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SpaceX NS5 prototype makes a successful attempt towards Mars

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Sriram
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Image credit: freenews.live

SpaceX has been one of the most innovative companies of the decade, and Elon Musk is leaving no stones unturned in bringing out new and power-efficient technology. Recently, the company has launched a new prototype ship towards Mars, to make humans multiplanetary species. In Boca Chica, the company has performed a 500-foot hop in what is named to be the SN5 prototype ship.

The prototype was shaped very oddly and looked nothing like a ship. It was designed like a cylindrically shaped tunnel, which rose to around 150 meters through a single Raptor engine. The nine-story tall ship, then gently returned to the ground and landed upright near the take-off position. It is not the first time that SpaceX has tried to make a spaceship to travel to Mars. There have been attempts before, but many failed during the pressurization test and were not able to leave the ground.

However, SN5 was designed for orbital flight, but it was decided that the ship will only do a small hop for testing purposes. It is not the final design of the spaceship, but just a tiny model of what SpaceX has been designing for their final project. Although this model did not have a nose, the final project design will be different and look like a rocket with a pointed nose. The shape of this NS5 was very similar to what a thermos looks like. The company has been going through a great and successful time recently when they brought back NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley from the International Space Station and splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico over the weekend.

SpaceX has been trying to solve the question of “Whether humans can travel to Mars” with all their technology and innovation. It is expected that this successful flight result would bring out a lot more from the company, which everyone is excited to see.

Google announces new features for family and kids using Smart assistant

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Sriram
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Image Credit: theverge.com

Google’s smart assistant has been one of the best services for a virtual AI assistant, which can do almost everything through your voice commands over the smartphone of Google device. The company has been adding many features regularly to this platform to make it better and one of the best AI assistants in the market. On Tuesday, Google announced a new feature that could help parents and kids with the online classes during the pandemic.

The new feature will help parents and kids manage their time while learning from home. One such feature to be announced is the “Family Bell“, which will create a bell sound for a specific time. Such as bells through the day for lunch, naps, homework, virtual classes, studies, and a lot more. One simply has to say, “Hey Google, create a Family Bell” on the smart speaker through Google Assistant. The Family Bell feature will alert you about any kind of virtual classes for your kids. Users who have a Google smart screen can play background school sounds to make it feel more realistic.

As per the company, it will help a kid feel like they are in an environment similar to the school. The user just has to say, “Hey Google, start the school day” or “Hey Google, the school’s in session“, to start playing those noises. Users can also use smart light through the Google Assistant to flash orange, red, and yellow, signifying that the school has started. The last feature is more focused on the Nest Hub and smart speakers, which will get more broadcast controls.

It can be used to broadcast a message through the entire home using the other speakers at home. You can let your family members in the other room know about any specific event or activity.

Apple is no longer number 1 in phishing attempts

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Sriram
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Image credit:mytechdecisions.com

Apple has been one of the innovative tech giants in the world, due to which they are regularly attacked by malicious software and a lot of phishing attempts to steal their data. Apple has been on the number one spot when it comes to phishing attempts. However, it’s not the same case now, and the number spot from Apple has shifted to other popular brands. Apple ID credentials have been on the top of the list for phishing attempts and hackers using fake websites and e-mail.

However, it seems that the layer of security used by Apple is hard to get by, due to which this year, Apple has just faced a mere 2% phishing attempts, which the number spot for the same has gone to Amazon and Google with 13% of phishing attempts on each. As per experts, the pandemic has been a major reason for the same. As people are under lockdown and were using Google cloud services to work from home, these services’ usage rose to a very high level, making them the perfect target for phishing attempts and stealing the login credentials.

Similarly, Amazon has also seen a large increase in phishing attempts on online shopping. The good things were that both the browser companies and web hosting companies responded quickly to this deceptive website and could suspend them. The list of top ten companies which were a target for phishing attempts this year are:

  1. Google
  2. Amazon
  3. WhatsApp
  4. Facebook
  5. Microsoft
  6. Outlook
  7. Netflix
  8. Apple
  9. Huawei
  10. PayPal

Companies suggest their customer check the link of the website or the link provided in the email before logging into the account. As soon as they log in through these platforms, their login credentials will be compromised, leading to loss of information and money. The users can also face an issue where their account is either suspended or closed. The users will generally get an e-mail or an ad on the website, providing an offer at low prices, which is too good.

Microsoft Team coming up with lots of new features

By
Shanmugam
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Image credit: thestatesman.com

Microsoft has been busy with the development of new features being added to its multiple products. Today, Microsoft has made yet another announcement where they added a new set of features to Team, including a feature that scales the meeting to 20,000 participants. The feature will be made available to all the users in the current week and is specially meant for the organization to connect multiple employees from the main office to the home office across location and time zones.

The feature can be accessed by initiating a one-on-one call and later adding a large group of colleagues to the platform. The feature will be a great addition for companies who would like to have a conference and large events virtually. Apart from this feature, many other features have been added to the Team. One such feature allows the employees to use phone numbers to make and receive calls with anyone, from both office and home. The feature will use the cloud-based phone system of the Team to connect people.

The list of features also adds a new team display, where dedicated Team devices will use the ambient touch screen, High-quality calls, and video and hands-free calls using Cortana. The Team will now also offer extended support for Skype for Business phones after 2023. The Team will continue to support core calling on SIP phones from Yealink, Cisco, Polycom. The support for SIP phones will be made available in 2021. Lastly, Microsoft will be offering a new range of Team phones with new features such as physical button, core calling, and high-quality audio.

The USB phones will have a dedicated Team button and out of the box usage. The device will be compatible with both Mac and Windows operating systems for use, made available for sale in late 2020.

Mobeewave acquired by Apple for $100 million

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Sriram
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0
Image Credit: mobilesyrup.com

Apple is always on a lookout for new companies that promise to bring new and innovative technology in the market and companies that could be a great addition to a new feature or service they are planning for the future. Recently, Apple has acquired Mobeewave, a Canadian startup that is working on converting iPhones into mobile payments terminals. The details of the deal were reported by Bloomberg, where it is found that Apple acquired the company for $100 million.

The technology, when fully developed, will help merchants to use Apple Pay much more easily. The technology that they use for this feature is the NFC chip, where the users have to tap the smartphone or credit card to another device for processing payments. NFC is one of the most common features that exist in all the iPhones after the iPhone 6 was launched with this feature. Good news for Mobeewave is that Apple has retained all its employees, which is around 100, and they will be working from the Montreal office location. No changes will be made to the office as well.

The company has also partnered with Samsung last year to develop a payment technology, which resulted in 10,000 downloads of Samsung’s POS app. With Apple acquiring this company, we can soon expect to see this feature being integrated into the iPhone with more features and functions than what we could see in Samsung. The company will be working in the same way as before, something Apple did not want to interfere with to maintain the team’s creativity.

WhatsApp brings in the new “Search the Web” and “Reverse Image Search” feature

By
Shanmugam
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Image Credit:9to5google.com

WhatsApp is, without a doubt, one of the most popular messaging apps of all time. The app provides unlimited messaging capabilities to its users, giving it an advantage over the normal messaging services through mobile networks. However, the unlimited messaging feature also became one of the most known drawbacks of the app. Whatsapp is very popular for spamming people with fake news and videos, due to which even WhatsApp had to limit the number of users to whom you can forward messages.

Although the restriction is partially removed, users get irritated by fake news and videos that often act like spam in the app. WhatsApp has now introduced a new pilot feature, which allows the user to search if the information received through WhatsApp is fake or real. The assertions made in the messages can now be directly searched on the internet. The services are currently available in Italy, the UK, Brazil, Ireland, Spain, Mexico, and the US.

whatsapp search image 1

Once someone sends you a message on WhatsApp, you will see a magnifying glass in front of the message. It applies to messages and images that have been at least forwarded five times. Once the user clicks on the magnifying glass icon, the assertion will be searched on the internet to verify it. The feature allows the user to upload the text and images via browser, due to which WhatsApp never uploads the data or messages to themselves. The feature will soon be rolled out in other countries as well.

It is expected that the feature will take a few more months before it is released in a stable version. The step has been taken due to the increasing spread of misinformation, especially in this pandemic. Due to their changes in message forwarding features, the forwarded message on the platform went down by 70%.

Google Finally reveals Pixel 4a

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Sriram
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0
Image Credit: firstpost.com

As promised by Google they have finally revealed the Google Pixel 4a on Monday, which is supposed to be their new affordable Pixel smartphone. The Pixel 4a has been launched at a starting price of $349 with a single variant of 6GB + 128GB in the US. The Phone is said to launch in India in the month of October where the price will also be revealed. The Pixel 4a is a direct successor to the Pixel 3a which was one of the most popular Pixel phones. 

The smartphone comes with a 5.8 inch OLED display and has a premium black finish. This is the only color available for Pixel 4a and the beautiful matte finish protects the phone from any kind of fingerprints. The entire phone is colored in black and the only highlighted point in the phone is the Power button in mint color. As per Google, the phone is now available for pre-order in the US through Google Store and Google Fi. The phone will be available to purchase through Google Store, BestBuy.com, Amazon, and other platforms in the US. 

As per the camera module that is said to be the best feature of Pixel phones, the phone still has the single-camera setup which has Sony’s 12MP IMX363 sensor. It might look a bit outdated compared to phones which have a quad-camera setup in the same range. However, it’s not the hardware that makes the camera perfect in Pixel 4a, it’s the software. The pictures taken through this phone can bring quad-camera setups to shame with its excellent software image processing, something Google has always highlighted. 

The camera has HDR support with dual exposure, Topshot, Portrait mode, night shots, and astrophotography capabilities, which is the best any camera has to date. The camera also provides video stabilization with optical image stabilization. The front camera is 8MP and the phone has a Snapdragon 730G chipset. The smartphone also comes with a 3140mAh battery and 18W fast charging support out of the box.

Chinese apps ban continues in India as they block Baidu and Weibo from the App Store and Play Store

By
Shanmugam
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0
Image Credit: Indiatvnews.com

Chinese apps are facing a lot of heat from countries globally, where many of them have been blocking or banning apps due to security issues. India has decided to block both Baidu and Weibo, which are one of the most popular and biggest apps from China. This step from India comes after they have already banned multiple apps originating from the country. These apps have been sending the user data back to China, which is a major security concern.

Both the apps that have been a premium offering from China and have millions of users worldwide have been asked to be taken off from the Google Play Store and the App Store in India. Also, the same has been informed to the ISP’s to block these platforms. The government has many more apps originally from China and has been under the radar ever since the ban on Chinese apps started. As per their official statement, these apps are engaging in activities that threaten the sovereignty and integrity of India.

Some of the most popular apps like PUBG were also under the scanner a few days back, due to which the game developers modified the privacy policy for Indian users. A similar action was also taken by the US government, where they decided to remove selected Chinese apps from online stores. Baidu and Weibo had a lot of resources invested in the Indian market, and the ban on such apps is very likely to bring a big impact on Chinese companies. The Indian government is also looking out for the clone, or similar Chinese apps banned previously. Many such apps have been banned a few days back as well.

Two new features spotted in the Radxa Rock Pi 4C

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Shanmugam
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0
Image Credit: Tomshardware.com

The new Radxa Rock Pi 4C is one of the best offerings from Radxa, which is known for creating single-board chipsets, especially for Android tablets. The new Radxa Rock Pi 4C was created for ultra-cheap ultra-compact systems, and the company has now started its sales. The product is based on the Rockchip RK3399 SoC, originally meant for Android tables where the affordable tables could provide a decent set of features and a good performance.

The chipset also made to entry-level power devices in many different categories like PCs, home theater, etc. Using the same features, the Radxa Rock Pi 4C has 2 Arm Cortex-A72 cores, clocked at 1.8GHz and four Arm Cortex-A53, which consumes less power at 1.4GHz. The SoC also comes with an Arm Mali T864 GPU. The configuration does provide a good mix of power-packed performance for entry-level devices and also saves on energy at the same time.

The two new features spotted in the new SoC were DisplayPort and support for NVMe storage, which was not available in their predecessor. The Soc also comes with 4GB LPDDR4 RAM onboard integrated, 128 GB eMMC with expandable memory support until 2TB. It also has common features like Bluetooth 5.0, Wi-Fi5, USB 3.0 ports, mini Display Port 1.2, 3.5 mm jack, and a USC C connector for charging and data transfer. The SoC has been created to compatible with multiple products and designs, and it measures only 85x54mm. The chipset can be used for Android TV, devices, or Linux devices as well.

iPhone 12 lineup to be released in two stages

By
Shanmugam
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0
Image Credit: gsmarena.com

It was earlier estimated that the release of the iPhone 12 might be delayed till November this year due to the supply chain issue where Apple cannot get the component supply on time due to pandemic. Another news that has come into the picture now is that the tech giant will roll out the devices in two different stages due to the supply delay and problem. The information was provided by Digitimes which claims that Apple will launch its two 6.1 inch iPhones, and during the second stage, it will roll out 6.7 inches and 5.4 inch iPhones.

Although, there is still no confirmed information as to which iPhone variants would be released, it seems that the first stage would release iPhone 12 and pro models, while the second stage will release the iPhone 12 Pro Max and the iPhone 12 lite version. The production of the iPhone 12 will see a delay of about four weeks, after which it will peak back to what is expected.

Apple seems to face a lot of issues recently due to the delay in getting the components. Many new things are expected for Apple, and even companies Mediatek is waiting for Apple to release its devices so that the sales for its new 5G chipset start.

Apple’s major event for the unfolding of these devices was expected in September and later expected to be delayed until November. The sources claim that the event could be held in October, which seems to be good news for Apple customers and fanboys.

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