No new members in November
William Gallagher
Thu Nov 20 2025, 10:05 AM EST · 2 minute read
The new accessibility iPhone grip and stand by Bailey Hikawa -- image credit: Apple
Apple is back with another limited edition iPhone accessory, this time a far more reasonably priced ergonomic grip that doubles as a stand for disabled users made by designer Bailey Hikawa.
Following the collaboration with a Japanese fashion house to make the iPhone Pocket, Apple has now teamed up with Los Angeles artist Bailey Hikawa. She already makes esoteric stands, grips and cases for the iPhone, and now one of them is in the online Apple Store — but this time with more purpose, and less artistic intention.
The Hikawa Phone Grip & Stand effectively requires a MagSafe compatible iPhone, and costs $70. It comes in two colors, either Chartreuse — a vibrant lime — or recycled crater, which is vaguely granite-like.
"The grip was designed through an extensive interview process to support varied ways of holding iPhone while reducing the effort needed to keep it steady," said Hikawa.
Apple says that it was made to commemorate 40 years of accessibility design at the company. Sarah Herrlinger, head of accessibility, has told ELLE Decor that this new grip is "just a great extension of that."
"It was a no-brainer to look at: what are the types of MagSafe accessories that can really be valuable to our communities, as well?" she says. "This is one of many accessories that are out there that solves unique problems for some people. "
The new grip and stand is a large accessory that resembles a portion of a cogwheel. It's made from soft-touch premium silicone, and is intended to work for people with different grip strengths.
It's the first time Hikawa has designed an iPhone accessory explicitly for accessibility, but she says she intends to do more.
"It changed the course of my work absolutely," says Hikawa. "This is the beginning of many more offerings for all kinds of bodies."
Side view of the new grip and stand, shown here in its granite color — image credit: Apple
ADAM ENGST 21 November 2025
Apple writes:
This year, all Apple Watch Ultra 3 and titanium Apple Watch Series 11 cases are 3D-printed with 100 percent recycled aerospace-grade titanium powder, an achievement not previously considered possible at scale. Every team at Apple rallied behind a shared ambition. The polished mirror finish on Series 11 had to be pristine. Ultra 3 had to maintain its durability and lightweight form to meet the demands of everyday adventurers. They both also had to be better for the planet without compromising performance, and use the same or better-quality materials.
Modern-day manufacturing is impressive enough in its own right, but Apple’s move to 3D printing Apple Watch cases at scale marks a significant milestone. Because 3D printing is an additive process that uses only the material in the final part, unlike subtractive machining of forged parts that results in significant waste, Apple says it uses 50% less raw material than in previous generations and expects to save over 400 metric tons of titanium in 2025. Over 20 hours, six lasers fuse more than 900 layers of recycled titanium powder to create a single Apple Watch case. Read the article for more over-the-top details and example videos.
Read original article
AppleInsider Staff
21
Fri Nov 21 2025, 01:06 PM EST · 2 minute read
Gmail
While Google disagrees, the company may have decided again that your data is its toy. Here's how to try to stop Gmail from training its AI on your email.
There's no shortage of big tech companies that want to use your data to train their large language models. Recently, I discussed how Meta wanted Facebook users to grant it permission to upload their entire camera roll to its cloud — perpetually.
This time, it's Google doing the data harvesting. Gmail now wants to use your emails — including any attachments you have — to train its AI models for features like Smart Compose and AI-generated replies.
While Google denies that this is the case, the company has made this feature opt-out by default, rather than opt-in. We know, because we checked multiple accounts, some that haven't been touched in years, and the feature was on. And, we stopped counting at dozens of accounts online saying the same.
And, to make matters worse, it's actually enabled in two different places, not just one, as spotted by Malware Bytes.
I, as well as my cohorts here at AppleInsider, strongly suggest turning the feature off. There's no reason Google should be able to access sensitive data like emails from your healthcare providers, utility bills and bank statements, or confidential workplace conversations without your explicit permission, if at all.
Here's a quick guide on how to disable Gmail AI training — be sure to do both, or else Google will still be able to use your data to some degree.
Disabling smart features in Google Workspace
Once you've completed that, don't forget to do the second part as well.
The setting applies to your account, not just the browser or app. This means you'll only need to disable the feature once for it to apply everywhere.
And, good news for users in the EU, Japan, Switzerland, and the UK: apparently, Google's been compelled to opt you out by default — so you won't need to make any of these changes.
As always, I suggest that you help friends and family who may not be as tech savvy navigate these features. Especially if they don't know what they're consenting to by using a service in the first place.
Update November 24, 9:21 AM ET: In an email to us, and presumably Malwarebyteswho broke the story and has since recanted some of it, Google says:
"These reports are misleading - we have not changed anyone's settings, Gmail Smart Features have existed for many years, and we do not use your Gmail content for training our Gemini AI model," Google said. "Lastly, we are always transparent and clear if we make changes to our terms of service and policies."
Our own testing on Friday proved that the statement about changing anyone's settings isn't quite accurate, though. We have added a line in the piece showing that.
Malcolm Owen
Mon Nov 24 2025, 02:57 PM EST · 1 minute read
Hackintosh is living on borrowed time with macOS Tahoe
Hackintosh users are successfully running macOS 26 Tahoe on their devices, in a battle that's taking place as Intel Mac support enters its final year.
Apple declared during WWDC 2025 that macOS 26 Tahoe would be the last macOSversion to include support for Intel Macs. While the end of that support obviously affects Mac users, it also impacts users of Hackintoshes.
With it being the last generation of macOS to work with Intel Macs, this means that macOS Tahoe will be the last that can be made to work on non-Apple hardware. Since a Hackintosh is a computer that isn't a Mac but still runs macOS, and are chiefly x86-based, that will effectively end the ability to update to macOS 27 or later versions.
Despite this dire outlook, users are still managing to get Hackintoshes running under macOS Tahoe.
Following the WWDC introduction, users were able to install beta versions of macOS 26 Tahoe on their Hackintoshes. However, doing so required a fair bit of work.
After the release of macOS 26 Tahoe to the general public, those same Hackintosh users are still managing to get things working.
In posts to the r/Hackintosh subreddit, users write about their success in installing macOS Tahoe on their hardware. Some are also doing so with point release versions of the operating system, showing they will also work.
Not everything is completely functional though, as audio, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi issues are frequently brought up in comments.
As for the process of getting it working, there are mentions of the Dortania OpenCore Guide, which now includes sections for macOS Tahoe prerequisites. There's also OpCore Simplify that helps to automate the process.
Some have also managed to get it working in a virtual machine, giving users who don't have the right hardware the opportunity to use the operating system.
Evidently, Apple hasn't done much to lock out Hackintosh users, considering the loss of Intel Mac support just around the corner.
For Hackintosh users, this is the last generation they can enjoy running macOS on their hardware. With macOS 27 supporting only Apple Silicon, that leaves little chance for anyone to create a workaround.
ADAM ENGST 1 November 2025
At The Verge, Robert Hart writes:
In the past few weeks alone, researchers have uncovered vulnerabilities in Atlas allowing attackers to take advantage of ChatGPT’s “memory” to inject malicious code, grant themselves access privileges, or deploy malware. Flaws discovered in Cometcould allow attackers to hijack the browser’s AI with hidden instructions. Perplexity, through a blog, and OpenAI’s chief information security officer, Dane Stuckey, acknowledged prompt injections as a big threat last week, though both described them as a “frontier” problem that has no firm solution.
Read Hart’s article for more details on the security and privacy concerns plaguing agentic browsers, but in short, they’re all somewhat vulnerable to “prompt injection” attacks, in which malicious instructions are concealed within content read by an AI. These instructions could be hidden in HTML comments, white text on a white background, or in the page metadata. They might trick the chatbot into requesting personal information or instruct the browser to download and execute malware.
Right now, agentic browsers have limited defenses against prompt injections. While AI systems can distinguish between system instructions and user content at the architectural level, they can’t reliably identify malicious instructions hidden within legitimate content encountered on Web pages. To an LLM, all text is tokens, and all tokens carry essentially equal weight. These browsers do employ input sanitization and prompt classification, and there are guardrails in place, but we’re talking about an entirely new attack space, making it impossible to anticipate and block all potential attacks.
However, there aren’t yet enough users of these agentic browsers to attract sophisticated cybercriminals, and the browsers don’t work well enough to be reliably exploited, so I’m comfortable using one occasionally for experimentation (see “Can Agentic Web Browsers Count?,” 30 October 2025). I think it’s safest to avoid using an agentic browser as your daily driver for now, though. At best, they are one-trick AI ponies that offer few features to enhance the human-powered Web browsing we all do.
ADAM ENGST 12 November 2025
ISSEY MIYAKE and Apple today unveiled iPhone Pocket. Inspired by the concept of “a piece of cloth,” its singular 3D-knitted construction is designed to fit any iPhone as well as all pocketable items. Beginning Friday, November 14, it will be available at select Apple Store locations and on apple.com in France, Greater China, Italy, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, the UK, and the U.S.
While it’s hard for Apple users not to think of the iPod Socks (see “Sockarooni!” 15 November 2004), your opinion of the iPhone Pocket likely reveals more about you than about it. Those who are sufficiently fashion-conscious to recognize Issey Miyake (makers of Steve Jobs’s black turtlenecks) probably have radically different opinions about the iPhone Pocket’s design and price ($149.95 for the short strap or $229.95 for the long strap) compared to those of us who don’t think twice about stuffing our iPhones into pockets or purses. It’s similar to whether you’re happy with a knockoff Apple Watch Sport Loop or willing to spend $1100 on a Hermès Satiné Grand H Fin band.
Personally, the idea of being inspired by “a piece of cloth” elicits an eye-roll, as does the notion of “singular 3D-knitted construction.” The pocketitself started as a standalone, tied-on pouch long before pockets were sewn into garments. And if you like the concept but the price gives you pause, you can find plenty of crossbody phone bags on Etsy for far less. With crocheted elephants! I wouldn’t be surprised to see knockoffs appear as the Internet knitting community rises to the challenge.
