Geek News

Numerous organizations have taken on the noble task of reporting pedophilic images, but it's both technically difficult and emotionally challenging to review vast amounts of the horrific content . Google is promising to make this process easier. It's launching an AI toolkit that helps organizations review vas t amounts of child sex abuse material both quickly and while minimizing the need for human inspections. Deep neural networks scan images for abusive content and prioritize the most likely candidates for review. This promises to both dramatically increase the number of responses (700 percent more than before) and reduce the number of people who have to look at the imagery. Unlike the conventional approach, which simply compares image hashes against known offending images, the AI method can also flag previously undiscovered material. That, in turn, co...

Flashy new features almost always arrive on the most expensive smartphones first, but Samsung may start taking a different approach. DJ Koh, head of Samsung's mobile division, tells CNBC that the company is now focused on differentiating mid-range phones ahead of flagship phones, as sales lag on higher-end models. "In the past, I brought the new technology and differentiation to the flagship model and then moved to the mid-end. But I have changed my strategy from this year to bring technology and differentiation points starting from the mid-end," Koh told CNBC . The change is about "focusing on millennials" Koh reportedly said that he had reorganized Samsung's mobile development team to prepare for the strategy shift. The first phone to... Continue reading… via The Verge - Tech Posts https://ift.tt/2CgA4wC ...

NASA's new leader is gung-ho on privatizing spaceflight , and that could lead to some new approaches to branding... like it or not. Administrator Jim Bridenstine has unveiled a NASA Advisory Council committee that will explore the feasibility of commercializing the agency's operations in low Earth orbit to lower its costs while its eyes turn toward the Moon and Mars . Some of these plans could include product endorsements from astronauts and even selling the naming rights to rockets and other spacecraft. You could see an astronaut on a box of Wheaties, or a Red Bull mission to the Red Planet. Committee head Mike Gold indicated that the committee would also consider scrapping "obsolete" regulations to let American astronauts support private activities aboard the International Space Station. Companies shouldn't have to "turn to Russian ...

Sony announced a new pair of compact cameras last week with some incredible zoom capabilities, going from as wide as 24mm to as zoomed in as 720mm. This isn't the first of Sony's compact cameras to have that exact zoom range, but this year's models add 4K shooting and, in one instance, a touchscreen. That should turn them into far more capable cameras that get closer to rivaling Sony's much loved RX100 series . The new models, HX99 and HX95 , are about the size of an iPod (if you can remember the last time you held one of those), just thicker, and weigh around half a pound. That's about the same as Sony's RX100 cameras, but there's one critical difference: the RX100 line uses a larger one-inch image sensor, whereas these cameras have a... Continue reading… via The Verge - Tech Posts https://ift.tt/2NjRugd ...

Technology Who will sit in the giant Acer gaming throne once winter comes? Catch up on our podcasts! via Popular Science "https://ift.tt/2CdNvx7"

The US, UK, and three other governments have called on tech companies to build backdoors into their encrypted products, so that law enforcement will always be able to obtain access. If companies don't, the governments say they "may pursue technological, enforcement, legislative, or other measures" in order to get into locked devices and services. Their statement came out of a meeting last week between nations in the Five Eyes pact, an intelligence sharing agreement between the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. The nations issued a statement covering a range of technology-related issues they face, but it was their remarks on encryption that stood out the most. They want voluntary action... but threaten to mandate it In their m... Continue reading… via The Verge - Tech Posts https://ift.tt/2NOyHXm ...

This week, Managing Editor Terrence O'Brien is obsessed with a new sampler that he can take anywhere. It's got its quirks, but that's apparently part of the appeal. Terrence O'Brien Managing Editor I love just about any gadget that makes noise and at least approximates what you could call "music." I've got countless cheap synths, from classics like the Casio VL-1 to DIY Atari Punk Consoles . And in March I became obsessed with the $89 Teenage Engineering's PO-33 KO sampler . I've always had a soft spot for the company's tiny PO series of music making gadgets, but after watching a few YouTube videos it became clear that this was something special, and I simply had to have it. See, the KO is a pretty full featured sampler that fits in your pocket. And since I got the rubberized case too, I can a...

Valkyria Chronicles 4 will be available on the Switch, but what if you never played the original and want to brush up on your WWII-inspired turn-based strategy? Don't worry, you're set. Sega has confirmed that the original Valkyria Chronicles will be available on Nintendo's system October 16th for $20, or $15 if you have the newest title in your Switch library. This isn't the remastered edition from 2016, so you might not get a visual extravaganza -- though you might not mind if you're defending Gallia in handheld mode. For many gamers, this will represent the first chance to play a classic Valkyria game on the go. VC2 and VC3 were only available on the PSP, Valkyria Revolution was only portable on the PS Vita, and Valkyria Chronicles D was a browser- and mobile-based game with fundamentally different mechanics. This brings the core series to...

Environment The weak storm is on its way out of Florida, but it's gaining strength. The weak tropical storm will eventually make landfall somewhere between New Orleans and Mobile—possibly on the verge of hurricane strength. via Popular Science "https://ift.tt/2PxaN2N"

It's been the subject of creepshots on public transit. It's reportedly been stolen and sold for thousands on the black market a full two months before its official announcement. And in the latest leak of Google's upcoming Pixel 3 XL, well, someone accidentally left the thing in their Lyft . It happens to the best of us, right? It's understandable that people with test units might be letting their guard down a bit since this phone has already been so thoroughly leaked. The driver, a Pixel 2 XL owner himself, quickly realized that he was handling the latest Pixel; there's no mistaking that notch. After shooting a few photos and sending them to Android Police , he returned the pre-production Pixel 3 XL to its rightful (and probably... Continue reading… via The Verge - Tech Posts https://ift.tt/2wyR9wr ...

Sony is perhaps the last bastion of smaller smartphones. Or at least, it used to be. For years now, Sony has been making "Compact" versions of its top-tier handsets that are more or less flagships in their own right. Each generation of Sony's latest XZ series of phones hasn't deviated from this tradition until IFA 2018, where Sony announced the new Xperia XZ3 , but no XZ3 Compact. Has the appetite for smaller phones finally vanished? Or are manufacturers content to let the hungry starve either way? In the before-times, the default size of smartphones began to increase as bigger screens became more affordable. At the same time, devices of the more petite variety developed a reputation for being crappy. Companies including LG and Samsung got into the habit of using disingenuous naming conventions for their smaller devices. They would take the title of th...