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Building a Speed Bump for Tech Companies' Maniacal Data Race

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Building a Speed Bump for Tech Companies' Maniacal Data Race

Facebook has been in seriously hot water for its data monetization model almost from the firm's beginning. The Cambridge Analytica, election meddling and fake news scandals have turned up the heat. Facebook's problems aren't limited to the public and government backlash that spans several countries; the firm faces potentially devastating legal threats too. On the surface, it appears to be a clear-cut issue: Social media and other tech companies must be reined in. Certainly, the EU thinks so, as is evidenced by its new GDPR.

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Ember's Temperature-Regulating Mug Just Keeps Getting Better

Crowdfunding projects often crash and burn. But Ember's heated travel mug just keeps improving.

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Amazon Kindle Paperwhite (2018): Specs, Price, Release Date

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Amazon Kindle Paperwhite (2018): Specs, Price, Release Date

Amazon's Kindle Paperwhite e-reader gets an update. You get more storage, better lighting, and still no Alexa.

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TechNewsWorld

DevOps: Let's Talk About Security

In spite of all the high-profile breaches that seem to sweep the headlines with greater frequency, companies slowly but surely have been getting a handle on internal security practices. At this point, it's hard to imagine any employee, in or out of the tech sector, who hasn't been run through antiphishing training. However, security is only as strong as its weakest link, noted David Bryan, a penetration tester and senior managing consultant at IBM X-Force Red. The link that still needs reinforcing is also the most fundamental: developers.

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BBC News - Technology

Children 'blackmailed' for sexual images in online video chats

One in 10 children have been asked to remove their clothes over online video chats, says the NSPCC.

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Google Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL Review: Software Is Eating Your Phone

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Google Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL Review: Software Is Eating Your Phone

Our favorite Android phone is back, and this time it’s loaded with even more AI smarts.

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TechNewsWorld

Serious Efforts to Use Tech for Good Shine Through

For much of this year, technology companies have been showcased in a very poor light. Several firms have been moving aggressively to buck this trend, however. HP's latest effort, in conjunction with the Clooney Foundation for Justice, is a case in point: an impressive initiative to supply and fund schools in places like war-torn Syria. HP also has provided substantial support to the Girl Rising movement. One of its focuses is to share stories about people who use technology to make the world a better place for girls and women.

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Voice Control for Connected Entertainment: Challenges and Opportunities

Smart speakers are becoming a more common platform for controlling connected entertainment due to a rapid increase in popularity and ease of use. Household penetration of smart speakers is expected to reach 47 percent among U.S. broadband households by 2022, based on Parks Associates estimates. New entrants in the connected consumer electronics market, including Samsung, Roku and Facebook, are likely to make announcements about new voice-controlled speakers at CES 2019 in order to claim a share of this new voice-first CE market.

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BBC News - Technology

Lost passwords 'lead to lost savings'

An estimated seven million people have lost savings and pensions, but there is help to track them down.

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Sundar Pichai: Google 'exploring' censored China search app

The firm's CEO defends a possible return to China, a market Google abandoned over censorship concerns.

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Social media moderators: Blur your eyes

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Social media moderators: Blur your eyes

Why one content moderator couldn't shake hands for three years after she left her job.

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Is it the end of the supermarket checkout till?

M&S is the latest shop to test a "scan and go" app, meaning shoppers don't need to use a till.

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Podcasting for Fun and Profit

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Podcasting for Fun and Profit

User engagement with podcasts has been steadily increasing, and many listeners actually prefer longer-format content, based on results of Apple's Podcast Analytics. The service, which Apple launched late last year, gives podcasters a way to track performance metrics including number of listeners, total time listened and time per device. The audience for podcasts has increased as content has become more specialized in nature, the analytics show. Listeners engage with podcasts for much longer periods than with other types of online content.

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Women as CEOs: The Problems and the Promise

I've followed several female CEOs over the years. Most of them failed, largely because they were both unqualified for the job and their boards didn't back them up. In several cases, the board and the CEO seemed to be in conflict, or the board simply didn't do anything. Those failures have created the impression that female CEOs are a bad bet. However, I believe the real problem is that boards haven't been doing their jobs. I think women would make better CEOs than men if they were trained and supported as well.

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Amazon Fire HD 8 (2018) Review: Affordable but Underwhelming

Amazon's Fire HD 8 is still incredibly cheap, but it's not the bargain it once was.

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BBC News - Technology

An online decency moderator's advice: Blur your eyes

Why one content moderator couldn't shake hands for three years after she left her job.

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Humanoid 'rescue robot' learns parkour

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Humanoid 'rescue robot' learns parkour

Atlas, a humanoid robot by tech firm Boston Dynamics, has learned the art of parkour.

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Facebook shuts down 'spammy' politics pages

Political sites with millions of followers have been purged in a Facebook crackdown on spam.

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Gadget Lab Podcast: Ivy Ross, Google’s Head of Hardware Design

The Gadget Lab team breaks down this week’s tech news and welcomes special guest Ivy Ross to the show, to talk about the new Google Pixel products.

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Click News: A ladder-climbing robotic snake

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Click News: A ladder-climbing robotic snake

BBC Click's Nick Kwek looks at some of the best technology news stories of the week.

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The world's longest non-stop flight takes off from Singapore

The Singapore Airlines aircraft has begun its near 19-hour, 15,000km flight to New York.

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Climate change: Is your Netflix habit bad for the environment?

The IT sector's share of global electricity consumption is predicted to increase rapidly.

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How to Install 'Fortnite' on Your Android Phone

Previously, 'Fortnite' on Android had been available only to Samsung devices and as a limited beta. As of now, everyone can have a turn.

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The Ick of AI That Impersonates Humans

As technology like Google Duplex continues to offload more basic human interaction to robots, it’s worth wondering what else might get lost in the process.

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Countdown on for world's longest non-stop flight

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Countdown on for world's longest non-stop flight

Singapore Airlines' non-stop flight to Newark will cover more than 15,000km and will take about 19 hours.

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Apple hires engineers from UK company Dialog

The deal represents one of Apple's biggest takeovers in headcount terms.

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TechNewsWorld

Smart High-Tech Solutions for Aging in Place

The call came in less than an hour before the 8 a.m. shift was scheduled to start: A family emergency meant the regular caregiver for an elderly client couldn't make her shift that day, so a replacement caregiver was needed ASAP. Homewatch CareGivers of San Juan Capistrano had to quickly send a substitute from its pool of licensed, trained and security-bonded caregivers. Once confirmed to cover the shift, the substitute caregiver tapped into the Homewatch CareGivers "Care+" mobile system to access the client's medical information.

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Protecting Against 'Natural' Cybersecurity Erosion

Every child who's ever played a board game understands that the act of rolling dice yields an unpredictable result. In fact, that's why children's board games use dice in the first place: to ensure a random outcome that is -- from a macro point of view, at least -- about the same likelihood each time the die is thrown. Consider for a moment what would happen if someone replaced the dice used in one of those board games with weighted dice -- say dice that were 10 percent more likely to come up "6" than any other number. Would you notice?

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How Jamal Khashoggi's Apple Watch Could Solve His Disappearance

Data from wearables—like location, activity, and heart rate—provide valuable clues to investigators.

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Cybersecurity Economics: The Missing Ingredient

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Cybersecurity Economics: The Missing Ingredient

There are times when looking at something narrowly can be more effective than taking a wider and more comprehensive view. Consider the experience of looking at organisms in a microscope or watching a bird through binoculars. Distractions are minimized, allowing optimal evaluation and analysis. In security, the normative way that we understand and examine the security of our organizations has a focus similar to the examples above: We examine the effectiveness of the security countermeasures put in place to achieve security objectives.

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BBC News - Technology

Walmart planning 'net-connected trolley'

Patent for a trolley that measures heart rate, walking speed, temperature and grip is lodged in US.

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Google Pixel Event Highlights: Pixel 3, Home Hub, Pixel Slate, Chromecast

From the Pixel 3 and its AI-powered camera, to the Home Hub display, to the Chrome-powered Pixel Slate tablet, here's all the new Google hardware.

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Watch Google Unveil the Next Pixel Phone

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Watch Google Unveil the Next Pixel Phone

We're expecting the Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL, plus a tablet, smart speakers, and more.

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TechNewsWorld

PC Innovation Is Back

There were two interesting product launches last week. HP delivered what is pretty much a clean slate rethinking of the 2-in-1 PC with the HP Folio, and Microsoft unveiled a refresh of its Surface Line. Both firms made a big deal of the fact that their products were much better than their Apple counterparts -- but Apple has been treating PCs like a drunk uncle for some time now. Basically, I think the folks at Apple are embarrassed they still make PCs, which is both sad and ironic, since Apple basically launched the PC revolution.

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BBC News - Technology

The Circle: Alex/Kate wins Channel 4's reality show

The show, billed as "the new Big Brother", will be remade by Netflix internationally.

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Microsoft pauses Windows 10 update after files disappear

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Microsoft pauses Windows 10 update after files disappear

Some Microsoft users complained their files vanished after installing the latest update for Windows 10.

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Sony WH1000XM3 Review: Bose Beaters

Sony's latest wireless headphones match or best Bose in just about every way.

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Yusaku Maezawa: Why I've bought a ticket to the Moon

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Yusaku Maezawa: Why I've bought a ticket to the Moon

Space X's mission to the Moon will be the first lunar journey by humans since 1972.

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TechNewsWorld

Data Breach Lawsuits: A Growing Risk for E-Commerce

The expanding world of Internet commerce likely will generate a corresponding expansion of data breaches, with the result that e-commerce businesses increasingly will become the targets of consumer class action lawsuits. Breach litigation has become more prevalent as a result of a perceptible legal trend favoring consumers. Various federal appeals courts have allowed consumers to launch class action suits even though the alleged injury from a breach was small, or even nonexistent, in terms of a current and tangible financial loss.

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The world’s first fully-autonomous indoor farm

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The world’s first fully-autonomous indoor farm

The world’s first fully-autonomous indoor farm in San Carlos, California, is soon to be operational.

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Gadget Lab Podcast: Hacking Humans

On this episode, WIRED's editor in chief Nick Thompson talks to best-selling author Yuval Noah Harari and Center for Humane Technology co-founder Tristan Harris about how social platforms expertly manipulate our thinking.

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The Best Sony PlayStation 4 Games (2018)

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The Best Sony PlayStation 4 Games (2018)

Crawl dungeons, experience the rapture, and learn to be a dad with our favorite PlayStation 4 games.

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Why Didn’t I Get an Emergency Presidential Alert Text?

If you didn't get a message from the president on your phone Wednesday, don't freak out.

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How to 'Turn Off' the Presidential Emergency Text Alert Test

If you really don't want to receive today's emergency test text message, there's one pretty simple workaround.

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BBC News - Technology

Weak passwords banned in California from 2020

Electronics firms must use unique codes or force users to generate their own passwords for gadgets

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Feely finger phone crawls across desk

A fleshy finger phone accessory that can tickle its owner has been developed in France.

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7 Tips for Getting the Most Out of Netflix

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7 Tips for Getting the Most Out of Netflix

We've all been there: scrolling through a seemingly never-ending carousel of shows and movies available on Netflix, trying to find the one thing we might want to sit down and enjoy. Except we often end up spending more time looking for something to kick back and view than actually watching the thing itself. But fear not! You too can optimize your Netflix viewing experience, both in terms of finding something you want to watch, and amplifying how you watch it. Here's how.

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