Tech Roundup: Facebook Gaming, Samsung Galaxy Note20 & More

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

• Chinese tech giant Huawei says it has "no chips and no supply" to make smartphones due to U.S. sanctions; production of its high-end Kirin smartphone chips to stop on September 15.
• Facebook reportedly relaxed its fact-checking rules so that conservative-leaning pages in the U.S. such as Breitbart were not penalised for violations of the company's misinformation policies in an attempt to counteract alleged conservative bias on the platform.
• Twitter to begin labelling government-linked media accounts, as well as "key government officials", from China, France, Russia, the U.K., and U.S.; to no longer amplify tweets from state-controlled media organisations by excluding them from its recommendation systems.
• Microsoft is reportedly pursuing a deal to buy all of TikTok's global operations, including those in India and Europe, days after announcing plans to acquire the video service's U.S., Canada, Australia, and New Zealand business, as the U.S. government follows India's footsteps to block all transactions with ByteDance and Tencent (which owns WeChat) starting September 20 over concerns that users' information could be exploited for blackmail and corporate espionage.
• In a separate development, TikTok has announced plans to set up its first data center in Europe with a US$ 500 million investment in Ireland to store data of European users amid Washington-Beijing tensions over concerns that it hoovering up user data and creating a national security risk.
• The Tencent ban is a lot more significant. Although the ban is intended to target WeChat, the Chinese tech company is entrenched deeper in the global tech industry, with ownership stakes in Snap, Blizzard, Spotify, Universal Music Group, Riot Games, and PUBG, among others.
• If Apple is forced to removed WeChat (it's already removed from the Indian App Store), it could render the iPhone a lot less useful for Chinese companies with an international presence, many of whom use WeChat as a primary communication tool, and the larger Chinese diaspora in America who use it to communicate with friends and family in China. May be this is the time to switch to Signal?
• The Indian government's ban on Chinese-based apps also include Baidu's search app, Xiaomi Mi Browser Pro, NetEase, Meitu's BoXxCAM and ByteDance's video-editing tool CapCut for possible privacy and security violations and rising geopolitical tension between India and China.

Facebook Gaming arrives on iOS

• Google discontinues Pixel 4 and Pixel 4 XL flagship phones merely nine months after they were released in October of last year to lukewarm reception, making it the shortest-lived handset among all Pixel phones sold by the company; comes as a leaked internal Android development document suggests Google is working on builds for a Pixel 5a, foldable Pixel, and at least two other first-party devices.
• Former Google engineer and Otto Trucking founder Anthony Levandowski is sentenced to 18 months on one count of stealing trade secrets, in addition to agreeing to pay US$ 756,499.22 in restitution to Waymo and a fine of US$ 95,000; files countersuit against Uber alleging that "Uber stalled the closing of the Otto Trucking acquisition so that it could work out a settlement with Waymo/Google in the trade secrets action," and that "by preventing Mr. Levandowski from obtaining the benefits of the Otto Trucking Agreement, Uber has violated the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing."
• It's worth pointing out that post acquisition, Otto Trucking was rebranded as Uber Freight, which has reported hundreds of millions in revenue since its creation. By claiming ownership of Uber Freight, the new lawsuit claims he be awarded at least US$ 4.128 billion in damages.
• Mozilla rolls out Firefox 79 with support for Enhanced Tracking Protection (ETP) 2.0 that blocks redirect tracking by default; says it has blocked 3.4 trillion tracking cookies after enabling Enhanced Tracking Protection by default in September 2019.
• Facebook becomes the latest company to decry Apple's restrictive App Store policies, as it launches Facebook Gaming on iOS without the app's mini games feature to get around the App Store's approval process.
• Apple's argument that the company can't individually review games offered on streaming services is weak because it doesn't apply the same rule to other streaming services like Netflix or YouTube.
• If anything, it comes across as an attempt to stave any potential competition to its Apple Arcade game subscription service. Apple's ecosystem has never been about choice, but more about its right to control what can and can't appear on its products. And if the recent Hey controversy is any indication, it's all about money.
• Toshiba, which launched the world's first laptop computer in 1985 (T1100), formally exits the laptop business, after Sharp acquires the rest of Toshiba's computer business, almost two years following the purchase of 80.1% of the division in 2018 and a subsequent rebrand — it's now called Dynabook — last year.
• New leaked documents reveal that Google's parent company Alphabet trains its employees not to use certain terms in writing like "dominant," "market," "barriers to entry," and "network effects" to protect the company from possible antitrust backlash.
• Handset maker OnePlus confirms its latest smartphones OnePlus 8, 8 Pro, and Nord come bundled with uninstallable Facebook App Installer, Facebook App Manager, and Facebook Services, in addition to apps like Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, and Netflix.
• Sony unveils WH-1000XM4 headphones with improved noise cancellation and an option to simultaneously pair with two devices at once over Bluetooth for US$ 349.99.
• WordPress-owner Automattic launches P2, a new communication and collaboration tool for remote teams, allowing members to organise files, projects, and conversations all in one place.
• The U.K. scraps a controversial algorithm used in visa applications following allegations that it discriminates against certain nationalities, with applicants from "suspect" countries automatically receiving a higher risk score, reducing their chances of being granted a visa.
• Researchers demonstrate a new facial recognition system (using an image translation technique called CycleGAN) that misdirects the algorithm into classifying an individual as someone else; comes on the heels of new attempts to subvert facial recognition such as Fawkes, which relies on "cloaking" faces by slightly altering photos so as to fool AI systems that bank on image databases gathered by scraping social media platforms.

The new Samsung Galaxy Note20 and Note20 Ultra

• Mobile-only short-form streaming service Quibi reportedly planning to offer a completely free tier to subscribers in Australia and New Zealand as the company struggles to build its subscriber base.
• Samsung announces Galaxy Note20 and Note20 Ultra Android smartphones, Galaxy Buds Live with noise cancellation, Galaxy Z Fold 2 foldable phone, 11" Galaxy Tab S7 and 12.5" S7+ tablets, and Galaxy Watch 3 in 41mm and 45mm variants at its annual Unpacked event; strikes deal with Microsoft to add deeper integration with Office, including syncing Notes with Microsoft OneNote (it however doesn't work the other way), and let users stream Android apps to Windows 10 devices via Your Phone.
• Indian ed-tech giant Byju's acquires 18-month-old Mumbai-based online coding startup WhiteHat Jr. for US$ 300 million, as it seeks to expand its footprint in the country during the pandemic.
• Google updates its G Suite apps with link previews, Smart Compose in Docs, improved comment navigation, and support for Microsoft Office files on Android.
• Smart speaker company Sonos accuses Amazon of predatory pricing by pricing its Echo speakers below cost, adding "companies like Amazon and Google are only able to engage in these kinds of price wars because of their ability to make up for losses from hardware sales."
• Chinese tech conglomerate Tencent is said to be in talks to merge China's biggest game-streaming platforms Huya and DouYu, giving it a combined market value of US$ 10 billion with over 300 million users.
• Online food pickup and delivery service DoorDash debuts DashMart, an online convenience store to sell snacks, groceries, and other food-related products from partner restaurants, in eight U.S. cities.
• Password management service LastPass rolls out new feature for premium subscribers that highlights breached passwords that end on the dark web for sale pose a security risk.
• E-commerce giant Amazon partners with Bharti Airtel, the third-largest telecom operator in India with more than 300 million subscribers, to sell a wide-range of AWS offerings under Airtel Cloud brand to small, medium, and large-sized businesses in the country.
• Uber acquires Autocab, a U.K.-based company that specialises in making software for taxi firms, as it seeks to widen its operations in the country; development comes as the company reports a net loss of US$ 1.78 billion in the second quarter of 2020, down from a year-ago net loss of US$ 5.24 billion, with its delivery business (Uber Eats) surpassing its core ride-hailing division.