Science and Tech

US President-elect Donald Trump has named “big tech” critic Brendan Carr to lead the US communications regulator, after he takes office in January 2025. Carr has attacked what he sees as the censorship of conservative viewpoints by top social media firms other than X, a site owned by his ally and fellow Trump backer, Elon Musk. He authored a chapter …

Getty Images Roblox has announced it will block under-13s from messaging others on the online gaming platform as part of new efforts to safeguard children. Child users will not be able to send direct messages by default unless a verified parent or guardian gives them permission. Parents will also be able to view and manage their child’s account, including seeing …

Getty Images Netflix says 60 million households worldwide tuned in live to see Mike Tyson take on Jake Paul, in the streaming giant’s first foray into live boxing. The event, which was free for subscribers, is being hailed by the tech giant as a “record breaking night”. However, fans hoping to watch have expressed their anger and disappointment after some …

Reuters A Secret Service robot dog patrols US President-elect Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence A robotic dog named “Spot” made by Boston Dynamics is the latest tool in the arsenal of the US Secret Service. The device has lately been spotted patrolling the perimeter of President-elect Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida. They do not have weapons – and …

Getty Images Elon Musk has stepped up his ongoing feud with ChatGPT-maker OpenAI with a revived lawsuit against the firm, adding Microsoft as a defendant. Mr Musk, a co-founder of the artificial intelligence (AI) company, accused it and the tech giant of operating a monopoly in an amended legal complaint on Thursday. It follows previous lawsuits accusing the firm of …

Getty Images You may have seen the word “Bluesky” popping up on your social media pages recently and wondered what people are talking about. It is an alternative platform to Elon Musk’s X and in terms of its colour and logo, it looks quite similar. Bluesky is growing rapidly and is currently picking up around one million new sign-ups a …

A hacker has been sentenced to five years in a US prison for laundering the proceeds of one of the biggest ever cryptocurrency thefts. Ilya Lichtenstein pleaded guilty last year in the case involving the Bitfinex cryptocurrency exchange being hacked in 2016 and the theft of almost 120,000 bitcoin. He laundered the stolen cryptocurrency with the help of his wife …

WASD One of the main showcases for UK gaming has been cancelled, reflecting the wider struggles of an industry which has seen a series of job cuts and studio closures. The WASD expo – which is usually held in London in April – is a shop window for British talent, with a particular emphasis on smaller, independent game-makers. But its …

Volocopter The VoloCity made demonstration flights in Paris over the summer One of the innovations at this year’s Paris Olympics was supposed to be an electric flying taxi service. Germany’s Volocopter promised its electric-powered, two-seater aircraft, the VoloCity, would be ferrying passengers around the city. It never happened. Instead the company ran demonstration flights. While missing that deadline was embarrassing, …

The social media platform Bluesky was hit by an outage on Thursday, amid a rising wave of popularity for the app, which is often described as a friendlier alternative to X,. Bluesky has at times been the most downloaded app on both the US and UK Apple Stores in recent days, with many social media users leaving X, formerly Twitter, …