Tech Roundup: OpenAI Operator, Samsung Galaxy S25 & More

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

• ByteDance-owned TikTok gets blocked in the U.S. but restores service to existing users in the country after reaching an "agreement with our service providers" and thanks U.S. President Donald Trump "for providing the necessary clarity"; marks a new phase in the fight over the future of the app.
• Meta unveils Edits, a video editing app coming next month on iOS and soon on Android, after CapCut is removed from app stores as part of the divest-or-ban law; reiterates it will continue to use its fact checkers outside of the U.S. "for now," and that it will make further changes based on how its Community Notes system works in the U.S.
• X begins rolling out a vertical video feed for U.S. users, as its rival Bluesky adds a custom feed for vertical videos; adds a video tab in the app's bottom navigation bar for quick access to video content on the platform.
• Meta-owned WhatsApp pilots adding music to Status Updates; lets users cross-post to Facebook and Instagram by linking their WhatsApp accounts with the other two platforms via the Accounts Centre hub.
• Microsoft loses its status as OpenAI's exclusive cloud provider, but says it has a new deal with the AI company that gives it a "right of first refusal" when OpenAI seeks to build additional capacity; also notes it has rights to OpenAI IP for use within its products. (The news follows the announcement of a joint venture between Arm, Microsoft, Nvidia, Oracle, and OpenAI to build a system of data centers in the U.S. called Starbase.)
• Movie streaming service Netflix once again raises prices in the U.S., Canada, Portugal and Argentina, with the standard U.S. plan jumping from US$ 15.49 to US$ 17.99 per month (the standard plan with ads has been increased from US$ 6.99 to US$ 7.99, and the Premium plan will now cost US$ 24.99, up from US$ 22.99); comes as the platform surpasses 301.6 million global subscribers, adding 18.9 million subscribers in Q4 2024.
• AI search company Perplexity debuts Sonar, an API service to let devs build generative search tools into their apps.
• Apple enables Apple Intelligence by default on macOS Sequoia 15.3, iOS 18.3 or iPadOS 18.3.
• Meta says it will offer eligible TikTok creators free verification, content deals and up to US$ 5,000 in bonuses to post Reels, as it tries to capitalise on the uncertainty surrounding TikTok.
• Chinese smartphone sales fall 3.2% YoY in Q4 2024, as Apple drops 18.2% to a 17.1% market share and Huawei increases 15.5% to an 18.1% market share.
• The U.K. government announces plans to allow citizens to digitise their driver's licenses through the GOV.UK mobile wallet app.
• Microsoft says it will automatically keep users signed in to their accounts starting next month; begins rolling out its new Game Assist in-game browser overlay on Windows 11.
• Google details improvements to Android's Circle to Search, including features to automatically recognising phone numbers, addresses and URLs, as Gemini gains the ability to work across multiple apps (aka extensions) in a single prompt.
• Samsung unveils the Galaxy S25, S25 Plus and Ultra handsets; plans to launch Galaxy S25 Edge, an ultra-thin version of its Galaxy S25 phone, in the first half of this year.
• Samsung's Galaxy S25 lineup becomes the first to support the Content Credentials standard, which identifies AI-generated images; makes Google's Gemini the default on-device assistant for the new Galaxy S25 series.
• Samsung updates its Wallet app with "Instant Installment," its take on the buy now pay later (BNPL) service, and "Tap to Transfer," similar to Apple's Tap to Cash; launches a kid-friendly mode for the Galaxy Watch 7, letting children call and text trusted contacts and parents track kids via GPS.
• Google begins broadly rolling out a Google Home extension in the Gemini app that makes it possible to control smart home devices linked to users' Google Account.

• Microsoft-owned LinkedIn faces a lawsuit by Premium customers who allege the business-focused social media platform disclosed their private messages to third-parties without permission to train generative artificial intelligence models.
• Google's YouTube adds experimental features, including higher audio bitrate of up to 256kbps for music videos and faster playback on mobile devices, for Premium users.
• Google signs an agreement to acquire a part of the HTC VIVE engineering team in Taiwan for US$ 250 million in cash, aiming to "accelerate" Android XR development.
• A new report from The Washington Post reveals that Google worked with the Israel Defense Forces, including offering AI tools, in the immediate aftermath of Hamas's attack on Israel in October 2023.
• Adobe updates Premiere Pro to allow users to search for video clips simply by describing them.
• Web browser Brave introduces a new feature in Brave Search called Rerank that allows users to "customise search rankings by boosting or removing domains from search results."
• Anthropic debuts Citations, a new API feature that allows developers to "ground" answers in source documents, for Claude 3.5 Sonnet and Claude 3.5 Haiku models.
• Google rolls out the first public beta of Android 16 for Pixel devices with support for Live Updates for ride sharing, food ordering and navigation apps; changes how visible URLs show up on mobile search results globally, dropping the "breadcrumbs" that show the hierarchy of a webpage's URL.
• Epic launches a free games program for its Epic Games Store for mobile and promises to pay the Apple Core Technology Fee for participants in the program on iOS for one year.
• OpenAI releases a "research preview" of its Operator AI agent that can automate web-based tasks and partners with DoorDash, Etsy, Instacart, OpenTable, Priceline, StubHub, Thumbtack and Uber (It's worth noting that OpenAI will store chats and associated screenshots from customers who use Operator for up to 90 days); comes as Perplexity launches Perplexity Assistant in its Android app, which can take "multi-app actions" like hailing a ride.
• Pakistan's parliament passes a controversial bill giving the government sweeping controls on social media, including prison terms for spreading "disinformation."
• The U.S. President Donald Trump signs an executive order on artificial intelligence to develop systems "that are free from ideological bias or engineered social agendas."
• Google-owned Fitbit agrees to pay a US$ 12.25 million fine over its Ionic smartwatches, which the company recalled in 2022 after reports that the watches' lithium-ion batteries overheated and, in some cases, caused second-degree and third-degree burns on consumers' arms or wrists.
• The U.K. Competition and Markets authority (CMA) opens investigations into Apple's and Google's mobile ecosystems, including operating systems, app stores and browsers, to "assess how competition is working across Apple's and Google's mobile ecosystems and what barriers may be preventing other competitors from offering rival products and services on Apple's and Google's platforms."
• Google launches its Chrome Web Store for Enterprises, allowing organisations to create a curated list of extensions that can be installed in employees' web browsers and minimise the risk of users installing potentially harmful or unvetted add-ons.
• Social media networks Tumblr updates Tumblr TV with video content, nearly a decade after launching it as a feed of GIFs.
• The Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) serves notices to cab aggregators Ola and Uber notice following consumer complaints about differential pricing based on mobile devices used; comes after reports that such services charge iPhone and Android users different fares for the same trips and orders.
• Google debuts a new security feature called Identity Check for supported Android devices that locks sensitive settings behind biometric authentication when outside of trusted locations; unveils classroom and accessibility features in Chromebooks, including granular controls in Google Workspace for Education, and rolls out a tool that lets users control their computer with their head and facial expressions.
• Truecaller, which has over 2.6 million paying users; rolls out real-time caller ID to its ~750,000 iOS subscribers, a feature that was previously only available on Android.