The future of TikTok is at stake and could be decided soon as the U.S. Supreme Court considers free speech arguments over a potential nationwide ban. If its China-based owner, ByteDance, doesn’t relinquish control of the app, TikTok might no longer […]

The post TikTok’s future hangs in the balance as US Supreme Court weighs free speech arguments over ban first appeared on Tech Startups.

I've been watching some pretty compelling coverage of the fires in and around Los Angeles for the past few days. Personally, I flip between KNBC and KCBS, only because I subscribe to apps that allow me to do that from my couch 400 miles North in the Bay Area -- Sorry Fox and ABC stations....

Tech Life is at CES in Las Vegas, one of the world’s biggest consumer tech shows.

Schools across the US and Canada are warning parents that a data breach may have leaked information for students and employees. The K-12 operations platform PowerSchool, which supports over 60 million students and has over 18,000 customers worldwide, suffered a breach that could’ve exposed names and addresses of students and educators and, in some cases, more sensitive information like Social Security numbers, medical information, and grades.

As initially reported by Bleeping Computer, threat actors got into PowerSchool’s support platform using compromised credentials. PowerSchool told Bleeping Computer that only a “subset” of schools are affected but has not provided a count of affected school districts or people. Additionally, the outlet says that in a note provided to its customers, PowerSchool claimed it paid a ransom request and “...has received reasonable assurances from the threat actor that the data has been deleted and that no additional copies exist.”

PowerSchool’s website and social media channels have no mention of the data breach or directions for people who may have been affected.

In an email to The Verge, PowerSchool spokesperson Beth Keebler wrote that the company became aware of “a potential cybersecurity incident” on December 28th and has “taken all appropriate steps to prevent the data involved from further unauthorized access or misuse.” Keebler also wrote:

The incident is contained and we do not anticipate the data being shared or made public. PowerSchool is not experiencing, nor expects to experience, any operational disruption and continues to provide services as normal to our customers.

Valerion announced a new feature for its VisionMaster Max projector at CES 2025 that will improve setup flexibility. The company will offer alternate lenses for the projector — a feature typically only offered on professional-grade home theater hardware — that can be swapped by users to change the size of the image it produces or how far it can project. That will accommodate a wider range of installations, from smaller living rooms to spacious dedicated home theaters, without sacrificing image resolution.

The VisionMaster Max was originally announced at IFA 2024 by Valerion, which is a sister brand to AWOL Vision that focuses on ultrashort throw (UST) projectors. The brand’s VisionMaster line debuted through a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign last October, including the Max model, which offered an optical zoom feature that allows it to project images from 40 to 300 inches in size.

Image: Valerion

The swappable lenses are a new feature for the projector, which is now available for purchase for $3,999. Valerion hasn’t announced which additional lens options will be available for the VisionMaster Max or how much they’ll add to the price. The stock lens has a throw ratio of 0.9-1.5:1, while Valerion was showing off an alternative with a 1.3-2.1:1 throw ratio — better for use in larger rooms — at CES, according to New Atlas.

The upgraded version of the VisionMaster Max offers the same features and functionality as the one announced at IFA. It’s a 4K triple laser projector capable of producing 3,000 ISO lumens of brightness, according to Valerion, and has the ability to upscale lower-res content using AI. It supports the IMAX Enhanced, Dolby Vision, and HDR10 Plus standards and includes a low input lag mode for gamers with refresh rates up to 240Hz when stepping down to a 1080p resolution.

The VisionMaster Max is an all-in-one projector, so it includes a pair of 12-watt speakers with support for DTS:X and Dolby Audio. It’s got three HDMI ports, including one with eARC support. In addition to Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, it can be connected to the internet using an ethernet cable if the wireless internet signal in your home theater is problematic. And the projector runs Google TV, so you can install apps for various streaming services, including Netflix, Disney Plus, and Amazon Prime Video.

Apple Arcade is welcoming the new year with ten new games, seven of them launching today. The remainder – which includes PGA TOUR Pro Golf – will be available from February 6 …

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Data WIRED collected during the 2024 Democratic National Convention strongly suggests the use of a cell-site simulator, a controversial spy device that intercepts sensitive data from every phone in its range.

Venu Sports, the sports streaming app that Fox, Disney, and Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) announced as part of a joint venture in February, will no longer launch, the three companies said today.

The app was supposed to give subscribers access to all three conglomerates' linear channels that show sports, including ABC, Fox, ESPN, FS1, and TruTV. Original content wasn’t expected to launch with the app, but the joint multichannel video programming distributor was expected to represent about 85 percent of the US sports rights market. The app was planned to cost $43 per month.

In a joint statement shared today, the companies said:

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The hackers targeting the Treasury are dubbed Silk Typhoon, and previously mass-hacked thousands of corporate email servers.

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Venu Sports is officially out of the game. Today, Disney-owned ESPN, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery announced in a joint statement that Venu Sports, their proposed virtual MVPD service, will be discontinued. The decision is effective immediately. It comes the same week that Disney announced a deal to combine its Hulu + Live TV business...

This post was created in partnership with Linqia One influencer agency based out of San Francisco, Linqia, has built a proven framework to help brands scale their influencer strategies and show meaningful results. According to Linqia's CEO Nader Alizadeh, a different approach is required to avoid falling victim to the sea of sponsored content sameness...

For me, skateboarding has always been about getting into a flow state. Much like playing Tetris, I’m at my best when I’m skating almost subconsciously, not thinking and acting in the moment. It’s not an easy zone to get into, and music has always been my shortcut. So the greatest compliment I can give to Skate City: New York is that I’ve spent the past week fine-tuning the perfect playlist, all so that I can also perfect my runs in the game.

New York is a sequel to the original Skate City; both are available through Apple Arcade, though the first game was eventually ported to consoles as well. It comes from Snowman, the studio behind the Alto series, and the shift to New York is a lot like the move from Alto’s Adventure to Alto’s Odyssey. It’s not an entirely new experience but, rather, one that changes the setting and adds some seemingly small — but very impactful — tweaks.

What makes the series so well suited to mobile is the way it balances approachability and depth. Skate City is extremely easy to pick up. It’s a side-scrolling game, so you’re always moving left to right, and all of the various tricks and moves are performed either by a swipe, tap, or hold. It all feels...

Read the full story at The Verge.

One last chance before the divest-or-ban law takes effect on January 19th.

TikTok has just over a week before it’s forced to either separate from its Chinese parent company ByteDance or functionally cease operations in the US. An appeals court upheld a divest-or-ban law, but the Supreme Court offers one final chance for the company and its users to make their case. The court is expected to issue a decision quickly after its January 10th oral arguments on whether to at least temporarily block the law.

President Joe Biden signed the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act — which passed with bipartisan support — last year, but it will take effect just one day before he hands power to President-elect Donald Trump, who has made frequent but nebulous promises to avoid a ban. Trump filed a surprise brief urging the Supreme Court to delay enforcement until he could broker a deal — though it’s unclear if the Chinese government would approve one.

If you have an iPhone 14 or later, you can send text messages via satellite where cellular service is unavailable. This can be particularly valuable in emergency situations like the Los Angeles wildfires, where cellphone masts have been damaged or destroyed.

T-Mobile and Starlink have now teamed up to offer the same capability to owners of phones without this feature …

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From facial recognition tools to algorithms that identify diseases, agencies reported that they didn't know enough about what they're acquiring from commercial vendors.

Save 41% on a set of 2 waterproof outdoor wall lights that bring both safety and a DIY light show to your home's exterior.

Google has teamed up with the Linux Foundation to establish a new initiative called the "Supporters of Chromium-Based Browsers." At the moment, most of the money that keeps Chromium, the open-source web browser project that produced the codebase powering Chrome, comes from Google. The company says it has no intention of reducing its contribution going forward, but it also continues to "welcome others stepping up to invest more." 

Under the Linux Foundation's management, the new initiative aims to fund the open development of Chromium projects and ensure proper support for contributions that could lead to technological advancements. It's also meant to provide a "neutral space" where developers, members of the academia and big industry players can work together. Aside from Google, Microsoft, Meta and Opera have also pledged their support for the initiative. 

Google said it established the new program after hearing from "many companies and developers about how critical the Chromium project is to their work" and how they would like to give it more than direct engineering support over the years. Chrome is just one of the browsers built on Chromium — Microsoft's Edge and Opera are also based on the project's codebase, so their involvement in the initiative doesn't really come as a surprise. 

It's worth noting that the Department of Justice called for the breakup of Google last year, including a sale of the Chrome web browser. Google said in its announcement that it intends to continue supporting the Chromium project, but only time will tell if selling off Chrome will affect its contributions. 

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/a-new-initiative-will-fund-and-support-open-source-chromium-projects-143028118.html?src=rss

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