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Digital Trends Live: Virus updates, WhatsApp cracks down, Dragon returns

By Todd Werkhoven April 7, 2020

On Tuesday’s episode of Digital Trends Live, host Greg Niber discusses the top trending stories in tech, including more updates on the coronavirus front, autonomous vehicles delivering tests, WhatsApp cracks down on misinformation, Dragon returns to earth, the NordicTrack Fusion CST, and more.

Ramon Pastor

Nibler speaks with Ramon Pastor, interim president of 3D printing & digital manufacturing at HP Inc., about how 3D printing has moved beyond just prototypes and has printed over 18 million parts for HP in 2019.

John Velasco takes a look at some new smart home devices, including Amazon’s tiniest indoor security camera, Talo’s smart toothbrush, and a way to mute your smart speakers.

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Todd Werkhoven's work can be read at numerous publications and he co-authored a personal finance book called "Zombie…

Mobile

WhatsApp’s online backups are getting end-to-end encryption

Facebook is tightening WhatsApp's security by extending end-to-end encryption (E2EE) to cloud backups via an update to the app on iOS and Android. This was already allowed this on local WhatsApp backups, but the company will extend these security tools to online backups made to iCloud and Google Drive.

"Starting today, we are making available an extra, optional layer of security to protect backups stored on Google Drive or iCloud with end-to-end encryption. No other global messaging service at this scale provides this level of security for their users' messages, media, voice messages, video calls, and chat backup," the WhatsApp team shared this week.

Mobile

Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram are back after several hours offline

facebook hacked

Well, here's one way to start a week off on the wrong foot: Facebook, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Instagram were all down for several hours on Monday. Yes, completely down. Starting at roughly 9 a.m. PT, Downdetector started to show a sharp spike in reports of outages -- though as we look back, users were discussing unsent messages and broken apps even earlier.

As of 4 p.m. PT, the services had for the most part returned to working order, albeit with some cobwebs left to shake out, leaving everyone collectively scratching their heads and wondering how an outage of this scale happened.

Mobile

WhatsApp’s biggest restriction might finally be lifted soon

WhatsApp multi-device support image laptop, display, tablet

WhatsApp is considering making a change that could fix one of its most long-standing flaws. A feature known as Multi-device 2.0 will allow users to connect their WhatsApp accounts to two or more phones.

The report comes from WABetaInfo via an early look at the upcoming WhatsApp update. Currently, WhatsApp has a multi-device feature that allows a person to connect their phone to four other devices -- including PCs, browsers, and other supported devices. Once enabled, you won't need your phone active or online to send and receive messages.