The Fairphone 6 will launch this month with a more modular design according to leaked details obtained by WinFuture. Alongside Fairphone’s usual repair-friendly build, the new device will seemingly support interchangeable accessories such as a card holder, lanyard, and ring grip.

That sounds similar to the modular accessories on the CMF Phone 1 and Phone Pro 2 by Nothing, which support screw-on lanyards, wallets, and kickstands. WinFuture reports that the Fairphone 6 will also have a two-part rear cover split into upper and lower sections, allowing owners to mix and match colors along with the accessories, with black, white, and green among the launch options.

Dutch site NieuweMobiel reports that the phone will launch on June 25th, and offer 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. Much like previous Fairphone models, it will be user-repairable, with replacement parts available for the earpiece, speaker, USB-C port, display, battery, and three camera lenses. When it arrives, it’s expected to cost €549.99 (around $625), a substantial drop from 2023’s €699 ($800) Fairphone 5. That phone never launched in the US, so we’ll have to hope that changes this time around.

The FDA has issued its first ever approval on a safety consultation for lab-grown fish. That makes Wildtype only the fourth company to get approval from the regulator to sell cell-cultivated animal products, and its cultivated salmon is now available to order from one Portland restaurant.

Wildtype announced last week that the FDA had sent a letter declaring it had “no questions” about whether the cultivated salmon is “as safe as comparable foods,” the customary final step in the FDA’s approval process for lab-grown animal products. The FDA has sole responsibility for regulating most lab-grown seafood, whereas the task is shared with the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) for cultivated meat.

The FDA’s pre-market safety consultation is voluntary, but is “helpful for marketability,” IP lawyer Dr. Emily Nytko-Lutz, who specializes in biotechnology patents, explained to The Verge. “There are other pathways involving self-affirmation of safety as well as a longer food additive review process, but the FDA’s authorisation with a ‘No Questions’ letter is a middle ground.”

Wildtype salmon is now on the menu at Haitian restaurant Kann in Portland, Oregon, and the company has opened a waitlist for the next five restaurants to stock the fish. It joins Upside Foods and Good Meat, two companies with permission to sell cultivated chicken in the US, while Mission Barns has been cleared by the FDA but is awaiting USDA approval for its cultivated pork fat. At a state level, the situation is more complicated, with eight states issuing bans on lab-grown meat as the technology becomes a conservative talking point.

The head of engineering for Optimus, Tesla’s humanoid robot division, left the company on Friday. Milan Kovac announced his departure on X, insisting that it “will not change a thing” about the company’s plans, which, as of March, meant building thousands of robots this year alone.

Kovac insisted that he was leaving Tesla only to “spend more time with family abroad,” adding that his “support for @elonmusk and the team is ironclad,” heading off speculation that his exit might have been prompted by Musk’s political activity or recent public squabble with Donald Trump. In his own tweet, Musk thanked Kovac for his “outstanding contribution to Tesla over the past decade.”

Musk has called the humanoid Optimus robots Tesla’s “most important product development,” and has repeatedly leaned on the division to generate hype as EV sales slow and the company’s stock price tumbles. “The only things that matter in the long term are autonomy and Optimus,” Musk told CNBC in May, referring to the company’s separate plans for self-driving cars, set to be deployed in a “robotaxi” service in Austin this month.

Bloomberg reports that Autopilot chief Ashok Elluswamy will take over responsibility for Optimus, which is at a critical stage. In March Musk claimed the company could make “at least one legion of robots this year and then probably 10 legions next year,” which would mean around 5,000 robots by the end of this year, and 50,000 in 2026. To do so, it will have to overcome China’s recent restrictions on exports of rare earth minerals and magnets, which are essential for the robots’ construction.

Two years after legal proceedings began, the SEC has formally dropped its lawsuit against Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange. It was one of the US government’s final ongoing actions against crypto companies.

Lawyers for the SEC and Binance jointly moved to dismiss the case in a filing on Thursday. It follows a 60-day pause requested by both parties in February. The case has been dismissed with prejudice, meaning the SEC can’t pursue it again. “We’re deeply grateful to [SEC] Chairman Paul Atkins and the Trump administration for recognizing that innovation can’t thrive under regulation by enforcement,” Binance told Reuters in a statement, calling the dismissal “a landmark moment.”

The SEC sued Binance in 2023, accusing it, and founder Changpeng Zhao, of operating an illegal exchange in the US and defrauding investors, along with a string of other offenses. Binance settled a separate case with the Department of Justice in 2023, which saw the company agree to pay $4.3 billion in fines. Zhao himself stepped down from the company and pled guilty to breaking anti-money-laundering laws, paying $50 million in personal fines and serving a four-month prison sentence.

The SEC dismissal is the latest sign of the Trump administration’s embrace of the cryptocurrency industry. In April it disbanded a DOJ unit dedicated to enforcing cryptocurrency fraud, and already this year the SEC has dropped investigations into both Coinbase and Robinhood. Meanwhile Trump has bolstered the crypto industry by launching a Crypto Strategic Reserve and hosting a private dinner for those willing to back (or short) his own $TRUMP meme coin.

Disney Plus and Hulu are both launching new Perks programs that offer subscribers discounts, digital freebies, and sweepstakes in an effort to stand out from the streaming competition.

The Disney Plus Perks program is available now in the US, with an international rollout planned later this year. Offers include a six-month DashPass membership from DoorDash, discounted stays at Walt Disney World, and savings when you shop from Adidas or Funko, along with rotating contests. Hulu is launching its own loyalty scheme on June 2nd. Details on that are still to come, but it will include offers from companies including Microsoft, Pure Green, and LG, with new perks dropping weekly over the summer.

To take advantage of the perks you simply have to be a subscriber to either streaming service, and you’ll get access to both programs if you subscribe to one of the company’s Disney Plus and Hulu bundle plans.

Disney Plus first introduced Perks last year with a handful of contests and early access ticket offers, but the new program has been expanded substantially to what Disney calls an “always-on” array of bonuses.

Fortnite maker Epic Games has announced that Apple has blocked the game’s return to iOS. Following the rejection, Fortnite is no longer available on iPhones and iPads even in the European Union, where it had previously been available to download through the Epic Games Store.

“Apple has blocked our Fortnite submission so we cannot release to the US App Store or to the Epic Games Store for iOS in the European Union,” the company posted on the official Fortnite X account. “Now, sadly, Fortnite on iOS will be offline worldwide until Apple unblocks it.”

The Verge has confirmed that the game is no longer available to download on iOS from the Epic Games Store or the alternative marketplace AltStore PAL in the EU, where it had previously been available.

However, according to Apple, that isn’t its doing.

“We asked that Epic Sweden resubmit the app update without including the US storefront of the App Store so as not to impact Fortnite in other geographies,” Apple spokesperson Olivia Dalton tells The Verge. “We did not take any action to remove the live version of Fortnite from alternative distribution marketplaces.”

Fortnite returned to iOS in the EU last year, but only through those two storefronts, and not Apple’s App Store. The return was made possible by the EU’s Digital Markets Act, which required Apple to allow third-party app stores on iOS.

Epic had resubmitted Fortnite to the US App Store this month following a recent ruling in Epic’s lawsuit against Apple. That ruling prohibited Apple from restricting developers’ ability to link to external payment systems, one of the issues that had started their long-running legal battle. Epic was forced to use its Swedish developer account to resubmit the game, as its US account was terminated in 2020 when it first broke Apple’s rules by introducing its own in-app payments to the game.

This week Epic CEO Tim Sweeney announced that the company had pulled its previous Fortnite submission and submitted a new version that included an update due to release today, noting that “all platforms must update simultaneously.” He’s since taken to X repeatedly to complain that unofficial Fortnite knock-offs have been allowed into the App Store while Fortnite hasn’t, claiming that Apple’s app review process has been “weaponized by senior management.”

Update, May 16th: Added comment from Apple.

When Google launched its long-awaited Find My Device network in April 2024, it arrived to… well, what's the opposite of "fanfare"? A slow network rollout and damning reviews dampened enthusiasm for what was supposed to be a wave of Android-powered rivals to Apple's AirTag. But a year's a long time in tech, and Google has been promising improvements almost since Find My Device was first switched on. I wanted to know: have things gotten any better?

To find out, I set about testing the latest trackers from the three main companies that make compatible models: Pebblebee, Chipolo, and Motorola. For now Google doesn't make its own Pixel or Nest-branded tracker, and Samsung's SmartTags use its own SmartThings Find network, not Google's. In the name of science, I also got hold of an Apple AirTag and a Tile tracker to serve as reference points for Google's chief competitors.

I found a network that's clearly improved in the year since launch, one that in good conditions - a busy city, a tracker that's not moving - is every bit as good as Apple's and Tile's. It's when tracking gets trickier, in rural settings or with moving tags, that a gap between Google and the competition still opens up …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Hours after Donald Trump’s latest tariffs came into effect, China has announced retaliatory measures: an additional 50 percent tariff on US goods, on top of a planned 34 percent charge, and adding a further 12 US companies to its export control list.

“The US’s practice of escalating tariffs on China is a mistake on top of a mistake, which seriously infringes on China’s legitimate rights and interests and seriously damages the rules-based multilateral trading system,” the country’s Tariff Commission said in a statement.

Last week China announced a 34 percent tariff on goods imported from the US, matching the rate that the US would impose on Chinese goods. Trump took that badly, adding an additional 50 percent levy, which China is now matching in return. The new US tariffs on China, and other countries around the world, took effect today, with the 84 percent rate added onto existing 20 percent tariffs for a total of 104 percent. China’s 84 percent levy on US goods will come into force tomorrow, April 10th. 

In addition to the elevated tariffs, China has added 12 US companies to its export control list, joining 16 additions from last week. That move bans the export of dual-use items – anything that can be used for both civilian and military purposes – to those companies.

The European Union is expected to confirm its own retaliatory measures soon, with a vote taking place today.

Framework has confirmed it will no longer be opening US preorders for the new Laptop 12 today, or announcing a price, as it evaluates the impact of Trump’s tariffs. The modular, convertible laptop will still be available later today for buyers elsewhere, including Canada and Europe.

The Laptop 12 is Framework’s smallest laptop yet, and its first convertible touchscreen model. It comes with a 13th Gen Intel Core i3 or i5 chip, a 1920×1200 touchscreen with stylus support, and up to 48GB of RAM and 2TB of storage. Like other Framework hardware, it’s modular and repairable. It also ships in a pastel pink and mint finish that we’re pretty fond of.

Although the company hasn’t announced pricing, it pitched the 12-inch laptop as an “entry-level” model at a “lower cost” than the Laptop 13. That model now starts at $899 for a DIY version, or $1,099 for a prebuilt one, after the company “paused” sales on some of the cheaper Laptop 13 models in the US to avoid selling them at a loss after factoring in the new tariffs.

Framework manufactures its products in Taiwan, which is subject to a 32 percent tariff as of today. The company explained on Bluesky that it’s beginning its tariff response with the “most reversible” changes, delisting and delaying products, and that it will avoid raising prices “until we have final confirmation that there is no alternative.”

Laptop 12 preorders open for buyers in Canada, Europe, Australia, and Taiwan today at 1pm ET, and pricing will be announced at the same time.

President Donald Trump’s promised higher tariffs have gone into effect today, targeting many countries whose goods imported to the US were already subject to a 10 percent base tariff that started on April 5th. China has already retaliated in an escalation of Trump’s global trade war.

The White House announced the tariffs on April 2nd, dubiously claiming they were “reciprocal” based on a nonsensical formula that far exceeded conventionally calculated tariffs. At the same time it declared a national emergency and stated that the higher tariffs would stay until Trump “determines that the threat posed by the trade deficit and underlying nonreciprocal treatment is satisfied, resolved, or mitigated.”

Countries targeted for higher tariffs included China at 34 percent, the EU at 20 percent, and Vietnam at 46 percent, but since the tariffs are additive, some of the real numbers are much higher — Trump had already slapped 20 percent tariffs on China, and added another 50 percent this week after China announced retaliatory measures, bringing it to a total 104 percent. That means the total tariff more than doubles import costs for everything shipped from China, including the majority of the world’s components and consumer electronics. The EU will vote on its own retaliatory tariffs today.

China announced another 50 percent tariff — matching Trump’s — on all US goods in retaliation. It’s set to go into effect on April 10th.

Some of the trade war’s effects have already been felt, with Nintendo delaying its just-announced Switch 2 preorders, Jaguar Land Rover pausing its April car shipments to the United States, and both Framework and Razer pausing some laptop sales. US memory chip maker Micron announced it would be adding a surcharge to its products on April 9th if the higher tariffs happened, and other companies are likely to follow suit soon.

Update, April 9th: Added mention of China’s additional 50 percent tariff levied in response.

China has responded to Donald Trump’s new trade tariffs with its own charges on US goods. After Trump announced the imposition of an additional 34 percent charge on Chinese imports into the US, China has announced a levy at the same rate for US goods shipped to China.

It has also barred 11 US companies from trading in the country, added 16 more to an export controls list, applied new restrictions to rare earth mineral exports, filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization (WTO), and started investigations into imports of American medical equipment.

In a statement announcing the new tariff, China’s finance ministry declared that the US tariff on Chinese goods “seriously undermines China’s legitimate rights and interests,” and called it a “typical unilateral bullying practice.”

Trump announced his latest levy on Chinese imports as part of new tariff rates that affect every country the US trades with, including a few uninhabited islands. It followed two separate 10 percent tariffs on China from earlier in the year, bringing the US’s total tariff on Chinese goods to 54 percent. He also signed an executive order ending the “de minimis” exemption for packages valued below $800, which could be a death blow for Chinese retailers like Shein and Temu.

“China urges the United States to immediately cancel its unilateral tariff measures and resolve trade differences through consultation in an equal, respectful and mutually beneficial manner,” the statement concludes. The Chinese levy will go into effect on April 10th, one day after the US’s new tariff starts to apply.

China has also imposed strict limits on the exports of some rare earth elements that are mined almost exclusively in China and used in electric vehicles, weapons, and other tech.

It’s also launching investigations into exports of X-ray tubes from America and India, amid allegations of “dumping” — when exported goods are sold for less than their domestic price, damaging the local industry. If that sounds oddly specific, bear in mind that the US dominates the international medical device trade.

The country has also barred 11 American businesses accused of “military and technological cooperation with Taiwan” from importing to, exporting from, or investing in China, adding them to its “Unreliable Entity List.” The new additions, mostly made up of drone and defense companies, include drone manufacturer Skydio, which started out making consumer drones but pivoted entirely to enterprise in 2023.

A further 16 US companies have been placed under export controls, banning the export of dual-use items – anything that can be used for both civilian and military purposes – to those companies. The BBC reports that a further six companies have been prohibited from shipping their goods to China because of “food safety concerns.”

China’s Commerce Ministry also says that it has filed a new charge within the WTO’s dispute settlement system, claiming that Trump’s reciprocal tariffs violate WTO rules. China initially lodged a complaint with the WTO in early February after Trump’s first 10 percent tariff, and updated it following the second round in March, but the WTO only describes the complaint as “In consultations.”