HiTechEdge

Tag: Apple

  • Google Will Open First Store in NYC

    Google Will Open First Store in NYC

    Taking a page from Apple and Microsoft, Google plans to open its first store in NYC.

    Apple’s retail stores have been a big part of the company’s success, becoming some of the most valuable stores in retail, per square foot. Although never achieving the same success, Microsoft’s stores were a familiar site in many shopping malls around the country before the company closed the vast majority of them.

    Google hopes to strike gold with its own retail store strategy, the first of which will be opened in NYC, in Chelsea. Google’s description of its store sounds very similar to an Apple Store.

    The company made the announce on its official blog.

    At the Google Store, customers will be able to browse and buy an extensive selection of products made by Google, ranging from Pixel phones to Nest products, Fitbit devices to Pixelbooks and more. Or they can shop online at GoogleStore.com and pick up their orders in store. Throughout the store, visitors will be able to experience how our products and services work together in a variety of immersive ways, which we’re excited to share more about when the doors open.

    We’ll have experts on hand to help visitors get the most out of their device, such as troubleshooting an issue, fixing a cracked Pixel screen or helping with installations. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a longtime Pixel user, are curious about our Nest displays or want to participate in one of the how-to workshops we’ll offer throughout the year — our team will be able to provide you with help that’s specific and personalized to your needs. 

    Should the Chelsea location prove successful, it’s a safe bet the company will likely expand its retail footprint. In the meantime, the Chelsea location will be open summer 2021.

  • Mac Viruses and Malware Have Reached ‘Unacceptable’ Levels

    Mac Viruses and Malware Have Reached ‘Unacceptable’ Levels

    Mac viruses and malware have reached an ‘unacceptable’ level, according to testimony from Apple senior VP Craig Federighi.

    Many interesting details have emerged in the Epic vs Apple court case over the future of the latter’s App Store ecosystem. One of the most fascinating, however, is just how much the Mac is already being impacted by security threats.

    Not that long ago, the Mac had the reputation of not being affected by malware or viruses. This was due to two factors: the platform’s UNIX underpinnings and security through obscurity. Because the Mac held such a low percentage of the market, it simply wasn’t worth it for hackers to invest a lot of resources to make Mac-specific malware.

    According to Federighi, that appears to have changed in a big way. When Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers asked why the Mac could allow app installs from multiple sources, but not iOS, Federighi drew a stark contrast between the level of security and protections the two platforms offer.

    “It is regularly exploited on the Mac,” Federighi explained. “iOS has established a dramatically higher bar for customer protection. The Mac is not meeting that bar today.”

    Federighi emphasized the disparity between the number of Mac users and iOS users, and the value of their respective ecosystems, making the point that things would be far worse for iOS users if it took the same approach as the Mac.

    “And that’s despite the fact that Mac users inherently download less software and are subject to a way less economically motivated attacker base,” Federighi continued. “If you took Mac security techniques and applied them to the iOS ecosystem, with all those devices, all that value, it would get run over to a degree dramatically worse than is already happening on the Mac.”

    All of this led to the admission regarding Apple’s view of the current state of Mac malware.

    “And as I say, today, we have a level of malware on the Mac that we don’t find acceptable and is much worse than iOS,” Federighi said. “Put that same situation in place for iOS and it would be a very bad situation for our customers.”

    Federighi’s explanation is at the heart of the case Apple is making, that keeping apps operating within its ecosystem help it provide the security and protection that people are paying for when they buy an iPhone or iPad. In contrast, individuals who don’t want that protection can buy Android.

  • Google and Samsung Combining Wear OS and Tizen info Unified Platform

    Google and Samsung Combining Wear OS and Tizen info Unified Platform

    Google and Samsung have announced they are combining their wearable platforms into a single unified one.

    Apple is currently the market leader in the wearables market, with Samsung coming in third-place. Google, on the other hand, hasn’t been able to break into the top five, prompting it to purchase Fitbit to give it a boost.

    Google and Samsung are now joining forces, combining Google’s Wear OS and Samsung’s Tizen into a single, unified platform that will help both companies better compete. The unified platform will be called “Wear,” although one can’t help but hope they come up with something with at least a little more pizazz.

    Bjorn Kilburn, Google Director of Product Management, Wear, outlined some of the benefits of the unification in more detail.

    For performance, our teams collaborated and made apps start up to 30% faster on the latest chipsets with smooth user interface animations and motion. To achieve longer battery life, we’ve worked to optimize the lower layers of the operating system – taking advantage of low-power hardware cores to enable better battery life. That includes handy optimizations like the ability to run the heart rate sensor continuously during the day, track your sleep overnight and still have battery for the next day. Finally, our unified platform will make it easier for developers to build great apps for the watch.

  • Google’s Play Store Privacy Changes Won’t Match Apple

    Google’s Play Store Privacy Changes Won’t Match Apple

    Proposed privacy changes for Android developers will fall short of the protections Apple offers, according to new reports.

    Google made headlines when it informed developers it would be changing how privacy is handled. Developers will soon be required to disclose the security features their apps offer, whether an app adheres to Google’s Families policy, if the app’s safety section has been independently verified and if data collection is optional or required.

    Despite offering significant improvements over the current privacy protections, Google’s level of protection will still fall short of Apple’s recent moves, according to AppleInsider.

    In particular, Google wants advertisers to continue to be able to target ads, as well as quantify how effective those ads are. In contrast, Apple’s App Tracking Transparency (ATT) is specifically aimed at preventing advertising’s from tracking users.

    According to AppleInsider, two Google employees say the company is working to improve privacy, but dragging its feet at the same time. The company clearly has more to lose than Apple, since it makes the bulk of its income from advertising. In contrast, Apple makes the bulk of its money from hardware and paid services, meaning it doesn’t treat people’s data as the product.

  • Apple Preparing MacBook Pro and Air Updates

    Apple Preparing MacBook Pro and Air Updates

    Apple is preparing its next round of MacBook Pro and Air updates, adding a 14 and 16-inch Pro and faster M1 processors.

    Apple introduced the new MacBook Air, 13-inch MacBook Pro and Mac mini last November, with all of them sporting the company’s new M1 chip. Based on the same designs that have powered the iPad and iPhone for years, the M1 immediately won rave reviews for its performance and battery life.

    The company is now preparing to add a 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro as soon as early summer, according to Bloomberg’sMark Gurman. In a move that’s sure to please Apple’s professional customers, the new MacBook Pros are expected to have a redesigned chassis that will include additional ports, an HDMI port and an SD slot — features that were removed from previous models in some of the company’s most unpopular moves.

    The new MacBook Pros will have 10-core chips, eight high-performance and two high-efficiency cores. The chips will be offered in two variations, differentiated by either 16 or 32 graphics cores. The chips will also support a maximum of 64GB of memory, a major upgrade over the 16GB in current M1 models.

    An updated MacBook Air is also expected as early as the end of the year, building on the success of the current M1 Air. Gurman’s sources say the MacBook Air’s chip will contain the same computing cores, although they will run faster. The graphics cores will also increase from the current 7 or 8 to 9 or 10.

    Mark Gurman is one of the most reliable Apple-watchers. If his sources are correct, the updates will bring welcome changes to Apple’s laptop lines and raise the bar for laptop performance.

  • Apple Music Adding Lossless Audio and Spatial Audio With Dolby Atmos

    Apple Music Adding Lossless Audio and Spatial Audio With Dolby Atmos

    Apple Music subscribers will soon enjoy Lossless Audio across the entire catalog, as the company also rolls out Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos.

    Apple Music is one of the most popular streaming music services, and Apple is bringing some major upgrades to it. Lossless Audio ensures subscribers will hear music the way it was recorded in the studio, while Spatial Audio creates multidimensional audio experiences.

    “Apple Music is making its biggest advancement ever in sound quality,” said Oliver Schusser, Apple’s vice president of Apple Music and Beats. “Listening to a song in Dolby Atmos is like magic. The music comes from all around you and sounds incredible. Now we are bringing this truly innovative and immersive experience to our listeners with music from their favorite artists like J Balvin, Gustavo Dudamel, Ariana Grande, Maroon 5, Kacey Musgraves, The Weeknd, and so many more. Subscribers will also be able to listen to their music in the highest audio quality with Lossless Audio. Apple Music as we know it is about to change forever.”

    Subscribers will need to turn on Lossless Audio in Settings > Music > Audio Quality. 

    “The soul and life of the mix is sitting in the extra bits of data that are stored in the lossless file,” said Mastering Engineer Piper Payne. “As a mastering engineer, having the ability to convey the music to the listener at its highest quality is the end goal of what I work for every day.”

    Apple says Dolby Atmos tracks will automatically play on all AirPods and Beats headphones that contain an H1 or W1 chip. The latest version of the iPhone, iPad and Mac will also support the feature automatically.

    “Today marks the introduction of Dolby Atmos on Apple Music — a new music experience that is transforming how music is created by artists and enjoyed by their fans,” said Kevin Yeaman, Dolby Laboratories’ president and CEO. “We are working with Apple Music to make Dolby Atmos widely available to all musicians and anyone who loves music.”

    The new features will be available June 2021 at no extra cost.

  • AT&T and Discovery Create Joint TV Streaming Company

    AT&T and Discovery Create Joint TV Streaming Company

    AT&T and Discovery are joining forces and creating a new company that will combine their media assets to better compete.

    The streaming market has become a fiercely competitive one, with YouTube TV, Hulu, fuboTV, Sling, Netflix, Amazon, Disney and Apple spending big bucks to gain subscribers and release original content. For smaller players, like Discovery+ and AT&T’s HBO Max, it can be difficult to compete.

    According to The Associated Press, the two companies believe their best option is to combine their media offerings, creating a single company that will open the door to better bundling options. Given the two companies control CNN, Food Network, HGTV, HBO, TBS and TNT, it’s a safe bet subscribers would pay to have a bundle including those channels.

    The new company may even be able to offer complimentary plans that fill in holes in other streaming packages offered by other companies. For example, fuboTV doesn’t carry CNN, TBS or TNT, making an affordable add-on package an attractive option for fuboTV users.

    If the deal is approved, AT&T shareholders would own 71% of the company, as opposed to Discovery’s 29%. It’s believed the combined company would save some $3 billion annually, freeing up more money for original content.

    Provided Discovery shareholders sign off on the deal, it is expected to close the middle of next year.

  • Apple TV+ Hits 40 Million Subscribers

    Apple TV+ Hits 40 Million Subscribers

    Apple TV+ has crossed a major milestone, according to estimates, topping 40 million subscribers.

    Apple TV+ is the company’s take on streaming TV, with a focus on original content. Ted Lasso, The Morning Show and Mythic Quest are some of the biggest TV shows on the platform. Meanwhile, Tom Hanks’ Greyhound was a critically-acclaimed movie that debuted on Apple TV+.

    Despite being a relative newcomer to the streaming market, Apple’s entry is already making some impressive strides, according to Newsweek. Apple TV+ was estimated to have 33.6 million subscribers at the end of 2019 and 40 million by the end of 2020.

    With 40 million subscribers, Apple TV+ comes in ahead of Paramount+ (under 36 million), Peacock (33 million) and Hulu (39.4 million). Apple’s platform is still behind HBO Max and far behind Disney+, Amazon Prime and Netflix.

    In addition, Apple TV+ has obviously benefited from Apple bundling it for free with new purchases of iPhones, iPads and Macs. It remains to be seen if the service maintains its popularity once people have to pay for it.

  • Apple’s App Store Stopped $1.5 Billion in Fraud in 2020

    Apple’s App Store Stopped $1.5 Billion in Fraud in 2020

    Apple has released a report detailing its efforts to protect users, including that it stopped $1.5 billion in fraudulent App Store transactions.

    The App Store is at the heart of Apple’s case against Epic, with the latter suing to force Apple to allow alternative payment methods and app stores. Not surprisingly, Apple is touting the benefits of the App Store, and working to demonstrate how integral it is to the overall security of the iOS platform.

    In its latest report, Apple reveals some significant details regarding its efforts.

    In 2020 alone, Apple’s combination of sophisticated technology and human expertise protected customers from more than $1.5 billion in potentially fraudulent transactions, preventing the attempted theft of their money, information, and time — and kept nearly a million risky and vulnerable new apps out of their hands.

    Apple also says it blocked some 48,000 apps for having hidden or undocumented features; 150,000 apps for including spam, being copycats or misleading users; and 215,000 for privacy violations.

    The company is also tackling fraudulent app ratings.

    App Store ratings and reviews help many users make decisions about which apps to download, and developers rely on them to incorporate new features that respond to user feedback. Apple relies on a sophisticated system that combines machine learning, artificial intelligence, and human review by expert teams to moderate these ratings and reviews to help ensure accuracy and maintain trust. Since 2020, Apple has processed over 1 billion ratings and over 100 million reviews, and over 250 million ratings and reviews were removed for not meeting moderation standards.

    While the Apple vs Epic court case will continue for some time, Apple is certainly trying to make a compelling case for how the App Store works and why it’s so important to the iOS ecosystem.

  • Vivo Commits to Three Years of Updates to Flagship Phones

    Vivo Commits to Three Years of Updates to Flagship Phones

    Vivo has announced it will provide Android and security updates for its flagship devices for at least three years.

    Vivo is a company that makes a brand of smartphones popular in Asia, Australia and Europe. Like most smartphone makers, Vivo phones run the Android operating system (OS). Unlike iOS, which is controlled exclusively by Apple, there is a great deal of variance in the levels of support the various Android vendors provide.

    Vivo is working to differentiate itself from rivals with the announcement that its upcoming Vivo X flagship line will receive OS and security updates for three years — with some caveats. The policy will only apply to users in Europe, Australia and India, and only includes the X line of smartphones.

    “Featuring top of the line hardware, the X series flagship phones are built to last — and we want to make sure that our customers get software support that lives up to their expectations,” said Vivo senior vice president and CTO Yujian Shi, via ZDNet.

    “We always innovate with the user in mind. With this pledge, we are making a promise to our customers that they will be able to enjoy a premium smartphone experience for an extended period and continue to benefit from the latest software features.”

    The announcement puts Vivo in greater competition with Samsung, which recently announced its own extended support plans. While Vivo’s announcement will likely help it in its core markets against other competitors, Samsung is still more widely available, and now offers four years of support, instead of Vivo’s three.