Rare Bipartisan Push to Scrutinize Silicon Valley After Google+ Fiasco

Google+ recently suffered an incident where a bug potentially exposed the data of thousands of users. Now we’re seeing a bipartisan push to reign in tech companies after a deluge of leaks.

At a Senate hearing Wednesday, Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune (R., S.D.) said it is increasingly clear from Google+ as well as Facebook Inc.’s earlier Cambridge Analytica scandal that industry self-regulation is no longer sufficient to protect users’ privacy.

We should never have trusted corporations to be able to self-regulate in the first place. That’s like telling a criminal to voluntarily turn themselves in.

The Internet of Things Will Bring a Creepy Future

The Internet of Things will turn everything into a computer, and will also create a creepy future for us with less privacy than ever before.

Mr. Schneier argues that the economic and technical incentives of the internet-of-things industry do not align with security and privacy for society generally. Putting a computer in everything turns the whole world into a computer security threat — and the hacks and bugs uncovered in just the last few weeks at Facebook and Google illustrate how difficult digital security is even for the biggest tech companies. In a roboticized world, hacks would not just affect your data but could endanger your property, your life and even national security.

Stardew Valley Coming to iOS

Popular game Stardew Valley is coming soon to iOS. It will arrive in the App Store on October 24. The app is being developed by London-based studio The Secret Police.

Chucklefish has been handling the business and marketing side of things. While the game will launch first on the iOS App Store, The Secret Police are currently working on finishing up the Android version, and I hope to give you more news about an exact launch date soon.

It will be available for US$7.99.