Webtagr - Technology News Summarizer

Shipping Regulations Halved Lightning Strikes Over Busy Singapore Strait

2025-08-23

A new study reveals that the International Maritime Organization's 2020 regulations reducing sulfur emissions from ships led to a nearly 50% decrease in lightning strikes over the busiest shipping lane near Singapore. Researchers believe ship emissions influence ice crystal formation and collisions within clouds, impacting lightning generation. This unplanned experiment highlights the significant, previously underestimated impact of human activity on thunderstorms and offers crucial insights into the effects of human emissions on climate change.

(theconversation.com)

Tech shipping emissions

Google TV Mandates 64-bit Support for Apps

2025-08-23

Google announced that starting August 1, 2026, all apps on Google TV and Android TV platforms must support 64-bit architecture and be compatible with 16KB memory page sizes. This means developers must update their apps to include arm64 native code; otherwise, apps won't be accepted on Google Play. The move aims to improve performance, reduce startup times, and prepare for future hardware. Google recommends developers start checking and updating their app code now to ensure compliance.

(nerds.xyz)

Tech

Microsoft Throttles onmicrosoft.com Emails: Upgrade or Face Restrictions

2025-08-23

Microsoft is warning companies using the onmicrosoft.com domain for emails to migrate to a custom domain or face email throttling. Starting October 15th, Microsoft will limit emails to 100 external recipients per organization per 24 hours, gradually expanding to all tenants by June 2026. This aims to combat spammers exploiting the onmicrosoft.com domain. Microsoft advises adding and setting a custom domain as primary to avoid restrictions, but migration might increase admin workload and necessitate credential updates.

(www.theregister.com)

Tech

Record Heat: A Global Workplace Crisis

2025-08-23

A new report from the WHO and WMO warns that record-breaking temperatures are transforming workplaces globally, impacting over 2.4 billion workers through heat stress. High temperatures are causing increased workplace injuries, decreased productivity, and even fatalities. The report calls for bold, coordinated action, including improved heatwave warning systems, adjusted work schedules, redesigned uniforms and workplaces, and emergency preparedness plans. Ultimately, reducing fossil fuel emissions to combat global warming is crucial to addressing this growing challenge.

(www.theverge.com)

Tech heat stress occupational health

China's CO2 Emissions Fall in First Half of 2025, But Challenges Remain

2025-08-23

China's carbon dioxide emissions fell by 1% year-on-year in the first half of 2025, driven by strong growth in clean energy, extending a decline that began in March 2024. The power sector, a major emissions source, saw a 3% drop in CO2 output, with solar power growth offsetting increased electricity demand. However, rapid expansion in the coal-to-chemicals industry added to emissions, posing a challenge to China's carbon peaking goals. Despite the emissions decrease, China is likely to miss several climate targets, highlighting the need for more ambitious goals in its upcoming Nationally Determined Contribution and 15th Five-Year Plan.

(www.carbonbrief.org)

Tech climate targets

Microsoft Curbs Vulnerability Info Access for Chinese Firms

2025-08-23

Following July's SharePoint zero-day attacks, seemingly linked to a leak in Microsoft's early-bug-notification program (MAPP), Microsoft has reportedly stopped providing Chinese companies with proof-of-concept exploit code for upcoming vulnerabilities. MAPP typically gives vendors two weeks' advance notice before Patch Tuesday, but now access is restricted for companies in countries required to report vulnerabilities to their governments, including China. These companies will receive general written descriptions instead of PoC code. Security experts see this as a positive step to prevent future leaks.

(www.theregister.com)

Tech

Bluesky Blocks Mississippi Users Over Age-Verification Law

2025-08-23

Bluesky, a social networking startup, has opted to block access from Mississippi users rather than comply with a new state law mandating age verification for all users. Citing resource constraints and concerns about the law's broad scope and privacy implications, Bluesky argues the required technical changes are too extensive for its small team. The company highlights the law's potential to stifle innovation and disproportionately harm smaller platforms. This decision affects only the Bluesky app built on the AT Protocol; other apps may choose a different course of action.

(techcrunch.com)

Tech

US Mines Already Have the Critical Minerals They Need—But They're Being Thrown Away

2025-08-23

A new analysis reveals that US mines already produce all the critical minerals needed annually for energy, defense, and technology, but these minerals—including cobalt, lithium, gallium, and rare earth elements—are currently discarded as tailings from other mining operations. The challenge lies in economically recovering these valuable resources. By improving recovery technologies and implementing supportive policies, the US could significantly reduce its reliance on imports and lessen the environmental impact of mining waste, according to the study.

(phys.org)

Tech critical minerals mineral recovery resource utilization

Bluesky Blocks Mississippi: Defying Strict Age Verification Laws

2025-08-23

Social media platform Bluesky announced it's blocking all Mississippi IP addresses in protest of a recent Supreme Court decision upholding the state's strict age verification law. Bluesky argues the law's requirements—identifying and tracking all users under 18 and demanding sensitive personal information from all users—are impossible to meet with current resources and disproportionately harm smaller platforms and free speech. This makes Bluesky the first major platform to take such drastic action in response to the law.

(www.wired.com)

Tech

Cloudflare Launches First MoQ CDN: The Beginning of the End for WebRTC?

2025-08-23

Cloudflare has officially launched its Media over QUIC (MoQ) CDN, a technical preview of a new standard aiming to replace WebRTC, HLS/DASH, and RTMP/SRT for real-time media streaming. Developers can test it using Cloudflare's public endpoint and various client libraries, even building live broadcasts quickly with provided Web Component APIs. While currently limited in features (e.g., lacking authentication and Safari support), this marks a significant step forward for MoQ, hinting at a revolution in real-time media delivery.

(moq.dev)

Tech Real-time Media

Google's Gemini App: Tiny Requests, Huge Cumulative Impact

2025-08-23

Google's team analyzed the energy consumption of its Gemini app. A single text request consumes a minuscule amount of energy, equivalent to about nine seconds of TV watching. However, the massive volume of requests results in a significant cumulative energy consumption and carbon footprint. Encouragingly, over the past year, Google has reduced energy consumption per prompt by 33x and carbon emissions by 1.4x through software optimizations (like Mixture-of-Experts) and renewable energy usage. This highlights how even seemingly small AI requests can have a large environmental impact at scale, demanding continuous technological improvements and energy strategy optimization.

(arstechnica.com)

Tech

arXivLabs: Community Collaboration on Experimental Projects

2025-08-22

arXivLabs is a framework enabling collaborators to develop and share new arXiv features directly on the website. Individuals and organizations involved embrace openness, community, excellence, and user data privacy. arXiv is committed to these values and only partners with those who share them. Got an idea to enhance the arXiv community? Explore arXivLabs!

(arxiv.org)

Tech

Coercive Citations in Peer Review: A Preprint's Shocking Findings

2025-08-22

An analysis of 18,400 open-access articles reveals that reviewers are significantly more likely to approve a manuscript if their own work is cited in subsequent versions. This preprint study, analyzing data from four open-access publishers, found that reviewers who were cited were more likely to approve articles than those who weren't. The study also analyzed reviewer comments, finding that reviewers requesting citations used more coercive language when rejecting papers. This raises concerns about potential conflicts of interest and academic integrity in the peer-review process.

(www.nature.com)

Tech citation manipulation

JWST Discovers Tiny New Moon Orbiting Uranus

2025-08-22

A team led by Dr. Maryame El Moutamid at the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) has discovered a previously unknown moon orbiting Uranus using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). The tiny moon, designated S/2025 U 1, is approximately 6 miles (10 km) in diameter and located between the orbits of Ophelia and Bianca. This brings the total known Uranian moons to 29. The discovery highlights JWST's capabilities in detecting even small, previously unseen celestial bodies in our solar system.

(www.sciencedaily.com)

Tech

Google's Honest (and Uncommon) Take on Pixel's Water Resistance

2025-08-22

Google's advertising materials surprisingly admit that no phone is truly waterproof or dustproof. While Pixel phones may boast an IP68 rating upon leaving the factory, this protection degrades over time due to wear, damage, or drops; liquid damage voids the warranty. This unusual transparency highlights the often-blurred line between marketing and reality in the mobile industry.

(www.theverge.com)

Tech phone waterproofing Google Pixel marketing transparency

Apple Fitness VP Accused of Toxic Workplace Culture

2025-08-22

Jay Blahnik, Apple's VP of Fitness Technologies, is facing accusations of fostering a toxic work environment. Multiple current and former employees allege verbal abuse, manipulation, and inappropriate behavior, leading over ten employees to take extended medical or mental health leaves since 2022. Despite an internal investigation, Blahnik remains employed and faces multiple lawsuits, including one alleging sexual harassment. The situation raises concerns about Apple's corporate culture.

(macdailynews.com)

Tech

Android 16 Beta Brings Enhanced Dark Mode and Themed Icons

2025-08-22

Google has released the Android 16 beta, featuring expanded dark mode and themed app icon support. A new 'intelligent inversion' feature forces dark theming on apps lacking native support, automatically darkening splash screens and status bars. Users can now also force themed icon colors onto apps, even without developer support. Other improvements include enhanced parental controls, more secure cross-platform data migration, improved PDF annotation and editing, and personal audio sharing for Bluetooth LE devices.

(www.theverge.com)

Tech Themed Icons

Single Atom Quantum Logic Gate Breakthrough

2025-08-22

University of Sydney researchers have achieved a breakthrough by implementing an error-corrected quantum logic gate on a single ytterbium ion using the 'Rosetta Stone' code (GKP code). This innovative approach leverages the ion's natural vibrations to encode and manipulate logical qubits, dramatically reducing the number of physical qubits needed for quantum computing. Published in Nature Physics, this milestone significantly improves quantum computing hardware efficiency and paves the way for large-scale quantum information processing.

(phys.org)

Tech quantum logic gate GKP code

The Huge Hurdle to US EV Adoption: Charging Infrastructure

2025-08-22

While a large percentage of US homes could theoretically support EV charging, the reality is far more complex. Over a third require costly electrical upgrades to handle home chargers, significantly increasing EV ownership costs and potentially exceeding those of gasoline cars. Furthermore, charging in multifamily dwellings presents even greater challenges, requiring permission from management companies and expensive grid upgrades, posing a significant obstacle to widespread EV adoption.

(arstechnica.com)

Tech charging infrastructure grid upgrades

US Water Consumption: A Deep Dive

2025-08-22

While US water is abundant and cheap, rising demand in the arid Southwest and from water-intensive industries like data centers is shifting this reality. This article analyzes the US's daily water consumption of 322 billion gallons, covering power generation, irrigation, industry, and domestic use. While thermoelectric power plants consume vast amounts, most is non-consumptive; irrigation's consumptive use is significant and difficult to reuse; data center water use, though relatively small now, is rapidly growing. The key takeaway: Careful interpretation of water use data is crucial, distinguishing between consumptive and non-consumptive uses.

(www.construction-physics.com)

Tech water consumption

Bo's Electric Scooter: A 22mph Commuter and a Bonneville Speed Demon

2025-08-22

UK-based Bo is making waves with two electric scooter models: the practical Model-M (22mph top speed, 40-mile range, $2,500) and the high-performance Turbo, aiming for triple-digit speeds at Bonneville. Founded by former F1 engineers, Bo aims to elevate e-scooters beyond disposable transportation. The Turbo boasts a 24,000-watt dual-motor setup and Safesteer stabilization technology, but commands a hefty $30,000 price tag. The article explores Bo's ambition, the high-end e-scooter market, and compares it to competitors like Rage Mechanics' RM-X.

(www.thedrive.com)

Tech electric scooter

Unlocking Shopping Carts with Phone Speaker Sounds: A DEFCON 29 Hack

2025-08-22

A hacker, @stoppingcart, demonstrated at DEFCON 29 a method to unlock electronic shopping carts using a phone speaker. Most electronic shopping cart wheels listen for a 7.8 kHz signal from an underground wire to lock and unlock. The hacker created a 7.8 kHz audio file and used the parasitic EMF from a phone's speaker to 'transmit' a similar signal, unlocking the cart. This exploits a vulnerability in the cart's security system, highlighting a security flaw.

(www.begaydocrime.com)

Tech electronic shopping carts

Adobe Acrobat Studio: AI Reimagines the PDF, Ushering in a New Era of Software?

2025-08-21

Adobe's 1993 release of the PDF revolutionized document handling. Now, Adobe integrates generative AI into Acrobat Studio, introducing 'PDF Spaces' and an AI assistant, aiming to redefine the PDF. This isn't just a feature upgrade; it's a landmark event signifying AI's deep integration into everyday software. While AI functionality is attracting attention, concerns about AI's impact remain. Whether Adobe's move will lead the industry like its transparency support did remains to be seen, but it undeniably marks the arrival of the AI-dominated software era.

(www.wired.com)

Tech

China's Great Firewall Mysteriously Blocks Port 443 for an Hour

2025-08-21

On August 20th, China's Great Firewall experienced a mysterious outage, blocking access to most foreign websites for about an hour. The outage affected TCP port 443, the standard port for HTTPS traffic, disrupting services reliant on it, including some Apple and Tesla services. The cause remains unclear, possibly a new device being tested, misconfiguration, or human error. This isn't the first Great Firewall glitch, highlighting flaws in China's internet censorship.

(www.theregister.com)

Tech Network Outage

Meta Accused of Inflating Ecommerce Ad Performance Metrics

2025-08-21

A whistleblower complaint alleges that Meta artificially inflated the return on ad spend (ROAS) for its Shops ads product by including shipping fees as revenue, subsidizing bids, and applying undisclosed discounts. The former employee, Samujjal Purkayastha, claims this was done to counteract the impact of Apple's 2021 privacy changes and boost adoption of the fledgling ecommerce ad product. Internal reviews allegedly revealed a 17-19% ROAS inflation due to the inclusion of shipping fees and taxes, a practice not followed by Meta's other ad products or competitors like Google. Purkayastha, who was subsequently terminated, brought these concerns to senior leadership. Meta denies the allegations and is actively defending the lawsuit.

(www.adweek.com)

Tech Ad Fraud

AI Crawlers Overwhelm the Open Web: Meta and OpenAI Leading the Charge

2025-08-21

Fastly's report reveals that AI crawlers are consuming the open web at an alarming rate, accounting for 80% of all AI bot traffic. Meta's AI division contributes over half of this crawler traffic, while OpenAI dominates on-demand fetch requests. This excessive scraping leads to increased website load, server overload, and harms content creators. Some companies ignore robots.txt directives, prompting website operators to fight back with anti-scraping techniques like Anubis. Experts call for responsible crawling standards, even suggesting that only the bursting of the AI bubble can solve this, with government regulation becoming urgent.

(www.theregister.com)

Tech web load

Windows 10 EOL: Impact on TurboTax Desktop

2025-08-21

Microsoft will end free support and security updates for Windows 10 on October 14, 2025. Consequently, TurboTax Desktop 2025 will only be compatible with Windows 11 (64-bit). Users on Windows 10 will need to upgrade to Windows 11 or switch to TurboTax Online to continue using the tax software.

(ttlc.intuit.com)

Tech Software Compatibility

Australia Post Halts US Transit Shipping Amid Trump Tariff Chaos

2025-08-21

Australia Post is suspending some shipping to the US due to upcoming Trump administration tariffs causing widespread disruption to postal networks and retailers globally. This means goods from other countries can no longer transit through Australia to the US. The suspension comes as the US ends its 'de minimis' exemption, adding tariffs to low-value imports. E-commerce businesses are facing confusion, and many postal operators are scrambling to adapt. Other countries are also halting shipments to the US, highlighting the uncertainty surrounding the tariff changes. Australia Post is exploring using third-party providers to handle the new duties.

(www.abc.net.au)

Tech shipping

24/7 AI Sales Avatars Outsell Humans on Taobao

2025-08-21

A Shanghai marketing company, PLTFRM, has created AI avatars that are revolutionizing livestream ecommerce in China. These AI salespeople stream 24/7 on platforms like Taobao and Pinduoduo, consistently outperforming human counterparts. Brother printers, for example, reported a 30% increase in livestream sales after switching to an AI avatar. While platforms like Douyin remain cautious, the widespread adoption of these AI avatars raises concerns about potential job displacement for human livestreamers and affiliate marketers. The technology's accessibility and affordability are fueling this trend, hinting at a future dominated by AI-generated content and sales.

(www.wired.com)

Tech Livestream Ecommerce

Windows 11 September Update: Copilot Enhancements, Customizable Lock Screen Widgets

2025-08-21

Microsoft is preparing a major feature drop for Windows 11 users in September. The update includes Copilot enhancements like improved Recall and Click To Do, alongside improvements for all users such as enhanced Windows Search (images displayed in a grid view), customizable lock screen widgets, and a redesigned Windows Hello interface. Additionally, the taskbar calendar flyout will once again display seconds, and Task Manager has been updated. Copilot+ PC users will get a new Recall landing page and a new Click To Do tutorial. Future updates include a more customizable Start menu and improved system-wide dark mode.

(www.windowscentral.com)

Tech

Category: Tech