Google’s latest upgrade to the Chrome browser began what will be a series of moves over the next several years to reduce the browser’s power consumption by limiting activity in background tabs. “Starting in version 57, Chrome will throttle individual background tabs by limiting the timer fire rate for background tabs using excessive power,” Alexander…
Intel’s $15.3 billion buyout of advanced driver assistance system (ADAS) maker Mobileye will help advance an alliance between the two companies and BMW, which plans to ship self-driving cars by 2021. The sale also buttresses a decision by Mobileye to favor BMW with its vehicle vision chip technology (called EyeQ) over Tesla, according to a…
Microsoft’s batch of security patches for March is one of the largest ever and includes fixes for several vulnerabilities that are publicly known and actively exploited. The company published 17 security bulletins covering 135 vulnerabilities in its own products and one separate bulletin for Flash Player, which has its security patches distributed through Windows Update.…
Buzz Aldrin cemented his legacy close to 50 years ago as the second man to walk on the moon. But Aldrin has greater ambitions: He wants to pave the way for humans to be a two-planet species. “I want my legacy to include a permanent human settlement on Mars,” Aldrin said onstage during a Tuesday…
Developers interested in extending the capabilities of Amazon’s Alexa virtual assistant have some more free tools in their arsenal, thanks to a program the company announced Wednesday. Developers with an active Alexa skill — a service that expands the capabilities of the virtual assistant — can apply for $100 in Amazon Web Services credits every…
An appeals court has barred an Ethiopian-born U.S. citizen from filing a civil suit against the African country, which allegedly infected his computer with spyware and monitored his communications. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled Tuesday that foreign states are immune from suit in a U.S. court unless an…
Wind River, an IoT software division of Intel, wants to help industrial users bring their legacy machine-to-machine systems into the age of open source and cloud computing. On Tuesday, it introduced software to virtualize industrial applications at the edge of the network, letting enterprises gradually migrate from older M2M technology to modern systems that give…
When Google announced plans to make smart clothing back in 2015 with Project Jacquard, I was intrigued but skeptical. I’ve worn sensor-filled clothes before, and they end up being more gimmicky than practical. But after trying on the first Jacquard product, a denim Levi’s jacket, I’m a believer. My biggest issue with wearable technology is…
While Google Hangouts is making a shift to serve enterprise users, it won’t be vanishing for consumers. Last week, the company announced that it would be splitting the chat and videoconferencing service into Hangouts Meet and Hangouts Chat, which raised questions about what would happen for those people who still use it in their personal…
Customers who have Reserved Instance contracts with Amazon Web Services will be able to subdivide some of their Linux and Unix virtual machine instances while maintaining their capacity discounts, thanks to pricing changes announced Monday. Reserved Instances allow customers to lock themselves into paying AWS for a certain amount of compute capacity with the company’s…