According to 9to5google, Google has completed transferring its domain business to site builder Squarespace. Google Domains was launched in 2014 as a domain name registrar and domain management service.
Back in June, Google unexpectedly announced that it would sell its domain business to Squarespace. The service hosted over 10 million domains and had millions of customers. Following the takeover, Squarespace said it “entered into a definitive asset purchase agreement with Google, whereby Squarespace will acquire the assets associated with the Google Domains business.”
Google Domains is transferred to Squarespace
At the time, Google argued that selling domain business was to “sharpen our focus.” The service officially stopped selling new domains on September 7 but left no announcement on its website and didn’t notify users through email. Instead, it directs customers to the Squarespace website by an affiliate link for registering a new one.
The company further notified users that “Google no longer offers new domain registrations, but try Squarespace. On September 7, 2023, Squarespace acquired all domain registrations and related customer accounts from Google Domains. Customers and domains will be transitioned over the next few months.”
Of course, the Google Domains website remains active for users who already bought a domain from Google. However, the website no longer sells new domains, and any new purchase must be done through Squarespace. The tech giant assured its customers that it would manage their domains during the transition.
Some users who have already completed domain migrations to Google Domains are worried about the decision, arguing that the transition might hurt the experience and make them pay a higher price. In terms of price, Squarespace domains’ fee starts at $12/year, which is the same price as Google “average” domains.
WordPress also has an offer for Google Domains customers. The first one million Google Domains users who transfer their domain will pay no transfer fee. Additionally, WordPress extends your registration for an additional year if you take this offer. The plan is open to “existing WordPress.com customers across most domains.”
Samsung’s mega huge Odyssey Neo G9 57 gaming monitor is now available for pre-order. This is the same monitor that Samsung showed off during CES and then more recently announced the pricing for. When it was first revealed, Samsung only showed off a picture of the monitor alongside some specs. But no price tag or availability timing.
We learned the official price back at the end of August and unsurprisingly it’s fairly expensive. Coming in at $2,499 it’s not Samsung’s most expensive gaming monitor but it sure is up there. Thankfully Samsung is throwing in a pretty special deal for those that pre-order. A $500 credit that can be used on Samsung.com. This can be redeemed immediately if you so choose. Or Samsung lets you save it for another purchase down the road. You don’t have long to spend it though as it will expire after November 30 of this year. There’s also one rather large caveat.
You can’t use the $500 for the pre-order price of the Odyssey Neo G9 57
Samsung’s wording makes it sound a little like you can, but you can’t. You can use it immediately in the same purchase order of the monitor. You just can’t use it to lessen the price of the monitor.
To use it immediately, you would need to throw in other stuff with your order. Say a new SSD to go with the new monitor so your games load faster. Or really any other product Samsung sells on its website. Another thing to keep in mind is that if you defer the $500 credit, it can take up to 35 days to get it emailed out to you at the email associated with your Samsung account. So at worst you get the credit code about 30 days before it expires. Depending on when you place the pre-order.
Speaking of which, if you want the credit, you have to place the pre-order for the Odyssey Neo G9 57 by October 1. There’s not a lot of wiggle room there. But if you fancy saving $500 on something else from Samsung that you wanted, now’s the time to take advantage.
Now that WatchOS 10 is officially available for the Apple Watch, you might want to know what models support the software update. WatchOS 10 brings in a lot of new features alongside improvements to the user experience.
There’s a big focus on glanceability to allow users quick access to their most important information. And this takes form in the new Smart Stack feature and the redesigned Apple apps, which now take up more space on the screen to make things easier to see. Apple Fitness+, Name Drop, offline maps and much more are coming to the watch. You’ll also need an iPhone XS running on iOS 17 to use WatchOS 10. Thankfully, iOS 17 is going to be available on loads of iPhone models. So there shouldn’t be too much worry about not having a phone that’s compatible.
With that said, here’s what you’re looking at for watch support with the new software.
WatchOS 10 will support most Apple Watch models
If you have an Apple Watch, you’re likely to get the new WatchOS version. Only the oldest watches won’t be compatible because Apple isn’t updating them anymore. As mentioned earlier you will need to have an iPhone that’s running on iOS 17 in addition to a compatible watch. And that’s any iPhone that’s an iPhone XS or later, with the iPhone XS having released in 2018.
That matches up exactly with the oldest watch Apple will update to this new software. The Watch Series 4. Other compatible watches include the Watch Series 4, Watch SE, Watch Series 6, Watch Series 7, Watch Series 8, Watch Series 9, Watch Ultra, and finally the Watch Ultra 2. Not all features will be available on all devices of course. Some of the older watches will not get access to some of the newest features. For example, the double tap gesture is only supported on Apple’s newest watches. The Watch Series 9 and the Watch Ultra 2.
Rest assured though, if you have one of the watches listed above, you’ll be able to update to WatchOS 10.
The Pixel Watch 2 appears to be getting a new metal band option when it releases, called the metal slim strap. It comes in a matte black color that matches the matte black watch case according to image leaks found by 9To5Google.
This would be Google’s second metal link style band for its Pixel Watch series. Though it looks quite a bit different from the first band. Not just from the slim style but the actual design and shape of the links themselves. In the image you can see the links have both a pill-shaped design and a rectangular design. But it’s only the pill-shaped portion that will be visible to you when the watch is being worn. As the rectangular parts of each link are on the underside of the band that will sit against your wrist.
It also looks to be using a deployment clasp style for the watch band closure. More or less it looks like the same kind of closure used on the already available Metal Links Band you can find on the Google Store for the first Pixel Watch. Which makes sense.
The Metal Slim Strap is not the only new Pixel Watch 2 metal band on the way
In addition to the Metal Slim Strap, there’s another leaked image of a second metal band. The Milanese style metal mesh band. This was initially thought to be releasing with the Pixel Watch but its “coming soon” listing was eventually removed from the Google Store and it never went up for sale.
However, Google might be looking to offer it with the release of the Pixel Watch 2 or sometime soon after. It was after all months after the initial Pixel Watch launch that the Metal Links band was released. According to this new leaked image, the metal mesh style band will come in a champagne gold color. Although it’s also been seen in other colors. When it was revealed in 2022 the Google Store page showed it in champagne gold, matte black, and polished silver. By the looks of it this uses the same magnetic style clasp as before. So Google probably hasn’t changed anything with the design at all.
Samsung‘s September security update has reached more Galaxy phones in the US. The company is now pushing the latest security patch to the Galaxy S22 series, Galaxy A53, and Galaxy A52 stateside. The new SMR (Security Maintenance Release) has already been rolled out to the Galaxy S23 series and all recent foldables.
The Galaxy S22, Galaxy S22+, and Galaxy S22 Ultra were one of the first Samsung phones to receive this month’s security patch. However, the initial rollout was limited to Europe. The Korean firm gradually expanded its coverage to more markets in recent days. The update has now reached the US versions as well.
We can confirm the availability of the September SMR for both carrier-locked and unlocked units of the Galaxy S22 trio in the US. The new firmware build numbers for the two variants are S901USQS3CWH3 and S901U1UES3CWH3, respectively. It’s a wide rollout for unlocked units, but the update is currently limited to T-Mobile, Metro, and Dish networks for carrier-locked units.
Nonetheless, now that the rollout has begun, it shouldn’t take much longer before Samsung pushes the update to everyone. Don’t expect anything major here, though. As confirmed by the official changelog, this release is all about the latest security fixes. The Korean firm’s September SMR for Galaxy devices patches more than 60 vulnerabilities, including at least four critical ones.
The Galaxy A53 and A52 also get the September update in the US
Alongside flagship models, Samsung has also been pushing the latest security patch to its budget and mid-range phones. In fact, the Galaxy A14 5G, which is a budget device, was the first to receive the new SMR globally. Since then, the company has released this update for the Galaxy A52, Galaxy Xcover 5, Galaxy A72, Galaxy A71, and a few more low-cost handsets, albeit in select markets.
The Galaxy A52 is now picking up the September SMR in the US, and so is its successor, the Galaxy A53. As of this writing, the update is available for unlocked variants of the two phones. The updated firmware version for the former is A526U1UESBEWH1, while that for the latter is A536U1UES6CWH1. Like the Galaxy S22, neither Galaxy A model is getting anything more than this month’s security fixes.
Samsung will soon push the new security patch to the carrier-locked variants of these two premium mid-range smartphones in the US. If you’re using either of them, you can look forward to a notification about the update in the coming days. You can also navigate to Settings > Software update > Download and install to check for updates manually.
After nearly 20 years at Microsoft, the head of Windows and Surface is heading out the door. That’d be Panos Panay, who has been a pretty popular face at Microsoft since Satya Nadella took over the role in 2014. Panay has been very popular at Surface events in the last few years – speaking of which, one is taking place this week. Making the timing this a bit more interesting.
Microsoft says that Yusuf Mehdi will take over as Windows and Surface chief. But this leaves a bigger question about Microsoft – what’s the future of their hardware business? Their hardware business has always been a bit odd. Their making laptops to compete with their partners, all running the same operating system. A lot like how Google makes Pixel to compete with their partners, all running on Android.
Surface devices have never been the top-seller in the Windows world. But they existed to represent what Microsoft’s vision of Windows is. There’s been some bumps in the road, like Surface Duo, which recently saw the end of the road.
Amazon is said to be hiring Panay
So what’s next for Panos Panay? Well, according to Bloomberg, he is heading over to Amazon. This is rather interesting, since he won’t even need to move for this job. Both companies are headquartered in Washington.
According to the report out of Bloomberg, Panay will be taking on the division responsible for its Alexa and Echo smart speakers. Who also has an event this week, showcasing new hardware. Of course, it is Techtember, so this isn’t a huge surprise.
This is a pretty big departure for Microsoft, and a huge get for Amazon. It makes you wonder, what does Amazon have planned for its hardware division as well. Amazon has been making hardware for close to 20 years at this point, going back to the original Kindle. But their hardware has never really taken off. Sure, we all have an Echo device in our home, but many of us got it for free with the purchase of another product.
We’ll have to wait and see how this pans out for Amazon and Microsoft.
Microsoft AI researchers accidentally exposed 38 terabytes of private data, including a disk backup of two employees’ workstations, while publishing a bucket of open-source training data on GitHub.
The backup includes secrets, private keys, passwords, and over 30,000 internal Microsoft Teams messages.
The data was exposed due to a misconfigured Shared Access Signature (SAS) token.
SAS tokens can be a security risk if not used properly, as they can grant high levels of access to Azure Storage data.
Organizations should carefully consider their security needs before using SAS tokens.
As part of their ongoing work on accidental exposure of cloud-hosted data, the Wiz Research Team scanned the internet for misconfigured storage containers. In this process, they found a GitHub repository under the Microsoft organization named robust-models-transfer. The repository belonged to Microsoft’s AI research division, whose purpose is to provide open-source code and AI models for image recognition.
After further digging, it was revealed that Microsoft AI researchers accidentally exposed 38 terabytes of private data, including a disk backup of two employees’ workstations, while publishing a bucket of open-source training data on GitHub. The backup included secrets, private keys, passwords, and over 30,000 internal Microsoft Teams messages.
However, the URL for the repository allowed access to more than just open-source models. It was configured to grant permissions on the entire storage account, exposing additional private data by mistake.
The Wiz scan showed that this account contained 38 terabytes of additional data, including Microsoft employees’ personal computer backups. The backups contained sensitive personal data, including passwords to Microsoft services, secret keys, and over 30,000 internal Microsoft Teams messages from 359 Microsoft employees.
In the hands of threat actors, this data could have been devastating for the technology giant, especially considering the current circumstances. Microsoft has recently revealed how malicious elements are eager to exploit Microsoft Teams to facilitate ransomware attacks.
The exposed URL, MS Team Chats and more (Credit: WIZ)
According to Wiz’s blog post, in addition to the overly permissive access scope, the token was also misconfigured to allow “full control” permissions instead of read-only. This means that not only could an attacker view all the files in the storage account, but they could delete and overwrite existing files as well.
This is particularly interesting considering the repository’s original purpose: providing AI models for use in training code. The repository instructs users to download a model data file from the SAS link and feed it into a script.
The file’s format was ckpt, a format produced by the TensorFlow library. It’s formatted using Python’s pickle formatter, which is prone to arbitrary code execution by design. This means that an attacker could have injected malicious code into all the AI models in this storage account, and every user who trusts Microsoft’s GitHub repository would’ve been infected by it.
In response to the news, Andrew Whaley, Senior Technical Director at the Norwegian cybersecurity firm Promon said: “Microsoft may be one of the frontrunners in the AI race, but it’s hard to believe this is the case when it comes to cybersecurity. The tech titan has taken great technological strides in recent years; however, this incident serves as a reminder that even the best-intentioned projects can inadvertently expose sensitive information.”
“Shared Access Signatures (SAS) are a significant cybersecurity risk if not managed with the utmost care. Although they’re undeniably a valuable tool for collaboration and sharing data, they can also become a double-edged sword when misconfigured or mishandled. When overly permissive SAS tokens are issued or when they are exposed unintentionally, it’s like willingly handing over the keys to your front door to a burglar,” Andrew warned.
He emphasised that “Microsoft may well have been able to prevent this breach if they implemented stricter access controls, regularly audited and revoked unused tokens, and thoroughly educated their employees on the importance of safeguarding these credentials. Additionally, continuous monitoring and automated tools to detect overly permissive SAS tokens could have also averted this blunder.”
This is not the first instance of Microsoft exposing such sensitive data. In July 2020, the Microsoft Bing server inadvertently exposed user search queries and location data, including distressing search terms related to murder and child abuse content.”
Nevertheless, Wiz researchers informed Microsoft about the data leak on June 22, 2023, and the tech giant secured it by August 16, 2023. The researchers published their report earlier today, once they were assured that all security aspects of the exposed servers had been addressed.
After the Galaxy S23, Galaxy S22, Galaxy S20, and recent foldable models, Samsung has now released the September 2023 security patch for the Galaxy S21 series. The rollout began recently in Europe and select Asian countries. The latest security update should soon reach the 2021 Galaxy flagships in other markets, including the US.
The September SMR (Security Maintenance Release) for the Galaxy S21, Galaxy S21+, and Galaxy S21 Ultra comes with the firmware build number G99*BXXS9EWI1 in Europe and Asia. The update is already available widely in the former market, but only a handful of countries in Asia are currently receiving the latest security patch. Samsung should cover the phones with the new SMR in more markets in the coming days.
As confirmed by the official changelog, the Galaxy S21 lineup isn’t receiving anything more than this month’s security fixes with the latest update. The Korean firm has already revealed that the September SMR patches more than 60 vulnerabilities across the Galaxy family. At least four of those were critical fixes patched by Google. Most of the remaining vulnerabilities were classified as “high-severity” issues by the Android maker and Samsung.
Samsung’s September update is also available for the Galaxy A71
Along with the Galaxy S21 series, Samsung is also pushing the latest security update to the Galaxy A71. The rollout for the 2020 premium mid-range model has begun in India. The device is picking up the new SMR with the build number A715FXXU8CVI3, SamMobile reports. A screenshot shared by the publication shows that the update has an OTA (over the air) file size of 485MB.
The OTA file size and the build number suggest the Galaxy A71 is getting more than just the latest security fixes here. However, the official changelog supplied by Samsung doesn’t mention anything else. Maybe some minor bug fixes or optimizations. Don’t expect major new features, though. The Galaxy A71 will no longer get feature updates. It arrived with Android 10 onboard and received updates until Android 13.
The September update for the Galaxy A71 should reach other countries in the coming days. Samsung will also push the update to the 5G version of the phone. As said earlier, the company has already rolled out the new SMR for most of its eligible flagship models as well as some mid-rangers, including the Galaxy A52 and Galaxy A72. If you haven’t received the update yet, you can manually check for it from the Settings app.
One of the best features of the Google Nest Hub Max is the ability to participate in video chats. It’s a great device to do so with especially if you don’t like to bother with a complicated setup. Well, unfortunately, the Nest Hub Max will be losing support for video call platforms Google Meet and Zoom, according to Phone Arena.
The need for video chats increased over the pandemic. This most likely contributed to the sales of the Nest Hub Max and other smart displays. So, it’s weird that the company decided to pull the plug on these services.
People who use Google Meet on their Nest Hub Max are pretty surprised by this news, but Zoom users knew about this for some time. The company announced this back in July, so this must have been in the pipeline for a while.
Those who still want to use these video call services on the Hub Max have until September 30th. That’s less than two weeks away, and it’s unfortunate for people who need to find an alternative.
At this point, we don’t know why Google is discontinuing support. We haven’t gotten an official statement from Google about this. Hopefully, it gives us some sort of explanation as to why.
The Nest Hub Max won’t be able to use Google Meet or Zoom, and people are upset
As you can imagine, the people who use this device are not taking this news gracefully. In fact, many people who use this device are understandably mad at Google. The company took away a very useful feature for seemingly no reason.
Several people have said that they’re not going to buy any more Google products because of this. There are also people who want a refund for the device. The ability to make video calls is a big reason for some people to pay $230 for the device.
The Galaxy S24 series may just be starting to take shape, but Samsung has already begun preparations for its successor. It has filed a trademark application for the Galaxy S25 brand name. This follows the Galaxy S24 trademark in early August.
First spotted by GalaxyClub, Samsung recently registered the Galaxy S25 brand name in Mexico. The application was filed with the Mexican Institute of Industrial Property (IMPI) on September 12. As expected, it falls under “class 9” of intellectual properties with the description precisely reading “teléfonos inteligentes.” That’s Spanish for smartphones.
This trademark application from Samsung doesn’t reveal anything more. However, it’s another proof that the Korean firm is being more active in registering brand names for its future products lately. The company usually did this just a few months before the launch, but it registered the Galaxy S24 moniker in July this year. That’s more than six months before the expected launch of the new flagships.
Samsung then surprised everyone by filing trademarks for the Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Galaxy Z Fold 7 brand names last week. The latter of the two isn’t expected to come until the second half of 2025, which means the registration came almost two years early. It appears the Korean firm is making a habit of such early registrations. The Galaxy S25, which should debut in early 2025, now has an official trademark too.
Interestingly, Samsung filed this trademark application in Mexico. It usually registers brand names for upcoming products in the UK, Europe, or South Korea first, followed by other regions. This change doesn’t mean anything notable, though. The Galaxy S25 trademark may soon pop up on the official trademark websites in other markets as well.
The Galaxy S24 series may arrive early
An early registration of the Galaxy S24 brand name may be followed by an early launch of the phones. Rumors are that Samsung is planning to unveil its 2024 flagships in January. We don’t yet have a precise launch date, but the company is reportedly starting the mass production of key components in November. The production of the Galaxy S23 began in December, with the official launch taking place on February 1, 2023.
While we wait for the Galaxy S24 launch date, leaks about the devices are gradually getting more detailed and frequent. Samsung is bringing back its Exynos processor to the flagship lineup, but the Ultra model may still ship with a Snapdragon chip globally. You can expect more rumors about the phones in the coming weeks as the Korean firm prepares for the launch early next year.
