Discord’s age-verification era is upon us, despite community backlash

image via TechCrunch
image via TechCrunch

“Age assurance draws strong opinions and skepticism, especially when it involves sharing biometric information or a form of ID,” Discord CTO Stanislav Vishnevskiy wrote in a blog post, published Tuesday. “At the same time, age assurance laws are expanding, and since my last post we’ve had to launch age assurance in other regions, including in Brazil and in Texas.” However, Vishnevskiy says more than 90% of Discord users won’t have to verify their age. He explains that Discord will instead use existing account data to detect “signals,” like account tenure (how long an account has existed), device and activity data, and other usage patterns, to determine whether a user belongs in the adult, teen, or unconfirmed age group.

https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/22/discords-age-verification-era-is-upon-us-despite-community-backlash/

What we expect from the upcoming Apple launch

image via TechCrunch
image via TechCrunch

It’s finally happening — this week, we are (probably) about to see Apple’s first foldable iPhone, more than five years after Samsung launched its first foldable phone. While the foldable iPhone is most exciting, we’re also anticipating news about AirPods, HomePods, and the non-foldable iPhone 18 line.

https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/07/what-we-expect-from-the-upcoming-apple-launch/

The sameness problem behind those unappetizing AI-generated menus

image via TechCrunch
image via TechCrunch

Generative AI menus have hit the restaurant business courtesy of models trained on a narrow, “pleasing” aesthetic that feels wrong even when you can’t articulate why. “The optimization of the datasets is for pleasingness, or you know, not being offensive, and so there’s a way that turns into homogenization,” Lee Rainie, director of the Imagining the Digital Future Center at Elon University, told TechCrunch. “What AI is known to do both in images and language is to shave off the edges.”

https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/03/the-sameness-problem-behind-those-unappetizing-ai-generated-menus

Norway considers ban on camera-enabled wearable ‘pervert glasses’

image via TechCrunch
image via TechCrunch

Norway’s Tung said there is a “clear trend toward combining artificial intelligence with cameras and microphones built into glasses, headphones, hats and other objects we use in everyday life.” “We must prevent this equipment from being used to monitor other people in public places,” said Tung, who added that this may include banning the use of facial recognition of other people in public places.

https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/02/norway-considers-ban-on-camera-enabled-wearable-pervert-glasses/

MapQuest’s app surges to No. 1 in Navigation after refusing to rename Lake Ontario

image via techcrunch.com
image via techcrunch.com

The “OG of online mapping,” as the company calls itself, announced on Thursday that it would not change the name of Lake Ontario on its maps to Lake America, despite Trump’s executive order directing the U.S. Department of the Interior to update the lake’s name in the U.S. geographic naming service. As a result, MapQuest’s mobile app downloads soared, sending the iOS app to the No. 4 position on the U.S. App Store’s Top Charts for apps (not including games) as of Monday morning on the U.S. east coast.

https://techcrunch.com/2026/08/31/mapquests-app-surges-to-no-1-in-navigation-after-refusing-to-rename-lake-ontario/

Meta settles for $18B in lawsuit brought by 29 states over social media harms to children

image via TechCrunch
image via TechCrunch

The lawsuit alleged that the social media giant knowingly designed platforms like Instagram and Facebook to addict children, despite knowing about the harms the platforms could pose to young users. The states also claimed that Meta knowingly collected data from children without parental knowledge, which violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA).

https://techcrunch.com/2026/08/26/meta-settles-for-18-billion-in-lawsuit-brought-by-29-states-over-social-media-harms-to-children

Oura faces lawsuit accusing it of misleading consumers about sleep-tracking accuracy

image via techcrunch.com
image via techcrunch.com

The lawsuit, filed on Thursday by Clarkson Law Firm in San Francisco, alleges that Oura rings are unable to measure any of the physiological signals needed to assess sleep quality or determine sleep stages, and that they instead rely on AI-generated estimates that have “a coin flip’s chance of being correct,” according to the complaint.

https://techcrunch.com/2026/08/21/oura-faces-lawsuit-accusing-it-of-misleading-consumers-about-sleep-tracking-accuracy/