Category: Apple Insider

Amazon’s M5 MacBook Pro sale delivers steep discounts on multiple configurations, from the standard model for $1,399 to the upgraded 1TB spec for $1,499.

March MacBook Pro deals are in full swing, with the standard M5/16GB/512GB spec discounted to $1,399.99, reflecting a $200 markdown off MSRP.

Buy M5/16GB/512GB MacBook Pro for $1,399.99

Prefer more storage? The 1TB M5 model with 16GB of memory is marked down to $1,499 — also a $200 discount off Apple’s new MSRP of $1,699 (and the lowest price ever).

Buy M5/16GB/1TB MacBook Pro for $1,499.99

You can also pick up a MacBook Air at a discount, with this closeout M4/16GB/512GB spec that’s down to an all-time low price of $1,079 while supplies last.

Apple shuttered its Grand Central Terminal store on March 13 for a surprise Alicia Keys concert, marking the start of 50th anniversary celebrations.

Apple CEO Tim Cook showed up with several senior executives. They transformed one of Apple’s most iconic retail spots into a temporary live music venue.

The company invited select media members, creators, and guests while keeping the performer secret until Keys appeared on stage.

Preparations began on March 12 with crews installing a stage, lighting, and audio equipment inside the retail space. Keys performed alongside her signature pink piano after the store was temporarily converted into a small concert venue.

People inside Grand Central Terminal could catch parts of the performance from outside the store. It’s unusual for Apple to close one of its most famous locations, especially since they usually keep their retail spaces open during business hours.

Tim Cook and Apple executives attend the event

Cook attended the concert alongside Apple marketing chief Greg Joswiak, retail head Deirdre O’Brien, and hardware engineering chief John Ternus. The executives watched the performance inside the Grand Central location with invited guests.

The Grand Central store sits inside one of New York City’s busiest transit hubs and serves as one of Apple’s most visible retail spaces. The setting allowed Apple to host a private event while drawing attention from commuters and visitors.

Keys has appeared at several Apple-related events over the years. She performed at Apple Music Festival 10 in London in 2016 and later headlined Apple’s NYC Holiday Masquerade Ball in December 2022.

The artist also appeared on Apple Vision Pro through the immersive performance Alicia Keys: Rehearsal Room, one of the early music experiences released for the spatial computing headset.

Part of Apple’s 50th anniversary celebrations

Apple announced that it plans to celebrate the company’s 50th anniversary over the coming weeks. Apple was founded on April 1, 1976, placing the milestone anniversary on April 1, 2026.

Cook said the anniversary would recognize the “creativity, innovation, and impact” made possible by Apple’s global community of users and developers.

The Grand Central performance is one of the first public events connected to the anniversary. Apple has not yet detailed additional celebrations tied to the milestone.

Adobe has issued a statement agreeing to pay a hefty fine after years of customers complaining about a lack of transparency in its billing agreements — but it still doesn’t think it did anything wrong.

Adobe has announced that it has finalized a settlement agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice. It officially marks the end of the more than two-year long saga surrounding its much maligned cancellation practices.

Of the $150 million Adobe has agreed to pay, $75 million will go directly to affected customers in the form of complimentary services. The remaining $75 will go directly to the Department of Justice to settle the lawsuit.

While Adobe agreed to pay the fee, it hasn’t admitted any wrongdoing. In fact, the company says, “While we disagree with the government’s claims and deny any wrongdoing, we are pleased to resolve this matter.”

To be clear, Adobe isn’t fixing the abhorrent cancellation fees – it’s just now required to be significantly more transparent about them.

To understand why this shook out the way it did, you’ll need to understand how Adobe handles subscriptions. And, if you’ve never seen this before, I apologize ahead of time for how confusing it is.

Starving artists need not subscribe

When a user subscribes to something Adobe offers, they’re given three options to pay: monthly; annual, paid monthly; or annual, paid upfront. Here’s what each of those options means.

None of the subscriptions, by the way, are terribly cheap. If you’re an independent artist who needs Adobe products, that can account for a large portion of your monthly overhead.

Monthly subscription: The most expensive option, Adobe’s monthly subscriptions are often twice the cost of the other subscription options. However, if a user needs to cancel the subscription, Adobe does not charge a fee.

Annual subscription, paid monthly: Typically half the price of the standard monthly subscription, Adobe allows users to subscribe at the yearly price while still paying monthly. The downside is that Adobe will charge 50% of the remaining contract if canceled.

Annual subscription, paid upfront: Users may also choose to pay upfront for a full year of service. While this has advantages, such as preventing surprise billing, Adobe warns users that there are absolutely no refunds on this plan after the first 14 days.

The outcry came when Adobe hid its cancellation terms and conditions in the fine print. This meant that anyone who suddenly couldn’t justify — or afford — paying $69.99 per month for the all apps plan could be hit with up to a $384.95 cancellation fee if they cancelled between day 15 and day 30 of the first month.

Even if a user cancelled in the seventh month, they’d still be forced to pay nearly $175. Which, again, for many individual users isn’t just inconvenient — they might not be able to afford it at all.

So, the high cancellation fees remain, but Adobe at least now discloses them a bit more clearly.

Interestingly enough, if you poke around the Adobe site, you’ll find that this cancellation fee varies from location to location. South Korean users only pay 10 percent of the annual commitment as a cancellation fee.

Adobe subscribers in Brazil only pay 20% if they choose to terminate the contract early.

Hackers have a new tool called ClickFix. The new attack vector combines fake human-verification prompts with malware, trying to trick users into running Terminal commands that bypass macOS security.

The tactic, known as ClickFix, disguises malware delivery as a routine human verification step. Victims are instructed to open tools like Terminal or a command prompt and paste a command to complete verification.

Running the command installs malicious software on the system. Stolen data can include passwords, browser information, and cryptocurrency wallets.

Security analysts say the technique is spreading quickly through compromised websites, malicious advertisements, and phishing campaigns.

CAPTCHAs are designed to distinguish human users from automated bots and have become a common part of browsing the web. Many sites rely on verification systems such as Cloudflare security checks or Google reCAPTCHA to filter automated traffic.

Attackers exploit users’ familiarity with these security screens. Fake verification pages appear after visiting compromised websites or clicking malicious ads.

Instead of asking users to identify images or check a box, the page instructs visitors to open a system tool and paste a command into it. Running the command downloads malware from a remote server and executes it locally on the victim’s device.

ClickFix fake CAPTCHA attacks are spreading rapidly across the web

Security researchers first identified ClickFix campaigns in 2024 as attackers began experimenting with copy-and-paste malware delivery methods.

Unlike older malware campaigns that relied on downloads or attachments, ClickFix convinces victims to run malicious commands themselves. Eliminating obvious downloads has helped the tactic spread quickly across compromised websites and phishing campaigns.

Researchers say detections of ClickFix-style attacks surged by more than 500% between 2024 and 2025. Security analysts now consider it one of the fastest-growing social engineering threats on the internet.

Recent campaigns have become more sophisticated, using countdown timers and video instructions in fake CAPTCHA pages to guide victims. Others use JavaScript to copy malicious commands to a user’s clipboard, increasing the likelihood of infection.

Although early ClickFix campaigns focused on Windows systems, researchers now report variants designed specifically for macOS devices. Some malicious pages detect a visitor’s operating system and display instructions tailored to Mac users.

The prompts commonly instruct victims to press Command-Space to open Spotlight, launch Terminal, and paste a command copied from the web page.

Once executed, the command can install information-stealing malware such as Atomic macOS Stealer. The malware can harvest browser credentials, cookies, and cryptocurrency wallet data from infected Macs.

Macs aren’t immune to attacks because they rely on user behavior rather than software vulnerabilities. While macOS security protections can prevent infection, they won’t stop a user from deliberately running a malicious command.

Why ClickFix fake CAPTCHA scams bypass many security defenses

Traditional malware detection often focuses on blocking suspicious downloads or exploit activity. ClickFix campaigns avoid many of those signals by shifting the final execution step to the user.

Security researchers describe the tactic as a form of social engineering that exploits trust in routine system prompts. Victims end up executing the attacker’s code themselves.

Many attacks rely on legitimate system utilities such as PowerShell or Terminal to run commands, a technique often called “living off the land.” Attackers use those built-in tools instead of custom malware loaders.

Security software may treat the activity as normal because the commands run inside trusted system utilities.

How to stay safe from fake CAPTCHA malware and ClickFix scams

We know that most AppleInsider users probably won’t fall for this. We guarantee you know somebody that will.

Tell them that the most reliable warning sign is simple. Legitimate CAPTCHA systems never ask users to open Terminal, PowerShell, or any other command interface and paste commands to complete verification.

A verification prompt that instructs you to run commands or paste text into a system tool is almost certainly malicious. Closing the page immediately is the safest response.

Fake CAPTCHA scams often appear on compromised websites, malicious ads, or phishing pages designed to imitate legitimate security checks. Avoid interacting with unexpected verification prompts or suspicious pop-ups.

Updating browsers and operating systems reduces exposure to malicious sites, while modern security tools block known threats. Awareness is the most effective defense, as ClickFix attacks rely on deception rather than software vulnerabilities.

It is possible to buy an Intel Mac Pro and give it enough upgrades to beat a more modern M3 Max MacBook Pro in a selected video task. You probably shouldn’t do it.

The last Intel Mac Pro isn’t the workhorse it once was.

At the time of its release, the Intel Mac Pro was the most powerful Mac you could buy. With extensive upgrade options, high-specification configurations, and the ability to add more PCIe cards and memory after purchasing, it was a device with a considerable amount of potential in the right hands.

However, with the influx of Apple Silicon and devices like the Mac Studio taking its place in creative businesses around the world, it’s lost a lot of its attractiveness. The switch over to Apple Silicon and the loss of user-serviceable memory didn’t help matters either.

However, owners of the last Intel Mac Pro can still get a lot of performance out of the now-classic hardware. But, only in specific circumstances and with an absurd amount of work and money to get the job done in 2026.

YouTube channel CircuitBoredd did just this, pushing a 2019 Intel Mac Pro to its limits by adding as many upgrades as possible. The project worked, but also demonstrated how much value you get from modern hardware compared to what was top-of-the-line over six years ago.

The project started with a fairly typical 7,1 Mac Pro, which was upgraded with a better processor than the 16-core chip it initially shipped with. The Mac Pro supported at most a 28-core 2.5GHz Intel Xeon W with 56 threads, which was acquired and installed into the Mac Pro.

Secondhand, today, this processor alone costs around $1,050.

The Mac Pro was also known for having the capacity to max out at 1.5 terabytes using 12 128GB DDR ECC DIMMs. While not the maximum, the project did use an absurdly large 768GB of memory.

Ignoring the current state of memory inflation, second-hand sticks of 128GB ECC DDR4 memory cost about $500 to $800 apiece, which would be a $3,000 to $4,800 upgrade. This is the cheapest way of getting to the figure, as 64GB modules are not much cheaper on eBay individually, and you would still need 12 modules instead of six for the 128GB method.

Continuing the upgrades, the machine was then installed with a pair of Radeon Pro Vega II Duo MPX Modules. Each module had a pair of GPUs, so the upgrade equated to four GPUs in total.

This also gave it 128 gigabytes of video memory to work with, which is an absurd amount to have on hand.

A search of eBay shows second-hand Radeon Pro Vega II Duo MPX modules selling for about $2,900 apiece. At launch, one card had a list price of $4,400.

It also used an Afterburner card, Apple’s add-on that cost $2,000 at the time of launch. Afterburner was a programmable Application-Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) designed for video production purposes.

The modern-day second-hand price of Afterburner has also come down, to about $400.

Rounding out the upgrades list are new SSDs. The videos don’t specify what drive is in use, but an M.2 to PCIe adapter card is involved in the process. Assuming that it is a hefty 8TB NVMe SSD to match the rest of the upgrades, that would be another $1,300 to $1,600 brand new, and less than $10 for that adapter card.

The result of all of the upgrades was a close to top-specification Intel Mac Pro, which the videos say cost close to $50,000 to acquire in 2019. The hardware has certainly lost most of its value over the years, though.

The project and its upgrades cost around $5,000, according to the YouTuber. Similar builds could be acquired for double that price, at about $10,000.

Based on the individual upgrade prices, and a barebones Mac Pro being found for $1,000 to start from, the total cost should really be in the region of $11,250 at a minimum. The $5,000 claimed cost is very ambitious and quite low compared to everyday pricing, but it’s plausible that some exceptional deals were made in amassing the parts.

Expensive but kinda fast

To test out the relevance of the now-upgraded Intel Mac Pro, it was put to work encoding a 17-gigabyte video project. This was a commercial project, including various titles, graphics, and effects that would tax most systems.

For the modern-day comparison, it was put against an M3 Max MacBook Pro, though its specifications were not advised in the video.

The result was that the Mac Pro was faster at crunching through the project, at about half a minute to a minute for the M3 Max. A MacBook Pro with M3 Max started from $3,199 or $3,499 at launch, depending on the size, and can be found on eBay from $2,500 and up.

Setting aside nearly every other factor or workflow, this does seem like a big win for the Intel Mac Pro in the wake of the Apple Silicon transition. That big win fades when you consider how much effort and expense went into getting the Mac Pro to this state in the first place.

You can buy a new Mac Studio with the M4 Max and 128GB of memory for $3,499 as a new device, and get pretty similar results. You could also splash out on a Mac Studio with an M3 Ultra chip with 32 cores and 256GB of memory for $7,499, if you need that many cores.

We wouldn’t buy either of these today. Mac Studio upgrades are likely in mid-2026.

Anyway, both are equipped with the Media Engine, onboard successors to the Afterburner card that are designed for video encoding and decoding, without the added accessory.

Also, the test is very much video production-based, so is skewed towards that specific goal. For almost every other task, it’s nowhere near as good as an entry-level Apple Silicon Mac.

Using Geekbench figures, we can also see a considerable difference in performance in general. Results for the 28-core Intel Mac Pro gives it single-core performance at 1,307 and multi-core at 10,795. In this very specific workflow, the Afterburner card, and interconnected video cards are doing nearly all of the heavy lifting.

For reference, the 14-inch MacBook Pro with M5 gets 4,228 for single-core and 17,459 for multi-core tests. An M3 Max 16-inch MacBook Pro can get to 3,128 for single-core and 20,961 for multi-core.

For video editing specifically, going for the M3 Ultra gains double the Media Engine capacity of its M3 Max counterpart. It may not cut the time down to be comparable to the claimed 30 seconds of the upgraded Intel Mac Pro, but it would be very close.

Ultimately, upgrading the Intel Mac Pro as far as possible is a great experiment and demonstrates that there is still some usable performance in pre-Apple Silicon hardware. But at the same time, you could just spend the same amount on brand new hardware for a similar effect.

And when you do, you end up with something more useful for everyday life, outside of the one particular task.

Early reviews praise the M5 MacBook Air for its performance and fast SSD speeds, but criticize the laptop’s $100 higher price tag compared to previous models.

Apple upgraded the MacBook Air with its M5 chip on March 3, delivering significant performance enhancements. The starting storage was also increased to 512GB, with Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 6 now available on the ultra-thin laptop as well.

Given that the new chip is the main change, though, most reviews of the M5 MacBook Air focus largely on its processing hardware and how it compares to previous models in everyday tasks.

The M5 chip, coupled with a few largely incremental upgrades, will cost users $100 more over the preceding M4-based model, and nobody’s happy about the change.

Tom’s Guide

In its review of the 15-inch MacBook Air with Apple’s M5 chip, Tom’s Guide, for instance, says the laptop “costs an extra $100 for most of the same features” found in the M4 model.

The M5 version maintains the same design and display of its M4 counterpart, but the changes it does offer make the laptop a viable option for those looking to upgrade from an earlier MacBook Air.

The publication described the 512GB starting storage, improved connectivity features of the N1 wireless networking chip, and performance increases as “nice bonuses.”

In gaming tests, CyberPunk 2077 and Assassin’s Creed: Shadows at 1200p resolution and medium graphical settings delivered under 30fps on the 15-inch M5 MacBook Air. Interestingly, Cyberpunk 2077 ran at a higher 34fps on the preceding M4 MacBook Air, with the same resolution and graphics settings applied.

In a battery test, which involved web surfing over Wi-Fi with the M5 MacBook Air display set to 150 nits of brightness, the 15-inch laptop stayed on for 15 hours and 30 minutes, up from 15 hours and 22 minutes on the M4 model. SSD speed tests showed a noteworthy improvement over the M4 MacBook Air.

Overall, the publication says the M5 MacBook Air is a good option for those looking to purchase a premium laptop under $1500. M4 MacBook Air owners have no reason to upgrade, though, per the review.

TechRadar

TechRadar, meanwhile, similarly views the M5 MacBook Air as an iterative improvement of an already great product. In essence, the publication says the 13-inch MacBook Air with the M5 chip is “every bit as good as its M4 predecessor, but a little faster.”

The review considers the $100 price increase acceptable, given that the updated laptop offers twice the starting storage of the preceding M4-based variant. Although no one expected the M5 MacBook Air to feature a touchscreen, the publication criticized Apple for not including it, noting that it’s available on similarly priced Windows laptops.

TechRadar tested the M5 MacBook Air with apps like Lightroom, Final Cut Pro, and Pixelmator Pro, and said that the ultra-thin laptop handled everything thrown at it. SSD speeds were also notably faster compared to those of the M4 MacBook Air.

In essence, the author of the review called the M5 MacBook Air the best ultraportable they’ve ever used, and they say the laptop is great for those who really need portability.

SixColors

For its review of the M5 MacBook Air, SixColors focused heavily on the performance upgrades, relative to the M4 model.

The publication says the new-and-improved M5 MacBook Air saw an 11 percent increase in single-core and multi-core performance over the preceding M4-based variant. GPU performance was 31 percent better on average, per the review.

To be more specific, the 15-inch M5 MacBook Air received a Geekbench 6 score of 4,167 points for single-core performance and 16,979 points in multi-core performance tests.

Even so, the review says “there’s little reason to upgrade” from the M4-based MacBook Air, as “the difference between the M4 and M5 is negligible for most users.”

Coming from the M1 MacBook Air, the M5 MacBook Air offers a single-core performance jump of a noticeable 75 percent. Single-core performance is also up 57 percent, compared to the M2 MacBook Air, meaning the owners of these two laptops should consider upgrading to the M5 model.

When copying a 29GB Final Cut Pro project from an external SSD, the M5 MacBook Air proved to be approximately 30% faster. SixColors also highlighted the improved memory bandwidth of the M5 model — 153GB/s, up from 120GB/s on the M4 MacBook Air.

Aside from the M5 chip, N1 wireless connectivity chip, and SSD improvements, though, the laptop is effectively the same as its predecessor, and the review makes this clear.

M5 MacBook Air review roundup: Improved performance, but not much else

Overall, the M5 MacBook Air is effectively a spec bump upgrade. While the N1 chip is a welcome upgrade, bringing Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 6 compatibility, and the SSD upgrades are a nice touch, the true change is the M5 chip.

Owners of the M1 and M2 MacBook Air should consider upgrading to the M5 model, as the performance upgrades are significant. Those using the M4 MacBook Air, meanwhile, have no reason to buy the new-and-improved M5 MacBook Air.

Following years of rumors, Apple has finally rolled out the new entry-level MacBook Neo. It’s $599.

The MacBook Pro and MacBook Air are premium notebooks on the market, with Apple avoiding the more budget-focused end for quite a few years. However, with its latest introduction, it is going to compete with Chromebooks and other low-cost notebook options, but on its own terms.

The new MacBook Neo is an effort to tempt value-oriented consumers to sign up to Apple’s ecosystem. To do this, Apple had to create a low-cost MacBook, stripping it down to the bare essentials.

From the outside, it looks like a MacBook Air, complete with a thin aluminum slab-style appearance. At 0.5 inches thick, it’s a tiny bit thicker than a MacBook Air, with its 11.71 by 8.12-inch footprint also a little bit smaller than the 13-inch Air.

At 2.7 pounds, it weighs the same.

Scaled back specs

The core of that change is the use of the A18 Pro, an A-series chip used in the iPhone 16 Pro, instead of the usual M-series Apple Silicon chips. This isn’t too much of a stretch for Apple to get working, considering the Apple Silicon range is based on the same tech it created for the A-series chips in the first place.

This technically isn’t the first Mac to have an A-series chip, as the 2020 Apple Developer Transition Kit housed an A12Z Bionic. However, this is the first to be actually sold directly to the public.

That’s a chip with a 6-core CPU, with two performance cores and four efficiency cores, as well as a 5-core GPU. The 16-core Neural Engine also makes an appearance.

While not an M-series chip, consumers can expect to see multicore performance comparable to the M1, and single-core power about M4 speeds. While not as powerful as the latest M5 chips, it’s still more than enough for everyday tasks and workloads that don’t require massive graphical processing.

Along with the chip, Apple has also scaled down other core specifications of the MacBook. This includes the unified memory, which now sits at 8 gigabytes versus the 16 gigabytes you’d expect from the cheapest MacBook Air. There are no upgrades available.

Storage is also similarly cut to the bone, with only 256GB or 512GB capacities available — with the $100 upgrade to 512GB version also coming with Touch ID. The port selection hasn’t suffered too much, with one side having both USB 3 and USB 2-speed USB-C ports, and the other having a 3.5mm headphone jack.

Notably, the unit does not have Thunderbolt.

While it does have a 13-inch display, it’s not the high-grade Retina that consumers are used to. At 2,408 by 1,506, it’s a lesser 219 pixels per inch. This is a bit more DPI than a 4K 32-inch monitor.

That screen has sRGB gamut support, as well as up to 500 nits of brightness.

External display support is curtailed compared to the other models, with it able to work with a single 4K screen at 60Hz. That display is connected to the USB 3 port, which has native DisplayPort 1.4 support.

There is a 1080p FaceTime HD camera in the top of the screen. This time, without the notch, like the iPad.

Still a serviceable notebook

While a lot has been cut from the model to make it affordable, there’s a lot of staple elements from Apple’s designs that are incorporated into this model.

You still get a full-size Magic Keyboard with 12 full-height function keys. However, you can only get Touch ID with the upper-tier model.

For wireless networking, Wi-Fi 6E is included along with Bluetooth 6 support.

Though the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro have four and six-speaker sound systems, this new model instead provides two-speaker stereo. There’s still Spatial Audio support if you have compatible earphones.

Apple includes a dual-mic array as part of its audio setup, which also has directional beamforming and performs the same processing tricks as an iPhone for voice clarity.

Apple even claims that it has enough battery power to last up to 16 hours for video streaming, or up to 11 hours of wireless web surfing. The battery is a small 36.5-watt-hour lithium-ion cell, recharged by either of the USB-C ports, not MagSafe.

Budget-friendly, soon

Apple has made the MacBook Neo available to preorder, with availability from March 11. It will ship in four colors: Silver, Blush, Citrus, and Indigo.

Pricing starts from $599 for the 256GB model, while the 512GB capacity option with added Touch ID is $699.

Apple set to show at GDC 2026 with a coordinated push across hardware, flagship game ports, and App Store strategy.

GDC Festival of Gaming, formerly Game Developers Conference (GDC), is set to take place on March 9 through the 13 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, California. Pretty much anyone who is someone in game development will be there — and that includes Apple.

In fact, Apple will be leading three separate sessions during the 2026 GDC Festival of Gaming. All three events will be held on Wednesday, March 11, in room 3014 of the West Hall.

The first session, “Built for games: Explore Apple Hardware and Software for Game Developers,” is set to run from 10:10 am to 11:10 am. This session will help developers discover how they can create gaming experiences across the whole of Apple’s ecosystem — including Vision OS — with Apple tools and technologies.

It will give an overview of unified architecture and system features that allow developers to create games that run on multiple platforms. Additionally, developers will gain helpful insight on how to boost performance, streamline launches, and create seamless gameplay.

This lecture-based session will include Apple’s Allan Schafer, Alexey Vinogadov, and Rich Forster, and covers the Game Production Technology and Production tracks.

Shortly after, starting at 11:30 am and running through 12:30 pm is “Bringing Cyberpunk 2077 to Mac.”

A behind-the-scenes look at what it took to bring Cyberpunk 2077, developers explain how they leveraged Apple’s hardware, software, and development tools to bring the project to completion.

CD Projekt Red’s Oleg Shatulo and Pawel Sasko are set to speak, as will Apple’s Charlyn Keating. Like the first session, it covers Game Production Technology and Production tracks.

The third session, “Maximize Your Game’s Potential on the App Store,” takes place fifteen minutes later, running from 12:45 pm until 1:45 pm. Speakers include Apple’s Abhishek Radhakrishnan and Kelly King, along with cofounder and CEO of Black Salt Games, Nadia Thorne.

This marketing and business-themed lecture helps developers discover best practices for bringing their games to the App Store. Black Salt Games will provide insight on how it brought its Apple Design Award-winning game Dredge to Apple platforms.

Apple’s current 15-inch MacBook Air equipped with the M4 chip has dropped to $1,049 as Amazon competes for your business this weekend.

The 15-inch M4 MacBook Air features a 10-core GPU, with the standard model also equipped with 16GB of unified memory and a 256GB SSD. Amazon is discounting the standard spec to $1,049, representing a 13% markdown off MSRP.

Buy 15″ MacBook Air for $1,049

Upgraded models are eligible for a $150 discount this weekend too, which can be found below and in our 15-inch MacBook Air M4 Price Guide.

And if you’re looking for the cheaper M4 13-inch MacBook Air, the smaller screen size is on sale as well with prices dipping to $899.

In addition to these MacBook Air deals, Amazon has dropped the Apple Watch Series 11 to $299 and the M5 MacBook Pro to $1,449.

The UK government’s continued attempts to gain access to iCloud users’ private data have prompted U.S. lawmakers to request a briefing about the issue.

Apple is a company widely known and often praised for its privacy-first approach, but sometimes that very same philosophy is at odds with the goals of world governments. The iPhone maker famously fought against an FBI request for an encryption backdoor, and it did the same when the UK came up with similar demands of its own.

The drama surrounding the UK’s seemingly never-ending pursuit of iCloud user data continues. On Wednesday, two U.S. lawmakers, U.S. House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan and Foreign Affairs Chair Brian Mast, requested that the UK government hold a briefing about its planned iCloud encryption backdoor.

As Reuters notes, the two lawmakers raised concerns over the UK’s efforts, suggesting that an encryption backdoor could allow user data to fall into the hands of authoritarian governments and cyber-criminals. They highlighted the need for public awareness on the matter.

“For there to be a ‘mature and informed public debate,’ it is imperative that the Committees fully understand the actions taken by the UK government with respect to the TCN issued to Apple,” said Jordan and Mast in a letter to Shabana Mahmood, Britain’s secretary of state for the Home Department. TCN here stands for technical capability notice.

“We respectfully ask that the Home Office and UK Embassy to the United States arrange for the briefing to occur as soon as possible, but no later than 10:00 a.m. ET on March 11, 2026,” continued the letter.

While it remains to be seen how the UK government will respond, the letter is not the first time US lawmakers and government officials have criticized the country’s attempts at securing an encryption backdoor for iCloud.

How the UK government tried to gain access to iCloud user data

The UK first sent Apple a demand for an encryption backdoor in January 2025, after a revised version of the Investigatory Powers Act was passed. The move sparked bipartisan anger among US lawmakers, with select members of congressional oversight committees writing to Tulsi Gabbard, the National Intelligence Director, about the issue.

The same month, Gabbard, in her response, expressed “great concern,” saying the US was not informed of the UK’s secret order. Rather than complying with the UK’s demands for an encryption backdoor, Apple disabled Advanced Data Protection in the country.

Months later, in March 2025, Apple allegedly fought the UK government’s confidential request at the High Court. Apple later gained the moral support of WhatsApp and select U.S. lawmakers in June 2025.

In August 2025, the UK appeared to have dropped its demands for access to encrypted Messages, according to a social media post by Tulsi Gabbard. The UK government, meanwhile, did not issue statements regarding the matter, even as the full scope of its backdoor demand was revealed.

While the UK seemingly gave up on its intent to access the data of all iCloud users worldwide, it still wants to access the iCloud data and files of British citizens. In September 2025, a UK Home Office order allegedly demanded that Apple create a way for officials to access encrypted cloud backups.

Overall, it’s unlikely that the government of the United Kingdom will ever be able to access the private data of every iCloud user across the world.

Still, its persistent interest in encryption backdoors continues to gain the attention of U.S. lawmakers, as we saw on Wednesday.