Geek News

Google might have just made itself the biggest example of how security keys can work better than other forms of multi-factor authentication . According to Krebs on Security , ever since the tech giant required over 85,000 of its employees to use physical security keys instead of one-time codes in 2017, it hasn't had a single case of account takeover from phishing. "We have had no reported or confirmed account takeovers since implementing security keys at Google," a company spokesperson said. "Users might b e asked to authenticate using their security key for many different apps/reasons. It all depends on the sensitivity of the app and the risk of the user at that point in time." Security keys like the one made by Yubikey give you a way to log into a website simply by plugging it in and pressing a button. You don't even need to type in your...

Clouds of Earth and Sky If you go high enough, you may find yourself on a picturesque perch between the water clouds of the Earth and the star clouds of the Milky Way. Such was the case last month for one adventurous alpinist astrophotographer. Captured here in the foreground above white clouds are mountain peaks in the Dolomite range in northern Italy . This multi-exposure image was captured from Lagazuoi , one of the Dolomites. Hundreds of millions of years ago, the Dolomites were not mountains but islands an ancient sea that rose through colliding tectonic plates . The Dolomites divergent history accounts for its unusually contrasting features, which include jagged crests and ancient marine fossils . High above even the Dolomites , and far in the distance, dark dust lanes streak out from the central plane of our Milky Way Galaxy . The stars and dust are dotted with bright red clo...

Discovery has its annual Shark Week event again, and from what I can see, at least there are no alien shark documentaries on the list this year. Meanwhile Netflix is premiering its latest studio castoff sci-fi film, Extinction , as No Man's Sky will reintroduce itself with the big Next expansion and debut on Xbox One. Hulu is streaming the first episode of Stephen King's Castle Rock series while Amazon goes behind the scenes of Tour de France food with Eat.Race.Win. and movie fans can get Steven Spielberg's Ready Player One on Blu-ray. Also, it's time for the Overwatch League finals , streaming on Twitch and airing on ESPN, Disney XD and ABC. Look after the break to check out each day's highlights, including trailers and let us know what you think (or what we missed). Blu-ray & Games & Streaming Ready Player One (3D, 4K) ...

Back in 2013, Yelp introduced an attribute that someone who values hygiene above all else would love: restaurants' health inspection scores. The website has only been displaying ratings on select restaurants' pages in New York and San Francisco, though, since the feature is part of the company's Local Inspector Value-entry Specification (LIVES) program developed with those megacities' local health departments. Now, the crowdsourced reviews portal is expanding its availability nationwide, giving y ou easy access to establishments' hygiene score cards across the US. You don't have to painstakingly dig for them in government websites anymore. Over the past five years, Yelp added health inspection scores to over 200,000 business pages. It now expects that number to balloon to nearly a million as it incorporates ratings from the official Health...

It isn't always easy to choose which music festivals to attend. You might not be aware that your dream festival exists, and the ones you do know may only have one or two artists you'd actually like to see. Spotify might just fix this. It's partnering with Festicket on a Festival Finder that uses your listening habits to help you score tickets (plus accommodations and travel) to events around the world that truly reflect your tastes. Stream a lot of trance? You may get suggestions for Creamfields in the UK and Transmission in Prague. There's a waiting list feature for festivals that have yet to offer tickets (up to a year in the future). The collaboration has an immediate appeal: it might help you find a new favorite festival, or even give you ideas for vacations that you wouldn't have considered in the past. Festicket also sees this a...

Verizon may be looking for some help launching its 5G home internet service with a bang. Sources talking to Bloomberg have claimed that Big Red is looking to team up with either Apple or Google to provide a streaming TV service when its fixed 5G broadband launches later in 2018. Although talks are still young and could easily go south, the insiders said i t would either draw on YouTube TV or "Apple TV" (a service, not the device ) to provide live programming. That last part is a head-scratcher, since Apple isn't expected to launch a video-focused service until roughly March 2019 -- Verizon might have to be patient. The price of the 5G-oriented service is still "under discussion," the sources said. YouTube TV costs $40 per month, though, so we wouldn't expect that price to vary unless there are significant changes. Apple and You...

The classic point-and-click adventure game Day of the Tentacle was released a hair over 25 years ago, so fans have been waiting a long time for a follow-up. With little sign of Double Fine releasing another entry in the series, some fans have taken the initiative to create their own, unofficial sequel. It's called Return of the Tentacle and you can download it right now for Windows, Mac and Linux. Best of all, the game is available for the low, low price of zero dollars. The sequel apes Day of the Tentacle 's 2D art style using hand-drawn locations, and it features an original soundtrack. You'll need to once again find a way of stopping Purple Tentacle from taking over the world and enslaving the human race. There's some time travel involved, along with some puzzles and familiar faces from other games. Return of the Tentacle is absolutely a labo...

Microsoft hasn't said much about its next Xbox consoles other than to acknowledge than they're in development. Details appear to be trickling out, though, and the biggest news may be what isn't included. Thurrott tipsters have maintained that the next Xbox console family, Scarlett, will include both a conventional system as well as a cloud-only model designed to work in tandem with its game streaming service . It would sell for a lower up-front price, as it would forego the beefy processing power needed to run everything locally. However, it would also address some of the latency issues associated with existing services -- it might not feel like a major compromise. Reportedly, the console would have a "limited amount of compute" inside to tackle not just basics like controller input and visual output, but game elements like collision dete...

Three lawsuits against e-cigarette start up Juul Labs, uncovered by Wired reporter Nitasha Tiku , allege that Juul's patented recipe stoked the users' nicotine addictions. One of the suits was filed in New York by the mother of a teen who started Juuling when he was 15 years old. Now, he can't stop, the suit alleges, "even though it subjects him to disciplinary measures at home and at school." The complaints, filed in the US District Court in Northern California, the San Francisco Superior Court, and US District Court in New York, specifically reference a key ingredient in Juul's recipe: compounds called nicotine salts . Nicotine salts form in the heat-dried tobacco leaves that are rolled into most cigarettes, and they're said to be... Continue reading… via The Verge - Tech Posts https://ift.tt/2uXGU2Z ...

You no longer have to toy with importing The C64 Mini if you just have to relive a childhood spent mashing on a Commodore 64's keys. Retro Games has announced that its '80s revival will reach North American retail stores on October 9th. This version still includes 64 pre-loaded titles, including era favorites like Epyx's sports games (such as California Games and Winter Games ), Boulder Dash and Speedball II: Brutal Deluxe . You can still add more, and even run C64 BASIC if you plug in a USB keyboard. There's no mention of pricing for the US (we've asked for details), but retailers are starting to take pre-orders. Whatever the cost, you may want to think carefully about snagging one. It's a good option for playing vintage C64 games with a minimum of fuss, and the library expansion is uncommon among mini consoles . We weren't the big...