Slashdot: Verizon Support Recommends Turning Off 5G to Conserve Battery Life

Verizon Support Recommends Turning Off 5G to Conserve Battery Life
Published on March 01, 2021 at 10:04AM
"Are you noticing your battery life is draining faster than normal?" tweeted Verizon Wireless customer support on Sunday, the Verge reports: Despite its relentless promotion of 5G phones and the fact that it spent more than $45 billion bidding on a new faster spectrum, Verizon support now is advising people on Twitter to turn off their phones' 5G access to preserve battery life. In a Sunday morning tweet, Verizon support helpfully suggested that "one way to help conserve battery life is to turn on LTE" if users found their batteries were "draining faster than normal." That step would, of course, turn off 5G in a phone that has it available. It's also worth pointing out that you don't actually "turn on LTE" when doing this step — LTE is always enabled as a fallback for the 5G network. But Verizon is obviously being cautious so as not to actually tell its customers to "turn off 5G". Verizon's tweet is now "unavailable," having apparently been since deleted. The Verge also points out that Verizon's nationwide 5G network "uses a technology called DSS, which in many instances is actually slower than the LTE network it's trying to replace."

Comments

Slashdot: AT&T Says Leaked Data of 70 Million People Is Not From Its Systems

AT&T Says Leaked Data of 70 Million People Is Not From Its Systems Published on March 20, 2024 at 02:15AM An anonymous reader quotes a report from BleepingComputer: AT&T says a massive trove of data impacting 71 million people did not originate from its systems after a hacker leaked it on a cybercrime forum and claimed it was stolen in a 2021 breach of the company. While BleepingComputer has not been able to confirm the legitimacy of all the data in the database, we have confirmed some of the entries are accurate, including those whose data is not publicly accessible for scraping. The data is from an alleged 2021 AT&T data breach that a threat actor known as ShinyHunters attempted to sell on the RaidForums data theft forum for a starting price of $200,000 and incremental offers of $30,000. The hacker stated they would sell it immediately for $1 million. AT&T told BleepingComputer then that the data did not originate from them and that its systems were not breached. &q

Slashdot: TurboTax and H&R Block Want 'Permission to Blab Your Money Secrets'

TurboTax and H&R Block Want 'Permission to Blab Your Money Secrets' Published on March 03, 2024 at 02:04AM Americans filing their taxes could face privacy threats, reports the Washington Post: "We just need your OK on a couple of things," TurboTax says as you prepare your tax return. Alarm bells should be ringing in your head at the innocuous tone. This is where America's most popular tax-prep website asks you to sign away the ironclad privacy protections of your tax return, including the details of your income, home mortgage and student loan payments. With your permission to blab your money secrets, the company earns extra income from showing you advertisements for the next three years for things like credit cards and mortgage offers targeted to your financial situation. You have the legal right to say no when TurboTax asks for your permission to "share your data" or use your tax information to "improve your experience...." The article c

Slashdot: H&R Block, Meta, and Google Slapped With RICO Suit, Allegedly Schemed to Scrape Taxpayer Data

H&R Block, Meta, and Google Slapped With RICO Suit, Allegedly Schemed to Scrape Taxpayer Data Published on October 02, 2023 at 03:14AM Anyone who has used H&R Block's tax return preparation services since 2015 "may have unintentionally helped line Meta and Google's pocket," reports Gizmodo: That's according to a new class action lawsuit which alleges the three companies "jointly schemed" to install trackers on the H&R Block site to scan and transmit tax data back to the tech companies which then used elements of the data to engage in targeted advertising. Attorneys bringing the case forward claim the three companies' conduct amounts to a "pattern of racketeering activity" covered under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), a tool typically reserved for organized crime. "H&R Block, Google, and Meta ignored data privacy laws, and passed information about people's financial lives around like

Shameless Plug

Search This Blog