Techno Bhogi

Embroiled in another massive data breach , Facebook may face $1.63 billion in fine from the European Union (EU) privacy watchdog, the media reported. According to a report in The Wall Street Journal on Sunday, Ireland’s Data Protection Commission which is Facebook’s lead privacy regulator in Europe, has asked Facebook to submit more details in the incident where data of over 50 million users were hacked via “Access Tokens” or digital keys. The “privacy watchdog could fine Facebook as much as $1.63 billion for the data breach”, the report added. “ We are concerned at the fact that this breach was discovered on Tuesday (last week) and affects many millions of user accounts but Facebook is unable to clarify the nature of the breach and the risk for users at this point ,” the regulator was quoted as saying. A Facebook spokeswoman said the social media giant will respond to questions from the EU watchdog. In the biggest-ever security breach after Cambridge Analytica scandal , Facebook...

Fortnite has just entered into Season 6, and there are a bunch of changes . Among the many new things, the patch notes mentioned new ‘floating islands’ on the map, but so far there was only one — a huge chunk of Loot Lake which was raised into the air by the Cube that apparently didn’t melt inside the lake. That particular floating island has been moving around the map, and underwater-Kevin has finally reached the first rune among the ones it left printed on the map, pulling it up into the air and causing it to float as well . The event took place at the rune near Pleasant Park, and has been caught on video by a bunch of players. The Floating Island has reached the first rune and raised the platform it's on. There appear to be volcanic craters appearing in the corrupted area as well! pic.twitter.com/WNjilehORk — Fortnite Master (@FNMasterCom) September 30, 2018 Other than there being two floating islands on the map now, the land pulled out of the ground has left behind a cr...

The Redmi Note 6 Pro has been made official without much fanfare and launched only in Thailand for now. It comes as an upgrade for one of Xiaomi’s most popular devices, the Redmi Note 5 Pro and brings along a slightly new design, bigger display, quad cameras, and more. So, let’s not waste any time, let’s take a look at the differences and similarities between these two Redmi Note ‘Pro’ devices: Redmi Note 6 Pro: All the New Features Xiaomi may find it easy to adopt a design pattern, which can trickle down to many of its devices over the year, but it knows when’s the best time to follow the trend and offer its users an upgrade. The Redmi Note 6 Pro does just that, so here’s a look at what’s new: Display One of the key differences, that you’ll indeed notice right off the bat, is the inclusion of a display notch on the Redmi Note 6 Pro. The Chinese giant has sliced off some of your top bezels to now include a 6.26-inch display as compared to the 5.99-inch display on Redmi Note 5 ...

Facebook recently revealed the company has discovered a potentially serious security flaw which might have exposed the data of around 50 million users. The vulnerability was spotted in the implementation of the ‘View As’ feature and may have been introduced back in July 2017, allowing hackers to steal digital login credentials of millions of users. But a new revelation might further widen the impact of the security breach. Facebook’s VP of product management, Guy Rosen, has disclosed that hackers may have also exploited the security flaw to access users’ accounts on third-party services, which use Facebook login, such as Tinder, Airbnb, Spotify as well as Instagram.  A Facebook spokesperson recently acknowledged malicious parties may have gained access to an individual’s profile on other services if they used their Facebook account to sign up for it. This basically means if you signed up for Instagram using your Facebook account, hackers might have also gained a...

Adding to the steadily growing lineup of Android 9 Pie devices, HMD Global (the company now leading the charge of Nokia-branded phones) is finally rolling out the stable update that brings the latest flavor of Android to Nokia 7 Plus owners. The Finnish giant had been testing Android 9 Pie on its popular mid-ranger, the Nokia 7 Plus, ever since the OS update was announced at Google I/O 2018 earlier this year. HMD Global pushed out the final Android 9 Pie beta update to users a couple weeks ago and it seems like Nokia 7 Plus owners, like me, can now rejoice that the stable Android 9 Pie update is here at last . The Android 9 Pie stable update, which carries the build number V3.22C, weighs in at about 1.4GB in total and it does take some time to download and install, so be patient. We’d been testing the beta builds and the stable update appears to be free of any bugs, and glitches up until now.   As pointed out in the tweet (and screenshot) below, Android Pie arrives...

The successor to the popular Redmi Note 5 Pro, which sold in millions in India , is here and you may not have heard of it as Xiaomi didn’t really make a huge deal of it. Redmi Note 6 Pro quietly made its debut in Thailand earlier this week and it brings along a larger display with a notch, quad-cameras, and a ton of AI features. Redmi Note 6 Pro Specs The Redmi Note 6 Pro features a bigger 6.26-inch Full-HD+ IPS LCD panel with a 19:9 aspect ratio as compared to its predecessor. It touts of 86 percent screen-to-body ratio, thanks to the notch, but there’s still a huge chin on this device. In line with its predecessor, the Redmi Note 6 Pro is powered by the Snapdragon 636 , coupled with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of onboard storage. It runs Xiaomi’s MIUI skin on top of Android 8.1 Oreo. In the optics department, the Redmi Note 6 Pro comes with an upgraded set of cameras. There’s a 12-MP primary sensor, with an f/1.9 aperture and EIS, and a secondary 5-MP depth sensor on the...

Xiaomi has quietly announced the new Redmi Note 6 Pro in Thailand and while the quiet launch is pretty surprising, we are glad that the Redmi Note 6 Pro is finally official, after so many leaks and rumors. The Redmi Note 5 Pro brings a number of upgrades over the Redmi Note 5 Pro, including the notch, but the most interesting upgrade has to be the new quad cameras. Yes, the Redmi Note 6 Pro comes with a dual camera setup on both the front and the back, making it the first Xiaomi phone to have dual selfie cameras. The Dual Selfie Cameras on the Redmi Note 6 Pro The dual camera setup on the front includes a 20MP f/2.0 primary camera along with a secondary 2MP depth camera sensor. The new setup should bring improved portrait mode selfies. I mean, the AI Portrait Mode in the Redmi Note 5 Pro’s front camera is decent enough but it still has its flaws. The secondary depth sensor in the Note 6 Pro should ensure that the portrait selfies have more natural blur and better edge detection. ...

Google has released the latest Android distribution report for the month of September which shows a noticeable growth in Android Oreo’s installed base. The new distribution numbers are based on data collected on the basis of Android devices which visited the Google Play Store in a span of 7 days ending on September 28, 2018. As per the updated Android distribution figures, Android Oreo’s net adoption figures now stands at 19.2% , with Android 8.1 Oreo standing at 5.8% while Android 8.0 commands a share of 13.4%. The previous report showed Android Oreo’s adoption at the 14.6% mark, which means it has recorded a jump of 4.6% in a span of around two weeks. Android Oreo’s growth had been stagnant since late August, however, the increase in its distribution comes at the expense of previous builds. As per the new report, Android Nougat now stands at 29.3%, down from the 30.8% share of the installed base recorded two weeks ago. Android 6.0 Marshmallow’s share has also dropped fro...

After numerous leaks and rumors over the past week, Xiaomi has now quietly made its latest mid-range offering – the Redmi Note 6 Pro – official in Thailand. This device is the successor to the popular Redmi Note 5 Pro, which sold millions of units in India and has brought along a larger display with a notch, quad-cameras and a ton of AI features. Price and Availability Xiaomi launched the Redmi Note 6 Pro only in Thailand on Thursday, September 27, via their Community Forum and Facebook . The device has been unveiled one configuration, with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage but there could very well be many other configurations globally. The device has gone on sale in Thailand  for 6,990 baht (approx Rs 15,999) and some users have already received their unit. It comes in three different color variants namely Black, Blue, and Rose Gold. Redmi Note 6 Pro: Key Specs Coming to the specs, the Redmi Note 6 Pro sports a huge 6.26-inch Full-HD+ IPS LCD panel with a...

Xiaomi’s subsidiary Pocophone launched its first smartphone – the Poco F1 – in India last month, featuring flagship specifications at an affordable price of just Rs. 20,999. Packing Qualcomm’s flagship Snapdragon 845 processor, up to 8GB RAM and 256GB of internal storage, the Poco F1 quickly became an overnight sensation worldwide. What’s more interesting is that at the launch event, Poco announced its support for the developer community and promised that unlocking the Poco F1’s bootloader won’t void the manufacturer’s warranty, something that is commonly seen on devices from other manufacturers. Poco ensured that unlocking the bootloader would be pretty easy for all developers, promising that any user could unlock the device’s bootloader in just 3 days . Even when users faced some problems unlocking the bootloader, Poco was quick to address the issues. However, there still was a major hurdle that the company needed to overcome, getting the devices to the developers. We got a li...

Amidst the global crypto market slump, Zebpay, one of the biggest cryptocurrency exchanges in India, has shut down operations following the  regulations imposed by the Reserve Bank of India earlier this year. In an official blog post, the company revealed that all unexecuted cryptocurrency transactions will be canceled starting at 4:00 PM on September 28th , and after that, no cryptocurrency orders will be accepted. Zebpay notified that all incomplete orders will be refunded as crypto coins and tokens back into the Zebpay wallet of customers. We are stopping our exchange. At 4 PM today, we will cancel unexecuted orders & credit your coins to your Zebpay wallet. No new orders will be accepted. The Zebpay wallet will work even after the exchange stops. Read more: https://t.co/W8ygzPIYz1 pic.twitter.com/tPWCnyu7Yu — zebpay (@zebpay) September 28, 2018 “The recent past has been extremely difficult. The curb on bank accounts has crippled our, and our customer’s, abili...

Earlier this year in March, Google officially rebranded its Android Wear platform as ‘Wear OS by Google’ which was unveiled at the Baselworld watch show in Switzerland. As part of the update, Google promised to introduce new features and improvements to the platform over the coming weeks and months. Following that in August, Google announced a refreshed WearOS with simpler gestures, a more proactive Google Assistant and easier activity tracking. As promised, the update is finally rolling out in September, although it’s almost the end of the September. Busy day? Every minute matters. The new #WearOSbyGoogle design gives you a helping hand when you need it most, convenient access to your notifications, #GoogleFit , and more. Rolling out now: https://t.co/UldqISuWdH pic.twitter.com/dvGlhxQIQg — Wear OS by Google (@WearOSbyGoogle) September 28, 2018 Now, according to a recent report from  Android Police , Google has started rolling out the update, called WearOS 2.1, bringing...

In a first-of-its-scale heritage mapping and digitisation project, Google and Ministry of Railways on Friday launched a project that aims to preserve the cultural heritage of the Indian Railways. The two-year digitisation project “The Railways-Lifeline of a Nation” is a comprehensive digital document viewable on Google’s Arts and Culture website. It was launched at the National Rail Museum. The project is divided into “Journeys”, “People”, “Heritage” and “Engineering” sections, each containing visual and textual narratives that rail enthusiasts can access for free. It comprises photographs, documentaries, text, virtual tours, 360-degree videos, online exhibits, and maps, pertaining to the Indian Railways. Minister of Railways, Piyush Goyal via video-conferencing said that the project is an experience for the “1.3 billion people of India about what the 1.3 million railway employees are doing for serving them”. “From the Nilgiri mountains to the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus Station, ...

In a first-of-its-scale heritage mapping and digitisation project, Google  announced a new project that aims to preserve the legacy and heritage of the Indian Railways through the Google Arts and Culture  website and app, which went viral earlier this year and could already be regularly used by many Indian users. The two-year digitisation project “The Railways-Lifeline of a Nation” is a comprehensive digital record which is seen on the Arts and Culture website and app. It was launched at the National Rail Museum in Delhi. Indian Railways, which started its journey in 1853 with a train between Boribunder and Thane, is the fourth largest railway network in the world. It’s arguably the most diverse railway network in the world too. The project documents everywhere Indian trains ply – such as the Nilgiri mountains or the bustling Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus Station . You can relive iconic train journeys to such as the Darjeeling toy train or the Kalka-Shimla mountain line. ...

While Xiaomi’s Bengaluru event was focused on smart devices, the Chinese giant launched one non-tech product dubbed as  Mi Luggage  in India as well. These suitcases, which are available in two different sizes, 20-inch and 24-inch, adds to the Chinese giant’s fledgling lineup of lifestyle products. I’ve already tried out Xiaomi backpacks earlier this year and I had loved it, so I had high hopes. They didn’t let me down and here are my first impressions of the Mi Luggage suitcases: Xiaomi Mi Luggage: First Impressions Xiaomi is good at building smartphones (even if some look similar) and other hardware but it’s not fooling around when it comes with other products either. You will find great build quality and  just a ‘Mi’ branding . It’s very minimal and follows a tried-and-tested design. Durability The Mi Luggage suitcases, available in 20-inch and 24-inch variants, are not just light, portable and ergonomic, but also have very sturdy build quality. T...

Led by Amazon, the smart speakers category in India grew 43 percent in the second quarter this year, an International Data Corporation (IDC) report said today. Amazon with its Echo range of smart speakers , led the category with 59 percent market share, closely followed by Google for the second position, showed IDC’s “Worldwide Quarterly Smart Home Device Tracker”. “ Although the initial usage of smart speakers are currently limited to few use cases as the smart homes market is at a very nascent stage in India, we are seeing signs of it growing beyond entertainment ,” Navkendar Singh, Associate Research Director, IDC India, said in a statement. The Indian smart home devices market which consists of connected lights, smart speakers, connected thermostats, smart TVs, home monitoring/security products, digital media adapters, among other connected devices for homes, saw a healthy year over year growth of 107 percent to reach at 1.4 million shipments in the second quarter of 2018. Vi...

At its major product launch event in Bengaluru, Xiaomi extended its smart home offerings beyond air purifiers, which also bagged an upgrade yesterday, and smart routers with the launch of the Mi Home Security Camera 360 degree. The smart security camera is one of the many products in Xiaomi’s “Mi Ecosystem,” where the devices are manufactured by partner companies (over 200 of them), such as Mijia in this case, but the device is sold under Xiaomi’s banner. This is the Chinese giant’s first-ever smart security product to be launched in India, so we were curious to check out its utility at the event. Here are our first impressions: Design and Build The Mi Home Security Camera 360 may look huge in close-up shots (like the one you can see below) but it’s actually a small thing – no bigger than a decent-sized coffee mug . The tiny, curved plastic body makes the camera look adorable and I, for one, would love to have in your house – keeping an eye on my things when I’m away...

There is good news for those who want to get the new Apple iPhone XS or iPhone XS Max  ( starts at Rs. 99,900 ) as Paytm Mall is offering an exchange bonus of Rs 7,000 to prospective buyers in addition to the exchange value of their old phones. The e-commerce arm of Paytm today announced the availability of the newly-launched iPhone models on its website and mobile app. The new iPhone XS and XS Max began shipping in India today, along with other second-tier markets, and there are tons of launch offers already . The phones would be delivered within 24 hours to customers in more than 20 cities, said a statement from Paytm Mall . The iPhone XS and XS Max support dual SIM and dual standby functionality and are fuelled by Apple’s latest A12 Bionic chipset built on 7-nm design and a new neural engine with an 8-core dedicated machine learning (ML) processor. Both the models — iPhone XS and XS Max — are available in 64GB, 256GB and 512GB storage variants in space gray, silver and a n...

More than a billion smartphones will be sold in India over the next five years, taking the number of users beyond the 700 million mark by 2022, Counterpoint Research reported today. Mid-range smartphones (roughly Rs 14,000-Rs 29,000), will grow 20 per cent (year-on-year) in 2018 and by almost four times during the next five years to make it one of the most important smartphone segments in India, the market research firm added. The sales volume sweet spot is moving from sub-$150 (nearly Rs 10,000) segment towards mid-tier as many features and capabilities common among flagship models, progressively diffuse through to these lower price bands, noted Counterpoint’s white paper on “India Mid-Tier Smartphone Segment and opportunity for SoC players”. “ Features such as full-screen displays, dual-cameras, biometric security and support for Artificial Intelligence (AI) are beginning to make in-roads to the mid-range. They will become widespread over the next few years ,” said Tarun Pathak, A...

The new Siri Shortcuts feature is probably the best thing to happen to Siri since, well, forever — the feature opens Siri up to third-party apps, exposes a lot of internal functionality of the iPhone to automation, and with the Siri Shortcuts app, even lets users actually write scripts and such (if they’re so inclined) to get a lot of stuff done with simple voice commands or widget taps. I had been using the iPhone X to test out iOS 12 and its features, and obviously I downloaded Siri Shortcuts as soon as it came out. Since then, I spent a lot of time at first trying to understand exactly how this thing worked, and then to actually create Siri Shortcuts for things I thought would be useful for me . I already have a shortcut to select and send my last few screenshots to my MacBook Pro with AirDrop. I have set up a shortcut to play podcasts and text my parents about my whereabouts when I leave from work, and I have a bunch of shortcuts that were in-the-making, but that was inter...

It’s been a terrible year for Facebook’s reputation, having been dented by allegations of election manipulation in 2017. While the Cambridge Analytica revelations earlier this year, which supported those allegations, shook the world and the company, it’s been a constant stream of controversies surrounding the company’s many privacy missteps . The latest one, believe it or not, is so bad, that it’s used largely by absolutely scummy  companies and apps simply looking to harvest daya. Facebook has been using its vast pool of mobile numbers submitted by users for two-factor authentication and allowing advertisers to target these numbers by adding them to their Facebook audience database. So now not only does Facebook know what you like, whom you interact with, the brands you love and the ones you hate, your political affiliations, your location and photos for facial recognition, but also has the phone number to deliver all those targeted ads straight to your phone through various a...

Another day, another Pixel 3 leak. Google’s upcoming Pixel 3 has been leaked more time times than most other smartphones, and the latest one claims that the upcoming Google flagship will feature a new vibration system to provide a better haptic feedback for user interactions. A new ‘hands-on video’ of the Pixel 3 XL has surfaced online, courtesy of a Russian publication named Rozetked, which shows the device in its white color option while being compared with the Pixel 2 XL. The audio is in the Russian language, but the publication has reportedly told 9to5Mac that the Pixel 3 will feature a ‘new vibration system, just like one on the iPhone 7, 8 and X or maybe even better’ . The video doesn’t really show the phone in action so we can’t really tell how the haptic feedback actually works. The publication also claims that the Pixel 3 offers a ‘very good sensitivity and the best touch experience’.  The iPhone X’s vibration system is powered by Apple’s Taptic Engine which contro...

Samsung recently launched its all new Galaxy A7 (2018) in India, adding on to its range of premium mid-range devices. The smartphone, which is priced starting at Rs. 23,990 , packs in the company’s first triple rear camera setup – with some cool software features – on a smartphone. We’ve finally got our hands on the device and here’s all that you will find inside the box of the new Galaxy A7. Samsung Galaxy A7 (2018): What’s In the Box? The new Samsung Galaxy A7 comes in a not-so-special white box that Samsung has been using for most (if not all) of its non-flagship smartphones. We received the black variant of the device which comes in the standard white box with A7 Triple Camera emblazoned on the face in bold letters. The box has an indicative triple camera module illustrated on the top right corner of the front, with more details about the device listed on the back. Inside the box you’ll find the following items: Samsung Galaxy A7 smartphone 5V/1.55A charging brick USB Ty...