Author: TechBrunch

Instagram head Adam Mosseri says the company is trying to improve the search capabilities of its app, acknowledging that this is an area where Instagram can do more to compete. This comment, made in a recent episode of the “Build Your Tribe” podcast, comes when younger Gen Z users often want answers from social apps like Tiktok instead of using traditional search engines. Of course, Instagram is in that mix, but I know it could be stronger. “We're starting to invest more in searching on Instagram because we have a lot of amazing content,” he said. “And frankly, what we…

A new app designed to organize the Open Social Web, Tapestry adds valuable features to help people keep up with multiple social networks. This will remove duplicate posts from your feed. This means that if you follow the same person across social networking services like Bluesky or Mastodon, and if you share it in multiple locations, you don't need to see their posts appear twice in your feed. A new feature called Crosstalk is rolling out in the Tapestry 1.1 iOS update on Tuesday. This is a substantial update following the February 2025 release. Tapestry was built by the same…

On Monday, Google released an update for Android. This fixed two zero-day flaws “may be under restricted, targeted exploitation.” This means that Google is aware that hackers are using bugs to compromise Android devices in real-world scenarios. One of the two zero-days tracked as CVE-2024-53197 was identified by Amnesty International in collaboration with Benoît Sevens, a security team at Google's Threat Analysis Group, a government-sponsored cyberattacks tracking. In February, Amnesty said it discovered Cellebrite, a company that unlocks its phone and sells its devices to law enforcement, was using three 0-day chains of vulnerabilities to hack it into Android phones.…

If you're reading this, consider it your signal. Here are opportunities to impact the future of technology. TechCrunch Surps 2025 is currently accepting speaker applications. Join the stage at Moscone West, San Francisco on October 27th-29th this year and share ideas with over 10,000 technical leaders, VCs and innovators that will shape the following: Please apply to speak in 2025 We are looking for a keen mind to guide interactive breakout sessions and authentic roundtables on topics that keep founders and technology leaders at night. If it sounds like you, don't wait – apply to sabotage and speak 2025 by…

Snapchat introduces sponsored AI lenses, a new form of advertising that allows brands to engage with consumers in an immersive way. Snapchat has been offering brands the opportunity to pay sponsored lenses on the platform for years, but now they can take advantage of AI-generated experiences powered by Snap's unique generation AI technology. With these interactive lenses, brands will help users communicate and engage in a more fun and interactive way when compared to traditional advertising. Because users can see themselves being transported into scenes generated by various AI. When a user takes a selfie for an AI lens, SNAP…

The founder, who created his own name to help restaurants connect better with diners, raised $50 million, his latest startup. Blackbird Labs has built the Payment-Loyalty Meat Blockchain Platform to grow its business repeatedly, while reducing some of the frictions around transactions. With around 1,000 restaurants currently signed up, CEO Benleventhull said he plans to use the money to launch the latest product, the Blackbird Club, to expand to markets outside of Charleston in New York (its home base), San Francisco and South Carolina. (Charleston, do you ask? “Charleston punches above the class,” Rental said in an interview. “It's a…

Meta introduces teenage accounts to Facebook and Messenger. This feature automatically registers younger users to app experiences with built-in protections, is available on these platforms in the US, UK, Australia and Canada before expanding to additional regions in the future. The teen account was first rolled out to Instagram last September after Instagram and other popular social networks were burned by US lawmakers for not doing enough to protect their teens. As part of Tuesday's announcement, Meta said on Instagram that it will bring new built-in protections to teenage accounts. The expansion to Facebook and Messenger will automatically make teens…

The UK government has lost its bid to keep the details of the surveillance order brought against Apple secret, according to a newly released decision by the UK Court of Supervisory Powers. The decision posted by the London Court of Investigation on Monday means that some of the legal cases will be held publicly despite objections from the UK government. In Monday's ruling, a court judge said he would not accept that the revelation of naked details of the case would damage public interest or be a disadvantage to national security. This is the first general perception that a case…

Thirteen years ago, when Chris Farmer founded SignalFire, an early-stage venture company in data analysis at the core of his investment strategy, many were skeptical of his approach. Traditional wisdom has determined that early companies do not have enough data to make their investment algorithms effective. “This was a very radical idea and everyone thought I was crazy,” Farmer (pictured above, on the right, CTO and partner Ilya Kirnos) told TechCrunch. There have been a lot of changes since Signalfire raised its first $53 million fund 2015. Today, more venture companies are adopting data-driven strategies in addition to, or sometimes…

The leak sites used by the Everest Ransomware gang were hacked and tainted this weekend, TechCrunch learned. A leak site that forced the victim to pay ransom demand by publishing stolen files, claiming, “Don't commit a crime.” At the time of writing, the site was still slandered. It is not clear whether the gang experienced a data breach as a result of the hack. Image credit: TechCrunch (screenshot) Everest is a prolific Russian-related ransomware gang that has claimed multiple hacking and data breach credits since its founding in 2020, including the theft of data from more than 420,000 customers from…