Business Insider: Think you can spot a hacker's phishing email? Take Google's quiz and find out.
https://www.businessinsider.com/google-quiz-hackers-phishing-emails-jigsaw-2019-1

Search Engine Land: How reputation became a major ranking factor in SEO.
https://searchengineland.com/how-reputation-became-a-major-ranking-factor-in-seo-310809

... The recent core algorithm updates and Medic Update over the past year, and publication of the Quality Rating Guidelines, are largely indicating that a business’s reputation is also key to this as well. If you’re interested in how this all may function, read on. ...

TechCrunch: Google will start retiring Hangouts for G Suite users in October.
https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/22/google-will-start-retiring-hangouts-for-g-suite-users-in-october/

Google’s strategy around its consumer messaging services remains baffling, especially since it killed off Allo (yet kept Duo on life support).

Today, the company clarified the timeline of the transition from classic Hangouts to Chat and Meet for its paying G Suite customers. For them, the Hangouts retirement party will start in October of this year.

Business Insider: The internet's 'father' says it was born with two big flaws.
https://www.businessinsider.com/google-vint-cerf-explains-why-early-internet-lacked-security-and-room-2019-1

The Verge: Facebook Messenger’s redesign is finally rolling out to all.
https://www.theverge.com/2019/1/18/18188319/facebook-messenger-redesign-release-date-features

9to5Google: Google Chrome is working to fix the ‘white flash’ between webpages.
https://9to5google.com/2019/01/18/google-chrome-fix-white-flash/

Hundreds of millions of email addresses and passwords have been posted online for anyone to download.

Nearly 800 million logins are in the huge dump which contains information from thousands of data breaches.

The stolen details are likely to be in use for years as hackers attempt to take over affected users accounts.

Hoogleraar: Eén goed gemikte aanval en het hele internet ligt plat | Universiteit van NL | AD.nl

'...1 Het internet bestaat uit grote netwerken die via kabels razendsnel informatie delen. Hoewel dat op het eerste gezicht niet zo lijkt, zijn deze netwerken volgens Pras in hoge mate van elkaar afhankelijk. Zo maakt het bijvoorbeeld niet uit of je provider Ziggo of KPN is; ze gebruiken dezelfde kabels. Doorgaans zijn de netwerken groot genoeg om elkaar op te vangen en er is dan ook nog nooit wat misgegaan. ,,Maar, één cyberaanval op een cruciaal verbindingspunt en de boel zou wel eens als een kaartenhuis in elkaar kunnen zakken’’, legt Pras uit. Aangezien tegenwoordig vrijwel de hele maatschappij via internet functioneert, kan een cyberaanval een verlammende invloed hebben....'

https://www.ad.nl/tech/hoogleraar-een-goed-gemikte-aanval-en-het-hele-internet-ligt-plat~a49ab321/

The final language of the EU Copyright Directive will reportedly be released next week. The directive seeks to “harmonize” copyright law across Europe. However there are two provisions (Articles 11 & 13) that are highly problematic and have caused free-speech advocates and many online publishers grave concern:

Article 11 would require Google, Bing and other news aggregators to pay non-waivable licensing fees when short snippets of content are presented on their sites

Article 13 would require platforms like Google, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and others to monitor and proactively screen content uploads for potential copyright infringement or face liability.