Over two decades, the United States and its allies spent hundreds of millions of dollars building databases for the Afghan people. The nobly stated goal: Promote law and order and government accountability and modernize a war-ravaged land. But in the Taliban’s lightning seizure of power, most of that digital apparatus — including biometrics for verifying […]
Tech
The Middle East on Monday got its first completely automated cashier-less store, as retail giant Carrefour rolled out its vision for the future of the industry in a cavernous Dubai mall. Like Amazon’s breakthrough unmanned grocery stores that opened in 2018, the Carrefour mini-market looks like any ordinary convenience store, brimming with sodas and snacks, […]
China’s famous chipmaker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC) revealed on Friday plans to upsurge independence in the chip manufacturing sector by investing $8.87 billion to build a chip plant in the tech city of Shanghai, according to a regulatory filing with the Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKSE). The Chinese expansion to globally take the lead […]
Facebook has apologized for putting a “primates” label on a video of Black men, according to a report in the New York Times. The newspaper said the video was posted by a tabloid in June and showed Black men in altercations with white civilians and police officers. After the video ended, an automatic message popped […]
The anticipation for Apple’s annual unveiling of its newest iPhone line is reaching a boiling point, as the tech giant is preparing for its mid-to late-September event at the company’s California headquarters where the public will get a glimpse of the new iPhone 13. While the event hasn’t been announced yet, Apple usually never skips […]
Ask for a roast beef sandwich at an Arby’s drive-thru east of Los Angeles and you may be talking to Tori — an artificially intelligent voice assistant that will take your order and send it to the line cooks. “It doesn’t call sick,” says Amir Siddiqi, whose family installed the AI voice at its Arby’s […]
After almost 6 years since YouTube’s launch, the video streaming site now boasts 50 million Music and Premium subscribers. The milestone marks a 30 percent increase from December of last year, which indicates that a great number of users are willing to enhance their free YouTube experience by paying to subscribe to the premium version. […]
Over the past week or so, Apple has eased some longstanding restrictions that helped make its App Store into a big moneymaker for the company. The company has long required app developers to pay high commissions to Apple on the sales of paid apps as well as purchases of subscriptions or digital items inside their […]
Apple will officially give developers of certain apps the option to link their customers to external websites to conduct their payments, addressing a longstanding App Store complaint that’ll solve the tech giant’s in-app payment system and its 30 percent cut. In a statement, the California-based company noted that changes will appear by early next year […]
The U.S. government’s highway safety agency wants detailed information on how Tesla’s Autopilot system detects and responds to emergency vehicles parked on highways. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration made the detailed request in an 11-page letter sent to the electric car maker that was dated Tuesday. The letter is part of a wide-ranging investigation […]