Category: info1
Google Chrome adds AI-powered store summaries to help US shoppers
Google on Monday announced an update to its Chrome web browser that will introduce AI-generated store reviews to U.S. shoppers with the aim of helping to determine the best places to make a purchase. The feature, which will be available by clicking an icon just to the left of the web address in the browser,…
Why Dispo’s co-founder made the leap from social media to steelmaking
Daniel Liss, co-founder of the social network Dispo and the dating app Teaser AI, is convinced he’s onto the next big thing: steelmaking. It all started, incongruously, with a few op-eds he wrote for TechCrunch about anti-trust enforcement in social media. The commentaries apparently caught the attention of some folks in Washington D.C., Liss told…
Allianz Life says ‘majority’ of customers’ personal data stolen in cyberattack
U.S. insurance giant Allianz Life has confirmed to TechCrunch that hackers stole the personal information of the “majority” of its customers, financial professionals, and employees during a mid-July data breach. When reached by TechCrunch, Allianz Life spokesperson Brett Weinberg confirmed the breach. “On July 16, 2025, a malicious threat actor gained access to a third-party,…
‘Wizard of Oz’ blown up by AI for giant Sphere screen
The massive Las Vegas venue known as Sphere will be screening its first classic movie, “The Wizard of Oz,” starting on August 28. And as detailed in a segment on CBS Sunday Morning, this isn’t just a matter of taking the existing movie and projecting it on Sphere’s 160,000 square foot, wraparound LED screen. Instead,…
Itch.io is the latest marketplace to crack down on adult games
Indie video game marketplace Itch.io announced this week that it has “deindexed” adult and not-safe-for-work games, removing them from its browse and search pages. The move, the company said, was in response to a campaign by Collective Shout (an advocacy group that has previously criticized video games, rap music, and lingerie commercials) targeting both Itch.io…
DOGE has built an AI tool to slash federal regulations
The Department of Government Efficiency hopes to use a new AI tool to eliminate half of the federal government’s regulatory mandates, according to The Washington Post. Citing a PowerPoint presentation dated July 1, The Post reports that the DOGE AI Deregulation Decision Tool is supposed to analyze around 200,000 federal regulations and identify the ones…
Astronomer winks at viral notoriety with ‘temporary spokesperson’ Gwyneth Paltrow
After spending the past week-plus in the headlines due to a seemingly inescapable social media scandal, data operations startup Astronomer is trying to shift the narrative with a tongue-in-cheek video starring actress and entrepreneur Gwyneth Paltrow. Paltrow was, of course, previously married to Coldplay singer Chris Martin. And it was at a Coldplay concert in…
U.K. starts enforcing online age check rules
A U.K. law requiring that pornography websites verify the age of their users took effect Friday. The BBC reports that around 6,000 porn sites have said they will start verifying users’ ages to comply with the Online Safety Act, although at least one major site was not requiring age checks as of Friday morning. The…
Tesla vet says that ‘reviewing real products’ — not mockups — is the key to staying innovative
GM’s EVs have been on a roll lately. After selling just the Chevy Bolt for years, a wave of new models — now up to 17 fully electrified vehicles — has pushed the automaker into second place in the U.S. behind Tesla. How did it get there? With a little help from a Tesla veteran.…
Dating safety app Tea breached, exposing 72,000 user images
Tea, an app that allows women to post anonymous comments about men they’ve supposedly dated, announced Friday that it has suffered a data breach, with hackers gaining access to 72,000 images. That number includes 13,000 selfies and photo IDs submitted for account verification, as well as 59,000 images from posts, comments, and direct messages, the…
