13 biggest announcements by Apple
Apple on Tuesday unveiled its AI-based system ‘Apple Intelligence’, which it says will give users the power to generate images and summarize text. The system is designed to help users generate or summarize content in their native apps and can be accessed from a Mac, iPad, or iPhone. The company also announced an update to its macOS software which will let users mirror their iPhone.
Apple is making a revision to the operating system callediOS 18
Apple has announced several new AI-powered features for its virtual assistant Siri and the Photos app. It said that users will be able to speak to Siri much more naturally in iOS 18. Apple added that writing features like this are available system-wide, anywhere you can type. Apple also announced a new image generation feature for the Photos app.
Is Apple about to finally launch a true voice activated device?
Apple is working on a voice-based assistant, Siri, to interact with the company’s own apps to help users better understand what they want and respond to their queries, Bloomberg reported. Siri will reportedly be able to take actions for users inside of Apple’s own apps, potentially making the assistant far more capable than it is today.
After security backlash, Microsoft will switch off recall
Google’s Project Zero researcher James Forshaw has found a way to access Microsoft’s Recall feature without “administrator privileges”. This comes after Microsoft announced changes to its Copilot+ feature to make it an opt-in feature. The new features require users to provide a username and password to unlock the feature, which was previously turned on by default.
Unless you opt in, Windows won’t take the photos after all
Microsoft has said that it will continue to develop new ” capabilities and experiences” for its customers by prioritising privacy, safety and security first. This comes after Microsoft’s ‘Recall’ feature was criticised for failing to protect users’ data from unauthorised access. “We are taking steps to improve recall security,” said Nina Davuluri, corporate VP at Microsoft.
The Israeli army launched a missile strike on the shelter in central Gaza
The Israeli military on Thursday claimed it killed nine people during an air strike in the Gaza Strip. It did not provide information on the kind of bombs used in the strike, but they did provide the names of nine men who they said were killed. The strike came after a rocket was fired from the Gaza Strip towards Israel on Wednesday.
An Israeli influence campaign was trying to sway American lawmakers
Israeli Ambassador to the US Michael Oren has said a social media campaign by Israel’s Ministry of Diaspora Affairs “causes strategic damage” to the State of Israel in wartime. The campaign is being paid $2 million by Israel’s Ministry of Diaspora Affairs to influence Democratic members of the US Congress to maintain support for Israel, The New York Times reported.
The city police are inside by machines
A police department in the US is monitoring 911 calls by using drones. This comes after Daniel Posada and his girlfriend lost their lives in 2018 at a bus stop. The police department began using drones in October 2018 to monitor emergency calls. Police logs show that neither the officer monitoring the drone feed nor the person who called 911 witnessed any physical altercation.
There are harms to online misinformation
Social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and YouTube face the threat of “disinformation”, reported The Washington Post. “We’ve been facing a challenge…from social media companies like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Tumblr, who are making it harder for Americans to get information through their platforms,” said Washington Post. Facebook has removed over 300 accounts from its platform in the last few months.
We don’t know how misinformation spreads online
A new study by Stanford University and the US’ New York University has found that companies are ten times more likely toadvertise on misinformation sites if they advertise using exchanges. Researchers used a dataset of over 1 million content posted on WhatsApp to discover that the content was “forwarded many times”. It was the first study to use GenAI to understand misinformation.