Samsung is making your car a little more DeXterous
When it comes to in-car entertainment, Apple’s AirPlay and Android Auto have dominated the space in recent years, so much so that it’s left little room for others to navigate the space and get their foot in the door. Until now. Samsung is reportedly developing a proper rival by the name of “Auto DeX” that supports more than 8,500 car models from over 120 different brands.
That’s according to @GalaxyTechie on X, who showed off a basic screenshot of the Auto DeX interface, which mimics the Android Auto/CarPlay feel, but with a Samsung twist. On the right is a widget for Bixby controls, with Samsung’s music player embedded beneath it. We see apps like Samsung’s Phone app, as well as a basic map icon that the leaker reckons will disappear once a designated app is chosen.
“The great news is, even if your car doesn’t support it or you don’t have a car, you can use it with some tricks,” they said in the post, noting that users can even use Auto DeX “even if your phone doesn’t support it!” It’s not entirely clear what this means, but it appears as though Samsung will allow Auto DeX to run directly on your smartphone, offering a glanceable UI that’ll be handy for the folks without a newer car.
There’s no telling just how far along into development the new feature is, and how it’ll work when it eventually turns up. When that’ll be is anybody’s guess.
The FBI is fighting crime, just not the ones you’d expect
The FBI has officially seized and dismantled seven websites “online criminal marketplaces,” all of which were deemed to be illegally offering pirated video games to users, oftentimes “days or weeks before their official release date.” This strict and sudden crackdown is at odds with the Bureau’s recent investigations elsewhere, which recently concluded that there never was a list of wealthy folk visiting a certain famed island. Go figure!
“As part of the actions announced today, the FBI has obtained authorization to seize the domain of multiple sites, to include nsw2u.com, nswdl.com, game-2u.com, bigngame.com, ps4pkg.com, ps4pkg.net, and mgnetu.com. These domains hosted and facilitated access to the pirated video games. Anyone visiting these sites will now view a seizure banner that notifies them the domain has been seized by federal authorities,” the agency wrote.
Folks looking to save a buck, a feeling shared by anyone who has dealt with Nintendo in recent years, will likely be familiar with Nsw2u, one of the larger piracy websites that reportedly offered Switch ROMs, which could be used by users running a hacked Nintendo Switch. Visiting any of the sites mentioned above will yield nothing more than a banner stating that the location has been seized.
The FBI reckons these brought about an expected loss of roughly $170 million in the span of a few months, which led to their dismantling of the seven marketplaces.
SpaceX makes history
On Sunday, Elon Musk’s SpaceX pulled off its 500th successful Falcon 9 mission, marking the crossing of a major milestone for the company. The rocket, with the help of a Falcon 9 first-stage booster, which incidentally completed its 13th successful mission this weekend, launched and successfully deployed the Dror 1 geostationary communication satellite.
The booster made its way back down to solid ground shortly after, where it’ll be checked and refurbished for later use. While not uncommon for SpaceX’s Falcon 9 to launch satellites for both private and commercial use, the agency typically sends up its own hardware to bolster the company’s Starlink programme, which may get its start in South Africa sooner rather than later.
Be careful where you stick those Switch 2 cartridges
If you’re a Switch 2 owner who wasn’t overly upset by the FBI’s seizure of famed Nintendo piracy websites, but still likes to hunt down a good deal (anything to avoid Nintendo’s pricing scheme), you’ve probably tried hunting down deals on Facebook Marketplace. According to Reddit user u/dmanthey, you’ll want to be careful about who you do business with, as the result may see your month-old console banned.
After purchasing a few second-hand Switch 1 games from Meta’s marketplace and inserting them into his month-old Switch 2 to update them, their console was banned from Nintendo’s online services the following day. After contacting Nintendo support and providing proof of the purchase, Nintendo quickly unbanned the user, in a process that was admittedly “painless”.
While Nintendo hasn’t vilified the simple act of buying and playing a second-hand Switch cartridge, it’s always keeping an eye open for anyone trying to get around the stringent anti-piracy measures it has in place. Nintendo embeds each cartridge with a unique code, allowing it to detect when that code has been replicated and distributed elsewhere. That’s what happened to this unknowing Reddit user.
In this case, the seller likely copied the data off the physical cartridge to a third-party device such as a MIG Flash before listing them on Facebook Marketplace for a profit. While everything turned out fine for this user, let this be a warning to anyone picking up second-hand cartridges to always keep hold of your proof of purchase.
