Canada: Bank of Montreal and Simplii Financial hit by hackers
Over the weekend, the Bank of Montreal and Simplii Financial both issued statements indicating that they had fallen victim to hackers. In the case of Simplii Financial, around 40,000 customer accounts have been affected, but numbers have not been revealed for the Bank of Montreal.
Both banks' statements indicate that they were contacted by "fraudsters" on Sunday, May 27, but it is not clear whether the two incidents relate to the same group.
Some US websites are blocked in the EU as GDPR day arrives
It has been impossible to avoid stories about GDPR over the last few weeks and months, and today the new rules regarding privacy and personal data come into force across the EU.
Inboxes across Europe have been flooded with GDPR-related emails as companies have rushed to comply with the new regulations that require them to seek consent from users to collect data about them. But now GDPR day has arrived, dozens of US websites are blocked in the EU.
StumbleUpon is closing down -- users can migrate to Mix.com
After 16 years, StumbleUpon is closing down. One of the first high-profile services that gave people a way to discover new websites and online content, it was enjoyed by over 40 million users.
The closure came out of the blue, and was announced by co-founder Garrett Camp in a blog post. He suggests that users might like to migrate to another one of his creations, Mix.com, and says that switching to the newer service has been made "as smooth as possible".
Google quietly relegates 'Don't be evil' from its Code of Conduct
For a long time, the words "don't be evil" were associated with Google. While not an official motto as such, the words were heavily ingrained in the company.
Google's method of operating has caused many people over the years to question the phrase, and when the company was re-organized under Alphabet the motto became "do the right thing". Nonetheless, in the Google Code of Conduct which is given to employees, "don't be evil" remained -- until just a few weeks ago when it was quietly relegated.
Twitter tweaks algorithms to give trolls less prominence
Twitter's troll problem has not improved, despite various measures taken by the company. The latest attempt to get things under control finds Twitter changing its algorithms to take into account "behavioral signals" and help bury content from trolls.
The algorithm tweaks do not mean that tweets will be deleted, but those that are found to "distort and detract from the public conversation" will be pushed further down conversations and search results to reduce their visibility.
Facebook launches Youth Portal to tell teenagers how it uses their data
Facebook has launched a new Youth Portal with the aim of educating its teenage users about using the social network safely.
The portal also reveals to teens how Facebook uses their data, and is packed with tips about using the service and translates the site's Data Policy into a more understandable form.
Walmart buys a controlling share in India's Flipkart
Rumors have circulated for a number of weeks, but now it's official: Walmart has just said it will spend $16 billion buying a controlling sharing in Flipkart, the Indian ecommerce site. The American retail giant fought off a last-minute bid from Amazon.
The deal values Flipkart at $20.8 billion, and will see Walmart taking an initial stake of 77 percent of the company. The remainder of Flipkart ownership is shared between Tencent, Tiger Global and Microsoft, as well as its co-founder Binny Bansal.
Vine successor V2 is postponed for an 'indefinite amount of time'
It is now over a year since Vine closed down, and fans have been holding out for a follow-up to the video service. Co-founder Dom Hofmann previously said that work was underway on a successor called V2, but this has now been put on hold.
Blaming "financial and legal hurdles", Hoffmann now says that the project has been postponed "for an indefinite amount of time". He says that he had hoped to bring V2 to life as a personal project, but the realization that more money will be needed means that investors need to be brought onboard.
Most popular travel sites have unsafe password practices
A new study of password and account security on 55 of the world's most popular travel-related sites reveals that 89 percent leave their users' accounts potentially exposed to hackers due to unsafe password practices.
The research by password management company Dashlane tested each website on five critical password and account security criteria. A site received a point for each criterion it met, for a maximum score of 5/5. Any score below 4/5 was considered failing and not meeting the minimum threshold for good password security.
Wikipedia now offers link previews -- but you can disable them
When you decide to look up anything on Wikipedia, you run the very serious risk of falling down a rabbit hole that will take you many hours to find your way back out of. To help avoid the problem of going off on too much of a tangent, the site recently introduced a new link preview feature.
It's a simple idea which means that it is possible to preview a page before you visit it, simply by hovering over the link. But it's not to everyone's taste. If you've noticed the new feature and want to kill it, you'll be pleased to hear that you can.
Instagram launches Data Download tool so you can grab the contents of your account
A couple of weeks ago, Instagram said that it was working on a tool that would enable users to download everything from their accounts. Now the tool has been launched ahead of the roll out of GDPR in Europe.
There has been no fanfare for the data download tool, but it's available for everyone to use. It gives people the opportunity to download "photos, comments, profile information and more" which is ideal for anyone looking to either backup their data, or who is thinking about moving to a rival service.
Facebook publishes its internal Community Standards guidelines and introduces appeals process
Facebook faces lots of criticisms and questions, and while much of this is focused on privacy and security, there are also lots of queries about what is permitted on the platform. To help users to understand what's allowed and what's not, the company has published its Community Standards for everyone to read.
As well as making it clear exactly what sort of content is likely to attract the attention of censors, Facebook is also introducing a new appeals process, giving people the ability to fight back if their content is removed.
Online banking security improves but only a third are free of critical vulnerabilities
The percentage of critical vulnerabilities in online banking systems is falling, but two thirds still contain at least one critical vulnerability according to a new report.
Enterprise security specialist Positive Technologies has released its Financial Application Vulnerabilities Report, drawn from audits performed by the company.
Facebook reveals new privacy controls for users around the world
Facebook has been hit with renewed criticism of its privacy policies in recent weeks in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Having promised to give users more control over their privacy settings -- and after already introducing some tools to this end -- the social network has now revealed how it will comply with General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in Europe and bring new "privacy protection" to users around the world.
With the impending arrival of GDPR, it had previously been thought that European Facebook users would have greater privacy controls than those in other parts of the world. But the company then revealed that GDPR-style privacy controls would actually be made available to everyone. Today, Facebook makes good on that promise, starting the rollout of new privacy settings in Europe and then around the globe.
Weibo reverses homosexuality policy in China: 'We're no longer targeting gay content'
Following a huge backlash over the weekend, Weibo -- the Chinese equivalent of Twitter -- has announced a reversal of a policy that would have seen gay content banned from the platform.
Originally announced on Friday, the "clean-up" operation was due to last three months, and covered violence and pornography as well as homosexual content. Now, however, Weibo has felt the pressure of public outcry and backed down saying: "We're no longer targeting gay content".
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