Tech Roundup: AI Race, Android Privacy Sandbox & More

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

• Google to add options that allows users to add and change keyboard shortcuts for Chromebooks; officially begins testing Privacy Sandbox on Android as part of a limited pilot. (Unlike Apple's App Tracking Transparency (ATT) feature, which requires app developers on iOS to ask users for their consent to in-app and cross-app tracking, Privacy Sandbox avoids binary choices in favour of a middle ground that aims to strike a balance between advertising and privacy.)
• A top German court rules that law enforcement's use of Palantir's automated data analysis to prevent crime as unconstitutional.
• Microsoft's AI-powered chatbot for its Bing search engine is shown to be "insulting users, lying to them, sulking, gaslighting and emotionally manipulating people, [and] questioning its own existence," according to multiple reports highlighting its "unhinged," "seriously deranged" and "erratic" behaviour; company says "very long chat sessions can confuse the model on what questions it is answering and thus we think we may need to add a tool so you can more easily refresh the context or start from scratch." (The development also highlights the unclear legality associated with training AI systems on data culled from the web without securing permission.)
• The European Commission to assess Adobe's US$ 20 billion acquisition of Figma, noting that the "transaction threatens to significantly affect competition in the market for interactive product design and whiteboarding software."
• E-book pirate site Z-Library, which was taken down in November 2022 by the U.S. government, resurfaces with a secret personal domains for users to avoid law enforcement seizures.
• Search engine You.com updates its AI search assistant YouChat, which was integrated in December 2022, with support for reliable citations, rich media and featured apps.
• Snap-owned Snapchat surpasses 750 million monthly active users, up 25% from April 2022; reports 2.5 million subscribers for its Snapchat+ paid tier.
• Movie streamer Netflix removes its "Surprise Me" button citing low usage.
• Germany's Deutsche Telekom (T-Mobile), Spain's Telefónica (Movistar, O2), United Kingdom's Vodafone and France's Orange join forces to launch a GDPR-compliant advertising venture in an attempt to take on Google, Meta and Amazon.
• Google formally launches Privacy Sandbox for Android in beta, starting with a "small percentage" of Android 13 devices.
• Meta updates Facebook's "Why am I seeing this ad?" tool to include information about how users' on- and off-platform activity informs its machine learning models for ads; Instagram plans to shut down live shopping on March 16, 2023, and focus on ads that help users discover businesses and shops on Instagram. (The development comas as ByteDance TikTok launches its in-app shopping checkout feature in the U.S. with select partners.)
• Transcription service Otter.ai announces OtterPilot, an AI assistant that summarises meetings and captures images of shared slides.
• Meta's WhatsApp tests a new "Kept messages" setting that allows users to access saved ephemeral messages; launches Instagram Channels, a broadcast chat feature that lets creators share public, text, images and polls to directly engage with their followers.
• Tile debuts an anti-theft mode that requires a biometric scan and linking a government-issued ID card to the Tile account (in addition to agreeing to its stringent terms of service, which include a US$ 1 million penalty for tracking an individual without consent) to deter the misuse of its trackers
• Microsoft's GitHub announces general availability of Copilot for Business, the company's US$ 19/month enterprise version of its AI-powered code completion tool.
• Microsoft formally disables Internet Explorer browser on machines running Windows 10; kills off Yammer, the enterprise social network it procured more than a decade ago in June 2012 for US$ 1.2 billion, in favour of Viva Engage.
• Mozilla expands the list of supported add-ons for its Android version of Firefox browser to include Firefox Relay and ClearURLs.
• Apple says iOS 16 is installed on 72% of all iPhones and on 81% of all iPhones introduced within the last four years, with 20% of all iPhones running iOS 15 and remaining 8% running iOS 14 or earlier; iPadOS 16 adoption hits 50% overall and at 53% for all iPad models introduced in the last four years.
• Apple tests iOS and iPadOS 16.4 betas with support for Safari web apps and push notifications.
• Tesla to recall (in technical parlance, issue over-the-air software updates) nearly 363,000 vehicles equipped with the company's controversial Full Self-Driving (FSD) software after the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) identified the driver-assist program as a "crash risk."