Be aware Google.com is different than ɢoogle.com!

 

Which one do you use, Google.com or ɢoogle.com? Be careful about the capital G, which is not the same, as you have probably noticed because it makes a great difference. Namely, one new trickery has been added to a long list of such and similar scams most of us have encountered at some point. The fake search engine ɢoogle.com has been recently developed and, as some believe, its appearance may be just the beginning of even worse things.

Google Analytics traffic searches showed the fake Google as traffic from “secret.ɢoogle.com.” earlier this year, sometimes alongside “Vote for Trump!” message as the page title. According to Analytics Edge, “the group behind this domain had used it for “referral spam,” which is a term that describes the side-effect of somebody abusing a site’s resources or linking back in massive numbers.” Furthermore, the inventors of the Google faker managed to design it in a way that would “hide the true location of incoming links.”

Once you try to navigate to the address, you are redirected to what appear to be the lyrics to Pink Floyd’s song Money. On the web page itself there are also instructions on how to use it.

Russian spammer Vitaly Popov, who is behind this project, insists his scams are no crime, but only “creative marketing,” as he names them. This is not the first time he has used this technique to create fake sites. He has also created the ilovevitaly.com referral traffic which has caused numerous issues for webmasters and web owners.

Finally, this is how he managed to do it. What he used was the character Unicode 0262, a part of the expanded Unicode character set, a.k.a. “Latin Letter Small Capital G.” Thus, the web page looks similar to the original, but if you access it, you’ll immediately notice that that is not what you are searching for.

As we mentioned above, the Google faker has caused concern about the possibility of other spammers using the same method in creating clones of other websites. We hope there won’t be any major issues in the future, but, still, be careful!

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Google redesigns Gmail for iOS and updates its Calendar!

 

Google has updated its Gmail and Calendar applications for iOS. These two applications are vital parts of Google’s cloud-based services. The updated Gmail app for iPhone and iPad introduces a redesigned user interface alongside a few features from Gmail on the web that it says were highly requested. The new design is notably similar to the Gmail app available on Android devices.

 

Among the new features, the updated Gmail app now brings over the “Undo Send” feature from Gmail on the web, which delays sending emails for a set number of seconds to allow users the option to “undo sending” after tapping send. The Undo Send feature on the web can be set to a 5, 10, 20 or 30 second delay, but it appears to be using a set 5 seconds for the mobile app.

Also new for the refreshed app is  the improved search functionality which includes instant results and spelling suggestions, and Google notes the ability to easily Swipe to archive or delete depending on your preference (which is now a single action rather than a swipe revealing a button). The design of the updated app makes the iPhone and iPad versions fit in with Google’s design for Gmail on Android devices, and overall feels much faster than the previous version.

Google Calendar: New shiny Features

The Calendar app on iOS has some shiny, new features:

• Month view and week in landscape view, so you have even more ways to see your schedule at a glance.
• Spotlight Search support, so you can search for events, Reminders and Goals in Apple’s Spotlight Search and find what you’re looking for faster.
• Alternate calendars. If you often look up dates in a non-Gregorian calendar — like Lunar, Islamic, or Hindu — you can now add that calendar to easily see those dates alongside your current calendar.

Samsung “paying extra careful attention” to Galaxy S8 development due to “huge changes”

Unperturbed by its ill-fated Note 7 flagship, which Samsung has now permanently stopped building due to ongoing battery woes, development of a next-generation Galaxy smartphone is in full swing. Reportedly, the troubled South Korean company is “paying extra careful attention” towards the development of the Galaxy S8.

That’s not just because of quality control issues with the Note 7, but also due to the fact that the Galaxy S8 packs in some “huge” hardware and design changes, according to a new report Tuesday from Korean news site ET News.

“Due to the issues with the Note 7, Samsung Electronics is paying extra careful attention towards development of Galaxy S8,” reads the Korean report.

According to the report, the S8 should have the features Apple is expected to engineer into its Tenth Anniversary iPhone next year, including a bezel-free curved screen with a redesigned Home button/fingerprint reader embedded underneath the glass panel, a dual-lens camera out the back and Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 830 chip.

Basically, Samsung is planning to fill all of the Galaxy S8’s front display with just the screen, just like Apple is expected to do with the next iPhone, as imagined by the below concept rendering.

 

“It is heard that Samsung Electronics is planning to eliminate even top and bottom edges of display for Galaxy S8,” creating a full-screen smartphone.

The side bezels should be made even skinnier than on current Galaxies by increasing the curvature of both edges of the AMOLED display. Samsung’s display-making arm should play an important role in volume production of that screen.

As for the Galaxy S8’s dual-cameras, Samsung is currently deciding whether to use all-in-one dual-cameras or separated dual-cameras, said a representative for a component industry. All-in-one dual-cameras have two lenses and a module versus separated dual-cameras that have two separate modules.

 

Samsung’s dual-cameras will be used to capture depth of field photos akin to the iPhone 7 Plus and are said to be 16 megapixels and eight megapixels versus a pair of 12-megapixel cameras on Apple’s phone.

As for the device’s brains, Samsung’s foundry business is said to start volume production of the Snapdragon 830 chip on a 10-nanometer FinFET process at the end of this year at the earliest, beating rival TSMC. Like the current Galaxy, certain S8 models will use Samsung’s next-generation Exynos chip in place of the Qualcomm one.

The previously rumored Exynos 8995 chip is said to incorporate a 16-nanometer Mali-G71 GPU manufactured by ARM, which appears to be a direct successor to the T880 model found within the Exynos 8990 that’s being used in the Galaxy S7 series and the ill-fated Note 7.

Using ARM’s new Bifrost architecture developed with 4K display and virtual reality applications in mind, the GPU should be almost twice as fast as its predecessor.

 

Digital Music News recently heard from sources that Samsung Mobile’s leadership is considering removing the 3.55mm headphone jack from the Galaxy S8.

The next Galaxy is expected to release in the first quarter of next year. For what it’s worth, we know from a leaked invite that the next Samsung Unpacked event will be taking place at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain on February 26.

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Google Announces its own phones: Pixel and Pixel XL!

If you’ve formed an emotional attachment to the Nexus brand, it’s time to say goodbye. But this is good news – the legacy continues with the Pixel, a collaboration between Google and HTC, the same team that brought us both the original Android phone and the first Nexus.

Two phones – the Pixel and Pixel XL – cover the bases of size preference, 5″ and 5.5″ respectively. Both have AMOLED screens, with 1080p resolution for the small one (441ppi) and QHD for the big one (534ppi). Battery capacity is also different, 2,770mAh and 3,450mAh.

Beyond that, both Pixels are more similar than they are different. Qualcomm supplied a revamped chipset, the Snapdragon 821, Android 7.1 Nougat (yes, a point upgrade over what the LG V20 has) brings “sustained performance mode.”

The camera boasts the same excellent qualities we loved on the last (ever?) pair of Nexus devices – 12MP sensor, 1.55µm pixels, f/2.0 aperture. But it resolves our one gripe with it too – it adds back the Optical Image Stabilization.

The Google Pixel and Pixel XL have the same storage options – 32GB (for those that use Google Photos and Play Music) and 128GB (for those that prefer their data offline). Both come with 4GB of RAM – one better than the Nexus 6P, nothing extraordinary though a clean Android OS runs leaner.

While HTC built the phones, the Pixels branded only with the Google logo. And they are loaded to the teeth with Google services that cover everything from messaging, through cloud services to AI assistants. The search giant has a growing stable of self-branded devices – the Google phone can connect to a Google router and cast to a Google media player, you get the idea.

The Pixel brand debuted with the best Chromebook money can buy, then ventured into Android with the Pixel C tablet, clearly, it’s a premium brand by Google. And the two phones are priced accordingly – they start $649 and will be available through a bunch of carriers and retailers. Check them out below.

Pre-orders start on October 13, with actual sales beginning a week later, October 20. The phones will be available in Quite Black, Very Silver and Really Blue colors.

More announcements from Google!

If you use these features in Chrome you should get a Chromebook before 2018!

Google announced that it’s planning to phase out support for its browser-based Chrome apps for every single OS except – of course – Chrome OS proper. That means no Chrome apps will be available to download on Windows, Mac or Linux starting the second half of 2017, and in early 2018, existing apps won’t load at all on those platforms.

The reason? People just didn’t use them. According to Google:

There are two types of Chrome apps: packaged apps and hosted apps. Today, approximately 1 percent of users on Windows, Mac, and Linux actively use Chrome packaged apps, and most hosted apps are already implemented as regular web apps.

Instead, Google will be doubling down on extensions and themes, which are getting a more prominent showcase in the Chrome Web Store.

The company says the Web has matured enough to support experiences that used to require dedicated offline apps, such as sending notifications or connecting to hardware. Still, the company is keeping native apps on Chrome OS, saying they play a “critical role,” — clearly there is some advantage to them, but that’s simply by virtue that Chrome OS can only run Chrome apps.

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