Liveblog: All the Google and Android News From Google I/O WIRED Staff05-28-2015 | 18:22:41 UTC [COMMAND VOICE] WIRED Staff05-28-2015 | 18:21:37 UTC Ellie Powers, Google Play product manager. Brian Barrett05-28-2015 | 18:20:48 UTC — Okay get ready for some Google Play axxxion. David Pierce05-28-2015 | 18:20:32 UTC — Now we’re about to talk about app discovery on Google Play. Ellie Powers here to tell us about it. 50 billion app installs in the last 12 months, she says, and a billion people actively using Android. WIRED Staff05-28-2015 | 18:20:19 UTC #buzzwords people WIRED Staff05-28-2015 | 18:19:10 UTC David Pierce05-28-2015 | 18:18:36 UTC — You can create a developer page on Google Play now, “ a single destination for all your apps on the Play store.” And you can run ads inside of your app, and more. Android has always needed to find ways to make more money for its developers, and […]

When will the future arrive? When will the future arrive? The future isn’t just around the corner. It’s here. With endless curiosity and a relentless work ethic, we bring the future closer every day. We spend our time inventing the technologies and advancing the industries that will define generations to come. These are the technologies of the future, today. Mobile Experiences Want the power of several professional level gadgets to fit neatly into a single device? No problem. We’re focused on creating increasingly powerful technologies that are small, light, and smart when it comes to battery use. Because if you can pack more capabilities into less space, why wait. Camera Mobile devices are no longer a runner-up to standalone cameras, thanks to stellar light optimization, color balance and even 3D imaging. Plus, our technologies enable innovative finishing options, like automatic color & tone correcting, as well as the ability to […]

Security News This Week: Be Careful With Your Apple Watch and Starbucks App A pedestrian walks by a Starbucks Coffee shop. Justin Sullivan So many hacks, so few days in the week to write alarming stories about every one. With this post, we’re introducing WIRED Security’s new weekly roundup of the security vulnerabilities and privacy updates that didn’t quite rise to our level for in-depth reporting, but deserve your attention nonetheless. Starbucks App Reportedly Hacked; Starbucks Denies It Hackers have reportedly been drawing funds from bank accounts attached to refillable Starbucks accounts. In breaking the story, Bob Sullivan reported that thieves were getting in by way of Starbucks mobile app. Starbucks has said in response that its app wasn’t hacked. Instead it suggested in a statement that hackers were obtaining the login credentials to customer mobile accounts through other means and compromising each account individually. Venom Vulnerability Was Not Bigger […]

So, the NSA Has an Actual Skynet Program Orion Pictures We’ve suspected it all along—that Skynet, the massive program that brings about world destruction in the Terminator movies, was just a fictionalization of a real program in the hands of the US government. And now it’s confirmed—at least in name. As The Intercept reports today, the NSA does have a program called Skynet. But unlike the autonomous, self-aware computerized defense system in Terminator that goes rogue and launches a nuclear attack that destroys most of humanity, this one is a surveillance program that uses phone metadata to track the location and call activities of suspected terrorists. A journalist for Al Jazeera reportedly became one of its targets after he was placed on a terrorist watch list. Ahmad Muaffaq Zaidan, bureau chief for Al Jazeera’s Islamabad office, got tracked by Skynet after he was identified by US intelligence as a possible […]

The Oculus Rift Is Coming In Early 2016 Oculus VR The wait for an Oculus Rift VR headset is almost over. Almost. In a post published on the Oculus Blog, the team behind the Oculus Rift announced its first consumer virtual-reality headset will ship to consumers in the first quarter of 2016. Pre-orders for the VR headset will start later this year, and a few dark and mysterious photos of the headset were posted along with the announcement. According to the Oculus blog, the headset will be based on the Crescent Bay prototype, which means there will be 360-degree positional tracking features on the headset. Oculus VR The blog post says the tracking system in the first-generation consumer VR headset will improve upon the tracking system featured in Crescent Bay. It’s designed so that you can use the headset for VR experiences while you’re sitting down or standing up and […]

How a Circular Smartphone Could Help Us Rethink Tech . Runcible is more of a provocation than a product, but it’s an interesting provocation. Screens are rectangles. Even the 3-year-old playing with your iPad could tell you that. But what would the digital world look like through a different sort of frame? Say… a circular one? Monohm, a startup based in Berkeley, California, was founded around this very idea. For the last year, the three-person team has been working a circular, palm-sized device dubbed Runcible. They cheekily refer to it as the “anti-smartphone,” a description that goes for both its form factor and its value system. The round device is meant to be the antidote to our feed-obsessed, notification-saturated digital existence. It’s a challenge to the rectangular status quo and everything it represents. That’s a quixotic dream, but an interesting one. Different Rectangles, Different Effects Display technologies have a long […]

Here’s How to Stream the Mayweather-Pacquiao Fight . Tonight, people all over the world will somehow, some way, be watching the pay-per-view Floyd Mayweather vs. Manny Pacquiao boxing match that’s being hyped as ‘the Fight of the Century.’ But for many, it won’t be easy. HBO and Showtime have exclusive rights to the match and are ready to take down illegal streaming sites offering the show. They’re so aggressive, they’ve already filed a couple of lawsuits against piracy sites that had planned to stream the fight.HBO and Showtime are trying to make it impossible to watch the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight online. But where there’s an Internet, there’s a way—even if it’s a fairly convoluted one. Truly, the only option if you’re a cord-cutter or a globetrotter is to use a VPN, or Virtual Private Network.A VPN service basically gives you a new IP address, one from a server located in another […]