Linux Foundation partners with Microsoft, Google, Meta and Opera to promote Chromium projects
The Linux Foundation has announced a partnership with 4 browser makers, part of an initiative said to advance the development of Chromium-based projects. Supporters of Chromium-based browsers,
Members of the initiative include Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, Opera browser, and Meta (Facebook). The group’s goal is to improve adoption and open development of the Chromium open source project for the benefit of the Internet.
Google says it will continue development of Chromium, but the Linux Foundation will manage backers’ funds for Chromium-based browsers, and transparently oversee the partnership with the open governance and community-driven development of the Chromium ecosystem.
Rumors claim that this could be a desperate move by Google to somehow keep Chrome intact in the antitrust case against the US Department of Justice. The news has shocked the Linux community, and caused an uproar among Firefox users, who are angered by the decision, and concerned about the future of Mozilla’s browser.
TikTok may be banned in America
A bill was passed by the US Senate in April 2024, aimed at forcing ByteDance to sell TikTok within a year or face a ban in the US. The China-based company, which owns the short-video platform, has refused to sell TikTok.
And now, the US Supreme Court has Signal That this could be the end of TikTok in the country, unless the app is sold to an approved third-party. While lawyers representing the company argued that the ban violated First Amendment rights of free speech, the federal government considers TikTok a national security concern.
The judge hearing arguments in the case was convinced that TikTok’s ties to China pose a risk to users in the US. It is now likely that TikTok will be removed from the Apple App Store and Google Play Store on January 19 for users in the United States. ,
VLC player to get AI-powered subtitles and translations
VLC has been downloaded over 6 billion times. VideoLAN, the non-profit organization behind the open source media player, celebrated this milestone by announcing a brand new feature. AI-powered subtitles.
AI subtitles should not be confused with older voice recognition technology. VLC’s AI feature, which is currently in development, uses open-source language models to identify spoken content and render subtitles in real-time. Interestingly, it also supports real-time translation for 100 languages. This can help millions of users who are interested in watching movies in foreign languages. VLC’s AI feature may not be available for all PCs, as it may require a Neural Processing Unit (NPU).
The new Outlook app will automatically install on Windows 10
This isn’t exclusive to Windows 11, Microsoft has confirmed that the new Outlook app will automatically install on Windows 10 PCs. The app has been criticized by many users who dislike its design, as it is basically a web wrapper for the Outlook website. It is not only more resource intensive than the older app, but also displays advertisements. there is a way Delete the new Outlook appBut this cannot be done before the new Outlook app is installed, as it will be sent as part of the February 2025 security update.
The classic Outlook app will be retired in 2029, but the Mail and Calendar apps have already been removed by Microsoft.
Fitness trackers are stealing your data
A report Published by Surfshark VPN has revealed that fitness apps used as companions for smartwatches and fitness bands are stealing user data from users. This includes personal information such as email addresses, user IDs, device IDs, profiles, device location, and even health-related data. Such data is then unethically sold to third parties, putting user data at risk of misuse.
Surfshark alleges that several apps were found guilty of collecting and sharing user data, including those made by Apple, Strava, Fitbit, Nike Training Club, among others. The report also claims that some apps collected information about a user’s ethnic background, sexual orientation, religious, philosophical beliefs, political opinions, genetic information, biometric data and more.
While this may come as a shock to many, it shouldn’t be a surprise, as part of their “Privacy Not Included” research, the Mozilla Foundation published a comprehensive report of various devices, apps, vehicles that are vulnerable to privacy issues. are not favourable.
NVIDIA launches RTX 5070 for just $549
NVIDIA has launched the much awaited rtx 5000 series Graphics cards with NVIDIA DLSS 4 upscaling technology. The new GeForce RTX 5070, 5070 Ti, 5080 and 5090 GPUs offer significantly better performance than older generation models at a lower price. These graphics cards support DLSS multi frame generation that can generate up to three additional frames per rendered frame.
The most surprising of these are the RTX 5070 and RTX 5079 Ti, which offer double the performance of their predecessors. NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 5070 features 12 GB VRAM, 6144 CUDA cores, with a 192-bit bus interface, and up to 672 GB/s bandwidth at 28 Gbps memory speeds. Tests indicate that the RTX 5070 was able to outperform the previous generation’s flagship model, the RTX 4090.
Best of all, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 costs just $549, which can provide some serious competition to the Intel Arc B580 and AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT.
Meta accused of using pirated content to train its AI
Facebook’s parent company Meta has been accused by authors who sued the company of violating copyright laws by using their content to train its artificial intelligence models. Fearing media and public reaction, Meta had omitted much information from the documents presented in court. A report Says Judge Vince Chhabria of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California did not redact some documents that revealed Meta was using illegal material to secretly train its AI.
Specifically, it was found that the company used content from pirated e-books available through the Russian-based “shadow library” Library Genesis (LibGen) to train its language models. Meta also allegedly placed torrents of pirated files on websites, i.e. assisted in illegally distributing copyrighted material. This could prove costly for Meta in a legal battle against the authors.
