Tech Roundup: Amazon's Echo Blunder, WhatsApp Child Pornography Problem & More

[A recurring feature on the latest in Science & Technology.]

1. Facebook's Software Development Kit (SDK), which allows app developers to integrate their apps with Facebook's platform apart from offering user analytics, display ads and enable users to login to a service with their Facebook ID, is found once again to be automatically transferring details like app usage statistics (such as when it's opened and closed), location, among others, from various popular Android apps like Skyscanner, Kayak, TripAdvisor, Duolingo, Yelp and Shazam back to Facebook all without user consent until GDPR went into effect last May. ("This happens whether people have a Facebook account or not, or whether they are logged into Facebook or not," says the new study.)
2. Indian government issues an order authorising 10 Central agencies to intercept, monitor, and decrypt "any information generated, transmitted, received or stored in any computer" in the country as part of the Information Technology Act, raising fears of a surveillance state; proposes amendments to rules governing content and freedom of speech online to make it mandatory for online platforms to "proactively" deploy technology (automated or otherwise) to remove/censor content seems as "unlawful" and require platforms like WhatsApp to break end-to-end encryption to be broken in order to trace the origin of messages. (It is to be noted that Australia just weeks ago passed a similar law that mandates E2EE chat platforms to provide backdoors for purposes of aiding government requests.)
3. Vietnam's new cybersecurity law (passed back in July, 2018) that mandates internet companies in the country to remove content the government regards as "toxic" and hand over any user data on request goes into effect today.
4. Amazon sends a man, who requested a copy of his Alexa search history through E.U. GDPR privacy law, more than 1,700 Echo digital voice assistant recordings belonging to a total stranger; blames it on a "human error" and says it deleted the audio files from the download link it shared with the man, who had incidentally already downloaded the recordings to his computer. (The disturbing incident follows a similar privacy mishap that occurred earlier this year when a family from Portland, Oregon, discovered that its Alexa-powered Echo device had recorded their private conversations and sent it to a random person in their contacts list.)
5. Facebook, which is already battling a barrage of privacy scandals, faces a new battle in WhatsApp after TechCrunch and BBC detail the use of platform's chat groups to spread illegal child pornography and rape videos, often masked by the app's end-to-end encryption that cloaks the content being shared from other parties, including WhatsApp itself, and inefficient content moderation (automated or otherwise) practices; Google shuts down third-party apps on Google Play Store that made it possible for users to discover child porn WhatsApp groups by incorporating "Adult" sections "that offer invite links to join rings of users trading images of child exploitation." (Research undertaken by AntiToxin Technologies found that these removed apps were supported by ads from Google and Facebook's ad platforms AdMob and Facebook Audience Network. Also, will Apple ban WhatsApp from App Store like the way it did with Tumblr and Telegram?)
6. Security researchers find new ways attackers linked to Iranian government (called Charming Kitten) steal two factor authentication (2FA) tokens in real-time; found to be embedding hidden images in phishing emails, upon clicking which directs users to lookalike Gmail and Yahoo! Mail login pages that the hackers use to capture the entered credentials on-the-fly to simultaneously enter them into the "real" login page, and in the event the accounts were protected by 2FA, they redirected targets to a fake page that requested a one-time password, which were also subsequently captured and entered into the original 2FA screen in order to gain access.
7. Cydia, the app distribution channel for jailbroken Apple devices, says it's planning to shut down in-app purchases through the app store after uncovering a bug related to PayPal digital token authorisation.
8. Vine and HQ Trivia 34-year-old co-founder Colin Kroll is found dead in his New York City apartment in what appears to be a case of drug overdose.
9. Instagram brings Live Q&A stickers to stories as it continues to aggressively push out new features inspired by other platforms like TikTok; tests horizontal tap-to-advance feed (just like Stories and the short-lived trial it conducted in October in its Explore feed), but backpedals after user outrage.
10. Google Drive tests new feature that allows users to share docs with non-Google account holders.
11. Apple sends ads disguised as push notifications to promote its Carpool Karaoke show and alert users of Apple Music's availability on Amazon Echo devices, running contrary to App Store guidelines that explicitly forbids developers from doing so - Section 4.5.3: "Do not use Apple Services to spam, phish, or send unsolicited messages to customers, including Game Center, Push Notifications, etc." (Guess those rules don't apply to itself?)
12. Anthony Levandowski, the controversial ex-Google engineer accused of stealing trade secrets from Waymo, who returned with an self-driving robotruck startup called Pronto.AI (previously called Kache.AI) earlier this July, designs a camera-based advanced driver assist system (ADAS) called Co-Pilot targeting long-haul trucking industry; tests the system by by undertaking a 3,000-mile drive from San Francisco to New York without any human intervention.
13. Google's Gboard for Android gains new colour themes, adds GIF support for Messages on the web, and brings a native password manager interface to Chrome's Android app alongside a "Sneak peek" experimental feature that loads a linked page in a overlay a la iOS' 3D Touch.
14. Apple releases iOS 12.1.2 software update with bug fixes and a workaround to circumvent Qualcomm's iPhone ban in China, complete with a new animation to force close apps from app switcher in the country. (Qualcomm holds a China-exclusive software patent on how apps close, which, now to think of it, is as dumb as Apple getting a patent for rounded corners.)
15. Google Lens, the search giant's  machine learning/computer vision-powered image recognition tool, can now "identify more than one billion products—four times the number it covered at launch" one year ago; says mobile-first indexing is now used for over half the web pages in its search results globally, a landmark move towards favouring mobile sites over desktop sites in Google Search.
16. Apple admits that some 2018 iPad Pro models are indeed shipping with a slight bend in the aluminium chassis, but says it's not a defect, adding it's a "side effect of the manufacturing process" that is not expected to worsen over time or negatively effect the iPad's performance "in any practical way."
17. Office chat platform Slack starts banning users who have visited U.S. sanctioned countries including Iran and North Korea in order to comply with U.S. regulations.
18. Snap Inc.'s share price hits an all-time of low of US$ 5 for the first time as continues to face stiff competition from Facebook, as new reports emerge that Facebook tried to buy Snapchat again in mid-2016, less than a year before it went public in March 2017, via The Wall Street Journal.
19. Facebook is reportedly developing a way to use cryptocurrency (not bitcoins, but stablecoin) to transfer money on WhatsApp in India, according to a new story by Bloomberg. (With Google Pay, Paytm and Flipkart's PhonePe leading the mobile payments space, it will be interesting to see how this plays out.)
20. Twitter begins displaying the client that is used to send each tweet; highlights whether a user tweets from the web or mobile and, if they are on a phone, whether they used Twitter's iOS or Android apps, or a third-party app.
21. Ride hailing startup Uber restarts its self-driving car program in Pittsburgh, nine months after the project was halted after one of its vehicles struck and killed pedestrian Elaine Herzberg in the Phoenix suburb of Tempe; gets fined US$ 460,000 by French data protection watchdog CNIL over its 2016 data breach that exposed 57 million rider information to cybercriminals, who connected to Uber's GitHub private repositories using some employee's login and password, and then connect to Uber's Amazon Web Services account (which was stored in plaintext on GitHub) and download user data.
22. The office of the Washington, DC Attorney General files lawsuit against Facebook over the company's Cambridge Analytica scandal, and its lax privacy standards surrounding third-party app access.
23. Microsoft issues an emergency patch to fix a security vulnerability in Internet Explorer web browser that allows hackers to gain broad access to computer systems, including capabilities to install programs; view, change or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights.
24. Facebook reportedly shelved a feature called Common Ground aimed at promoting civil political discourse that "tried to encourage users with different political beliefs to interact in less-hostile ways" over "fears the proposed fix could trigger claims of bias against conservatives," according to The Wall Street Journal.
25. Amazon files new patent that connects camera-equipped smart doorbells to facial recognition "surveillance" databases (like Rekognition) so as to alert homeowners and police of suspicious activities and people. (When is it coming for Echo devices?)
26. Facebook, which promised it will roll out a feature to allow users (and non-users) to clear the browsing history connected to their profiles back in May, says the feature (called Off-Facebook history) is still months away from launch (The data involves a list of websites and apps that you visit even when you are not on Facebook. The company collects this information through Facebook's software plugins that are used by third-party app developers.) 
27. Amazon announces record-breaking Christmas holiday sales; says customers bought millions of Amazon Devices and that "tens of millions of people worldwide started Prime free trials or began paid memberships."
28. Amazon and Walmart's Flipkart face new roadblocks in India after government announces changes to how foreign companies can conduct business in the country (foreign direct investment policy) effective Feb. 01; bars online marketplaces from entering into exclusive deals (Amazon has exclusive tie-ups with Xiaomi, and Flipkart, with Oppo) for selling products on their platforms and mandates that not more than 25% of the inventory on an e-commerce platform can be from a single vendor. (The move comes after online sellers complained to the Competition Commission of India that the country’s largest e-tailers, Flipkart and Amazon, were indulging in predatory pricing and deep discounting, destroying the business of smaller vendors. Offline sellers too have complained against the extremely low prices offered by online retailers, thereby translating to low footfall in brick-and-mortar-stores.)
29. Taiwanese handset manufacturer Foxconn to start assembling high-end iPhone models from its new Sriperumbudur facility in Chennai, India. (Taiwanese company Wistron currently makes the lower end Apple models like iPhone 6S and SE in Bengaluru.)
30. U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) passes ruling that authorises wireless carriers to "continue their efforts to stop unwanted text messaging through robotext-blocking, anti-spoofing measures, and other anti-spam features," thus giving them broad powers to block any text message they wish, potentially harming competition and raising censorship concerns.
31. Essential officially discontinues selling its namesake flagship Android phone; says it's "now hard at work on our next mobile product and will continue to sell accessories and provide speedy software updates and customer support to our existing community."