Category: Technology

Blame Ryan Reynolds.

With a new wireless brand from the hosts of SmartLess emerging last week, and the debut of Trump Mobile this week, it sure seems like there’s a hot new trend in Celebrities Selling Things: phone service. How did it come to this? Why can’t they just stick to tequila? I talked to a couple of experts about the situation, and it’s not entirely the Deadpool actor’s fault. But also: it is kind of his fault.

To be clear, none of these celebrities / political figures are building new cell networks from scratch. What they’re launching are Mobile Virtual Network Operators, or MVNOs. These are companies that buy wireless service from the three big US carriers and re-sell it. It’s a business model that has existed for decades, Techsponential analyst Avi Greengart tells me. “They address market segments that carriers can’t or don’t want to address with their main brands,” he says. Older customers, people whose first language isn’t English, people with bad credit – they’re all prime targets for MVNOs.

It’s an attractive arrangement for the big carriers since they may have extra network capacity that would otherwise go unused. “They get a …read more

Starting in summer 2026, Netflix subscribers in France will be able to watch commercially broadcast TV content “without ever having to leave the service.” The streaming giant has announced a distribution deal with French media company TF1 Group to make TF1’s free-to-air live TV channels and on-demand TF1 Plus streaming content available to French Netflix users as part of their existing subscription plan.

“This is a first-of-its-kind partnership that plays to our strengths of giving audiences the best entertainment alongside the best discovery experience,” Netflix CEO Greg Peters said in a statement. “By teaming up with France’s leading broadcaster we will provide French consumers with even more reasons to come to Netflix every day and to stay with us for all their entertainment.”

The carriage deal will enable French Netflix subscribers to watch major live sports matches, scripted dramas like Broceliande and Erica, soap operas such as Demain nous appartient, and unscripted shows like The Voice. Financial details were not disclosed, but for Netflix, this deal may also contribute towards a legal requirement to invest a portion of its French revenue into French-language content. Netflix started experimenting with a linear-style TV feature in France in 2020 …read more

Garmin has announced a new sleep-tracking band that can be strapped to your upper arm, which could make it more comfortable to wear overnight. The Index Sleep Monitor tracks sleep stages, heart rate, and even your breathing to create a “comprehensive view of overall fitness and recovery,” with a personalized sleep score delivered every morning so you know how well you slept, according to Garmin.

The Index Sleep Monitor is now available through Garmin’s online store in S-M and L-XL sizes for $169.99. The tracking is handled by a small, removable electronic module that features motion sensors and an optical heart rate sensor that Garmin says will run for up to seven days between charges.

In addition to tracking your light, deep, and REM sleep stages throughout the night, the Index can also measure your respiration rates, and, when paired with blood oxygen saturation measurements (a feature not available in all countries) it can help you “better understand shifts in breathing patterns while sleeping.”

<img src="https://platform.theverge.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/06/garmin_sleep2.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&crop=0,10.798320425817,100,78.403359148365" alt="A person sleeping in bed wearing Garmin’s Index Sleep Monitor on their right arm." title="A person sleeping in …read more

In a 68-30 vote on Tuesday evening, the Senate overwhelmingly passed the GENIUS Act with bipartisan support. Eighteen Democrats joined the majority of Republicans in passing the bill, which is the first to establish a federal regulatory framework for stablecoins, crypto tokens that are pegged to the value of the US dollar.

In the past year, and after the crypto industry funneled over $131 million into Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, the Republican Party has embraced the crypto industry with enthusiasm, voting overwhelmingly for the bill’s passage. There were two GOP holdouts: Senators Rand Paul of Kentucky and Josh Hawley of Missouri, both ardent critics of Big Tech. The bill now goes to the House of Representatives, which is working on its own companion legislation, the STABLE Act.

Its passage had not always been assured. Back in May, nine Democrats who’d previously supported the GENIUS Act suddenly reversed course, asking to revise the bill’s text, and days later, Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Ron Wyden (D-WA) successfully killed an attempt to bring the bill to a floor vote by citing several current events involving the Trump family’s crypto ventures, including …

Read …read more

In a purported attempt to limit Israel’s ability to wage cyberwarfare, Iran has begun throttling its civilians’ access to the internet and plans to disconnect entirely from the global internet by Tuesday night.

Fateme Mohajerani, a government spokesperson, said during a recent television broadcast that the speed reduction was “temporary, targeted, and controlled, aimed at countering cyberattacks,” according to machine translation.

The announcements come amidst the escalating war between Iran and Israel, which broke out after Israel attacked the country on June 12th, and a rise in reported internet outages. Civilians have claimed that they’ve been unable to access basic but critical telecommunications services, such as messaging apps, maps, and sometimes the internet itself. Cloudflare reported that two major Iranian cellular carriers effectively went offline on Tuesday, and The New York Times reports that even VPNs, which Iranians frequently use to access banned sites like Facebook and Instagram, have become increasingly harder to access.

Furthermore, the Iranian government is urging citizens to delete WhatsApp – one of the country’s most popular messaging platforms – claimin …

Read the full story at The Verge.

…read more

For the third time, President Donald Trump will extend the deadline for TikTok to spin out from its Chinese parent company or face a US ban. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed in a statement Tuesday that Trump will sign an executive order this week extending the deadline another 90 days, landing the new deadline in mid-September.

The Trump administration will spend the next 90 days “working to ensure this deal is closed so that the American people can continue to use TikTok with the assurance that their data is safe and secure,” Leavitt said.

The extension, first signed on January 20th, theoretically offers legal cover for TikTok’s US service providers who are subject to the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act from the hundreds of billions in penalties they could face for keeping the app online and in US app stores. But that legal cover was already shaky given that Trump’s extensions are not codified into the law, which was passed overwhelmingly by a bipartisan vote in Congress, and upheld as constitutional by the Supreme Court.

As The Verge previously reported, ByteDance and an Oracle-led coalition had nearly hammered out a deal …read more

The Senate confirmed Republican Olivia Trusty to serve on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Tuesday, installing another nominee by President Donald Trump and ending the brief lack of quorum at the agency. The vote was 53-45, with Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) being the only Democrat to vote in her favor. 

Trusty will join Republican Chair Brendan Carr and Democratic Commissioner Anna Gomez on the panel, with two seats remaining empty. Trump has yet to select other nominees for the roles. No more than three commissioners on the independent agency are allowed to be from the same party, though Gomez had expressed doubt that Trump may nominate another Democrat to the agency. Former Republican Commissioner Nathan Simington endorsed his chief of staff, Gavin Wax, a MAGA loyalist who once said Trump’s return to office would be a “time for retribution,” after announcing he’d be stepping down from his post.

Trusty was a longtime staffer for Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS), who previously served as the top Republican on the Commerce Committee, which oversees the FCC and related issues. Commerce Committee Ranking Member Maria Cantwell (D-WA) said in a letter to Senate Majority Leader John …read more