iPhone maker Foxconn will stay shut in China for another week at least - The Verge

Foxconn has stopped “almost all” of its production in China until February 10th at the earliest due to the coronavirus outbreak, according to both Reuters and Bloomberg. A lengthy stoppage could substantially disrupt Foxconn clients, the most visible being Apple, from shipping devices to customers.

Last week, Apple CEO Tim Cook told investors that the company’s revenue projections for the upcoming quarter reflected a delay in reopening production facilities. Apple also closed its stores and offices through February 9th. Half of the world’s iPhones are said to be made at Foxconn’s “iPhone City” in Zhengzhou, China, where as many as 350,000 people work side-by-side to assemble Apple’s most profitable product. Nearly all of the world’s iPhones are made in China, most by Foxconn, some by Pegatron.

China had extended the Lunar New Year holiday in much of the country with factories expected to reopen on February 3rd. That date was extended until February 10th on Monday. Manufacturers’ ability to reopen their factories is dependent upon approval from central and provincial governments.

The coronavirus outbreak was declared a global health emergency by the World Health Organization, and threatens to upend the global supply chain, already in turmoil after the US vs. China trade war. The virus has infected more than 20,000 people, 400 of whom have died.

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2020-02-04 11:51:35Z
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Google admits it sent private videos in Google Photos to strangers - The Verge

Google is alerting some users of its Google Photos service that they’ve had their private videos sent to strangers by the search giant. Google’s Takeout service, that lets people download their data, was affected by a “technical issue” between November 21st and November 25th last year. It resulted in a small number of users receiving private videos that didn’t belong to them.

Google’s nonchalant email alerting users doesn’t provide any details on how many people were affected, nor the amount of individual videos that were distributed incorrectly per account. Google fixed the issue after five days, and 9to5Google reports that less than 0.01 percent of Google Photos users who used Takeout were affected. Google Photos has over 1 billion users, so even a small percentage will impact a significant number of people. Google has apologized “for any inconvenience this may have caused.”

“We are notifying people about a bug that may have affected users who used Google Takeout to export their Google Photos content between November 21 and November 25,” explains a Google spokesperson in a statement to 9to5Google. “These users may have received either an incomplete archive, or videos — not photos — that were not theirs. We fixed the underlying issue and have conducted an in-depth analysis to help prevent this from ever happening again. We are very sorry this happened.”

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2020-02-04 09:37:30Z
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Artist creates fake traffic jams on Google Maps with wagon of phones - Business Insider - Business Insider

• An artist pulled 99 smartphones around Berlin in a red wagon, tracking how the gadgets affected Google Maps‘ traffic interface.
• Wherever the phones went, Google Maps showed a traffic jam, displaying a red line and routing users around the area.
• Google Maps predicts the density of cars in an area by pinging smartphones that use the app.
• Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.

An artist „hacked“ Google Maps‘ traffic display – and all it took was a red wagon and 99 smartphones.

Simon Weckert toted the pile of smartphones down empty streets in Berlin. Every street he traversed suddenly appeared as a traffic-heavy red zone on Google Maps, rerouting drivers to avoid the streets, as shown in Weckert’s YouTube video documenting the results.

Weckert essentially gamed the mechanism Google Maps uses to predict traffic, he said in an email to Business Insider.

A Google representative told Business Insider that the app determines traffic by continuously pinging smartphones that use location services and by using „contributions from the Google Maps community.“

„We’ve launched the ability to distinguish between cars and motorcycles in several countries including India, Indonesia and Egypt, though we haven’t quite cracked traveling by wagon,“ the representative said. „We appreciate seeing creative uses of Google Maps like this as it helps us make maps work better over time.“

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For Weckert’s experiment, all 99 smartphones were turned on with Google Maps running.

Foto: sourceSimon Weckert

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„There is no such thing as neutral data. Data is always collected for a specific purpose, by a combination of people, technology, money, commerce, and government,“ Weckert said in an email to Business Insider.

Foto: sourceSimon Weckert

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Weckert said he carried out the experiment last summer but published the results this week in honor of the 15th birthday of Google Maps.

Foto: sourceSimon Weckert

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Weckert added that he wanted to draw attention to the blind trust that many people have in tech companies and platforms.

Foto: sourceSimon Weckert

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„Maps have the potential as an instrument of power for some intentions. They substitute political and military power,“ Weckert said. He added that „we are highly focused on“ the data of apps like Google Maps „and tend to see them as objective … thus data are viewed as the world itself, forgetting that the numbers are only representing a model of the world.“

Foto:

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2020-02-03 22:11:34Z
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Microsoft fixing Teams outage that disrupted business--expired certificate to blame - USA TODAY

Edward C. Baig USA TODAY

Published 12:14 PM EST Feb 3, 2020

So much for “team” work. Microsoft Teams experienced an outage Monday with its business-oriented communications and collaborative platform and rival to Slack.

Microsoft said that the issue was related to an expiring "authentication certificate,"  and that it was working on a replacement that would "remediate impact." 

Some users had been able to get into Teams through the Teams app on the phone, but not through the desktop app.

Service on the Teams desktop was restored for at least some folks around 11:30 a.m, east coast time, as Microsoft rolled out its fix.

"We're sorry--we've run into an issue," is the message users saw when they tried to log in from the desktop app earlier in the day.

The outage was felt globally, with users on the Downdetector.com site reporting Teams having been down in Florida, Texas, Oklahoma, Germany and Italy. 

Microsoft's explanation for the Teams outage invited scorn on social media.

"Microsoft Teams goes down after Microsoft forgot to renew a certificate. That's embarrassing!," tweeted Kevin Shoaf.

Business people felt  the pain of the Teams' disruptions.

Teams user Andrew Choi tweeted, "Microsoft Teams, what now? We have a meeting and can't proceed of it. Ugh."

Another user, E-C, tweeted, "Microsoft Teams is down and I feel lost." 

Are you still having problems accessing Microsoft Teams? Email: ebaig@usatoday.com; Follow @edbaig on Twitter

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2020-02-03 17:03:45Z
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Microsoft Teams is experiencing 'issues:' Company working on fix for outage - USA TODAY

Edward C. Baig USA TODAY

Published 10:54 AM EST Feb 3, 2020

So much for “team” work. Microsoft Teams is experiencing an outage with its business-oriented communications and collaborative platform and rival to Slack. The company says it is working on a fix.

Some users have been able to get into Teams through the Teams app on the phone, but not through the desktop app.

"We're sorry--we've run into an issue," is the message users are seeing when they try and log in from the desktop.

No word yet on the cause of the issue or when it might be fixed.

Users on the Downdetector.com site reported Teams being down in Florida, Texas, Oklahoma, Germany and Italy. 

Microsoft's 365 Status Twitter accounted posted: "We're investigating an issue where users may be unable to access Microsoft Teams. We're reviewing systems data to determine the cause of the issue. More information can be found in the Admin center under TM202916."

Business people are already reporting disruptions.

Teams user Andrew Choi tweeted, "Microsoft Teams, what now? We have a meeting and can't proceed of it. Ugh."

Another user, E-C, tweeted, "Microsoft Teams is down and I feel lost." 

USA TODAY has reached out to Microsoft for comment.

Story is developing

Email: ebaig@usatoday.com; Follow @edbaig on Twitter

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2020-02-03 15:22:30Z
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BlackBerry phones could disappear as TCL partnership ends - The Verge

The brand keeping BlackBerry phones alive across most of the globe, TCL Communications, plans to stop selling BlackBerry phones later this year. In a tweet this morning, TCL announced that it “will no longer be selling” BlackBerry-branded phones as of August 31st, 2020, because it will no longer have the rights to design and manufacture them. Existing devices will continue to be supported.

BlackBerry decided in 2016 to stop making its own phones, after years of failures, and to license its brand out instead. The biggest licensing deal was with TCL, which since December 2016 has had the near-global rights to design and sell BlackBerry-branded phones. It’s done a decent job of it, pairing classically BlackBerry-style designs with the functions of modern Android phones. None of the devices have been blockbuster hits, though, and recent devices have received poor reviews.

Without TCL making new phones, it’s possible the BlackBerry brand will disappear for a moment. BlackBerry does have other phone manufacturing partners, but their relationships are much more limited. BB Merah Putih launched a single phone in Indonesia in 2017, and Optiemus Infracom made some phones for India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, and Bangladesh. TCL had the rights for all other regions.

We’ve reached out to BlackBerry for comment. There’s no word yet on whether BlackBerry will look for another manufacturing partner or begin to make its own phones again.

The bigger move here may be from TCL. The company has slowly built out its name over the past several years making phones under several different brand names, including BlackBerry, Alcatel, and Palm. This year, the company intends to start selling phones under its own name. Leaving BlackBerry behind may just give the company more time to focus on devices of its own.

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2020-02-03 14:54:25Z
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Samsung Galaxy S9 update with One UI 2 and Android 10 starts rolling out (Update: US Unlocked and more countries) - Android Police

Despite updates to Samsung's roadmap indicating that Android 10 for the Galaxy S9 and S9+ might be further out than expected, the company has just started pushing the latest Android build to first phones from 2018's lineup. In contrast to the Galaxy S10's extremely slow rollout, the update is already live in the US and a few countries in Europe.

So far, Reddit users say they've received the update in Germany, Lithuania, Spain, and the US (on Xfinity), but since reports are only starting to trickle in, we might soon see Android 10 in many more locations and across more carriers.

The update has the January security patch in tow and comes in at about 1.8GB to 2GB, depending on your device variant. It gives Galaxy S9 owners all the goodies from Android 10, including gesture navigation, dark mode, improved sharing, and much more. Samsung adds some of its own features on top, like a native screen recorder, quick settings changes, and general improvements to animations and system stability.

The company wants to deploy the new software until at least April, so depending on your phone's variant, you might be in for a longer wait. Head to the Software update entry in your phone's settings to check for the over-the-air update. If you're particularly impatient, you can also download and flash the update yourself from SamMobile's firmware archive, but you'll lose all your data in the process and might possibly end up with a brick for a phone — proceed with caution and only if you absolutely know what you're doing.

We can currently confirm the rollout for the following carriers and countries:

• US
  • Unlocked
  • US Cellular
• Brazil
• Canada
• India
• Italy
• Netherlands
• Romania
• Russia
• Switzerland
• UK

US Cellular and more countries

Samsung continues rolling out Android 10 and first people in India, Italy, the Netherlands, Romania, Switzerland and the UK report that they've received the update. In the United States, US Cellular also provides first subscribers with the update.

People in Azerbaijan and the United Arabic Emirates have received the January patch sans Android 10, which could possibly mean that they'll have to wait a little longer for the new OS.

Unlocked US phones and more countries

A tipster confirmed to us that the update is arriving on first unlocked US phones. People based in Brazil, Canada (Rogers), and Russia can also look forward to Android 10 as the rollout has begun in these countries, too.

US Unlocked update screen.

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2020-02-03 13:38:00Z
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