Hasta La Gadget!

Cigarette butts pose a huge risk to the world’s oceans and can be a pain to clean up by hand especially on public spaces like beaches. A group of Italian scientists have built a quadruped robot that can identify litter and pick up the smaller bits with its leg mounted vacuums.

VERO, the vacuum equipped quadruped robot, is a four-legged device designed to look for and clean up litter on a variety of terrains. VERO was designed and built by a team of researchers from the Dynamic Legged Systems lab at the Italian Institute of Technology in Genoa, according to USA Today.

The group published a paper back in April on VERO’s development and effectiveness in the Journal of Field Robotics. The research paper states that cigarette butts are a serious concern. Discarded butts release toxic chemicals and microplastics into the ocean as they break down. It’s also the “second most common undisposed waste worldwide, in terrains that are hard to reach for wheeled and tracked robots.”

VERO is designed for picking up this common type of small litter. An operator sets up a field target for the robot to traverse. Then it slowly walks the entire length of the target while identifying litter with a special neural network and onboard cameras. The quadruped robot has a “convolutional neural network for litter detection” that can target litter and pick it up with one of four leg mounted vacuums, according to IEEE Spectrum.

Cleaning up beaches also can be a challenge because the sand makes it hard to lug wheeled trash bins or heavy receptacles over the terrain. The researchers conducted tests on “six different outdoor” scenarios to show VERO’s proficiency at navigating difficult terrain. It can steady itself while picking up trash with an Intel RealSense depth camera mounted on its chin.

The robot didn’t get every piece of trash in its initial test but it still picked up 90 percent of the cigarette butts identified in testing. That’s 90 percent less waste that ends up in the ocean.

There don’t seem to be any plans to implement VERO just yet. The researchers say VERO’s design could be programmed and engineered to do other tasks like spraying crops, looking for weaknesses in infrastructure and helping with construction projects.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/this-vacuum-robot-dog-can-find-and-suck-up-trash-with-its-feet-203952526.html?src=rss

The US Consumer Product Safety Commission has determined that Amazon is responsible for hazardous or defective products sold by third-party retailers through its platform. The CPSC unanimously decided that more than 400,000 products sold through the Fulfilled by Amazon program represent a “substantial product hazard,” and that the tech giant is legally responsible for their recall. It also said that Amazon failed to properly notify buyers about the faulty products and did not encourage buyers to return or destroy those items.

Today’s decision is several years in the making, with the CPSC initially suing Amazon in July 2021. This investigation centered on carbon monoxide detectors that did not function correctly, hair dryers that did not have electrocution safeguards and children’s sleepwear that did not meet federal flammability standards. Under the decision and order issued by the agency, Amazon must submit plans to notify customers about these faulty products and take steps for getting them returned or destroyed.

We’ve reached out to Amazon for comment and will update this post if we hear from the retailer.

The Department of Justice took similar actions against eBay in recent months. In September 2023, the department sued eBay after environmentally unsafe materials were put up for sale on the retailer, and in January 2024, the company paid $59 million for a DoJ settlement over pill press machines.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/cpsc-says-amazon-is-responsible-for-hazardous-items-from-third-party-sellers-213334907.html?src=rss

The next Made by Google is just around the corner (Aug. 13, to be exact) but you may not have to wait to find out about the Google Pixel Watch 3. A leak from a Google source to the website Android Headlines reveals some new details about the new smartwatch.

The website received a bunch of promotional material from its Google source showing the specs of the Google Pixel Watch 3 and its improvements from its predecessor the Google Pixel Watch 2. The biggest difference is the size offerings in that you don’t have to settle for just one. Instead of just the standard 41mm size, the Google Pixel Watch 3 will be available in 41 and 45 mm.

Google is also replacing the Watch 2’s AMOLED display for an Actua display in the Google Pixel Watch 3 that’s 1,000 nits higher at its peak than the previous model. The battery can also charge 20 percent faster if you have the 41mm model. Battery life has long been an issue for the Pixel Watch line, and the improvements there are mixed: Google is still quoting the same 24 hours with the Always On display, but touts a new battery saver mode that extends battery life to up to 36 hours.

Android Headlines

The Google Pixel Watch 3 will also have a bunch of new functions. It can provide live video views from Nest Cam or Nest Doorbell devices with voice support and quick access to apps like Maps and Wallet. The new watch’s features have a big focus on fitness with workout tracking, haptic cues for jogging at certain paces and a detailed step tracker that can measure your average pace during a walk or a run. It also works with Fitbit Premium to provide a morning briefing of your daily fitness metrics, access to virtual trainers and ideas for recommended workouts.

Of course, none of this is official or confirmed yet. We won’t know all of the Google Pixel Watch 3’s features and capabilities until its big reveal on Aug. 13.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/fresh-leak-shows-the-google-pixel-watch-3-comes-in-two-sizes-instead-of-one-222109082.html?src=rss

A new blog post from Samsung highlights how its Galaxy Z Flip series devices are being adopted by law enforcement. The line of foldable mobile devices was part of a pilot program at the Kimberling City Police and the Indian Point Police in Missouri two years ago to test how the electronics could improve the forces’ daily operations. According to Samsung, the program was the first time a foldable device was used by police as a bodycam. After the end of the pilot program, two more police departments signed on to use the Flip devices as bodycams. The solutions from those pilot tests are also being extended to 25 metro police departments in five states.

The Flip devices used for the police testing were customized in a collaboration with Visual Labs, a company that repurposes mobile devices for use as body and dash cameras. The modifications, like remapping the volume button to start the camera, were intended to make it easier and faster to begin recording in the field, according to Samsung.

It’s a surprising use case for Samsung to emphasize for its US audience. The Verge picked up on the blog post and was also quick to cite an investigation from ProPublica and The New York Times that demonstrated how local policies can negate the positive value of bodycams, either delaying or preventing footage from being released.

That said, Samsung is hardly the only tech company that has gotten involved with making its products part of law enforcement. Amazon-owned smart doorbell company Ring had (and reversed) policies of how and what footage it would share with officers. There are also broader stories still unfolding around how law enforcement are using technologies such as facial recognition and drones.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/samsung-is-marketing-galaxy-z-flip-phones-as-police-bodycams-233310531.html?src=rss

Google has responded to allegations that it “censored” searches about Donald Trump after Elon Musk baselessly claimed the company had imposed a “search ban” on the former president. The issues, Google explained, were due to bugs in its autocomplete feature. But Musk’s tweet, which was viewed more than 118 million times, nonetheless forced the search giant to publicly explain one of its most basic features.

“Over the past few days, some people on X have posted claims that Search is ‘censoring’ or ‘banning’ particular terms,” Google wrote in a series of posts on X. “That’s not happening.”

Though Google didn’t name Musk specifically, over the weekend the X owner said that “ Google has a search ban on President Donald Trump.” The claim appeared to be based on a single screenshot of a search that showed Google suggested “president donald duck” and “president donald regan” when “president donald” was typed into the search box.

The same day, Donald Trump Jr. shared a similar image that showed no autocomplete results relating to Donald Trump for the search “assassination attempt on.” Both Trump Jr. and Musk accused the company of “election interference.”

In its posts Tuesday, Google explained that people are free to search for whatever they want regardless of what appears in its autocomplete suggestions. It added that “built-in protections related to political violence” had prevented autocomplete from suggesting Trump-related searches and that “those systems were out of date.”

Likewise, the company said that the strange suggestions for “president donald” were due to a ”bug that spanned the political spectrum.” It also affected searches related to former President Barack Obama and other figures.

Finally, the company explained that articles about Kamala Harris appearing in search results for Donald Trump is not due to a shadowy conspiracy, but because the two— both of whom are actively campaigning for president — are often mentioned in the same news stories. That may sound like something that should be painfully obvious to anyone who has ever used the internet, but Musk’s post on X has fueled days of conspiracy theories about Google’s intentions.

Musk’s post, which questioned whether the search giant was interfering in the election, was particularly ironic considering that the X owner came under fire the same weekend for sharing a manipulated video of Kamala Harris without a label, a violation of his company’s own policies.

While Google’s statements didn’t cite Musk’s post directly, the company pointed out that X’s search feature has also experienced issues in the past. “Many platforms, including the one we’re posting on now, will show strange or incomplete predictions at various times,” the company said.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-dismisses-elon-musks-claim-that-autocomplete-engaged-in-election-interference-214834630.html?src=rss