Facebook’s hours-long outage on Monday left its nearly 3 billions users unable to connect with each other on the service, and apparently not everyone was content to wait for the social networking giant to work out its problem. The company behind Telegram, an instant-messaging-app rival to Facebook’s Messenger, said Tuesday that it added 70 million …

The person behind a leak of internal Facebook research that served as the basis for a series of news reports about the harm the social network’s platforms cause, publicly revealed herself on 60 Minutes on Sunday. She is a former algorithmic product manager at Facebook named Frances Haugen. Haugen, who worked at Facebook for about two years, told 60 Minutes …

Facebook on Wednesday released its internal research regarding the impact of Instagram on teens after a Wall Street Journal investigation raised serious concerns about the photo-sharing app’s impact on the mental health of teens, including girls’ body image.  The report, based on a “trove of internal communications” reviewed by the Journal, prompted US lawmakers to press the world’s largest social network …

Facebook agreed to pay billions of dollars extra on top of an initial fine sought by the Federal Trade Commission in 2019 to protect CEO Mark Zuckerberg from personal liability related to a massive data leak probe, shareholders allege in a pair of lawsuits made public on Tuesday. In lawsuits filed last month in Delaware’s Chancery Court, two groups of …

The Bezos Earth Fund on Monday pledged $1 billion to help protect vulnerable nature and Indigenous peoples around the world, with an initial focus on the Congo Basin, the tropical Andes and the tropical Pacific Ocean. The goal of the $1 billion pledge is protect 30% of land and sea from mass extinctions and climate change by 2030.  The commitment …

Facebook on Saturday criticized a series of Wall Street Journal articles about the social media platform’s negative effects on users, saying the articles contained “deliberate mischaracterizations” and “conferred egregiously false motives to Facebook’s leadership and employees.” The series, based on information culled from internal Facebook documents and online employee discussions, reported that the company was aware of the “platform’s ill …

Amazon plans to roll out a self-branded TV in the US as early as October, Business Insider reported Thursday. The TVs, expected to be big-screen models in the range of 55 to 75 inches, will include compatibility with the company’s Alexa voice assistant, the news outlet said, citing unidentified sources. The US launch has been in the works for nearly …

Apple’s iPhone 13 will feature satellite communication connectivity that will allow users to make calls and send texts in areas without cellular coverage, according to a note from Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. The forthcoming handset will include hardware that allows it to tap low Earth orbit satellites, allowing it to stay connected in areas that lack 4G or 5G coverage, …

A passenger’s Samsung Galaxy A21 caught fire Monday inside the cabin of an Alaska Airlines flight after landing at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, forcing the crew to deploy the aircraft’s evacuation slides to remove the flight’s occupants. The passenger’s phone “overheated and began sparking” after the flight from New Orleans landed Monday evening, an Alaska Airlines spokesperson told the Associated Press. …

For the most up-to-date news and information about the coronavirus pandemic, visit the WHO and CDC websites. Apple reportedly told corporate employees on Thursday that their expected return to the office will be delayed until January amid a surge in COVID-19 cases and variants. The iPhone maker said in a memo to employees that it will confirm the reopening timeline a month …