Google's newest Pixel feature drop is meant as much for spur-of-the-moment creativity as it is everyday conveniences. The company is rolling out a June feature update that, with a separate download, offers a free music-making tool from Teenage Engineering. The Pocket Operator for Pixel app (shown at middle) turns your videos into music and video "cut-ups" with a mix of sounds, patterns and visual effects. You'll need a Pixel 5 or newer to get started, but It could be worth a try if you'd like to craft beats during your downtime.

The feature drop also lets you see imagery from your Nest Doorbell on your Pixel phone's lock screen (pictured at left). You'll know right away if it's worth answering the door. And if you need to show proof of your COVID-19 shots, you can now take a screenshot of your digital vaccine card and create a shortcut for your home screen (right). This will only be available in Australia, Canada and the US, but could be helpful if you still need to show proof of vaccination to hop on a flight or enter a venue.

Other upgrades include a previously beta-only Conversation mode in the Sound Amplifier app (to enhance chats for people with hearing loss), a reminder to turn off your flashlight and (soon) air quality alerts for Australia, India and the US. You'll also find a trio of new Pride-themed wallpapers from Yann Bastard, while skin tone-friendly image filters are now active in Google Photos.

The update starts rolling out today to Pixel 4 and later devices. You can also expect broader support for existing features, including Car Crash Detection in Canada as well as new languages in Messages' chat translation (Dutch, Korean, Thai, Traditional Chinese and Turkish).

Facebook isn't the only one compensating Illinois residents over alleged privacy violations. The Vergenotes Google has agreed to pay $100 million to settle a class action lawsuit accusing the company of violating Illinois' Biometric Information Protection Act (BIPA) through Photos' "Face Grouping" feature. The settlement will let you claim between $200 and $400 if you appeared in a picture on Photos between May 1st, 2015 and April 25th, 2022.

Google supposedly broke the law by collecting and analyzing faces without appropriate notice, asking for "informed" consent or sharing data retention policies with the public. Face Grouping is meant to help you find photos of given people by detecting faces and automatically organizing them into collections.

You have until September 24th to submit a claim, and can object to the settlement terms before August 10th. The final approval hearing is slated for September 28th.

We've asked Google for comment. In a statement to The Verge, the company defended Face Grouping by stressing that collections were only visible to you and can be disabled.

The settlement is relatively modest. In 2021, Facebook agreed to pay $650 million to settle a lawsuit over its defunct face-based Tag Suggestions feature. This might not be the last big payout in the near future, though. Snap is dealing with a class action suit over purportedly illegal collection of face and voice data for its augmented reality effects, and it might face a similar expense if the plaintiffs prevail.

It’s that time once again. Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference kicks off today. As ever, the proceedings will commence with a keynote that will contain the majority of the biggest news. Apple has invited a small number of guests to attend the keynote at Apple Park, though most folks will need to tune in virtually. The event starts at 1PM ET and you can watch it below.

You'll get your first proper look at features coming to iOS 16, iPadOS 16, watchOS 9, tvOS 16 and the next macOS. The updates should arrive later this year, though you can try the new OS versions early if you're willing to install the various developer betas.

We have an inkling of what to expect from WWDC thanks to a melange of reports and leaks. Health, Messages, notifications and the lock screen are all said to be in line for updates on iOS 16 and iPadOS 16. Improved multitasking is believed to be on the way to iPad, while it's expected that iOS will gain support for always-on displays ahead of that feature coming to some of the next-gen iPhones.

There are also rumblings that Apple will announce a refreshed MacBook Air running on an M2 processor. In any case, we won't need to wait long to find out what Apple has in store.

Axon has paused work on a project to build drones equipped with its Tasers. A majority of its artificial intelligence ethics board quit after the plan was announced last week.

Nine of the 12 members said in a resignation letter that, just a few weeks ago, the board voted 8-4 to recommend that Axon shouldn't move forward with a pilot study for a Taser-equipped drone concept. "In that limited conception, the Taser-equipped drone was to be used only in situations in which it might avoid a police officer using a firearm, thereby potentially saving a life," the nine board members wrote. They noted Axon might decline to follow that recommendation and were working on a report regarding measures the company should have in place were it to move forward.

The nine individuals said they were blindsided by an announcement from the company last Thursday — nine days after 19 elementary school students and two teachers were killed in a mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas — about starting development of such a drone. It had an aim of "incapacitating an active shooter in less than 60 seconds." Axon said it "asked the board to re-engage and consider issuing further guidance and feedback on this capability."

Axon CEO Rick Smith suggested the drones could be deployed as a measure to prevent mass shootings. As Reuters notes, he envisioned drones being stationed in school hallways and having the ability to enter rooms through vents. The drone system, which Axon suggested might be ready as soon as 2024, would have cost schools around $1,000 per year.

The system would have tapped into security camera feeds to detect active shooter events using both human monitoring and artificial intelligence. While a human operator would have made the final decision on whether to fire a Taser, Axon planned to develop "targeting algorithms" to help them with "properly and safely aiming the device."

"This type of surveillance undoubtedly will harm communities of color and others who are overpoliced, and likely well beyond that," the resigning board members wrote. "The Taser-equipped drone also has no realistic chance of solving the mass shooting problem Axon now is prescribing it for, only distracting society from real solutions to a tragic problem. We all feel the desperate need to do something to address our epidemic of mass shootings. But Axon’s proposal to elevate a tech-and-policing response when there are far less harmful alternatives, is not the solution."

Those board members said that before Axon made its announcement, they urged it to "pull back" on the plans. "But the company charged ahead in a way that struck many of us as trading on the tragedy of the Uvalde and Buffalo shootings," they wrote. "Significantly for us, it bypassed Axon’s commitment to consult with the company’s own AI Ethics Board."

Smith said that the goal of the announcement was to start a conversation about the use of drones equipped with Tasers as a possible solution. "I acknowledge that our passion for finding new solutions to stop mass shootings led us to move quickly," Smith said in a statement. "However, in light of feedback, we are pausing work on this project and refocusing to further engage with key constituencies to fully explore the best path forward."

The AI ethics board has had previous success in convincing Axon to change course. In 2019, the company said it wouldn't use facial recognition in its police body cameras after the board expressed concern about the plan.

Just because you use a password manager doesn't mean you want to enter passwords every time you check that manager... and now, you don't have to. LastPass has launched an option to access your vault using a passwordless sign-in — it's the first password manager with this feature, the company claims. Grant permission through the LastPass Authenticator mobile app and you can update account info on the web without entering your master password.

The approach relies on FIDO-compliant password-free technology. The feature is available to both personal and business users. LastPass is also promising options beyond the Authenticator app in the future, such as relying on biometric scans or hardware security keys.

It may seem odd to rely on a phone app to check passwords on your PC, and LastPass already takes care of some headaches through its browser extension. Still, this promises to take more of the pain out of password managers. It might also convince you to use a stronger password for your vault knowing that you'll only rarely need to type it in.

Elon Musk still isn't happy with Twitter's stance on bots and other fake accounts. As Bloombergreports, Musk has amended an SEC filing to claim Twitter is committing a "material breach" of merger terms by allegedly refusing to disclose enough information about bot spam and fake account data. The social network's offer to provide additional info on its testing methods for bogus accounts is both inadequate and an attempt to "obfuscate and confuse" the situation, the Tesla chief said. In other words, he's concerned Twitter is trying to hide the true scope of its bot problem.

Musk reportedly needs the data to both prepare for the Twitter acquisition and to improve his financing of the deal, according to the filing. He also maintained that he neither needs to explain his reasoning for the data nor agree to new conditions to access any info.

We've asked Twitter for comment. The company has routinely claimed that bots and fake accounts represent less than five percent of daily users, but hasn't shared significantly more detail. Musk put his purchase "temporarily on hold" in mid-May as he sought to confirm that figure.

This isn't the only obstacle Musk's bid faces. Regulators in the European Union, for instance, have warned that the entrepreneur will still have to obey local content rules regardless of his desire to loosen Twitter's policies. If Musk and Twitter remain at odds over bot data, however, the $44 billion purchase could fall apart before it's even finalized.

This weekend's Xbox and Bethesda showcase won't include all the news that's fit to stream. Like it did last June, Microsoft will run a second event, which will include more trailers, discussions with developers and in-depth looks at some of the games featured in the main Xbox and Bethesda Games Showcase.

Xbox Games Showcase Extended will take place on June 14th at 1PM ET. It will run for around 90 minutes and will be available in English, Latin America Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, German and French, and with live audio descriptions and American Sign Language. Support for more languages will be added later. You'll be able to watch on YouTube, Twitch, Twitter and Facebook.

Last year's Xbox Games Showcase Extended offered additional details on the likes of Forza Horizon 5, Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2,Microsoft Flight Simulator and some third-party games. We also learned about the return of Xbox Design Lab to help players customize their controllers.

The primary showcase is set for June 12 at 1PM ET. It'll be on the same channels, as well as TikTok, Steam and Bilibili. Microsoft says the event will be available in 33 languages overall, though some may not be available until next week if the translations aren't finished in time. English audio descriptions and ASL will help more fans enjoy the show.

Xbox notes it will stream the showcase in 1080p at 60 fps. A 4K version will be available on YouTube afterward. Meanwhile, Engadget will have coverage of all the biggest news from both events.

While we know the Google Pixel 7 is on the horizon, that knowledge isn't going to help you if you're in need of a new smartphone immediately. But Amazon has a new sale on the Pixel 6 Pro 5G that may be just what you're looking for. You can pick up the flagship smartphone from the online retailer for $799 right now, or $100 off its normal price. That's the cheapest we've seen the smartphone, making it a good time to get all of the latest features a Google phone has to offer before the Pixel 7 comes out.

The Pixel 6 Pro earned a score of 91 from us and we consider it to be one of the best Android phones you can get. Its two-toned design with the horizontal camera bar may be polarizing, but it's also striking and pretty slick. The 6 Pro has a 6.7-inch, 120Hz display that will automatically adjust refresh rates depending on what you're doing. It also has an under-display fingerprint sensor that, while a tad slow, provides an extra layer of security. The 6 Pro runs on Google's Tensor Processing Unit and we found it to provide excellent performance overall. Along with its strong performance, you can expect an equally strong battery life from the handset. We managed to get over 17 hours of use before needing to power up again.

One of the stand-out features of Google's Pixel smartphones is the camera array, and that remains the case for the Pixel 6 Pro. It has a 50-megapixel main sensor, a 12MP wide-angle lens and a 48MP telephoto shooter with a 4X optical zoom. These cameras work together to take lovely photos that are on-par with those taken by the iPhone 13 Pro's camera array. Android 12 also brings a number of handy photography features including Magic Eraser, Face Unblur, Long Exposure and more.

Yes, you could save even more money and opt for the Google Pixel 6, but you'd be forging the 6 Pro's 120Hz screen, telephoto camera and ultra wideband chip in the process. If you've had your eye on a Pixel phone for some time, now's a good opportunity to pick up the best model available right now for less.

Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.

Online marketplace Etsy has unveiled a new purchase protection program designed to safeguard both buyers and sellers. Right now, you have limited options if something else goes wrong with a purchase — usually, Etsy will send you back to the seller and let you work out problems with them. Starting August 1st, though, buyers will get full refunds on purchases if they "don't match the item description, arrive damaged, or never arrive," Etsy wrote. 

On the seller side, Etsy plans to invest at least $25 million per year to cover refunds for sellers on orders up to $250 for issues out of their control. "This program will help buyers feel more confident when they shop from businesses on Etsy, while we invest directly in our sellers to provide them an important layer of assurance," said Etsy CEO Raina Moskowitz in a statement. 

Angry Etsy sellers recently went on strike over fee hikes and slow support response times. The company defended the increases by saying it would put the extra money back into the business rather than boosting profits. On top of the $25 million in purchase protection, it recently announced $50 million in spending to improve customer support. It promised to use that money to expand its team, improve live chat support and reduce response times.

"Etsy’s Purchase Protection program will complement our broad efforts to improve customer support, increase trust signals across the user experience, and maintain the integrity of our marketplace as a destination for unique and special items," said Moskowitz. Whether sellers will be convinced remains to be seen, however. 

There’s plenty riding on NASA’s next-generation Space Launch System, the modern-day rocket that will carry the Artemis missions. But after delaying its most recent test to make urgent repairs to the fuel system, the SLS is once again ready for another milestone. Today, the craft is on its way over to Launch Pad 39B to prepare for its “wet” dress rehearsal (so they fuel it, even if they have no intention of launching) later this month.

That test will take the rocket all the way to the countdown procedure while fully fuelled, giving engineers plenty of new data ahead of a planned real-world launch. If that all goes to plan, we could be a few months away from sending an uncrewed vehicle into orbit around the Moon. Give it a couple more years, and we’ll hopefully send a crew beyond Earth’s gravity for the first time since 1972.

— Dan Cooper

The biggest stories you might have missed

• 'I Am Groot' heads to Disney+ on August 10th

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• FTC says victims of crypto scams have lost more than $1 billion since 2021

‘Diablo Immortal’ is unplayable on some Samsung phones with Exynos chipsets

This is not an out-of-season April Fools’ joke.

Blizzard / NetEase

The Diablo Immortal reviews all said pretty much the same thing: There’s a good game hidden beneath all of that loot-box crud. Unfortunately, if you were using a Samsung phone with one of the company’s own Exynos chipsets, the game feels a lot more broken than that. It appears as if the title isn’t working well with that silicon, making the title almost unplayable. A Blizzard spokesperson said the company is exploring the problem and may block downloads of the title to some affected phones while they scramble for a fix.

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NASA probably won't need Russia to send more astronauts to the ISS

Now SpaceX is its best friend (for now).

NASA

NASA has purchased an extra raft of crewed missions from SpaceX to ensure the International Space Station retains its full personnel complement until 2030. The five trips are enough to provide an “uninterrupted” US presence on the station until its planned retirement date. Not only will it help give NASA options during its launch program, it’ll also cover any gaps made by Boeing’s yet-to-be-certified Starliner vehicle, which isn’t due to fly until next year. If nothing else, that’s some egg on the face of the aerospace giant, which has lost ground to its upstart rival in the spaceflight world for some time now.

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Apple's 2022 MacBook Air reportedly won't come in a selection of iMac-like colors

No Orange MacBook Air for you.

It’s the week of Apple’s big developer event, which means we’re likely to get a whole host of new hardware and software announcements as part of the main show. But if you were hoping the next-generation MacBook Air would have the same bunch of color options as the new iMac, prepare for disappointment. Those in the know claim an updated M1 MacBook Air will only sell in four hues: space gray, silver, blue and gold. That said, it’s hard to know what the company will announce given the factory closures caused by China’s fresh round of COVID-19 lockdowns.

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China’s Shenzhou-14 mission arrives at Tiangong space station for final construction

The country’s homegrown space station is getting a big push toward completion.

Astronauts aboard China’s Shenzhou-14 mission have successfully arrived on the nation’s Tiangong space station. The crew of three will spend the next six months on the station to make a significant stride toward completing its setup. Next month, the country will launch a lab module to expand the station’s footprint, with a second unit going up in October, and astronauts will conduct several EVAs to get everything connected and ready. If successful, the nation expects Tiangong to be fully operational by the end of the year.

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Automotive giant Stellantis pleads guilty to diesel emissions fraud

It paid a $300 million fine.

Stellantis, parent company of Fiat Chrysler and PSA Group, has pleaded guilty to charges of criminal conspiracy after covering the extent of its diesel emissions. The automotive giant was accused of violating the Clean Air Act, misleading regulators around tailpipe emissions and installing defeat devices to cheat government tests. As part of the settlement, the company must submit compliance reports to the Justice Department for three years. Meanwhile, three of its employees are awaiting criminal charges. Given the outsize impact that tailpipe emissions have both on people’s health and the climate, and that the company’s net profit was reportedly nearly $15.2 billion in 2021, the penalty seems like something of a bargain.

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