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Google Meet is bringing out a new Troubleshooting menu to help users easily understand how their local desktop and network environments affect the quality of their video call. With the new launch targeted solely at the end users, Google Meet aims to provide more visibility into how a system is performing. Google Meet introduced some

A month after federal regulators ordered it to disclose how its practices affect children and teenagers, TikTok is tightening its privacy practices for the under-18 crowd. Starting on Wednesday, default privacy setting for accounts with users aged 13 to 15 will be private. That means only someone the user approves as a follower can view

Amazon urged a judge not to order the company to restore web-hosting service to Parler, saying the conservative social media platform failed to police violent content before and after the Capitol riot. Amazon Web Services suspended service for Parler after it was used by supporters of President Donald Trump to organise the storming of the

WhatsApp on Tuesday provided clarification on its recent privacy policy update and stated that the latest change didn’t affect the privacy of messages sent to friends and family in any way. The instant messaging platform said it wanted to “address rumours”, and that reiterate that it will “continue to protect your private messages with end-to-end

The number of new users installing messaging app Signal every day is on track to cross 1 million, putting it closer to levels seen by larger rival WhatsApp, following an update to the Facebook-owned app’s privacy policy. About 8,10,000 users globally installed Signal on Sunday, nearly 18-fold compared with the download numbers on Jan. 6,

Social network Gab is benefitting from the suspension of several Twitter accounts – including Donald Trump’s – and the taking offline of rival Parler, its CEO said Monday. Between 6,00,000 and 7,00,000 Internet users are registering on the platform every day, Andrew Torba, who is also a co-founder, said in an interview. Gab registered more

Security researchers claim to have downloaded a huge amount of information from Parler before the service was taken offline by Amazon Web Services. The app, which was popular with many supporters of US President Trump, contained many posts, photos, and videos from the January 6 attack, and after the social network got deplatformed by multiple

Signal has emerged as one of the top alternatives to WhatsApp recently,  with WhatsApp’s updated privacy policy causing an outrage on the Internet. Many people have declared their intention to delete WhatsApp and switch to Signal. If you were wondering what the fuss is all about, here’s a primer on Signal to answer all of

WhatsApp appears to soon allow users to test its multi-device support. A recent WhatsApp beta for Android has suggested that the messaging app could bring a WhatsApp Web Beta release to let users try anticipated multi-device support that is rumoured to enable WhatsApp access simultaneously on multiple devices. Some references suggesting support for multi-device logins

WhatsApp groups are showing up on Google search yet again. As a result, anyone could discover and join a private WhatsApp group by simply searching on Google. This was first discovered in 2019, and was apparently fixed last year after becoming public. Another old issue, which also appeared to have been fixed but seems to

Signal is seeing a huge influx of users who are switching from WhatsApp, as users want to protest about WhatsApp’s new privacy policies, a movement that also got a significant boost when Tesla boss Elon Musk tweeted “Use Signal”. But if you’ve just started using the privacy-focused messaging application then there are quite a few features

WhatsApp recently updated its privacy policy and terms of service. The move has caused quite a stir, with reports claiming that it makes sharing data with Facebook mandatory. However, WhatsApp has issued an official statement clarifying that its data-sharing practices with Facebook have not changed. The changes that will go into effect next month look

Telegram seems to be enjoying the backlash WhatsApp received after it updated its privacy policy earlier this week. The messaging service posted the classic two Spider-Man pointing at each other meme with Facebook and WhatsApp icons in place of the two superheroes on Twitter. It then continued to take jabs at WhatsApp and Telegram users

Donald Trump faced quite a lot of backlash following violent protest at the US Capitol by Trump supporters. The event, that disrupted the Electoral College debate and lead to the death of five people, was said to have been instigated by Trump’s social media messages ever since the November presidential election. As a result, Trump’s

Twitter said on Friday that it has permanently suspended US President Donald Trump’s account due to the risk of further incitement of violence following the storming of the US Capitol on Wednesday. The suspension of Trump’s account, which had more than 88 million followers, silences his primary megaphone days before the end of his term and follows

Signal saw a significant jump in new sign-ups after Elon Musk’s tweet advising his followers to use the privacy-focused app, in the wake of concerns about WhatsApp’s new privacy policy where it says it would share user data with Facebook. If you’re using either Signal or Telegram you know that dozens of your contacts have

WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger collect a vast amount of user information and data compared to other popular messaging apps including Signal and Telegram, Apple’s privacy labels update revealed. Both apps owned by Facebook collect usage data and location details which are the cases with other apps. In contrast, Signal comes as the most private messaging

US President Donald Trump returned to Twitter on Thursday with a video acknowledging that Joe Biden would be the next US president as other social media services including Facebook blocked his accounts over concerns that his messages might spark further violent protests. Twitter unlocked the president’s @realDonaldTrump Twitter account, which has 88 million followers, after

Elon Musk tweeted “Use Signal” on Thursday, right after changes were made to WhatsApp’s privacy policy that would lead to more data sharing with its parent company Facebook. Earlier today, Musk also tweeted a ‘domino effect’ meme, where he implied that the start of Facebook was responsible for the chaos and violence that took place

Twitter on Wednesday began limiting the reach of tweets stoking an assault on the US Capitol by a mob intent on overturning the election results.  ”We have been significantly restricting engagement with tweets labeled under our Civic Integrity Policy due to the risk of violence,” the Twitter support team said. “This means these labeled tweets

Facebook has dropped the like button from its redesigned public pages used by artists, public figures and brands, the social media company said on Wednesday. Facebook pages will only show followers and have a dedicated News Feed where users can join conversations, interact with peers, and engage with fans, the company said in a blog

Facebook will again ban political advertisements in Georgia on Wednesday, after the conclusion of the state’s runoff elections, it said in a blog post on Tuesday. “This is part of our ongoing efforts to reduce the potential for confusion or abuse,” Facebook told advertisers in an email seen by Reuters. Last month, Facebook lifted its

WhatsApp has updated its privacy policy and terms of service to better integrate with other products and services offered by Facebook. Unlike the release of a new feature or an update that adds new functionality, the instant messaging app has brought the change almost silently earlier this week. It has, however, informed Android and iPhone

Podcasting platform Breaker on Monday said its team is becoming part of Twitter to apply its expertise to audio experiences at the one-to-many messaging service. Financial terms of the deal to acquire the people behind four-year-old Breaker, based in San Francisco, were not disclosed. “I’m joining Twitter to help build @TwitterSpaces,” Breaker co-founder Leah Culver

Instagram is testing a new design for viewing stories on desktop. In the new look, Instagram Stories are expected to appear in a carousel, instead of the current single-tile format that takes up the entire page. A company spokesperson confirmed to a publication that testing of the new feature is indeed underway. The report suggests

Online collaboration service Slack suffered a major outage on Monday as people tried to get back to business remotely on the first work week of the new year. San Francisco-based Slack put out word early Monday that people were having trouble connecting to the service, then upgraded the incident to an outage a short time

Facebook’s chief of advertising integrity, who handled the company’s ad products around sensitive subjects such as politics and coronavirus misinformation, departed this week, according to an internal company post viewed by Reuters on Friday. Rob Leathern, director of product management, said earlier this month on Facebook’s internal network that he would be leaving the company

The Trump administration on Monday appealed a federal judge’s order blocking restrictions that would have effectively barred the use of Chinese-owned short video-sharing app TikTok in the United States. The government has cited national security concerns in its targeting of TikTok, arguing that the personal data of US users could be obtained by China’s government.

Facebook has moved to wind down several Irish holding companies that had allowed it to shift billions of dollars in profit to the country, where it was lightly taxed, the Times of London reported, citing company documents. The Irish companies were used to hold its intellectual property for international sales, and Facebook companies around the

Facebook recently hosted the Facebook Fuel for India 2020 virtual event where CEO Mark Zuckerberg showed interest in pushing payments through WhatsApp deeper in the country. The social media giant also hosted a special session at the two-day event to highlight different use cases of the instant messaging app. However, while naming banking partners behind