Chordify is a new app that purports to give you the chords to almost any song. I haven’t given it a try yet, but I’ve seen it getting pretty decent reviews from a few people I trust.
iOS App Chordify Launches
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Yahoo Secretly Scanned Customer Emails for U.S. Intelligence
Joseph Menn, writing at Reuters:
Yahoo Inc last year secretly built a custom software program to search all of its customers’ incoming emails for specific information provided by U.S. intelligence officials, according to people familiar with the matter.
The company complied with a classified U.S. government directive, scanning hundreds of millions of Yahoo Mail accounts at the behest of the National Security Agency or FBI, said two former employees and a third person apprised of the events.
Disney Looking at Potential Twitter Bid
Bloomberg is reporting that the Walt Disney Co. is looking at making a bid for Twitter:
The Walt Disney Co. is working with a financial adviser to evaluate a possible bid for Twitter Inc., according to people familiar with the matter. After receiving interest in discussing a deal, Twitter has started a process to evaluate a potential sale. Salesforce.com Inc. is also considering a bid, working with Bank of America on the process, according to other people, who declined to be named because the matter is private.
So Disney could own the happiest place on earth, and one of the biggest collections of hatred the world has ever seen.
Yahoo Confirms 500 Million User Accounts Breached
Yahoo has confirmed a breach of over 500 million user accounts:
Based on the ongoing investigation, Yahoo believes that information associated with at least 500 million user accounts was stolen and the investigation has found no evidence that the state-sponsored actor is currently in Yahoo’s network. Yahoo is working closely with law enforcement on this matter.
Spotify and Tinder Team Up to Add Music to Profiles
Jordan Crook, at TechCrunch, on the team up between Tinder and Spotify:
Just as Tinder allowed folks to connect their Instagram accounts to their Tinder profile, the same is now true for Spotify. Users will be able to check out each others’ most-played songs on Spotify.
But even if you don’t have Spotify, Tinder will still let you use Spotify to add your ‘Tinder Anthem’ to your profile. Think back to the MySpace days of auto-playing songs on profiles and you’ll have a pretty good idea of what this will feel like.
See Cute Is What We Aim For, swipe left.
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Samsung Recalls Galaxy Note 7
Ina Fried, writing for Recode, on Samsung’s recall of the Galaxy Note 7:
Samsung said Friday that it will replace all of the Galaxy Note 7 “phablets” it has sold amid reports that some batteries on the phones have exploded.
In what could be the biggest smartphone recall ever, Samsung said it will replace all devices in the coming weeks. The company said it has confirmed an issue with the battery cells used in the phone and has halted sales globally.
Ouch.
43 Million Passwords Hacked in Last.fm Breach
John Mannes, writing at TechCrunch:
The number of passwords and the severity of the hack were not uncovered until today. The passwords were stored using unsalted MD5 hashing. Rather than storing passwords in plaintext, nearly every site that stores critical user information utilizes some form of hashing. Hashing is a method for encrypting data, but some methods are far superior to others.
These are some really bad password practices and if you have an account at Last.fm, you should go change your password. Also, LeakedSource is a good resource to see if your information has shown up in any of these information database dumps over the past few years. You can search by your email address.
Instagram Adds “Stories”
Josh Constine, writing at TechCrunch:
People only post the highlights of their life on Instagram, so today the app adds its own version of “Stories” to poach goofy, off-the-cuff, everyday content from Snapchat. It works exactly like Snapchat Stories, allowing you to post 24-hour ephemeral photo and video slideshows that disappear. But because Instagram Stories appear at the top of the old feed, your followers will inevitably see them without you needing to build a new audience in a different app.
I mean, yeah, it is a clone of Snapchat’s feature, but it is also exactly why I post rarely to Instagram and post stupid things all the time on Snapchat.
Verizon Buys Yahoo for $4.8 Billion
Vindu Goel, reporting for The New York Times:
Verizon, seeking to build an array of digital businesses that can compete for users and advertising with Google and Facebook, announced on Monday that it was buying Yahoo’s core internet business for $4.83 billion in cash.
The deal, which was reached over the weekend, unites two titans of the early internet, AOL and Yahoo, under the umbrella of one of the nation’s largest telecommunications companies. Verizon bought AOL for $4.4 billion last year. Now it will add Yahoo’s consumer services — search, news, finance, sports, video, email and the Tumblr social network — to a portfolio that includes AOL as well as popular sites like The Huffington Post.
Yahoo and AOL, once giants of the industry, now just another part of Verizon. I wonder what Tumblr’s fate will be?
The Set Listener Creates Playlists From Set Lists
The Set Listener is a pretty cool web-app that lets you enter any Setlist.fm URL into it and it’ll create a Spotify playlist from the songs. Clever.
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Hacker Involved in ‘Celebgate’ Pleads Guilty
James Vincent, writing for The Verge:
A hacker has pleaded guilty for his role in the “Celebgate” breach of 2014. Edward Majerczyk faces up to five years in federal prison for violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. Like fellow hacker Ryan Collins, the 28-year-old Majerczyk used a phishing scam to trick celebrities into entering their online credentials into fake ‘security’ sites. Majerczyk then used this information to illegally access more than 300 personal Gmail and iCloud accounts, retrieving private photos and videos from targets including celebrities. No individuals affected by the hack were named in court documents.
Katy Perry’s Twitter Account Hacked
Yesterday Katy Perry, the most followed account on Twitter, got hacked. From TechCrunch:
This incident is yet another reminder that despite the platform’s security measures, no one’s Twitter account is safe—especially if they are a celebrity. Other high-profile Twitters that have been hacked include Justin Bieber, Lea Michele, and Britney Spears—and even the U.S. Central Command.
This is a good time to also point out that over the past week it looks like emails and passwords to over seven hundred million accounts may have leaked from LinkedIn, Tumblr, and MySpace:
There are some really interesting patterns emerging here. One is obviously the age; the newest breach of this recent spate is still more than 3 years old. This data has been lying dormant (or at least out of public sight) for long periods of time.
The other is the size and these 4 breaches are all in the top 5 largest ones HIBP has ever seen. That’s out of 109 breaches to date, too. Not only that, but these 4 incidents account for two thirds of all the data in the system, or least they will once MySpace turns up.
This is a good time to remind you to choose secure, long, and unique passwords for all your online accounts. I use, and recommend, 1Password.
Peter Thiel Backs Hulk Hogan’s Lawsuit Against Gawker
One of the more interesting stories in the journalism space over the past week has been the revelation that billionaire Peter Thiel has been secretly funding Hulk Hogan’s lawsuit against Gawker. I think, not surprisingly, I agree most with John Gruber’s take:
It’s free speech on both sides. Thiel was free to secretly back (and apparently strategically steer) Hogan’s case against Gawker. But Gawker founder Nick Denton was free to air his suspicion that Hogan had a billionaire Silicon Valley backer, and Forbes was free to out Thiel as said backer. And now commentators who are appalled are free to express their outrage at Thiel, perhaps embarrassing him and making it less likely that he or others of similar super-wealth will do this in the future.
You’re free to do stupid shit under the banner of free speech, and I’m free to say so.
Behind the Pebble Core
Steven Levy, writing for Blackchannel, on the new device from Pebble called the “Pebble Core.” It’s basically a little keychain sized device that can stream music from Spotify.
Today, Pebble is launching Kickstarter campaigns for three products. Only two of them are smart watches. It’s the third product that will garner the most attention. It’s a Pebble that’s not a watch. It is optimized for a single task: taking a run. It’s a white plastic and black rubber block, a little thicker than a mahjong tile, with an orange clasp that grasps a keyring. It plays music, has GPS and other sensors that can track activity, and a 3G cellular modem that allows it to work even if your phone isn’t on you.
Google Announces “Google Home”
Google has announced their own little device that lives in your home and you speak to and it does things for you, kind of like the Amazon Echo. From, The Verge:
It’s not portable, but the benefit of always being plugged in is that Google can make a more powerful speaker. Quieroz says that it “really fills the room” and that it will have “strong bass and clear highs.” That’s important, because one of the main use cases Google is foreseeing here is listening to music. The Echo isn’t great at that.
I like the idea of these devices being around and helping me with conversions while cooking, or checking basketball scores, or hopefully one day being able to control more home automation — I’m not convinced on them being great music listening devices yet.1
I’ll reserve judgement until I can hear one in person. I do think this is potentially a great podcast speaker.↩