An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: Shekinah and Orlandria Lennon were sitting at their kitchen table this fall, taking online classes, when video of their teachers and fellow students suddenly froze on their laptop screens. The wireless antenna on the roof had stopped working, and it could not be fixed. Desperate for a solution, their mother called five broadband companies, trying to get connections for their home in Orrum, N.C., a rural community of fewer than 100 people with no grocery store or traffic lights. All the companies gave the same answer: Service is not available in your area. The response is the same across broad stretches of Robeson County, N.C., a swath of small towns and rural places like Orrum dotted among soybean fields and hog farms on the South Carolina border. About 20,000 of the county's homes, or 43 percent of all households, have no internet connection.

The technology gap has prompted teachers to upload lessons on flash drives and send them home to dozens of students every other week. Some children spend school nights crashing at more-connected relatives' homes so they can get online for classes the next day. [...] Millions of American students are grappling with the same challenges, learning remotely without adequate home internet service. Even as school districts like the one in Robeson County have scrambled to provide students with laptops, many who live in low-income and rural communities continue to have difficulty logging on. "About 15 million K-12 students lived in households without adequate online connectivity in 2018," the report notes, citing a study of federal data by Common Sense Media, an education nonprofit group that tracks children's media use.

"[T]he pandemic turned the lack of internet connectivity into a nationwide emergency: Suddenly, millions of schoolchildren were cut off from digital learning, unable to maintain virtual 'attendance' and marooned socially from their classmates."

Come June 1, 2021, Google will change its storage policies for free accounts -- and not for the better. Basically, if you're on a free account and a semi-regular Google Photos user, get ready to pay up next year and subscribe to Google One. From a report: Currently, every free Google Account comes with 15 GB of online storage for all your Gmail, Drive and Photos needs. Email and the files you store in Drive already counted against those 15 GB, but come June 1, all Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drawings, Forms or Jamboard files will count against the free storage as well. Those tend to be small files, but what's maybe most important here, virtually all of your Photos uploads will now count against those 15 GB as well. That's a bid deal because today, Google Photos lets you store unlimited images (and unlimited video, if it's in HD) for free as long as they are under 16MP in resolution or you opt to have Google degrade the quality. Come June of 2021, any new photo or video uploaded in high quality, which currently wouldn't count against your allocation, will count against those free 15 GB. [...] In addition to these storage updates, there's a few additional changes worth knowing about. If your account is inactive in Gmail, Drive or Photos for more than two years, Google 'may' delete the content in that product.

A former Microsoft software engineer from Ukraine has been sentenced to nine years in prison for stealing more than $10 million in store credit from Microsoft's online store. Ars Technica reports: From 2016 to 2018, Volodymyr Kvashuk worked for Microsoft as a tester, placing mock online orders to make sure everything was working smoothly. The software automatically prevented shipment of physical products to testers like Kvashuk. But in a crucial oversight, it didn't block the purchase of virtual gift cards. So the 26-year-old Kvashuk discovered that he could use his test account to buy real store credit and then use the credit to buy real products.

At first, Kvashuk bought an Office subscription and a couple of graphics cards. But when no one objected to those small purchases, he grew much bolder. In late 2017 and early 2018, he stole millions of dollars worth of Microsoft store credit and resold it online for bitcoin, which he then cashed out using Coinbase. US prosecutors say he netted at least $2.8 million, which he used to buy a $160,000 Tesla and a $1.6 million waterfront home (his proceeds were less than the value of the stolen credit because he had to sell at a steep discount).

Kvashuk made little effort to cover his tracks for his earliest purchases. But as his thefts got bigger, he took more precautions. He used test accounts that had been created by colleagues for later thefts. This was easy to do because the testers kept track of test account credentials in a shared online document. He used throwaway email addresses and began using a virtual private networking service. Before cashing out the bitcoins, he sent them to a mixing service in an attempt to hide their origins. Kvashuk reported the bitcoin windfall to the IRS but claimed the bitcoins had been a gift from his father.

Apple said on Friday that it's replacing AirPods Pro headphones that have sound problems. CNBC reports: These problems include a static or crackling sound that increases in loud environments and issues with active noise cancellation. Apple said AirPods Pro made after October 2020 don't have the problems. Owners who experience problems can contact Apple online or make an appointment at an Apple store to get their AirPods Pro replaced for free. Only devices that are confirmed to have the issue will be replaced. The replacement applies only to the buds, not the charging case. Apple's not offering a similar program for other AirPod models.

An anonymous reader quotes CPO magazine: An Avast report found that several popular TikTok profiles profited by pushing scam apps to underage children. At least three TikTok accounts with over 350,000 followers were implicated. The campaign involved at least seven scam apps distributed on both Google Play Store and Apple App Store. Users had downloaded the rogue apps more than 2.4 million times, earning the fraudsters more than $500,000.

A 12-year old girl from the Czech Republic discovered a suspicious behavior on a popular app trending on TikTok and reported it to Avast. The child was a participant in the Avast's "Be Safe Online" cybersecurity initiative that teaches the youth how to identify cyber threats. Researchers at the cybersecurity firm investigated and found at least three TikTok profiles aggressively advertising scam apps to underage children. One of the TikTok profiles had more than 300,000 followers, while an Instagram account had more than 5,000 fans. Following the discovery, Avast researchers reported the scam apps to Google, Apple, Instagram, and TikTok...

Avast reported that most of the scam apps promoted by the popular TikTok profiles were HiddenAd trojans. Such apps are disguised as useful software but served intrusive ads outside the app. They also hid app icons to prevent users from finding out the ads' source or uninstalling them.

Facebook has filed a lawsuit against two companies for creating and distributing malicious browser extensions that scraped user data without authorization from the Facebook and Instagram websites. From a report: Named in the lawsuit are BrandTotal, an Israeli-based company with a Delaware subsidiary, and Unimania, incorporated in Delaware. The two companies are behind UpVoice and Ads Feed, two Chrome extensions available on the official Chrome Web Store since September and November 2019, where they racked up more than 5,000 and 10,000 installs, respectively. "BrandTotal enticed users to install the UpVoice extension from the Google Chrome Store by offering payments in exchange for installs, in the form of online gift cards, and claiming that the users who installed the extension became 'panelists . . . [who] impact the marketing decisions and brand strategies of multi-billion dollars (sic) corporations'," Facebook said in court documents filed today.

Facebook has temporarily shamed Apple out of taking a 30 percent cut of paid online events organized by small businesses and hosted on Facebook -- things like cooking classes, workout sessions, and happy hours. Demand for these kinds of online events has soared during the COVID-19 pandemic. From a report: Apple says that it has a longstanding policy that digital products must be purchased using Apple's in-app payments system -- and hence pay Apple's 30 percent tax. In contrast, companies selling physical goods and services are not only allowed but required to use other payment methods (options here include Apple Pay, which doesn't take such a big cut). For example, an in-person cooking class is not a digital product, so a business selling cooking class tickets via an iPhone app wouldn't have to give Apple a 30 percent cut. But if the same business offers a virtual cooking class, Apple considers that to be a digital product and demands a 30 percent cut -- at least if the customer pays for the class using an iOS device. Last month, Facebook announced it would start offering a new feature for small businesses to host paid online events. Facebook has waived any fees for the first year, allowing small businesses to pocket 100 percent of the revenue. But Apple refused to budge on its 30 percent take.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: Amazon plans to open 1,000 small delivery hubs in cities and suburbs all over the U.S., according to people familiar with the plans. The facilities, which will eventually number about 1,500, will bring products closer to customers, making shopping online about as fast as a quick run to the store. It will also help the world's largest e-commerce company take on a resurgent Walmart. Amazon couldn't fulfill its two-day delivery pledge earlier this year when shoppers in Covid-19 lockdown flooded the company with more orders than it could handle. While delivery times have improved thanks to the hiring of 175,000 new workers, Amazon is now consumed with honoring a pre-pandemic pledge to get many products to Prime subscribers on the same day. So with the holidays approaching, Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos is doubling down by investing billions in proximity, putting warehouses and swarms of blue vans in neighborhoods long populated with car dealerships, fast-food joints, shopping malls and big-box stores. Amazon didn't comment on the expansion plans, but has said its last-mile delivery efforts are meant to supplement, not replace, its long-time partners. "Our dedicated last-mile delivery network just delivered its 10 billionth package since launching over five years ago, and we're proud to provide a great service for our customers," an Amazon spokeswoman said.

"In just a few years, Amazon has built its own UPS," says Marc Wulfraat, president of the logistics consulting firm MWPVL International Inc., who estimates Amazon will deliver 67% of its own packages this year and increase that to 85%. "Amazon keeps spreading itself around the country, and as it does, its reliance on UPS will go away."

After years of complaints from users, Goodreads' reign over the world of book talk might be coming to an end. From a report: Goodreads started off the way you might think: two avid readers, in the mid-Noughties, wanting to build space online for people to track, share, and talk about books they were reading. Husband and wife Otis and Elizabeth Chandler say they initially launched the platform in 2007 to get recommendations from their literary friends. But it was something many others wanted, too: by 2013, the site had swelled to 15 million users. That year Goodreads it was bought by Amazon, an acquisition Wired magazine called "quaint", given Amazon's roots in bookselling before it became the store that sold everything. Even then, many Goodreads users already felt stung by the tech giant which had, a year earlier, changed the terms of its huge books dataset (which Goodreads used to identify titles). Goodreads had been forced to move to a different data source, called Ingram; the move caused users to lose large amounts of their reading records.Z

Most stuck with it, however -- not because of the platform itself, but because of its community. Writing in the Atlantic in 2012, Sarah Fay called Goodreads "Facebook with books," and argued that "if enough contributors set the bar high with creative, funny, and smart reviews it might become a force of its own." While newspapers mourned the decline of reading and literature, Goodreads showed that a large and growing number of people still had a real passion for books and bookshops. Thirteen years after the first Kindle was sold, printed books have more than ten times the market share of ebooks, but talking about books happens much more online. But now, for many, the utopia Goodreads was founded to create has become closer to purgatory. Goodreads today looks and works much as it did when it was launched. The design is like a teenager's 2005 Myspace page: cluttered, random and unintuitive. Books fail to appear when searched for, messages fail to send, and users are flooded with updates in their timelines that have nothing to do with the books they want to read or have read. Many now use it purely to track their reading, rather than get recommendations or build a community. "It should be my favourite platform," one user told me, "but it's completely useless."

Apple adjusted its App Store review guidelines to loosen restrictions on iPhone and iPad games that stream directly from the internet and in-app purchase rules that have frustrated developers. From a report: The changes mean Apple will approve games that stream from the web, versus from content installed on a device, for the first time. That reverses a rule that frustrated companies including Microsoft. The new rules will still require games to be submitted individually. That means companies still won't be able to launch all-you-can-eat streaming game services on Apple's platform. However, these services can now offer a catalog that directs users to other streaming games from the same developer. But that catalog must point players to the App Store to download those other games individually. Apple is also no longer imposing its in-app purchase requirements on online teaching apps, such as tutoring or workout offerings.

Apple on Monday announced that its new App Store appeals process, first revealed at WWDC in June, is now live, meaning developers can challenge Apple over whether their app is in fact violating one of its guidelines. In addition to that, Apple says developers can also suggest changes to the App Store guidelines through a form submission on its online developer portal. From a report "For apps that are already on the App Store, bug fixes will no longer be delayed over guideline violations except for those related to legal issues. You'll instead be able to address guideline violations in your next submission," reads a note posted to Apple's developer website. "And now, in addition to appealing decisions about whether an app violates guidelines, you can suggest changes to the guidelines." These changes were introduced at WWDC on the heels of a rather public feud with software maker Basecamp, the creator of a new email service called Hey. Basecamp openly challenged Apple over whether it could distribute an iOS companion app to its email service without including in-app sign-up options, as Hey costs $99 a year and Basecamp felt it unnecessary to give Apple its standard 30 percent cut of that revenue (although Apple does only take 15 percent of in-app subscription revenue after one year of service). Apple, in response, held up the company's bug fixes and update capability.

Apple blocked Facebook from informing users that Apple would collect 30 percent of in-app purchases made through a planned new feature, Facebook said. From a report: Apple said the update violated an App Store rule that doesn't let developers show "irrelevant" information to users. The feature lets Facebook users buy tickets for online events directly through the app. Apple's rules say that purchases of digital content have to use the App Store's payments system, giving Apple 30 percent of the total. Facebook says it asked Apple to waive this fee so that all of the revenue could go to event organizers, but Apple refused. The feature is now available, but without the message about Apple's 30-percent cut. Earlier this month, Facebook released an image showing what the message would look like in the app. The planned message on Android was expected to read "Facebook doesn't take a fee from this purchase." According to Reuters, that message doesn't show up in the version of the app downloaded through Google Play, either.

The shift to online shopping has accelerated in the COVID-19 pandemic, but today Amazon made a bold move that underscores its belief that physical stores will remain a key component of how consumers shop. From a report: In the Los Angeles neighborhood of Woodland Hills, the e-commerce giant today opened its first Amazon Fresh supermarket. This is the first of a series of Amazon Fresh stores that the company plans to open, with others so far confirmed in Oak Lawn, Illinois; Schaumburg, Illinois; Naperville, Illinois; Irvine; California; and North Hollywood, California. A blog post from Jeff Helbling, the head of Amazon Fresh Stores, notes that the store will open initially invitation-only, based on emails it will be sending out to locals, from 7:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. PT.

Kanye West is being sued for pulling the tried-and-true Silicon Valley tactic of allegedly stealing trade tech secrets. Gizmodo reports: First spotted by TMZ, the suit is being spearheaded by small, Pennsylvania-based ecommerce company MyChannel (MYC, for short). MYC allege that after pouring millions of dollars and half a year's worth of work into mocking up a spiffy new site for Ye's online clothing store, the rapper stepped out on their contract. According to the lawsuit, West then took the company's ideas for himself, and from the sound of things, just... ghosted them -- breaking multiple promises, violating NDAs, and acting like a huge tool in the process.

According to the [30+ pages of MYC's complaint], West initially contracted MYC back in the spring of 2018 with the promise that if the company created a juiced-up video platform for his e-commerce site, he'd not only, y'know, pay the company for its services, but would invest a hefty $10 million into the business. MYC also had West sign an NDA just to make sure that the company's proprietary video tech wouldn't be "ripped off" without any payment. Probably assuming that Kanye would keep his word, MYC says its team spent the next six months clocking 80 hour workweeks on the project, spending tens of thousands on the proposed video software in the process. Not only that, but because Kanye "demanded" that the team move its HQ from its home in Philly over to California, and later Chicago, living expenses sunk them even deeper into the hole. All told, MYC claims to have spent spent $7 million of its own funds before confronting West and telling him to make good on his end of the deal.

Instead of fulfilling his side of the bargain, the suit describes how West -- who it's worth pointing out is a literal billionaire -- came up with some "untrue perceived slight," and cut all ties with MYC's team, leaving them stranded and in a mountain of debt. Meanwhile, West spent the months immediately afterward using what MYC describes as a near-carbon copy of their platform as part of the promotion for "Sunday Service," West's so-called pop-up church experience.

Facebook is seeking to force a face-off with Apple over its 30% in-app purchase commission fee, which Facebook suggests hurts small businesses struggling to get by during the pandemic. From a report: Facebook has never publicly gone after Apple, a key strategic partner, this aggressively. Both companies face antitrust scrutiny, which in Apple's case has centered on the very fee structure Facebook is now attacking. Facebook is trying to position itself as friendlier to small businesses than Apple, which also faces a lawsuit from Fortnite maker Epic Games over its commission and in-app payment restrictions. Facebook said Friday that it will launch "Paid Online Events" for small businesses in 20 countries around the world to charge Facebook users to attend their classes, instructions and other events. The feature could be useful for any small business or individual offering a service, such a preacher, musician, yoga teacher or cooking instructor. Facebook asked Apple to either waive its 30% cut or let Facebook go around it and process event payments via Facebook Pay, in either case letting event hosts keep all the revenue they generate. Apple declined, according to Facebook. "Really what we're pushing on right now is to make sure all tech companies who can afford to do so join us in supporting small businesses," Fidji Simo, head of Facebook App, said on a press call Friday. Hosts will be able to collect the full ticket price from Facebook users who attend their online events via the web or Android. Facebook says it is using its own payment system on Android and letting developers keep all the money.

The largest mall owner in the U.S. has been in talks with Amazon.com, the company many retailers denounce as the mall industry's biggest disrupter, to take over space left by ailing department stores. From a report: Simon Property Group has been exploring with Amazon the possibility of turning some of the property owner's anchor department stores into Amazon distribution hubs, according to people familiar with the matter. Amazon typically uses these warehouses to store everything from books and sweaters to kitchenware and electronics until delivery to local customers. The talks have focused on converting stores formerly or currently occupied by J.C. Penney and Sears, these people said. The department-store chains have both filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and as part of their plans have been closing dozens of stores across the country. Simon malls have 63 Penney and 11 Sears stores, according to its most recent public filing in May.

It wasn't clear how many stores are under consideration for Amazon, and it is possible that the two sides could fail to reach an agreement, people briefed on the matter said. The talks reflect the intersection of two trends that predate the pandemic but have been accelerated by it: the decline of malls and the boom in e-commerce. Malls were struggling for years, as more customers stayed home to shop online. The spread of the coronavirus, which forced malls to temporarily close and limited their crowds even after reopening, has worsened the situation. Amazon, meanwhile, was able to navigate new logistical challenges during Covid-19 and recently reported its greatest quarter ever. For Amazon, a deal with Simon would be consistent with its efforts to add more distribution hubs near residential areas to speed up the crucial last mile of delivery.

Last month, Microsoft removed the option to purchase 12 months of Xbox Live Gold from the Microsoft Store, leading many to believe the company could be planning to phase out the service altogether with the launch of the Xbox Series X. When asked about the plans by The Verge, Microsoft said: "We have no plans to discontinue Xbox Live Gold at this time. It is an important part of gaming on Xbox today, and will continue to be in the future." The Verge's report also notes the company isn't planning to rename Xbox Live: Rumors of an Xbox Live rename appeared this week, after Microsoft announced changes to its services agreement. The software giant started referring to Xbox Live as the "Xbox online service," prompting some to assume Xbox Live was going away. "The update to 'Xbox online service' in the Microsoft Services Agreement refers to the underlying Xbox service that includes features like cross-saves and friend requests," says a Microsoft spokesperson in a statement to The Verge. "This language update is intended to distinguish that underlying service, and the paid Xbox Live Gold subscription. There are no changes being made to the experience of the service or Xbox Live Gold."

While it's clear Xbox Live Gold isn't going away, Microsoft's statement doesn't mean the service won't be made free at some point in the future. Microsoft still requires Xbox One owners, and potentially Xbox Series X owners, to purchase an Xbox Live Gold subscription to play multiplayer games online. Windows 10 players of Xbox Live-enabled games do not require the same subscription, however. This split gets especially tricky for games like Halo Infinite, which Microsoft has promised will have a free-to-play multiplayer mode. If Microsoft does continue Xbox Live Gold as a paid service on Xbox consoles, then PC players will get totally free access to Halo Infinite and Xbox players will not.

According to Bloomberg, attorneys general from New York and California are partnering with the FTC to investigate Amazon's online marketplace, in what may be the beginnings of a formal antitrust enforcement action. From a report: The agencies are going to interview witnesses jointly on conference calls over the next few weeks. The news comes after intense questioning over Amazon's Marketplace practices during [last week's landmark Big Tech antitrust hearing]. Rep. Lucy McBath (D-GA) asked CEO Jeff Bezos whether its actions toward Marketplace sellers was a pattern of behavior. She played testimony from a third-party bookseller who believed Amazon had blocked their store, without providing an explanation why, effectively destroying her business. Bezos responded that "third-party sellers in aggregate are doing extremely well on Amazon."

The Marketplace platform allows third-party sellers to peddle their wares to Amazon's massive online customer base, accounting for more than half of all of the company's e-commerce sales. Marketplace products are often less expensive -- and sometimes of lower quality -- than other products sold on Amazon. But consumers don't always understand the difference between buying something from a third-party seller versus buying directly from Amazon or one of the company's private-label brands. Amazon's Marketplace has been in the spotlight over the past few months, following a bombshell report in The Wall Street Journal exposing how the e-commerce giant secretly used data it gathered from third-party sellers to launch its own branded products, a practice Amazon executives have denied in the past. At the hearing, Bezos said the company maintains a policy against using seller-specific data but said he could not guarantee that the policy had never been broken.

When a customer gets refunded for an app they purchased, Apple doesn't refund the 30% cut they took from the developer, says developer Simeon Saens of Two Lives Left. While [online] payment processors generally don't refund fees on refunded payments, "the App Store doesn't position itself as a payments processor the way Stripe does, so it sounds really weird that they would act like one," writes HN user chadlavi. Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney says in a tweet: This is a critical consideration in these 30% store fees. They come off the top, before funding any developer costs. As a result, Apple and Google make more profit from most developers' games than the developers themselves. That is terribly unfair and exploitative. "If the app store took a 3% chunk and never refunded it regardless of the ongoing status of the transaction, that would put them right in line with other payment processors," adds chadlavi. "It would also still net them billions of dollars, I think!"

UPDATE: In a follow-up tweet, Simeon says he "was mistaken in my original (now deleted) tweet." He adds: "Apple does not keep the 30% commission on a refund the refund happens as you'd expect. I don't know where I got the idea that it worked the way I thought it did."

Slashdot reader ravenscar did some digging in the Apple developer forums and found that "Apple has the right to keep its 30%... [but] rarely exercises this right and most developers see a 1 to 1 relationship on funds received vs funds refunded in these situations." They go on to say: "I can't find any cited examples of Apple keeping the commission."

An anonymous reader shares a report: Following Walmart's decision last week to shutter its doors on Thanksgiving Day over COVID-19 concerns, fellow big-box behemoth, Target, has announced that it will also be skipping this year's orgiastic capitalist pre-game for the good of consumers and workers. Well, that's the official position at least. "Historically, deal hunting and holiday shopping can mean crowded events, and this isn't a year for crowds," Target execs said in an official statement. It marks the first time since 2011 that the megastore will not be open on Thanksgiving -- a trend long criticized by labor activists for, you know, forcing underpaid retail workers to go into work and stare down deal-hungry shoppers instead of spending time with their own families.

It's important to note that these statements from Walmart, Target, and what many predict will be an increasing number of other retailers, are only announcing a moratorium on Thanksgiving pre-Black Friday sales events, and not a cancellation of actual Black Friday plans, which appear to still be going on as planned. In-store Thanksgiving sales first gained in popularity years back when online sales began to eat away at physical stores' holiday season profit margins. Turkey Day events consistently ranked outside the 10 busiest days of the year for most businesses while simultaneously lowering profits from Black Friday itself. So, if you can believe it, it appears this wave of decisions isn't exactly coming from the good of shareholders' hearts.