Last August, T-Mobile confirmed it had fallen victim to a hack that saw the personal data of more than 54 million of its customers compromised. In the aftermath of that incident, the carrier announced a multi-year partnership with cybersecurity firm Mandiant. At the time, T-Mobile CEO Mike Sievert said the firm, alongside accounting agency KPMG, would help the carrier audit its security practices and implement policies that would help it prevent future cybersecurity incidents.

Newly unsealed court documents (PDF link) filed by the Department of Justice suggest the carrier may have also hired a third-party firm to prevent the data leaked in the hack from circulating more widely. First spotted by Motherboard, the documents detail criminal charges against Diogo Santos Coelho, the alleged founder and administrator of RaidForums. Before it was taken down by the Justice Department, the website was a place where hackers came to buy and sell stolen data, including it would seem the personal information of T-Mobile’s customers.

The documents detail an incident involving an individual who went by the alias “SubVirt.” At some point on or around August 11th, 2021, they posted to RaidForums to try and sell a trove of recently hacked data. The Justice Department doesn’t explicitly name a victim, instead referring to them simply as “Company 3,” but notes a later post “confirmed the data belonged to a major telecommunications company and wireless operator provides services in the United States.”

According to the agency, Company 3 “hired a third-party to purchase exclusive access to the database to prevent it being sold to criminals.” An employee posed as a potential buyer and paid approximately $50,000 in Bitcoin to obtain a sample of the data. They then paid an additional $150,000 for the entire database with the understanding that SubVirt would delete their copy. Unfortunately for Company 3, SubVirt and their collaborators did not honor the agreement. The Justice Department notes “it appears the co-conspirators continued to attempt to sell the databases after the third-party’s purchase.”

Based on information in the court documents and the timeline of the incident, Motherboard, which first reported the news of the data breach in 2021, suggests T-Mobile is the unnamed carrier alluded to by the Justice Department. We’ve reached out to the company and Mandiant for comment.

After nearly two years of PlayStation and Epic Games Store exclusivity, indie darling Bugsnax is making its way to additional platforms. Starting April 28th, you can play the game on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch and Steam, in addition to PlayStation 5 and PS4 as was previously the case. The game is also coming to Xbox and PC Game Pass, as well as Microsoft’s Xbox Cloud Gaming platform.

That same day, developer Young Horses will release The Isle of Bigsnax, a free content update that adds a new island for players to explore. The studio estimates the DLC includes three to four hours of additional gameplay for players to complete. 

On the island, you’ll find new Bugsnax, including one that’s a mashup of a stick bug with celery for its long, tendril-like legs. Additionally, the update adds new challenges in the town of Snaxbug. Completing those will reward you with furniture and accessories you can use to decorate your in-game personal hut. But the most exciting part of the update is that you’ll be able to find hats for your Bugsnax.

You can see all the improvements detailed in the trailer above. The new versions of Bugsnax will cost $25 if you decide to buy them to own.

Last summer, TikTok began beta testing Effect House, a platform that allows people to create their own augmented reality filters for use within the app. The closed test eventually came to include approximately 450 creators. And starting today, TikTok is opening the program to anyone who wants to take part. Visiting the Effect House website, you’ll find tools and documentation designed to help you begin making your own AR filters.

TikTok has also published a set of dedicated guidelines detailing the policies governing Effect House. In addition to the company’s Community Guidelines, creators will need to adhere to those rules if they want to see their work made accessible to the wider TikTok community. Among the filters that won’t be allowed on the platform include ones that promote plastic surgery. For instance, you can’t upload an effect that lets someone see how their face might look with lip filler.

Many platforms that offer AR effects, including TikTok, feature their share of first-party beauty filters, but in recent months there’s been a backlash against those among both users and lawmakers. In particular, Instagram has come under significant scrutiny in the US after The Wall Street Journal published a report that claimed Facebook’s own researchers had found the app was “harmful for a sizeable percentage of teens.”

TikTok says its Trust and Safety team will review all user-submitted effects to ensure they adhere to its policies before granting them approval. Users can also report filters, which will prompt the company to take another look at the offending effect to see if it misjudged its appropriateness.

Meta has begun testing user monetization tools within Horizon Worlds, the company announced on Monday. Starting today, a select group of creators can begin creating digital items and effects they can then sell directly within the virtual social space. With the rollout of today’s test, only users over the age of 18 in the US and Canada can purchase those goods. Creators can begin making items they want to sell by tapping the Commerce tab and gizmo within the app’s Create mode.

“While we’re launching this today as a test with a handful of creators to get their feedback, these types of tools are steps toward our long-term vision for the metaverse where creators can earn a living and people can purchase digital goods, services and experiences,” the company said.

According to Meta, creators participating in its monetization program will need to follow the guidelines outlined in its Prohibited Content Policy. As with Facebook and Instagram, the company is leaving moderation partly up to users. “If you see something that appears to violate our policies, you can submit a report for us to review,” it said.

With today’s announcement, Meta has also begun testing a bonus program with creators who live in the US. Those involved can earn additional revenue by making progress on monthly goals put forward by the company. Meta won’t collect fees on those bonuses and promises to pay out in full at the end of each month.

The tools Meta announced today effectively see the company putting in place the building blocks for the vision of the metaverse CEO Zuckerberg presented at Connect 2021. But it’s also easy to see how those tools could feed into the company’s ambitions around NFTs. “If you imagine what some future metaverse [at] some point down the line [would look like], clearly the ability to sell virtual goods and take them with you from one world to another is going to be an important part of it,” Zuckerberg said in a recent interview, conducted, where else, but in Horizon Worlds.

In 1928, Scottish microbiologist Alexander Fleming discovered what we know today as penicillin. Fleming’s work and that of his successors would go on to forever change how we treat bacterial infections. And to this day, antibiotics are one of the most powerful tools we have to protect people from a host of harmful bacteria.

But those same antibiotics can decimate the “good” microbes that live in our guts, opening the door to a host of potential health complications, including painful bouts of diarrhea that can take months to resolve. In recent years, some doctors have begun prescribing probiotics to help offset the harm antibiotics can do to gut bacteria, but the problem with that approach is that they’re just as susceptible to antibiotics and are not a replacement for those microbes.

Enter researchers from the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In a study published on Monday in the journal Nature Biomedical Engineering, they detail work they’ve done on a “living cellular therapeutic device” that promises to protect humans from the harmful side effects antibiotics can have on our guts.

Wyss Institute at Harvard University

Per Science Daily, they modified a strain of bacteria that is frequently used in cheese production to deliver an enzyme that can break down beta-lactam antibiotics. Many of the most commonly prescribed antibiotics in the US, including penicillin, fall under that family. Using gene editing, they further modified how their bacterium synthesizes the enzyme to prevent it from transferring that capability to other bacteria. The result is a treatment that reduces the harmful effects of antibiotics while still allowing those drugs to do their work. 

In a study involving mice, the researchers found their bacteria “significantly” reduced the damage ampicillin did to the test subject’s gut microbes and allowed those communities to recover fully after just three days. By contrast, in mice that only received the antibiotic, the researchers saw a much greater loss of microbial diversity.

It may be a while before you’re taking a course of modified bacteria alongside your next antibiotic treatment, but the team is hopeful they will have something ready soon. “We are now focusing on getting these living therapies to patients and are finalizing the design of an effective, short, and inexpensive clinical trial,” said Andrés Cubillos-Ruiz, the lead author of the study.

Sonos has acquired Mayht, a Dutch startup best known for co-creating a Bluetooth speaker powered by light. Mayht specializes in an audio technology called Heartmotion. The company claims to have reinvented “the core of speaker driver” to allow for speakers that can be up to 10 times more compact than other models without sacrificing sound quality or bass output. And it’s that expertise Sonos is paying approximately $100 million to secure for itself.

“Mayht’s breakthrough in transducer technology will enable Sonos to take another leap forward in our product portfolio,” said CEO Patrick Spence, adding the acquisition would help the company “accelerate” its product roadmap.

Notably, Spence said the deal also gives Sonos access to intellectual property that will help it further differentiate itself from its competitors. The company is currently in the middle of a bitter legal battle with Google over speaker patents. At the start of the year, the US International Trade Commission found that the search giant had infringed on Sonos’ intellectual property, creating a situation where Google downgraded the functionality of some of its devices to circumvent an import ban.

Sonos promised to share more details about its acquisition of Mayht during its Q2 earnings call in May.

The next major release of Apple’s iOS operating system could include “significant enhancements,” according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. In his latest Power On newsletter, Gurman says he anticipates iOS 16 to include an update to notifications and an assortment of new health-tracking features.

However, for those hoping to see a redesign of iOS, that’s apparently not on the table. “I’m not expecting an end-to-end redesign of iOS’s interface, even though it hasn’t changed much since iOS 7 nearly a decade ago,” said Gurman. He notes the extent of any interface changes Apple plans for might end at a tweak to the iPad’s multitasking UI.

Looking to the company’s other operating systems, Gurman notes watchOS 9 may include upgrades to its activity and health tracking features, but stopped short of sharing specifics. Even less clear is what Apple has planned for the next version of macOS. With Big Sur, the company redesigned its desktop operating system to make it look more like iOS. Meanwhile, with the more recent Monterey, Apple introduced features like Universal Control and SharePlay.

Apple will preview the new macOS, alongside iOS 16 and watchOS 9, at WWDC 2022. The company’s annual developer conference kicks off on June 6th this year. It’s possible we could also see Apple introduce new hardware at the event as well, with Gurman reiterating that Apple is working on new MacBook Air and MacBook Pro models.

Since February, GM’s Cruise self-driving unit has offered public taxi rides in San Francisco. And for the most part, it seems the service hasn’t run into any notable problems. That is until a strange situation played out last weekend when one of the company’s vehicles left police seemingly confused by its response to a routine traffic stop.

The video you see above was first posted on April 2nd but only began to circulate widely after 9to5 publisher Seth Weintraub shared it on his personal Twitter account on Saturday. It shows San Francisco police attempting to pull over a driverless Cruise vehicle in the city’s Richmond District, only for the car to temporarily take off as a group of onlookers watch the scene in disbelief.

One day after Weintraub shared the video, Cruise commented on the clip, stating its vehicle yielded to police and moved to the nearest safe location for that traffic stop. “An officer contacted Cruise personnel and no citation was issued,” the company said. “We work closely with the SFPD on how to interact with our vehicles, including a dedicated phone number for them to call in situations like this.”

It’s unclear why police stopped the vehicle, but it would appear the car didn’t have its front lights on. It's safe to say we may see more episodes like the one that played out on April 2nd occur as autonomous vehicles become a more common sight on US roads. It should come as no surprise then Cruise produced a video designed to teach first responders how to approach its vehicles. Check it out above.

Sonic has done it again. With a $71 million debut at the domestic box office, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 has set a new record for the US film debut of a video game adaptation, beating out the previous high watermark set by its predecessor in 2020. The first movie in what now Paramount plans to expand into a cinematic universe made $57 million during its opening weekend. 

Before the pandemic shut down theaters throughout the US and other parts of the world, the first Sonic film went on to gross $319 million globally. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is currently on track to beat those earnings having grossed approximately $141 million globally.

As with the first movie, timing appears to have been a significant factor in Sonic 2’s early success. Its main competitor at the box office was Sony’s much-maligned Morbius, which saw a drastic 74 percent drop in ticket sales from its opening weekend last Friday. It only earned $10.2 million in additional domestic revenue after a $39 million debut. What we can say, people love Idris Elba. 

For a few days now, Amazon has offered a $50 discount on the 256GB model of Apple's 10.2-inch iPad, allowing you to purchase the tablet for $429. But if all you wanted to do was buy the less expensive base model, you’ve been out of luck until now. As of this weekend, you can purchase the 64GB variant for $309, down from $329, from both Amazon and Walmart. That’s the best discount of the year on Apple’s entry-level tablet. Just note that Amazon is only offering the silver colorway at that price, while you can get both the silver and space gray models for $309 from Walmart.

We gave the ninth generation iPad a score of 86 in 2021. Yes, it features a tired design that Apple hasn’t updated in years, but there’s still a lot to like about the tablet. It’s a solid performer with Apple’s in-house A13 Bionic chip powering everything, including the updated 12-megapixel wide-angle camera that comes with the company’s “Center Stage” feature for improved video calling. Battery life is also solid, with the tablet capable of going 10-plus hours on a single charge.

The main drawbacks of the 10.2-inch iPad are that it doesn’t come with a USB-C port and that you’re stuck using the first-generation Apple Pencil – which you charge by connecting it to the tablet’s Lightning port. That said, if all you need is a device for browsing the web, reading and watching video content, it’s hard to go wrong with the 10.2-inch iPad.

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