One of the most crucial components of staying safe online is making sure that your account passwords don’t fall into the wrong hands. LastPass makes it easy for users to keep track of passwords for various different sites and services, and now it’s adding functionality that will facilitate sharing credentials with others.
Obviously, it’s generally not a good idea to let too many people know what your password is for any important account. However, it’s more and more common that a few different users might share one login — especially when it comes to subscription services like Netflix and Spotify — so the new family sharing functionality set to be offered by LastPass will no doubt come in handy for many.
Previously, the family sharing functionality offered up by LastPass was little more than a basic shared folder that could be accessed by several different users who held a paid account, according to a report from 9to5Mac. Before the end of the summer, this aspect of the service is set to receive some significant upgrades.
Soon, users will be able to share permission to log in to various accounts on a case-by-case basis, rather than just offering up access to the entire group. For instance, all members of the family might be given permission to log into Spotify, while only the parents have the ability to access online banking.
LastPass also plans to introduce a “family backup plan,” which will allow members of the family group to upload documents like their social security cards and medical records for use in an emergency. Other members of the group can be granted access to these documents so they’re accessible when they’re needed the most.
Family groups will be placed in the hands of one designated manager, who can nominate other members as managers, and add and remove people from the group. The primary manager will be the person who pays the subscription fee.
LastPass plans to launch these family sharing features to its millions of users before the end of the summer, but if you want a sneak preview, you can sign up for an early access program via the company’s website.
In 1950, Alan Turing asked whether machines can think. Rather than argue over definitions, he turned the question into a party game, where an interrogator trades typed messages with hidden players and tries to work out who is who. Since then, chatbots have gotten so good that they have already fooled humans in modern versions of the test.
So, four researchers from Paris Cité University asked the obvious follow-up question in a new study published in Computers in Human Behavior Reports: can AI at least catch its own kind?
Mozilla is giving Firefox’s Smart Window two new tricks. If you haven’t tried it yet, Smart Window is an optional AI mode in Firefox with a built-in chat that helps you get things done while you browse. With this update, it can fill out online forms using details from your tabs and keep an eye on websites for you.
Tired of typing the same details into every form?
The absolutely absurd idea of putting a touchscreen display on a mouse isn't exactly new. Turtle Beach already did it with its Command Series MC7, which features a 2.25-inch control screen. But apparently, even that wasn't ridiculous enough for Arctic Fox Technologies. Its new Super Mouse looks like someone took the chunky old Atari ST mouse, slapped a touchscreen and scroll wheel on it, and called it an upgrade.
The result is a rather unusual-looking mouse that is now on Kickstarter, starting at $199. And as ridiculous as it looks, some of its features are genuinely intriguing.