Right now, Samsung’s Galaxy Fold and Huawei’s Mate X represent two opposing viewpoints in foldable phone design. And while Xiaomi still hasn’t set a release date for its upcoming flexible handset, a new teaser video for Xiaomi’s Mi Fold shows that more combatants are still to come in the upcoming bendy phone wars.
Picking a smartphone isn’t just about picking between iOS and Android because if you choose Android you also need to weigh up all the different flavors of Android on the market. Google, Samsung, Sony, LG, OnePlus, HTC, Motorola and the rest all do Android differently, and Samsung recently revamped its own mobile OS…
In 2013, Google went big on robotics. Under the leadership of Android father Andy Rubin, the company went on a shopping spree that included marquee companies like Boston Dynamics. The division was named Replicant, in an homage to Blade Runner that worked with the whole Alphabet motif. It was big and secretive and expensive, and within a few years, everything kind of went to hell.
The past few years have found the company picking up the pieces and moving on. It recently felt ready to give The New York Times a look at what it’s been working on under the leadership of Principal Scientist Vincent Vanhoucke in a new lab at its Mountain View headquarters.
The results, it seems, are modest by design. The company has moved away from the flashiness that defined the space under Rubin. No humanoids, no Big Dogs. The relatively simple hardware is tasked with less exciting tasks: manufacturing, warehouse logistics and the like. Clearly the company has taken a page or two out of the Amazon Robotics playbook. From the sound of it, the company is looking to solve more immediate issues, with a look toward the three Ds (dull, dirty, dangerous) that automation experts always talk about.
In an important sense, it’s also a much more Google approach to the category, with hardware in service of software. Google Brain and machine learning are at the heart of the innovations the company seeks to develop. It’s a smart rethink that focuses on the companies strength, even though it may lose the moonshot nature that’s long been promoted within Google X.
Mozilla’s free password manager designed for users of the Firefox web browser is today officially arriving on Android. The standalone app, called Firefox Lockbox, offers a simple if a bit basic way for users to access their logins already stored in their Firefox browser from their mobile device.
The app is nowhere near as developed as password managers like 1Password, Dashlane, LastPass and others as it lacks common features like the ability to add, edit or delete passwords; suggest complex passwords; or alert you to potentially compromised passwords resulting from data breaches, among other things.
However, the app is free – and if you’re already using Firefox’s browser, it’s at the very least a more secure alternative to writing down your passwords into an unprotected notepad app, for example. And you can opt to enable Lockbox as an Autofill service on Android.
But the app is really just a companion to Firefox. The passwords in Lockbox securely sync to the app from the Firefox browser – they aren’t entered by hand. For security, the app can be locked with facial recognition or a fingerprint (depending on device support). The passwords are also encrypted in a way that doesn’t allow Mozilla to read your data, it explains in a FAQ.
Firefox Lockbox is now one of several projects Mozilla developed through its now-shuttered Test Flight program. Over a few years’ time, the program had allowed the organization to trial more experimental features – some of which made their way to official products, like the recently launched file sharing app, Firefox Send.
Others in the program – including Firefox Color, Side View, Firefox Notes, Price Tracker, and Email Tabs remain available, but are no longer actively developed beyond occasional maintenance releases. Mozilla’s current focus is on its suite of “privacy-first” solutions, not its other handy utilities.
According to Mozilla, Lockbox was downloaded over 50,000 times on iOS ahead of today’s Android launch.
The Android version is a free download on Google Play.
Huawei held a press conference today in Paris. And the company just unveiled its brand new flagship phone — the P30 and the P30 Pro. In many ways, this year’s update is a continuation of the P20 series — but everything has been upgraded. I played with both devices for a bit of time yesterday, here’s my experience.
While Huawei’s sub-brand Honor has switched to a hole-punch design, Huawei is keeping the good old notch for its flagship device. But this year’s notch is a lot smaller. The company has switched from an iPhone X-like notch to a tiny little teardrop notch.
The P20 and P20 Pro were the last flagship phones to feature a fingerprint sensor below the display, on the front of the device. With the P30 series, Huawei is removing that odd-looking bezel and integrating the fingerprint sensor in the display.
The company could have used that opportunity to make the phones smaller. But Huawei opted for taller displays instead. The P20 and P20 Pro had 5.8-inch and 6.1-inch displays with a 18.7:9 aspect ratio. The P30 and P30 Pro have gigantic 6.1-inch and 6.47-inch displays with a 19.5:9 aspect ratio.
The P30 Pro is still narrower than the iPhone XR, but it won’t be for everyone. It definitely feels too big in my hand for instance.
The industrial design of the P30 series is in line with the P20 series. The phones feature a glass on the back with colorful gradients. The frame is made of aluminum. Overall, the devices feel slimmer on the edges thanks to curved back and front glasses. The company has flattened the top and bottom edges of the devices as well. Everything feels solid in your hand.
The P30 and P30 Pro are now closer when it comes to features. They both have an OLED display with a 2340*1080 resolution for instance. You no longer have to choose between an LCD and an OLED display.
The two biggest differences you can spot is that the P30 Pro has a Samsung-style display, slightly curved on the sides — the P30 displays is completely flat. Huawei is also bringing back the headphone jack, but only for the P30. It doesn’t really make sense to segment the lineup this way, but maybe Huawei considers you have enough money to buy wireless earbuds if you’re in the market for a P30 Pro.
Both devices come in five colors — Breathing Crystal, Amber Sunrise, Perl White, Black and Aurora. Amber Sunrise is a red to orange gradient color, Breathing Crystal is a white-to-purple gradient, Perl White is a white-to-slightly pink gradient, Aurora is a blue-to-turquoise gradient.
You’ll be able to buy the P30 for €799 ($900) with 128GB of storage and the P30 Pro for €999 ($1,130) for 128GB of storage — there are more expensive options for the P30 Pro with more storage. The phones will be available in Europe and Asia today, and probably won’t be released in the U.S.
When it comes to cameras, Huawei has always been one of the leading smartphone manufacturers on this front. There are only four brands that ship cameras that perform so well — Apple, Samsung, Google and Huawei.
It’s going to be hard to comment on the quality of the photos after so little hands-on time, but the P30 Pro now features not one, not two, not three but f-o-u-r sensors on the back of the device.
Thanks to the new time-of-flight sensor, Huawei promises better bokeh effects with a new depth map. The company also combines the main camera sensor with the telephoto sensor to let you capture photos with a 10x zoom with a hybrid digital-optical zoom.
The telephoto lens uses a periscope design. It means that the sensor features a glass to beam the light at a right angle. Huawei uses that method to avoid making the phone too thick.
On the P30, the cameras are more or less the same, but a bit worse:
More than hardware specifications, Huawei says that software has been greatly improved to enhance the quality of your photos. In particular, night mode should be much better thanks to optical and software-enabled stabilization. HDR shots and portrait photos should look better too.
On the front of the device, the selfie camera sensor has been upgraded from 24 MP to 32 MP. And you can capture HDR and low light photos from the front camera as well.
Huawei has upgraded its homemade system-on-a-chip with the Kirin 980 that you can find in the Mate 20 and Mate 20 Pro. It runs Android Pie 9.1 with Huawei’s EMUI custom Android user interface.
In addition to 40W USB-C charging, Huawei is integrating wireless charging for the first time in the P series (up to 15W). The P30 Pro has a 4,200 mAh battery. You can also charge other devices with reverse wireless charging, just like on the Samsung Galaxy S10.
The P30 Pro is IP68 water and dust resistant while the P30 is IP53 resistant.
You won’t find a speaker grill at the top of the P30 Pro because the company has removed the speaker. Instead, Huawei is vibrating the screen in order to turn the screen into a tiny speaker for your calls.
Huawei is also launching new in-ear earbuds today. The FreeLace looks more or less like the BeatsX with a cord behind your neck. You can disconnect the cord and plug your wireless earphones directly into your smartphone to pair them – no Bluetooth pairing required.
That hidden USB-C port is also how you’re going to charge the earbuds. For 5 minutes of charge time, you get 4 hours worth of playback. They’ll be available in four colors — Graphite Black, Amber Sunrise, Emerald Green and Moonlight Silver.
The earbuds are magnetic so you can wrap them around your neck. When you disconnect them, it automatically answers your calls, play your music. When you connect them again, it hangs up or pause your music. The FreeLace earbuds will be a separate accessory for €99.
I’ve been waiting a long time for some company, any company, to bring a big zoom to a smartphone. Two years ago, Oppo showed off a prototype handset with a 5X zoom at MWC. But alas, after all this time, Huawei has finally brought 5X optical zoom to the real world on the new P30 Pro.
Apple is revamping its Apple TV app with a new offering. But how will you be able to access the service exactly? Apple is launching the Apple TV app on smart TVs from Samsung, LG, Sony and Vizio.
The Samsung app will land first, and other manufacturers will get the Apple TV app this Spring. The app will also be available on Roku and Fire TV devices. And the company is also launching an Apple TV app on macOS this Fall. It’s unclear if you’ll be able to access the service from Android phones, Windows 10 computers, etc.
The Apple TV app has been available in a handful of countries so far. Apple is launching the app in over 100 countries by the end of the year.
The app combines content you can buy and rent in the iTunes Store, subscriptions to premium partners, such as HBO, Starz and Showtime, as well as on-demand offering from cable subscriptions (Spectrum, AT&T, etc.).
And of course, Apple is also announcing its own original content subscription, Apple TV+.
A large-scale independent study of pre-installed Android apps has cast a critical spotlight on the privacy and security risks that preloaded software poses to users of the Google developed mobile platform.
The researchers behind the paper, which has been published in preliminary form ahead of a future presentation at the IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy, unearthed a complex ecosystem of players with a primary focus on advertising and “data-driven services” — which they argue the average Android user is unlikely to be unaware of (while also likely lacking the ability to uninstall/evade the baked in software’s privileged access to data and resources themselves).
The study, which was carried out by researchers at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M) and the IMDEA Networks Institute, in collaboration with the International Computer Science Institute (ICSI) at Berkeley (USA) and Stony Brook University of New York (US), encompassed more than 82,000 pre-installed Android apps across more than 1,700 devices manufactured by 214 brands, according to the IMDEA institute.
“The study shows, on the one hand, that the permission model on the Android operating system and its apps allow a large number of actors to track and obtain personal user information,” it writes. “At the same time, it reveals that the end user is not aware of these actors in the Android terminals or of the implications that this practice could have on their privacy. Furthermore, the presence of this privileged software in the system makes it difficult to eliminate it if one is not an expert user.”
An example of a well-known app that can come pre-installed on certain Android devices is Facebook.
Earlier this year the social network giant was revealed to have inked an unknown number of agreements with device makers to preload its app. And while the company has claimed these pre-installs are just placeholders — unless or until a user chooses to actively engage with and download the Facebook app, Android users essentially have to take those claims on trust with no ability to verify the company’s claims (short of finding a friendly security researcher to conduct a traffic analysis) nor remove the app from their device themselves. Facebook pre-loads can only be disabled, not deleted entirely.
The company’s preloads also sometimes include a handful of other Facebook-branded system apps which are even less visible on the device and whose function is even more opaque.
Facebook previously confirmed to TechCrunch there’s no ability for Android users to delete any of its preloaded Facebook system apps either.
“Facebook uses Android system apps to ensure people have the best possible user experience including reliably receiving notifications and having the latest version of our apps. These system apps only support the Facebook family of apps and products, are designed to be off by default until a person starts using a Facebook app, and can always be disabled,” a Facebook spokesperson told us earlier this month.
But the social network is just one of scores of companies involved in a sprawling, opaque and seemingly interlinked data gathering and trading ecosystem that Android supports and which the researchers set out to shine a light into.
In all 1,200 developers were identified behind the pre-installed software they found in the data-set they examined, as well as more than 11,000 third party libraries (SDKs). Many of the preloaded apps were found to display what the researchers dub potentially dangerous or undesired behavior.
The data-set underpinning their analysis was collected via crowd-sourcing methods — using a purpose-built app (called Firmware Scanner), and pulling data from the Lumen Privacy Monitor app. The latter provided the researchers with visibility on mobile traffic flow — via anonymized network flow metadata obtained from its users.
They also crawled the Google Play Store to compare their findings on pre-installed apps with publicly available apps — and found that just 9% of the package names in their dataset were publicly indexed on Play.
Another concerning finding relates to permissions. In addition to standard permissions defined in Android (i.e. which can be controlled by the user) the researchers say they identified more than 4,845 owner or “personalized” permissions by different actors in the manufacture and distribution of devices.
So that means they found systematic user permissions workarounds being enabled by scores of commercial deals cut in a non-transparency data-driven background Android software ecosystem.
“This type of permission allows the apps advertised on Google Play to evade Android’s permission model to access user data without requiring their consent upon installation of a new app,” writes the IMDEA.
The top-line conclusion of the study is that the supply chain around Android’s open source model is characterized by a lack of transparency — which in turn has enabled an ecosystem to grow unchecked and get established that’s rife with potentially harmful behaviors and even backdoored access to sensitive data, all without most Android users’ consent or awareness. (On the latter front the researchers carried out a small-scale survey of consent forms of some Android phones to examine user awareness.)
tl;dr the phrase ‘if it’s free you’re the product’ is a too trite cherry atop a staggeringly large yet entirely submerged data-gobbling iceberg. (Not least because Android smartphones don’t tend to be entirely free.)
“Potential partnerships and deals — made behind closed doors between stakeholders — may have made user data a commodity before users purchase their devices or decide to install software of their own,” the researchers warn. “Unfortunately, due to a lack of central authority or trust system to allow verification and attribution of the self-signed certificates that are used to sign apps, and due to a lack of any mechanism to identify the purpose and legitimacy of many of these apps and custom permissions, it is difficult to attribute unwanted and harmful app behaviors to the party or parties responsible. This has broader negative implications for accountability and liability in this ecosystem as a whole.”
The researchers go on to make a series of recommendations intended to address the lack of transparency and accountability in the Android ecosystem — including suggesting the introduction and use of certificates signed by globally-trusted certificate authorities, or a certificate transparency repository “dedicated to providing details and attribution for certificates used to sign various Android apps, including pre-installed apps, even if self-signed”.
They also suggest Android devices should be required to document all pre-installed apps, plus their purpose, and name the entity responsible for each piece of software — and do so in a manner that is “accessible and understandable to users”.
“[Android] users are not clearly informed about third-party software that is installed on their devices, including third-party tracking and advertising services embedded in many pre-installed apps, the types of data they collect from them, the capabilities and the amount of control they have on their devices, and the partnerships that allow information to be shared and control to be given to various other companies through custom permissions, backdoors, and side-channels. This necessitates a new form of privacy policy suitable for preinstalled apps to be defined and enforced to ensure that private information is at least communicated to the user in a clear and accessible way, accompanied by mechanisms to enable users to make informed decisions about how or whether to use such devices without having to root their devices,” they argue, calling for overhaul of what’s long been a moribund T&Cs system, from a consumer rights point of view.
In conclusion they couch the study as merely scratching the surface of “a much larger problem”, saying their hope for the work is to bring more attention to the pre-installed Android software ecosystem and encourage more critical examination of its impact on users’ privacy and security.
They also write that they intend to continue to work on improving the tools used to gather the data-set, as well as saying their plan is to “gradually” make the data-set itself available to the research community and regulators to encourage others to dive in.
The main purpose of Galaxy S10's punch-hole selfie camera is to cut down bezels while avoiding the need for a distracting, centrally-located notch. But less than a month after the S10's release, users are already figuring out other novel uses for Samsung’s nifty selfie cam.
Apple is holding a keynote today on its campus in Cupertino, and the company is expected to talk about new services. Don’t expect any new device, today’s event should be all about content. At 10 AM PT (1 PM in New York, 5 PM in London, 6 PM in Paris), you’ll be able to watch the event as the company is streaming it live.
Rumor has it that the company plans to unveil multiple new services. The most anticipated one will be a new video streaming service that should compete with Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and others. In addition to that service, Apple will unveil an Apple News subscription to access magazines and premium articles for a flat monthly fee.
But we might also hear about a mysterious credit card and a gaming subscription service. Details are still thin, so it’s going to be interesting to hear Apple talk about all those services.
If you have an Apple TV, you can download the Apple Events app in the App Store. It lets you stream today’s event and rewatch old ones. The app icon was updated a few days ago for the event.
And if you don’t have an Apple TV, the company also lets you live-stream the event from the Apple Events section on its website. This video feed now works in all major browsers — Safari, Microsoft Edge, Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox.
So to recap, here’s how you can watch today’s Apple event:
Of course, you also can read TechCrunch’s live blog if you’re stuck at work and really need our entertaining commentary track to help you get through your day. We have a team in the room.
