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Google I/O 2022 Starts Today: How to Watch, What to Expect

Google I/O 2022 is kicking off today, and just like the past years, you can watch its livestream. The Google I/O 2022 keynote featuring Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai, and his core team, is expected to bring the key announcements, such as the launch of new hardware including an affordable Pixel phone as well as advancements and improvements coming to Android and Wear OS. Shortly after the main keynote, Google will hold a developer-focussed keynote where we are expected to see some detailed information about the company’s prime software updates.

How to watch Google I/O 2022 livestream in India and around the world

Google I/O 2022 will take place as a two-day event, starting with the keynote that will begin at 1pm ET (10:30pm IST) today. The developer-centric event will be held at the Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View, California. However, Google will livestream the conference for its worldwide audience. The event — including the main keynote — will be livestreamed through Google’s social media channels. While the keynote will be livestreamed for all, developers who want to virtually attend specific sessions and the developer-focussed keynote following the main keynote need to register on the Google I/O site.

You can watch the Google I/O 2022 keynote live from the video embedded below.

What all to expect at Google I/O 2022

Just like past years, this year’s Google I/O conference will detail the company’s latest developments towards its operating systems including Android and Wear OS. The rumour mill has also suggested that we could see some hardware-focussed announcements at the event.

Android 13
At Google I/O 2022, we can expect Google to explain its new advancements and improvements in Android 13. The operating system, which is the successor to last year’s Android 12, received its first developer preview in February. It is likely to get an Apple-like spatial audio feature for Pixel 6 models as well as two carrier connections on a single eSIM, per previous reports.

Wear OS
In addition to Android 13, Wear OS is likely to get an update with a list of enhancements and improvements that we can expect at this year’s Google I/O. Google last year announced its partnership with Samsung for integrating Tizen within Wear OS. We could see some new moves at that end.

Pixel 6a
At this year’s I/O keynote, Google is expected to repeat its 2019 take and unveil the Pixel 6a as its new affordable smartphone. The phone is speculated to have Google’s Tensor chip — similar to the existing Pixel 6 models. It is also expected to have the Pixel 6-like back design, a retail box surfaced online has suggested. The new Pixel phone may, however, lack some of the features that were exclusive to the Pixel 6 series. Normally, Google uses its I/O conferences to detail software and Web technologies, though it did make a change in 2019 when it announced the Pixel 3a and Pixel 3a XL as its two affordable smartphones.

Pixel Watch
Alongside the Pixel 6a, the Pixel Watch is expected to debut at Google I/O 2022 keynote later today. The rumour mill has suggested that Google is working on its own smartwatch hardware for some time. It is speculated to have a circular design and run the latest Wear OS version. It could also come with a Fitbit integration for enhanced fitness tracking support.

Pixel Buds Pro
Google is tipped to launch the Pixel Buds Pro alongside the Pixel 6a and Pixel Watch at this year’s I/O keynote. The new truly wireless stereo (TWS) earbuds by the Android maker are said to be available in Carbon, Fog, Limoncello, and Real Red colours.

Google Assistant improvements
This year’s Google I/O is also expected to bring some new improvements to Google Assistant — to make it a better option against Amazon’s Alexa and Apple’s Siri. There could also be some enhancements specifically to uplift your smart home experience.

Google Search advancements
At the I/O 2022 keynote, Google is expected to announce some of its tweaks to improve search results. These changes are expected to leverage the company’s artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning advancements.

Other updates
If we go by the historical records, Google is likely to announce updates to Google Maps, Photos, and Gmail at this year’s I/O conference. We may also see the company bringing back its Wallet app to complement Google Pay. Furthermore, there could be some special announcements around Google’s plans to work on Web 3 and develop next-generation apps and experiences for metaverse.

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Tinder Owner Match Sues Google to Avoid Being Removed From the Play Store

Dating apps maker Match Group Inc sued Alphabet Inc’s Google on Monday, calling the action a “last resort” to prevent Tinder and its other apps from being booted off the Play store for refusing to share up to 30 percent of their sales.

Match’s lawsuit follows ongoing cases brought by Fortnite maker Epic Games, dozens of US state attorneys general and others in targeting Google’s allegedly anticompetitive conduct with the Play store.

Google said Match was attempting to dodge paying for the significant value it receives.

“Like any business, we charge for our services, and like any responsible platform, we protect users against fraud,” Google said. It has said its payment tool helps deter scams.

Match’s lawsuit, which was filed in federal court in California, accuses Google of violating federal and state antitrust laws and seeks to bar such behavior.

It is notable because some of Match’s apps have been exempted from Google policies for about the past decade. Now, Google says it will block downloads of those apps by June 1 unless they solely offer its payment system and share revenue, the lawsuit states.

“This lawsuit is a measure of last resort,” Match Chief Executive Shar Dubey said. “We tried, in good faith, to resolve these concerns with Google, but their insistence and threats has left us no choice.”

At stake for Match is what it describes as hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue that would have to be paid to Google.

The majority of users on Match’s most popular app, Tinder, prefer its payment system, which allows for installment plans, bank transfers and other features not provided by Google, according to the lawsuit.

Google said that developers can bypass the Play store and that it has lowered fees and created other programs to address concerns.

Dubey said that going around Play was unviable.

“It’s like saying, ‘you don’t have to take the elevator to get to the 60th floor of a building, you can always scale the outside wall,'” she said.

© Thomson Reuters 2022

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Global Tech Industry Body Seeks Revision in India’s Directive on Reporting of Cybersecurity Breach

US-based technology industry body ITI, having global tech firms such as Google, Facebook, IBM and Cisco as its members, has sought a revision in the Indian government’s directive on reporting of cyber security breach incidents. ITI said that the provisions under the new mandate may adversely impact organisations and undermine cybersecurity in the country.

ITI country manager for India Kumar Deep, in a letter to CERT-In chief Sanjay Bahl dated May 5, asked for a wider stakeholder consultation with the industry before finalising on the directive.

“The directive has the potential to improve India’s cybersecurity posture if appropriately developed and implemented, however, certain provisions in the bill, including counterproductive incident reporting requirements, may negatively impact Indian and global enterprises and undermine cybersecurity,” Deep said.

Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) on April 28 issued a directive asking all government and private agencies, including internet service providers, social media platforms and data centres, to mandatorily report cybersecurity breach incidents to it within six hours of noticing them.

The new circular issued by the CERT-In mandates all service providers, intermediaries, data centres, corporates and government organisations to mandatorily enable logs of all their ICT (Information and Communication Technology) systems and maintain them securely for a rolling period of 180 days and the same shall be maintained within the Indian jurisdiction.

ITI has raised concerns over the mandatory reporting of breach incidents within six hours of noticing, to enable logs of all ICT systems and maintain them within Indian jurisdiction for 180 days, the overbroad definition of reportable incidents and the requirement that companies connect to the servers of Indian government entities.

Deep, in the letter, said that the organisations must be given 72 hours to report an incident in line with global best practices and not just six hours.

ITI said that the government’s mandate to enable logs of all covered entities’ information and communications technology systems, maintain logs “securely for a rolling period of 180 days” within India and make them available to the Indian government upon request is not a best practice.

“It would make such repositories of logged information a target for global threat actors, in addition to requiring significant resources (both human and technical) to implement,” Deep said.

ITI also raised concern on the requirement that “all service providers, intermediaries, data centres, body corporate and government organisations shall connect to the NTP servers of Indian labs and other entities for synchronisation of all their ICT systems clocks”.

The global body said that the provisions could negatively affect companies’ security operations as well as the functionality of their systems, networks and applications.

ITI said that the government’s current definition of reportable incident to include activities such as probing and scanning is far too broad given probes and scans are everyday occurrences.

“It would not be useful for companies or CERT-In to spend time gathering, transmitting, receiving and storing such a large volume of insignificant information that arguably will not be followed up on,” Deep said.

ITI has asked the government to defer timeline for implementation of the new directive and launch a wider consultation with all stakeholders for its effective implementation.

ITI demanded CERT-In to “revise the directive to address the concerning provisions with regard to incident reporting obligations, including related to the reporting timeline, scope of covered incidents and logging data localisation requirements”.

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Google Play System Update for May 2022 Adds Self-Sharing to Nearby Share Option

Google Play system updates for the month of May have been released, and one of the changes include the addition of self-sharing to the Nearby Share feature, apart from a redesign of the Google Help app. Google system updates include the Android operating system, Google Play store, and Google Play Services. Every month, Google shares the latest updates about the changes it makes with the system update, to what it calls the “Google System” for Android. Usually, the changelog seems pretty much the same for every month, but this time it lists some changes and improvements.

According to a report by 9to5Google, Google is bringing self-sharing to Nearby Share, which offers an experience similar to AirDrop on Apple devices, with the latest Google Play May 2022 update. Nearby Share is also compatible with Chromebook and Windows PCs.

With the new feature, users will be able to share files, links, and text from one of their own devices to another without needing to approve every file they share, says the report. To recall, the self-share option in Nearby Share was spotted in development last month, and first spotted in January.

To get these latest features and improvements on one’s Android device, users will have to update Google Play Services version 22.15 and Play Store version 30.3. Both these versions have begun rolling out as of May 2.

Also, users can directly head to Google Play to update Google Play Services, if an update is available. Meanwhile, Google Play system updates can also be found through the Settings app, under About phone > Android version > Google Play system update on the phone.

Moreover, the new Google Play system update also brings a redesign to the Google Help app. Although the changelog doesn’t mention any specific details regarding the design change, it’s possible that Google may bring its “Material You” design theme to the app.

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YouTube Go to Be Discontinued in August: Here’s What You Need to Know

YouTube Go is going to be shut down in August. The move was officially confirmed via a post on Google’s support page. The search giant has recommended that YouTube Go users should switch to the main YouTube app. They can also use the Web browser to access the website directly. The YouTube Go app was released in 2016 for users with low-end hardware or poor data connections. There are also several key features missing from the Go version like the “ability to comment, post, create content, and use Dark theme.”

According to the post shared by Google, the main YouTube has been optimised over the years to offer improved performance on entry-level smartphones and slow network connections. The company has also promised future updates to reduce data usage for users that only have access to limited data. All these improvements and planned updates for the main app have made the YouTube Go app redundant. Also, there have been vast improvements in the capabilities of low-end smartphones since 2016, when this app was initially launched. To recall, the app was built specifically for India from the ground up, but was also made available in other developing markets.

The YouTube Go app currently sits at over 500 million installs on the Google Play store. Notably, the app had not received a new update since October 2021, which might indicate that this app was on the back burner for some time.

Google has been constantly releasing updates and adding new features to the YouTube app. It recently widely released the Super Thanks, which allows users to tip content creators while watching their videos. This feature allows content creators to reduce their dependency on advertisements. Also, there was a recent report which suggested that YouTube would be receiving a dedicated Podcasts homepage. This rumoured update might also bring audio-only ads to the platform.

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Square Enix Sells Tomb Raider, Other Major Franchises to Help Fund Blockchain Projects

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Google Rolling Out May 2022 Update With a Fix for Weak Notification Vibrations on Pixel 6, Pixel 6 Pro

Google has started rolling out the May 2022 update for its Pixel phones that addresses weak notification vibrations specifically for the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro. The problem of weak notification vibrations surfaced earlier this year and was reported by a large number of users on both the latest Pixel phones. The May 2022 software update also fixes the display and launcher issues for all Pixel phones starting from the Pixel 3a to the Pixel 6 Pro.

As highlighted in the changelog available on the Community post, the May 2022 Pixel software update includes improvements for haptic feedback to enhance vibration alerts particularly on the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro. These improvements are essentially aimed to address user complaints related to weaker vibrations that surfaced on platforms including Google’s support forum and Reddit after the March software update.

Users had complained at the time that following the March update, they were starting to miss text messages and calls due to weaker vibrations than what they were getting earlier.

The March update was, though, meant to offer features including Live Caption and Night Sight support for Snapchat. It also included bug fixes, including the ones for some Wi-Fi connectivity issues on the Pixel 6 series.

It was not the first time when an update introduced problems for Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro users. Last year, the December update caused call drop issues on both Pixel 6 models. Google had to pause that update to avoid its mass impact.

The May 2022 update also fixes the issue that was causing the display on the Pixel phone to wake without user interactions. It also addresses the problem that was resulting in a launcher crash after restarting the device. Both these fixes apply to all eligible Pixel phones, namely the Pixel 3a, Pixel 3a XL, Pixel 4, Pixel 4 XL, Pixel 4a, Pixel 4a (5G), Pixel 5, Pixel 5a (5G), Pixel 6, and the Pixel 6 Pro.

Google has also improved the security side of things with the latest update.

The May 2022 update for the Pixel phones running Android 12 will continue to roll out over the next week in phases. You can check for its arrival on your Pixel device by going to Settings > System > System update. Alternatively, you can get the factory images or OTA images of the update package from the Android Developers portal if you are aware of the risk involved in manually installing the new software version.

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Google Will Now Show Warning Banners When Opening Potentially Malicious Docs, Sheets, Slides Files on the Web

Google is expanding its warning banners for potentially malicious Google Drive files. While previously it displayed the banners when users were attempting to open such a file within a Google Drive account, or from within a Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, or Drawings file, Google has now brought the feature to the file-level – which means that if a user tries to open such a potentially malicious or dangerous Google Docs, Sheets, or Slides file on the Web, they will be served a warning of the dangers ahead.

As per a Workspace Updates blog post by Google, this feature is available to all the Google Workspace customers, as well as legacy G Suite Basic and Business customers. The rollout was officially started on April 27, and it will gradually be available for all users. The rollout may take up to 15 days to reach everyone, Google said.

The move by Google is a step to prevent scams that use its productivity tools, a method bad actors have been spotted using in the past in an attempt to send phishing and other malicious links. The expansion takes the warning banners out of the productivity tools itself, directly to the Web.

Earlier this month, in related news, Google announced a feature for Google Workspace that supports all the emojis, including gender-neutral options. Users can now react to any content on Google Docs, simply using a symbol instead of writing a comment or remark on it. As per the company, the feature supports all the emojis in the latest release. These include gender-neutral options as well.

If you’re wondering how to use the emoji reaction feature, they will appear as a third option alongside ‘Add Comment’ and ‘Suggest Edits’ when you highlight text. According to Google, these responses provide a less formal alternative to comments. Emoji reactions are coming to Google Docs at a time when the service is undergoing a big overhaul with its expansion from being a word processor into more of a remote working collaboration tool.

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Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt Claims He’s More Interested in Web 3 Than Crypto

Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google, has recently disclosed his views on the emerging blockchain industry, expressing that what fascinates him the most is not cryptocurrencies but the future of Web 3. Schmidt who’s also served as chairman for Google noted that “tokenomics” is a notion that piques his interest in Web 3. However, he did disclose that he has invested a “little bit” of money in digital assets too. Schmidt goes on to state that if he were in a position to start his career as a software engineer today, he would focus on AI algorithms or Web 3.

“A new model [of the internet] where you as an individual [can] control your identity, and where you don’t have a centralised manager, is very powerful. It’s very seductive and it’s very decentralised,” Schmidt tells CNBC in an interview. “I remember that feeling when I was 25 that decentralised would be everything,” he added.

He further pointed out that Web 3 would birth new models of content ownership and ways to compensate people for their creation. Schmidt added that, “[Web 3′s] economics are interesting. The platforms are interesting, and the use patterns are interesting,” Schmidt says. “[It] doesn’t work yet, but it will.”

Moving to the topic of crypto, Schmidt admits that he admires cryptocurrencies, but added that most blockchain networks spend a lot of time ensuring no one attacks them. According to the former Google exec, the move is incredibly wasteful. Despite admitting that he holds some cryptocurrencies, Schmidt didn’t name the specific coins he has invested in.

Though his time as Google CEO was over a decade ago — 2001 to 2011, to be precise, Schmidt still served as the internet giant’s executive chairman until 2017, and its technical advisor until 2020. Since leaving the company, he’s spent most of his time funding research in artificial intelligence, biology, and energy. However, on the cryptocurrency front, he also became a strategic advisor for Chainlink labs in December.

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Google Reveals to Have Blocked Over a Million Policy-Violating Apps From Being Published on Play Store in 2021

Google has revealed that it blocked as many as 1.2 million apps from being published on Google Play in 2021 as they were violating its policies. The company said that it introduced privacy-focussed features and enhancements to protect users against bad apps and developers, and improved data safety that all helped bring improvements for Android consumers. In addition to its ongoing efforts, Google has the Google Play Protect pre-installed malware protection that is claimed to scan billions of installed apps each day across billions of devices to limit malicious and unwanted software from Android phones.

In a blog post, Google’s Android security and Privacy team said that by blocking 1.2 million policy-violating apps from being published on Google Play, it prevented billions of harmful installations. The Android maker also noted that it banned 190,000 bad developer accounts to reduce malicious and spammy developers. It also closed around 500,000 developer accounts that were inactive or abandoned.

“Providing a safe experience to billions of users continues to be one of the highest priorities for Google Play,” the team said.

In May, Google announced its Data safety section, which essentially works similar to Apple’s privacy ‘nutrition labels’, and lets developers give users the information about the privacy and security of their apps directly through their app listings on Google Play. It rolled out to users earlier this week, and developers are required to complete the information required in this section for their apps by July 20.

The Data safety section is one of the moves by Google to help make users aware of what data they are sharing with app developers and for what purposes. However, since the onus of sharing data access information is on developers, there could be some instances of misleading details. Google, though, said that apps that don’t become compliant will be subject to policy enforcement.

Google has features including the Policy and Programs section on Google Play Console. It also worked with system development kit (SDK) developers to improve the safety of its SDKs. As a result of all these initiatives, Google said that as much as 98 percent of apps migrating to Android 11 or higher have reduced their access to sensitive APIs and user data. It also claimed to have significantly reduced “the unnecessary, dangerous, or disallowed use of Accessibility APIs in apps migrating to Android 12, while preserving the functionality of legitimate use cases.”

Specifically for Google Pixel users, Google said that its in-house devices now use new machine learning models that help improve the detection of malware through Google Play Protect.

“The detection runs on your Pixel, and uses a privacy preserving technology called federated analytics to discover bad apps,” the team said.

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