https://techxplore.com/rss-feed/internet-news/ en-us The latest news on the internet, world wide web, web 2.0 and science technology. Australia unveiled draft laws on Tuesday that would tax tech giants Meta, Google and TikTok unless they voluntarily strike deals to pay local outlets for news. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-04-australia-aims-tax-tech-giants.html Internet Tue, 28 Apr 2026 03:43:53 EDT news696566584 YouTube is offering Hollywood celebrities and entertainers a free detection tool to help combat their deepfakes, expanding the Google-owned video platform's efforts to guard against AI-driven impersonations. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-04-youtube-deepfake-hollywood.html Internet Fri, 24 Apr 2026 04:30:01 EDT news696222850 A University of Queensland study has shown large language models (LLMs) used in AI content moderation may be prone to subtle biases that undermine their neutrality. A team led by data scientist Professor Gianluca Demartini from UQ's School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science used persona prompting to test the tendency of AI chatbots to encode and reproduce political biases, and found significant behavioral shifts. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-04-ai-bias-online-content-moderation.html Internet Wed, 22 Apr 2026 12:40:01 EDT news696079502 Online review aggregator Yelp wants to harness artificial intelligence to make it easier for users to find information curated by other people. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-04-yelp-ai-chatbot-users-sift.html Internet Tue, 21 Apr 2026 13:00:01 EDT news695994747 A new study, published in Anatomical Sciences Education, provides evidence that researchers and scientific organizations can significantly improve public access to accurate, high-quality information through structured engagement with Wikipedia, one of the most widely used knowledge platforms in the world and an increasingly influential source for both search engines and artificial intelligence systems. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-04-strategic-wikipedia-engagement-scientific-visibility.html Internet Tue, 21 Apr 2026 07:00:01 EDT news695967842 European Union chief Ursula von der Leyen said Wednesday that an EU-developed age verification app was ready to go, as the bloc pushes to better protect children from online harm. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-04-eu-age-app-ready-children.html Internet Wed, 15 Apr 2026 10:10:01 EDT news695464584 For some evangelical Christians, faith is about having a personal relationship with Jesus. At $1.99 per minute, the tech company Just Like Me is taking that concept to a new level. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-04-buddhabot-chats-ai-jesus-faith.html Internet Fri, 10 Apr 2026 12:07:31 EDT news695041603 Modern life depends on fast and reliable wireless connections. Video calls, streaming services, virtual reality, and smart devices all place growing demands on networks that already serve billions of users. Most wireless data today travels through radio-based technologies such as Wi-Fi and cellular systems. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-faster-greener-wireless-indoors.html Internet Sun, 05 Apr 2026 14:00:01 EDT news694169544 Good news for people who regret the Gmail address they came up with when they registered for an account: Google is now letting users change it. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-04-awkward-gmail-google-users.html Internet Thu, 02 Apr 2026 10:20:04 EDT news694342599 A QUT study of 20 popular paid and free apps for children aged 5 to 8 years found that most contained deceptive design patterns aimed at attracting children to paid content, increasing their time spent using the app, or encouraging them to watch advertisements for other products. Corresponding author Professor Daniel Johnson from QUT's School of Computer Science and the Australian Research Council Center of Excellence for the Digital Child, said the study found at least one deceptive pattern in 15 of the 20 apps. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-popular-kids-apps-deceptive-tactics.html Internet Tue, 31 Mar 2026 09:40:02 EDT news694168741 Instagram is testing a pay tier that offers features including letting subscribers discreetly view "Story" posts that normally vanish after 24 hours, Meta told AFP on Monday, confirming a report by news website TechCrunch. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-meta-subscription-tier-instagram.html Internet Tue, 31 Mar 2026 04:31:43 EDT news694150269 Australians are among the most anxious in the world about artificial intelligence (AI). https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-manners-machines-ai-scrapers-destroying.html Internet Sat, 28 Mar 2026 20:00:01 EDT news693745341 Internet trailblazer Yahoo is exploring technology's next frontier with Scout, an answer engine powered by artificial intelligence. Scout seems insightful, based on its response to a question posed by The Associated Press about why one of Silicon Valley's brightest stars faded away a decade ago. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-yahoo-ai-powered-scout-roots.html Internet Fri, 27 Mar 2026 13:50:01 EDT news693836714 Researchers at Stevens Institute of Technology used machine learning tools and social network theory—the study of how people connect with each other—to better understand how people interact online. Using data from X, formerly Twitter, researchers probed the complex patterns of relationships and shared interests that link people together across the internet. In particular, they focused on elucidating how people form online communities, interact within those communities or leave them. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-machine-social-network-theory-formation.html Internet Thu, 26 Mar 2026 10:00:04 EDT news693734846 The US Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday in a landmark copyright case that internet service providers (ISPs) are not liable for online pirating of music by their users. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-internet-liable-music-piracy-users.html Internet Thu, 26 Mar 2026 06:30:01 EDT news693722430 For many job seekers, it might seem like there's never been a harder time to find a job. Hiring for white-collar jobs has been especially weak, part of what economists call a "low-hire, low-fire" job market in which businesses are largely holding onto their workers while hiring remains sluggish, making it difficult for younger workers to land permanent work. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-ai-job.html Internet Thu, 26 Mar 2026 05:34:23 EDT news693722027 Researchers have discovered a major security leak hiding in plain sight on the internet that could expose the personal data and financial records of millions of people. In a paper published on the arXiv preprint server, Nurullah Demir of Stanford University and colleagues analyzed 10 million websites to see how often API (application programming interfaces) credentials are exposed. These are digital keys or tokens that enable different software programs to communicate and are often used to process bank payments and access cloud storage. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-thousands-websites-accidentally-sensitive.html Internet Wed, 25 Mar 2026 12:40:04 EDT news693658041 Love is mysterious. You feel it in your chest, your knees, your soul. Love will put you on budget airplanes across the world, leave you hiding from your own phone after a sent text message or perhaps standing in the rain with your belongings in a box. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-dating-app-algorithms.html Internet Tue, 24 Mar 2026 20:30:01 EDT news693582035 Viewers would rather watch video at slightly lower speeds than endure rebuffering, according to new research from Lancaster University. The study investigated how dynamically slowing down or speeding up playback is perceived by viewers, and how playback speed changes compare to other ways of overcoming viewer internet slowdowns—such as reducing picture quality and pausing for rebuffering. The resulting paper is published in the journal ACM Transactions on Multimedia Computing, Communications, and Applications. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-video-streaming-frustrating-buffering-circle.html Internet Wed, 18 Mar 2026 15:30:02 EDT news693066062 In a survey study of U.S. teens, more than half (55.3%) reported that they had created at least one image using nudification tools, which use generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) to show what an individual may look like without clothing. Chad Steel of George Mason University, Virginia, U.S., presents these findings in the open-access journal PLOS One. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-teens-ai-sexualized-images-survey.html Internet Wed, 18 Mar 2026 14:00:13 EDT news693044175 Google Maps will depend more heavily on artificial intelligence to help people figure out where they want to go and the best way to get there as part of a major redesign unveiled on Thursday. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-google-overhauls-app-adding-ai.html Internet Thu, 12 Mar 2026 10:30:05 EDT news692528627 Researchers at the University at Albany and Rutgers University have developed an early-warning framework that can predict harmful social media interactions before they erupt, paving the way for interventions that can minimize harm and make platforms safer for users. Using publicly available datasets from Reddit and Instagram, two social media platforms with distinct conversation dynamics, researchers trained models to predict from just the first 10 comments whether a thread would escalate into "concentrated waves of toxic interactions"—or what they have dubbed a "negative storm" or "neg storm." https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-early-toxic-social-media-storms.html Internet Tue, 10 Mar 2026 15:20:04 EDT news692374021 TikTok is built for people to create and share their own content, so dance music and indie artists fill the platform's Top 100. On Spotify, love songs and music from major record labels dominate its top charts. On both platforms, people's preferences only partly explain what songs become hits. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-tiktok-spotify.html Internet Mon, 09 Mar 2026 13:40:04 EDT news692281682 Why do you see the results you do when you search for information online? It's a complex mix of what the source is, its relationships to other sources online, and your own past browsing history and device settings. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-03-google-sources-good-online-news.html Internet Thu, 05 Mar 2026 10:10:01 EST news691927741 A new study examining digital behavior in Taiwan suggests that simply having internet access is no longer enough to ensure digital inclusion—a finding with growing implications for the United States as governments, schools, and employers continue shifting services online. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-02-smartphone-internet-access-deepens-digital.html Internet Thu, 26 Feb 2026 10:10:06 EST news691322320 Online chat service Discord has announced it will begin testing age verification for some users, joining a growing list of platforms trying to work out who is actually behind the screen. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-02-age-verification-online-safely-privately.html Internet Sat, 21 Feb 2026 19:00:03 EST news690725304 Social media addiction has been compared to casinos, opioids and cigarettes. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-02-social-media-addictive-adults-ways.html Internet Sat, 21 Feb 2026 13:30:05 EST news690902437 Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is set to testify Wednesday at a groundbreaking social media addiction trial, summoned by lawyers representing a plaintiff who alleges Instagram and other platforms were deliberately designed to make young users addicted. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-02-zuckerberg-testify-landmark-social-media.html Internet Wed, 18 Feb 2026 05:40:01 EST news690611647 YouTube said late Tuesday it had fixed a widespread outage that hit hundreds of thousands of users around the world. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-02-youtube-outage.html Internet Wed, 18 Feb 2026 04:31:58 EST news690611503 Romance scams are among the most emotionally damaging forms of cyber crime because they combine carefully manufactured intimacy with financial theft—the scammers go after your heart, and then your wallet. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-02-romance-scams-internet-stay-safe.html Internet Wed, 11 Feb 2026 11:06:35 EST news690030362