Can’t quit Facebook? You can protect yourself without deleting your account

Facebook started out as a great way to connect the world, find old friends, and upgrade this whole “face-to-face” talking thing we’ve been stuck with. It ended up as a way for marketers to Hoover up our information and sell stuff to us. The recent fiasco with Cambridge Analytica is a perfect example of everything that’s wrong with the social network.

But maybe, just maybe, there’s still some good left in Facebook. Maybe you don’t want to leave — how else would you stay in touch with Cousin Margo and that friend who moved to Australia? There are a variety of ways you can protect your private data, ensure your confidentiality, and in general prevent all those bad actors from latching onto your data. Follow the steps below to protect yourself without deleting Facebook entirely — or just go whole hog and delete your Facebook account completely.

Alternative No. 1: Remove Facebook from apps

This first alternative removes Facebook from connected apps. You’re essentially turning the platform off so third-party apps don’t have access to your account and its information. Here’s how to block them:

Step 1: Click on the down arrow button next to the question mark icon on the navigation bar.

Step 2: Click Settings.

Step 3: On the resulting “General Account Settings” page, click the “Apps” category in the menu on the left.

Step 4: On the resulting page, locate “Apps, Websites and Plugins” listed under the apps and click the “Edit” button.

Step 5: On the pop-up, click the blue “Disable Platform” button.

Alternative No. 2: Block specific data used by other apps

With this method, you’re controlling the data friends and family take with them to other apps, such as your birthday, relationships, education, employment, and so on. Here’s how you can cut off their data supply:

Step 1: Click on the down arrow button next to the question mark icon on the navigation bar.

Step 2: Click Settings.

Step 3: On the resulting “General Account Settings” page, click the “Apps” category in the menu on the left.

Step 4: On the resulting page, locate “App Others Use” and click the “Edit” button.

Step 5: On the pop-up window, choose the data you allow other people to bring with them in their apps.

Step 6: Click the blue “Save” button.

Alternative No. 3: Turn off Facebook’s data collection on other websites

Finally, our third alternative pertains to your Facebook information used for advertisements. These include your use of websites and apps, and advertisements paired with your social actions. Here’s how to nuke this use of your data:

Step 1: Click on the down arrow button next to the question mark icon on the navigation bar.

Step 2: Click Settings.

Step 3: On the resulting “General Account Settings” page, click the “Ads” category in the menu on the left.

Step 4: On the resulting “Your ad preferences” page, scroll down to “Ad Settings.”

Step 5: Switch on or off “Ads based on your use of websites and apps.”

Step 6: Switch on or off “Ads on apps and websites off of the Facebook Companies.”

Step 7: Choose “Only my friends” or “No One” for “Ads with your social actions.”

Step 8: While you’re here, scroll up to “Your information” and switch off the available settings to your preference.

Still want to delete your Facebook account? Fine then. Let’s move on.

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‘Sea of Thieves’ technical problems and how to fix them

Microsoft and Rare launched online pirate adventure game Sea of Thieves on March 20, and players around the world have started exploring its vast waters and blowing each other up with their ships’ cannons. When everything is working as intended, Sea of Thieves can be an exhilarating adventure, but players have reported a number of technical issues and bugs in the game’s opening days, which have kept everyone (including us) from finding the fun. We compiled a list of the most common problems players have reported, as well as any possible steps you can take to fix them.

Connection issues

Big surprise here: An online-only multiplayer game is suffering from connection issues at launch. Upon loading into the Sea of Thieves main menu, you might see a message such as “KiwiBeard, “Greybeard,” or “DaffodilBeard,” among other facial hair-themed errors. The majority of these are error messages related to the game’s servers rather than a problem with your system or your own internet connection.

Possible solutions:

• There isn’t much you can do to resolve server-side errors. Instead, check back during hours where game traffic is likely to be lower, such as the middle of the day. Rare is working to alleviate the issues, and they should begin to stabilize in the days following the launch.
• If you get either a “CinnamonBeard” or “BronzeBeard” connection error, Rare recommends completely quitting the Sea of Thieves application and restarting it. To do this on Xbox One, return to the system’s dashboard, highlight the game and press the “menu” button. Choose to quit the game, then start it as you normally do and attempt to connect again.

Missing reputation, ship, or currency

Occasionally, you may load into Sea of Thieves, and find you don’t have any items, that your currency will be completely depleted, or that your ship hasn’t appeared. You may also find you aren’t receiving any new money or earning reputation for completing voyages. Don’t worry: It’s related to the server problems Rare is having, and it can almost always be resolved.

Possible solutions:

• Quit to the main menu of Sea of Thieves and then reconnect to the game. This will usually alleviate any issues you have with your currency being completely missing or with your ship not spawning at the dock. If it doesn’t work on your first attempt, try reconnecting a second time. Should this fail, you may just need to wait it out.
• If your reputation or currency aren’t increasing when you complete new voyages, you aren’t losing out on any rewards for good. These changes should be credited to your account at a later time. Rare is working on a permanent solution to stop this delay from occurring in the future.

Glitches and gameplay issues

There are a few other problems in Sea of Thieves that don’t appear to be tied directly to server issues. These range from the amusing to the frustrating, and most of them don’t have any player-side solutions.

• Ships going airborne — occasionally you will see a player’s ship launch into the sky like a killer whale and soar through the air before landing in the water once again. We encountered it after damaging an enemy with cannonballs, but it can be frustrating when you’re trying to navigate through tight areas and a ship suddenly lands in front of you.
• Dropping through the floor of your ship — when entering the bottom deck of your ship, you can transport through the floor and land in the sea, requiring a mermaid in order to get back onboard.
• Material and supplies not working correctly — we encountered a bug with consumable items that made for some pretty stressful fights. Instead of being able to carry 10 cannonballs or five bananas, we were only able to carry two of each. The game would still display the incorrect number, however, dropping from nine cannonballs to zero after loading the second into a cannon. We were able to correct this by quitting to the main menu and reconnecting to the game.

Wish your Galaxy S9 were a Pixel? Here’s how to make it look like stock Android

The Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus were recently released, but not everyone is a fan of the software powering each device. Samsung’s Experience UI — formerly known as TouchWiz — has improved with each passing update and smartphone release, however, there are still plenty of people who would prefer to work with something a bit more bare bones. Lucky for you, we’re going to show you how to make your S9 and S9 Plus look like the stock version of Android.

Choosing a stock launcher

First, you need to change the launcher. If you’re not familiar with the commonplace tool, it’s basically the app you use as your home screen. There are plenty of customized offerings to choose from in the Google Play Store, but if you’re trying to achieve that stock Android look, we recommend opting for the Pixel Launcher. To do so, navigate to this website on your mobile device, tap the blue Download APK button located near the bottom of the page, and save the installer to your device.

Once downloaded, pull down the notification — or navigate to the MyFiles app on your phone — and tap the APK, followed by Install. After you’ve successfully installed the launcher, tap your home button and select it from the resulting list. If you want to continually use the Pixel Launcher moving forward, go ahead and select Always in the bottom-right corner.

Opting for a messaging app

The next thing you’ll want to change is the messaging app. We personally prefer Google’s offering given it allows you to swipe away messages upon reading them, but most users will likely want to stick with something like Android Messages. To set it up, simply head to Google Play, install the app, and follow the on-screen prompts to set the app as your default messaging platform. We also suggest you pick up Google’s stock keyboard, the aptly titled Gboard, which will complement Android Messages — the installation/setup process is the same as that for the aforementioned messaging platform.

Setting Chrome as your default browser

Next, let’s ensure that Google Chrome is set as your default web browser. To do so, click the cog icon in the upper-right corner of your home screen, select Apps, and tap the three dots in the upper-right corner. Then, select Default apps from the resulting menu, tap Browser app, and check the bubble beside Chrome. Now, whenever you open a link or anything that requires your browser, your phone should automatically open the content in Chrome.

Choosing the appropriate dialer

Once you’ve set your default browser, it’s time to turn your attention to your dialer and contacts. There’s no stock version available for either (that we know of), but there is a decent clone in the Google Play Store called ExDialer. After you’ve downloaded and installed the app, open the Settings menu, select Apps, and tap the three dots in the upper-right corner. Next, select Default apps from the resulting menu, tap Calling app, and select ExDialer.

Selecting a calendar

Now, let’s set Google Calendar as your go-to calendar app. The app should already be on your device, but if it’s not, you can pick it up from the Google Play Store. Once installed, go to the Settings menu, select Apps, and tap Calendar. Afterward, tap Clear defaults, and the next time something requires you to input an event, choose Google Calendar from the host of available options, which will set it as your default calendar moving forward.

Implementing live wallpapers

Although not exactly “stock” Android, one of the better features Google decided to bring to its Pixel lineup are living wallpapers. These depict outer space and other exotic locales, and essentially function as animated backgrounds, adding a modern touch to your device. Adding them to your Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus, however, is a multi-step process.

David Cogen/The Unlockr

First, navigate to the Google Play Store and download the Wallpapers app. Then, navigate to the XDA website on your mobile device, download the AKP file that’s listed in the first post, and save the installer directly to your phone. Once downloaded, pull down the notification and tap Install, which should enable a section for live wallpapers within the Wallpapers app. Once that’s taken care of, simply choose your wallpaper of choice, tap Set wallpaper in the upper-right corner, and choose whether you’d like to set it as either your home screen or both your home screen and lock screen!

David Cogen — a regular contributor here at Digital Trends — runs TheUnlockr, a popular tech blog that focuses on tech news, tips and tricks, and the latest tech. You can also find him on Twitter discussing the latest tech trends.

Hublot’s first smartwatch will cost over $5,000

Another luxury brand is jumping into the smartwatch game. Hublot has announced that it’s making a limited number of its first smartwatch — an extension of its Big Bang line that’s all about the 2018 FIFA World Cup. While World Cup referees will wear the watch, consumers will be able to buy it as well, though the company says it’s only making 2,018 of them. The smartwatch will announce World Cup matches 15 minutes before they begin and will update wearers on yellow and red cards, player changes and goals. Game statistics will appear on the watch face while play is ongoing.

The Big Bang smartwatch runs Google’s Wear OS and is compatible with Android 4.4 and above as well as iOS 9 and above. It goes on sale starting May 1st and it will cost you. Jean-Claude Biver, watch chief at Hublot’s parent company LVMH, told Bloomberg that it will be priced around 5,000 francs (approximately $5,241).

Hublot’s watch is the latest addition to those offered by luxury brands. Others include models from Tag Heuer and Montblanc.

Netflix opens its public bug bounty program

Today, Netflix announced the launch of its public bug bounty program. The company, which has been expanding its bug bounty setup over the last few years, started with a responsible vulnerability disclosure program in 2013. That then led to its private bug bounty program, which it launched in 2016 with 100 Bugcrowd researchers on board. Since then, Netflix has invited over 700 researchers to participate and has received 145 valid submissions since launch. The company’s new public program is on the Bugcrowd platform.

Netflix joins a number of other companies that have public bug bounty programs aimed at rooting out security flaws before they become an issue. Intel recently opened up its program following the Meltdown and Spectre fiasco while Apple launched its in 2016. Samsung, Google, DJI and Twitter are also among those with bug bounty programs.

On average, Netflix pays out $1,102 for valid submissions, though it has paid as high as $15,000 in the past. You can see the company’s payout scale here. The company says its report acknowledgement average is 2.7 days and researchers that spot an issue that Netflix then fixes get added to the Security Researcher Hall of Fame.

Source: Netflix (1), (2)

Google makes Pixel 2’s driving awareness available to Android apps

If you have a Pixel 2, you might have appreciated its Driving Do-Not-Disturb feature — it can automatically minimize distractions while telling the difference between a stop at the intersection and the end of your ride. That intelligence hasn’t really been available beyond Google’s walls, however, and the company is fixing that problem. It’s releasing a Transition programming kit that makes this contextual awareness available to all Android apps. The framework combines location, motion detection and other sensor data to gauge what you’re doing without killing your phone’s battery.

Google can already point to example apps, both of which involve driving: QuickBooks Self-Employed uses the kit to accurately track mileage, while Life360 can provide a timeline of drives.

As you might guess from this, the possibilities are relatively narrow right now. Google plans to add more activities to the Transition framework over time, though, including an ability to account for trains and other vehicles. It’ll take a while before developers latch on to the feature, but you could eventually see many apps that account for what you’re doing without asking you to lift a finger.

Source: Android Developers Blog

Mark Zuckerberg finally weighs in on Cambridge Analytica

While stories about Cambridge Analytica harvesting data from millions of Facebook accounts without consent sparked conversations and debates over the weekend, one voice was conspicuously absent from the mix: Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. That’s officially no longer the case, though — Zuckerberg posted a lengthy response to the Cambridge Analytica situation on his personal Facebook page in which he pledged to investigate “all apps that had access to large amounts of information” before Facebook changed its policy in 2014 and more actively control the kind of data access available to developers.

“The good news is that the most important actions to prevent this from happening again today we have already taken years ago,” he wrote. “But we also made mistakes, there’s more to do, and we need to step up and do it.”

Zuckerberg spends the first part of his response running through the events as we know them, and by now they’re fairly well understood — a Cambridge researcher created a personality quiz that was taken by around 300,000 people, but because of the way Facebook’s Friend APIs worked at the time, those 300,000 people inadvertently also handed over information about the people in their own social networks. All together, this meant Kogan — and Cambridge Analytica, the political research firm with whom Kogan shared everything — walked away with data from tens of millions of people. Upon discovering that transaction, Facebook banned the app and insisted all that data be deleted. As it turns out, that might not have been the case, so Facebook recently banned Cambridge Analytica from the platform and hired a forensics firm to audit CA’s systems to make sure the data is really gone.

After getting everyone up to speed, Zuckerberg laid out a plan for ensuring incidents like this don’t happen again. As mentioned, that will involve Facebook investigating apps that had access to broad swathes of user information before shutting down the API that allowed users to pass on data about their friends. Developers that fall into Facebook’s crosshairs and do not agree to an audit will be banned outright.

Going forward, Facebook will also prevent developers from re-accessing your data if you haven’t used their app within three months. More importantly, the social giant plans to reduce the amount of personal information developers can access when you sign into an app or service using your Facebook account. According to Zuckerberg, “only your name, profile photo, and email address” will be shared — currently, app developers can access public profile information like your name, age range, gender, locale and time zone without needing Facebook to review the app in question. And finally, Facebook will make an existing tool that allows users to revoke data access to apps they’ve greenlit in the past more prominent by placing it right at the top of people’s news feeds.

While many probably preferred a quicker response from Facebook’s leader, Zuckerberg has offered concrete steps to help prevent illicit data harvesting in the future. That said, the word “sorry” appears not once in the CEO’s 935-word post; the closest Zuckerberg gets to an apology are references to “mistakes” the company has made. Also missing is any explanation as to why Facebook seemingly made no effort to contact any user whose data might have been illicitly obtained after the company figured out what happened. Given the public’s response to the reporting of the Cambridge Analytica story, to say nothing of the anti-Facebook sentiments shared by industry heavyweights like WhatsApp co-founder Brian Acton, Zuckerberg’s measured response — while technically proficient — seems unlikely to satisfy people considering bailing on Facebook entirely.

Pininfarina will go from designer to automaker with all-EV lineup

For decades, Pininfarina has largely been a design house — it shaped and built cars, but usually under someone else’s name (such as the Ferrari F40). It’s apparently ready to become a full-fledged manufacturer, however, and a thoroughly 21st century one at that. Autocar sources have heard that Pininfarina is launching an all-electric car lineup headlined by a hypercar, nicknamed PF-Zero, that would aim squarely at the Bugatti Chiron with a 2020 launch. It would have power comparable to the 1,479HP of the Chiron, and would be based on a modular platform jointly developed by its parent company Mahindra (a Formula E competitor) and Rimac. There would also be more accessible models… relatively speaking.

The rest of the lineup reportedly involves SUVs. The highest-end model in the group, codenamed PF-One, would tout roughly 940HP (from a monstrous 140kWh battery pack) and a sub-3 second 0-62MPH acceleration. It’d chase after the Lamborghini Urus. The other too models, meanwhile, would pursue the Porsche Cayenne SUV and Macan crossover.

The tipsters said Pininfarina would officially enter manufacturing with an announcement at the same time as Rome’s Formula E race gets underway on April 14th. If so, it’d be part of a larger trend where familiar auto industry names launch primarily or exclusively electric car brands. While they tend to focus on the high end, they reflect a growing confidence that companies can revolve around EVs instead of treating them as niche models.

Via: Autoblog

Source: Autocar

The New York Times brings Bowie exhibit to your phone with AR

Now that Google has released its first take on an Android augmented reality framework, ARCore 1.0, quite a few AR apps are taking advantage of it. The New York Times, who has already released an AR experience around Olympic athletes for iOS, is now launching a new AR feature that focuses on David Bowie’s “visual legacy.” This is also one of the few AR experiences that supports both ARKit and ARCore, making it available on both iOS and Android.

You can access the new Bowie feature via The New York Times app, projecting life-size versions of the rock star’s iconic costumes into your own space. As with other AR experiences, you can explore the outfits as if they were really there, walking around to see the back, for example, or getting up close to see details you might miss in a photo. The pieces were scanned at the Brooklyn Museum just before the “David Bowie is” exhibition opened.

Source: The New York Times

Facebook lays out stricter rules to protect your social data

It’s been a few years coming, but today Facebook unveiled its strategy for protecting user data on its platform. The basic gist? The company is going to be more cautious about how data is shared, and be much more transparent with its users. Today’s announcement came alongside Mark Zuckerberg’s delayed response to reports of Cambridge Analytica’s data harvesting strategy, which managed to gather information from 50 million people.

Facebook was quick to point out that it already implemented fixes that would prevent another company from repeating Cambridge Analytica’s technique. For example, the company started reviewing apps that asked for user data before they launched in 2014, and it’s given users more ways to control how developers access their data. But those tools weren’t exactly easy to use, even for tech-savvy users.

Moving forward, Facebook says it’s going to fully audit apps that had access to large amounts of data before its 2014 platform revamp, as well as ban any offenders. Given that Facebook knew about Cambridge Analytica’s data mining strategy in 2015, responded with a mere wrist slap (the company asked for collected data to be deleted, but never double-checked to see if that were true), and didn’t ban them until last week, the company has to be extra vigilant to prove it’s taking privacy issues seriously.

Additionally, Facebook says it’ll alert anyone affected by malicious apps, something the company should have been doing from the start. One of the more damning aspects of the Cambridge Analytica story was that Facebook didn’t warn the 50 million users that their data was potentially being misused. Perhaps more than just saying it’ll keep people informed, Facebook has to prove to its 2.2 billion monthly users that it can actually be trusted.

The company will also turn off data access to apps you haven’t used in three months. While that might lead to headaches for some, especially for people who don’t often log into Facebook, it squashes one of the platform’s big vulnerabilities. Just go look at your Facebook privacy settings — there’s a good chance you’ve given random apps access to your data and have completely forgotten about it. In a similar vein, the company says it’s also going to make it easier for people to control how apps user their information.

In a future update to its Login tool, Facebook will also restrict the data that unapproved apps can see to your name, photo and email address. Beyond that, developers will have to be approved by Facebook. The company is also expanding its bug bounty program to reward people who discover apps that maliciously gather data.

While all of these updates should vastly improve data privacy on Facebook, it’s inexcusable that it took a major PR disaster for the company to implement them. As social media scholar Zeynep Tufekci wrote in the New York Times, “If Facebook failed to understand that this data could be used in dangerous ways, that it shouldn’t have let anyone harvest data in this manner and that a third-party ticking a box on a form wouldn’t free the company from responsibility, it had no business collecting anyone’s data in the first place.”

Source: Facebook