Tech Roundup: Google GDPR Fines, Tencent Xiaowei & More

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

1. China's Chang'e 4 lunar rover, which made history as the first spacecraft to land on the far side of the moon, breaks new ground after cotton seeds (along with rapeseed and potato seeds) carried by the lunar lander sprout, marking the very first instance of biological matter growing on the moon.
2. "Only one in four Americans want online services such as Google and Facebook to collect less of their data if it means they would have to start paying a monthly subscription fee," according to a new survey of 3,240 U.S. adult Internet users between December 13, 2018 and December 16, 2018 conducted by the Center for Data Innovation, indicating how few people are willing to pay for privacy.
3. Google gets fined 57 million Euros by French data protection watchdog CNIL in what's the first major penalty for a U.S. technology company under the new E.U. GDPR regulation; says the search giant failed to comply with regards to transparency and consent, and says that it forces users to sign up (or sign in) to a Google account in order to complete setting up an Android phone.
4. Law enforcement officials in the U.S. cannot force smartphone users to unlock their devices using fingerprints or other biometric features such as facial recognition or fingerprints, in a landmark ruling issued by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California and what's a rare instance of law catching up with advancements in tech.
5. Google, as part of a wider privacy push, begins removing apps from Play Store that request permission to access call logs and SMS text message data but haven't been manually vetted by Google staff as part of a move to cut down on apps that have access to calling and texting data; says it will only allow those apps that require full access to the information in order to accomplish the "app's primary use case."
6. Germany's antitrust watchdog The Federal Cartel Office, which has been investigating Facebook since 2015 and has already found that the social media giant abused its market dominance to gather data on people without their knowledge or consent, plans to outline more steps to prevent Facebook from gathering some forms of user data, particularly objecting to how the social network acquires data on people from third-party apps - including its own WhatsApp and Instagram services as well as games and websites - and its tracking of people who are not members.
7. E.U. antitrust watchdog European Commission to slap Google with fresh fines for hindering competition targeting its AdSense product (a platform that allows companies to place ads on their websites) that it says hindered competition by preventing customers from accepting rival search ads and restricting how competitors’ ads were displayed.
• The commission in July fined Google a record 4.3 billion euros for abusing its dominance in Android, demanding that the company alter the way it bundles search and web-browser apps onto Android mobile devices. A year earlier, Google received a then-record 2.4 billion-euro penalty after regulators accused it of skewing results to thwart smaller shopping search services.
8. Amazon joins Zigbee Alliance Board of Directors, a consortium of companies involved in creating, maintaining, and delivering open, global standards for the Internet of Things (IoT) collectively called the Zigbee protocol, as it continues to expand exponentially in the smart home space.
9. Microsoft-owned professional social network LinkedIn now requires users connecting to the service from China link phone numbers to their accounts in order to comply with Cyberspace Law that mandates websites to verify users' real identities before using their services.
10. Facebook expands its fact-checking efforts in the U.K. and takes the help of Full Fact to check articles, images, and videos posted on the social network to reduce the spread of fake news; WhatsApp, which rolled out message forward limits in India last July, extends the feature globally, restricting users from forwarding a message more than five times.
11. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg pens a new op-ed piece for The Wall Street Journal (paywall) ahead of the company's 15th anniversary; says "We don't sell people's data, even though it's often reported that we do. Facebook also doesn't deliberately share clickbait ('it's not what people want') or deliberately leave harmful content up to drive up engagement ('advertisers don't want their brands anywhere near it')," while keeping mum on the exact information it collects for advertising and whether a paid-subscription is something it is willing to consider.
12. Tencent unveils a new Siri-like smart voice assistant called Xiaowei for WeChat, the most popular all-purpose chat app used across China, to link it to its own services like QQ Music and third-parties via lite-apps for on-demand services like food delivery and ride hailing.
• WeChat's dominance is also the reason why Apple iPhone is struggling, as Chinese smartphone users don't care whether they on iOS or Android; all they care about is having WeChat on their phones, a service that has become so indispensable that every aspect of a typical Chinese person's life, not just online but also off is conducted through a single app.
13. World's first CRISPR gene-edited babies "designed" by He Jiankui, a scientist at Shenzhen's Southern University of Science and Technology, are declared illegal by China after official probe shows that He fabricated ethics approvals which he used to recruit eight couples to participate in clinical procedures between March 2017 and November 2018.
• It is to be noted that the attempt led to two pregnancies, including one that resulted in the birth of twins last November and another, that is yet to be born.
14. Microsoft is reportedly working on a project codenamed "Bali," that’s designed to give users control of data collected about them;  updates its To-Do task scheduling app to allow users attach files to specific tasks.
15. Microsoft's search engine Bing gets briefly blocked for almost a day in China for unknown reasons; partners with NewsGuard, a news literacy project that assigns nutrition label to news websites (green and red) based on a variety of criteria like credibility and transparency, to bundle the feature into Edge browser to alert users if they visit websites that use deceptive headlines, publish false content, and fail to have adequate transparency regarding ownership and financing.
16. U.S. consumer protection agency Federal Trade Commission is considering "record-setting" fines for Facebook over its abuse of user privacy, amplified by last year's Cambridge Analytica data scandal.
• But what would be the exact number that really scares Facebook? The largest the FTC has ever fined was a US$ 22.5 million penalty against Google in 2012 for tracking iOS users for advertising purposes against their consent by placing a tracking cookie circumventing Safari browser's default cookie-blocking setting.
• For a company that made more than US$13 billion in revenue last year, even millions of dollars in fines is a drop in the ocean. What it needs to do instead of monetarily penalising the company is that it should order the breakup of Facebook into three independent businesses: Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp. Now that would be a shocker, wouldn't it?
17. Urbandroid, the developer behind apps Sleep As Android, Twilight, and others, launches a new informational website Don't kill my app! that highlights the most egregious Android handset manufacturers that go aggressive with app management.
18. U.S. telecom provider Verizon reportedly working on its Netflix-like cloud gaming service, according to screenshots obtained by The Verge, as the market continues to heat up with players like Microsoft (xCloud), Google (Project Stream), and Amazon (currently said to be in the works) pursuing similar strategies to allow users avid gamers to play them across different platforms and devices.
• Cross-platform compatibility is a good thing to have, but the development isn't without its share of concerns. With net neutrality laws abolished in the U.S., what if Verizon decides to prioritise bandwidth to favour its own service over others?
19. Mozilla releases roadmap for Flash support in Firefox; to disable the plugin by default starting version 69 (it's currently at v64), and plans to completely remove Flash support from consumer versions early 2020.
20. Samsung's upcoming Galaxy S10 smartphone leaked ahead of its unveil in several images; to come with a punch hole front camera and Samsung Blockchain KeyStore, an in-house cryptocurrency wallet that lets users trade Ethereum, and potentially other cryptocurrencies.
21. Norway's National Authority for Investigation and Prosecution of Economic and Environmental Crime officially opens an investigation into reports that Jay-Z owned music streaming service TIDAL inflated streaming numbers for Beyonce and Kanye West's albums Lemonade and The Life of Pablo.
22. Facebook begins rolling out new changes that allows users to share events and coordinate with friends IRL using Stories, said to be testing a meme hub within Facebook app called LOL ("the concept is in the early stages right now," according to the company), to shutter its facial-recognition based photo sharing app Moments on February 25, and says it plans to invest US$ 300 million in local news over the next three years.
23. Amazon investors urge the retail giant to stop selling facial recognition software to government agencies. (The company raised surveillance concerns last June after reports emerged that the company is selling police departments in the U.S. facial recognition software called Rekognition that allows them to scan mug shot photos against real-time footage.)
24. A plain photo of an egg becomes the most liked Instagram post with over 51.3 million likes (as of January 27).
25. Google rolls out horizontal swiping gesture in YouTube that allows users to swipe right or left while watching videos to advance to the next video or go back, adds Google Assistant icon to www.google.com mobile homepage that launches the app on the phone (Android only), brings RCS support for Google Fi, months after expanding the MVNO service beyond Pixel phones to other Android phones and iPhones, and reportedly set to unveil Google Duo for the desktop web as it continues to overhaul its messaging strategy centred around Messages, Duo and Hangouts Chat and Meet.
26. NBC Universal jumps into an already crowded streaming market with a new service (set for launch early 2020) that will be a free, ad-supported product for cable TV subscribers, and about $12 per month for others, as Walmart abandons plans for a video streaming service in favour of improving Vudu, a video rental service it acquired in 2010; rival Viacom acquires ad-supported free TV on-demand streaming service Pluto TV for $US 340 million. (Viacom, in partnership with TV18, already offers a similar platform in India called VOOT.)
27. OnePlus is readying its next flagship, barely three months after releasing OnePlus 6T, with no notch and possibly employing a slider mechanism like Oppo (which is also a sister company, both subsidiaries of BBK Electronics Corporation) and Xiaomi to house front cameras and light sensors.
28. Apple fires fresh salvo against Qualcomm; says it wanted to use Qualcomm modems in the iPhone XS, XS Max, and XR, but had to settle for Intel LTE chips after Qualcomm refused to sell them as a direct consequence of Apple suing the chip maker for its licensing practices.
• In a separate development, German court throws out patent lawsuit filed by Qualcomm that led to the ban of iPhone 7 and 8 models in the country, dismissing the suit as groundless and that saying the patent in question was not violated by the installation of its chips in Apple's smartphones.
29. Twitter brings back reverse chronological timeline to Android, a month after the optional feature was rolled out in iOS, fixes a bug in its Android app that accidentally revealed some users' protected tweets to the public since November 3, 2014 (the company did not specify exactly how many users were impacted by the issue), begins rolling out an updated web interface with new emoji button, quick keyboard shortcuts, upgraded trends, advanced search, and more, and starts testing "Original Tweeter" tag to help users spot the original tweeter in a thread and identify fake accounts.
30. Privacy-focussed search engine DuckDuckGo launches maps search to locate addresses, businesses, geographical locations and nearby places based on data provided by Apple Maps.
31. Apple says it has replaced 11 million iPhone batteries in 2018 as part of its discounted US$ 29 battery replacement program, up from between one and two million replacements during the same period, indicating that Apple did lose out on significant revenue from potential US$ 1,000 iPhone upgrades.
• This battery replacement program, itself a response to critique that the company was intentionally throttling performance of older phones to compensate for their ageing batteries, is symptomatic of a larger trend across the smartphone industry: we have hit peak smartphone, and yearly upgrades are nowhere as exciting as they used to be 10 years ago. If anything, handset makers should release new phones only every other year, thus lengthening the product life cycle and making room for better hardware/software support in the long run.
• In other news, Apple tries new tactics to sell its new iPhone XR; sends "customised emails to owners of older iPhone models with a trade-in value of the older device and a tech specs comparison with the iPhone XR" and begins quietly re-selling iPhone SE in the U.S. four months after it discontinued the model in favour of iPhone XR.
32. Music streaming service Spotify and Indian record label T-Series enter into a global content agreement for over 160,000 songs from its catalog as the music streaming service readies India debut; purportedly getting into hardware with a "voice-controlled in-car music player" that syncs to car stereos via Bluetooth, reports The Financial Times, and makes it easy for users to mute artists, but makes the feature accessible only on mobile (once an artist is blocked however it applies to the desktop player as well).
33. Amazon takes its Echo-branded wall clock off the shelf after users report connectivity issues; says "We're working hard to address this and plan to make Echo Wall Clock available again in the coming weeks."
34. Meizu, world's 11th largest handset maker, unveils Meizu Zero, the first smartphone to have no ports, holes (even for the speaker), or wires; comes with "mSound 2.0" technology that allows the sound to come from the screen itself, an in-display fingerprint sensor, wireless charging, eSIM, IP68 water resistance rating and virtual buttons on the side that make use of haptic feedback to turn the phone on/off and adjust volume.
35. Netflix, in a letter to shareholders, says it isn't overly concerned with Disney's upcoming streaming service Disney+, and it's Fortnite and YouTube that it treats as rivals, as the company adds 8.84 million subscribers (for a total of 139 million streaming members worldwide) for the period October-December and ramps up expenditure on original content.
• "We compete with (and lose to) Fortnite more than HBO. When YouTube went down globally for a few minutes in October, our viewing and signups spiked for that time," read the missive.
36. Electric car maker Tesla to slash 7 percent of its full-time employee workforce (approx. 3,000), and retain only the most critical temps and contractors as costs mount and production of Tesla 3 model faces repeated delays.
• The move marks the second round of job cuts in less than a year after the company laid off 9 percent of its employees last June, and follows recent cost-cutting measures to reduce the price of its products and boost margins.
37. Microsoft announces plans to end support for Windows 10 Mobile devices effective December later this year; recommends users to switch to an Android or iOS device as the company fully cedes control of mobile to Apple and Google.
• The company has interestingly taken a similar "Trojan Horse" approach to Cortana voice assistant. Microsoft, which has already partnered with Amazon to enable Cortana and Amazon integration, recently announced that it would decouple Cortana from search in Windows 10 devices.
• According to Chief Executive Satya Nadella, "Cortana needs to be that skill for anybody who's a Microsoft 365 subscriber. You should be able to use it on Google Assistant, you should be able to use it on Alexa, just like how you use our apps on Android and iOS so that’s at least how we want to think about where it'll go."
38. Apple's newly released iOS 12.2 developer beta previews the company's paid news magazine subscription service Apple News Magazines, confirming earlier rumours that it intends to integrate Texture, a digital magazine subscription app it acquired last March, within Apple News. (Can it also expand Apple News beyond U.S., U.K. and Australia?)
39. Google acquires Fossil's smartwatch related intellectual property for US$ 40 million, in addition to acqui-hiring a number of Fossil employees, as it prepares to unveil its own Pixel branded wearables.
40. Popular footwear and apparel company Nike launches new Adapt BB self-lacing shoes for US$ 350 (goes on sale February 17) that can be paired with the Nike Adapt mobile app to find the perfect fit, ushering a new era of workout-related data insights.