Technology
Lyft to ‘open money can’ on dynamic pricing
Ride-hailing giant Lyft will pilot a brand new feature called Price Lock that may let passengers purchase a monthly subscription “that locks in the price for a specific route over a specific period of time,” CEO David Risher said.
The feature is meant to address the problem of inconsistent dynamic pricing, particularly for commuters who use the Lyft app day-after-day. It’s a part of Lyft’s broader plan to “open the can of loot in prime time,” Risher said Wednesday in the course of the Lyft conference. Q2 results phone call.
“Primetime” is Lyft’s term for dynamic pricing, which is when ride-hailing platforms dynamically raise the costs of rides when demand is high or supply is low.
“Reliable pricing is especially important to them because they know how much a ride should cost and they hate price changes,” Risher added.
Lyft hasn’t provided much details about how the Price Lock economics will impact Lyft’s bottom line. However, Risher said Wednesday that a subscription will cost lower than $5 per 30 days. The feature is already available within the Lyft app and appears to cost $2.99 per 30 days.
The company didn’t immediately respond to a request for more information concerning the feature or whether it might be included in Lyft’s important subscription platform, Lyft Pink.
The move toward “primetime” pricing is nothing recent for the corporate. A yr ago, Risher unveiled his plan to eliminate dynamic pricing so as to offer riders cheaper rides in a bid to persuade them to switch from Lyft’s biggest competitor, Uber.
Risher noted that “prime time will never completely disappear” because “it’s an important way to match supply and demand during periods of rapid growth.”
“But with innovations like price lock, we can gradually reduce the frequency of this and hopefully take what I think is the most hated feature of ridesharing and turn it into a reason to choose Lyft.”
Over the past yr, Lyft has made a concerted effort to reduce the variety of rides subject to dynamic pricing. Risher saw that number drop by 25% quarter-over-quarter, which he said contributes to higher conversion rates.
“In fact, the markets where we saw the biggest declines in prime time in Q2, like Phoenix, Baltimore and Orlando, are the markets where conversion rates are improving the most,” Risher said.
It was the primary quarter by which Lyft reported a GAAP profit, but that success was tempered by a weak third-quarter outlook. Lyft had forecast gross bookings, or the entire value of transactions, of $4 billion to $4.1 billion, barely below analyst estimates of $4.13 billion. (For comparison, Uber’s gross bookings within the second quarter were $20.6 billion, but Uber has a worldwide market share and Lyft is accessible only within the U.S. and Canada.) Its revised core profit forecast of $90 million to $95 million also fell in need of Wall Street’s $104.3 million goal.
Lyft noted that it expects gross bookings to grow barely faster than rides, partly since the reduction in dynamic pricing will impact gross bookings per ride.
Technology
How the digital “you” can withstand your torturous online conference calls
Now you can appear like you are on a Zoom call in your office, even whilst you’re sipping a margarita in a hammock far, far-off. Courtesy of a several-month-old startup called Marinadethe premise is easy: upload a five-minute training video of you creating an avatar, and 24 hours later you may seemingly be able to go. Do you ought to call from your automotive? This can be your secret. Too lazy to get away from bed? No problem. At the beach club? You’re probably pushing it, although judging by the demo video, that is not the only problem that should be solved. (The service is currently available in Basic, Standard and Professional versions, with prices starting from $300 to $1,150 per yr.)
The technology, backed by Los Angeles-based Krew Capital, currently only works with macOS, Pickle says, but a Windows version is anticipated next month. As for the conferencing apps that customers can pick from, they include Zoom, Google Meet and Teams, in keeping with Pickle. However, you should have to attend to make use of them. According to the website, “due to high demand, clone generation is currently delayed.”
Technology
‘Wolves’ sequel canceled because director ‘no longer trusted’ Apple
It could also be hard to recollect, but George Clooney and Brad Pitt starred together within the movie “Wolves,” which Apple released just two months ago.
On Friday, the film’s author and director Jon Watts said Friday that the sequel is not any longer happening; IN one other interview for Deadlinehe explained that he “no longer trusts (Apple) as a creative partner.”
According to reports, the corporate limiting your film strategy. For example, “Wolfs” was imagined to have a giant theatrical release, but as an alternative it played in a limited variety of theaters for just per week before it landed on Apple TV+.
Watts, who also created the brand new Star Wars series “Skeleton Crew,” said Apple’s change “came as a complete surprise and was made without any explanation or discussion.”
“I was completely shocked and asked them not to tell me I was writing a sequel,” Watts said. “They ignored my request and announced it in their press release anyway, apparently to put a positive spin on their streaming axis.”
As a result, Watts said he “quietly refunded the money they gave me to continue” and canceled the project.
Technology
The Rise and Fall of the “Scattered Spider” Hackers.
After greater than two years of evading capture following a hacking spree that targeted some of the world’s largest technology firms, U.S. authorities say they’ve finally caught a minimum of some of the hackers responsible.
In August 2022 security researchers made their information public with a warning that a bunch of hackers targeted greater than 130 organizations in a complicated phishing campaign that stole the credentials of nearly 10,000 employees. The hackers specifically targeted firms that use Okta, a single sign-on service provider that hundreds of firms around the world use to permit their employees to log in from home.
Due to its give attention to Okta, the hacker group was dubbed “0ktapus”. By now the group has been hacked Caesar’s entertainmentCoinbase, DoorDash, Mailchimp, Riot Games, Twilio (twice) and dozens more.
The most notable and severe cyber attack by hackers in terms of downtime and impact was the September 2023 breach of MGM Resorts, which reportedly cost the casino and hotel giant a minimum of $100 million. In this case, the hackers collaborated with the Russian-speaking ransomware gang ALPHV and demanded a ransom from MGM for the company to get better its files. The break-in was such a nuisance that MGM-owned casinos had problems with service delivery for several days.
Over the past two years, as law enforcement has closed in on hackers, people in the cybersecurity industry have been attempting to work out exactly tips on how to classify hackers and whether to place them in a single group or one other.
Techniques utilized by hackers similar to social engineering, email and SMS phishing, and SIM swapping are common and widespread. Some of the individual hackers were part of several groups chargeable for various data breaches. These circumstances make it obscure exactly who belongs to which group. Cybersecurity giant CrowdStrike has dubbed this hacker group “Scattered Spider,” and researchers imagine it has some overlap with 0ktapus.
The group was so energetic and successful that the US cybersecurity agency CISA and the FBI issued a advice in late 2023 with detailed details about the group’s activities and techniques in an try and help organizations prepare for and defend against anticipated attacks.
Scattered Spider is a “cybercriminal group targeting large companies and their IT helpdesks,” CISA said in its advisory. The agency warned that the group “typically engaged in data theft for extortion purposes” and noted its known ties to ransomware gangs.
One thing that is comparatively certain is that hackers mostly speak English and are generally believed to be teenagers or early 20s, and are sometimes called “advanced, persistent teenagers.”
“A disproportionate number of minors are involved and this is because the group deliberately recruits minors due to the lenient legal environment in which these minors live, and they know that nothing will happen to them if the police catch the child” – Allison Nixon , director of research for Unit 221B, told TechCrunch at the time.
Over the past two years, some members of 0ktapus and Scattered Spider have been linked to a similarly nebulous group of cybercriminals generally known as “Com” People inside this broader cybercriminal community committed crimes that leaked into the real world. Some of them are chargeable for acts of violence similar to robberies, burglaries and bricklaying – hiring thugs to throw bricks at someone’s house or apartment; and swatting – when someone tricks authorities into believing that a violent crime has occurred, prompting the intervention of an armed police unit. Although born as a joke, the swat has fatal consequences.
After two years of hacking, authorities are finally starting to discover and prosecute Scattered Spider members.
in July This was confirmed by the British police arrest of a 17-year-old in reference to the MGM burglary.
In November, the U.S. Department of Justice announced it had indicted five hackers: Ahmed Hossam Eldin Elbadawy, 23, of College Station, Texas; Noah Michael Urban, 20, from Palm Coast, Florida, arrested in January; Evans Onyeaka Osiebo, 20, of Dallas, Texas; Joel Martin Evans, 25, of Jacksonville, North Carolina; and Tyler Robert Buchanan, 22, from the UK, who was arrested in June in Spain.
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