We are still finding out the full potential of generative AI and how it could help people. As you know, Google has its own AI chatbot that you’re able to try out now. This chatbot, named Bard, can do a lot of stuff, as Google gave it the ability to debug code.
When we found out that ChatGPT could write actual code, we were all dumbfounded. Well, Google Bard can also do that, but the company is looking to crank that capability up to 11. According to a blog post released today, Google Bard will offer several services that will help you write code.
This approach is meant to be much more substantial than what we see with ChatGPT. Yes, Bard can generate code for you, but it’s focusing more on helping learn and grow as programmers so that they won’t need AI in the future.
Google will help you in more than 20 programming languages including C++, Python, Java, Javascript, Go, and Typescript. This means that the code you’re learning is pretty much covered.
So, as stated, Bard can generate code for you. Just ask it what you want it to generate and you’ll get a response. You can also paste in your own code and ask it to make alterations. What’s neat is that you can easily export the generated code to your Google Colab.
This feature comes in handy when you want it to debug code for you. If you’re writing code, and you want to check it for errors. That’s a handy tool if you’re looking to double-check your work.
Google still wants to teach you
The most notable thing about this update is that Bard will actually teach you about the code you’re working on. It will explain why the code works or doesn’t work rather than just writing it out for you. This gives you the ability to learn about coding.
This is crucial, as it can be tempting for people with no coding background to rely on AI to generate code for them. However, without knowing the fundamentals of programming and just typing in requests, a person could have a much harder time making a proper and stable app.
Google updated Bard with this capability today, so you can access it now.
So, in case you aren’t quite up to speed with the happenings in the world of AI — it is now more than just a thing. Is it just a fad though? Well, considering that we’re likely to see it powering features on some of the best phones to come out in 2023… Probably not.
But that is because AI can do loads more than just act as a “shortcut” for your Google search or next university assignment. It can generate music, write software code, create visual arts and even play RPG games with you. And ChatGPT specifically is really good at that last one!
While the technology itself is impressive, it is what users do with the results that will come to define how the public views it. And, unfortunately, we’ve got loads of negative examples.
This latest one is about a song, which sounds like a legitimate collaboration by RNB stars Drake and The Weeknd. The track is called “Heart On My Sleeve” and until recently, you could find it on all of the major music streaming platforms. Without proper credit.
Apple led the charge against the song by allegedly removing from their platform first.
But how does one credit something like that anyway? The AI created it, but it can’t bear the fruits of its labor, for it does not need them. The user who prompted it exerted some form of creativity, but that is based on what the AI model knows about the performers. And as for the musicians themselves… Well, they didn’t play a direct role in the equation. The song went viral and its creator, going by @ghostwriter, got approximately 629,439 streams from it on Spotify alone. The platform’s lowest rate is about $0.003 per stream, so that amounts to somewhere around $1,888. But the song was also on all other major streaming platforms.
BBC released a report which highlights the comments of Universal Music — publisher of the aforementioned artists — which, to no one’s surprise, is claiming that this is a form of copyright violation. The publisher stated that AI platforms have a “legal and ethical responsibility” to combat this sort of usage.
Apple led the string of takedowns, removing it from its Apple Music streaming service. Deezer, Tidal, TikTok, Spotify and YouTube followed suit closely after, but the source quotes that the song can still be found online.
Copyright specialists from the UK have commented that the current legislation is nowhere near prepared for this sort of shenanigans. This means that songs like this could potentially be seen as completely original by the law, depending on how deep the deepfake is.
But as we can see from the example here, publishers aren’t ready to take this sitting down. AI was sure to have a huge impact on all of our lives, but who would’ve thought that it would extend to a necessity to change copyright laws, huh?
Days after the horrifying cyberattack, more details about the 3CX incident surface online as Mandiant discloses its investigations. As revealed, the cyber attack on 3CX systems linked back to another supply-chain attack on a separate firm.
3CX Cyber Attack Update: Mandiant Shares Its Investigations
After investigating the matter for weeks, the cybersecurity firm Mandiant has shared insights about what happened with 3CX.
As revealed in its post, its team could trace back the 3CX cyberattack’s link with another supply-chain attack that affected Trading Technologies Inc.
While the researchers have shared the detailed technical analysis of the malware, the incident timelines, and the attack flow in their post, here’s a quick review.
Specifically, 3CX caught the malware from a trojanized version of Trading Technologies’ software installer X_TRADER. Analyzing the malicious software made Mandiant discover the embedded VEILEDSIGNAL backdoor that executed the attack.
The modular backdoor executed the attack in steps, downloading malicious DLLs and other payloads. Alongside this backdoor, two other modules added to its functionality by providing C2 injection in the process and listening Windows communication.
The malware infiltrated the 3CX network through this Trading Technologies app, after which, the attackers spread laterally on the 3CX network. During this process, the attackers kept harvesting credentials and compromised Windows and macOS systems alike, deploying malicious DLLs and backdoors.
Tracing back this UNC4736 malware activity led the researchers to deduce a North Korean threat actor behind the attack.
Earlier this month, 3CX admitted suffering a terrible cyberattack on its network that also affected its customers. It turned out that the attackers exploited the firm’s app to roll out malicious updates to the customers.
At that time, 3CX confirmed hiring Mandiant for investigating the cyber attack, and now, the security firm has shared the update.
While 3CX became a potent indicator of Trading Technologies’ supply-chain attack, the researchers suspect that there may be some other victim firms. But they may or may not have noticed and reported the compromise on their networks yet.
A joint advisory about a Cisco vulnerability by several US and UK agencies gives us a peek inside the minds of ideologically motivated cybercriminals
In a joint advisory, the UK National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), the National Security Agency (NSA), the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have released information about APT28’s exploitation of Cisco routers in 2021.
Now please don’t stop reading because you think this is old news. If you think 2021 is long ago, maybe you will be surprised to learn that the vulnerability used in these attacks was actually discovered in 2017.
Cisco published workarounds and updates for this vulnerability in June of 2017. Nevertheless, the advisory says that the mentioned tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) may still be being used against vulnerable Cisco devices.
The Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is an application-layer protocol that provides a standardized framework and a common language for monitoring and managing devices in a network. SNMP is designed to allow network administrators to monitor and configure network devices remotely, but it can also be abused to obtain sensitive network information and, if vulnerable, exploit devices to penetrate a network. In 2021, APT28 used infrastructure to masquerade SNMP access into Cisco routers worldwide.
This was possible because the SNMP subsystem of Cisco IOS and IOS XE Software contains multiple vulnerabilities that could allow an authenticated, remote attacker to remotely execute code on an affected system or cause an affected system to reload. These vulnerabilities affect all releases of Cisco IOS and IOS XE Software prior to the first fixed release and they affect all versions of SNMP-Versions 1, 2c, and 3. An attacker could exploit these vulnerabilities by sending a crafted SNMP packet to an affected system via IPv4 or IPv6.
Enter Jaguar Tooth, the name of the malware that APT28 used to obtain further device information and enabled unauthenticated access via a backdoor. The actor obtained this device information by executing a number of commands via the malware and send them out over trivial file transfer protocol (TFTP). The information includes discovery of other devices on the network.
Discovery and countermeasures
Should you be worried about this threat? That depends on your threat model. If there is a reason for state actors to be interested in you in some way, then the answer is yes. This is the type of threat that the UK’s Minister and Secretary of State for National Investment Security, Mr Dowden, is referring to when he talks about groups that are ideologically motivated, rather than financially motivated.
If you suspect your router has been compromised, you can follow Cisco’s advice for verifying the Cisco IOS image. If that does not take away your suspicion, you should:
Revoke all keys associated with that router. When replacing the router configuration be sure to create new keys rather than pasting from the old configuration.
Replace both the ROMMON and Cisco IOS image with an image that has been sourced directly from the Cisco website, in case third party and internal repositories have been compromised.
To prevent falling victim to this specific threat there are some steps you should take:
Do not use SNMP if you are not required to configure or manage devices remotely. If you do need it, use a limiting allow list for SNMP messages to prevent unauthorized users from accessing your router.
Review your password policy and adapt it where necessary.
Use logging tools to record commands executed on your network devices.
We don’t just report on vulnerabilities—we identify them, and prioritize action.
Vivo has announced its second-gen book-style foldable smartphone, the Vivo X Fold 2. This is technically the company’s third book-style foldable, but the Vivo X Fold+ was a mid-gen device, kind of.
In any case, the Vivo X Fold 2 does bring a number of improvements over its predecessor, and one of the main ones is its weight. This thing is a lot lighter than the Vivo X Fold 2. That device weighed 311 grams, while this one weighs 278 grams. That’s still hefty, but do keep in mind that this is a large foldable phone.
The Vivo X Fold 2 foldable is now official, and it does resemble the company’s “regular” flagships
The Vivo X Fold 2 launched in China, and at this point, we’re not sure if it will be coming to more markets. The device definitely looks like a cousin to the flagship Vivo X90 series that the company announced not long ago.
This is also a flagship-grade phone, but a foldable one. More on that soon, let’s quickly go over its design. As you can see in the provided images, the device has vegan leather on the back. It has a circular camera island on the back, with ZEISS optics on board. It does fold flat, and its frame is made out of metal.
The Vivo X Fold 2 is fueled by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 SOC, while it also includes 12GB of LPDDR5X RAM and 256GB or 512GB of UFS 4.0 flash storage. So, Vivo didn’t really cut corners here.
It has two 120Hz displays, each of which has an in-display fingerprint scanner
The main display measures 8.03 inches, and it’s a QHD+ (2160 x 1916) Samsung E6 AMOLED panel. This is an LTPO display, and it offers a refresh rate of up to 120Hz. HDR10+ is supported, as is Dolby Vision, while the display can go up to 1,800 nits of brightness at its peak.
The second panel is a 6.53-inch fullHD+ (2520 x 1080) unit. This is also Samsung’s E6 AMOLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate. This panel goes up to 1,600 nits of brightness at its peak.
120W wired charging is included, as is 50W wireless charging
A 4,800mAh battery is on board. The device supports 120W wired charging, in addition to 50W wireless charging. Reverse wireless charging is also a part of the package, by the way.
Android 13 comes pre-installed on the device, along with OriginOS 3 in China. If it launches globally, you’ll get Vivo’s Funtouch OS on top of it. There are two in-display fingerprint scanners included here, one for each of the phone’s displays. These are ultrasonic fingerprint scanners, by the way.
The phone has two SIM card slots (2x nano SIM), and it does support 5G connectivity (SA/NSA). Bluetooth 5.3 is included in the package too, of course.
You will find three compelling cameras on the back, with ZEISS optics
A 50-megapixel main camera (Sony’s IMX866 sensor, f/1.75 aperture, OIS, ZEISS T* coating, V2 chip) is backed by a 12-megapixel ultrawide camera (Sony’s IMX633 sensor, 108-degree FoV, f/2.0 aperture) on the back. The third camera on the back is a 12-megapixel portrait telephoto unit (f/1.98 aperture). A single 16-megapixel selfie camera (f/2.45 aperture) is also included, on each of the two displays.
The Vivo X Fold 2 measures 161.29 x 143.43 x 5.95mm when unfolded, and 161.29 x 73.42 x 12.9mm when folded. Do note that this goes for the Black model, the Red and Blue models are a bit thicker at 13.2mm, for some reason. Those are the three color options this phone comes in, by the way. They’re officially called Shadow Black, China Red, and Azure Blue colors.
The two Vivo X Fold 2 models are priced at CNY8,999 ($1,380) and CNY9,999 ($1,455) in China. Both models include 12GB of RAM, but their storage units are different (256GB and 512GB).
Do you own an iPhone? So you are very familiar with the problem of running out of memory space. And even now, you may be trying to free up space on your gadget after another attempt to update the operating system or take a picture of something. Luckily, this article will tell you how to effectively clear your device’s memory and make room for the needed data.
1. Change the Camera Settings
Video content takes the lion’s share of the device memory for many users. Captured clips actively consume the free space but are rarely reviewed or distributed. Most videos eventually remain stored on the smartphone. The difference in file size with different resolutions is demonstrated in the iOS settings: Settings → Camera → Video recording.
If you lower the quality from 4K to 1080p, you can halve the final size of the video. If you do not shoot at 60 fps, the video will take up to half the space. It is an excellent solution since, compressing the video quality alone, you can reduce the final size of this content by three times.
2. Remove Unnecessary Photos
The second most crucial space eater on the iPhone is photos. A dozen or a hundred photographs will not affect the free space. Still, many users over the years of working with iOS have thousands of unnecessary pictures in their media library.
And here we mean outdated screenshots, failed photos you forgot to delete, duplicate or similar images, and a dozen more blurry or faulty frames. But it is impossible to clear an extensive media library manually. Fortunately, you can use the following photo-deleting apps to fix this problem:
Smart Cleaner
Slidebox
Gemini Photos
Phone Cleaner
Cleanup
These apps are elementary to use: you must choose the right one and delete unnecessary photos. Remember also to clear the Recently deleted album in the Photos app afterward.
3. Upload Photos and Videos to the Cloud
If you don’t want to compress your videos and your photos don’t have duplicates or unwanted screenshots, you can free up space by uploading your content to the cloud. Use the standard iCloud: Settings → Photos → Photos in iCloud. But you must buy more free space because the initial 5 GB of storage is insufficient.
So you can choose a third-party cloud with favorable rates or essential storage capacity or create your cloud storage. Then, when you run the client for the first time, you can unload the entire gallery with one click and free up a few gigabytes on your iPhone. After that, it’s enough to run the service client once or twice a week, unload all the photos, and then delete them from your smartphone.
4. Unload Unnecessary Apps
One of the iOS features allows you to unload unused apps on your smartphone automatically. The system, at its discretion, removes programs and games that have not been used for a long time, leaving the settings and data on the iPhone.
But you can return an app to your smartphone with a single click at any moment. Thus, you can trust the system and enable automatic unloading via Settings → iTunes Store and App Store → Unload Unused, or you can go to Settings → General → iPhone Storage and manually unload some heavy programs that are not needed at the moment.
In the first case, you will not notice the effect immediately since it takes time for the system to identify unused programs. And in the second case, there will be no risk of staying at the right time without a particular program: you will immediately identify several large programs for download and see the result.
However, you may encounter another problem with apps when they don’t load. So what can you do in this case? For example, you can fix iPhone apps not loading problems with the help of the consulting service Howl experts, who solve various technical issues daily.
5. Delete Downloaded Music
Music lovers often download their favorite playlists, albums, or tracks directly to their devices to keep themselves safe if they go offline. Unfortunately, as a result, after a couple of months, the music tracks start taking up a lot of space on the smartphone. To solve this issue, you can turn off the automatic downloading of audio on your iPhone that is added to your media library.
Then clean it of outdated tracks that you hardly ever listen to. You can find these songs by using special automation commands. And the most radical way is to go to Settings → Basic → iPhone Storage → Music and delete all the music downloaded to your smartphone.
6. Clear the Other Storage
Sometimes the most consuming section of the dynamic memory is the Other storage containing the system cache, software trash, and data from installed applications. Unfortunately, iOS does not provide detailed statistics in this section. But downloaded videos on YouTube, movies in VLC, or projects in iMovie can consume much space on your phone.
To fix the problem, you need to assess the size of the applications in the menu Settings → Basic → iPhone Storage and then delete unnecessary content and free up space. Active iPhone users who transfer backups from one device to another and don’t set up the system from scratch can pull gigabytes of unnecessary cache, which also ends up in the Other storage. The easiest and most effective way to get rid of the phone’s trash is to make a backup and restore from a copy.
Summing Up
You can easily take the measures described above to clear the memory of your iPhone of unnecessary data. These practical tips will help you keep track of the occupied space and unload the data if necessary. As a result, you can free up about a dozen gigabytes of space. In addition, you can also use helpful apps like Slidebox, Gemini Photos, or Phone Cleaner, which diagnose your device memory, and clean cache and temporary files.
Advertorial by UPDF: the opinions expressed in this story may not reflect the positions of PhoneArena!
Love them or hate them, PDF files are still an undeniably large part of our professional lives. Thus, choosing the best PDF editor to manage and edit PDF files is essential, especially if you want to spare yourself from some extra stress when you have to edit the text in a PDF file. One of the best PDF editors out there is called UPDF, and it happens to be quite the feature-rich PDF converter that will elevate your work with such files to the next level. It’s a multi-platform tool and one purchased license gives you access to UPDF on all supported platforms: Mac, iOS, Windows, and Android.
While this PDF editor is free-to-use, some of its premium features are only available with a subscription plan or a one-time purchase that gets you perpetual access to the service. At the moment, you can save a very decent 54% off on UPDF and also get the aJoysoft PDF Password Remover as well as 10GB of cloud storage for free; more details are at the bottom of this article.
UPDF: All the features
So, what features does the powerful UPDF editor bring to the table? First and foremost, it lets you view, read, search, and print PDF documents. Secondly, UPDF is a very powerful PDF editor, which lets you modify any part of the PDF document, be it text, image, links, watermarks, headers or footers, and even the background itself. And yes, UPDF also lets you add your signature to a PDF document, which is one of the more common uses for a dedicated PDF editor.
UPDF’s interface is friendly and intuitive
Annotation is also part of UPDF’s feature list: you can highlight or underline the document, strikethrough or add a squirrel line, add sticky notes, text boxes, stamps, stickers, and add different shapes to express yourself in the best way possible. That’s an important feature that only the best PDF editors out there have.
UPDF allows for rich PDF annotation
When it comes to further managing PDF documents, this Adobe Acrobat alternative allows you to convert your PDF to any of the following supported formats (DOCX, PPTX, XSLX, CSV, RTF, TXT, PNG, JPG, BMP, GIF, TIFF, XML, HTML, and PDF/A).
Probably the best feature of UPDF is the built-in OCR tool, which allows you to convert the scanned text of a PDF document into content that’s easily searchable and editable later on. Another highlight of the OCR feature is its built-in support to detect more than 38 languages with up to 99% accuracy, deliver smaller file size output with high quality, and overall boast the highest OCR speed.
UPDF features a very powerful OCR tool
UPDF also has the extremely useful UPDF Cloud feature, which gives you 10GB of cloud storage and lets you upload PDF files of up to 2GB in size. No matter which platform you use UPDF on, you can easily edit and sync uploaded PDF files, which might come in super handy to the digital nomads among us.
You can also combine multiple files into one big PDF file, which has the potential to streamline your workflow. Fret not, if the final PDF file happens to be just a tad bit too large, UPDF can easily reduce its file size. In terms of security, this excellent PDF converter allows you to set both permission and open passwords on your PDF files, which is a crucial aspect of your digital safety.
Have in mind that the features listed thus far are only available on desktop OSes (Windows and Mac), while you could also read, edit, and annotate PDF on Android and iOS.
UPDF vs Adobe Acrobat: How do they compare?
How does UPDF fare against another contender for the best PDF editor championship title, the popular Adobe Acrobat Reader? First and foremost, the pricing of UPDF speaks for itself, as it’s way more affordable than Adobe’s pricier Standard and Pro offerings; you just get more value with UPDF. Secondly, UPDF has way more features and built-in functionalities in comparison with Adobe Acrobat Pro. Most importantly, UPDF can also convert your PDF files to way more file formats in comparison to Adobe’s PDF editors.
Convert PDF to Word, Excel, PPT, Text, RTF, HTML, XML, and Images (PNG, JPEG, TIFF)
Y
Y
Y
Convert PDF to CSV, BMP, GIF
Y
–
–
OCR
Y
Y
–
Create PDFs
Y
Y
Y
Compress PDFs
Y
Y
Y
Protect PDFs
Y
Y
Y
Fill out forms
Y
Y
Y
Merge PDFs
Y
Y
–
As we mentioned earlier in this article, UPDF is currently available at 54% off, which is a great deal considering the features you get, but this is not all! This special offer also gets you aJoysoft PDF Password Remover and 10GB of UPDF Cloud storage for free. The annual license for this Adobe Acrobat alternative is currently priced at $29.99, while the perpetual license that grants you lifetime access is just $45.99, and as we mentioned, one license gets you platform-agnostic access to the service.
But don’t just take our word for it, feel free to download UPDF for a free trial and make up your mind about this powerful PDF editor.
Why should you choose UPDF as your go-to PDF editor? This one has all the makings to be the best PDF editor most people will ever use, with so many features included that there’s literally nothing major lacking; in fact, UPDF probably has more functionalities than you could ever need.
Moreover, its friendly interface design makes editing and converting PDF files an intuitive process, requiring little to no time to get around and fulfill your task in the fastest and most efficient way possible.
Finally, and probably most important for many people looking for the very best PDF editor out there, UPDF is available on just about any major mobile platform out there, be it Windows, Mac, iOS, or Android, so a single license lets you use this feature-rich PDF tool on any supported device.
We take a look at a story involving the FTC going head to head with a payment processor caught up in tech support scam allegations.
A multinational payment processing company and two of its executives are facing a potential $650k fine as a result of allegedly processing credit card payments for tech support scammers. While this fine isn’t exactly massive in comparison to some of the privacy breaches and other incidents seen down the years, the original fine the company was handed was an eye-watering $49.5m. The fine was reduced alongside an agreement to court orders which involve close monitoring of “high-risk clients”.
The Federal Trade Commission has acted to stop Nexway, a multinational payment processing company, along with its CEO and chief strategy officer, from serving as a facilitator for the tech support scammers through credit card laundering.
The FTC’s complaint against Nexway (and several of its subsidiaries and an associated company known as Asknet), its CEO Victor Iezuitov, and its chief strategy officer Casey Potenzone charges that the defendants were at the center of several offshore tech support scams, processing tens of millions of dollars in charges and giving the scammers access to the US credit card network.
A big part of the complaint is in relation to the so-called “premium tech support” customers using the Nexway system for credit card payment processing. The FTC alleges that a Nexway leadership meeting indicated that it was “strongly dependent” on its premium tech support clients, which represented 25% of Nexway’s revenue.
Additionally, the complaints related to the individual tech support scammers were in great supply. So much so that chargebacks (a way for people to dispute charges they feel to be wrong, like realising they’ve been hit by a tech support scam) and cancellations were in no short supply. From the complaint, in relation to one support scam outfit using Nexway for payment processing:
…on February 10, 2017, the Senior Key Account Manager at Nexway sent Potenzone an email titled “Nexway/TechLiveConnect: Chargeback & Cancellation rates”. The February 10, 2017 email included a table showing Tech Live Connect had (1) chargeback rates of 2.2% in November 2016, 2.6% in December 2016, and 1.5% in January 2017; and (2) cancelation rates of 23.2% in November 2016, 27% in December 2016, and 21.8% in January 2017.
Credit card companies keep a sharp lookout for signs of repeated dubious transactions happening via fraud monitoring programs. From the complaint:
Nexway had such high chargebacks that Visa placed the company in its Chargeback Monitoring Program in December 2017.
Something was clearly amiss here, and complaints from consumers related to pop-ups, locking up the screen while a siren plays, and bogus virus warnings made to the Better Business Bureau and elsewhere leads us to where we are today.
Tech support scams have been around forever, and often ride on the coattails of established brands to sell their wares. This kind of scammer has imitated everything from Microsoft to genuine security firms down the years. If you’re an organisation unfortunate enough to be imitated, you can also expect to field support calls from understandably annoyed people who think that you’ve ripped them off, as opposed to the genuine culprits.
Tips for avoiding tech support scams
There’s a huge amount to cover with this style of attack, but here’s a few of the basics to get you up to speed:
Beware the lock up. If your browser or mobile device “locks up”, as in you’re no longer able to navigate away from a virus warning, you’re on a tech support scam. If something claims to show the files and folders from inside of your browser, this is another signal that you’re on a fake page. Close the browser if possible (for example, by pressing CTRL+ALT+DEL on a Windows PC) or restart your device if this doesn’t work.
Screenlocker issues. These are typically fake Windows Blue Screen of Death error pages, except they come with the tech support scammer’s phone number included. You may need one of our removal self-help guides to resolve this.
Beware of someone wanting to connect to your computer remotely. One of the tech support scammer’s biggest weapons is their ability to connect remotely to their victims. If they do this, they essentially have total access to all of your files and folders.
Did you already pay? Contact your credit card company or bank and let them know what’s happened. You may also need to file a complaint with the FTC, or contact your local law enforcement agency depending on your region.
For a very detailed breakdown of tech support scams, how they operate, and more suggestions to keep yourself safe from harm, please check out our dedicated tech support scams page.
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The April 2023 Android security patch is available for Samsung‘s Galaxy S20 series in the US. The company recently released the latest security update for the factory-unlocked units of the 2020 flagship trio. It should soon cover the carrier-locked variants as well. The April SMR (Security Maintenance Release) was released for the Galaxy S20, Galaxy S20+, and Galaxy S20 Ultra in international markets a couple of weeks back.
The latest update for the unlocked variants of the Galaxy S20 series in the US comes with the firmware build number G98*U1UES4HWCB. Samsung’s official changelog doesn’t mention anything apart from this month’s security enhancements. The company recently announced that it will push Image Clipper to its 2020 flagships with a new update. It appears Galaxy S20 users will have to wait for the May update for this new feature.
Introduced with the Galaxy S23 series earlier this year, Image Clipper is a Samsung Gallery feature that lets you instantly crop out subjects from images. While viewing a photo, you can press and hold on to a subject to crop it out. The cropped image can be saved separately or shared on social media directly from the gallery. Samsung has already pushed this feature to the Galaxy S22 series and its latest foldables. The Galaxy S21, Galaxy S20, Galaxy Note 20, and older foldable models will get it with upcoming updates.
Galaxy S20 series gets April update with over 70 security fixes in the US
As far as the content of the April SMR is concerned, Samsung is pushing more than 70 vulnerability patches here. Around 20 of those are Galaxy-specific patches while the remaining 50 are Android OS patches. At least five vulnerabilities patched this month were critical ones. Google says some of those allowed remote code execution. Threat actors could exploit those vulnerabilities to remotely gain access to affected devices without anyone’s notice. The vast majority of other patches were labeled “high-severity” by Google and Samsung.
If you’re using an unlocked Galaxy S20, Galaxy S20+, or Galaxy S20 Ultra in the US, these security fixes should soon reach you. The update is widely available on most networks. Galaxy S20 users with a carrier-locked unit can also look forward to receiving the April SMR within the next few days. As usual, Samsung lets you manually check for updates on your Galaxy smartphone. Open the Settings app, go to the Software update menu, and tap on Download and install. We will let you know when Samsung pushes Image Clipper to the Galaxy S20 series.
After laying off over 11,000 employees last year due to challenging economic conditions, Meta has reportedly commenced another round of layoffs this week. These new job cuts will be part of a broader restructuring effort aimed at cutting costs and will affect around 4,000 employees in technical roles, including user experience, software engineering, and graphics programming.
However, according to the LinkedIn posts by employees, Meta has laid off many gameplay programmers from the Reality Labs unit, which focuses on augmented and virtual reality experiences. This indicates that the company is scaling down its investments in the platform, which has been struggling to gain traction and attract users.
“I woke up this morning to the unfortunate news that I was one of the many laid-off from Meta today,” a Facebook business program manager wrote on LinkedIn.
Lori Goler, Meta’s head of people, acknowledged that saying goodbye to friends and colleagues who have contributed so much to Meta is difficult. And to help employees process the news, the company has asked North American employees, whose jobs allow it, to work from home on Wednesday.
More layoffs in the coming months
While the current layoffs focused on product-facing teams, reports suggest Meta plans to cut business-facing roles, such as finance, legal, and HR, beginning in May. Moreover, tech teams who weren’t impacted by the current round of layoffs might also be included in the next round.
This drastic downsizing of the company is part of Zuckerberg’s “Year of Efficiency” plan, which came into effect last year. And although Wall Street has welcomed this downsizing, with Meta’s shares up 81% this year, the company is still backing its bet on the metaverse, which is yet to gain user interest. Just last quarter, Meta’s Reality Labs unit recorded a $4.28 billion operating loss, thus bringing its total losses for 2022 to $13.72 billion.
