As promised, popular RSS reader NetNewsWire, which changed ownership last year, has released v5.0. From a blog post: NetNewsWire 5.0 is shipping! In case you haven't been following along until just now: NetNewsWire is an open source RSS reader for Mac. It's free! You can just download it and use it. No strings. It's designed to be stable, fast, and free of bugs. It doesn't have a lot of features yet, and that's because we prioritized quality over features. We will be adding more features, of course, but not quickly. We're also working on an iOS app.

Get ready for the iPhone 11 on September 10. Apple today sent invites to reporters for its next big product launch. It plans to introduce its newest devices and services at 10am, at the Steve Jobs Theater in Cupertino. From a report: The iPhone may be a tougher sell this year. Apple isn't expected to change the basic design of the device, making it the first time the iPhone's had the same look for three years in a row. At the same time, rivals are introducing phones with flexible screens and with 5G -- two innovations not found in Apple devices. Many people are looking toward 2020 for big iPhone changes. This year, Apple is expected to introduce three new models, replacing the iPhone XS, XS Max and XR with the rumored iPhone 11, 11 Max/11 Pro and 11R. The devices likely will include better cameras, faster processors and iOS 13. They come at a time of malaise in the smartphone market, with people holding onto their devices longer than before.

Apple has released today an iOS security update to patch a bug the company accidentally un-patched in an earlier release, introducing a security weakness that allowed hackers to craft new jailbreaks for current iOS versions. From a report: The original bug, discovered by Ned Williamson, a Google Project Zero security engineer, allows a malicious app to exploit a "user-after-free" vulnerability and run code with system privileges in the iOS kernel. iOS version 12.4.1, released today, re-patches this bug that was initially fixed in iOS 12.3 but was accidentally unpatched in iOS 12.4, last month. Sadly, Apple's blunder didn't go unnoticed and earlier this month, a security researcher named Pwn20wnd released a public exploit based on Williamson's bug that could be used to jailbreak up-to-date iOS devices and grant users complete control over their iPhones. But while users taking a risk and jailbreaking their own devices doesn't sound that dangerous, a lesser-known fact is that malware operators and spyware vendors can also use Pwn20wnd's jailbreak as well.

Netflix is testing an all-new recommendation system called "Collections" that relies on humans instead of neural networks. TechCrunch reports: While Netflix today already offers thematic suggestions of things to watch, based on your Netflix viewing history, Collections aren't only based on themes. According to Netflix, the titles are curated by experts on the company's creative teams, and are organized into these collections based on similar factors -- like genre, tone, story line and character traits.

This human-led curation is different from how Netflix typically makes its recommendations. The streaming service is famous for its advanced categorization system, where there are hundreds of niche categories that go beyond broad groupings like "Action," "Drama," "Sci-Fi," "Romance" and the like. These narrower subcategories allow the streamer to make more specific and targeted recommendations. Netflix also tracks titles that are popular and trending across its service, so you can check in on what everyone else is watching, as well. The feature is currently in testing on iOS devices and can be found at the top right of the app's homepage, if you've been opted in to the test.

Yubico is releasing the $70 YubiKey 5Ci, the first security key that can plug into your iPhone's Lightning port or a USB-C port, and it's compatible with popular password vaults LastPass and 1Password out of the box. The Verge reports: That means you may not have to remember your password for your bank ever again -- just plug the YubiKey into your iPhone, use it to log into the 1Password app, and get that bank password. At launch, it'll support these well-known password managers and single sign-on tools: 1Password, Bitwarden, Dashlane, Idaptive, LastPass, and Okta. And when using the Brave browser for iOS, the YubiKey 5Ci can be used as an easier way to log into Twitter, GitHub, 1Password's web app, and a couple other services.

Notably, the 5Ci doesn't work with the newest iPad Pros at all, despite having a USB-C connector that fits. And you can't just plug the Lightning side of the 5Ci into an iPhone and expect it to work with any service that supports the FIDO authentication protocol -- our passwordless future isn't here just yet. Yubico tells The Verge that services have to individually add support for Lightning connector on the 5Ci into their apps.

Bill Stasior, the former head of Apple's Siri division, is leaving the company after nearly a decade to join Microsoft's artificial intelligence division, reports The Information. "Although Stasior left Apple in May, he's only joining Microsoft later this month as a corporate vice president, reporting to Chief Technology Officer Kevin Scott," reports The Verge. "Stasior worked at Apple for more than seven years, joining back in 2012." From the report: After Giannandrea took a more hands-on role in the Siri division upon being hired last summer, he was subsequently promoted to a senior vice president role at Apple in December. That meant he was reporting directly to CEO Tim Cook, and he was also responsible for all machine learning and general AI projects at Apple. According to The Information, that promotion resulted in Stasior walking away from day-to-day duties running the Siri team.

Prior to Giannandrea joining, Stasior had the responsibility of running Siri, who was vice president of the division for more than seven years. But Apple effectively tossed executive leadership of the product around like a hot potato. It was initially former iOS software chief Scott Forstall's job to oversee Siri, but after he left the company unceremoniously over the controversial Apple Maps fiasco, the role went to services chief Eddy Cue and then eventually VP of software engineering Craig Federighi. Finally, when Giannandrea joined, Siri had a proper executive to oversee it, but that seems to have resulted in Stasior's departure for reasons unknown. The Information notes that Stasior will not be working on Cortana. Instead, he'll be leading up an AI group, although it's unclear what exactly he'll be working on.

Apple has mistakenly made it a bit easier to hack iPhone users who are on the latest version of its mobile operating system iOS by unpatching a vulnerability it had already fixed. From a report: Hackers quickly jumped on this over the weekend, and publicly released a jailbreak for current, up-to-date iPhones -- the first free public jailbreak for a fully updated iPhone that's been released in years. Security researchers found this weekend that iOS 12.4, the latest version released in June, reintroduced a bug found by a Google hacker that was fixed in iOS 12.3. That means it's currently relatively easy to not only jailbreak up to date iPhones, but also hack iPhone users, according to people who have studied the issue.

"Due to 12.4 being the latest version of iOS currently available and the only one which Apple allows upgrading to, for the next couple of days (till 12.4.1 comes out), all devices of this version (or any 11.x and 12.x below 12.3) are jail breakable -- which means they are also vulnerable to what is effectively a 100+ day exploit," said Jonathan Levin, a security researcher and trainer who specializes in iOS, referring to the fact that this vulnerability can be exploited with code that was found more than 100 days ago. Pwn20wnd, a security researcher who develops iPhone jailbreaks, published a jailbreak for iOS 12.4 on Monday.

A group of app developers have penned a letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook, arguing that certain privacy-focused changes to Apple's iOS 13 operating system will hurt their business. From a report: In a report by The Information, the developers were said to have accused Apple of anti-competitive behavior when it comes to how apps can access user location data. With iOS 13, Apple aims to curtail apps' abuse of its location-tracking features as part of its larger privacy focus as a company. Today, many apps ask users upon first launch to give their app the "Always Allow" location-tracking permission. Users can confirm this with a tap, unwittingly giving apps far more access to their location data than is actually necessary, in many cases. In iOS 13, however, Apple has tweaked the way apps can request location data. There will now be a new option upon launch presented to users, "Allow Once," which allows users to first explore the app to see if it fits their needs before granting the app developer the ability to continually access location data. This option will be presented alongside existing options, "Allow While Using App" and "Don't Allow." The "Always" option is still available, but users will have to head to iOS Settings to manually enable it. The app developers argue that this change may confuse less technical users, who will assume the app isn't functioning properly unless they figure out how to change their iOS Settings to ensure the app has the proper permissions.

Apple has filed a lawsuit against Corellium, accusing the software company of illegally selling virtual copies of iOS under the guise of helping discover security flaws. "Apple said the software company Corellium has copied the operating system, graphical user interface and other aspects of the devices without permission, and wants a federal judge to stop the violations," reports Bloomberg. From the report: Apple said it supports "good-faith security research," offering a $1 million "bug bounty" for anyone who discovers flaws in its system and gives custom versions of the iPhone to "legitimate" researchers. Corellium, the iPhone maker said, goes further than that. "Although Corellium paints itself as providing a research tool for those trying to discover security vulnerabilities and other flaws in Apple's software, Corellium's true goal is profiting off its blatant infringement," Apple said in the complaint. "Far from assisting in fixing vulnerabilities, Corellium encourages its users to sell any discovered information on the open market to the highest bidder."

Corellium creates copies of the Apple iOS, and says that it's all to help white-hat hackers discover security flaws. Instead, according to Apple, any information is sold to people who can then exploit those flaws. Corellium, in a posting dated July 4 on its website, said it "respects the intellectual property rights of others and expects its users to do the same." Corellium's products allow the creation of a virtual Apple device, according to the suit. It copies new versions of Apple works as soon as they are announced, and doesn't require users to disclose flaws to Apple, the Cupertino, California-based company said in the complaint. Apple also wants a court order forcing Corellium to notify its customers that they are in violation of Apple's rights, destruction of any products using Apple copyrights, and cash compensation.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: Apple, Google, Amazon, and most recently Facebook have been found hiring human workers to transcribe audio captured by their own products. Motherboard found Microsoft does the same for some Skype calls, and is still doing so despite other companies suspending their reliance on contractors. A cache of leaked documents obtained by Motherboard gives insight into what the human contractors behind the development of tech giants' artificial intelligence services are actually doing: laborious, repetitive tasks that are designed to improve the automated interpretation of human speech. This means tasks tech giants have promised are completed by virtual assistants and artificial intelligence are trained by the monotonous work of people.

The work is magnified by the large footprint of speech recognition tools: Microsoft's Cortana product, similar to Apple's Siri, is implemented in Windows 10 machines and Xbox One consoles, and is also available as on iOS, Android, and smart speakers. The instruction manuals on classifying this sort of data go on for hundreds of pages, with a dizzying number of options for contractors to follow to classify data, or punctuation style guides they're told to follow. The contractor said they are expected to work on around 200 pieces of data an hour, and noted they've heard personal and sensitive information in Cortana recordings. A document obtained by Motherboard corroborates that for some work contractors need to complete at least 200 tasks an hour. The pay for this work varies. One contract obtained by Motherboard shows pay at $12 an hour, with the possibility of contractors being able to reach $13 an hour as a bonus. A contract for a different task shows $14 an hour, with a potential bonus of $15 an hour. A Microsoft spokesperson told Motherboard in an emailed statement, "We're always looking to improve transparency and help customers make more informed choices. Our disclosures have been clear that we use customer content from Cortana and Skype Translator to improve these products, we engage third party expertise to assist in this process, and we take steps to de-identify this content to protect people's privacy."

The headphone jack is increasingly being omitted from smartphones and tablets, but what about laptops? When Apple launched the redesigned MacBook Pro in 2016, it decided to remove the SD card slot, full-sized USB Type A ports, and Thunderbolt 2 ports -- but keep the 3.5mm headphone jack, even though it axed the headphone jack in the 2016 iPhone 7. The reason, Apple said, had to do with the lack of wireless solutions for pro audio gear that many users use with their MacBooks. "If it was just about headphones then it doesn't need to be there," said Apple marketing chief Phil Schiller. "We believe that wireless is a great solution for headphones." He added: "But many users have set-ups with studio monitors, amps and other pro audio gear that do not have wireless solutions and need the 3.5mm jack."

While most laptops today still retain the headphone jack, that trend doesn't seem like it'll last for too much longer as the industry moves to embrace wireless audio. Laptop alternatives like Apple's iPad Pro and Samsung's Galaxy Tab S5e have both ditched the 3.5mm port, meaning it's only a matter of time until laptops themselves lose the port. Our question to you is: do you use the headphone jack on your laptop? Would you mind if a manufacturer removed the port to make room for a bigger battery or make the device slimmer and more portable? Let us know your thoughts below.

Apple and Spotify are in talks about potentially enabling Siri to play songs, albums, and playlists from the leading subscription music service. The Verge: A new report from The Information confirms that Spotify would be taking advantage of new capabilities that Apple is introducing in iOS 13 and iPadOS 13, which allow other apps to be on equal footing with Apple Music when making music requests through the company's Siri voice assistant. If Spotify takes advantage of the new tools, you'll be able to play music without having to open the app on your iPhone or iPad. The integration could be a sign of progress between two companies that have butted heads to a more heated degree than ever before over the last year. In March, Spotify filed an antitrust complaint with the EU that accused Apple of disadvantaging third-party services that compete with its own apps. Among other gripes (such as Apple's subscription tax), Spotify pointed to hands-free Siri compatibility as one convenient feature that Apple was reserving for its own Apple Music service. Further reading: Apple Says Spotify Wants 'the Benefits of a Free App Without Being Free'; and Apple Cites Irrelevant Spotify Subscription Stats In New Antitrust Defense.

Eyal Guthmann, a software engineer at cloud storage service Dropbox, writes: Until very recently, Dropbox had a technical strategy on mobile of sharing code between iOS and Android via C++. The idea behind this strategy was simple -- write the code once in C++ instead of twice in Java and Objective C. We adopted this C++ strategy back in 2013, when our mobile engineering team was relatively small and needed to support a fast growing mobile roadmap. We needed to find a way to leverage this small team to quickly ship lots of code on both Android and iOS. We have now completely backed off from this strategy in favor of using each platforms' native languages (primarily Swift and Kotlin, which didn't exist when we started out). This decision was due to the (not so) hidden cost associated with code sharing.

Here are some of the things we learned as a company on what it costs to effectively share code. And they all stem from the same basic issue: By writing code in a non-standard fashion, we took on overhead that we would have not had to worry about had we stayed with the widely used platform defaults. This overhead ended up being more expensive than just writing the code twice.

Long-time Slashdot reader freelunch reports that Google Voice "has announced via email that they are ending one of their most popular features -- sending transcripts of voice mails via text message. The cited reason is carrier message blocking."

From Google's email: It has come to our attention that certain carriers are blocking the delivery of these messages because they are automated and, at times, contain transcripts that resulted from unsolicited robocalls.

We can no longer ensure these messages will be delivered, so unfortunately we are turning down the feature. We have been slowly rolling out these changes and expect them to be fully deployed by 9 August 2019. No action is needed on your part.

However, the Get voicemail via email continues to be supported. As an alternative, the Google Voice iOS, Android and web apps can always be used to check voicemail and view transcripts.

Google is launching a beta of its augmented reality walking directions feature for Google Maps, with a broader launch that will be available to all iOS and Android devices that have system-level support for AR. On iOS, that means ARKit-compatible devices, and on Android, that means any smartphones that support Google's ARcore, so long as "Street View" is also available where you are. TechCrunch reports: Originally revealed earlier this year, Google Maps' augmented reality feature has been available in an early alpha mode to both Google Pixel users and to Google Maps Local Guides, but starting today it'll be rolling out to everyone (this might take a couple of weeks depending on when you actually get pushed the update). We took a look at some of the features available with the early version in March, and it sounds like the version today should be pretty similar, including the ability to just tap on any location nearby in Maps, tap the "Directions" button and then navigating to "Walking," then tapping "Live View" which should appear near the bottom of the screen.

The Live View feature isn't designed with the idea that you'll hold up your phone continually as you walk -- instead, in provides quick, easy and super-useful orientation by showing you arrows and big, readable street markers overlaid on the real scene in front of you. That makes it much, much easier to orient yourself in unfamiliar settings, which is hugely beneficial when traveling in unfamiliar territory.

Apple says it will offer up to $1 million for hackers who can find vulnerabilities in iPhones and Macs. "That's up from $200,000, and in the fall the program will be open to all researchers," reports Forbes. "Previously only those on the company's invite-only bug bounty program were eligible to receive rewards." From the report: As Forbes reported on Monday, Apple is also launching a Mac bug bounty, which was confirmed Thursday, but it's also extending it to watchOS and its Apple TV operating system. The announcements came in Las Vegas at the Black Hat conference, where Apple's head of security engineering Ivan Krstic gave a talk on iOS and macOS security. Forbes also revealed on Monday that Apple was to give bug bounty participants "developer devices" -- iPhones that let hackers dive further into iOS. They can, for instance, pause the processor to look at what's happening with data in memory. Krstic confirmed the iOS Security Research Device program would be by application only. It will arrive next year.

The full $1 million will go to researchers who can find a hack of the kernel -- the core of iOS -- with zero clicks required by the iPhone owner. Another $500,000 will be given to those who can find a "network attack requiring no user interaction." There's also a 50% bonus for hackers who can find weaknesses in software before it's released. Apple is increasing those rewards in the face of an increasingly profitable private market where hackers sell the same information to governments for vast sums.

Twitter has disclosed more bugs related to how it uses personal data for ad targeting that means it may have shared users data with advertising partners even when a user had expressly told it not to. TechCrunch reports: Back in May the social network disclosed a bug that in certain conditions resulted in an account's location data being shared with a Twitter ad partner, during real-time bidding (RTB) auctions. In a blog post on its Help Center about the latest "issues" Twitter says it "recently" found, it admits to finding two problems with users' ad settings choices that mean they "may not have worked as intended." It claims both problems were fixed on August 5. Though it does not specify when it realized it was processing user data without their consent.

The first bug relates to tracking ad conversions. This meant that if a Twitter user clicked or viewed an ad for a mobile application on the platform and subsequently interacted with the mobile app Twitter says it "may have shared certain data (e.g., country code; if you engaged with the ad and when; information about the ad, etc)" with its ad measurement and advertising partners -- regardless of whether the user had agreed their personal data could be shared in this way. It suggests this leak of data has been happening since May 2018 -- which is also the day when Europe's updated privacy framework, GDPR, came into force. Twitter specifies that it does not share users' names, Twitter handles, email or phone number with ad partners. However it does share a user's mobile device identifier, which GDPR treats as personal data as it acts as a unique identifier. The second issue Twitter discloses in the blog post also relates to tracking users' wider web browsing to serve them targeted ads. Here Twitter admits that, since September 2018, it may have served targeted ads that used inferences made about the user's interests based on tracking their wider use of the Internet -- even when the user had not given permission to be tracked.

Privacy has been a renewed focus with Apple's next operating system update. One new feature in iOS 13 that seems centered on user privacy could have sweeping consequences for messaging and online call apps. From a report: In iOS 13, Apple will not allow apps to run voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) in the background when the programs are not actively in use. Many apps that offer VoIP services currently run in the background, and they will need to be rewritten to adjust to Apple's upcoming rules. The change is slated to roll out when iOS 13 is released in September. However, app developers will get a grace period, and they have until April 2020 to comply. VoIP services ostensibly stay running in the background so they can connect calls quickly, but they also let those apps collect information about what users are doing on their devices. Restricting the programs that can simply be open at any time on its mobile hardware fits the narrative Apple is crafting about being a trusted place for customer privacy in an increasingly untrustworthy industry.

Google is expanding its Advanced Protection Program to its Chrome browser. From a report: If you're an Advanced Protection Program user and you have sync turned on in Chrome, you will now automatically receive stronger protections against risky downloads. Google didn't go into much detail regarding the protections, likely not to publicly give away how they work. But the company did say that when users attempt to download "certain risky files," Chrome will now show additional warnings, or in some cases even block the downloads outright. The warnings are, however, only available in Chrome for Windows, Mac, and Linux. Google is not rolling out the Advanced Protection Program to Chrome for Android and iOS.

Google researchers have shared details of five flaws in Apple's iMessage software that could make its devices vulnerable to attack. The BBC reports: In one case, the researchers said the vulnerability was so severe that the only way to rescue a targeted iPhone would be to delete all the data off it. Another example, they said, could be used to copy files off a device without requiring the owner to do anything to aid the hack. Apple released fixes last week. But the researchers said they had also flagged a sixth problem to Apple, which had not been rectified in the update to its mobile operating system.

Apple's own notes about iOS 12.4 indicate that the unfixed flaw could give hackers a means to crash an app or execute commands of their own on recent iPhones, iPads and iPod Touches if they were able to discover it. Apple has not commented on this specific issue, but has urged users to install the new version of iOS, which addresses Google's other discoveries as well as a further range of glitches and threats. One of the two Google researchers involved - Natalie Silvanovich - intends to share more details of her findings at a presentation at the Black Hat conference in Las Vegas next month.