Tech Digest daily roundup: Amazon to start drone deliveries in US

Amazon says it will begin delivering parcels to shoppers by drone for the first time later this year, pending final regulatory approval. Users in the Californian town of Lockeford will be able to sign up to have thousands of goods delivered by air to their homes, it said. The shopping giant has promised drone delivery for years but has faced delays and reported setbacks. But it said it planned to roll out the service more widely after Lockeford. “The promise of drone delivery has often felt like science fiction,” it said in a blog post. “[But] later this year, Amazon customers living in Lockeford, California, will become among the first to receive Prime Air deliveries. BBC 

NASA has lost two satellites designed to track hurricanes after the rocket carrying them malfunctioned. The cause hasn’t yet been revealed but a livestream feed showed the Astra launch vehicle successfully lifting off from Cape Canaveral in Florida before suffering a second-stage failure hundreds of kilometres into the sky. It is the second time that the private spaceflight company Astra has lost NASA satellites. Back in February, its chief executive said he was “deeply sorry” after his firm accidentally destroyed four tiny NASA satellites in a failed launch. Sky News 

Nothing has confirmed it will reveal its first smartphone to the world next month. The fledgling tech company, led by former OnePlus boss Carl Pei, has officially confirmed that the Nothing Phone (1) launch event will take place on 12th July 2022 at 4pm BST / 11am ET / 8am PT / 1am AEST. Phone fans have been waiting a while for this news, which comes three months after a leaked photo claiming to show a Nothing handset appeared online and two months after Nothing confirmed its existence. The launch is tagged ‘Return to Instinct’, which seems to be a nod to Nothing’s mission to ‘make tech more human’. What HiFi

Russian ransomware criminals have unwittingly exposed the effectiveness of global sanctions, after trying to hack the very researchers who unmasked them. Earlier this month, research by cyber investigators at Virginia-based Mandiant traced exactly how Evil Corp – a Russian-based group of “cyber-enabled bank robbers” – tried to hide behind a web of anonymity to evade sanctions and continue to steal from Britain and the US. The group then turned on Mandiant in an attempted data theft. In a unique twist, their failed efforts highlighted that targeted sanctions might be the elusive key the Western world needs to defeat ransomware gangs. Telegraph

Microsoft has started beta testing its new File Explorer tabs for Windows 11. The tabs feature for File Explorer is now rolling out to Windows Insiders in the Beta Channel and appears to be very close to release for everyone running Windows 11. The tabs feature includes a refreshed design that makes it easier to quickly access folders or find favorite files. The updated File Explorer design includes tabs to navigate multiple folders in a single window and the ability to move tabs around freely. Microsoft originally tested tabs in Windows 10 apps four years ago in a feature named Sets. This included support for tabs inside File Explorer, but Microsoft eventually canceled the project and never shipped it to Windows 10 users. The Verge