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We got to play the next Assassin's Creed game set in Japan with Ubisoft's new take on exploration -- as well as teases of the Animus system.

After the ouster of Syria's longtime leader Bashar al-Assad last month, Israel's military has taken up a new post in the demilitarized buffer zone created in Syria after the 1973 Arab-Israeli war.

(Image credit: Ayman Oghanna for NPR)

"The only way to stop data from ending up in the wrong hands is by not collecting it in the first place." This is the claim included in an ad from one of the best VPN providers around that ran on Monday, January 20, 2025, in the New York Times.

Through a cartoon-style FBI agent, the Swiss company Mullvad seeks to shed light on the tensions between technologists and law enforcement around encryption.

On one side, the recent Salt Typhoon hack – which compromised all major US telecoms – prompted US authorities to call on citizens to switch to encrypted communications. At the same time, however, the FBI referred to "responsibly managed encryption." For Mullvad, this means one thing – creating backdoors to end-to-end encryption.

"This proves they have not understood anything at all and are not learning from their mistakes. They don’t understand the basics: if you create backdoors, they will be exploited by others, as happened in the Salt Typhoon case," Jan Jonsson, CEO at Mullvad, told TechRadar, adding that the campaign is a way to raise greater awareness around this issue.

U.S. authorities installed backdoors to mass-monitor their own citizens. Someone hacked the backdoors, and millions of Americans' communications ended up in unintended hands.They are doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.Ad in today’s… pic.twitter.com/XgwmBNx1VfJanuary 20, 2025

Encryption – which refers to scrambling data into an unreadable form to prevent unauthorized access – is the guarantee that your messages (for example, when you use Signal or WhatsApp) or internet connections (think of how virtual private network (VPN) apps work) remain private between you and the receiver.

Despite recognizing the importance of using encrypted messaging apps, law enforcement has long argued that police officers should be able to access these encrypted messages to catch the bad guys.

This is not a prerogative for US authorities, either. EU lawmakers, for example, are also pushing for the so-called Chat Control proposal. If enacted, this will require all encrypted communication providers to create such an encryption backdoor to allow the monitoring of all citizens' chats on the lookout for illegal content.

Ironically, the day that Mullvad decided to run its ad in the New York Times, the Financial Times published an article reporting the Europol chief's endorsement, yet again, of "responsible encryption."

"Mass surveillance does not belong in democratic societies. We want people to know their rights and demand their rights," said Jonsson. "And we want the politicians to realize that there is no such thing as anonymous data, that data collected eventually leaks, and that it is high time for authorities to stop mass-surveilling their own and other populations."

More of Mullvad's privacy-focused ads

This was the third in a series of ads, run by Mullvad, in the popular US paper to raise awareness about the risks of intrusive data collection and sharing.

Published on January 8, the first ad pictured a leaking car and came as a response to the Volkswagen data breach that exposed the sensitive information of over 800,000 electric vehicles. A leak, Mullvad explains, that shows that there is no such thing as anonymous data.

Do you know?

(Image credit: Mullvad VPN)

Mullvad has been pretty vocal against the EU CSAM (child sexual abuse material) proposal to scan all citizens' chats. The VPN provider put up banners in Stockholm and Guttenberg when Sweden was holding the EU Presidency in 2023. "We will continue to be active in opposing mass surveillance proposals," Jan Jonsson, CEO at Mullvad, told TechRadar.

Jonsson said: "We cannot have a society where people’s lives are tracked under the excuse that the data is anonymous when patterns in the data reveal the person behind it."

A week after, on January 17, a second ad featured a short comic strip shedding light on a few distinct, yet entangled, issues linked with Big Tech's invasive data collection practices.

By tracking everything people do online, according to Mullvad, Big Tech companies are mapping people's ideas before they're even voiced aloud, de-facto undermining their right to free expression.

The VPN provider also believes that banning metadata collection – meaning all the information about the data that is not the content – could also be an easy way to resolve the problem of misinformation from its root. That's because Jonsson said: "Personal data is what is used to create the algorithms that fuel the spread of misinformation."

• Insomniac is still keeping quiet on the release date for Marvel's Wolverine
• Insomniac's co-head Chad Dezern said there is "pent-up excitement" around the project, but couldn't offer any more details
• Marvel's Wolverine was announced back in 2021

Four years after its initial announcement, we still have no idea when Marvel's Wolverine is launching, and Insomniac Games still can't confirm if it will be released in 2025.

News recently broke that Insomniac's founder and CEO Ted Price will be stepping down from the role after more than 30 years. Following the announcement, the studio's new co-chiefs Ryan Schneider, Chad Dezern, and Jen Huang sat down with Variety to discuss the switch in leadership as well as what's in store for the company.

While Chad Dezern did touch on Insomniac's next superhero game, Marvel's Wolverine, the co-head was still unable to offer any juicy details about it or an idea of when players can expect to get their hands on it.

"We’ve announced Wolverine, and we’d love to talk more about Wolverine, but we have to be like Logan today, and remain very stoic until it’s time to pop the claws down the road," said Dezern.

"As much as we’re as much as we have pent-up excitement, we got to hold on to it. So that’s, that’s about as much as we could say about our upcoming projects today."

Marvel's Wolverine was announced in 2021 alongside a short teaser trailer but development updates have been quiet since. Following a cyber attack in December 2023 which resulted in a number of leaks, the studio did release a statement about the situation while also confirming that the game "continues as planned" and "is in early production and will no doubt greatly evolve throughout development, as do all our plans."

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(Image credit: Kris Connor/Getty Images)

• Asus mentioned an AMD microcode flaw in recent patch notes
• The flaw was not yet publicized by the processor manufacturer
• AMD has since confirmed the news

AMD has seemingly confirmed the existence of a microcode vulnerability which apparently spilled, unintentionally, from PC maker Asus.

Security researcher Tavis Ormandy recently spotted a BETA bios fix for a “microcode signature verification vulnerability” apparently plaguing Asus’ gaming motherboards, being mentioned in the company’s release notes.

This was quite strange, since at the time AMD had made no mention of any such vulnerability.

Confirmation from AMD

"It looks like an OEM leaked the patch for a major upcoming CPU vulnerability, ie: 'AMD Microcode Signature Verification Vulnerability,'" Ormandy said. "I'm not thrilled about this. The patch is not currently in linux-firmware, so this is the only publicly available patch."

Microcode can be described as a set of small instructions stored inside a processor that tells it how to do specific tasks. It works behind the scenes to help the processor understand and carry out more complicated commands.

After the community started asking questions, Asus edited the notes to remove mentioning AMD’s microcode issue. In the meantime, the chipmaker told The Register that Asus’ information was correct:

"AMD is aware of a newly reported processor vulnerability. Execution of the attack requires both local administrator level access to the system, and development and execution of malicious microcode," it said.

The company also suggested abusing the bug requires the victims being tricked into action.

"AMD has provided mitigations and is actively working with its partners and customers to deploy those mitigations,” it added. “AMD recommends customers continue to follow industry-standard security practices and only work with trusted suppliers when installing new code on their systems. AMD plans to issue a security bulletin soon with additional guidance and mitigation options."

At press time, there was no information about the processor models affected by this vulnerability.

Via The Register

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• Assassin's Creed Shadows will allow for more player freedom
• Associated game director Simon Lemay-Comtois says exploration is "much more free form"
• The development team wanted to find "the right balance of discovery and wonder"

Ubisoft Quebec has reworked exploration in Assassin's Creed Shadows to allow for more player freedom in its open world.

That's according to Simon Lemay-Comtois, associated game director for Assassin's Creed Shadows, who told TechRadar Gaming during a special preview event that the team decided on a more guided experience for the upcoming game compared to previous entries in the series.

"It used to be 'point exactly where, right we want players to go', and that has shifted across the entire industry," Lemay-Comtois said. "For us, we already started this with Odyssey a while back where we had a default mode, which is [the] classic 'go here' and then we had, I think we called it exploration mode if I recall, and it was less guided.

"Now for Shadows, this is what we start from. The default mode is much more free form and you have to piece it together."

Lemay-Comtois also noted that if players wanted to, they can turn default mode back on if they wish, which will offer a more direct experience that will help you with where you need to go.

"It feels better to use information that you find and objectives that you piece together," he added. "Is it some form of reward? I think that's what the industry has been showing us these last five, six years, is that finding things by yourself, it's rewarding, so therefore, why don't we just put that in the forefront of exploration?"

The game director also explained how the team tried to make Shadows' setting of Japan a less overwhelming location to explore, compared to games such as Valhalla and Odyssey.

"It's always tricky, because we know we want to represent a much more accurate landscape scale for Japan than we had before, say, for Odyssey, Greece was very compacted compared to [the] real world," he said.

"With Japan, we're not doing it, but we're trying to get closer to a one-for-one scale, especially on castles and stuff like that. So first we start with 'How big does the map need to be to accommodate the different important location where the story is going to take place?' And 'How much space do we need between those things?' And then, when we have that, 'How much content do we need for it to feel right between those things, for you to be pulled off to the side and find things?'"

The development team went through various playtests to get this right, Lemay-Comtois said, to "make sure that we find what feels to be the right balance of discovery and wonder" as well as other things in the world players might be able to notice in the distance that they can find for themselves.

"[The] landscape of Japan is flat ground with very sharp, steep mountains that are not very high, but they completely blocked line of sight over distance," Lemay-Comtois added. "So it's kind of tricky to... you need to be able to climb on a mountain to see what's on the top of the other mountain.

"So it's been, it's been a fun challenge to do, but it's there's no formula to it. You do it, you iterate, you try again, you try again until enough people say that feels good, and hopefully you nail it."

Assassin's Creed Shadows launches on March 20 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and PC.

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• Assassin's Creed Shadows - preview
• Assassin's Creed Shadows - hideout mode impressions
• Assassin's Creed Shadows - Animus hub impressions
• What the Assassin's Creed Shadows developers are most excited for fans to see

• Assassin's Creed Shadows will feature more than 700 cinematics
• Realization director David Nibbelin said these cinematics will allow players to connect to the characters on a deeper level
• Players will experience "two perspectives of Japan" through the eyes of Naoe and Yasuke

Ubisoft has revealed that Assassin's Creed Shadows will feature more than 700 cinematics, but it has stressed that it won't be "all chit-chat."

Speaking to TechRadar Gaming during a recent Assassin's Creed Shadows preview event, realization director David Nibbelin said that the development team focused heavily on these cinematics and that it felt important for players to connect to the game's protagonists, Naoe and Yasuke, in between combat and open-world exploration.

"We needed to find a way to make sure that cinematics were compelling content that the player really wanted to put the controller down and enjoy," Nibellin said. "So for us, when we look at cinematics, we can't just think of them as telling a story. It seems kind of silly, but what we want you to do is, we want you to feel these scenes.

"We want you to think of them not as simply what happens next, but as a moment, to recognize consequence, to reflect on the choices you made as a player through gameplay or through selections, actually get an emotional payoff, so that you can connect with the player the characters that you're playing as."

Nibellin continued, saying that these cinematics will allow players "to connect to the characters themselves on a deeper level" and that the team approached this idea by showcasing "two perspectives of Japan through the eyes of our protagonists."

"When you think of Naoe and Yasuke, you think we have two very different viewpoints of this world," he said. "Yasuke who comes in seeing the very creme de la creme, the very top of the elite level. He's meeting Oda Nobunaga, and then Naoe, a farmer's daughter in the hills of Iga, she's seeing it from a very different side...

"It's easy to see big armies and big figures and think [of] the more generic historical context, but what was it like for these two experiences coming into this world? So when you connect through history, it needs to be through them."

The developer also teased that players will be able to experience Naoe and Yasuke's personal stories, their familial dynamics, and how they both deal with loss and romance, while at the same time rooted firmly in Japanese tradition.

Assassin's Creed Shadows was delayed earlier this month and is now set to launch on March 20 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and PC.

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• Assassin's Creed Shadows - preview
• Assassin's Creed Shadows - hideout mode impressions
• Assassin's Creed Shadows - Animus hub impressions
• What the Assassin's Creed Shadows developers are most excited for fans to see

• Assassin's Creed Shadows' main story won't feature multiple endings, Ubisoft has confirmed
• Associated game director Simon Lemay-Comtois said side content will have different outcomes
• The game's Canon mode will also take away dialogue options to offer a fixed experienced

Assassin's Creed Shadows' main story won't have multiple endings and will instead feature a fixed outcome.

During an interview with TechRadar Gaming at a recent preview event for Assassin's Creed Shadows, Simon Lemay-Comtois, associated game director, confirmed that the game's narrative can't be changed through player decisions.

"So we don't have multiple endings," Lemay-Comtois said. "We don't have a big shift that could happen. The story that we tell is going to end up where it's going to end up. What you get to choose is the detail and the path you take to get there."

Although the main story's outcome is fixed, Lemay-Comtois confirmed that side quests will allow for multiple outcomes depending on player choices.

"There's a lot of side content that is much more the choices you make in the side content will dictate an outcome or another. But in the main story, it's mostly style and player choice that changes the path you take to get where you want," he said.

Lemay-Comtois also touched on the game's Canon mode, which allows players to experience the game with choices already made for them.

"Some players don't like choice in the games. I'm not one of them, but we introduced the Canon mode, which is the 'here's Assassin's Creed Shadows without choices in it' and this is the ultimate story that the writer would write if there was no choice," the developer said.

This means dialogue choices won't be featured in this mode, which Lemay-Comtois said allows conversations to "flow from one character to the other".

Assassin's Creed Shadows is scheduled to launch on March 20 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and PC.

You might also like...

• Assassin's Creed Shadows - preview
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• What the Assassin's Creed Shadows developers are most excited for fans to see

• I interviewed two Assassin's Creed Shadows devs and asked what they're excited for fans to experience
• One dev focused on the recruitment in-game
• Another highlighted the new way that Shadows is telling its story

Excitement for Assassin’s Creed Shadows is growing as we race toward the game’s March 20 release date.

I recently visited Ubisoft Quebec to go hands-on with the game and get a behind-the-scenes look at development. During my visit, I spoke to key developers and quizzed them on their favorite elements of the game that have not been spoken about much up until now but they were most excited for fans to see.

I first talked to associate game director Simon Lemay-Comtois, who identified something about the people you’ll find out in the world in Assassin’s Creed Shadows.

“I think the allies that you can recruit, like their individual stories and personalities, and the actors who play some of them is the coolest bit that we have not yet revealed fully.”

This relates to the party of extra characters you can collect in Shadows who will take up residence in the Hideout area of the game after you meet them.

Game Director, Charles Benoit, then looked towards the narrative when I asked him the same question, saying the most exciting thing we’re yet to see more of is “the way the stories unfold.”

“I think players will really like the story structure”, referring to the game’s use of flashbacks for both characters to understand their backstories, as well as the dual perspective on the world and narrative more generally.

“So you have a mix of exploring and doing the open world and then leaving [and seeing] past events of their life. And I think the way it’s structured is pretty cool and pretty different from other Assassin’s Creed games, so I can't wait to see what people will think about that”.

The story is something I’m really keen to learn more about myself. Even after several hands-on hours with the game, and experiencing plenty of intrigue and interesting hooks, I’m still in the dark about what’s going on in the game.

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• An AMD exec has explained why RDNA 4 GPUs won’t launch until March
• The reason is to ensure the drivers are fully honed and FSR 4 is more widely supported
• On top of that, there’s a mention of making sure plenty of RX 9070 stock is on hand

AMD has provided a reason why the launch of its RX 9070 graphics cards was announced as happening in March 2025, when the hope – based on chatter from the grapevine, and quite a lot of it – was for an earlier release in Q1.

As made clear by David McAfee on X, AMD’s VP and GM of Ryzen CPU and Radeon graphics, the company is “taking a little extra time to optimize the software stack for maximum performance and enable more FSR 4 titles.”

I really appreciate the excitement for RDNA4. We are focused on ensuring we deliver a great set of products with Radeon 9000 series. We are taking a little extra time to optimize the software stack for maximum performance and enable more FSR 4 titles. We also have a wide range…January 22, 2025

So, AMD is tuning graphics drivers to work as well as possible with the incoming RX 9070 offerings, and to bring more PC games into the fold of being supported by FSR 4.

Furthermore, the exec from Team Red also indicates that building up stock is part of the equation when it comes to pitching the launch of RDNA 4 GPUs later in Q1, rather than earlier.

Analysis: A new tack from AMD – don’t rush, get it right?

This second announcement in short order from McAfee appears to serve a few possible purposes. Of course, on a surface level, it’s good to be kept up to date with what’s going on, and to hear why Team Red is taking more time on this. And I think this is something AMD needed to clarify, as there were a lot of rumors bubbling around what’s happening behind closed doors with RDNA 4.

One of the more frustrating elements of the ‘delay’ of RDNA 4 – which isn’t strictly a delay, seeing as AMD only ever said Q1 2025 for the launch, and that can be as late as March (though admittedly, not any later) – was the apparent appearance of multiple RX 9070 models at retailers. Seasoning needed to be sprinkled over those sightings, naturally, but there were a number of photos, all of which looked authentic enough (it seemed unlikely they were all fakes somehow). These led to some bewilderment and frustration as to why AMD isn’t just ‘getting on with it’ as it were.

McAfee indirectly addresses this with his latest comment, in the mention of some retail partners having “started building initial inventory” but that there’s much more to come. This explains those photo leaks and also assures us that there’ll be plenty of RDNA 4 stock on hand – also playing into, and capitalizing on, the worries that Nvidia won’t have a decent level of inventory for its RTX 5000 graphics cards (at least not initially for RTX 5090 and 5080 models).

All of this is deflecting away from the rumor that AMD has gotten involved in price wrangles with retail partners (who already ordered and received RX 9070 models or at least some stock) after seeing Nvidia’s unexpectedly low MSRPs for Blackwell desktop GPUs.

Furthermore, another concern aired about RDNA 4 was that support for FSR 4 might be thin on the ground to begin with, especially compared to DLSS 4, as Nvidia has a lot of support right out of the gate.

So, it does make sense to address this, and more broadly focus on making the RX 9070 launch as good as it can be – in terms of FSR, drivers, and stock availability. Granted, the fact that the RTX 5070 should already be out in February, and fully tested, to allow for better pitching of the price of the RX 9070 and its XT sibling, is obviously a benefit here too. (If AMD hasn’t yet finalized the price – which, given the overall picture, seems likely to be the case).

This main thrust of making the RDNA 4 launch a high-quality affair also chimes with what Moore’s Law is Dead (MLID) just shared in his latest video (see above). The YouTuber notes that AMD has switched strategy under Jack Huynh (Senior VP of Computing and Graphics) to avoid rushing out products when the market – or launches from rivals – demands them to arrive, and instead, take the time to get the hardware fully right.

And I can’t argue with that strategy because, well, it fully makes sense, and MLID’s sources also make it clear that they aren’t worried that RX 9070 models might disappoint.

So, while I’d like to buy a new mid-range GPU sooner rather than later, I’m just going to have to be patient, as will everyone else. Because even if that is a bit frustrating, if RDNA 4 pans out very well as a result, it will, of course, be worth the wait.

Via VideoCardz

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Our Samsung Galaxy Unpacked live coverage may have wrapped up, but we’re still feeling the excitement of seeing the new Samsung Galaxy S25, S25 Plus, S25 Ultra, and all-new S25 Edge revealed unto the world.

The new flagship Galaxy lineup brings with it a handful of upgrades for each of the three models, with increased RAM, new AI tools, and the blazing-fast Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset.

One of the upgrades that caught my eye during the livestream was the announcement of a new storage tier for the baseline S25, which now comes in a 512GB storage option in addition to the existing 128GB and 256GB variants – but, for some reason, not in the US.

The 512GB storage tier was previously limited to the Samsung Galaxy S24 Plus and S24 Ultra. But this small change gives UK and Australia-based customers a lot more flexibility when it comes to finding the right sizing and storage capacity for them.

The S25 Plus measures 6.7 inches diagonally, so getting more storage previously meant picking up a rather large phone. Keen photographers, gamers, or long-term users who prefer a smaller Galaxy phone now have the option of carrying around half a terabyte of storage in the form of the 6.2-inch S25.

At £959 / AU$1,599, I actually think this high capacity handset is very reasonably priced. It certainly undercuts the 512GB model of the iPhone 16, which comes in at a hefty $1,099 / £1,099 / AU$1,949. Overall, a very pro-consumer choice – good job, Samsung.

However, part of me thinks Samsung could have gone a little further with this year's baseline Galaxy flagship when it comes to storage. Though it may seem crazy to say to those of us who can remember the days of 16GB being the default, I think we’re getting close to the logical end of the 128GB default.

Having plenty of storage space is important as we continue to rely on our phones for day-to-day tasks. (Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)

With generative AI offering new ways to create different types of content, and phone makers continuing to focus on high-resolution mobile photography, users have more ways to fill up their storage than ever before. This, combined with the deflation of component prices over time should, in my opinion, spell the end of 128GB flagships sooner rather than later.

Though still enough space for light to medium users, the baseline S25's 128GB storage option now sticks out like a sore thumb in the company’s lineup. I’d love to have seen Samsung push forward and break this standard before it becomes noticeably outdated.

Of the ‘big three’ phone makers – Apple, Samsung, and Google – Samsung is especially renowned for fitting its phones with high-spec components. A higher standard storage would’ve given the S25 an edge over the Pixel 9 and iPhone 16, both of which sport 128GB as standard and both of which won’t be upgraded until much later in the year.

Still, I’m happy with the lineup we’ve got – as mentioned, this is one of the most competitively priced baseline flagships on the market, and if raising the standard storage tier would incur a price hike then perhaps keeping it steady was the right move. And those who pre-order an S25-series phone get a storage upgrade on the house anyway, doubling your storage for no extra cost.

Our Samsung Galaxy Unpacked live blog is winding down, but for a rundown of the events be sure to check out our Samsung Galaxy Unpacked recap. And for our initial impressions of the new Galaxy phones, be sure to check out our hands-on Samsung Galaxy S25 review, hands-on Samsung Galaxy S25 Plus review, and hands-on Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra review.

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• Researchers discover large supply-chain attack targeting Chrome extension developers
• Dozens have been compromised, resulting in possibly millions of victim users
• Researchers urge users to patch or uninstall certain extensions

Hackers have managed to compromise dozens of legitimate Google Chrome extensions in what appears to be a highly sophisticated supply chain attack.

As a result, millions of browser users are at risk of data theft, identity theft, wire fraud, and more, cybersecurity researchers at Sekoia has said.

The researchers said the attack starts with a very convincing phishing attack, in which the threat actors impersonated Google Chrome Web Store support. They sent emails to Chrome extension developers, warning them about violated store policies, and having their work removed from the store unless they “extended their privacy policy”. Obviously, the email came with a link, leading to a legitimate Google OAuth authorization page, built for a malicious application

Facebook Business and other targets

Victims who would log in would actually share their login credentials with the attackers, who would use the access to poison their work and compromise the extensions.

Sekoia says that the threat actors were going after Facebook Business accounts, API keys, session cookies, access tokens, account information, and ad account details. In some cases, it was added, the crooks were going after ChatGPT API keys and user authentication data, as well.

The team traced the campaign back to at least March 2024, with the possibility of earlier activity, too.

Some of the more popular extensions that were targeted include GraphQL Network Inspector, Proxy SwitchyOmega (V3), YesCaptcha assistant, Castorus, and VidHelper – Video Download Helper. The full list of attacked extensions can be found on this link.

The number of affected individuals is measured in hundreds of thousands, or even millions, and mostly revolves around the number of downloads of these plugins. Most of the poisoned solutions have been pulled from the Chrome Web Store already. However, users are still advised to remove, or update, affected extensions, to versions released after December 26, 2024, and reset important account passwords, especially for Facebook and ChatGPT.

Via The Register

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