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The Like button and its associated counter have become a quick and easy way to judge the popularity of Facebook posts and online content. But now the social network is considering hiding the Like counter.

Reverse engineering of the Facebook app revealed that Facebook is experimenting with the idea of keeping the number of Likes content has a secret, and it comes after the company introduced the same policy on Instagram.

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Zao -- a Chinese face-swapping app with the potential to be used to create deepfakes -- went viral over the weekend, shooting to the top of the App Store download charts. But concerns have been raised not only over the potential for the app to be abused, but also over its privacy policies.

Of particular concern are clauses which grant the developers "free, irrevocable, permanent, transferable, and relicense-able" rights over users' photos. Zao responded by tweaking its privacy policy, but complaints are still flooding in.

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Following the release of KB4512941 for Windows 10 version 1903, users have noticed a huge leap in CPU usage by Cortana.

After installing the cumulative update, the Cortana process SearchUI.exe is making much higher use of the CPU for many people. The problem can arise on systems where Bing Search has been disabled, and a series of workarounds have been suggested while Microsoft works on addressing the problem.

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We all have them. Those days when we question our life choices. The roads not taken. The career paths followed and later regretted.

For example, why did I choose to become a quality assurance screener for Apple’s Siri-equipped devices? Surely, the idea of listening to hours upon hours of random conversations, punctuated by the occasional moan/grunt or farting noise, was not at top of mind when I graduated university with a BS in CS (or was it a CS in BS)? And, of course, there’s no way I could have anticipated the events that would transpire one fateful day in September 2019 -- events that would shake this seasoned writer to his very core.

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Happy Labor Day Weekend, dear BetaNews readers! Tomorrow, many of us "working stiffs" will get the opportunity to do nothing. We can sit around, watch TV, barbecue some meat -- hell, for one day, we can pretty much do whatever we'd like. Personally, I picked up some steaks from Costco, which are marinating now in anticipation. Sadly, not everyone will be off from work tomorrow, so if you will be at your job on Labor Day, please accept both my sympathies and respect.

If you want something fun to do tomorrow while relaxing at home, why not install Linux? Seriously, folks, what better time than Labor Day to look into replacing Windows 7 or Windows 10 on your PC with something better and faster? If your PC has been sluggish, or if you are wary of all the telemetry (spying) built into Windows 10, a distribution such as Linux Lite can breathe new life into your computer. Today, following a short beta period, Linux Lite 4.6 "Final" becomes available for download.

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If you are one of the unfortunate owners of an aluminum Apple Watch Series 2 or Series 3 that has developed cracks, there's some good news: Apple has launched a replacement program which means you may be able to get a new screen free of charge.

Apple has not given details of the number of affected units, but says that it "has determined that, under very rare circumstances, a crack may form along the rounded edge of the screen in aluminum models of an Apple Watch Series 2 or Series 3".

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Jack Dorsey's Twitter account was hacked yesterday, and the hackers -- going by the name of the Chuckle Gang -- proceeded to send racist tweets and made reference to a bomb at Twitter headquarters.

The account of the Twitter CEO was back under control relatively quickly, and the tweets sent out by the hackers were deleted. Twitter has said that its security systems were not compromised in the attack, instead blaming the account hijacking on a "security oversight" by a mobile provider which enabled hackers to take control of a mobile number associated with Dorsey's account.

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Foxit Software has revealed that it "recently" suffered a security breach in which private user data was exposed to unnamed third parties. Those whose account have been affected are being contacted and "encouraged to change their passwords".

The company -- famed for PDF applications such as Foxit Reader and PhantomPDF -- does not say when the incident took place, nor how many users are affected, but it explains that "My Account" section of user accounts was exposed. This includes data such as email addresses, passwords, users' names, phone numbers, company names and IP addresses, but not payment information.

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Windows 95 has been enjoying a nostalgia-fueled revival in recent years. There have been concepts made for modern versions of the ancient OS on desktop and mobile and it’s even now possible to give an Apple iPhone a Windows 95 makeover.

Last year, developer Felix Rieseberg released Windows 95 as an Electron app and a few months later updated it to run gaming classics like Doom. Three months ago he gave the OS a welcome performance boost, and now it gets a smart new user interface and upgraded components.

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PC gamers are really lucky nowadays. Not only are there many fun games, but lots of great hardware too. Monitors in particular have dropped in price while introducing higher refresh rates. Today, for instance, AOC launches a new monitor that is quite impressive. Called "CQ27G1," the 27-inch curved display features 2560x1440 resolution, AMD FreeSync, and an impressive 144Hz refresh rate. Best of all, it is competitively priced too.

What really intrigues me, however, is what AOC calls "Re-Spawned Warranty." Going back to a purchase date of January 1, 2019, the company will cover its gaming monitors for at least three years, including for a single dead pixel. Yes, you read that correctly -- if even one pixel goes bad, it will fix it. Many other companies require there to be many dead pixels before taking any action. Hell, for the first year, AOC will even cover accidental damage once. Believe it or not, if you do end up needing a replacement, AOC will send you a new monitor before you return the broken one.

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The UK government has always maintained that following Brexit, the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will be absorbed into UK law. This means that there will be no material changes to the data protection rules that organizations in the UK will need to follow.

However, the French data protection regulator has recently said that in the event of a no-deal Brexit and absence of an adequacy decision, it will treat the UK like any other country that is outside the European Economic Area. In other words, it will treat the UK as a "third country."  It’s likely that other EU country regulators will take this approach too -- and such decisions have legal implications for organizations.

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Bug bounty programs have become a popular way for developers to track down security issues in software, but big pay-outs are not something that every company can afford.

In a bid to keep its Android platform secure, Google has announced that its own bug bounty program is being expanded to include all big Android apps, regardless of who develops them. The company will reward security researchers who find bugs in any app in the Google Play Store with 100 million or more installs.

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In an effort to reassure privacy advocates, Tesla announced that its new automobile insurance product for owners of the company’s popular electric vehicles will not use onboard sensor data from said vehicles in determining policy premiums. The fear was that the company would use the voluminous data collected by every Tesla Model 3, S or X to pre-judge the risk associated with specific drivers and penalize those who've demonstrated a propensity for speeding or other aggressive behavior.

Most news outlets are reporting this as a win for consumers, another bit of pushback against our intrusive, surveillance-state of a world. But my question is: Why? Or, rather, why not?

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Mozilla has released Thunderbird 68.0 for Windows, Mac and Linux. Also released in portable and -- for the first time -- 64-bit form for Windows users, Thunderbird is Mozilla’s free and open-source email client.

Version 68 unveils improvements to its App Menu, incorporates the options dialog into the main program window and offers improved attachment-handling features.

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Ever since computers were invented, people have made up stories about how they'd one day become smarter than the humans that made them. While that seemed impossible with the first mega computers that had limited functional capabilities, the idea of an independent computer system is becoming more real with the development of AI.

AI, also known as artificial intelligence, has captured the fascination of people around the world. If it's developed correctly, it could be the next major technology transformation that the world undergoes. It would help many people and change lives, so what progress is being made? Recently, the Brain Simulator II was announced as a major step forward in the advancement of AI. Read on to learn more about this program and what it means for the tech community.

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