We all wish our phones were just a little faster, right? Whether you're chugging along with a device from three years ago or rocking a brand new Pixel, it's the same — more speed is better.

Here's what to try, and what to avoid.

What Works:
The default apps and settings on Android aren't always the best if speed is your priority. Making a few changes and keeping your phone free from clutter can give you a quick performance boost.
1. Clean Up Your Home Screen
2. Use a Different Launcher
3. Change Browsers
4. Uninstall Bad Apps
5. Remove Antivirus Software
6. Stop Apps Auto-Syncing
7.Reboot Regularly
8. Speed Up Animations
9. Try a Different ROM
10. Flash a Custom Kernel
11. Control Background Apps With Greenify

What Doesn't Work:
1. Task Killers
2. Closing Apps
3. Using Any Speed Boosters
4. Hitting the Limits

As the country moves towards a cashless environment after demonetisation, the initial awe and confusion have given way to a flurry of concerns.

The ease of conducting financial transactions is probably the biggest motivator to go digital. You will no longer need to carry wads of cash, plastic cards, or even queue up for ATM .

The recent waiver of service tax on card transactions up to Rs 2,000 is one of the incentives provided by the government to promote digital transactions.

If all transactions are on record, it will be very easy for people to keep track of their spending.

The written record will help you keep tabs on your spending and this will result in better budgeting.

It may not seem like much of an advantage, but being cashless makes it easy to ward off borrowers.

“The biggest fear is the risk of identity theft. Since we are culturally not attuned to digital transactions, even well-educated people run the risk of falling into phishing traps,” says Nagpal.

Another weak link is the inadequate redressal mechanism. “Given the tedious process and poor grievance redressal, people will have no easy recourse if they lose money online,” adds Nagpal. There is no stringent legal process to deal with this kind or scale of fraud.

Since you will be dependent on your phone for all your transactions on the move, losing it can prove to be a double whammy.

While there is no denying the convenience of card or mobile wallet transactions, it could open a spending trap for an unsuspecting population.

The government's demonetisation move of Rs. 500/- and Rs. 1000/-, and the subsequent cash crunch, has led to a surge in digital payments.

According to the government data, the number of daily transactions through e-wallet services such as Oxigen, Paytm and MobiKwik has shot up from 17 lakh — recorded on November 8 when demonetisation was announced — to 63 lakh as on December 7 (a growth of 271%). In terms of value, the surge has been 267%, from Rs 52 crore daily to Rs 191 crore now.

Transactions through RuPay Cards (e-commerce and point-of-sale) were up 316% at 16 lakh daily (3.85 lakh on November 8), while in terms of value the growth has been 503% at Rs 236 crore (Rs 39 crore). The government, however, did not provide a break-up of transactions conducted in urban and rural/semi-urban areas.

The government and digital payment companies expect the trend to stay strong, at least till easy availability of cash. The trend got a boost after fiaince minister Arun Jaitley's announcement of a slew of incentives on Thursday for digital payments. The surge has been encouraging and in line with the government's thinking of promoting digital transactions "to drive in honest, accountable and transparent" payments, said Ravi Shankar Prasad, minister for electronics and IT.

"With digital transactions, money will come into the system, it will be accountable, generate tax and help develop the country's economy. When money will come into banks, the government will be able to come up with better welfare schemes," Prasad said.

The government has doled out a number of sops for consumers when they make payments digitally. These include discounts on purchase of fuel and payments for insurance and at toll plazas. Service tax has been waived on digital transactions for purchases up to Rs 2,000, while charges on transactions through feature phones have also been cut.

Planning to buy Google's Pixel smartphone? This may be just the right time. The smartphone is available at a discount of Rs 7,000 with HDFC Bank's credit cards. The cashback offer is available till November 30.

There's another attractive offer available on the made-by Google smartphone on Flipkart website. The e-tailer is offering an exchange offer of up to Rs 26,000 on the smartphone. This offer can be further clubbed with cashback offers of Rs 5,000 and Rs 7,000 from Axis Bank and HDFC Bank respectively.

Google's Pixel smartphone launched in India on October 13 and sports a starting price tag of Rs 57,000. The smartphone features a 5-inch full-HD (1080x1920 pixels) resolution AMOLED display and is backed by a 2770mAh battery with fast-charging technology. It has an 8MP front-facing camera powered by Sony IMX179 sensor and a 12.3MP rear camera with Sony IMX378 sensor, f/2.0 aperture, and a larger 1.55um lens allowing the camera to capture more light. It also includes features like Smartburst and Lens Blur.

Pixel features aluminium and glass frames and comes in Quite Black and Very Silver colour variants. The smartphone also has a Really Blue colour variant, which is avialable only in the US. The storage options available include 32GB and 128GB. The smartphone runs Android 7.1 Nougat operating system out of the box.

With Pixel smartphones, Google has given a break to its 'Nexus' lineup, streamlining the naming scheme for all its devices. Although pixel has been crafted by HTC, they are the first to come without any OEM branding.

Almost all major Linux distributions (e.g. Ubuntu, Linux Mint, and Elementary) have the in-built functionality to directly run from USB flash drives. This is quite convenient as it lets you carry your personalized desktop settings, files etc. with you anywhere. Wonder if you could do something like this with Windows 10 as well?

Yes, you can. A free Windows utility program called WinToUSB allows you to install the full copy of Windows 10 on any flash drive. This flash drive can be then used to boot just about any computer (as long as it supports booting from USB flash drive) to a fully-functional Windows 10 OS.

To get this done, all you need is a USB flash drive (preferably 16B or higher in capacity) and a Windows 10 installation disc (or ISO file). Here's how to create a portable Windows 10 installation using WinToUSB.

Step 1: Download and install WinToUSB from its website. On running the utility, you have to specify the location of the Windows 10 ISO or the installation disc. Click Next.

Step 2: After plugging in the flash drive into the USB port of the computer, select it in WinToUSB and format it. Once this is done, you have to select the flash drive as both system and boot partition. Finally, click Next to start copying essential Windows 10 files to the flash drive.

Step 3: The process of creating the bootable Windows 10 USB may take a few minutes. When the process is finally finished, you can use this flash drive to boot (and run) a fully-working copy of Windows 10 on any computer. That's how easy it is.

It's important to note some pointers here. When you boot up Windows 10 from USB for the flash drive for the first time, you'll need to do a little bit of an initial setup. This includes regular tasks such as setting up user accounts and passwords and configuring network settings. But after this, all those settings would be saved to the USB flash drive itself and thus won't need to be configured every time you boot from the flash drive.

Google on Tuesday unveiled a new smartphone and home hub that squarely aim at products from market leaders Apple and Amazon.

The company's new branded smartphone, called "Pixel," marks a departure from past efforts. Up to now, Google's Nexus phones were made by a variety of manufacturers that sold them under their brands.

Google is trying to position itself as a complete supplier rather than simply offering Nexus-branded handsets that were rebatched by another company," said Jeff Orr, senior practice director for mobile devices at ABI Research.

Google announced Pixel, along with its home entertainment and smart device hub, called "Google Home," at a launch event at Ghiradelli Square in San Francisco. At the forum, the company emphasized the unity of the ecosystem behind its new hardware offerings.

That's more of a challenge to a device leader such as Apple than an announcement of the next generation of Google-branded handsets," Orr told TechNewsWorld.

Leaks about Google's expected family of Pixel smartphones, reportedly manufactured by HTC, on Monday reached a crescendo ahead of the company's Tuesday press event.

Google is poised to announce two smartphones, the Pixel and Pixel XL, according to specs published by UK retailer Carphone Warehouse.

Both use a Qualcomm Snapdragon 821 processor.
Google Assistant reportedly is a major feature of the devices.
"This is a major disruption," said Werner Goertz, research director for personal technologies at Gartner.

"Google realize the Nexus concept worked up to a certain point, but now they have to take tighter ownership of the end point, which is the smartphone -- not the PC or tablets," he told TechNewsWorld.

Internet giant Google has announced Google Station, which the company claims will bring fast and affordable Wi-Fi to millions of people across India. Under the service, Google plans to rollout Wi-Fi hot spots at public places such as malls, metro stations, cafes and universities across the country. The announcement was made at an event organised by the company in Gurugram today.

"The goal is to give people many hot spots within a few minutes walk from their home, university, or workplace, unified by a simple login process that works across all of them," Caesar Sengupta, vice-president, Next Billion Users at Google said in a statement. The company plans to set up infrastructure for the same and offer unified logins to users.

The company in association with RailTel currently offers free Wi-Fi access at 53 railway stations across India and plans to take it to 100 stations by the year-end. The plan is to take the service to 400 train stations. The company also announced at the event that its AI-powered Google Assistant will soon be available in Hindi. Google Assistant is the company's rival to Apple's Siri and Microsoft's Cortana.

Google also announced that India was the first country to get its new messaging app Allo. Google Allo takes on Facebook-owned WhatsApp.

Having announced it earlier this year at the I/O developer conference, Google has finally made its messaging app - Allo, available to the general public. The app boasts features like end-to-end encryption and claims to deliver a great user experience. Allo is likely to compete against the likes of WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger.

In essence, Allo is an instant messaging app which works a lot like WhatsApp. Users don't need a Google account to sign-in and an account can be created using just the mobile number. However, Google has introduced some fun and exciting features in Allo that make it quite fun. Want to know more?

Here are some key features of the new Google Allo app:

Google Assistant support Allo comes with Google Assistant integration, which brings the search feature into the app. Users can search for hotels, flights, movie theatres and many other things directly from the app. Along with this, there are plans to integrate the app with other services like YouTube, Maps and Translate. Essentially, the concierge service comes to life in Allo.

Smart Reply Allo messaging app is equipped with a 'Smart Reply' feature, earlier seen in the Inbox by Gmail app. Smart Reply provides suggestions to users for replies at the time of texting. It uses artificial intelligence to read text and replying patterns of the users, and then comes up with relevant suggestions.

Bigger texts Google Allo users can adjust the size of the text replies with ease. Users can increase or decrease the font size using slider buttons called 'Whisper' and 'Shout'.

Incognito Mode Allo also comes with an Incognito mode, which is built on company's open signal protocol. The feature is designed to make chats more secure. Incognito chats also expire once a conversation is over.

Write on pictures In order to make conversations more interesting and engaging, Allo app allows users to write or draw on pictures before sending them.

Stickers onboard Just like Line and WeChat, Google Allo offers stickers to make conversations fun and more expressive.

In an active group on Whatsapp, messages can often flow at the speed of light. This can cause confusion when people start to have individual conversations within the group.

If you've ever fallen victim to being misunderstood for saying "Old" in reference to a joke your aunt shared in the family Whatsapp group, but your cousin took offence because she mistook it as your reply for a selfie she shared at the same time, asking everyone "How do I look?", this new Whatsapp feature is a godsend for you.

With its latest update, Whatsapp allows you to directly reply to individual messages, which are then embedded into your reply for better understanding. The feature is available for both Android and iOS users.

Still not sure how to use it? Here's a step-by-step guide

Step 1: Press and hold the message you want to directly reply to. A menu of options would appear right above it.

Step 2: Tap on 'Reply'. The message will now be embedded into your textbox.

Step 3: Type in your message, and hit 'Send'. This is all you need to do to reply to particular messages in Whatsapp. This new feature comes in handy during lengthy conversations, and minimises any sort of confusion.

To avoid wastage of screen space, quoted messages do not appear in full, but you can tap them, and Whatsapp scrolls all the way up to the original text.

Facebook-owned Whatsapp regularly updates its iOS and Android apps. However, it seems that the company is planning to bring a new update for its Windows 10 mobile app.

The update, which is currently in its last phase of beta testing, enables OneDrive integration in WhatsApp. This can come in handy when backing up WhatsApp data while changing devices. The update is expected to be rolled out gradually to all users.

Until now, if users had to transfer data from one Windows device to another, the same wasn't possible. In order to do so, users had to first install a third party app and then transfer their data to the downloaded app. Furthermore, users then had to transfer the data back into their new Windows devices through the same third party app. This seriously compromised user data and privacy.

Whatsapp already supports cloud-backup on services from other platforms such as Android (Google Drive) and Apple (iCloud). However, the update comes with a new challenge. It will likely make it even more difficult to switch between platforms. Should users want to transfer from a Windows-based device to an Android or iOS device, it would indeed be very difficult. A direct transition would, however, rectify this feature.

The company will be also adding a new camera icon for sharing pictures and videos in the new update. Already available on other operating systems, the feature allows users to share photos and videos directly through the app itself, without having to switch or toggle between other applications.

Facebook-owned Whatsapp regularly updates its iOS and Android apps. However, it seems that the company is planning to bring a new update for its Windows 10 mobile app.

The update, which is currently in its last phase of beta testing, enables OneDrive integration in WhatsApp. This can come in handy when backing up WhatsApp data while changing devices. The update is expected to be rolled out gradually to all users.

Until now, if users had to transfer data from one Windows device to another, the same wasn't possible. In order to do so, users had to first install a third party app and then transfer their data to the downloaded app. Furthermore, users then had to transfer the data back into their new Windows devices through the same third party app. This seriously compromised user data and privacy.

Whatsapp already supports cloud-backup on services from other platforms such as Android (Google Drive) and Apple (iCloud). However, the update comes with a new challenge. It will likely make it even more difficult to switch between platforms. Should users want to transfer from a Windows-based device to an Android or iOS device, it would indeed be very difficult. A direct transition would, however, rectify this feature.

The company will be also adding a new camera icon for sharing pictures and videos in the new update. Already available on other operating systems, the feature allows users to share photos and videos directly through the app itself, without having to switch or toggle between other applications.

Popular photo-sharing app Instagram recently launched its 'Stories' feature to take on rival Snapchat. Stories is essentially a feature that allows users to post pictures and videos that automatically disappear after 24 hours. While that's fine for Instagram's mobile apps, those of you who use Instagram on desktop may have noticed that this feature has not shown up on Instagram's website yet.

But worry not, as there is an easy solution for this. If you use Google Chrome (which you most probably do), it's easy to view Instagram stories on desktop using a simple Chrome extension.

Dubbed Chrome IG Story, the extension injects your friend's Instagram Stories above your feed on Instagram.com desktop website, just like they appear in the mobile app. Here's how to use Chrome IG Story to view Instagram stories on desktop

Step 1: Search for Chrome IG Story chrome in Chrome Web Store. When found, click the 'Add to Chrome' button to install the extension.

Step 2: Once the extension is installed, you'll see its icon show up besides the icons of other extensions.

Step 3: For testing Chrome IG Story, go to Instagram.com website from the desktop and check your profile. You should now be able to see the Instagram Stories that appear on your mobile app, on the top of your Instagram feed.

Step 4: You can use the arrow keys to navigate forward and back, and press the Esc key to close the gallery. You can also right click the icon of an Instagram user to download their Story. The obvious advantage of Chrome IG Story is that you don't have to pay anything for it. Chrome IG Story provides a hassle free way to enable Instagram's Stories functionality on the photo-sharing service's desktop app.

Furthermore, it's worth noting that even though this allows you to view the Instagram stories, it does not mark them as 'seen'. So the person who has posted the Story won't know that their story has been viewed or downloaded.

Google announced the Duo video calling app and Allo chat app at its I/O developer conference back in May this year. Last month, the company officially launched Duo, which crossed 10 million downloads in just a month. Now, the company has confirmed that it will be launching Allo soon as well.

Speaking to Gadgets Now, Google confirmed that it will be launching Allo chatting app for all users on September 21.

For those unaware, Allo is a standalone messaging app which comes with a built-in search engine. It has Google Assistant integration and uses the phone number as the primary user identification method. Users can also link their Google account to the app.

Allo has various emojis and custom stickers, catering to different users based on their region. One of the important features is the aforementioned built-in search, which allows users to initiate Google searches by just typing @google followed by the search query. This means that users don't have to leave the chat window for searching information relevant to the current conversation.

Google Allo comes with some interesting features and is likely to give competition to the likes of WhatsApp and Hike. However, the app lacks features like document sharing and calling, which are there in WhatsApp.

In related news, Google is planning to introduce audio calling support to its Duo app.

According to Google's product lead of communication, Amit Fulay, the voice calling feature is "coming soon" to Duo video calling app. The news came via Fulay's Google+ post where he replied to a user asking about "Any way to make it audio only call? Need is with roaming data."

A young hacker here in Kollam has received a Rs 10.70 lakh ($16,000) bounty after finding a vulnerability in Facebook code.

Facebook began the bug bounty programme in 2011, under which people who notify flaws on its website are given a reward.

Arun S Kumar, a 20-year-old computer engineering student at the MES Institute of Technology and Management in Chathannoor, exposed a critical vulnerability in Facebook Business Manager which would allow a hacker to take control over the Facebook page in less than 10 seconds.

"Since the hacker would be able to manipulate the page of any Facebook user, the damage it would bring is beyond imagination," said Arun while speaking to TOI.

He detected the bug on August 29 and reported it to the Facebook security team. One of them wrote back to him the very next day saying how his discovery helped them prevent a massive security breach. The team fixed the bug by September 6 and after three days Arun got a mail from them informing him of their decision to reward him.

Arun has a history of bug hunting. He had spotted many bugs in Google and Facebook in the past. Facebook had paid out a Rs 7 lakh bounty to him in April for finding a vulnerability. The young techie has received about Rs 30.85 lakh ($46,000) in payouts for hunting down bugs in the past three years.

Facebook had invited him in August this year along with three other hackers from different countries for a meeting with its security members at Las Vegas. He was also awarded the tenth place in the Facebook's hall of fame of the white hat hackers. He is the only Indian to be honoured in the website's hall of fame.

A native of Mundakkal here at Kollam, Arun is a year away from completing his degree. He said he wished to use the prize money to fund his higher education abroad. His father, P S Sureshkumar, is a clerk with the state government and mother, Nagalakshmi K, a housewife.

India is now increasingly seen as a destination for innovation and digital transformation mainly due to some of its recently launched initiatives like 'Startup India' and 'Digital India', American entrepreneurs and venture capitalists from the Mid-West have said.

"India is now being viewed increasingly as a destination for innovation and digital transformation," said Bala Palamadai, president of TiE Midwest and founder-CEO of Bizofit during a meeting of TiE Midwest Chapter on Thursday.

The Consul General of India in Chicago, Dr Ausaf Sayeed, said the ambitious 'Startup India' programme launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi aims to fill gaps in the economy for the growth and development of startups and to boost digital entrepreneurship at the grassroots.

"'Startup India' has brought lots of positivity among the entrepreneurs in India and as of now India has the third largest number of startups globally," he said.

Neeru Arora, chief information officer and chief knowledge officer, Aon Corporation, elaborated the role of her organisation in promoting entrepreneurship.

Narendra Kale, who has contributed in formulation of policies pertaining to startups and innovation in India, narrated his own journey of becoming business person by following a disciplined approach and taking risks while promoting entrepreneurship in his life.

1. Have multiple accounts on one device

2. Make messaging work for you

3. Drop the screen size down

4. Make animations faster or switch them off

5. Backup text messages, transfer them or view on PC

6. Automate daily or mundane tasks

7. Move stuff to external storage

8. See how well your charger & cable are doing

Earlier this year, Facebook launched a feature allowing users to upload photos with a 360-degree view. With this, users can view a scene from all angles - top, down, front and back. A 360-degree photo can either be created using a special 360 camera or by simply taking a panorama on your iPhone or a Samsung Galaxy smartphone. Apps such as Street View and Google Camera can also be used to do the same on your android device.

While all of us may have come across a 360-degree photo at some point or the other, not all of us have tried posting one. If you've taken the photo using any of the above mentioned tools, the process would be the same as uploading a regular photo.

Here's a quick guide on how to post a 360 photo on Facebook:
On the web:
· Click the Photo/Video tab at the top of the News Feed section or on your Timeline
· Select a photo
· Share it with your desired audience
· Click and drag to view the photo
On your smartphone:
· Tap on the What's on your mind? box at the top of the News Feed section or on your Timeline
· Select the Photo/Video option and choose a photo
· Share it with your desired audience
· Tilt and move your phone or drag your finger to view the photo
· You can also tap on the photo to view it in full screen

As of now, Facebook allows you to post only one 360-degree photo at a time and it's not applicable to profile pictures. It is different from the 360-videos posted on Facebook. Such videos are created using a special set of cameras to capture a scene in its entirety.

British surgeons have carried out the world's first robotic operation inside the eye -potentially revolutionising the way vision conditions are treated. Patient Father William Beaver, 70, an associate priest at St Mary the Virgin Church in Oxford, said his eyesight was returning following the procedure, having previously experienced distorted vision similar to "looking in a hall of mirrors at a fairground".

The procedure was carried out by surgeons at Oxford's John Radcliffe Hospital. The robotic eye surgery trial involves 12 patients undergoing operations with increasing complexity .

On completing the operation, Professor Robert MacLaren said: "We have just witnessed a vision of eye surgery in the future. Current technology with laser scanners and microscopes allows us to monitor retinal diseases at the microscopic level, but the things we see are beyond the physiological limit of what the human hand can operate on. With a robotic system , we open up a whole new chapter of eye operations that currently cannot be performed."

It was the first time a device had been available that achieved the three-dimensional precision required to operate inside the human eye.

A public interest litigation in the Delhi High Court (HC) challenges the change in WhatsApp's privacy policy. As a part of a crucial update to the messaging app's policy, it will now share user data with its parent company, social networking giant Facebook. The litigants have argued that WhatsApp's terms of service are “deceptive" and difficult to comprehend for a layperson. The Delhi HC has sought a response from government agencies, DoT and Trai, on the same.

Here is all you need to know about the controversy:

1. A privacy policy for a technology company such as WhatsApp or Facebook tells you how and where they will use your information -- your phone number, your contacts, your pictures, etc. A policy sets down whether and how these will be used to serve you ads, or to give you software updates.

2. WhatsApp had started out with an emphatic focus on never having any ads ever on its app. But after Facebook bought it in February 2014, change appeared to be inevitable. This August, they announced updates to their privacy policy.

3. So Facebook gets to know my phone number and people I frequently text too...? Yes

4. How those Facebook ads work? Imagine being fed with more information in what you may or may not be interested in buying. Some Facebook users already have linked their phone number with the social networking giant.

5. Wait. So Facebook is now going to read my Whatsapp messages too? That is tricky. WhatsApp says it doesn't store messages after they are delivered. At all. However, the policy does suggest that Facebook can use your messages.

Alphabet's Google has suspended Project Ara, its ambitious effort to build what is known as a modular smartphone with interchangeable components, as part of a broader push to streamline the company's hardware efforts, two people with knowledge of the matter said.

The move marks an about-face for the tech company, which announced a host of partners for Project Ara at its developer conference in May and said it would ship a developer edition of the product this autumn.

The company's aim was to create a phone that users could customize on the fly with an extra battery, camera, speakers or other components.

A spokeswoman for Google declined to comment on the matter.

At the ongoing IFA 2016 in Berlin, Germany, Acer has unveiled its Chromebook R 13 laptop. The company claims that it's the industry's first convertible Chromebook with a 13.3-inch display. The Chromebook R 13 will be available in North America in October, with price starting at $399.

Acer Chromebook R 13 is the latest addition to the company's Chromebook line-up, following the successful 11-inch Chromebook R 11. Like its predecessor, the Chromebook R 13 transitions fluidly between four usage modes - laptop, pad, display and tent.

The convertible has a 13.3-inch touch-capable Full HD display of 1920x1080 pixel resolution. The display supports 10-point multi touch, as well as Tap, Swipe and Pinch-to-Zoom gestures.

Acer Chromebook R 13 will be available in several configurations, with 4GB of RAM and 16GB/32GB/64GB of eMMC storage. The device is powered by a MediaTek M8173C CorePilot quad-core processor.

The hybrid is claimed to deliver 12 hours of battery life and comes with a USB Type-C port as well. This allows for fast data transfers, connection to a high-resolution external displays and the ability to charge other peripherals. It also has USB 3.0, HDMI, Bluetooth 4.0 and 3.5mm audio input for connectivity.

The four modes of Acer Chromebook R 13 are as follows:

1. Laptop mode keeps the display at 90-degrees from the keyboard for an efficient and productive input and typing experience.

2. Display mode bends the keyboard under the system so the display is closer to the user. When the Chromebook R 13 is put in this position, the on-screen image auto-rotates to the correct viewing orientation.

3. Tent mode provides an ideal viewing and touch experience in confined spaces.

4. Pad mode allows the Chromebook to be used as a tablet with the display and keyboard touching each other.

Search giant Google has updated its Contacts app for Android. The update introduces quite some new features and improvements, including a revamped design.

A noticeable addition after the update is the hamburger menu on the left of the Contacts app. In place of the Favourites and All tabs options, users will now see a single contact list, with a sidebar menu available via the said hamburger button.

Along with this, users will also be able to manage duplicate contacts. The app will also offer suggestions regarding what might be duplicate contacts. Users will be able to dismiss suggestions or link duplicate contacts for unifying them under a single name. The app will now also allow users to filter contacts by labels and source accounts.

Earlier this month, Google rolled out an update for its trio of office productivity apps - Docs, Sheets and Slides, on iOS. The update brings enhanced multi-tasking functionality for devices like the iPad Pro, bumping the Docs and Slides apps to version 1.2016.30204 and Sheets app to version 1.2016.30206.

The update brings in verious features, numerous bug fixes and performance improvements.

Facebook has got a new plan to further enhance the video viewing experience of its users. The company will soon be improving the way it shows videos shot vertically. So far, the social media giant fits vertical videos inside a typical horizontal video format.

According to a report from The Marketing Land website, who also shared some images showing the new vertical video interface, Facebook in its upcoming Android and iOS app update will be showing vertical videos in 2:3 aspect ratio instead of the current 1:1 aspect ratio. It won't take the full screen like we see in apps like Snapchat but would be larger than before. Users would have to click on the video to see it in full screen.

"We know that people enjoy more immersive experiences on Facebook, so we're starting to display a larger portion of each vertical video in News Feed on mobile," a spokesperson told the website. The vertical videos will also support ads and live broadcasts.

With larger, friendly vertical video interface, users are likely to get less distracted and focus solely on the content shown in the vertical video. With this feature, Facebook will be competing with YouTube and Snapchat as well.

Facebook last month introduced offline video feature in India. The feature lets users save videos in the 'Saved' section inside the app itself. This can be done by tapping on the 'Save video' option from the drop down menu in the particular post.

These saved videos can be viewed offline as many times as users want. As per the website, Facebook would not let users download the videos directly on the device storage in order to make them stick with the social media service.

The similar feature is also there in Google's YouTube, it allows the users to save videos inside the app and watch them later (when offline). YouTube last year also introduced full screen playback of vertical videos.

Just a few hours ago, WhatsApp updated its terms & conditions, as well as its privacy policy. While terms, conditions and privacy policies are jargons that people don't really care about, especially in case of tech products, this is something one should be concerned about.

While the detailed privacy policy and terms are too verbose and consist of a whole lot of technical mumbo-jumbo, the gist is that now WhatsApp will start handing over its user data to Facebook, the social media company that has owned it since 2014.

An important excerpt from the updated terms and conditions reads, "By coordinating more with Facebook, we'll be able to do things like track basic metrics about how often people use our services and better fight spam on WhatsApp. And by connecting your phone number with Facebook's systems, Facebook can offer better friend suggestions and show you more relevant ads if you have an account with them. For example, you might see an ad from a company you already work with, rather than from someone you've never heard of."

Essentially, what the above means is that now Facebook will be able to use WhatsApp accounts (and the phone numbers they are tied to) and track their usage habits, thus helping the social network serve them friend suggestions and more personalized advertising.

Public outrage has already started to pour in on the internet, with WhatsApp users venting their ire on forums, websites and of course, on Facebook and Twitter.

But as privacy-intrusive as this move is, it shouldn't come off as a surprise. In fact, this is something that was inevitable ever since Facebook acquired WhatsApp in 2014.

We might come across as playing the devil's advocate, but what needs to be realized is that at the end of the day, Facebook is a business. And like all of them, it needs to make money. You don't just buy something for $19 billion if you don't plan on churning it into a cash cow. And that's exactly what Facebook plans to do with WhatsApp, a communication platform that is used by an astounding 1 billion users across the world.

After Facebook-owned WhatsApp rolled out end-to-end encryption, the popular messaging platform ensured users that their chats are secured from any unwanted third-party attention. In fact, WhatsApp joined the league of very few chat apps that offer complete end-to-end encryption. However, a new revelation by security expert has again put a question mark on WhatsApp privacy.

Apple's iOS security expert Jonathan Zdziarski has claimed that the chats on WhatsApp are never removed even after users have hit the delete button. "The latest version of the app tested leaves forensic trace of all of your chats, even after you've deleted, cleared, or archived them... even if you 'Clear All Chats', he said in a post.

Zdziarski suggests that the only way to completely remove all traces of chats is to remove the WhatsApp entirely from the phone.

1. Earth View from Google Earth
2. Google Dictionary
3. Google Similar Pages
4. Google Mail Checker
5. Save to Google Drive
6. Data Saver
7. Personal Blocklist
8. Caret Browsing
9. Google Translate
10. Google Input Tools
11. Google Scholar Button
12. Share to Classroom
13. Google Tone

This year, Google seems to be running slightly ahead of schedule with the rollout of its Android 7.0 Nougat preview. And although the search giant has not yet mentioned when it will be rolling out the final consumer version to users, a Canadian carrier seems to have spilled the beans regarding the same.

According to Canadian carrier Telus, the Nexus 5X and Nexus 6P will receive Android 7.0 Nougat starting August 22. The news comes from the carrier's software update list. The update is likely to roll out over-the-air, meaning that unlocked and carrier-free Nexus devices would get the final Android 7.0 updates slightly earlier.

Recently it was reported that the upcoming OS version of Android will include enhanced Data Saver option that will enable users to set up warning and halt limits, making it easy to manage mobile data allowances. It will also let users provide unrestricted data access to certain apps. If that's not intelligent enough, Android Nougat will make Data Saver smarter.

India has been ranked the world's top exporter of information and communication technology in a UN agency report that recommended that the country leverage this lead to innovate in emerging areas where biology and materials sciences intersect with computing.

Overall, India leapt 14 places from the 85th rank last year to the 61st in the latest Global Innovation Index (GII) released in Geneva by the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) in partnership with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) on Monday.

India ranked 8th in the world for producing graduates in science and engineering and showed the most significant improvements in human capital and research moving up 40 places to 63.

WIPO, a specialised agency of the UN, worked also with Cornell University and INSEAD, the international business school, to prepare the ninth edition of the index.

In a nod to India's "jugaad" tradition of innovation, the report said that its culture of "frugality and sustainability" can help it capture global markets.

Popular instant messaging app WhatsApp has started rolling out its voicemail feature to iOS users. The update allows iPhone and iPad users to send a voicemail to a contact if he/she has not answered the WhatsApp call.

This means that in case a call made via WhatsApp is rejected, the users will also be shown the option of leaving a 'voice message' alongwith the 'call again' and 'cancel' options. Users can send voicemails by holding down the 'voice message' button. Once the user is finished speaking, he can lift his finger from the screen to send the message. This message will appear in the user's active WhatsApp conversation with the caller.

Also, in case a user changes his mind while sending the voice mail, then he can also cancel the message by sliding his finger to the left. However, so far users cannot listen to the recording before sending the voice mail.

Recently, it was found that a bug named QuadRooter puts almost 1 billion Android handsets at risk. The vulnerability, discovered by security company Check Point, is said to give hackers access to user's personal information by remotely rooting the smartphones. According to the company, the security bug affects devices with Qualcomm chips, which are installed into devices during the manufacturing process.

The flaw includes four vulnerabilities, any of which can be used by hackers to take control of a smartphone. Now, Google has reportedly given its stance on the matter claiming that the threat is not as serious as it has been projected.

The search giant, as reported by Tech Insider, has said that out of the aforementioned four vulnerabilities it has fixed three issues as a part of the August Android OS security update. The fourth vulnerability will be fixed in September's security update.

Although Google is already sending out fixes for the bug, it still remains unlikely that all the 900 million smartphones would receive the update. Google adds that its 'Verify Apps' feature would also be ruling out the malicious apps. The feature will scan the apps before installing them on the handset. Verify Apps is switched on by default.

However, those users who have older versions of Android OS running on their handsets (older than Jelly Bean) would have to manually activate the 'Verify Apps' feature.

Google has started rolling out an update for its Maps app on Android . The update brings SD card support and 'Wi-Fi only' mode to Google's navigation app.

Thanks to the latest update, users will now be able to easily navigate long stretches of roads while still saving on device storage and data.

The update adds a new ' Wi-Fi Only' option in the Settings Menu, which replaces the 'Offline Areas' option. When the option is enabled, the app will stop using cellular data and load majority of the navigation data through Wi-Fi.

The Wi-Fi mode looks like a handy option that can save on your mobile data charges when you are on the go. Along with this, the update also adds the ability for users to download offline areas to an SD card and save the internal storage on your phone.

However, to see what the traffic is like or update offline maps, users can easily switch back to online mode. This can be done by finding the nearest Wi-Fi.

Recently, Google rolled out an update to its Google Maps iOS app. The update finally brought the much-needed multiple-stop support to the app.

Thanks to the update, Google Maps on iOS now provides the users the ability to add multiple stops on a single trip. Interestingly, the feature has been available on the web version of Maps for quite some time. Support for multiple stops was rolled to the Maps app on Android recently, and now iOS users can enjoy it as well.

Google has rolled out an update for its Android Wear smartwatch app. Interestingly, this one removes some functionality instead of adding it. After the update, the 'Together' feature will no longer be available.

The 'Together' functionality enabled users to communicate directly through their Android smartwatches . The feature also allowed users to send stickers, messages, emoji and doodles to each other.

Google said that 'Together' is being shut down because majority of its features are already present in the latest Android Wear 2.0 platform. The search giant further added that the feature will stop working from September 30.

Technology giant Google has released a new application specially designed for children to let them explore the Himalayas using maps, 3D imagery and gameplay, a media report said.

Called "Verne: The Himalayas", the app introduces the character Verne, who is a friendly, 500-foot Yeti children can use to move around the map scenes.

"The new app , which the company describes as 'an experiment', takes advantage of Google Maps' 3D imagery of the Himalayas but combines it with a bit of gameplay to make the idea of zooming around the 3D scene more fun and engaging," Tech Crunch reported on Thursday.

The Yeti in the game can climb up to the top of Mount Everest, go skating on icy lakes, chase yaks, ride a jetpack, play Himalayan instruments and delivers educational information about the Himalayas via a voice over.

Given its limited focus -- only the Himalayas -- this app will likely keep kids entertained for a brief period of time.

"If Google chooses to later expand this experiment to encompass more of the world and the 3D imagery it collects, it could easily turn this concept app into something that is more like an interactive, kids' version of Google Earth," the report said.

Online marketplace Snapdeal on Thursday launched an in-app integration with Uber that will enable Snapdeal customers directly book a cab.

"Our unique partnership with Uber , a global leader in smart mobility, is an important step in that direction. We are confident that this integration will further provide an exemplary experience to our customers," said Tony Navin, senior vice president (Partnerships and Strategic Initiatives), Snapdeal , in a statement.

Google has rolled out an update to its Maps service on all major platforms including Android , iOS and Web. The update brings a cleaner and more user-friendly appearance, in addition to introducing a tweaked topography and removing the road outlines. Also, the update brings more points of interest, train stations and other spots.

The updated Maps app shows points of interest in Orange colour. Users would simply need to open the app and look for areas shaded in Orange.

"We determine "areas of interest" with an algorithmic process that allows us to highlight the areas with the highest concentration of restaurants, bars and shops. In high-density areas like NYC, we use a human touch to make sure we're showing the most active areas," said Google.

New areas of interest are now highlighted with new shades to depict different districts. "The world is full of information, which means highlighting necessary info on the map without overcrowding it is a balancing act. So as part of this update, we've removed elements that aren't absolutely required (like road outlines). The result is a cleaner look that makes it easier to see helpful and actionable information like traffic and transit," said the search giant.

Different colour schemes in Google Maps will also let users differentiate between man-made or natural features and also easily identify hospitals, schools or highways.

The search giant recently rolled out Wi-Fi only mode to its Maps app through an update. Along with this, the update also included new notifications for mass transit related delays. Few weeks ago, it also sent out updates with sharper and more seamless imagery , using photos from Landsat 8 observation satellite developed through collaboration between NASA and the United States Geological Survey.

In the past few years, WhatsApp has emerged as almost the de facto mode of communication in several countries around the globe.

1.
Often miss the 'call back' feature when making WhatsApp calls? WhatsApp has finally heard you.
With v2.16.189, users get the 'call back' option in the app. The feature appears on the app screen after a call is declined.
So far, 'call back' the feature is available only in WhatsApp's Android app. Also, it has not been rolled out via Google Play store, but is available in the app's latest beta version. Those interested can manually download and install the app's apk file from APKMirror website.

2.
Another Android-only feature for now, voice mail will allow users to record messages by long pressing the 'mic' icon near the chat box.

3.
Often feel that you could quote a specific conversation in those long-threaded messages?
It's possible, thanks to a functionality WhatsApp added recently. The popular messaging app rolled out an update which brings message quote feature.
The update enables users to quote somebody's message(s) at the time of replying. Users just need to select a message which they want to reply to, following which a reply button comes up.
Then they need to tap the button, type in the reply and simply hit Send. Once this is done, the message is sent and the reply appears in quotes.
The feature works in both one-on-one as well as group chats. Along with this, users can also preview the quoted message inside a box.

4.
Bored of chatting on WhatsApp with the same default system font? The company has silently rolled out a new feature to WhatsApp's Android app, which allows users to type in a new font.
The font appears similar to the Fixedsys typeface in Windows. However, so far this is the only option available. Also, while the new font is a welcome move from WhatsApp, using it can be difficult and even tiresome.
This is because users have to put backquote symbol (`) three times before and after the text they want to change the font of.

5.
WhatsApp has added end-to-end encryption to all its messages.
Encryption ensures that only a message's sender and recipient can read messages, stopping communications from being intercepted in the path. And yes, just like messages, WhatsApp calls too are encrypted end-to-end.
This means that WhatsApp and third parties can't listen to them.

6.
According to multiple reports, WhatsApp is set to add music-sharing feature to its app.
The feature will allow users to share music stored on their devices as well as from Apple Music service.
The feature is expected to arrive on iOS devices first.

7.
Another upcoming feature in WhatsApp is mentions. It will come in handy during group conversations, and works in a similar way as mentions work on Facebook.
It will reportedly show the name in a different coloured text. The feature is aimed to help users grab the attention of a specific user in group conversations.
The group invite feature will help users send a link to other people to join a group by just tapping on it.

8.
WhatsApp is expected to add GIF support to its iOS app soon.
The feature has reportedly been spotted in iOS beta version 2.16.7.1.
Other instant messengers like WeChat, Line already support the same.

9.
The app is also speculated to soon feature support for bigger emoji.
This feature too is based on Apple's announcement regarding support for the same in the upcoming iOS 10.

10.
Video calling was spotted in WhatsApp beta for Android users in May, but dissappeared in later updates.
However, it is quite certain that the company will be introducing it in the near future. The feature appeared in WhatsApp beta for Android update (v2.16.80) via the Google Play beta testing program.
Rumours about the rollout of WhatsApp video calling feature have been there for quite a long time.

With major launches happening globally this month like the OnePlus 3, Google Tango-enabled Lenovo Phab 2 Pro, Samsung Galaxy S7 Active and others, there still a couple of big-ticket launches left for smartphone enthusiasts this month. Here are five smartphones set to launch in the coming 10 days.

Xiaomi will launch its biggest smartphone yet- Mi Max- in India on June 30. The device was launched in last month in China. Xiaomi Mi Max features a massive 6.44-inch display and weighs 203 gram. Xiaomi will bring the 3GB RAM and 32GB ROM version in the country. It is expected to be priced between Rs 15,000 and Rs 20,000.

After launching the Moto G4 Plus, Lenovo-owned Motorola is all set to launch its Moto G4 in India on June 22. The smartphone like the Moto G4 Plus, will also be available exclusively via Amazon India. The handset is less powerful than the Moto G4 Plus and is expected to cost below Rs 13,000.

Huawei under its Honor brand is expected to launch its Honor 5C smartphone on June 22 as well. It was launched in China in April. Honor 5C is powered by Huawei's home-brewed HiSilicon Kirin 650 chipset coupled with 2GB RAM and 16GB of built-in memory. The dual-sim smartphone has a 5.2 inch Full HD display and comes with Android 6.0 Marshmallow out-of-the-box.

Micromax will be launching its Canvas Unite 4 budget smartphone this week. The handset comes as a successor to the Unite 3, which was launched last year. Unlike other Unite smartphones, this one too comes with several local language options.

The Indian smartphone maker will also be launching its Micromax Canvas Unite 4 Pro smartphone along with the Unite 4. The handset too is expected to come with multi-language support (support for regional languages). It features slightly better specifications than the Unite 4.

Over 100 million voice calls are made every day on messaging app WhatsApp. The company announced this in a blog post.

"For more than a year, people have used WhatsApp Calling to talk with friends and family around the world. It's a great way to stay in touch, especially when connecting with people in other countries, or when messages alone won't do. Today, more than 100 million voice calls are made every day on WhatsApp - that's over 1,100 calls a second! We're humbled that so many people have found this feature useful, and we're committed to making it even better in the months to come," said the Facebook-owned WhatsApp in the post.

Celebrating the achievement, WhasApp CEO Jan Koum wrote on his Facebook page, "When I first moved to the USA, making a phone call to friends and family that I left in Ukraine was a frustrating process. You had to pick up a phone that was connected to a wall and hope that the person you were calling was near their phone on the other end. Years later, mobile phones began to make this a bit easier, but switching SIM cards and worrying about your mobile plan still made it challenging to call home. Since the early days of WhatsApp, we've worked to tear down the boundaries that stand between people staying in touch with their friends and family. A little over a year ago, we made it possible to make calls using WhatsApp—for those times when it's important to hear a voice on the other end of your phone. Today, we're proud that people are making 100 million calls a day on WhatsApp!"

Gionee has launched its S6 Pro smartphone in China. Priced at $300, the smartphone will be available in Rose Gold, Silver and Gold colour options. It is up for sale on Gionee's official online store in China.

The S6 Pro flaunts a unibody metal design and also incorporates a fingerprint sensor, in addition to a USB Type-C port.

Talking about the specifications, the Gionee S6 Pro sports a 5.5-inch Full HD 2.5D curved display of 1080x1920 pixel resolution. It is powered by a 1.8GHz octa-core processor paired with 4GB of RAM. The phone offers 64GB of internal storage, which can be further expanded via microSD cards of up to 128GB in size. It runs Android 6.0 Marshmallow operating system topped with Gionee's Amigo OS.

As for the cameras, Gionee S6 Pro sports a 13MP rear camera with LED flash and an 8MP selfie shooter. Connectivity options include 4G, LTE, 3G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and GPS, with a 3,130mAh battery rounding up the spec sheet.

Last month, Gionee launched Marathon M5 Plus in India priced at Rs 26,999. The Marathon M5 Plus sports a 6-inch Full HD AMOLED screen of 1,080x1,920 pixels resolution. The smartphone comes with numerous 'modes,' including an energy efficient Eco Mode and an Extreme Mode for the best experience.

The device runs on Android 5.1 Lollipop operating system with Gionee's Amigo UI baked on top. It is powered by a 1.3GHz octa-core MediaTek processor coupled with 3GB of RAM. Internal storage stands at 64GB and can be further expanded up to 128GB via a microSD card.

A solar-powered airplane finished crossing the United States on Saturday, landing in New York City after flying over the Statue of Liberty during its historic bid to circle the globe, the project team said.

The spindly, single-seat experimental aircraft, dubbed Solar Impulse 2, arrived at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport at about 4 a.m. local time after it took off about five hours beforehand at Lehigh Valley International Airport in Pennsylvania, the team reported on the airplane's website.

"Such a pleasure to land in #NYC! For the 14th time we celebrate sustainability," said the project's co-founder Andre Borschberg on Twitter after flying over the city and the Statue of Liberty during the 14th leg of the trip around the globe.

The Swiss team flying the aircraft in a campaign to build support for clean energy technologies hopes eventually to complete its circumnavigation in Abu Dhabi, where the journey began in March 2015.

The solar craft's cruising speed, akin to that of a car, required pilots to take up meditation and hypnosis in training to stay alert for long periods.

Borschberg alternates with fellow pilot Bertrand Piccard at the controls for each segment of what they hope will be the first round-the-world solar-powered flight.

On April 24, Piccard landed in San Francisco, completing a trans-Pacific crossing after a nearly three-day trip that began in Hawaii. The flight took more than three times the 18 hours Amelia Earhart took to fly solo from Hawaii to California in the 1930s.

The propeller-driven Solar Impulse flies without a drop of fuel and its four engines are powered solely by energy collected from more than 17,000 solar cells built into its wings.

Surplus power is stored in four batteries during the day, to keep the plane aloft on extreme long-distance flights.

DHAKA: Facebook, Microsoft and Google have agreed to work with Bangladesh government over "inappropriate contents" on the internet, the Parliament was told amidst a series of brutal killings by Islamists of secular bloggers and minorities.

Speaking at a question-and-answer session, state minister for telecoms Tarana Halim said that not only social media giant Facebook, but the two internet behemoths, too, have also agreed to respond to the government's request within two days.

"After intense discussion with Facebook, Google and Microsoft, it has been agreed that they will respond to requests with 48 hours," she said.

Last year, the Bangladesh government suspended the use of Facebook, its Messenger app, and some other communication apps for 22 days, citing security reasons following the murder of two foreign nationals and the attack on a police check post.

Before the 22-day ban, the government had blocked some popular calling and messaging services such as WhatsApp and Viber for several days during a three-month agitation by the BNP-led alliance early last year.

Police had said then they were having trouble tracking down saboteurs, as they were using these apps to communicate.

In November last year, Halim had written to the Facebook authorities, conveying her wish to discuss with them a gamut of issues related to the social network site and its messenger app.

The minister subsequently held a meeting at Facebook's Asia Pacific headquarters in Singapore and told reporters about the social media giant's promise to cooperate.

Facebook's half-yearly 'Government Request Report' in April this year showed that it had, for the first time, responded to requests from the Bangladesh government.

After launching the Gboard keyboard app for rival Apple's iOS , Google has now launched another app called Motion Stills. Coming from Google Research, the app works in tandem with iOS' Live Photos feature and uses video stabilization technology to freeze the background in still images to create cinematic pans.

As a result, iOS users get a looping GIF image with the subject and other surrounding objects moving, whereas the background stays still. The search giant adds that the app does not require an internet connection.

"Our challenge was to take technology designed to run distributed in a data center and shrink it down to run even faster on your mobile phone. We achieved a 40x speedup by using techniques such as temporal subsampling, decoupling of motion parameters and using Google Research's custom linear solver, GLOP. We obtain further speedup and conserve storage by computing low-resolution warp textures to perform real-time GPU rendering, just like in a videogame," said the firm. The algorithm also identifies optimal start and end points of a scene to optimise the looping.

Although the app is only available for iOS users, Google says it might integrate its features into its existing products as well, such as Google Photos.

Facebook seems to be testing some new features for its website and mobile app. The social media giant is said to be testing a new and improved 'Hide from Timeline' feature. It is also testing other functionalities like wishing users on their birthdays right from the notification drop down menus, and getting notifications when a user's profile loads slow because of low internet speeds.

Until now, if you don't want to see an already published post on your timeline, you have to click on the top corner icon on the post and select the 'Hide from Timeline' option. However, according to some users, the option (available as a checkbox) can now be seen directly inside the box from where the updates are posted.

Initially spotted by CNET website, the updated posts along with the feature will still show up in search results and will be listed in your activities on the 'Your Posts' page. The page however, is only accessible by you only.

"The Timeline on your profile is a great place to see a comprehensive history of your Facebook posts. We've heard feedback that sometimes, you may want to share a post with friends and family via News Feed and not have that post be displayed on your Timeline. The ability to hide a post from your Timeline already exists, and today we're testing a feature that would make it even easier to control where your posts live by giving you the option to publish a post only to News Feed and not to your Timeline," said Facebook to Engadget website.

Telcos have sought parity with over-the-top (OTT) players that provide communications services such as WhatsApp and Skype , saying these apps provide similar services such as voice calling and should be brought under the same regulation as carriers.

"It is an undisputed fact that VoIP (voice over Internet protocol) service offered by OCSPs (OTT communication service providers) is a substitute for" services offered by telecom service providers (TSPs), Rajan Mathews, director general at GSM industry body Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), said in a letter to the telecom regulator dated June 3.

"OCSPs offer these services without holding any licence in India, which is violative of the Indian Telegraph Act. The licensing and regulatory regime cannot allow a situation wherein the licensed entity (read: Telcos ) is treated at a lower footing than an unlicensed entity (read: OCSP)," COAI said.

At the heart of the matter is the fact that communication apps offer calling services at far lower rates than carriers — mostly a consumer just pays for the data consumed — thus eating into the telcos' revenue pie. Voice still accounts for around 80% of a telco's revenue. Telcos want these apps to be brought under regulation, so that the apps need to pay the same levies such as licence fee, spectrum charges, etc. besides also following rules around security, lawful interception, quality of service.

Facebook has appointed Umang Bedi as managing director India, where he will lead in building and maintaining strategic relationships with top clients and regional agencies in the country. He will take over from Kirthiga Reddy, who will be returning to United States to join the global accounts team at Menlo Park. As part of global accounts team, she will be managing Facebook 's relationships with the world's largest global advertisers.

Prior to joining Facebook , he was the managing director of the South Asia region at Adobe. He was responsible for growing their business in India and helping India grow to amongst the leading markets for Adobe in the APAC and global regions.

Facebook works with more than 85% of the top 100 advertisers in India identified by Kantar. 100% of those advertisers use video within their Facebook campaigns in India. Bedi will officially start at Facebook in July and Kirthiga will start her new role in August.

Bedi comes to Facebook with close to two decades of leadership experience covering sales, marketing and partnerships where he successfully built teams and grew businesses for multinational companies.

Artificial intelligence and machine learning will create computers so sophisticated and godlike that humans will need to implant "neural laces" in their brains to keep up, Tesla Motors and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk told a crowd of tech leaders this week.

While Musk's description of an injectable human-computer link may sound like science fiction, top tech executives repeatedly said that artificial intelligence (AI) was on the verge of changing everyday life, during discussion at a conference by online publication Recode this week.

It is no secret that tech companies are diving into AI analytics research, an industry that will grow to $70 billion by 2020 from just $8.2 billion in 2013, according to a Bank of America report citing IDC research.

AI, which combs through large troves of raw data to predict outcomes and recognize patterns, is already used in web search systems, marketing recommendation functions and security and financial trading programs. The technology will spread to driverless cars and service robots in the future, the Bank of America report said.

1. Earth View from Google Earth

2. Google Dictionary

3. Google Similar Pages

4. Google Mail Checker

5. Save to Google Drive

6. Data Saver

7. Personal Blocklist

8. Caret Browsing

9. Google Translate

10. Google Input Tools

11. Google Scholar Button

12. Share to Classroom

13. Google Tone

Google on Friday showed off a modular Android-powered smartphone it said is on track to hit the market next year.

Word that Project Ara was moving ahead, and not shelved as some had speculated during the past year, came on the final day of Google' s annual developers conference in the Silicon Valley city of Mountain View.

Developers interested in creating applications for the devices will get access to early versions of Ara, which provides a frame in which modules such as cameras, speakers, and sensors can be re-arranged by users like game pieces so as to customize handsets.

Google said that a consumer version of Ara should be available next year.

When the first Ara prototype was unveiled early last year at World Mobile Congress in Barcelona, Google expressed hope the approach would provide easier access to smartphones for people in developing countries.

The principle is simple: basic structures are designed to hold screen modules, batteries, cameras, sensors, 3G, Wi-fi or other components snapped into place with the help of magnets.

If a mobile phone breaks or an updated model is released, instead of buying a new handset a user could simply swap out components.

Pricing of Ara had yet to be revealed, but Google last year referred to an entry-level model with a production cost of $50. Plans to launch Ara in Puerto Rico last year were scrubbed.

Google announced its new smart messaging app called Allo and video app named Duo at its annual conference. The apps boast of end-to-end encryption and claim to deliver smooth user experience. These apps also offer great functionalities and are poised to give tough competition to the likes of WhatsApp, Snapchat , Facebook Messenger and many others.

Allo is a standard chatting app, which works a lot like WhatsApp. The users don't need a Google account to sign-in; all they need is a mobile number just like WhatsApp. However, the search engine giant has introduced some fun and exciting features in the Allo app that makes it very user friendly.

Here are some key features of the new Google Allo app:

Google Assistant support
Google Allo comes with the Google Assistant integration, which brings the search feature into the app. The users will now be able to search for hotels, flights, movie theatres and many other things directly from this app. Along with this, the app will also be integrated with tools like YouTube , Maps, and Translate. Basically, the concierge service comes to life in this app. Something Whatsapp and other IM's were trying to do.

Smart Reply
The Allo messaging app comes equipped with the Smart Reply feature, which was earlier seen in the Inbox app by Gmail. The Smart Reply feature provides suggestions to the users for replies at the time of texting. It uses the artificial intelligence to read the text and reply patterns of the users, and then comes up with relevant suggestions. Seems useful on paper, but does it really work? We would get to know in a few months time.

Bigger texts
The Google Allo users will have the ability to adjust the size of the text reply with ease. The users can increase or decrease the font size using slider buttons called 'whisper and shout.'

The Incognito Mode
The app also comes with an incognito mode, which is built on company's open signal protocol. The feature is designed to make the chats more secure. Moreover, the chats will also expire once the conversation is over.

Write on pictures
In order to make the conversation more interesting and engaging the Allo app allows the users to write or draw on pictures before sending them.

Stickers onboard
Stickers are becoming an important medium of communication. Just like, Line and WeChat Google Allo also offers stickers to make the conversation more expressive.

Google Duo
Along with Allo, Google also introduced its video calling app Duo at the conference. This video calling app might be able to give a tough competition to FaceTime and is designed to work in tandem with Allo. The app flaunts an immaculate and simple user's interface and the company also claims that it can operate even on low network connections. All the Duo calls will be in HD. However, the app will automatically control the video quality by sensing the network connectivity.

The Google Duo app also comes with an interesting feature called Knock Knock, which shows the preview video of the caller, before you pick up the call. Once the user receives the call, the audio turns on, and two parties can start the conversation.

Overall, Google managed to pick up lot of goodies from competing instant messengers (IM's), made it better with Google search capabilities and eco-system, and placed them in these new apps. The features will make life easier for the users, since they will get search, booking and video calling features at one place. The road for Whatsapp and other IM's does seem hard, but we cannot strike off Facebook owned IM just as yet.

Being driven by a young demographic profile, increasing internet penetration and relative better economic performance, India's e-Commerce revenue is expected to jump from $30 billion in 2016 to $120 billion in 2020, growing at an annual rate of 51%, the highest in the world, according to a joint ASSOCHAM-Forrester study paper.

While in terms of base, India may be lower than China and other giants like Japan, the Indian rate of growth is way ahead of others. Against India's annual expansion of 51%, China's e-commerce is growing at 18%, Japan 11% and South Korea 10%, according to a joint study.

With annual additions of 25 million internet users, India is ahead of countries like Brazil and Russia even within the BRICS nations. India has an Internet user base of 400 million in 2016 whereas Brazil has 210 million internet users and Russia has 130 million of internet user.

Interestingly, about 75% of online users are in the age group of 15-34 years since India is one of the youngest demography globally. "This is expected to be a continuing trend in coming years, given the age distribution in India", said D S Rawat, ASSOCHAM Secretary General. It is not surprising to see the growth among categories focused on younger audiences in the last 12 months, added the paper. The maximum online shoppers are from the 15-24 years of age group, comprising both of males and females.

1. Use data compression in Chrome

Web browsing is one of the major data-hogging activities on our smartphones. Most of the websites have bulky advertisements that eat up a large chunk of data. But you can prevent this data drainage by using Chrome’s data compression feature. After activating the feature, Google takes over the data transfer between websites and the browser and optimises it for maximum savings.

In order to activate the feature, you just need to open Chrome and tap on the 3-dot menu. Now go to Settings > tap on Data Saver, and you are all sorted.

2. Restrict background data

Some of the apps that we use consume a lot of data, even when the smartphone is not being used. This is essentially to get the notifications from apps in real-time and keep everything updated. However, not every app needs to stay active all the time. So you can easily select and restrict the data usage of individual apps as per your requirement.

Just go to Settings > Data Usage, and select the app you want to restrict the data for. Now, toggle the switch with ‘Restrict app background data’ label to off.

3. Update apps when on Wi-Fi

You must try and refrain from updating the apps over cellular connections. This can be controlled by restricting auto-update feature of the Google Play store.

Just go to the Google Play store and tap on the menu button. Then tap on ‘Settings’ option and then select ‘Auto-update apps’ button. Finally, select the ‘Auto-update apps over Wi-Fi only’ option.

4. Avoid streaming online

Streaming videos and music eats up more data than you realize. So it’s best to avoid these activities while you’re consuming mobile data. You can store music and videos on your device locally to avoid streaming.

If you have to stream music and videos anyway, make sure to set the streaming quality to low.

5. Cache everything important

There are some apps which enable you to cache important data locally. Some of these apps are Google Maps and Google Play.

So try and cache as much content as you can when on a Wi-Fi network. This will help you enjoy the same content later, without having to waste mobile data.

6. Check account sync settings

Real-time syncing and push notifications are all great, but they also mean that the smartphone has to keep polling the servers for fresh content regularly. Obviously, this takes up quite a share of the mobile data. So it is advisable to always keep a check on the account syncing settings and adjust them accordingly.

Go to Settings > Accounts, and select the services you think are fit for push notifications.

7. Download data management apps

Try and download a good data management app to help you conserve data. These apps compress data and are capable of saving up to 50% data. They can also restrain some apps from accessing the data. Some of these apps are Opera Max or CM Data Manager.

YouTube plans to launch a service that streams cable television channels to viewers over the internet for the price of a subscription, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday.

YouTube has made a priority of creating the service, called Unplugged, which could debut as early as next year, according to the report, which cited unnamed people close to the project.

YouTube executives have talked about the plan with major media companies such as Viacom, NBCUniversal, and Twenty-First Century Fox but had yet to obtain rights to any content, according to unidentified sources cited by Bloomberg.

YouTube is a unit of Alphabet-owned Google, where it has been billed as a star performer when it comes to attracting viewers and revenue.

YouTube last year introduced Red, were ad-free videos can be seen for monthly subscriptions of $10 in the United States.

When contacted by AFP, YouTube declined to comment on the Unplugged report.

The social networking giant has paid $10,000 to a 10-year-old boy for spotting a bug in Facebook-owned photo-sharing platform Instagram.

According to a report in technology website VentureBeat.com, Jani from Finland discovered the security flaw in Instagram on his own.

He found a bug in Instagram which requires you to be at least 13 before even signing up, that lets him delete any comment on the social network.

"He reported the bug by email, offered proof by deleting a message on one of Facebook's test Instagram accounts and it was fixed in February. Facebook paid him the bug bounty in March," the report added.

"I would have been able to remove anyone, even Justin Bieber," the report quoted Jani as saying.

The Finnish boy wishes to become a security researcher. "It would be my dream job. Security is very important," he was quoted as saying.

He used the reward money to buy a new bike, football gear and computers for his two brothers.

Like Google and Microsoft, Facebook also has a bug bounty programme.

Facebook may help keep more students engaged and enrolled to massive open online courses or MOOCs, a new study has found.

In a study that compared MOOC student use of the course's Facebook groups to use of the built-in course message boards and forums, researchers said students were more engaged on the Facebook groups and also admitted to the researchers that they preferred interacting more on the social media site than through the course tools.

"In previous studies we found that the real challenge for MOOC developers and instructors is trying to keep students engaged and enrolled in the course," said Saijing Zheng, a former doctoral student at Pennsylvania State University in US.

"In this study, we are finding that social media tools may be one way to keep students engaged in a MOOC," said Zheng, who is currently a research scientist at Microsoft.

All phones sold in the country from the year 2017 will need to have a provision for a panic key that would enable users to intimate about emergency situations. The measure, aimed at women safety, will also see a provision for installation of a GPS navigation system from January 1, 2018, to track the location of the person in crisis with accuracy.

"Technology is solely meant to make human life better and what better than using it for the security of women... from January 1, 2017, no cell phone can be sold without a provision for a panic button and from January 1, 2018, mobile sets should have also GPS in-built," telecom minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said.

The move has been ordered by the government through an official notification dated April 22. "With effect from January 1, 2017, no mobile phone handset company shall sell in India... feature phones without the facility of panic button by pressing 'Numeric key - 5' or 'Numeric key - 9' to invoke emergency call," the notification said.

It added that no smartphone should be sold in India without the facility of the emergency call button. This button, on being pressed for a long time should invoke an emergency call, or the use of existing power button, when short pressed thrice in quick succession.

Microsoft Corp and Alphabet Inc's Google have reached a deal to withdraw all the regulatory complaints against each other, the companies told Reuters.

"Microsoft has agreed to withdraw its regulatory complaints against Google, reflecting our changing legal priorities. We will continue to focus on competing vigorously for business and for customers," a Microsoft spokesperson said in an email.

Google, in a separate email, said the companies would want to compete vigorously based on the merits of their products, not in "legal proceedings".

The companies in September agreed to bury all patent infringement litigations against each other, settling 18 cases in the United States and Germany.

"... Following our patent agreement, we've now agreed to withdraw regulatory complaints against one another," Google said on Friday.

Social media giant Facebook has launched "Group Calling" on Messenger that can let a user add 50 participants simultaneously over the internet.

Messenger's latest feature was set to be rolled out globally over the next 24 hours on Android and iOS devices for free and users can start a group Voice over IP (VoIP) audio call from any group chat, TechCrunch.com reported.

Voice over IP (VoIP) is a methodology and group of technologies for the delivery of voice communications and multimedia sessions over Internet Protocol (IP) networks such as the internet.

To start a group call, a user needs to just tap the "Phone" icon, select which of the group chat members he or she wants to include and call. All the selected members will receive a Messenger call simultaneously.

If one misses the initial call but the call is still in progress, the users can tap the Phone icon in the group chat to join the call.

The user can also see who all are joined in the call and can add participants during the group conversation.

Scientists have combined the best features of a lobster and a fish to create an artificial eye that can see in the dark and may be used in surgical probes, search-and-rescue robots or planet-seeking telescopes.

Researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in US improved the sensitivity of the imaging system through the lenses rather than the sensor component.

Bomb-diffusing robots, laparoscopic surgeons and planet-seeking telescopes all need to resolve fine details through almost utter darkness.

These false eyes could help search-and-rescue robots or surgical scopes make dim surroundings seem bright as day, researchers said. "These days, we rely more and more on visual information. Any technology that can improve or enhance image-taking has great potential," said Hongrui Jiang, professor at UW-Madison.

Most attempts to improve night vision tweak the "retinas" of artificial eyes - such as changing the materials or electronics of a digital camera's sensor - so they respond more strongly to incoming packets of light.

However, rather than interfering with efforts to boost sensitivity at the back end, researchers set out to increase intensity of incoming light through the front end, the optics that focus the light on the sensor.

They found inspiration for the strategy from two aquatic animals that evolved different strategies to survive and see in murky waters. Looking between the prominent proboscises of elephant-nosed fishes unveils two strikingly unusual eyes, with retinas composed of thousands of tiny crystal cups instead of the smooth surfaces common to most animals.

These miniature vessels collect and intensify red light, which helps the fish discern its predators. The group emulated the fish's crystal cups by engineering thousands of miniscule parabolic mirrors, each as tall as a grain of pollen.

The researchers then shaped arrays of the light-collecting structures across the surface of a uniform hemispherical dome. The arrangement, inspired by the superposition compound eyes of lobsters, concentrates incoming light to individual spots, further increasing intensity.

"We showed fourfold improvement in sensitivity. That makes the difference between a totally dark image you can't see and an actually meaningful image," said Jiang.

Wonder what happens on internet in one minute? Lots. The amount of transactions and exchanges that happen on internet in 60 seconds is mind-blowing. Here's what 60 seconds mean on the most important elements of internet -- Facebook, Twitter, Amazon, YouTube, Tinder, Snpachat, YouTube and more ...

1. As much as 701,389 Facebook logins.

2. On Facebook-owned WhatsApp, almost 20.8 million messages are exchanged every minute.

3. On Google search --the world's biggest search engine -- one minute equals to 2.4 million search queries.

4. The global dating website gets 972.222 swipes every minute.

5. The video-sharing website YouTube boasts of 2.78 million video views per minute.

6. As many as 150 million emails sent are sent every one minute.

7. Cab-hailing service Uber sees 1389 rides every 60 seconds.

8. Here's another astounding number -- 527,760 photos are shared on Snapchat every minute.

9. Apple's App Store sees as many as 51,000 app downloads every minute.

10. Ecommerce behemoth sees sales worth $203,596 every minute on its website.

11. For job website LinkedIn, every minute means addition of at least 120-plus new accounts.

12. Microblogging website Twitter sees 347,222 Tweets per minute.

13. Photo-based social media platform Instagram witnesses 34,194 new posts in every 60 seconds.

14. The number on Vine per minute is 1.04 million Vine loops.

15. For music streaming website Spotify one minute equals to 38,052 hours of music.

Homegrown phone maker Micromax on Wednesday introduced 15 new handsets, a move seen as a desperate measure to stave off rising competition from Samsung and the growing list of Chinese makers such as Lenovo, Vivo, Oppo, Huawei and Gionee.

As the country's second-biggest handset seller loses market share, its promoters insist that "all is well" with the company, while dismissing talks of an exit. Micromax promoters are understood to have spoken to China's Alibaba for a majority stake sale, but the talks failed over differences in valuation.

Rahul Sharma, one of the four promoters who set up the company in 2000 (phone sale started in 2008), says that Micromax had voluntarily taken a "step back" over the last quarter or so as it worked to "realign its portfolio" and build an ecosystem of services around its devices.

The new devices, coupled with a redesigned logo and tagline, are seen as an attempt towards a spirited fightback. "We are a marathon runner, and not a sprinter," Sharma says, as he highlights the company's attempts to differentiate its devices through bundling of services such as cabs, e-commerce, health, entertainment and payment. These have been achieved through partnerships with various aggregators.

Taking the personal computer competition to a new level, global giant HP Inc has unveiled eight new products with the world's thinnest HP Spectre Notebook -- weighing 1.1 kg and as thin as 10.4 mm -- and Elite x3 - a 5.96-inch touchscreen device that will allow users to connect seamlessly to a separate screen, mouse and keyboard.

Both Spectre laptop and Elite x3 devices will be available in India soon. While $1,249 (India prices yet to be announced) Spectre notebook will be available in the market from mid-June, Elite x3 phablet will hit the Indian market later this year.

"HP Spectre is the thinnest notebook in the world and unlike the majority of other super thin PCs on the market, this laptop doesn't compromise power or features," Anneliese Olson, vice president of personal systems business, HP Asia-Pacific and Japan, told reporters here.

Priced at Rs 130,000 and now available in India, another key product HP EliteBook Folio is the thinnest and lightest business-class notebook with 12.4 mm thickness and weighs under one kg.

WhatsApp has announced that all messages sent on its service are now fully encrypted, but the service could still be storing important information about people's conversations.

The company announced yesterday to much celebration that it had taken steps to ensure that WhatsApp messages could only be read by the person sending and receiving them. It said that it had taken the step to ensure that messages couldn't be intercepted by hackers or oppressive regimes.

But the company is still able to store important data that could be used for spying or other malicious ends by those same people, according to its own privacy information. Though it can't store or even read the contents of messages, it can still store a whole host of other data about them.

"WhatsApp may retain date and time stamp information associated with successfully delivered messages and the mobile phone numbers involved in the messages, as well as any other information which WhatsApp is legally compelled to collect," the company's privacy page reads.

That means that information can exist on WhatsApp's servers and so potentially be vulnerable to hacking or requests from governments to view it.

Debate has raged over the importance of so-called metadata — information about messages rather than their contents — for security services. Governments and others have argued that such information is only useful for making decisions at a high level and not about any specific person — but privacy campaigners have said that metadata can be easily used to piece together somebody's life.

Facebook is set to introduce "secret chats" to Messenger, according to a new report.

The company has buried a reference to the new feature in the code of its iPhone app, according to a report from The Information.

The report also claims that Facebook is looking to make its Messenger app into a retail hub, which will allow people to buy and sell things through the app.

It isn't clear exactly what those secret chats will be. But within Facebook Messenger competitor Telegram, the same phrase is used to refer to special chats that are fully encrypted and have measures to stop them being viewed elsewhere.

"Telegram's special secret chats use end-to-end encryption, leave no trace on our servers, support self-destructing messages and don't allow forwarding," Telegram's website explains. "On top of this, secret chats are not part of the Telegram cloud and can only be accessed on their devices of origin."

A UK-based company is working on a new technology that may spell the end for paper passports by allowing you to use your smartphone at immigration control.

De La Rue, the world's largest producer of passports and British banknote printer, announced plans to embed passports directly into smartphones.

Martin Sutherland, chief executive of the company said that it had started work on a project to provide secure phone-based information that would work at immigration control, 'The Times' reported.

Passports are one of the last hold-outs of non-digital documents. Airline tickets, for example, are already delivered direct to phones.

The key would be for De La Rue to adapt its identity technology into a digital format and for governments to approve its use.

Airports in Miami and Atlanta have already tested mobile-based clearance systems, under which travellers can use a phone to enter customs information.

However, paperless passports were still in the early stage of development and were unlikely to arrive in the short term, Sutherland said.

You may soon be able to dial landline or mobile phone numbers from popular internet apps such as Skype, WhatsApp or Viber, following clearance for inter-connect agreements between internet service providers and telecom operators by an inter-ministerial panel of the government on Monday.

The move may result in substantially lower charges for voice calls (which would be billed as per data usage), though poor quality of internet networks - a general irritant with broadband services in many parts of the country - could be a dampener.

A part from being a consumer-friendly move, the decision to allow inter-connect agreements between ISPs and telecom operators will be a shot in the arm or Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Jio Infocomm, which will soon begin services across the country . Reliance Jio plans to offer voice over its 4G network. Following the panel's clearance, its subscribers will be able to terminate calls on the landline or mobile networks of any service provider ranging from MTNL or BSNL's fixed lines o the mobile numbers on Air el, Vodafone or Idea Cellular.

"The move has been cleared by the inter-ministerial elecom commission and groundwork to get it going will start soon," an official source said.

Sector regulator Trai had already recommended the measure to allow inter-connect for voice over internet protocol (or VoIP) services, and this had been pending with the telecom ministry .Changes will be made to licence conditions to allow inter-connection of IP (internet protocol) networks.

"The government has removed a major policy hurdle to allow interplay between internet and non-internet net works," Hemant Joshi, telecom analyst at Deloitte, said.

Logging on to a computer to file a leave application or submit a travel request is so yesterday. Now, an increasing number of companies are letting their employees do all this and more through customized mobile applications.

Ajay Ananthpadmanaphan, a zonal business manager with Bharti Airtel, says it's made his life a lot simpler. "I can approve travel requests for all my territory sales managers on the go, via my mobile, and this saves me a lot of time," he says.

Chandrakant Mandrupkar, general manager at KEC International, says he's been using the 'Grow@RPG' app to view and apply for job opportunities across functions and companies within the RPG group. ICICI Bank's app 'Universe on the move', which lets employees update attendance and apply for leave, sees transactions of more than a lakh every month.

As smartphones continue to permeate our personal lives, companies are moving towards a mobile HR environment with apps that go beyond back office integration. "Apps have been launched for a range of functions (such as e-learning) and these are helping streamline processes," says T K Srirang, Sr GM & HR head at ICICI Bank.

Google Inc, long an also-ran in cloud services, has scored an important victory in its effort to win corporate clients: Home Depot is moving some of its data to Google's cloud.

The deal, flagged by Google executive Greg DeMichillie in a briefing and expected to be announced formally on Wednesday, highlights the momentum Google Cloud Platform has gained under the leadership of Diane Greene, a co-founder of VMWare who joined Google late last year.

VMWare sells its "virtualization" technology for improving the efficiency of data centers to many of the same customers that Google Cloud is targeting.

Many of Google Cloud's more prominent customers, including message service Snapchat, are new internet-based companies -- not always the best references for chief information officers at more traditional companies.

Google's AlphaGo on Tuesday rocked the worlds of Go and artificial intelligence when it beat 18-time international Go champion Lee Se-dol the final round of the Google DeepMind Challenge.

Lee lost the first three rounds last week but came back and won the fourth game.

One criticism of AI programs is that they have done well relying on logical inferences based on heuristics and memory, but they lack intuition and can't learn from their mistakes or derive new knowledge without human programming.

AlphaGo's victory changes that, according to Mike Jude, program manager, Stratecast/Frost & Sullivan.

Go "depends as much on logic, like chess, as it does on intuition," he told TechNewsWorld. "The results of this competition imply that AlphaGo has transcended the brute-force approaches to solving games of logic.

Android is the most popular operating system in the world, installed on millions - if not billions - of devices, from smartphones and tablets to smart appliances such as TVs and fridges. So it's always exciting when a new version is released, and Google is busy working on Android 7.0 N.

The current version of Android, Android 6.0 Marshmallow, hasn't even been out a year, and many Android owners are still waiting for it to become available for their devices. That hasn't stopped Google working on its follow-up, although Android 7.0 N is still in its early stages - we don't even currently know what the 'N' stands for - although we have made a few educated guesses.

But, even though it's still early days for Android 7.0 N, you can still download and install it right now - although there are some caveats. First, this is an early developer preview, which means it's not intended for regular smartphone owners, but rather app developers who want to make sure their products work with Android 7.0 N. So although you can expect some of the latest features of Android 7.0 N to work, such as bundled notifications and multi-window support, you should expect some bugs and errors as well.

If you want - or need - an Android device that works smoothly and reliably, then you should wait for the final release of Android 7.0 N, which will hopefully be later this year. The second important thing to remember about this early version of Android 7.0 N is that it will currently only work with the Pixel C tablet or a newer Nexus device: the Nexus 5X, Nexus 6P, Nexus 6, Nexus Player or Nexus 9.

Consumers can now file complaints against misleading commercials by companies to advertising watchdog ASCI through mobile messaging app WhatsApp.

Consumers can now WhatsApp the objectionable advertisement to +91 77-100-12345, from where the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) would lodge 'suo moto' complaints using this number.

Consumers can send pictures of print ads, hoardings, packaging or screen shots of websites, links of YouTube videos etc and a ASCI team would be scrutinising these complaints and take it further if found valid, ASCI said a statement.

"ASCI is empowering consumers by making it more accessible. Today almost every person with a smartphone is using messaging services such as WhatsApp. Technology makes it possible for them to flag false, misleading or offensive ads instantaneously and anytime anywhere while on the go," ASCI chairman Benoy Roychowdhury said.

WhatsApp will serve as only the first touch point for consumers to reach ASCI with their main objections and images of the objectionable advertisement.

Last year, it had launched a mobile app to connect with the consumers and curb misleading advertisements.

Internet search engine giant Google, which last year reorganised itself as Alphabet, is currently in talks with a number of local telecom operators to kickstart its ambitious Google Loon project, months after chief executive Sundar Pichai managed to secure support for the project from the government.

In an exclusive interview, Google India chief Rajan Anandan also did not rule out the possibility of the company setting up an office for its early-stage investment fund Google Ventures in India in the future, although he declined to share further details and a timeline.

Last year, Google set up an office in India for its late-stage investment fund Google Capital.

"Google Capital is here (in India). Google Ventures is only a matter of time... India actually has 50 Series-A investors, we only have five Series-D investors. So, there is a gap in late-stage investing and we decided to close that gap. What are the gaps? How can we as a company help address those gaps? So, that's the lens that we apply — we just don't want to do that because you have something," said Anandan, the managing director for Google South East Asia and India.

If there's no pack that you particularly like, the "Reaction Packs" give you a choice to make your own, the report added.

A new browser extension makes reactions expressed on social networking site Facebook a little more fun by allowing users to react to news through a wide range of emojis featuring US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.

Facebook recently rolled out its Reactions -- a line-up of six emojis each expressing different emotions like "Love," "Wow," "Haha," "Sad," and "Angry".

But the new browser extension, called Reaction Packs which works on Firefox or Safari, can swap out all of the standard reaction emoticons on Facebook for sets of Donald Trump, Pokemon and Soot Sprites, romper.com reported.

If there's no pack that you particularly like, the "Reaction Packs" give you a choice to make your own, the report added.

Alphabet's much-talked about high-speed internet service, Google Fiber, had 53,000 video subscribers as of December end, up 79% from a year earlier, brokerage MoffettNathanson said, citing numbers from the US Copyright Office.

Google has been expanding the service, which promises internet speeds of up to 1,000 megabits per second, in several cities in the United States.

"If there is a surprise here, it is perhaps that the growth rate isn't higher," MoffettNathanson said.

"After all, there has been a steady stream of new cities announced, and they've now been at it for a long time in at least a handful of markets."

The service is currently available in Atlanta, Austin, Charlotte, Kansas City, Nashville, Salt Lake City, San Antonio Provo, Utah, and Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina, according to the Google Fiber website.

Alphabet, formerly Google, said in December it would consider bringing the Fiber internet service to Los Angeles and Chicago.

Government has asked Google to select a telecom operator as partner for testing the balloon-based internet technology, Loon Project, in the country.

"Google wants to test the Loon Project in expensive and scarce spectrum bands. It has been asked to partner with any telecom operator that can meet its requirement and then approach the government for testing Loon," an official source told PTI.

The official said that if Google wishes to conduct a test with BSNL, it can carry out the experiment in the spectrum held by the state-owned company.

"This approach should resolve the spectrum band sought by Google as well as security, to some extent," the official added.

"The company has decided that we will, henceforth, offer 'cash on delivery' mode of payments for those who have placed an order for the 'Freedom 251' smartphone. This will ensure further transparency and clear any misgivings," Ringing Bells president Ashok Chadha said in an official statement.

Noida-based startup Ringing Bells, the makers of the world's cheapest smartphone- Freedom 251, is reportedly refunding the payments that it had accepted on the first pre-booking date. The company stated that it had accepted payments from the first 30,000 orders, after which their website had crashed.

According to news channel ABP News, Ringing Bells MD Mohit Goel has claimed that the company has refunded the money of all 30,000 customers and said that the company will accept cash on delivery only.

Notably, after the first 30,000 bookings were made, the company did not ask for any booking amount after its website was live after a 24-hour outage. Once the second round of booking were made live on the website, the company allowed people to book one Freedom 251 unit with one email ID and mobile number.

After a particular booking was successfully accepted, Ringing Bells said that the customer would receive a payment link on the registered email ID to confirm their booking within 48 hours. However, it did not send any payments related email to its customers.

"The company has decided that we will, henceforth, offer 'cash on delivery' mode of payments for those who have placed an order for the 'Freedom 251' smartphone. This will ensure further transparency and clear any misgivings," Ringing Bells president Ashok Chadha said in an official statement.

Facebook has rolled out a new feature that lets users wish their friends on their birthdays via a 15-second video on the platform. This seems to be aimed at replacing the birthday wishes on Facebook that are usually sent by users in text or image form.

The birthday cam feature has been rolled out for Facebook's iOS app only so far. The feature comes into play as users head to the friend's wall to post the wishes and prompts them to post a video instead. Users can add frames to the videos as well.

If the videos catch up, users will have a new (and interactive) way to wish their friends on birthdays, but may lead to spamming on their friends' timelines. Only time will tell how Facebook users react to this new feature as going through all the videos may take up a lot of time.

Facebook has been bullish on videos for well over a year now and this step is likely to help video proliferation on the platform.

Since he announced the launch of a mobile phone for Rs 251, Mohit Goel has faced widespread scepticism, along with visits by police and income tax officials at his rented two-storey office in Noida. However, the Amity University graduate insists that he will not only deliver the phones at the stunning price he has quoted, but also make a profit of Rs 31 on each handset sold.

"Why am I being hounded? What wrong have I done?" Goel asked in the course of an exclusive interview with TOI. The director of Ringing Bells insists that his new venture is not a fly-by-night operation and will begin customer deliveries from April 15.

"Has there ever been a case of income-tax evasion against me or my company, or has there been an FIR filed against me in any police station? Why am I being called a 'bhagora' (who'll run away with the money)? I intend to do a valid business, just like any other startup, and I have a business plan ready."

The company claims it has received over 7 crore registrations on its website since it started accepting applications on February 18. "We are taking online bookings for only 25 lakh units in the first batch due to limited supplies, while giving another 25 lakh through offline distributors. I will deliver the handsets before June 30. All the money that we receive from customers through the payment gateway will be kept in an escrow account and we will touch it only when we deliver the devices." The company has an account with ICICI Bank.

The dual SIM Freedom 251 device carries a 4-inch display, 1GB RAM, 8GB internal memory with a 1.3GHZ quad-core processor, dual cameras and comes with a charger, headphone and one-year warranty.

The duo say that they have a carefully laid-out business model to manage the disruptive price for the device "The price that works out per device is roughly around Rs 1,500," Chadha says. insists, though significantly lowering it down from the Rs 2,500 he had announced on the day of the unveiling of the device.

The number of internet users in India would reach 500 million by 2017, with as many as 400 million of them getting online through mobile phone, a senior official of search engine giant Google has said.

"There are 350 million internet users in India, of which 152 million are mobile users. This number is projected to increase to 500 million in 2017, of which 400 million are going to be mobile users," Ashish Kalsi, strategist, search quality of Google India said.

He was speaking at a workshop for journalists organized by Vox Foundation and "powered by Google" here yesterday.

"Content is king. What Google does is it gives a level -- playing field to all provided the content is sound," he said.

Kalsi explained the four things needed for a website to be discovered quickly on Google search -- accessibility, value, display and great user experience.

The online content creators can also tap the features such as search console, Google trends, Indian language internet alliance, he said.

January, one of India's major e-commerce firms discovered that someone has been buying goods on its platform for free for several months.

A hacker, operating from a small town in Uttar Pradesh, had exploited a loophole in its payment system to manipulate it and avail 100% discount on almost anything he purchased for about six months. It would have continued had it not been for another hacker — an ethical one — who spotted the loot and helped the ecommerce company save the day.

"We hacked in to the e-commerce platform from outside and were able to buy almost anything for free," said the 20-something ethical hacker who helped the company. "It may be little complicated for you to understand, but simply put, an algorithm was developed which manipulated the payment gateway in to reading duplicated discount codes," the youngster said.

E-commerce and mobile app-based service providers such as Amazon, Flipkart, Snapdeal, Paytm and Ola are increasingly roping in ethical hackers to look for loopholes in their system by continuously trying to hack into them from outside and report back to the company even as they grow their business in the country at an astronomical pace. In some cases these ethical hackers also help companies fix the glitch.

"We're in the job of finding flaws across people, process and technology of an organisation's digital setup. We hack them with their permission and produce an overall maturity scorecard of the organisation providing the CEO/CFO the information about the overall cyber risk they are sitting on along with a roadmap to enhance the cyber security maturity of the organisation," said Saket Modi, CEO at Lucideus, an online cyber security firm.

Facebook, which was founded in 2004, didn't pass 1,000 employees until 2009, and today it has around 13,000 workers across 65 countries.

1. They're bold:
When Facebook CEO and co-founder Mark Zuckerberg filed for the company's initial public offering in 2012, he wrote that one of the sayings he and his employees live by is, "The riskiest thing is to take no risks". "We encourage everyone to make bold decisions, even if that means being wrong some of the time," he wrote.

2. They focus on impact:
"People who thrive here at Facebook are always creating new things and figuring out ways to improve," said global head of recruiting Miranda Kalinowski. "They have this deep curiosity". Facebook employees need to have the personal drive to further the Facebook mission, which is to make the world more open and connected.

3. They move fast:
"Move fast and break things" was one of Zuckerberg's founding mantras. As the company's matured, it hasn't lost its value of moving as quickly as possible to stay innovative, which in turn fuels growth. "We're less afraid of making mistakes than we are of losing opportunities by moving too slowly," Facebook's values read. "We are a culture of builders - the power is in your hands."

4. They're open:
From its open floor plans to its culture of constant feedback, Facebook values workers who embrace transparency and collaboration. "Openness and transparency, building community, collaborating -- it's all part of the way we work together," Goler said.

5. They build social value:
Goler explained that Facebook is a "strengths-based organization." The term, borrowed from management consultant and author Marcus Buckingham, refers to a company that builds upon individuals' talents rather than trying to strengthen their weaknesses. This allows employees to produce work that they find meaningful. At Facebook, this approach reinforces Zuckerberg's mission of providing citizens across the world with the opportunity to express themselves online

Tacskey Ventures replaces the traditional way of buying fish and vegetables with an app-based home-delivery service. An order placed through WhatsApp before 9.30am will be delivered before noon. There's no delivery charge. Registered customers will also get price alerts before 8am through a WhatsApp broadcast message.

SL Shafi, project manager, Tacskey Ventures told TOI they launched this on a trial basis on February 1. "We deliver fresh fish and vegetables to customers' homes at a very competitive price. While fresh fish is procured directly from fishermen on the Mangaluru coast, vegetables are sourced from farmers across Karnataka. Fish is delivered after cleaning it. We have over six years experience in wholesale fisheries," Shafi said.

The service is available only for pre-subscribed customers, he said. "Customers can register by texting their name and address in detail to 8095346444 via WhatsApp. Customer details are kept confidential and will not be used for any forms of advertisement. We do not add their numbers to any WhatsApp group," he said.

Shafi said the two-wheeler service network is currently available only on seven routes. "Very soon, all areas in the city will be covered by appointing more delivery boys. The initial response during the trial period was overwhelming. Based on people's demand, we have decided to add fresh chicken and fruits too to our product list.We have introduced an introductory offer in which a customer will get 25% cashback on completion of 18 purchases in a month," he added.

Got hundreds of Facebook friends you hardly know? Now is a good time to do some digital cleanup, while the year is still fresh. Review your security and privacy settings, and make sure those casual acquaintances you met at a bar eons ago aren't still getting the most intimate details of your life.

Turn on Login Approvals:
Because passwords are tough to manage, it's best not to rely solely on them. Turn on what Facebook calls Login Approvals. It's in the account settings under “Security.” After you do so, you're asked for confirmation -- entering a special number sent to your phone -- when signing on from a new device. Unless you switch devices often, this is something you set up once and forget about. And no one else can log in with your password unless they also have your phone and that special number.

Use privacy Checkup tool:
Facebook offers a series of quick privacy ‘shortcuts’. On desktops and laptops, look for the small padlock on the upper right corner of the browser. On Apple and Android devices, access shortcuts through the menu -- the three horizontal bars. The key shortcut is “Who can see my stuff?” See whether you've been inadvertently broadcasting your musings to the entire Facebook community. You'll probably want to at least limit sharing to ‘Friends’ rather than ‘Public’, though you can customize that further to exclude certain individuals or groups -- such as co-workers, acquaintances or grandparents. When sharing, remember that less is more. While you're at it, check ‘Timeline and Tagging' in your account settings from a PC or mobile.

Unfriend some:
Purge friends you're no longer in touch with. If you think ‘unfriending' is too mean, add them to an ‘Acquaintances' or ‘Restricted' list instead. Acquaintances' means they won't show up in your news feed as often, though they'll still have full access to any posts you distribute to your friends. 'Restricted' means they'll only see posts you mark as public. Either is effectively a way to unfriend someone without dropping any clues you've done so.

Check your News Feed preferences
You can exert some influence over whose posts you see more or less often by going to ‘News Feeds Preferences.'' The setting is on the top right on browsers and Android apps and on the lower right on iPhones. Here, you can select friends who'll always show up on top, or hide someone's posts completely. Finally, if you're worried about data usage, you can stop videos in your news feeds from playing automatically. On Android, go to ‘Autoplay' in the ‘App Settings’. On iPhones, it's in the account settings under ‘Videos and Photos’.

Watch those apps:
The Privacy Checkup tool on PCs will review apps for you automatically. On mobile devices, look for “Apps” in the account settings (not “Apps” in the main menu). A related option is the Security Checkup tool. It's an easy way to log out of Facebook on devices you rarely use. You can also enable alerts when someone tries to sign on from a new device or browser. To run this, go to http://Facebook.com/securitycheckup on a PC. On the Android app, you can search for “security checkup” in the Help Center. On iPhones and iPads, you'll have to find the options individually in the account settings under “Security.”

Put ‘Legacy Contact’:
Two settings might eliminate grief later in life ... or death. In the security settings, you can designate certain friends as trusted contacts. They'll have power to help you if you get locked out of your account for some reason. You can also designate a ‘Legacy Contact' -- a family member or close friend who'd serve as your administrator should you, um, make your last status update (as in, ever). They won't be able to post on your behalf or see your messages, but they'll be able to respond to new friend requests and take a few additional actions on your deceased behalf. Celebrity like wardrobe is a dream. #Sayswho.. Now shop for similar celebrity outfits at Follo Star Shop- Bollywood Ka Fashion. Login to www.follo.in/starshop now and start shopping !!

Google is developing a virtual reality headset that works without a smartphone or computer, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

The headset will include a screen, high-powered processors and outward-facing cameras, the Journal reported, citing one person.

Alphabet Inc's Google currently sells a virtual reality device made of cardboard into which users slide in their mobile phones.

Since the launch in 2014, Google has shipped five million Google Cardboards.

The company declined to comment on the Journal report.

Truecaller is an app that you can install and use in your Android phone and resolve the mystery of apparently unknown callers by a single click.
Here are seven tricks and tips that you can use to become a pro at using Truecaller

Block calls:
The app can be used to block calls beginning with a certain set of numbers. If you find someone is annoying you over the phone and the number begins with the set 8051, simply block the numbers beginning with those digits.

See who is calling even without data connectivity:
It is not necessary to have an internet connection on the phone at all times for this app to work. Once a number is identified the app will identify it, whether or not you are connected to the internet.

Protect yourself from spammers:
Truecaller automatically safeguards you from the known spammers in a region once you download the app in your device. You can also choose to reject calls from people who hide their identity while calling through this app.

Use Truedialer as default dialer:
Truecaller lets you do much more than just blocking calls from people you want to avoid. It offers a dialer and users can choose to use Truedialer as the default dialer. Its Discovery feature works much like Twitter and Facebook’s methods to find people you already know. It works on your location and existing contact list. If you find a contact with details set to private, Truecaller can show flowchart so that you can find a common friend

Identify numbers with Search bar:
Truecaller makes it easy to identify any phone number literally! There is a search bar that you can see after launching the app. Simply, type in a phone number in that field. You may also type in, address and names.

Set up your own profile:
With Truecaller, you can set up your own profile and customize it the way you want. This helps the call recipients get the details about you. You can choose to display your full name and a picture, for example.
You may add information like a website and an email ID for the convenience of your contacts. The app also has an option for users who want to write a short description about themselves.
Similarly, you can choose to hide your identity from the call recipients under the privacy tab of settings.

Remove your number from its database:
The app also lets you remove your number from its database. You need to visit this link http://www.truecaller.com/unlist. Then type in your phone number inclusive of country code. Next, choose a reason for number removal, enter the captcha and click on unlist button.

WhatsApp has reportedly been the target of a new scam which deceives users into disclosing personal information.

According to BT, the links appear to come from your friend but instead lead you to a discount page which then asks for your personal details.

Unassuming users are then led to a fake website which infects your phone with malware, allowing the scammer to obtain sensitive information.

WhatsApp's popularity has exploded in recent years. It now has nearly one billion users worldwide and has become a key target for scammers.

We remember BBM being one of the best and most secured chat clients for mobile users. However, their glory was short lived when WhatsApp came into play. Recently, the company had announced that the instant messaging (IM) platform has over 1 billion users.

Now, Facebook owned WhatsApp has increased it group member limit from 100. The number has been increased to 256, which seems to be an odd number to increase the limit to. This could be because of server and platform restrictions. Or this could be a testing stage for WhatsApp to see how the users and businesses make use of it, and gradually increase the member number.

So what does all this mean for the user?

Well, Facebook did announce they will keep the platform free for the end user. However, they didn't buy WhatsApp for billions of dollars just to give a free mobile IM app to the world. They are out to make money and like any business this platform will also be monetized.

Right now group admins and businesses are using WhatsApp to sell products or spread awareness about brands. We are sure many of you have got some type of spam on WhatsApp by strangers who are selling mobile numbers or are just running a survey. With the increase in group member base the spam messages on this IM system will also go up. On the other side, group admins would be able to spread the word out to many more users at the same time.

Businesses would also take full advantage of the system to advertise using groups. By our reckoning Facebook is trying to monetize this section with some sort of advertising, maybe in line or on top. This can be group specific too. Also, Facebook might sell the WhatsApp platform to group admins who want more users on their groups for a fee. People who want more than 256 users on the group would need to cough up a shiny penny.

You don't always find everything you need to know in the user manual ¬ plus, who reads that thing anyway? If you want to find out more about some hidden tips and tricks for your Android smartphone/tablet device, read this non-exhaustive list.

1. Quickly access notification settings:
Too many notifications can become irritating after some time. Tap and hold on a notification in the drop down notification bar.
This will show you a Setting icon next to the notification -- tap on the icon to open up the Notification settings of that particular app.
From here, you can adjust them or turn them off completely.

2. High contrast text:
Reading text on a smartphone screen can be be difficult for people with weak vision. Often, light grey text tends to merge with the background making it difficult to read.
An easy way to solve this issue is by enabling high contrast text from Settings > Accessibility. Once enabled, you can instantly see the text appear crisper and easy to read.

3. Find a silent phone:
Did you switch off your phone ringer and misplace the phone? Since its on silent, even calling it from another number might not help. The simple way out is to head to www.google.com/android/devicemanagerand login with the same Google ID as the phone.
Here, you can view the location of your phone and send a signal to ring loudly -even with the ringer off.

4. Smart lock:
For security reasons, everyone should set up a lockscreen password on their smartphone. But it gets tedious to enter it each time. With the smart lock function, you can have the phone unlocked when its safe with you in your home. Go to security > Smart Lock and add your home location to trusted places. You can also add a Bluetooth de vice (like a speaker or trusted device.)
Once you do this, your phone will not ask for a lock password when it detects that you are at home or if you are connected to one of the trusted devices.

5. Custom reject SMS:
Go to Settings > Phone or open up the dialer and access the phone settings. In the menu, you will see a Reject with SMS option.
In this setting, you can remove or edit any or all of the pre-set messages to be sent when you reject an incoming call.

6. Increase interface speed
Head to settings > About Phone and tap 7 times on the 'Build Number' menu. This will enable Developer Options in settings. Here, scroll down to settings for Window and Transition Animation scale.
By default, the value of animation is set to 1x. Reduce it to 0.5x to improve the speed. You can also turn the animations off to further improve the speed.

7. Stop automatic shortcuts:
Each time you install a new app from the Play Store, a shortcut icon is placed on the home screen. If you don't want that to happen, open the Play Store, tap on the three bars on the top left and open Settings.
Here, you will see an option called 'Add icon to Home Screen' -- simply uncheck the box to disable automatic shortcut placement.

Chinese consumer electronics maker LeEco plans to start selling virtual reality headsets and launch smart TVs in India in the June quarter, months after entering the country with its smartphone range, a company executive said.

LeEco's VR headset, Le 3D Helmet, will come equipped with a 5.5 inch, 2K resolution screen with a 70 degree field of view. It was launched in China in September.

Virtual reality (VR) is seen as the next big thing in technology but not many devices are available for sale in India.

Oculus, the VR company Facebook Inc bought in 2014, started accepting pre-orders this month for its much-awaited headset, Rift, which is priced at $599.

Atul Jain, India chief operating officer of LeEco, declined to disclose the price of the company's VR device.

At an event held in New Delhi today, LeEco unveiled two new smartphones – Le Max and Le 1s. The LeMax 64GB is priced at Rs 32,999 while the Le 1s is priced at 10,999 for the 32GB variant.

Both devices will be available exclusively via Flipkart. Flipkart also announced a 10 percent cash back via Axis Bank. Registrations until February 2 till 11AM and the flash sale begins on the same day at 12 noon for the Le 1s. The flash sale for the Le Max will be on 16 February.

In terms of specifications, the LeTV Le 1s features a 5.5 Inch FHD touch screen display with a 1920 x 1080 pixel resolution and 403ppi. It is powered by a 2.2 GHz octa-core Mediatek Helio X10 processor paired with 3GB RAM.

It includes an internal storage of 32GB and does not include a microSD card. The smartphone comes equipped with a 13 MP rear camera with LED flash and a 5MP front-facing camera. A 3000 mAh battery completes the package.

In terms of specifications, the LeTV Le Max features a 6.33 Inch Quad HD Touch Screen Display with a 1920×1080 pixel resolution and also, offers a 2K display. Offering a floating glass design, it is powered by a 1.5 GHz octa-core Snapdragon 810 processor paired with 4GB RAM. It has an inbuilt storage of 64GB and does not feature a memory slot. It comes with a 21 MP Rear Camera With LED Flash along with a 4MP Front-Facing Camera. A 3400 mAh Battery completes the package. The LeMax will be available in 128 (gold) and 64GB (silver) variants.

Change the video’s playback speed
You can hit the Settings button on the video and click the Speed option. You can then slow down the video (0.25X and 0.5X) or speed it up (1.25X, 1.5X and 2X). This feature, however, is available only for desktops and not for the app.

Keep your account private
If you don’t want other YouTube users to know which videos you have liked, see your playlists or see the channels you subscribe to, you can keep all your information private. All you need to do is to log into YouTube, type ‘www.youtube.com/account_privacy’ in the address bar of the browser and tick the boxes Likes and subscriptions (private).

Play videos on loop
All you need to do is to open the video, hit the ‘right click’ button on the mouse/trackpad and select the ‘Loop’ option, and the video will repeat itself.

Go keyboard-only
Just open YouTube with the URL ‘www.youtube.com/leanback’ and you will get the keyboard navigations.
In the YouTube standard model, you can use keyboard shortcuts like k (pause/play), j (rewind 10 seconds), l (fast-forward 10 seconds) and m (mute). Press 0 to go the beginning of the video, while hitting any number between 1 and 9 takes you to the respective percentage (for example hitting 7 will take you directly to the 70% spot).

Set default video resolution
If you have a slow internet connection and want to avoid the pain of waiting for the video to buffer, you can go to ‘www.youtube.com/account_playback’ and select the option ‘I have a slow internet connection.
If you want videos to play only in HD resolution, you need the ‘Magic Actions’ extension for Google Chrome and Firefox. Just select the ‘Auto HD’ option and the ideal streaming resolution.

Go in karaoke mode
Want to sing along your favourite track but don’t want the hassle of looking for lyrics each time? Just get the Musixmatch browser extension, which will overlay the lyrics on the video as it plays. Perfect for karaoke nights.

#Artist
If you want only the music/videos of a specific artist, just type ‘#ArtistName’ in the search bar. This search feature works on the desktop website, mobile site and app.

Make your searches specific
Using ‘HD’ after a song’s title in the search bar will show you only HD videos. Similarly, if you remember the exact title of a video you once watched but can’t find it now, use the phrase ‘allintitle’ followed by the video’s title to get the exact video.

Save for later
Hit the ‘+ Add To’ button on the YouTube website or app and select the Watch Later option to save videos for future viewing.

Facebook is growing at an exceptional pace as it enters adolescence, propelling it into a better position to challenge Google as the internet's most powerful company.

It marked the first time that Facebook's quarterly revenue has surpassed $5 billion -- more than fading internet star Yahoo now generates in an entire year. Facebook's earnings also more than doubled to $1.56 billion, even as the Menlo Park, California, company invests heavily in virtual reality, artificial intelligence, internet access in remote parts of the world and a mobile ad network for services other than its own.

The performance lifted Facebook's stock by $11.37, or 12%, to $105.82 in extended trading after the report came out.

Starting tomorrow, passengers using Mumbai Central will be able to access high-speed internet as it becomes the first railway station in the country to get Google's Wi-Fi service.

This is part of Google's tie-up with state-owned RailTel Corp of India to provide Wi-Fi connectivity at 407 stations. It will be Google's biggest such project here.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai, during his visit to India in December, had given a January deadline for the facility at the first station. Extending support to the Digital India initiative, Pichai had said that 100 railway stations will be covered by 2016-end. Railway officials said that the project was on track and will meet the deadline.

RailTel's fibre optic network is being used as the backbone connecting the stations. Officials told ET that high-speed connections will be available for all users, many of whom may not be online otherwise.

Pichai, on his blog, had promised connectivity that was "many times faster than what most people in India have access to today."

Passengers could use it for anything from downloading a book or a game for their journey, watching videos or researching their destination.

Enable your child to unlock their unique inborn but hidden potential with the help of Brain-O-Pedia's (D.M.I.T) Brain Mapping Analysis.

Parent interaction organized by Brain-o-Pedia will be held on 22^nd Jan (FRI) 6pm - 9pm and 23^rd Jan (SAT) 10am - 1pm at

Microsoft has finished rolling out Skype's much-anticipated real time voice translation service to all of its Windows users, according to a post on the Skype blog.

Skype -- founded in Estonia in 2003 -- can understand Mandarin, English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish, and translate one to another as you video call your Skype contacts.

"We launched Skype Translator preview just over a year ago in partnership with Microsoft Translator," the blog post reads. "Skype Translator has come a long way since then."

Skype said French to English is the most popular language pair, while the top international "calling corridor" is Germany to Ghana.

State-run BSNL has extended the scheme giving 80% reduction in mobile rates to its existing customers, with effect from January 16.

The company had earlier announced the scheme for new customers.

"Earlier, BSNL had reduced call rate by up to 80% for its new prepaid mobile customers only and now the same has been extended for existing prepaid users also," the company said in a statement. <

Google Maps might know the local traffic better than me, but for short trips around town, I can't be bothered to turn it on. But thanks to the latest update to Maps on Android, I don't have to.

Among a few other updates in Maps v9.19 spotted by Android Police, Google has introduced a new 'Driving Mode'. While you're driving around town without a destination dialed in, Google will use your frequent locations and search history to come up with a predicted destination, and then push traffic information or news about road closures as you're driving, so you can adjust the route as you see fit.

It's a neat (if creepy!) feature that should make driving around town a little more efficient; of course, if it makes more users open Maps when they're driving around, it also means that Google gets more data to plug into its traffic algorithms (among other things).

NUNot being able to download your favorite videos from Facebook is something that most users hate. But there are certain ways in which you can get your work done and save those beloved videos. Following are the ways in which you can download Facebook videos.

Unlike the ones uploaded by you, Facebook sadly doesn't allow you download those videos that are posted or shared by your friends. However, there are certain steps by which you can download or save any video uploaded on Facebook without any software:

To download a video posted/shared by a friend:
1. Open Facebook and find the video you want to download.
2. Play it and select the link in the address bar.
3. Then change the URL in Address bar as follows- change "www" to "m" so that the initial part of the URL looks like https://m.facebook.com/......
4. Once you change it, press enter to open the mobile version of the page.
5. Once the mobile version of the page opens, click play and right click the video and then from the options select Save video as, Save target as or Save link as depending on the browser you are using.
6. Then choose where you want to save it. LL

After years of declining use, Microsoft is finally ending support for versions 8, 9 and 10 of their Internet Explorer web browser on January 12th.

These versions of the browser will still be usable, but they won't receive any more security or technical updates after the cut-off -- meaning those using them will become much more vulnerable to hackers and security breaches.

As Microsoft has announced, one final patch for the browser versions will deliver an 'End of Life' notification, which will tell users they should switch to Internet Explorer 11, the latest version of the browser, as soon as possible.

Users will alternately be encouraged to switch to Microsoft Edge -- the company's new browser, designed to be more suited to the features of the modern web.

Microsoft announced that support would end for old versions of IE back in August 2014, so users have had a long time to upgrade.