By Queenie Wong, Los Angeles Times

Millions of people already use the Life360 app to track the location of their family members and loved ones.

Now the California tech company behind the popular family safety app is hoping people will use a new gadget and their location-tracking services to keep tabs on their pets.

On Wednesday, Life360 unveiled a new tracking device people can attach to their pet’s collar. The product, called Life360 Pet GPS, uses cellular, GPS, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth technology so people can accurately pinpoint where their furry friends are.

The device works with the Life360 app so people can track their pets on a digital map, set up alerts if the pet strays outside set boundaries, provide emergency contact information for pets and notify other members if their dog or cat gets lost.

First released in 2008, Life360 became a popular app for people to track the location of their kids, grandparents and other family members. The company, founded in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina when people were trying to locate and stay connected to loved ones, has added more services such as roadside assistance and identity theft protection.

The release of the pet tracker shows how location sharing is becoming more common even amid concerns about privacy and stalking.

Pet trackers can cost hundreds of dollars, so some pet owners have tried Apple AirTags or similar products as cheaper alternatives. However, using some products can be risky because dogs sometimes swallow AirTags, and the locations aren’t always up to date.

Life360 said the tracker will cost roughly $50 but there will be a discount as part of an introductory offer.

New or existing Life360 Gold or Platinum members will be able to buy the Pet GPS tracker for $3.60 for a limited time. The San Mateo-based company will also waive the activation fee, which is usually around $80, for the first tracker added to a private group known as a “Circle” on the app.

Life360 said its new tracker is resistant to water, dust and biting.

The device includes a battery that lasts up to 14 days and will enter a “Bluetooth Reserve Mode,” making it possible for people to locate their pets for up to six months. The pet tracker comes in colors such as pink, navy and black and is being released in the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

Lauren Antonoff, chief executive at Life360, said in a statement that the company aims to make it easier for people to bring home their pets safely.

“Traditional safety measures like microchips require a vet or shelter visit and often have missing or outdated info, and all-purpose Bluetooth trackers can struggle to locate pets on the move, especially in remote areas,” she said in a statement.

The pet tracker gives Life360 another stream of revenue.

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More than 55 million Life360 members own pets, the company said. The company owns Tile, trackers people attach to their keys, wallets, bikes and other objects, along with Jiobit, which also sells a pet tracker.

Life360 has a free version of its app and some users pay a monthly subscription fee for additional features, including family driving summary, roadside assistance and travel support.

The company primarily generates revenue from the sale of subscriptions and tracking devices. Some of Life360’s revenue has come from selling aggregated non-personally identifiable information to partners and third-party products and services, according to its annual report.

As of June 30, Life360 has roughly 88 million monthly active users across more than 180 countries.

Life360 said in August that its second-quarter revenue reached $115.4 million, up 36% from the same period last year. Its net income during that quarter was around $7 million.

©2025 Los Angeles Times. Visit at latimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

By WYATTE GRANTHAM-PHILIPS, AP Business Writer

NEW YORK (AP) — A major Amazon Web Services outage disrupted scores of online platforms on Monday — leaving people around the world unable to access some banks, chatting apps, online food ordering and more.

History shows these kinds of system outages can be short-lived, and are often minor inconveniences — such as placing a lunch order in person or waiting a few hours for a gaming platform to come back online — than long-term problems, but recovery can be a bumpy road. And for people trying to move money, communicate with loved ones or work using impacted services, disruptions are especially stressful.

Consumers may not realize how many platforms they use rely on the same back-end technology. AWS is one of only a handful of major cloud service providers that businesses, governments, universities and other organizations rely on. Monday’s outage is an important reminder of that — and experts stress it’s important to diversify our online lives where we can, or even have some “old school” alternatives to turn to as a backup plan.

“Don’t put all your eggs in one digital basket,” said Lee McKnight, an associate professor at Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies, noting these kinds of outages aren’t going away anytime soon.

So what, if anything, can you do to prepare for disruptions? Here are a few tips.

Keep your money in more than one place

During Monday’s AWS disruptions, users on outage tracker Downdetector reported problems with platforms like Venmo and online broker Robinhood. Banks such as Halifax and Lloyds also said some of their services were temporarily affected, although some customers continued to report lingering issues.

Even if short-lived, outages that impact online banking and other financial services can be among the most stressful, particularly if a consumer is waiting on a paycheck, trying to pay rent, checking on investment funds or making purchases. While much of your stress will depend on the scope and length of disruptions, experts say a good rule of thumb is to park your money in multiple places.

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“I’m a big fan of holding multiple accounts that can give us access, to some degree, of funds at any given time,” said Mark Hamrick, senior economic analyst at Bankrate. This underlines the importance of having an emergency savings account, he explains, or other accounts separate from something like day-to-day checking account, for example.

Keeping some cash in a safe place is also a good idea, he adds — and emergency preparedness agencies similarly recommend having physical money on hand in case of a natural disaster or power failures. Still, it’s important to keep hoarding in moderation.

“We shouldn’t go overboard, because we can lose cash — it can be stolen or misplaced,” Hamrick said. And in terms of prudent financial practices overall, he explains, you also don’t want to have lots of money “stored under a mattress” if it could instead be earning interest in a bank.

Depending on the scope of the outage, some other options could still be available.

If digital banking apps are offline, for example, consumers may still be able to visit a branch in person, or call a representative over the phone — although wait times during widespread disruptions are often longer. And if the disruptions are tied to a third-party cloud services provider, as seen with AWS on Monday, it’s not always something a bank or other impacted business can fix on its own.

Have backup communication channels

Monday’s AWS outage also impacted some communications platforms, including social media site Snapchat and messaging app Signal.

In our ever-digitized world, people have become all the more reliant on online channels to call or chat with loved ones, communicate in the workplace and more. And while it can be easy to become accustomed to certain apps or platforms, experts note that outages serve as an important reminder to have backup plans in place.

That could take the form of simply making sure you can reach those who you speak to regularly across different apps, again depending on the scope of disruption. If broader internet and cloud services that smartphones rely on are impacted, you may need to turn to more traditional phone calls and SMS text messages.

SMS texting relies on “an older telecom infrastructure,” McKnight explains. For that reason, he notes that it’s important to have contacts for SMS texting up to date, “and not just the fancier and more fun services that we use day to day” in case of an emergency.

Meanwhile, there can also be outages that specifically impact phone services. For non-cloud service outages in the past, impacted carriers have suggested users try Wi-Fi calling on both iPhones and Android devices.

Save your work across multiple platforms — and monitor service updates

Overall, McKnight suggests “building out your own personal, multi-cloud strategy.”

For online work or projects, that could look like storing documents across multiple platforms — such as Google Drive, Dropbox and iCloud, McKnight explains. It’s important to recognize potential security risks and make sure all of your accounts are secure, he adds, but “having some diversity in how you store information” could also reduce headaches when and if certain services are disrupted.

Many businesses may also have their own workarounds or contingency plans in case the technology they use goes offline. While a wider recovery from Monday’s outage is still largely reliant on Amazon’s wider mitigation efforts, individual platforms’ social media or online status pages may have updates or details about alternative operations.

You can also check outage trackers like Downdetector to see if others are experiencing similar problems.

Even after recovery, experts also suggest checking payments, online orders and messages you may have sent during or close to the outage — in case something didn’t go through.

Is there a tech topic that you think needs explaining? Write to us at onetechtip@ap.org with your suggestions for future editions of One Tech Tip.

By JONEL ALECCIA, AP Health Writer

Forget colorful leaves. Any caregiver knows that the real signs of fall are kids with coughs, sneezes and sniffles.

Autumn marks the start of respiratory virus season, when colds, flu and other bugs start circulating — especially among the very young.

A recent study confirmed what many families intuitively know: The littlest students harbor the most germs.

Children in pre-kindergarten and elementary school showed highest rates of virus detection compared with older students and staff, according to research published in the journal Pediatrics.

“Young children can have up to 10 respiratory viruses a year as their immune systems are introduced to different infections for the first time,” said Dr. Jennifer Goldman, a pediatrician at Children’s Mercy hospital in Kansas City, Missouri, who co-led the study.

Younger kids were more likely to have virus detected

Goldman and her colleagues analyzed nasal swabs and symptom reports from more than 800 students and staff in a large school district in Kansas City from November 2022 to May 2023.

They found that overall, more than 85% of all participants had at least one respiratory virus detected during that time and more than 80% had an episode of acute respiratory illness — though not necessarily at the same time.

More telling, 92% of pre-K and elementary school kids had a virus detected, compared with about 86% of middle school students, about 77% of high school students and 76% of staff.

The pre-K kids, ages 3 to 5, had the highest rates of actual illness, too, the study found.

Most of the viruses were the kinds that cause the common cold, including rhinovirus, which was found in 65% of participants, and types of seasonal coronavirus detected in about 30%. The virus that causes COVID-19 was found in about 15% of those studied.

Study confirms the experiences of pediatricians who are parents

The new study provides a baseline look at the burden of viruses in school settings, Goldman said.

It also confirms the real-world experience of pediatricians who are parents, like Dr. Nicole Torres of the University of Miami Health System.

“I can say this for my own children, who are now in their teens: They were sicker when they were younger,” she said.

The study also squares with older research that found that young kids play a key role in spreading respiratory viruses at home. Dr. Carrie Byington was co-author of a University of Utah study, published in 2015, that recruited 26 households to take nasal samples from everyone living in a home, every week, for a year.

That study found that children younger than 5 had virus detected for half of the weeks of the year, recalled Byington, who is now with the University of California, San Diego.

“And if you live in a household with multiple children, that proportion just goes higher, so it can appear as if someone is always sick,” she said.

How to prevent illness — or at least try to

Preventing illness in children at school or at home can be tough, experts acknowledge.

Being up to date on vaccinations for COVID-19 and influenza is important, they said. So is frequent handwashing, learning to cover coughs and keeping hands away from the eyes, nose and mouth. Cleaning and sanitizing frequently touched surfaces and objects and optimizing fresh air are also key.

When little ones do get sick, the best treatment is often supportive care like extra fluids and rest. In serious cases, medical providers may recommend medications to reduce fever or antiviral drugs.

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It can take a couple weeks, however, for lingering symptoms like coughs to completely resolve. By then, the child may well have another cold.

“I do tell parents of younger children to expect them to be ill once every month, every month and a half,” Torres said. “It’ll seem that way.”

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Edward Lotterman

An Old Testament sage once said, “there is nothing new in the world.” Yet the Trump administration and that of Javier Milei in Argentina have really found something unique.

It is the bailout of a Latin American country in which the corruption, self-dealing and cynicism on both sides appears evenly balanced. In the 57 years since the U.S. Army sent me to Brazil, kindling my own love affair with that complex continent, I have never seen anything quite like it.

Consider the paradoxes:

• Just as U.S. farmers are piling soybeans on the ground because storage and transportation systems are jammed full by lack of exports, mainly to China, the Trump administration is organizing a $40 billion bailout of a country that just made a large sale of soybeans to China and will sell more.

• Just as U.S. cattle ranchers and feeders are in their fourth year of making good money after decades of beef prices declining in real terms and a decade-long drought, the president is calling for large increases in U.S. beef imports from Argentina.

• Just as death rates from disease and hunger are climbing in poor nations after the cutoff of USAID health and nutrition programs, the sum earmarked for this one, non-starving middle-income country equals the $40 billion for that agency worldwide in 2023.

• Ironically, despite U.S. farmer and rancher anger about siding with a competitor, Argentina will actually be stronger in global commodity markets without the bailout, either if it is not made or fails. More about that below.

Background on Argentina’s politics and its ag sector is useful.

First off, Argentina has perhaps the most bountiful endowment of natural resources relative to population of any country in the world. Its vast grasslands, the pampas, have rich soils and good rainfall.

Wheat was grown and beef raised from the colonial era on. By the late 1800s, with railroads, threshing machines, large slaughterhouses and steamships with refrigeration, Argentina exported vast quantities of wheat and beef to England. The country grew rich. By 1910, per-capita incomes in Argentina were similar to those of Australia or Canada.

Exporting to war-torn Europe during World War I made things even better. But postwar economic travails in Europe, the financial crash of 1929, trade wars ignited by the U.S., together with the eventual Great Depression, put an end to prosperity. Ninety years later, Argentina still hasn’t recovered its economic mojo.

A military coup in 1930 ended 70 years of democracy. Fourteen different generals or admirals would occupy the Pink House — the equivalent to our West Wing — between then and 1983. One, Juan Peron, came to power as part of a 1943 military coup. He stood for election in 1946 and won despite strong U.S. opposition. Not a defender of big landowners and industrialists, Peron broke the mold of the traditional strongman. A charismatic populist with a mishmash of ideas from Italy’s Benito Mussolini and Catholic social thought, Peron championed the causes of labor and the poor.

Aided by his wife of neo-Broadway fame, Evita, Peron gave the government a much greater role in the economy, establishing labor unions and extensive social benefits. He also created a political movement continuing to this day. Opposing this brought Milei to power in late 2023.

A political cycle of Peronists and anti-Peronists during this period involved an economic ping-pong of reform plans by newly elected presidents. Harsh reforms led to bursts of prosperity. Then large budget deficits, corruption and an overvalued peso would lead to shortages of needed foreign currencies and other economic crises.

Argentina defaulted on foreign debts repeatedly and pleaded for bailout packages from the International Monetary Fund even more often. These carried harsh conditions usually pushing the nation into recession even as foreign exchange accounts came into balance.

Milei won election after two decades during which three Peronists had held power for 16 years. Milei’s libertarian economic program directly countered the Peronists’ statism, but his demagogic political style mirrors that of the old strongmen.

Milei’s crash free-market program boosted the stagnant economy. But two familiar problems reared their ugly heads. Corruption arose, including deals involving Milei’s sister. And Milei’s contrary anti-free market policy of maintaining a fixed exchange rate brought problems in less than a year.

Foreign exchange crises are unknown to U.S. citizens because the dollar is the world’s “reserve currency.” All other countries need tradable currencies such as dollars, euros, pounds or yen to pay for imports of raw materials, intermediate goods for manufacturing finished products or machinery and consumer goods. They also need such currencies to pay interest and principal on business or government borrowing from lenders abroad.

As long as a country exports enough to earn such needed foreign currencies, there is no problem. But if exports run short, market forces push the exchange value of the domestic currency lower. People needing dollars, euros, yen or yuan must offer more pesos to get them. That raises the price of imports in pesos.

Governments can deter such drops in exchange value by selling off reserves of currencies they hold. When these run out however, devaluation is inevitable, usually causing a recession. The longer the inevitable was staved off, the harsher the eventual adjustment.

Despite his free-market rhetoric, Milei kept a fixed exchange rate. Argentina lacked foreign currencies so soon that last April it sought yet another $20 billion from the IMF. The absurd result was that Argentina, with 0.5% of the world’s population, has 35% of all IMF loans outstanding.

Now, six months later, that money is largely gone. Hence the need now for another $20 billion, or perhaps $40 billion, from a combination of the U.S. Treasury or Wall Street. These dollars are not going to build railroads, ports, schools or refineries or even provide school lunches. They mostly will keep prices of imported business and consumer goods low for ordinary consumers and help rich Argentines move wealth abroad before the next collapse.

A bailout will also help hedge fund operators like Treasury Secretary Scott Bessant’s former colleague, occasional deal partner and long-time friend, Robert Citrone, cover large bets he made on Milei’s boom proving permanent. Moreover, hedge funds like Blackrock, Pimco and even Fidelity, that were so stupid as to buy peso-denominated Argentine bonds, also will get their irons retrieved from the fire,

Hence the deep corruption permeating the deal.

This past week Trump sneered at a reporter who asked about the Argentina bailout. “Argentina is fighting for its life,” he said. Even for Trump, this is preposterous. Argentina faces a devaluation just as it has every five years or so since the 1950s.

Compared to the just-added $1 trillion to the U.S. national debt in the past eight weeks, $20 billion or $40 billion may not seem like much. Yet it would cover a lot of Obamacare subsidies and not just for Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s Republican family in Georgia. The effect, if this money were instead invested in America first, would be large across rural Minnesota and other farm regions as well as to many in metro areas like ours.

Which brings us to the irony to which outraged U.S. farmers are blind: Without the bailout, the peso would fall in value relative to the dollar and other currencies. That would make Argentine beef, soybeans and corn cheaper to buyers in China and everywhere else, actually strengthening its position in global markets. In this regard, U.S. agriculture should be supporting the bailout, not opposing it, because, taken alone, raising the peso’s value would be a net positive for U.S. exports versus Argentine competition.

Yet another irony is that Trump is making the bailout conditional on Milei’s party winning upcoming congressional elections. This is a backfiring gift to Milei’s opponents. In 1946, U.S. Ambassador Spruille Braden’s denunciations helped Juan Peron win millions of votes with the slogan, “Braden or Peron?” Trump demanding votes for Milei’s party will have the same perverse effect.

Yet the deal is likely to go through. Milei caters masterfully to Trump’s ego and will be president even if his party loses seats in Argentina’s legislature. Rich donors to our president have much at stake. GOP members of Congress still cower from MAGA’s power. Democrats seem powerless in mustering opposition, let alone understanding what’s really going on here. Few beside farmers voice objections. We live in terrible times.

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St. Paul economist and writer Edward Lotterman can be reached at stpaul@edlotterman.com.