3,000 people were sexually abused in an Uber vehicle in the US in 2018
The Guardian takes a peek under the racist Facebook rock and doesn’t like what it sees
iPhone 11 Pro constant location access mystery solved, it’s the U1 UWB chip
Enjoy these Star Wars branded Apple Watch bands
Cheap Viofo 4K dashcam, Alexa Smart Home kit, AirPods, Echo Input, Far Cry 5 PS4, 4TB external HDD
As if one of their robotic cars murdering a woman isn't bad enough, Uber today revealed it's received over 3,000 reports of sexual assault in the US (just the US!) in 2018. That's almost 10 a day. 45% of the assaults were from riders, so it's not just creepy drivers groping at innocent women. Uber makes great pains in its report to explain that the rate of sexual assault on its platform is lower than that of general society and that they facilitated over 1.3b rides in 2018 that were perfectly fine - but still, 3,000 people getting sexually abused a year, what the hell is going on? Imagine going to bed at night knowing 10 people that day were sexually assaulted in the business you operate. I wonder if any of the people getting stupid rich off Uber feels any sort of guilt about this?
Another day, another international covert operation using Facebook to stir fear of Islam for profit. This time the Guardian found a group of 21-pages all run by an Israeli outfit that posts over 1,000 fake news posts a week to over 1 million followers across Australia, the UK and US. Their modus operandi is to smear people right wingers love to hate (e.g: London mayor Sadiq Khan, US congresswoman Ilhan Omar, Australian senator Mehreen Faruqi) on their dogshit blogs covered in ads only a smooth brained fuckwit would click, then post links to those posts all over Facebook groups that eat this garbage up. I don't know how much money they made, but even a single dollar is a dollar too much. Hate for profit and everyone is complicit. I lament this side of the internet so much.
Old mate Brian Krebs wondered why the iPhone shows an icon for location access near the time, even though every single app has location access turned off. If no apps have access to location services, what the hell is accessing location info?! Apple caught wind of the article and explained to its preferred set of journalists (Brian aint one of em) that the service accessing the device's location is the U1 ultra-wide band chip. It's constantly pinging your location to ensure it doesn't operate in areas it's not supposed to as the frequencies it uses aren't globally identical. So not a big deal, but also not what users expect to happen when they disable location access. As Arstechnica writes,"this issue illustrates the challenges Apple faces with its privacy-oriented marketing. When the company attempts to position itself as the privacy-friendly alternative to data-collecting competitors, it invites a great deal of scrutiny".
It's almost time to celebrate the birth of our Lord and saviour, Jesus Christ! To commemorate a virgin giving birth in a barn, we buy each other gifts and one of those gifts might just be an official licenced Star Wars band for your loved one's Apple Watch. My friend and Sizzle subscriber Derek runs this business, but I thought Star Wars Apple Watch bands are cool enough to mention with my fellow dorks as I know you'd probably find it cool too. If you aren't into Star Wars, there's other patterned watch bands with matching wallpapers, like this pizza themed set (you like pizza, don't you?) or a rendition of Van Gogh's post-impressionist masterpiece, Starry Night. I saw this painting in New York and it's very beautiful. He painted it whilst looking out the window of his cell in a French aslyum. I doubt the watch band does it justice, but it's still nice.
Viofo A129 Pro DUO 4K dashcam (front & rear) - $299.95 from Shopping Square’s eBay store
Alexa Smart Home starter kit (2nd-gen Echo Dot, TP-Link smart bulb & smart power plug) - $49 at JB
Apple AirPods 2 with charging case - $199.80 from Alcosonline’s (what?) eBay store
Amazon Echo Input - $25 at Amazon
Far Cry 5 for PS4 - $15 at Amazon
4TB Seagate desktop external HDD - $98 at Harvey Norman
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😁 The Sizzle is curated by Anthony "@decryption" Agius and emailed every weekday afternoon. Join us on Slack and chat with other Sizzle subscribers.
The Sizzle is created on Wathaurong land and acknowledges the traditional owners of country throughout Australia, recognising their continuing connection to land, water and community. I pay my respect to them and their cultures and to elders both past and present.