Articles about Internet

The possibility of Google making a return to China was leaked this summer, but the company has remained pretty tight-lipped about the matter. But now CEO Sundar Pichai has spoken publicly about the prospect of Google producing a censored version of its search engine to comply with Chinese regulations.

Speaking at a conference in San Francisco, Pichai revealed that Google has, internally, built a search engine for China, because "we wanted to learn what it would look like". He said that the company is "exploring" the idea, and pointed out that 99 percent of searches would not be censored.

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Google has long been eyed with suspicion, and incidents such as covering up potential data leaks does nothing to help. Privacy and security have increased in importance for the average internet user, and this has seen people moving away from Google and investigating the alternatives.

One beneficiary of this shunning of Google is DuckDuckGo. The privacy-focused search engine has enjoyed a 50 percent surge in usage over the last year, and it can now boast a new record of 30 million daily searches.

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In less than two weeks, Twitter's Moments will no longer be available to mobile users.

Seemingly in recognition of the fact that hardly anyone used the feature, Twitter is killing off the ability to create Moments in its iOS and Android apps. But the company is not completely shutting down Moments -- the feature will still be available to those who really want to continue using it.

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Following the footsteps of Microsoft Edge and Chrome, Firefox is -- at long last -- going to offer support for the delivery of notifications through Windows 10's Action Center.

The move will please many Firefox users as this is a highly-requested feature, and it brings Mozilla's web browser in line with its rivals. While there is no release date for the finished version of Firefox 64, Action Center notification support has already made its way into the nightly builds.

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We live in an age where privacy is simultaneously highly valued and under increasing attack -- and nowhere is this truer than online. The EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) has been fighting the corner for web users for some time, and with the latest version of its Privacy Badger extension it is helping people fight back against Google.

The latest update to the extension -- which is available for Chrome and Opera on the desktop, and Firefox on both the desktop and Android -- introduces new blocks on "link tracking" in Google web search, Hangouts and the Docs suite

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Google has announced the availability of a new TLD (top-level domain) from its own Google Registry. Joining the likes of .com and .org comes .page which is described as "a new opportunity for anyone to build an online presence".

With security in mind, Google says that all .page websites require an SSL certificate. For businesses and individuals, the race is now on to grab the domain they want before it is snapped up by someone else.

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The problems of bullying, harassment and trolling on social media are getting worse all of the time and the likes of Twitter and Facebook are under pressure to offer tools and protection to their users. Today Facebook unveils new options to help empower those who fall victim to such attacks.

One new feature provides a way to report or delete multiple posts at once, and there is also a way to report bullying on behalf of someone else. Facebook is introducing new protections for public figures -- who frequently find themselves under attack -- and is also pushing education programs.

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Tim Berners-Lee is famous for inventing the world wide web, and now he's ready to take things to the next level with an ambitious open source project called Solid. Noting that the web has become "an engine of inequity and division", Berners-Lee wants to restore the power and agency of individuals online and move the balance of power away from "powerful forces who use it for their own agendas".

Solid is not a completely new venture. Berners-Lee has been working on it for some time, and it is built on the existing web as we know it. Where it differs is that "it gives every user a choice about where data is stored, which specific people and groups can access select elements, and which apps you use". This is about decentralizing the web.

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Mozilla has partnered with Troy Hunt -- the brain behind data compromise checking service Have I Been Pwned -- to create its own data breach notification service. Called Firefox Monitor, the free service lets users check if any of their email accounts or personal data have been involved in data breaches.

More than this, Firefox Monitor can also keep an eye out for future data breaches and notify those who have signed up whether their data has been affected.

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With the release of Chrome 70, Google is set to address two recent privacy concerns with its browser. Users have been unhappy with Chrome 69 forcibly signing them into the browser when they sign into a Google website, and there have also been concerns about the handling of cookies.

Due for release in the middle of October, the next version of the web browser will enable users to disable the controversial sign-in feature, as well as changing the way Chrome handles the clearing of auth cookies.

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CRM service Zoho disappeared from the internet after its domain registrar suspended it for failing to deal with phishing appropriately.

TierraNet blacklisted Zoho.com after receiving complaints about phishing emails sent from Zoho-hosted accounts. This meant that many businesses were unable to access their documents, address books and emails, causing chaos for many. Zoho has said that in order to ensure such an occurrence is never repeated, it will become a domain registrar itself.

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Chrome users have reacted angrily after the discovery of a new forced sign-in for the web browser. In short, the change means that when you sign into a Google service -- such as Gmail -- you are also automatically signed into this account within Chrome itself.

While a handful of people have welcomed the new sign-in activity, there is a very vocal number who are extremely unhappy. In addition to the perceived privacy concerns, what has particularly upset people is the fact that they are being signed into Chrome without being told about it.

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Alex Jones' Infowars has found itself cut off from yet another platform. Having been booted from social media sites including Twitter and Facebook, as well as YouTube and the App Store, PayPal has now given it the elbow.

The online payment service has taken exception to Infowars' promotion of "hate" and "discriminatory intolerance" and has hit Jones' cash cow where it hurts -- in the wallet. He has been given ten days to find a new payment processing service.

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More than half of adults worldwide are more likely to consult digital resources than their significant other (SO) for recommendations for products and services according to a new report by cloud database company DataStax.

In the US, 64 percent of adults choose digital resources over their SO, in the UK it's 61 percent, and Germany, 52 percent. The French, however, are still inclined to the offline approach with only 45 percent of adults choosing digital resources over their SO.

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Amazon has been hit with allegations of staff bribery which the company says it is investigating.

A report in the Wall Street Journal this weekend claims that employees have been accepting bribes in return for leaks of sales data. It is also alleged that staff help out independent sellers by deleting negative reviews in exchange for payment, and restore accounts that have been banned.

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