Amazon and Visa have resolved their simmering dispute over payment fees in the UK and elsewhere, Reuters has reported. "We've recently reached a global agreement with Visa that allows all customers to continue using their Visa credit cards in our stores," a spokesperson told Reuters. 

Amazon threatened to stop accepting Visa in the UK starting January 19th, citing the high fees it charges for credit card transactions. The rest of Europe wasn't impacted as the EU has a cap on card issuer fees, but both Mastercard and Visa card issuers jacked fees in the UK following Brexit. UK regulators recently announced that they'd investigate those increases. 

It seemed likely that Amazon wouldn't carry out its threat, given Visa's dominance in the payment market. Sure enough, shortly before that deadline, Amazon announced it would continue accepting the cards after all and said it was "closely working with Visa on a potential solution." 

Amazon didn't ban or threaten to ban Visa cards anywhere else, but it has been charging an additional transaction fee for Visa-using customers in Australia and Singapore. That charge has now been revoked, and Visa and Amazon appear to have put the whole thing behind them. "This agreement includes the acceptance of Visa at all Amazon stores and sites today, as well as a joint commitment to collaboration on new product and technology initiatives," a Visa spokesperson said in a statement. 

As both the Chrome and Firefox browsers approach their 100th versions, what should be a reason for the developers to celebrate could turn into a bit of a mess. It turns out that much like the Y2K bug, the triple-digit release numbers coded in the browsers' User-Agents (UAs) could cause issues with a small number of sites, Bleeping Computer reported. 

Mozilla launched an experiment last year to see if version number 100 would affect sites, and it just released a blog with the results. It did affect a small number of sites (some very big ones, though) that couldn't parse a user-agent string containing a three-digit number. Notable ones still affected included HBO Go, Bethesda and Yahoo, according to a tracking site. The bugs include "browser not supported" messages, site rendering issues, parsing failures, 403 errors and so on.

How could such a silly thing be happening? "Without a single specification to follow, different browsers have different formats for the User-Agent string, and site-specific User-Agent parsing," Mozilla explained in the blog. "It’s possible that some parsing libraries may have hard-coded assumptions or bugs that don’t take into account three-digit major version numbers." 

Luckily, developers for both browsers have a plan. If there are issues with sites that can't be resolved before the versions are released, both browsers will freeze the version numbers at 99 in the UA strings or inject code overrides to fix the problems. Both have also asked developers to test their sites with Firefox/Chrome 100 user agents. The browsers are set to arrive on March 29th and May 3rd for Chrome and Firefox respectively — hopefully like Y2K, it'll be much ado about nothing.. 

An Amazon union avoidance officer has reportedly told workers at the company's JFK8 warehouse that there's a possibility they could get lower pay than what they're currently getting if they unionize. Motherboard has obtained an audio recording of a mandatory anti-union meeting that happened on Wednesday, wherein the officer could be heard describing the collective bargaining process. "The negotiation phase of the process is called collective bargaining, and in the negotiation, there are no guarantees. You can end up with better, the same, or worse than you already have," the officer said. 

An employee then cuts in and asks what they mean that workers could end up with worse, and the officer responds that there are no guarantees what would happen: "We can't promise what's going to happen. Amazon can't promise you that they're going to walk into negotiations and that the negotiations will start from the same [pay and benefits workers have already]. They could start from minimum wage for instance. I don't think that will happen, but it's a possibility." 

"So you're saying that Amazon’s gonna say..." the worker said, to which the officer responded: "I just said I'm not saying that." When the worker asked "So why put that out there?," the officer completely changed the topic. In addition, the officer also talked about how workers will be liable to pay union dues if they unionize and that there's no limit to how much they could be charged in New York. The election will have "significant and binding consequences not just for yourselves but for future associates, your coworkers, and potentially for your family," they warned. 

Frank Kearl, the lawyer representing workers at JFK8, told Motherboard:

"The [union avoidance consultant] makes the threat and tries to walk it back but once you’ve poisoned the well you can’t take it back. Even though she realized she made a mistake in making the threat, it doesn’t mean the threat wasn’t made and heard by all the workers who were forced to sit in on that session. It's against the law and an unfair labor practice to make a threat of reprisal.”

The National Labor Relations Board had previously accused Amazon of threatening, surveilling and interrogating workers at its JFK8 warehouse to discourage them from unionizing. A union avoidance consultant reportedly told them back then that organizing at the warehouse would fail anyway, because the organizers were "thugs." Amazon denied the allegations. 

The Amazon Labor Union, which is an independent group seeking to represent workers in the company, successfully collected enough signatures at JFK8 in its second attempt to unionize. Amazon and the ALU have reached an agreement to hold an in-person union vote at the facility between March 25th and March 30th. 

Spotify announced today that it is acquiring two major podcast ad tech firms, Chartable and Podsights, in a move to expand its offerings to advertisers. Both companies offer popular tools that help brands and agencies better understand the effectiveness of their podcast ads.

In a blog post announcing the acquisitions, Spotify laid out how both companies will expand its ad platform. With Podsights, advertisers will be able to see more detailed data on who clicked on an ad and what actions they took after the fact (i.e. if they purchased the actual product). “As part of Spotify, Podsights will be able to utilize Spotify’s technology and intelligence to bring more accurate measurement and actionable insights to podcast advertisers around the world,” wrote Spotify in its post.

The Chartable acquisition seems more geared towards podcast ads about podcasts. It's two promotional tools — SmartLinks and SmartPromos — will now be available to podcasters on Spotify. SmartPromos allows podcasters to see which ads are resulting in the most downloads and essentially measure the success of their ad campaigns. SmartLinks, according to Chartable’s website, are “shareable, trackable URLs that automatically route listeners to their podcasts”. The tool allows podcasters to track both clicks and downloads.

Spotify has invested heavily in expanding its podcast offerings over the past couple of years; both by locking high-profile creators into exclusivity deals and offering podcast advertisers more bang for their buck with more detailed analytics. The Chartable acquisition in particular will build on Megaphone’s offerings; another ad tech acquisition Spotify made in 2020.

These two acquisitions are likely to sweeten the pot for both advertisers and professional podcasters looking to join Spotify. If you’ve felt that podcast ads have become more numerous over the past couple of years or so, you’re not imagining things: Spotify has expanded its ad setup with in-app ads and pre-recorded ad slots that are tailored to your listening habits. "This latest deal seems positioned to make the platform a more attractive option for brands and advertisers, and to entice podcasters without a network or salespeople of their own into Spotify's walled garden."

Samsung's next hardware event will coincide with Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The company announced today it will host a fully virtual keynote on Sunday, February 27th at 1PM ET. You'll be able to watch the event on Samsung's website and the company's YouTube channel. You'll also find full coverage here at Engadget.

In years past, Mobile World Congress was one of the most important events in Samsung's release calendar. Between 2014 and 2018, the company frequently took to Barcelona to announce its latest Galaxy S phones. However, after it came out with the Galaxy S9 in 2018, the company began instead to unveil those devices at its own Unpacked events. It's easy to see why: while Samsung always dominated the MWC news cycle, it still shared the limelight with other phone makers, including Sony and LG.

And then the pandemic came. In 2020, the GSMA canceled the event. One year later, it pushed it back to late June, but Samsung was among the companies that said it wouldn't have a physical presence at the conference. Now, after two years away, it's returning to the MWC roster.

As for what we can expect from Samsung, it's hard to say. At its first Unpacked of 2022, the company announced the Galaxy S22 and Tab S8. Judging from the invite Samsung shared, the company could focus on devices like the Galaxy Z Flip and Z Fold. The next version of the latter will reportedly take inspiration from the new Galaxy S22 Ultra and add a built-in slot for the company's S Pen Stylus. We won't know the full details until Samsung confirms them come February 27th. Either way, you'll want to visit Engadget that day to see what the company has been working on behind the scenes.

Don't expect to watch HBO's The Last of Us series any time soon. Channel programming president Casey Bloys told The Hollywood Reporter in an interview that the adaptation of Naughty Dog's apocalyptic games won't air in 2022. Bloys didn't commit to a release date, but he noted filming was still underway in the western Canadian city of Calgary.

The series stars The Mandalorian and Narcos veteran Pedro Pascal as the grizzled survivor Joel, while Game of Thrones' Bella Ramsey plays the teen Ellie. The games' Merle Dandridge plays the resistance leader Marlene, while Gabriel Luna (True Detective) and Anna Torv (Fringe) respectively play Joel's brother Tommy and the smuggler Tess. Nick Offerman also has a guest role. The high-level plot largely mimics that of the first game — Joel is tasked with escorting Ellie to an organization searching for a cure to the brain infection that ravaged humanity, but the journey becomes far more complicated.

The timing will have HBO's The Last of Us debut long after the game's sequel. Expectations are already riding high, though. On top of the cast, the show is written and executive produced by Chernobyl's Craig Mazin and Naughty Dog's Neil Druckmann. In theory, the series will both buck the trend of so-so game adaptations and give Sony's PlayStation Productions studio some extra credibility.

Starting as early as January 2020, Russian state-sponsored hackers have repeatedly targeted American defense contractors, according to the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA). In an alert spotted by The Verge, the agency said on Wednesday that Russian-backed actors have spent the past two years targeting contractors with US security clearance. What's more, those activities allowed them to obtain sensitive information and export-controlled technologies, said CISA.

Those hackers cast a wide net, targeting companies with contracts involving weapons and missile development, as well as vehicle and aircraft design, among other sensitive areas of work for the Department of Defense. CISA makes no mention of those actors obtaining classified documents, but the agency notes they went after both large and small targets. Alongside the FBI and NSA, CISA anticipates Russian-backed hackers will continue to target defense contractors in the near future.

“The acquired information provides significant insight into US weapons platforms development and deployment timelines, vehicle specifications and plans for communications infrastructure and information technology,” said CISA. “By acquiring proprietary internal documents and email communications, adversaries may be able to adjust their own military plans and priorities, hasten technological development efforts, inform foreign policymakers of US intentions and target potential sources for recruitment.”

The advisory comes as tensions between the US and Russia continue to escalate over a potential invasion of Ukraine. In recent weeks, the country has faced multiple cyberattacks, with the most recent coming earlier this week. Ukraine’s defense ministry and two of its state-owned banks suffered denial-of-service attacks. The attacks weren’t directly attributed to Russian-backed actors, but the country blamed its neighbor last month for a campaign that hobbled dozens of government websites.

Netflix was the first company to announce a project around the alleged Bitcoin money launderers, Heather "Razzlekhan" Morgan and Ilya Lichtenstein, but unsurprisingly, it won't be the last. Deadline reports that Forbes Entertainment and EOne will be teaming up to produce two projects around the scandal: a scripted series, as well as a documentary. Naturally, both projects will lean on Forbes' reporting, but what's more interesting is that Morgan was also a Forbes contributor for several years. 

Morgan and Lichtenstein, or the "crypto couple" as many call them now, allegedly tried to launder $3.6 billion in bitcoin that was stolen from the 2016 Bitfinex hack. The cryptocurrency was worth around $63.7 million when it was originally stolen, but now it's valued at over $5 billion. That eye-watering figure mostly comes down to the skyrocketing value of bitcoin over the last several years. Notably, the bitcoin scandal is also the largest financial seizure ever by the Justice Department, beating out the $1 billion recovered from the dark web marketplace Silk Road in 2020.  

Starting today, everyone who is running a bot account on Twitter can add a label to make it clear the tweets are automated. The company started testing the label in September and is now rolling it out globally.

Some bot accounts focus on things like emoji mashups, breaking news and weather updates. Twitter says the label will provide users with more details about a bot account and its purpose. That, Twitter suggests, will help folks decide which accounts to follow and engage with, while perhaps adding a layer of trust and transparency.

The company announced in 2020 that all "high-quality" bot accounts would need to make it clear they weren't manually being run by someone. Under that rule, operators of certain bot accounts need to state that they're automated and display the name of the person behind them.

Twitter isn't limiting crypto fans to tipping with Bitcoin. The social network has expanded its tipping options to let creators add their Ethereum address. If you're sitting on a stash of that other major cryptocurrency, it should be easier to show your support.

The expansion also adds support for a trio of payment services, including Barter, Paga and Paytm. You can send tips by visiting the Tips icon in someone's Twitter profile. If you want to receive tips and are at least 18 years old, you can choose to edit your profile and enable tips.

Ethereum support is helpful if you aren't quite as enthusiastic about Bitcoin as former Twitter chief Jack Dorsey. In some ways, though, the payment service support is more useful. Barter, Paga and Paytm are useful in India, Nigeria and other countries where mobile payments thrive. Twitter's move not only lets more people tip, but makes it more practical for digital creators to operate in certain countries — they'll know their audiences can contribute.