Your phone has a microphone ostensibly so you can talk to people. But apps can also use your microphone to listen to the world around you. Some apps might even be using the microphone to do things you’d prefer they weren’t doing. For example, apps can employ ultrasound cross-device tracking (uXDT) …
Read More »Google Ends Android Nougat Beta, Promises Android O Beta ‘Soon’
Google released the first developer preview of the upcoming Android O update several months ago, but the Android beta program was still busy with Android 7.1 Nougat at the time. Now, Google says a full beta test of Android O will begin soon, and that means the Android Nougat beta …
Read More »Google’s Mysterious Fuchsia OS Gets a Weird UI Called Armadillo
Google launched Android to the public in 2008, and it has since grown to be the most popular operating system on the planet. Android is still growing and bringing Google services to more consumers than ever, but what comes after Android? Google isn’t resting on its laurels — last year …
Read More »While No One Was Looking, BlackBerry Built a Damn Good Phone
Over the past seven years, BlackBerry’s market share has slipped away, lost to Apple and Android. The company made multiple attempts to revive its own fortunes, from its oft-delayed BB 10 operating system to devices like the Z10 and Passport. Nothing stuck, including the company’s first attempt to combine a …
Read More »Foundry Futures: TSMC, Samsung, GlobalFoundries, and Intel Gear Up For 7nm and Beyond
Over the past few years, companies like Samsung, TSMC, and GlobalFoundries have all jockeyed for the pole position in the highly competitive (and extremely expensive) foundry business. Even Intel, which used to march to the beat of its own drum, has gotten in on the action. As the cost of …
Read More »HandBrake Download Mirror Compromised With Mac Malware
HandBrake is an extremely popular piece of video transcoding software because it’s cross-platform, open source, and free. However, it was also recently compromised by malware. Users of the software were alerted recently that one of HandBrake’s download mirrors was infiltrated between May 2nd and 6th. Anyone who downloaded the macOS …
Read More »Nvidia Goes All in for AI With New Volta Architecture
SAN JOSE, CA–A first-time attendee to Nvidia’s flagship GTC conference this week could be forgiven for thinking Nvidia was an AI company. CEO Jensen Huang’s 2+ hour keynote included mini-tutorials on various types of machine learning, and a nearly endless number of plugs for AI-based applications hosted on Nvidia GPUs. …
Read More »Microsoft Hits 500-Million-Device Milestone for Windows 10
Microsoft has announced that Windows 10 is now used by 500 million devices every month, up from 300 million devices at this point last year. That’s an impressive growth rate year-on-year. And while Microsoft will never hit its original goal of one billion installations within three years (the collapse of …
Read More »Cray Announces New, AI-Focused Supercomputers
Deep learning, self-driving cars, and AI are all huge topics these days, with companies like Nvidia, IBM, AMD, and Intel all throwing their hats into the ring. Now Cray, which helped pioneer the very concept of a supercomputer, is also bringing its own solutions to market. Cray announced a pair of …
Read More »Microsoft to Revamp Windows 10’s Look With Fall Creators Update
Windows 10 is now running on 500 million devices. Sure, Microsoft had to pester and annoy many people to upgrade, but now there are that many more users who will get the newly announced Fall Creators Update. That’s the placeholder name for Microsoft’s next big Windows 10 update, which as …
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