Friday, Sep 18, 2020 | Last Update : 01:23 PM IST

178th Day Of Lockdown

Total Cases

5,212,686

96,792

Recovered

4,109,828

87,778

Deaths

84,404

1,175

Maharashtra114584081235431351 Andhra Pradesh6014625080885177 Tamil Nadu5142084589008618 Karnataka4943563830777629 Uttar Pradesh3362942632884771 Delhi2347011981034877 West Bengal2155801870614183 Odisha167161133466722 Telangana1650031335551005 Bihar164224149722855 Assam150349121610528 Kerala12221687341490 Gujarat119088999083271 Rajasthan109088906851293 Haryana103773816901069 Madhya Pradesh97906743981877 Punjab90032658182646 Chhatisgarh7777541111628 Jharkhand6710052807590 Jammu and Kashmir5971138521951 Uttarakhand3713924810460 Goa2678320844327 Puducherry2142816253431 Tripura2069612956222 Himachal Pradesh11190691997 Chandigarh92566062106 Manipur8430653951 Arunachal Pradesh6851496713 Nagaland5306407910 Meghalaya4356234232 Sikkim2119178923 Mizoram15069490

Technology In Other news

In Other News

Among the concerns is a fear that under the so-called News Media Bargaining Code, news businesses “will be able to somehow control their algorithms,” Australia’s fair trade regulator Rod Sims said. “We’ll engage with them and clarify that so that there’s no way that the news media businesses can interfere with the algorithms of Google or Facebook,” Sims said. (Photo | Wikimedia Commons - Sollok29)

Australia's pay-for-news law: Facebook, Google won't have to give out user data, says regulator

The final draft of the bill could be introduced into Parliament in late October.

17 Sep 2020 10:52 PM

More than $3.3 billion was spent in the US in August on video game hardware, content and accessories, according to NPD analyst Mat Piscatella. Both Sony and Microsoft hope to gain a huge volume of sales during of the holiday season in the US, especially Christmas. (Photo | AFP)

Sony launching PlayStation 5 on November 12, right behind Microsoft Xbox X on November 10

The current PlayStation 4 has outsold Xbox by more than two to one, but Microsoft hopes to take the battle back to Sony.

17 Sep 2020 10:24 PM

A group known as the WeChat Users Alliance and several people who say they rely on the app for work, worship and staying in touch with relatives in China sued to stop the ban in federal court in California. The suit says the ban violates its US users’ freedom of speech, free exercise of religion and other constitutional rights.

US says WeChat ‘ban’ might impair messaging but will not draw criminal charges for users

Using the app to communicate won’t be a banned transaction, although messaging on it could be “directly or indirectly impaired” by the ban.

17 Sep 2020 9:32 PM

The Financial Times had earlier reported that ByteDance was to place TikTok’s global business in a new US-headquartered company with Oracle investing as a minority shareholder along with other US investors. Trump says he won’t allow that. (Photo | AFP)

Trump still scrutinising Oracle-TikTok deal, regrets that US won’t get a slice of the pie

Some Republicans raise concerns that ByteDance would maintain access to information on the 100 million TikTok users in the US.

17 Sep 2020 9:00 PM

Google Glass launched seven years ago faced privacy hurdles, so Facebook is testing Aria prototypes with just 100 people, who will record in Facebook offices, their homes, and public spaces, but not in stores or restaurants without written consent. (Representative Image | Wikimedia Commons - Rijans007)

Google Glass may not have taken off but Facebook eyes AR space with Ray-Ban smart glasses

“Imagine a pair of glasses that add a 3D layer of contextually relevant, meaningful information on top of the physical world,” Facebook said

17 Sep 2020 7:17 PM

Acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Michael R. Sherwin speaks, Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2020 at the Justice Department in Washington. The Justice Department has charged five Chinese citizens with hacks targeting more than 100 companies and institutions in the United States and abroad, including social media and video game companies as well as universities and telecommunications providers. Officials announced the prosecution on Wednesday. (AP)

US on the lookout for 5 Chinese superhackers who targeted India

In the attacks, the conspirators installed 'Cobalt Strike' malware on Indian government-protected computers, the indictment said

17 Sep 2020 3:49 PM

“The failure of Facebook to appear before the committee shows that it is trying to hide its role in the Delhi riots,” Aam Aadmi Party’s Raghav Chadha told reporters. This photograph shows a riot affected area in Northeast Delhi as on March 8, 2020 (Photo | Wikimedia Commons - DTM)

Facebook India chief Ajit Mohan gives hate speech hearing a miss

Last week, a Delhi Assembly panel had summoned him to determine if the social networking site deliberately ignored instances of hate speech.

15 Sep 2020 8:41 PM

The more than 6,000-word memo by former employee Sophie Zhang cited organised efforts to harass, mislead or manipulate people in Azerbaijan, Ukraine, Bolivia, Ecuador, India and elsewhere, along with election manipulation efforts in the United States and Brazil.

Facebook not doing enough to stop election manipulation, says fired employee

She said she found multiple blatant attempts by foreign national governments to abuse the platform on vast scales to mislead the citizenry.

15 Sep 2020 8:15 PM

The rules require telecommunications providers to treat all data traffic the same, and prevent them from reserving better access for their own services, or selling bandwidth to big companies like Google and Netflix while leaving a slower Internet for everyone else.

European Union top court verdict keeps the internet egalitarian

The European Court of Justice on Tuesday issued its first interpretation of the EU’s net neutrality rules since they were adopted in 2015.

15 Sep 2020 7:22 PM

YouTube Shorts will be modified based on user feedback before being made more broadly available.

As YouTube Shorts gets rolled out in India, could it dull desi TikToks' allure?

YouTube Shorts videos are limited to 15 seconds, according to the Google-owned platform used by some 2 billion people worldwide.

15 Sep 2020 6:26 PM

Chinese state media outlets CGTN and China News Service on Monday reported that ByteDance would not sell TikTok to Oracle, while The Wall Street Journal said the transaction is being structured as a partnership and probably won’t be an outright sale.

US government considers Oracle's bid for TikTok, but China says deal won't go through

The bid would be handled by a government panel that reviews foreign transactions for national security concerns.

15 Sep 2020 5:32 PM

The government should work promptly on consulting with industry players and civil society on changes that are required in the draft rules for e-pharmacies and notify them on priority. (Photo | Pixabay - Steve Buissinne)

Tech This Week | Regulating online pharmacies must be an inclusive exercise

The draft amendments and the e-pharmacy space needs to be more platform friendly as we advance.

12 Sep 2020 8:39 PM

Drone companies are moving away from targeting individual users and instead tailoring their products for government or commercial tasks such as inspecting pipelines, monitoring crops or police surveillance. DJI has made a push to counter the security concerns, most recently with a Wednesday announcement that it will enable an internet “kill switch” on more drones so that commercial and government users can halt data transmission on sensitive flying missions. (Representative Image | AP)

Leading drone maker DJI being sidelined in US-China rift changes tack to preserve dominance

Years before the push to ban TikTok and WeChat and blacklisting Huawei, DJI was already under watch as a potential national security threat.

11 Sep 2020 9:29 PM

Microsoft and Walmart together were involved in negotiations with ByteDance to buy TikTok’s US operations in which Oracle too was interested. But a new rule introduced by China recently may not allow for sale of the short-video platform to a foreign company. (Photo | Pixabay - iXimus)

'It’ll either be closed up or they’ll sell it', Trump says, refusing to extend TikTok sale deadline

In an executive order last month, Trump had set a September 15 deadline for the Chinese app to either sell to a US company or shut it down.

11 Sep 2020 8:50 PM

Microsoft did not assess which foreign adversary poses the greater threat to the integrity of the November presidential election. The consensus among cybersecurity experts is that Russian interference is the gravest. (Photo | AP)

Microsoft warns of Russia, China hackers' attempts to influence US elections

Foreign activity groups have stepped up efforts targeting the election as had been anticipated, Microsoft corporate vice president Tom Burt.

11 Sep 2020 5:02 PM

The move indicates Huawei intends to push ahead with plans to create its own ecosystem, a challenge analysts say is daunting in a world dominated by Android and Apple’s iOS.

Android having pulled out long ago, Huawei set to launch own jazzed up HarmonyOS

The source code for HarmonyOS will be made available beginning in December to software developers who create apps for smartphones.

10 Sep 2020 10:34 PM

Remember when former US National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden revealed that the American government was eavesdropping on people’s online data and communications? It was also revealed that Facebook gave US security agencies access to the personal data of Europeans. (Photo | thedaywefightback.org)

Facebook facing heat for sending EU data to US, which, like China, is accused of snooping

A recent court ruling found that some trans-Atlantic data transfers don’t protect users from American government snooping.

10 Sep 2020 6:49 PM

“Facebook should not be complicit in more offline violence, much less another genocide (referring to charges of spurring Myanmar's systematic killing of Rohingya people), but the pattern of inaction displayed by the company is reckless to the point of complicity,” the letter stated. This photograph shows Facebook India Policy Chief Ankhi Das posing with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. (Photo | Facebook - Ankhi Das)

Over 40 rights groups write to Zuckerberg seeking Ankhi Das' removal as India Policy Chief

The rights group said the bias in policy led by Ankhi Das had spurred violence against minorities in India.

10 Sep 2020 5:40 PM

Over 40 rights groups write to Zuckerberg seeking Ankhi Das' removal as India Policy Chief

The rights groups said the bias in policy led by Ankhi Das had spurred violence against minorities in India.

10 Sep 2020 5:40 PM

While it is “understandable” that social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Twitter remove content that incites or promotes violence, “they are not currently archiving this material in a manner that is accessible for investigators and researchers to help hold perpetrators to account”, HRW said.

Not enough to remove hate speech, social networks must archive evidence: Human Rights Watch

Online posts could also help document atrocities and abuses such as chemical weapons attacks in Syria and police abuse in the United States.

10 Sep 2020 4:22 PM

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Dilip Cherian

178th Day Of Lockdown

Total Cases