As per reports, it was detected that multiple units of Nokia 7 Plus were inadvertently sending sensitive information to a server located in China. A lot of concerns were raised regarding the same. As per the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), data cannot be used beyond the limits of what users think is the appropriate limit, or else companies can face serious consequences.
About The Data Packet
Reports state that sensitive data was being sent to a Chinese domain whenever the device was being switched on or being unlocked. The transferred data included the SIM card number, geographical location and the device’s serial number. Interestingly, the domain name of the Chinese server was vnet.cn, which refer to the China Internet Network Information Center, or CNNIC. The aforementioned domain is owned by the state-run Chinese Telecom operator.
When the data packet was inspected in detail, it was revealed that the information contains data from both the SIM card and the area it was associated with. This meant that the recipients of the data packet would have been able to geotag the real-time location of the device. Furthermore, sources say that they found a resembling piece of code on Github, which was developed by reputed electronics company, Qualcomm. It contained a registration procedure similar to what was executed in the Nokia 7 Plus. The code gathers data regarding the smartphone and transfers all the data in a similar format to the designated server.
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The incident may have been caused due to an error in manufacturing smartphones. A code segment intended for the Chinese variants of the Nokia 7 Plus might have been installed in the Norweigan variants for the same. Shortly after this incident, HMD Global rolled out a firmware update that deleted the China-based application from Nokia smartphones. Finnish data regulators are now considering starting a full-scale investigation of the events that took place. Stating that the SIM card number and serial numbers are indeed personal information, the agency believes that this incident may be a direct violation of the GDPR legislation.
Interestingly, Oculus has teamed up with Lenovo in order to formulate the design of the Rift S. The American technology company states that its new VR headset features better weight distribution around the head and improved light blocking. Furthermore, the Rift S is connected via a single cable to reduce clutter while using the headset. Users can use the integrated audio system on the Rift S, or connect their preferred headphones via the 3.5 mm headphone jack.
Additional features include Oculus Insight, which promises inside-out tracking for an improved experience. The company claims that the feature uses computer vision algorithms to help the headset capture, trace and navigate physical spaces in real time. All this is done with the help of five sensors. Moreover, Oculus has redesigned its Touch controllers for better gesture controls. Another interesting feature that Oculus has introduced is Passthrough+, which utilizes core runtime advancements to provide a comfortable session with the least amount of performance impact. This may help users when they see or step out of their playing space all of a sudden.
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First announced on a limited invitation-only basis in October 2014, the Inbox application was officially released to the public in May 2015. The app had some interesting features such as advanced filtering and message snoozing that appealed to a multitude of users. Moreover, the app was a fresh overhaul from the “cluttered” interface of the Gmail app, some users reported. For instance, the Inbox app gathered necessary information from the Gmail application and used it to provide just key bits of data to the user.
Inbox users may see a notification while launching the application that displays a message from Google. The message says that the app will be going away in “X” days, where X is the number of days to April 2. The notification also informs users that all the helpful features of the Inbox app have been integrated with the Gmail app. Subsequently, for those who are trying to locate the application on the Play store, a lot of users are unable to find it too.
Organizations usually encode user passwords with a process called hashing, which includes the 
Facebook’s VP stated that the flaw was detected as a part of a routine security review in the month of January. He also stated that Facebook’s login technology employs a different strategy that doesn’t risk the exposure of sensitive data. Also, he mentioned that the company had found no evidence of the data being accessed improperly and that the passwords were never visible to any person outside the organization. After being brought to light, the company itself came forward with a statement that it will notify all the Facebook and Instagram users regarding the bug, and how it has fixed all instances of the same.
The new AirPods feature the Apple-designed H1 chip with boosted power efficiency and much faster connection sequence. The AirPods also sport the hands-free “Hey Siri” feature to launch the Apple voice assistant, a characteristic that was missing in the previous generation. The new AirPods are available with a new wireless charging case in addition to the standard charging case. The new charging case will cater to the user’s convenience while charging the AirPods.
The Season 6 update will introduce new weapons like the G36C in the game. The rifle will be exclusive to the snow-laden Vikendi Map and will act as a replacement to the SCAR-L assault rifle. Both the guns utilize 5.56 mm ammunition. The G36C can be kitted with stocks, laser sights, thumb grips etc. Furthermore, a three-wheeled vehicle called Tukshai will be added to the game alongside the Jeep, the Darcia etc. Season 6 update will also introduce a new skin for the M762 assault rifle, which uses 7.62 mm ammo.
The Season 6 update will bring forward two Elite pass variants, the Elite Pass and the Elite Pass Plus. The only upside of purchasing the Elite Pass Plus is that the users will get an additional 25 ranks without grinding for them. The pass will also include subscriptions, with two different plans called Prime and the Prime Plus. They will provide free UC, RP etc.
The Season 1 Pass for Apex Legends features 100 tiers of rewards, similar to Fortnite. The unlockables include new weapon skins, XP boosts and attractive banner frames for different characters/legends. Players can earn up to 1000 Apex Coins (in-game currency) via levelling up the battle pass, which can be used to buy the next season’s battle pass without spending “real” money.
LG unveiled its first rollable TV at the CES 2018 (Consumer Electronics Show). The company showcased a 65-inch 4K OLED TV called the LG Roled, or the LG Signature OLED R9. It retracts into a cuboidal shaped enclosure when not in use. The company previously stated that the rollable OLED TV will go on sale this year itself. This time, LG has moved past the rollable TV, instead, it is just including a rollable screen in a housing-cum-base for the device.
The flexible screen is housed in three different types of casings, as shown in the patent images. The housing sports a triangular design to prevent the flexible screen from bending over. All three housing designs are a bit different from each other. The reason for this is not clear, but it may be because LG is testing out the most stable base for the Roll-up screen.
The TV can also function as a speaker system if the display is not completely raised. Similar to LG’s TV at the CES, the upcoming TV may be equipped with a 100 Watt Dolby Atmos Speaker. The flexible screen can be completely rolled out to have a normally functioning television. In 2018, LG 
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Stadia will launch in the latter part of 2019, with only four major countries targeted as of now: UK, Canada, US and Europe. The company will take advantage of the huge viewer base of Youtube to help improve Stadia and mainstream the service into streaming and gaming. Gamers will be able to play any game they want directly from Google’s data centres, without actually downloading the game. According to the company, it has successfully tested the high resource-demanding Assassin’s Creed Odyssey on Chrome Streaming with flawless results.
Google’s new platform is not limited to a single game, rather, players will be able to purchase games from a variety of stores affiliated with it. Amongst other interesting features, Stadia will allow users to share gaming clips from their favourite moments during the gameplay which other users can just click on the game to instantly play it. The platform makes use of Virtualization and Advanced Cloud computing to make this possible.
As mentioned previously, the games will be streamable across a multitude of devices. Laptops, desktops, TVs and smartphones will be able to run the games without any glitches, Google says. Moreover, the company claims that the gameplay can be transferred “seamlessly” across various Google devices as well. Of course, latency and data centre availability will play a huge role in keeping the experience smooth and stutter-free.
Following the software, Google also launched its new controller, known as the Stadia Controller. The controller sports Google’s signature minimalistic design and connects directly via Wi-Fi to the game that the user is playing, not to the device he/she’s playing it on. Google states that by doing so, it will eliminate response delays between the hardware and the software, thereby ensuring lag-free gameplay.
The controller also features a “Google Assistant” button, which lets users pull up the voice assistant during the game itself and ask it relevant questions. For instance, if the gamer is stuck on a level and needs some help, he/she can directly ask the assistant regarding the level and get instant tips to complete it. The other special button on the controller is the Capture button, which lets the user capture a screenshot or a gameplay video for personal use or sharing purposes. 
Regarding computing, Google stated that it is continuously updating its Data Centres for better ping across all areas. Gamers were ecstatic when the company announced that upon launch, Stadia will support 4K games at 60 fps, with support for 8K/120 fps in the future. For achieving this milestone, Google will partner with AMD to build custom GPUs which will deliver 10.7 TeraFlops of power to each machine. Each module of Stadia will run on a 2.7 GHz x86 processor with 16 GB of RAM. Furthermore, Google also announced that one of the first games supported by Stadia would be Doom: Eternal, which is a first-person shooter with a huge fanbase.
It also includes support for cross-play, where gamers can play the same game across different platforms. Stadia offers game developers a chance to use its machine-learning based transfer tool, which will let developers drop an image into each frame of the video/game to transform the entire game into the image’s style. Moreover, State Share will let gamers share the exact state of their game via a URL, which can be clicked by users to launch a similar instance of the game on their own device. For streamers, Google introduced Crowd Play, where an advanced lobby system will let viewers play with or against their favourite streamers/content creators on YouTube.
Towards the end, Google announced its new Stadia Games and Entertainment Studio to develop and design new games for the community. The American company also stated that more than 100 renowned studios already have devkits for Stadia, so more games should be added to the library really soon.
Minecraft players may relate to this game because it is what it says it is. Pixelized characters fighting against each other in an epic battle of survival doesn’t sound very convincing, but it actually is. Pixel’s Unknown Battle Grounds may sound something like Player’s Unknown Battlegrounds, but it looks nothing like it. Retro visuals adorn the game, with harmless-looking weapons like the AK-47 and Multiple barrel shotguns scattered throughout the map. The game is still in beta, so players may encounter some bugs, but the game offers the smoothest experience out of many other 3D games out there.
The first-person shooter combines intense firefights of the original game with a battle-royale genre, similar to what was seen in Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 Blackout mode. With a multitude of maps like Nuketown, Crash, Standoff, Crossfire and Hijacked, the game will go up against the likes of PUBG Mobile and Fortnite mobile. Unlike PUBG and Fortnite, this franchise has a separate fanbase that is expected to follow the game’s development on mobile.
The beta version of Call of Duty Mobile was first released in December 2018. The game featured different multiplayer modes like Free4All (Solo mode). Search and Destroy, Frontline and Team Deathmatches. Furthermore, Call of Duty introduces its iconic zombie mode in the mobile game. While the beta version of the game included just a single-player zombie mode, it is expected that the full version will have co-op multiplayer mode too.
As per reports, players will be able to play as special characters from the Call of Duty universe. Furthermore, players will be able to customize their characters and weapons as to their liking. For doing so, they will have to spend in-game currency that can also be purchased digitally. The game will be a standalone title, with no correlation to any previous Call of duty storylines. To match up to the competition, the game will be free to download.
The Jetson Nano sports the CUDA-X AI computer, which brings accelerated computing to the platform. CUDA-X AI is a collection of software acceleration libraries designed on the NVIDIA’s programming model. The company claims that it delivers 472 GFLOPS of performance for AI-based computing. Remarkably, the CUDA-X consumes only 5 watts of power for operation.
The company also states that the chip has upgraded power management, clocking, memory and accessible input/outputs. It features Jetpack SDK, which is also designed on CUDA-X and has libraries for deep learning, computer vision, graphics and multimedia processing. It runs the Linux OS, which is fully compatible with NVIDIA’s AI platform. Moreover, NVIDIA includes a reference platform called JetBot to reduce the time taken for initial hardware assembly. All of the aforementioned source codes are available on Github, the company says.
The Jetson Nano runs on the quad-core ARM A57 CPU and a 128 core NVIDIA Maxwell based GPU. It supports 4K/60fps video modules. It has support for 4GB LPDDR4 memory with transfer rates of up to 25.6 Gbps, and a Gigabit Ethernet port for connectivity. As mentioned before, it runs Linux for Tegra. The module measures at 70mm x 45mm, whereas the whole devkit measures at 100mm x 80mm. 
Selected gamers who are a part of the game
First released for Microsoft’s Xbox in 2014, the Halo franchise will be available to play on PC via popular gaming portal, Steam. The franchise package will include Halo Reach, Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, Halo 3, Halo 3: ODST, and Halo 4. It is interesting to note that all the iterations of the game will not be released at once, instead, Microsoft plans to release all the games in chronological order. This means that Halo: Reach will be the first game that will land in the hands of gamers. Even though the game was first released in the year 2010, it’s still a classic and is rated as one of the best gameplay experiences of all time by gamers worldwide
The Red Magic 3 will feature a combination of air and liquid cooling to optimize the device’s temperature. The advanced cooling system will ensure that the smartphone can handle extensive thermal stress while running graphics-intensive games. In terms of the chipset, the Nubia Red Magic 3 is confirmed to be kitted with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 SoC. The 7nm Snapdragon 855 chipset consists of an octa-core Kryo 485 CPU clocked at 2.84 GHz and the Adreno 640 GPU.
Amongst other features, the ZTE-associated company also confirmed the presence of the highest amount of RAM in a smartphone to date. Considering that 12 GB RAM is the top industry benchmark till now, the Red Magic 3 will definitely sport the same, if not more. Another interesting feature of the device seems to be the refresh rate of the smartphone’s display. Nubia’s GM mentioned that the Red Magic 3’s screen will have the highest refresh rate ever seen in a gaming handset, which will be even higher than most gaming PCs. Razer Phone has a 120 Hz display, so it’s very interesting to see how Nubia follows up on that.
The gaming smartphone will also feature a 4D vibration motor to enhance haptic feedback while playing games. The feedback will be customizable via an application present on the device. Last but not least, the Red Magic 3 will have an upgraded battery than its predecessor’s 3,800 mAh power cell. A better battery would mean more gaming hours on the device, which might make the device a good deal for a lot of smartphone gamers out there.
The Alienware Area 51m has a modern design, which is referred to by the company as a “Legend” design. The RGB enabled laptop supports customizable lighting, which means that users can adjust the colour scheme of the keyboard, mousepad, the power button, the logo and the rear air vents separately. Using AlienFX lighting, users can design custom profiles and assign them to hotkeys for convenient switching.
Dell states that Alienware Area 51m uses the company’s proprietary cooling technology called Cryo-Tech v2.0, which sports a dual-intake design, high voltage driving fans and load-balancing heat pipes to optimize component cooling. The laptop also has a honeycomb thermal pattern which helps in increasing airflow, the company claims. Moreover, the laptop is made out of magnesium alloy to increase rigidity.
Users can upgrade their drives while customizing the laptop online to include even more memory options. The company claims that the level of customization present in the Area 51m is unlike any other gaming laptop in the market.
The Area 51m has the following ports
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