The update is available now for some users, with a full rollout expected over the “coming days/weeks.” | Image: The Verge A critical security update is now available for some Chrome users on Mac, Linux, and Windows that patches a zero-day vulnerability that could make systems susceptible to data theft and other cyber attacks. On Tuesday, Google confirmed in a Chrome stable channel update that it “is aware that an exploit for CVE-2023-6345 exists in the wild.” The vulnerability was discovered on November 24th by two security researchers working within Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG). Google hasn’t released many details…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google Drive users on iOS are getting a new scanning feature that lets them quickly photograph documents and add them to their libraries, the search giant has announced. The feature has been available for Android for over a decade, but until now iPhone and iPad users haven’t had the same option. Google has also upgraded the scanner in Drive’s Android app. iPhone users in the US will also benefit from a new title suggestion feature that attempts to auto-generate a document title based on text it recognizes in the scan. The feature previously…

Illustration by Aaron Fernandez for The Verge Black Friday used to be one day! Feels like it started mid-November this time around, and here we are on Sunday. How is this day different from Cyber Monday? How will Monday be any different than Tuesday? It’s all a barely differentiated smear at this point. But the good news is that the deals are still here. They’ll be here tomorrow, too, but if your Sunday plans include scanning for deals, at least you’ll find plenty of them. Most of the good deals we’ve seen on phones, smartwatches, headphones, and accessories are holding…

Illustration by Aaron Fernandez for The Verge Black Friday 2023 has come and gone, and we’re cruising toward Cyber Monday — but that doesn’t mean all of yesterday’s deals are history. Quite the opposite. You can still take advantage of big savings at many retailers. Whether you’re shopping for a new smartphone, the latest noise-canceling headphones, or a stylish smartwatch, a ton of popular products are still heavily discounted. Whether you’re checking off everyone on your list for the upcoming holidays or you’re just shopping for the best prices for yourself, we’re scouring all the quality deals Black Friday has…

Illustration: The Verge If it feels like every streaming service received a price hike this year, it’s probably because most of them have. Netflix, Apple TV Plus, Discovery Plus, and Disney Plus are just a few recent examples, though there are still ways to weather the price increases. Black Friday brings all sorts of deals, after all, including ways to save on your monthly streaming bill. And even as we enter the weekend, many of the most tempting streaming discounts are still available. In fact, some streaming services are offering deals that offset their recent price hikes — well, at…

Illustration: The Verge The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) claims Apple denied a set of new benefits to unionized employees at its Towson, Maryland store, according to a complaint filed on Tuesday. In the complaint, the NLRB alleges Apple didn’t extend enhanced benefits to Towson workers with the goal of “discouraging” other employees from unionizing. Some of those new benefits include new healthcare options, a free Coursera subscription, and prepaid tuition at some colleges. The Apple store in Towson became the first Apple retail location in the US to unionize last year with a historic vote to join the International…

Threads is adding trending topics and hashtags. | Image: Meta Mark Zuckerberg revealed Meta is testing a new tagging feature for Threads that’s like hashtags, but not exactly. Yes, you’ll use a hashtag to create or add to a topic’s conversation, but instead of showing up as a hashtagged word, Threads converts it to a blue-text hyperlink. Australian users will get the first crack at it in the initial “limited test” before it gets a wider release. Typing a “#” into the post text field brings up a card with the topic you’re tagging or other, similar ones. Underneath that,…

Ultraman’s classic powers make him well-equipped to deal with almost any larger-than-life situation threatening the lives of ordinary people. But in the first teaser for Netflix’s new animated Ultraman: Rising feature from co-directors Shannon Tindle and John Aoshima, none of the hero’s incredible powers can prepare him for the challenges of becoming a father… to a baby kaiju. Ultraman: Rising tells the story of how Japanese baseballer Ken Sato (Christopher Sean) returns to his home country with the intention of becoming the next Ultraman and Earth’s protector, only to inadvertently find himself saddled with the responsibility of raising a baby…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Anyone using Discord to host files will want to change that, as links to those files will begin to refresh every 24 hours by the end of this year. The company told Bleeping Computer that doing so will help the company fight malware spreading on its platform since that gives it more ability to “restrict access to flagged content.” According to the article, Discord says the change won’t affect anyone sharing content on the platform, as links within the client will be refreshed automatically. However, links shared outside of Discord won’t work a…

Miles Morales in the Across the Spider-Verse suit. | Image: Sony Interactive Entertainment For the art team at Insomniac Games, there’s one job that everyone seems to want: working on Spidey’s suits. Since the first Spider-Man game on the PS4, modeling the in-game suits has been “a hotly contested assignment” among the studio’s character team, according to senior art director Jacinda Chew. Over the course of three games, including the recently launched Spider-Man 2, the team has managed to add a huge number of unlockable suits, covering everything from the Across the Spider-Verse animated film to the internet’s favorite bodega…

Illustration: The Verge Instagram boss Adam Mosseri said in a reply on Threads last night that his team is working on an API for Threads, despite concern that it would help publishers push content more than it would creators. TechCrunch spotted his reply in a thread in which Platformer’s Casey Newton told another user the lack of a developer API is why Threads has no TweetDeck equivalent. If the API is robust enough, it could open the platform up to new ideas, expressed through third-party apps and web experiences, about how to actually interact with Threads or view its content….

You can save $186 when you buy the second-gen Sonos Beam paired with a subwoofer and two Sonos Era 100 smart speakers. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge It’s not often we see good deals land on new Sonos products, so the company’s early Black Friday sale is one to take a look at. Now through Sunday, October 29th, Sonos is taking up to 20 percent off various home theater sets, offering you a chance to save up to $385 on some of the best soundbars in the market. First up, Sonos is offering some great bundle deals…

New device types, including robot vacuums, smoke alarms, washing machines and refrigerators are coming to Matter. | Photo Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge One year in, and Matter is adding support for fridges, robot vacuums, smoke alarms, and more. It’s a major step toward a complete smart home, but success hinges on platform and manufacturer follow-through. Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge October starting to slip away, and so far, all we’ve gotten was a very confusing Apple Pencil, despite rumors of iMacs and iPads. Well, it sounds like that new 24-inch M3-powered iMac is on its way this month after all. Mark Gurman thinks so, having written in his Power On newsletter for Bloomberg today that it’s coming very soon — as early as October 30th, in fact. That would end, as Gurman notes, an over 900-day drought since the M1 iMac launched in the first half of 2021. Gurman writes that he…

Here’s something to stop you from hiding your tired face in early morning meetings. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge A highly requested feature, according to Google, is finally being introduced in Google Meet that allows users to apply ‘beauty’ effects during video calls. Announced in a Google Workspace update on Wednesday, portrait touch-up is currently rolling out to Google Meet on mobile devices for early adopters, with an extended rollout to remaining accounts scheduled to begin on October 28th. Google said it also plans to bring the portrait touch-up feature to Google Meet on the web “by…

Counter-Strike 2 players could get unceremoniously banned for using Anti-Lag Plus. | Image: Valve Counter-Strike 2 developers strongly warned players in a post that they’ll be banned if they turn on AMD’s Anti-Lag feature for CS2. According to the post, the features from the most recent driver updates are “implemented by detouring engine dll functions,” adding that when AMD updates the drivers, the team will work on “identifying affected users and reversing their ban.” AMD added support for Anti-Lag Plus in CS2 in the Adrenaline Edition version 23.30.1 driver. The feature is exclusive to Radeon RX 7000-series GPUs, so older…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge European Commissioner Thierry Breton sent a letter to Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai reminding him of the company’s obligations under the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA) as a large online platform to keep illegal content and disinformation from being shared on YouTube surrounding Israel’s war with Hamas. “Following the terrorist attacks carried out by Hamas against Israel, we are seeing a surge of illegal content and disinformation being disseminated in the EU via certain platforms,” Breton wrote. He added that YouTube has an obligation to protect children and teens in the EU from violent…

Illustration by Lucia Pham / The Verge It’s that time of the year again. Amazon’s latest Prime Day event, Prime Big Deal Days, is now upon us. The exclusive sales event unofficially kicks off the early, early holiday shopping season, and with it comes a cavalcade of deals and discounts. Some are bound to be repeat deals you may have encountered during a random sale, while others are matching their best price to date or dropping even lower. If you’re in the market for earbuds, headphones, smart home devices, smartwatches, or Android phones, you’re likely to find a worthwhile deal….

Image: William Joel / The Verge Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 9, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you’re new here, hurray! I’m so happy you’re here, and also, you can catch up on all the old editions at the Installer homepage.) This week, I’ve been reading Zeke Faux’s excellent crypto book and the story of the viral cookies that suddenly disappeared, trying desperately to figure out what the heck the Humane AI Pin actually does, pouring all my notes and tasks into NotePlan, watching the new-to-Netflix season of The Great British Baking…

Photo by Jakub Porzycki / NurPhoto via Getty Images Google is rolling out a Gmail app for Wear OS that will allow smartwatch wearers to view their inbox and open messages. The announcement comes a few months after the app’s initial announcement at Google I/O in May. The app (first spotted on the Google Play Store by 9to5Google) allows users to check their email from the comfort of their Pixel Watch. Per 9to5, you can refresh your inbox, scroll full emails, and switch between multiple accounts from the watch interface. New email notifications can also be displayed on the watch’s…