Tech News Today for July 31, 2017

Tech News for Monday July 31, 2017

Back in March, the US Senate voted to overturn Broadband Privacy Rules that had prevented ISPs from selling our browsing information. A group at DefCon last week presented evidence of just how easy it is for someone to deanonymize that browsing data. Security experts Svea Eckert and Andreas Dewes attempt to prove the consequences of the loss of broadband privacy when our ISP is able to sell our “clickstreams,” that specifically track minute-by-minute browsing activity. Quartz reports that the good news is that even though ISPs can legally sell this data to whomever they want, right now they say they don't plan to sell it to anyone. Read more at qz.com.

New details about Apple’s plans for the next iPhone have been discovered, but this time, Apple itself appears to be responsible for the information coming to light. Early firmware for Apple’s HomePod speaker hit the web late last week, and an iOS developer has analyzed the code to discover a number of references to FaceDetection, seemingly confirming to some degree that infrared face detection might in fact be a part of the upcoming iPhone 8. Read more at cnet.com.

Get ready for ads in your GIFs. TechCrunch reports that Giphy will soon test sponsored gifs. Giphy has over 200 million daily active users across all platforms, so advertisers are understandably eager to scoop up this real estate. The ads will work a little like they do in search, sources at TechCrunch say. A search for "Woooo," for example, might turn up a sponsored tequila GIF. Like URL search results, there will be other GIFs you can choose from. Read more at techcrunch.com.

Linden Labs, the company that brought the world Second Life (for better or for worse) has had something cooking for the past four years, and just opened its Sansar VR platform up as a beta to the public. Like Second Life, Sansar is a virtual world filled with hundreds of creator-made experiences like museums, theaters, tropical destinations, and even further into games and stories. Anyone can design a virtual object to sell to other users. The world is playable with just a screen, but was designed with VR in mind. Read more at venturebeat.com.

Megan Morrone and Jason Howell are joined today by Marques Brownlee to talk about the Tesla Model 3 event last Friday. Tech News Today streams live weekdays at 4PM Pacific, 7PM Eastern at twit.tv/live. You can subscribe to the show and get it on-demand at twit.tv/tnt.