MacRumors

When Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified in front of Congress last week about the ongoing Cambridge Analytica scandal, he was asked a question about what kind of data Facebook collects from people when they use various apps and websites that have Facebook tools and integrations installed.

Zuckerberg promised to share more information on that topic at a later time, and today Facebook made good on that promise with a detailed article on what data Facebook gets from third-party apps and websites.

Facebook has several plug-ins and tools that allow Facebook to gather data on users even when they're not using Facebook, including social plugins (Like and Share buttons), Facebook login (which lets you log in to services with a Facebook account), Facebook Analytics, and Facebook ads (allows apps and websites to show ads from Facebook advertisers, run ads on Facebook, and measure ad effectiveness).

Facebook says that whenever you use an app or a website that has one of these tools installed, the company receives information even if you're logged out of Facebook or do not have a Facebook account.

According to Facebook, the information collected offline is used to "make [app and website] ads better," with Facebook receiving data that includes IP address, browser, operating system, cookie information, and which app or website you're using, all of which is common information collected when you use an app or a website.

Facebook provides detailed information on how the data collected from each of these tools is used:

• Social plugins and Facebook Login. We use your IP address, browser/operating system information, and the address of the website or app you're using to make these features work. For example, knowing your IP address allows us to send the Like button to your browser and helps us show it in your language. Cookies and device identifiers help us determine whether you're logged in, which makes it easier to share content or use Facebook to log into another app.
• Facebook Analytics. Facebook Analytics gives websites and apps data about how they are used. IP addresses help us list the countries where people are using an app. Browser and operating system information enable us to give developers information about the platforms people use to access their app. Cookies and other identifiers help us count the number of unique visitors. Cookies also help us recognize which visitors are Facebook users so we can provide aggregated demographic information, like age and gender, about the people using the app.
• Ads. Facebook Audience Network enables other websites and apps to show ads from Facebook advertisers. When we get a request to show an Audience Network ad, we need to know where to send it and the browser and operating system a person is using. Cookies and device identifiers help us determine whether the person uses Facebook. If they do, we can use the fact that they visited a business's site or app to show them an ad from that business - or a similar one -- back on Facebook. If they don't, we can show an ad encouraging them to sign up for Facebook.
• Ad Measurement. An advertiser can choose to add the Facebook Pixel, some computer code, to their site. This allows us to give advertisers stats about how many people are responding to their ads -- even if they saw the ad on a different device -- without us sharing anyone's personal information.

App and website usage habits are also used to determine the content and ads that are shown on Facebook. A person who visits a lot of sports related sites, for example, will see more sports-related news stories and ads.

To control what data Facebook is collecting, the company directs users to its News Feed preferences and Ad preferences to remove unwanted advertisers and opt out of certain types of ads. You can disable the feature that lets Facebook provide targeted ads based on your browsing habits, and you can disable the option that lets other apps and websites use your Facebook interests to provide ads.

Facebook says that it will address additional questions that were raised during Zuckerberg's testimony in future posts.

Introduced in iOS 11, lane guidance in Apple Maps is designed to let Maps users know which lane they should be in to avoid missing an upcoming turn or exit.

The lane guidance feature was initially limited to the United States and China when iOS 11 was first released in September, but Apple has been working to expand it to additional countries. Recently, the feature was introduced in Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Poland, and Czech Republic.

With the addition of these five countries, lane guidance is available in a total of 19 countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, China, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Africa, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK, and the United States.

The other major iOS 11 Maps feature, which adds speed limit information to the Maps app, remains limited to the United States and the UK at the current time.

A full list of Apple Maps feature availability by country can be found on Apple's website.

Apple's new low-cost sixth-generation iPad with Apple Pencil support has likely spurred many new customers to adopt an iPad or upgrade from an older model. At just $329, the new iPad is much more affordable than the iPad Pro, making it easier than ever to get your hands on a tablet that works with the Apple Pencil.

For new iPad owners, we've rounded up a handful of apps that are well worth checking out if you want to use your iPad for creative tasks like photo editing, sketching, video editing, drawing, and more, plus we've thrown in some useful productivity apps.

• Affinity Photo ($19.99) - Affinity Photo is a desktop-class photo editing app that's available on the iPad, and it's a useful app for both photo editing and drawing with support for unlimited layers, photo adjustment tools, filters, retouching, and more. It requires a powerful processor, so it's only compatible with the iPad Air 2, the 5th and 6th-generation iPads, and iPad Pro models, and you can use the iPad for drawing and selectively editing. Affinity Photo isn't cheap, but if you want one of the best photo editing tools you can get on the iPad, it's worth checking out.
• Procreate ($9.99) - Procreate is a popular and well-known sketching, drawing, and painting app. Because it's been available on the iPad for years, the Procreate team has had a lot of time to make improvements and refinements to the app, making it the go to for many artists who work on the iPad. It has been optimized for Apple Pencil, so you can create works of art with Apple's stylus. It features customizable brushes, support for layers, and a 64-bit painting engine that supports high-resolution artwork. If you want to draw or paint on your iPad, Procreate is one of the apps to check out.
• LumaFusion ($19.99) - If you want to edit video on the iPad but want something more than iMovie, LumaFusion is a powerful video editing option that you'll want to take a look at. Using LumaFusion, you can do everything you might do with a desktop app, like trimming clips, adding in transitions, correcting color, adding effects, using slow-motion, fast forward, and reverse, and adding titles, audio, and more.
• Astropad ($29.99) - Astropad is a unique app that's designed to turn your iPad into a graphics tablet for your Mac, so you can use it like a Wacom tablet or similar device. With Astropad, you can draw on your iPad with Apple Pencil and your drawings will be sent over to your Mac wirelessly. It works with any Mac app, including Photoshop, Illustrator, Lightroom, Affinity Photo, and Pixelmator.
• Copied (Free) - Copied is a useful productivity app that can be used to save snippets of text that you've copied on the iPad, letting you keep track of text, links images, and more. Snippets you've saved can be easily inserted into new documents, and on the iPad, Copied supports full drag and drop functionality and multitasking, so saving information is as simple as dragging it from your current app to Copied.

What are your favorite apps for the iPad that new users should check out? Let us know in the comments.

T-Mobile will pay $40 million to the U.S. Treasury for failing to correct ongoing issues with call delivery to rural areas and fooling customers with false ringtones, the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced today.

The FCC decided that T-Mobile violated the Communications Act following an investigation launched after T-Mobile subscribers were unable to reach customers served by three rural carriers in Wisconsin. T-Mobile claimed it had fixed the issue, but the FCC continued to get numerous complaints from T-Mobile callers attempting to reach at least 10 rural areas. From FCC chairman Ajit Pai:

"It is a basic tenet of the nation's phone system that calls be completed to the called party, without a reduction in the call quality--even when the calls pass through intermediate providers. The FCC is committed to ensuring that phone calls to all Americans, including rural Americans, go through."

According to the FCC, T-Mobile injected false ringtones into "hundreds of millions of calls" to rural areas to trick T-Mobile callers into thinking the phone was ringing on the other end of the line when it was not. False ringtones can cause a caller to hang up thinking no one is available, and it can also "create a misleading impression" that a caller's service provider is not responsible for the failed call, says the FCC.

The FCC also said that rural call completion problems have "significant and immediate public interest ramifications," leading to lost revenue for rural businesses, impediments for medical professionals unable to reach patients in rural areas, families who can't reach relatives, and "dangerous delays" in public safety communications.

T-Mobile has admitted to violating the FCC's prohibition on inserting false ringtones and failing to correct problems affecting calls to select rural areas. In addition to the $40 million payment, T-Mobile has also agreed to implement a compliance plan to fix these issues.

Carl Chery, Apple Music's head of hip-hop programming, has left Apple to work for Spotify, reports Variety.

As head of hip-hop programming, Chery secured Apple exclusive releases from Chance the Rapper, including Grammy Award-winning album "Coloring Book," and he also helped discover artists like Cardi B, Bryson Tiller, Post Malone, Khalid, Daniel Caesar, 6LACK, and H.E.R.

Chery first joined Apple in 2014 when Beats Music was acquired by the company, and prior to that date, he was a music journalist for SOHH.com, XXL, and BET. At Spotify, Chery will likely work with the service's popular RapCaviar playlist, which lost its curator last month.

The news of Chery's hiring comes as Spotify prepares to introduce changes to its mobile app, which will be announced next week. It's not entirely clear what new features are coming to the Spotify app, but the company has been testing voice control and new free subscription options designed to make the streaming service easier to use.

Apple today seeded the second beta of an upcoming watchOS 4.3.1 update to developers for testing purposes, two weeks after releasing the first watchOS 4.3.1 beta and three weeks after releasing watchOS 4.3.

Once the proper configuration profile has been installed from the Apple Developer Center, the new watchOS 4.3.1 beta can be downloaded through the dedicated Apple Watch app on the iPhone by going to General --> Software update.

To install the update, the Apple Watch needs to have at least 50 percent battery, it must be placed on the charger, and it has to be in range of the iPhone.

Shortly before watchOS 4.3.1 was introduced, Apple stopped allowing developers to update Apple Watch apps built on the original watchOS 1 SDK. In watchOS 4.3.1, there's an alert when launching a watchOS 1 app that warns that the app may not be compatible with future versions of watchOS. This suggests Apple may drop support for watchOS 1 apps entirely in the future, just as it did with support for 32-bit iOS apps in iOS 11.

Code hidden within watchOS 4.3.1 suggests Apple is working on introducing support for custom third-party watch faces, but this is likely a feature that would be introduced as part of a major watchOS 5 update rather than through watchOS 4.3.1.

There were no other new features discovered in watchOS 4.3.1, which is unsurprising as this is a minor 4.x.x update. It's likely this update focuses primarily on bug fixes to address issues discovered since the release of watchOS 4.3.

Apple does not provide detailed release notes for watchOS, so we may not know what's included in the update until it sees a public release.

Apple today seeded the second beta of an upcoming tvOS 11.4 update to developers for testing purposes, two weeks after seeding the first beta and three weeks after releasing the tvOS 11.3 update.

Designed for the fourth and fifth-generation Apple TV models, the new tvOS 11.4 developer beta can be downloaded onto the Apple TV via a profile that's installed using Xcode.

tvOS 11.4, paired with iOS 11.4, reintroduces AirPlay 2 features that were present in early tvOS and iOS 11.3 betas but were removed ahead of release. With AirPlay 2, the same audio content can be played on multiple devices (like the Apple TV) throughout your home. After installing iOS 11.4 and tvOS 11.4, the Apple TV will once again be listed in the Home app.

There were no other new features discovered in the first tvOS 11.4 update, and it's likely it focuses on bug fixes and other small improvements. Apple's tvOS updates have historically been minor in scale, and we may not find any other new additions.

We'll update this post should new features be introduced in the second beta of tvOS 11.4.

Last November a new streaming TV service called "Philo" was announced, aimed at providing a much cheaper monthly cost for users by cutting out all sports-related content. Starting at $16 per month, subscribers can stream 37 entertainment networks on multiple devices including iPhone, MacBook, Roku, smart TVs, and more.

At the time of its announcement the company said a Philo app would be coming to Apple TV, and now CEO Andrew McCollum has confirmed that the Apple TV app for Philo will be launching this summer (via CNET).

This will be a bonus for Apple TV owners, since most over-the-top live TV streaming services don't support Apple's TV app, but many individual network apps do.

The live-TV streaming company will work on Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV devices this summer, CEO Andrew McCollum said last week. An Android mobile app is next on the roadmap.

In addition, you'll be able to do more with your Philo account. The company is unlocking the streaming apps for the TV networks included in a customer's subscription. That means if you pay for Philo's $16-a-month bundle of cable channels, you'll be able to access the paywalled apps for channels like AMC, Nickelodeon, Discovery Channel and History.

Philo's $16/month tier provides access to 37 channels, including A&E, AMC, BBC America, Lifetime, TLC, Travel Channel, and VH1. There's also a $20/month option that increases the channel count to 46, adding in options like Logo and Nicktoons. Philo's entertainment-focused lineup lacks sports, live news, major broadcast networks, and local channels -- all of which help lower the monthly cost of the service.

On the channels offered by Philo, subscribers can record live TV and set recordings on future episodes to watch later, with space lasting for 30 days. In terms of streaming, Philo lets users stream on up to three screens at once in HD.

Comparatively, rivals like Sling TV start at $20/month for about 25 channels, DirecTV Now starts at $35/month for about 60 channels, Hulu with Live TV starts at $40/month for about 50 channels, and PlayStation Vue starts at $40/month for about 45 channels. All of these services include sports or have an option to add on sports content for an additional monthly cost.

ESPN itself has launched its own over-the-top streaming package called ESPN+, focusing on live sports, original shows and films, studio programs, and an on-demand library of content. ESPN+ costs subscribers $4.99/month or $49.99/year, and is pitched as a companion service to other ESPN channels and cable packages since it lacks some major live TV content, like games in the NFL and NBA.

Apple's next Activity Challenge for Apple Watch wearers will be centered around Earth Day this Sunday, April 22, with notifications that should begin appearing on Friday, April 20. The Earth Day Challenge requires you to do any workout for 30 minutes or more on April 22, and record your activity within the Workout watchOS app or any other app that adds workouts to the Health iOS app.

As is tradition with Activity Challenges, once you complete this feat on Earth Day then Apple will grant you a new achievement badge within the Activity app on iPhone, as well as various iMessage stickers that you can use to decorate your messages to friends and family members. 2018 marks the second year Apple has launched an Earth Day-specific Activity Challenge, and its goal is the same as it was in 2017.

Apple will be celebrating Earth Day a variety of ways this upcoming week, with employees in retail stores again wearing green shirts instead of traditional navy blue as a way to mark the annual environmental-focused event. In the past, Apple has marked Earth Day by adding a green leaf accent to the Apple logos of its retail stores, and shared Earth Day videos, Apple Music playlists, and featured apps in the App Store.

For Activity Challenges, this is the fourth one in 2018, following a Ring In The New Year Challenge in January, Heart Month Challenge in February, and International Women's Day Challenge in March. If Apple keeps following its annual Activity Challenge schedule, the next physical trial for Apple Watch owners will take place around Mother's Day in May.

Samsung will begin manufacturing OLED displays for a new iPhone X and iPhone X Plus next month, according to Taiwan's Economic Daily News.

The report is a good sign that Apple's widely rumored trio of 2018 smartphones will be released simultaneously, including a new iPhone X, a larger iPhone X Plus, and a mid-range LCD model with Face ID. The new smartphone lineup will likely be announced in early September and available to order later in the month.

This would contrast with Apple's staggered release of the iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus, and iPhone X last year. While all three models were unveiled in September, iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus pre-orders began September 15, while iPhone X pre-orders didn't begin until October 27, nearly a month and a half later.

The delayed launch of the iPhone X was attributed to reported production challenges with the TrueDepth camera system powering Face ID. Those issues have since been resolved, and shouldn't have any effect on the 2018 launch.

All in all, getting your hands on Apple's flagship new smartphone may be quicker and easier this fall. But, as with any iPhone launch, pre-order availability will likely be limited, so early adopters will probably still need to act fast.

MacRumors and Twelve South have partnered up again this week, offering our readers the chance to get the accessory maker's HiRise Duet charging stand for $30 off its original price of $119.99. The HiRise Duet is a combination charging stand that supports both the iPhone and Apple Watch, with an integrated Lightning charger for iPhone and iPad, as well as a Magnetic Charging Disc for the Apple Watch, all of which are powered by a single AC cable.

Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When you click a link and make a purchase, we may receive a small payment, which helps us keep the site running.

To get the discount, head over to Twelve South's official Amazon page for the HiRise Duet, add the dock to your cart, and enter the promo code 30DUET during checkout. For Amazon Prime members with free two-day shipping, this marks the stand down to $89.99 from $119.99, excluding tax. The MacRumors exclusive HiRise Duet code will run through Saturday, April 28, so be sure to take advantage of the deal before that date if you're interested. Twelve South notes that this is the largest discount it has ever offered on the HiRise Duet.

In other deals happening today, Best Buy is discounting both the Nest Learning Thermostat and lower-cost Nest Thermostat E, but only for My Best Buy members. If you have an account, you can get the third-generation Nest Learning Thermostat for $199.99, down from $249.99, and the Nest Thermostat E for $139.00, down from $169.00. Best Buy's sale prices are some of the best deals online for Nest's thermostats this week, coming in about $10 to $20 cheaper than Amazon and Walmart.

Also notable is Belkin's first discount on the Boost Up Wireless Charging Pad, compatible with Apple's iPhone X, 8, and 8 Plus. United States users can get the Qi mat for 20 percent off through May 12, with the accessory priced at $47.99, down from $59.99. Sales on the device are also hitting Amazon, where Belkin's official store has the Boost Up mat for $44.99 as of writing. Belkin's Qi accessory was one of the devices promoted by Apple following the debut of the new iPhones last year, along with Mophie, but on Apple.com the Boost Up device remains $59.95.

For more information on the latest sales happening this week -- including $200 off select MacBook Pro models at Best Buy -- be sure to visit our full Deals Roundup.