Technology - Kalakshar US

Disney reportedly lost 1.7 million paid subscribers in the week after suspending Kimmel

Reporter Marisa Kabas, founder of The Handbasket, posted on Bluesky today that more than 1.7 million subscribers canceled their paid Disney streaming plans between September 17 and September 23. The total allegedly includes subscriptions to Disney+, Hulu and ESPN. That falloff reportedly marked a 436 percent increase over the usual churn rate for the service. We’ve reached out to Disney+ for comment on this claim.

Disney also chose to increase subscription prices last week, which could prolong the wave of cancellations. Kabas’ source also claimed that Disney sped the return of the late night show because it had planned to announce the price hike last Tuesday.

In case you need a reminder of the entertainment news that dominated headlines for the past two weeks, Disney-owned ABC suspended the late night talk show Jimmy Kimmel Live on September 17 after President Donald Trump and members of his administration accused the host of making inappropriate comments regarding the assassination of right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk. Although Disney then announced on September 22 that the program would be reinstated the following night, it seems a lot of viewers were not impressed with the company’s actions.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/disney-reportedly-lost-17-million-paid-subscribers-in-the-week-after-suspending-kimmel-201615937.html?src=rss

Tile trackers reportedly have a security flaw that can let stalkers track your location

Researchers have discovered major security flaws with Tile tracking tags, according to a report by Wired. These flaws could allow both the company itself and tech-savvy stalkers to track a user’s location. The security issue could also let a malicious actor falsely frame a Tile owner for stalking, as the flaw can make it appear as if a particular tag is constantly in the vicinity of somebody else’s tag.

The issue pertains to how Tile tags transmit data during use. Tile tags transmit a lot of data beyond that of other trackers, including the static MAC address and the rotating ID. According to reporting, none of this stuff is encrypted. The rotating ID changes all of the time, but a MAC address doesn’t.

Researchers believe that all of this information is stored in cleartext, making it easy for hackers to get ahold of. This also would theoretically give Tile itself the ability to track its users, though the company says it doesn’t have this capability.

It gets worse. Anyone with a radio frequency scanner can allegedly intercept all of this information as it’s being transmitted, creating another potential security hole. Also, this problem might not even be solved if Tile decides to stop transmitting the MAC address. This is because the company generates its rotating ID in such a way that future codes can be reliably predicted from past ones.

“An attacker only needs to record one message from the device,” one of the researchers behind the findings said, adding that a single recorded message will “fingerprint it for the rest of its lifetime.” The researcher said this creates a risk of systemic surveillance.

The security researchers, who are involved with the Georgia Institute of Technology, reached out to Tile’s parent company Life360 in November of last year to report the findings. Wired said the company stopped communicating with the researchers in February. The company did say it has made a number of improvements to its security but didn’t elaborate further.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/tile-trackers-reportedly-have-a-security-flaw-that-can-let-stalkers-track-your-location-183949165.html?src=rss

Meta is bringing new facial recognition tools to the UK, EU and South Korea

Meta is expanding its use of facial recognition in Europe, the UK and South Korea to crack down on accounts that impersonate public figures. The new facial recognition-powered safety features are now live on Facebook in the regions and will expand to Instagram in the coming months.

The technology was initially put to use last year starting in the US, helping to identify ads that fraudulently use a celebrity’s likeness as well as to help people regain access to hacked accounts. Public figures opt in to this program in Europe, which is also being rolled out in South Korea alongside the new protections against impersonation. This new use case is aimed at scammers who pose as public figures to trick unsuspecting users into sending money or other scams of that nature.

“We’ll now use facial recognition technology to compare the profile picture on the suspicious account to the real public figure’s Facebook and Instagram profile pictures. If there’s a match, we will remove the impostor account,” said a Meta spokesperson.

In addition to the US rollout, the company’s facial recognition technology has been used to aid account recovery in the UK, EU and South Korea since March. This came three years after Facebook decided to shut down its facial recognition system on Facebook, due in large part to public backlash against the technology.

The social media giant touts the benefits of these tools, reporting that in the first half of 2025, user reports of “celebrity bait” ads dropped by 22 percent globally. Facial recognition remains a controversial technology, with differing public opinion on its use in law enforcement and the workplace.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/meta-is-bringing-new-facial-recognition-tools-to-the-uk-eu-and-south-korea-185303065.html?src=rss

A PlayStation photography book featuring never-before-seen design concepts is on the way

Sony has been marking the 30th anniversary of PlayStation by selling you stuff, like PS5 consoles and accessories styled after the PS1. The company has something else lined up to mark the occasion: a photography book showcasing “never-before-seen prototypes, concept sketches and design models that shaped hardware development” from the early days through to the current PS5 era.

PlayStation: The First 30 Years is a 400-page hardback book printed on heavyweight matt art stock. You better hope your coffee table is sturdy, since this book is a chonkster. It weighs in at 5kg (11lbs).

Sony worked with publisher Read-Only Memory on PlayStation: The First 30 Years. The collaborators have offered a peek at what’s inside the book. It’s shaping up to be a fascinating glimpse at some of the designs Sony tried for its hardware over the last few decades.

For instance, the original PlayStation could have looked much different, more directly exemplifying designer Teiyu Goto’s “vision of simple squares and circles coming to life.” (For what it’s worth, Engadget deputy editor Nathan Ingraham said this design looked like a proton pack):

An early concept design for the original PlayStation.

Sony/Read-Only Memory

Some of the controller concepts are pretty out there too. Some don’t look all that comfortable to hold or use for extended gaming sessions. This one — which appears to be for the PS3 at the earliest, given the inclusion of the PS button — is truly bonkers. Thank goodness Goto landed on the SNES-style design with grips that has proven so successful (and comfortable) over the years:

A PlayStation controller concept.

Sony/Read-Only Memory

The book isn’t entirely limited to hardware concepts, as it features photos of Sony’s design labs. The tome seems like a very cool item for PlayStation fans and those who love gaming history to have, but there might be an element of sticker shock.

The book is available via Read-Only Memory’s website for $182. A deluxe edition with exposed binding, a foil-stamped clamshell presentation box and a photographic print signed by Goto and photographer Benedict Redgrove will run you $467. The fancier edition has a limited run of 1994 copies. Coincidentally, that’s the year the PS1 debuted in Japan. Both editions of the book will ship in spring 2026.

Meanwhile, Sony has teamed up with Reebok for a collection of 30th anniversary sneakers styled after — you guessed it — the PS1. The kicks will be available in October and the three designs are linked to the PS1’s launch regions. They include the InstaPump Fury 94 for Japan, Pump Omni Zone II for the US and Workout Plus for the UK.

Sony x Reebox sneakers are on the way

Sony/Reebok

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/playstation/a-playstation-photography-book-featuring-never-before-seen-design-concepts-is-on-the-way-164859020.html?src=rss

This Roomba robot vacuum is on sale for only $150 ahead of Prime Day

The iRobot Roomba 104 robot vacuum is on sale for $150 just ahead of October’s Prime Day. That’s a nice little discount of 40 percent, which represents a savings of $100.

This is a newer version of the unit that topped our list of the best budget robot vacuums. It’s an entry-level robovac that gets the job done. The cleaning motor is fairly powerful and it ships with a multi-surface brush and an edge-sweeping brush. The vacuum uses LiDAR to map a home and to help it avoid obstacles when cleaning.

It’s also been equipped with specialized sensors to prevent falling down stairs. Steps are the natural enemy of all robot vacuums, except maybe this one. The Roomba 104 integrates with the company’s proprietary app, which allows for custom cleaning schedules and the like. The robot can also be controlled via voice assistant and boasts compatibility with Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant.

The vacuum will automatically head to the charger for some juice when running low, which is nice. The battery lasts around 200 minutes per charge, which is a decent enough metric for a budget-friendly robovac. The only downside here? This is just a vacuum. It doesn’t mop and it doesn’t come with a dedicated debris canister.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/this-roomba-robot-vacuum-is-on-sale-for-only-150-ahead-of-prime-day-164953406.html?src=rss

Claude Sonnet 4.5 is Anthropic’s safest AI model yet

In May, Anthropic announced two new AI systems, Opus 4 and Sonnet 4. Now, less than six months later, the company is introducing Sonnet 4.5, and calling it the best coding model in the world to date. Anthropic’s basis for that claim is a selection of benchmarks where the new AI outperforms not only its predecessor but also the more expensive Opus 4.1 and competing systems, including Google’s Gemini 2.5 Pro and GPT-5 from OpenAI. For instance, in OSWorld, a suite that tests AI models on real-world computer tasks, Sonnet 4.5 set a record score of 61.4 percent, putting it 17 percentage points above Opus 4.1.

At the same time, the new model is capable of autonomously working on multi-step projects for more than 30 hours, a significant improvement from the seven or so hours Opus 4 could maintain at launch. That’s an important milestone for the type of agentic systems Anthropic wants to build.

Sonnet 4.5 outperforms Anthropic’s older models in coding and agentic tasks.

Anthropic

Perhaps more importantly, the company claims Sonnet 4.5 is its safest AI system to date, with the model having undergone “extensive” safety training. That training translates to a chatbot Anthropic says is “substantially” less prone to “sycophancy, deception, power-seeking and the tendency to encourage delusional thinking” — all potential model traits that have landed OpenAI in hot water in recent months. At the same time, Anthropic has strengthened Sonnet 4.5’s protections against prompt injection attacks. Due to the sophistication of the new model, Anthropic is releasing Sonnet 4.5 under its AI Safety Level 3 framework, meaning it comes with filters designed to prevent potentially dangerous outputs related to prompts around chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.

A chart showing how Sonnet 4.5 compares against other frontier models in safety testing.

Anthropic

With today’s announcement, Anthropic is also rolling out quality of life improvements across the Claude product stack. To start, Claude Code, the company’s popular coding agent, has a refreshed terminal interface, with a new feature called checkpoints included. As you can probably guess from the name, they allow you to save your progress and roll back to a previous state if Claude writes some funky code that isn’t quite working like you imagined it would. File creation, which Anthropic began rolling out at the start of the month, is now available directly in conversations with the chatbot, and if you joined the waitlist Claude for Chrome, you can start using the extension today.

API pricing for Sonnet 4.5 remains at $3 per one million input tokens and $15 for the same amount of output tokens. The release of Sonnet 4.5 caps off a strong September for Anthropic. Just one day after Microsoft added Claude models to Copilot 365 last week, OpenAI admitted its rival offers the best AI for work-related tasks.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/claude-sonnet-45-is-anthropics-safest-ai-model-yet-170000161.html?src=rss

FCC accidentally leaked iPhone schematics, potentially giving rivals a peek at company secrets

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) recently published a 163-page PDF showing the electrical schematics for the iPhone 16e, despite Apple specifically requesting them to be confidential. This was most likely a mistake on the part of the FCC, according to a report by AppleInsider.

The agency also distributed a cover letter from Apple alongside the schematics, which is dated September 16, 2024. This letter verifies the company’s request for privacy, indicating that the documents contain “confidential and proprietary trade secrets.” The cover letter asks for the documents to be withheld from public view “indefinitely.” Apple even suggested that a release of the files could give competitors an “unfair advantage.”

To that end, the documents feature full schematics of the iPhone 16e. These include block diagrams, electrical schematic diagrams, antenna locations and more. Competitors could simply buy a handset and open it up to get to this information, as the iPhone 16e came out back in February, but this leak would eliminate any guesswork. However, Apple is an extremely litigious company when it comes to stuff like patent infringement.

The FCC hasn’t addressed how this leak happened or what it intends to do about it. AppleInsider’s reporting suggested that this probably happened due to an incorrect setting in a database. This was likely not an intentional act against Apple, which tracks given that the company has been especially supportive of the Trump administration. CEO Tim Cook even brought the president a gold trophy for being such a good and important boy.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/fcc-accidentally-leaked-iphone-schematics-potentially-giving-rivals-a-peek-at-company-secrets-154551807.html?src=rss

Microsoft is trying to make ‘vibe working’ a thing

Microsoft is taking inspiration from the AI-driven workflows of “vibe coding” and has now set out to make “vibe working” a thing (yes, those are the words the company chose.) Does AI in the workplace even lead to worthwhile outputs? Does it mortgage our brains’ ability to learn? There are many seemingly critical question unanswered. But in the meantime, sure: vibe working it is.

Using Office Agent within Office apps or Copilot chat, users can begin a document with a single prompt and then work iteratively alongside Copilot to develop a finished product. Microsoft says this is the “new pattern of work for human-agent collaboration.” The Agent Mode tool supports Excel and Word workflows, and Microsoft says PowerPoint support is coming soon; Office Agent works with PowerPoint and Word, with Excel coming soon.

The company waxes poetic about the “full power of Excel” being available only to expert users and promises that an Agent Mode that can “speak Excel” will change all that. In data shared as part of the announcement, Microsoft said that Copilot Agent Mode in Excel achieved 57.2 percent accuracy on the SpreadsheetBench benchmark. This is compared to a 71.3 percent human score, though it’s not clear if that’s for average users, Excel power users or how many human users that score is derived from. Still — not great numbers!

Agent Mode also works in Word to summarize, edit and of course help to create entire drafts (though its unclear what those relative accuracy rates are.) Both the Excel and Word Agent Modes are powered by OpenAI’s latest models. Office Agent in Copilot chat is powered by Anthropic models and can create PowerPoint presentations and Word documents in what Microsoft calls a “chat-first experience.”

Agent Mode for Excel and Word, as well as Office Agent, are available today through the Frontier program. Agent Mode is currently limited to the web-based versions of Word and Excel and is coming to desktop soon.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/microsoft-is-trying-to-make-vibe-working-a-thing-163334367.html?src=rss

Anker’s latest Prime charging devices are already on sale

Anker has a bunch of new Prime charging devices available and some of them are already getting solid discounts. The lineup includes a laptop-compatible Prime Power Bank (26,250mAh, 300W). The device’s Amazon page currently features a clippable coupon that will take $46 off the price, reducing it by 20 percent. That means you’ll be able to snap this powerbank up for $184.

This portable charger delivers a whopping 300W of total output between its two USB-C ports and single USB-A port. Anker says that, thanks to its 140W output (and if you’re using a 5A cable), you can top up the battery of an M4 Pro MacBook Pro to 50 percent in 27 minutes and an iPhone 17 Pro Max to 50 percent in 22 minutes. You can keep tabs on what’s happening on each port using the display.

This is also the first Anker powerbank that supports up to 250W of input recharging by using both USB-C ports simultaneously. This faster charging can top up the powerbank’s own battery to 50 percent in just 13 minutes, according to Anker.

This model has a capacity of 26,250mAh (99.75Wh), which is very close to the FAA’s limit of 100W. It’s TSA-approved, so you’ll be able to take it on flights. It’s capable of taking an M4 MacBook Pro from fully dead to an 80 percent charge. The power bank weighs 1.3 lbs — the same as about three iPhones, Anker says.

Other Anker Prime devices are on sale too. A new 3-in-1 MagSafe charger — which can top up the batteries of your iPhone, Apple Watch and AirPods with wireless charging case simultaneously — also gets a 20 percent discount to $184 when you use a clippable coupon. While there are certainly less expensive 3-in-1 MagSafe options out there, this one includes Qi2 25W support for faster charging, as well as TEC active cooling. Anker suggests this can help speed up charging times and help guard against iPhone battery degradation over time.

A three-port GaN Prime Charger that plugs into an outlet is 20 percent off too, at $120 with a clippable coupon. Anker says it’s as compact as an AirPods Pro 3 case and can provide a total output of 160W, with up to 140W via a single USB-C cable. The charger is said to offer smart power distribution, and you can monitor what’s happening and adjust modes via an onboard display and controls.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/ankers-latest-prime-charging-devices-are-already-on-sale-152040769.html?src=rss

Amazon’s Kindle Scribe drops to a record-low price for Prime Day

We’re only one week away from Amazon Prime Day and the sales have already started. The deals include Amazon’s devices, from Kindle tablets to Echo speakers.

Take the Amazon Kindle Scribe, which has dropped to $300 from $400. The 25 percent discount brings the second-generation device back down to its all-time low price. This deal is available on the 16GB model in Tungsten (dark grey) and doesn’t include Kindle Unlimited. If you want more storage, the 32GB and 64GB versions are also 25 and 24 percent off, respectively.

The Kindle Scribe is our pick for best e-reader E Ink tablet. It scored an 86 in our review, thanks to the smooth reading and writing experience it provides. We were also fans of its sleek and slender design. It has a 10.2-inch screen and offers front lights that auto-adjust to your needs. Our biggest gripe was the cost which, thanks to this deal, is less of an issue.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/amazons-kindle-scribe-drops-to-a-record-low-price-for-prime-day-134701307.html?src=rss