Mass shooting at Madden Championship Series event in Florida leaves several dead

At least eleven people have been shot and four people were killed in a mass shooting attack at a livestream event debuting the new “Madden NFL 19” game at an arcade in Jacksonville, Fla., according to local news reports. The Jacksonville Sheriff’s office confirmed on Twitter that one suspect was dead at the scene and […]

View More Mass shooting at Madden Championship Series event in Florida leaves several dead

Inside the Vegas nightclub that launched its own cryptocurrency

TwitterFacebook

It’s 11:15 p.m. on a Friday night and a man in a white button-down shirt named Joey just ordered me a shot of Fireball. It’s a little hard to hear him over the music blasting from the other side of the velvet ropes, but the club’s director of services leans in close to make sure I can hear him. 

“Excellence and hospitality in the crypto world,” Joey says in response to my request that he describe just what, exactly, is going on here. 

I’m sitting on a spacious couch in a private club, inside of another nightclub, inside of a casino, and we’re discussing Las Vegas’s first cryptocurrency nightclub: MORE Las Vegas. Launched in April by Peter Klamka — a man known for, among other things, his involvement with The Legends Room gentlemen’s club which allowed patrons to tip performers in bitcoin — the nightclub comes with all the trappings of a typical VIP Vegas destination. There’s the $250,000 bottles of champagne, high-heeled cocktail waitresses, and view of the Bellagio fountains that’s to die for.  Read more…

More about Bitcoin, Las Vegas, Def Con, Ethereum, and Cryptocurrency

View More Inside the Vegas nightclub that launched its own cryptocurrency

Hacking the websites responsible for election information is so easy an 11 year-old did it

It’s time to talk about election security. Over the weekend at Def Con, the annual hacker convention in Las Vegas to discuss some of the latest and greatest (or scariest) trends in the wild world of hacking, a pair of election security hacking demonstrations set up for adults and kids alike offered up some frightening […]

View More Hacking the websites responsible for election information is so easy an 11 year-old did it

Dozens of Vegas slots went offline simultaneously during a hacker convention

TwitterFacebook

The casino is “pretty certain” it wasn’t hacked. 

The annual DEF CON hacking convention returned once again to Las Vegas this weekend, and with it came the typical good-natured mischief that’s bound to happen when thousands of cybersecurity professionals congregate in one spot. Early Saturday morning at the Linq casino, however, looked to be something else entirely.  

It was around 1:00 or 2:00 a.m. and DEF CON attendee Matt Anderson was hanging out at the Linq — a casino just across the street from Caesars Palace, the convention’s host — when it happened: Dozens of slot machines went down, all at once.  Read more…

More about Hackers, Las Vegas, Def Con, Tech, and Cybersecurity

View More Dozens of Vegas slots went offline simultaneously during a hacker convention

The hackers just arrived, and they’re already breaking Vegas

TwitterFacebook

It’s 107 degrees outside, and a disturbing number of people charging down the sidewalk are wearing black jeans. 

That seemingly incongruous fashion choice, more than the blinking digital badges swinging from the necks of every mohawk-sporting passerby, clues the confused tourists into the reality that this week in Las Vegas is different. Yes, this week is DEF CON, and the hackers are very much in town.

And you better believe they’re already breaking Vegas. 

Thursday was the official start of the 26th annual DEF CON hacker convention, this year spread out between Caesars Palace and The Flamingo. As typical, the first day of the four-day affair started slowly — the hacking villages where people practice remotely hijacking cars and breaking into voting machines are still getting set up, and the few opening talks cover decidedly non-technical tricks like how to lose your police tailRead more…

More about Hackers, Las Vegas, Def Con, Tech, and Cybersecurity

View More The hackers just arrived, and they’re already breaking Vegas

TrustToken opens its dollar-backed cryptocurrency to accredited investors

Pitching a dollar-pegged token that offers cryptocurrency speculators a way to move their investments across volatile exchanges, TrustToken (the first public investment from a16z crypto) is now looking for public investments from accredited investors on CoinList. The company’s first token is TrueUSD, a stablecoin that is redeemable one-to-one for U.S. dollars. In its first four […]

View More TrustToken opens its dollar-backed cryptocurrency to accredited investors

Forget the Vegas drive-thru wedding: Get hitched inside a driverless shuttle

Your wedding venue search is over. Who needs a wedding chapel when there’s a perfectly functional driverless shuttle bus roaming the streets of Las Vegas?
That’s the venue the American Automobile Association is offering a lucky couple looking to get …

View More Forget the Vegas drive-thru wedding: Get hitched inside a driverless shuttle

Massage-on-demand company, Soothe, raises $31 million

The massage-on-demand service Soothe seems to be rubbing investors the right way with the close of a new $31 million round of funding. The Series C round from late-stage and growth capital investment firm, The Riverside Company, caps a busy first quarter for the massage service. It also relocated from Los Angeles to Las Vegas; […]

View More Massage-on-demand company, Soothe, raises $31 million

The Las Vegas strip’s first legit esports arena just opened for business

On the south end of the Vegas strip, a different kind of gaming is taking root. At the Luxor casino, the Esports Arena Las Vegas just opened its doors, occupying the former home of the LAX nightclub. Following a special event on March 22, the arena, owned by Allied Esports, opened for regular operations on Monday, […]

View More The Las Vegas strip’s first legit esports arena just opened for business

The biggest trend at CES was sleeping through CES

TwitterFacebook

CES is a ruthless grind. As the largest tech convention in the world wraps up today in Las Vegas, thousands of attendees are engaged in one last push to make the most of a hectic week filled with problematic product launches, power outages, and too many sales pitches to count — and they’re dead tired. 

The cracks started to show Wednesday, technically only the convention’s second day. Mixed in among the drone-racing courses, home robots, and at least one promise of free beer (only while supplies last!), were an untold number of people from around the world just trying to catch a goddamn minute of sleep.  Read more…

More about Tech, Ces, Sleep, Las Vegas, and Consumer Tech

View More The biggest trend at CES was sleeping through CES