Technology News

Cybercrimes Could Cost India Rs. 20,000 Crore Due to Brand Abuse and Fake Domains in 2025: CloudSEK India could potentially suffer financial losses reaching roughly Rs. 20,000 crore due to cybercrimes in 2025, as per a recent report by a cybersecurity firm. The report predicted that brand abuse, phishing scams, and fake domain takedowns would be the leading methods to conduct cybercrimes in the ongoing year.

Apple Adds Age Assurance Features for Improved Privacy, Revamps Child Account Setup Process Apple has announced that it is streamlining the setup of Child Accounts and enhancing parental control features. The company aims to minimize data collection by developers while verifying app users' ages. Apple will introduce additional age categories for ratings, ensuring precise categorisation for apps designed for younger users. Developers will also be required to ...

Canada Regulator to Impose Fee on Google For Online News Law's Operating Costs The imposition of the levy on Google comes at a time of increased tension between Canada and the United States over trade, border security, and a digital services tax on US technology firms.

OpenAI Introduces GPT-4.5 AI Model in Research Preview, Its ‘Best Model for Chat Yet’ OpenAI released a research preview of GPT-4.5 artificial intelligence (AI) model on Thursday. The successor to the GPT-4o model arrives with improvements in natural conversations, reasoning, and coding. Calling it “our largest and best model for chat yet,” the AI firm highlighted that the company scaled up both pre-training and post-training with this model.

Alibaba Releases Open-Source Wan 2.1 Suite of AI Video Generation Models, Claimed to Outperform OpenAI’s Sora Alibaba released a suite of artificial intelligence (AI) video generation models on Wednesday. Dubbed Wan 2.1, these are open-source models that can be used for both academic and commercial purposes. The Chinese e-commerce giant released the models in several parameter-based variants. Developed by the company’s Wan team, these models were first introduced in January...

US Examining Whether UK's Encryption Demand on Apple Broke Data Treaty In a letter dated February 25 to two US lawmakers, Tulsi Gabbard, the US director of national intelligence, said the US is examining whether the UK government had violated the CLOUD Act, which bars it from issuing demands for the data of US citizens and vice versa.

Google's AI Overviews Erode the Internet, US EdTech Firm Chegg Says in Lawsuit Chegg, an online education company that offers textbook rentals, homework help, and tutoring has filed a lawsuit against Google. In the lawsuit filed in Washington, D.C., Google is co-opting publishers' content to keep users on its own site, erasing financial incentives to publish.

Gmail to Replace SMS Authentication With QR Codes for Two-Factor Authentication Google will stop supporting SMS-based two-factor authentication (2FA) for Gmail, replacing it with QR code support. This change aims to enhance security, as malicious users can trick people into sharing SMS login codes, undermining 2FA. While the old SMS-based system is still used on many platforms, QR codes are expected to provide better protection for Google account...

India's Tata Play, Airtel Digital TV Reportedly Near Merger India's Tata Group and Bharti Group are close to merging their satellite TV businesses. The merged entity is expected to be run by Bharti Airtel, which will likely hold between 52 percent-55 percent with the remaining held by Tata Play shareholders, including Walt Disney, sources familiar with the matter have told the media.

Google Reveals Its Veo 2 Video Generation AI Model’s Pricing on Vertex AI Platform Google has revealed the pricing to generate videos using its latest Veo 2 artificial intelligence (AI) model. The Mountain View-based tech giant will charge users generating video via its Vertex AI platform $0.50 (roughly Rs. 43) per second. This will shoot up to $30 (roughly Rs. 2,600) for a minute-long video generated using the AI model.

Google Said to be Facing EU Charges of Breaching Big Tech Rules Google is set to be charged with breaching EU rules aimed at checking the power of Big Tech. One probe focuses on whether Google favours its vertical search engines such as Google Shopping, Google Flights and Google Hotels over rivals, and whether it discriminates against third-party services on Google search results.

OpenAI Begins Rolling Out Its Operator AI Agent in Several Regions OpenAI began rolling out its artificial intelligence (AI) agent Operator in several countries on Friday. The agentic tool was so far available in preview to ChatGPT Pro users residing in the US, after the company introduced it in January. Equipped with a dedicated browser, the Operator is a general-purpose AI agent that can autonomously perform tasks online based on p...

YouTube Premium Lite Plan With Limited Ads Said to Launch Soon in Four Countries YouTube Premium Lite might soon be launched as a cheaper alternative to the ad-free YouTube Premium subscription, allowing users to stream videos with ads on some content. This new plan is expected to debut in four countries after several months of testing. However, the Alphabet-owned streaming platform has not yet announced official plans or pricing details for the m...

WhatsApp Faces EU Tech Rules After Reaching Very Large Platform Status WhatsApp has hit a user criterion set out in landmark EU tech rules, the unit owned by Meta Platforms said, meaning it is required to do more to tackle online illegal and harmful content.

Amazon Appstore for Android to Shut Down in August; Amazon Coins to Be Discontinued Amazon Appstore will be discontinued later this year, 14 years after it was launched for Android devices. Alongside this, Amazon will also wind down its Amazon Coins digital currency programme used for app purchases. While the app store won’t be available for download on Android devices, it will continue to function on Amazon's own devices, including Fire tablets an...

Google Unveils AI Co-Scientist, a Gemini 2.0-Powered Multi-Agent System to Speed Up Scientific Discovery Google unveiled a new artificial intelligence (AI) system that can assist scientists in the scientific discovery process. Dubbed AI co-scientist, the tool is powered by the Gemini 2.0 AI model and includes a multi-agent system that specialises in different tasks in the discovery process. The Mountain View-based tech giant stated that the AI system is designed to be a ...

Microsoft Muse AI Model Unveiled; Can Generate Game Visuals and Controller Actions Microsoft researchers introduced a new artificial intelligence (AI) model on Wednesday that can generate 3D gameplay environments. Dubbed the World and Human Action Model (WHAM) or Muse, the new AI model was developed by the tech giant’s Research Game Intelligence and Teachable AI Experiences (Tai X) teams in collaboration with Xbox Games Studios’ Ninja Theory.

Gemini in Google Meet Can Now Suggest ‘Next Steps’ After Meetings Google Meet is getting a couple of new features, the company announced on Tuesday. The first feature is exclusive to the Google Workspace enterprise and business accounts, and it upgrades the existing note-taking capability in Gemini. Users will now be able to see a checklist of “next steps” suggestions from the AI, based on the conversations in the meeting to hel...

Meta Announces Inaugural AI-Focused LlamaCon Event for Developers, to Be Held in April Meta announced its inaugural LlamaCon event on Tuesday. The developer-focused conference will cover the company's open-source artificial intelligence (AI) models, tools, and future developments with this technology. Announcing the conference, the tech giant stated that LlamaCon will be held on April 29. No further details have been shared for now.

Honor Will Unveil Its AI-Focused Strategic Initiative ‘Alpha Plan’ at MWC 2025 Honor announced its plans to share a new strategic initiative focused on artificial intelligence (AI) at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2025 on Monday. The smartphone brand will showcase its “Alpha Plan” in a keynote session in Barcelona. While the company did not share any details about what the announcements could be about, it is speculated to be about software...

ICC Champions Trophy 2025 Live Streaming: How to Watch Pakistan vs New Zealand Match on Mobile and Smart TV for Free The ICC Champions Trophy 2025 is here, and it will feature 15 matches in Pakistan and Dubai. Team India will have three matches in Dubai. The final will take place on March 9, 2025. Here’s everything you need to know about the ICC Champions Trophy live streaming details, India-centric match details, full schedule, and more.

Instagram Exploring Dislike Button for Comments, with Potential Impact on Ranking Algorithms Instagram has finally confirmed that it is testing a new 'dislike' button that lets users downvote a distasteful or irrelevant comment on the platform. The dislike button will appear across both Feed posts and Reels. The Meta-owned photo and video-sharing platform will not show the dislike count but it will be considered in ranking comments.

Researchers Using AI to Scan Animals’ Faces to Decipher Signs of Pain and Emotions: Report Researchers are now reportedly experimenting with artificial intelligence (AI) to decipher the facial expressions of animals to understand their emotions. As per the report, several research groups are now using AI models with computer vision to analyse emotions and signs of pain and distress in farm animals. This is one of the niche use cases of the technology.

OpenAI Will Not Launch o3 as Standalone AI Model in Favour of Unified GPT-5 OpenAI CEO Sam Altman revealed last week that the company has decided not to release the o3 artificial intelligence (AI) model. In January, the company rolled out the o3-mini model to all ChatGPT users, and the more capable o3 model was expected to be launched this month. However, sharing details about its AI roadmap, Altman revealed that instead of a standalone o3 mo...

Perplexity Introduces Deep Research That Can Generate Expert-Level Reports on Complex Topics Perplexity introduced a Deep Research function on its platform on Friday. The tool can analyse complex questions better and provide comprehensive reports by reasoning through the topics. The new feature is being added to the model picker and is currently available to all users. The company claims that its responses are generated faster than the eponymous OpenAI tool, ...

SEBI Said to be Seeking Greater Access to Social Media Records SEBI is seeking broader powers from the government to remove unauthorised financial advice from social media platforms. This is the second time since 2022 that the Securities and Exchange Board of India has sought such powers, with approval from the government still pending.

Meta to Allow Rival Ads Providers to List on Facebook Marketplace After EU Antitrust Fine Meta Platforms will allow rival classified ads service providers to post listings of their ads on Facebook Marketplace. Calling it the Facebook Marketplace Partner Progam, Meta said the scheme is a response to the EU competition watchdog even as it challenged the fine in court.

JioHotstar Streaming Platform Launched, Combines JioCinema and Disney+ Hotstar JioHotstar, the new streaming platform created by bringing together JioCinema and Disney+ Hotstar, was launched by JioStar on Friday. The newly created platform will host the entire content library of both of the over-the-top (OTT) platforms. Apart from shows and movies from the two merging entities, the platform will also host content from various international studi...

JioHotstar May Launch Soon; JioStar Reportedly Shares Teaser for Viacom18, Star India’s Joint Venture Platform JioHotstar, the speculated new platform emerging from the joint venture between Reliance and Disney Star, could reportedly launch soon. As per a report, the social media page of JioStar made a cryptic post hinting at the launch of the new over-the-top streaming platform that will combine JioCinema and Disney+ Hotstar. Separately, several users have reported online tha...

PM Modi Said to Meet Elon Musk for Possible Starlink Talks During US Trip PM Modi is set to meet Elon Musk during his trip this week to the United States. Musk is likely to hold one-on-one talks with Modi, and India's government expects that these could include Starlink's long-delayed plans to launch satellite broadband services in India, said the two sources, who declined to be named as the plans are private.

Adobe Releases AI-Powered Generate Video in Public Beta, Redesigns Firefly Web App Adobe released its Generate Video tool in public beta on Wednesday, which is now available to all users. The artificial intelligence (AI) video generation tool is powered by the company’s Firefly Video Model, and was first teased in September 2024. The San Jose-based tech giant also redesigned the Firefly web app, and the new layout highlights all the different gene...

Anthropic’s Economic Index Reveals Software Engineering Is Most Impacted by AI Anthropic introduced the Anthropic Economic Index on Monday to understand how artificial intelligence (AI) is impacting the labour market and the economy. The initial report of the research reveals that software engineering fields are the most impacted by this new technology. The research found the arts, design, sports, entertainment, and media fields to be in the sec...

Meta Starts Eliminating Jobs in Shift to Find AI Talent Meta has started notifying “low-performers” that they are being laid off. The company is scouring for new talent to dominate the AI race. The company is offering US-based employees severance packages that include 16 weeks of salary, in addition two weeks for each year of service.

Google Expands NotebookLM Plus to Google One AI Premium Subscribers Google announced the expansion of NotebookLM Plus to individual users on Monday. The upgraded version of the platform that offers higher usage and more security tools has been only available to enterprises and education accounts so far. However, the Mountain View-based tech giant has now bundled it with the Google One AI Premium subscription. Those subscribed to the p...

OpenAI Reportedly Planning to Manufacture Its First In-House AI Chipset OpenAI is reportedly planning to manufacture custom artificial intelligence (AI) chipsets this year. As per the report, the San Francisco-based AI firm has begun the design process internally and is on track to complete the design of the processor in the next few months. The company’s main reason to fabricate custom AI chipsets is said to reduce reliance on Nvidia a...

Malicious Machine Learning Models Discovered on Hugging Face: Report Hugging Face, the artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) hub, is said to contain malicious ML models. A cybersecurity research firm discovered two such models that contain code that can be used to package and distribute malware to those who download these files. As per the researchers, threat actors are using a hard-to-detect method, dubbed Pickle file...

Meta Prepares for Layoffs on Monday, Circulates Internal Memo Meta Platforms plans to carry out its expected company-wide layoffs next week. Employees in Germany, France, Italy and the Netherlands will be exempt from the cuts "due to local regulations," while those in more than a dozen other countries across Europe, Asia and Africa will receive their notifications between February 11 and February 18.

GitHub Copilot Upgraded With Agent Mode and Gemini 2.0 Flash, Project Padawan Unveiled GitHub Copilot, the artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot for the coding platform, is getting several new features. Announced on Thursday, the company is adding a new agent mode to the chatbot that can automatically iterate on code generated by it and analyse errors. Alongside, the Microsoft-owned platform also made Copilot Edits generally available, which was first an...

UK Reportedly Orders Apple to Give it Access to Users' Encrypted Accounts UK authorities have asked Apple to let them retrieve all the content any Apple user worldwide has uploaded to the cloud. UK's office of the Home Secretary has ordered it to provide the access.

WhatsApp Reportedly Testing Feature to Allow Users to Make Bill Payments in India WhatsApp is reportedly working on a new feature for users in India. This feature is expected to allow users to make bill payments directly from within the messaging app. In November 2020, WhatsApp introduced the option to send money using the Unified Payment Interface (UPI) to select users in the country.

Researchers Create a Low-Cost Open-Source AI Model to Analyse How OpenAI’s o1 Reasons Researchers from Stanford University and Washington University have developed an open-source artificial intelligence (AI) model that is comparable in performance to OpenAI’s o1 model. The main objective of the researchers was not to create a powerful reasoning-focused model but to understand how the San Francisco-based AI firm instructed its o1 series models to perf...

Google Reportedly Internally Testing an AI Mode Feature for Search Google has reportedly started internally testing a new artificial intelligence (AI) feature for its Search platform. Dubbed AI Mode, the feature was first rumoured in December 2024. It is said to open a full-screen interface where users can ask complex and exploratory queries, and the AI responds in a conversational manner and also displays URLs in case they want to d...

OpenAI Expands ChatGPT Search Feature to Users Without an OpenAI Account OpenAI is expanding the ChatGPT Search feature to everyone without the need to sign up for the platform. The company announced the rollout of the feature on Wednesday and highlighted that anyone across the world can access the AI platform and start using the AI firm’s native search engine-powered feature to ask queries.

SparkCat Crypto Stealer Malware Infected Multiple Apps on Play Store, App Store Security researchers have discovered several apps on the App Store and Google Play infected with the SparkCat crypto stealer malware. The apps contained a malicious SDK using optical character recognition (OCR) to steal "crypto wallet recovery phrases" from users' screenshots. Notably, this is the first time such cryptocurrency-stealing malware has been detected on Ap...

OpenAI’s Trademark Filing Suggests Plans for AI Devices and Humanoid Robots OpenAI might be planning to move to the hardware space and build artificial intelligence (AI) devices, including humanoid robots. The San Francisco-based AI firm filed a trademark application with the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) last week and listed a large number of consumer gadgets that the company might build in the near future.

Adobe Acrobat AI Assistant Being Upgraded With a Contract Intelligence Feature Adobe Acrobat’s artificial intelligence (AI) assistant is getting a new capability that will make it easier for users to get a quick breakdown of complex contracts. Announced on Tuesday, the new feature is called Contract Intelligence, and it adds a new workflow for the AI chatbot whenever a user opens a contract via Acrobat. The company says the feature can surface...

OpenEuroLLM Project Announces Development of Open-Source Multilingual AI Models OpenEuroLLM Project, a European alliance tasked with developing open-source artificial intelligence (AI) models, was announced on Monday. The project is backed by the European Commission, which has also awarded it the Strategic Technologies for Europe Platform (STEP) Seal, recognising it as a critical technology project. The group aims to develop a family of multiling...

Ola’s Bhavish Aggarwal Announces Krutrim AI Lab, Releases Open-Source Krutrim-2 Model Ola founder and chairman Bhavish Aggarwal announced the Krutrim AI lab on Tuesday. The AI-focused research lab will be the central hub for all the future model releases of Ola Krutrim (commonly referred to as Krutrim). Alongside, several new India-focused open-source artificial intelligence (AI) models were also released, with the main highlight being the Krutrim-2 AI...

Anthropic Developing Constitutional Classifiers to Safeguard AI Models From Jailbreak Attempts Anthropic announced the development of a new system on Monday that can protect artificial intelligence (AI) models from jailbreaking attempts. Dubbed Constitutional Classifiers, it is a safeguarding technique that can detect when a jailbreaking attempt is made at the input level and prevent the AI from generating a harmful response as a result of it.

Indian Government Expands Aadhaar Authentication Service to Public and Private Entities The Indian government expanded the Aadhaar authentication service to both public and private entities across multiple sectors on Friday. The expansion was part of a recent amendment introduced by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY). The ministry said the ease of restriction in accessing the authentication service will boost innovation, knowl...

Google to Ask US Appeals Court to Overturn App Store Verdict Google has argued in court filings to the San Francisco-based 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals that a trial judge made legal errors in the antitrust case that unfairly benefited Epic Games.

OpenAI Introduces Deep Research in ChatGPT, an AI Agent That Can Conduct Multi-Step Research OpenAI introduced a new artificial intelligence (AI) agent in ChatGPT on Sunday that can independently research on the Internet. Dubbed Deep Research (not to be confused with Google’s Gemini-powered AI agent with the same name), it can conduct multi-step research on complex topics. The AI firm stated that the AI agent is powered by one of the o3 AI models, can is cu...

Budget 2025: Tech in Focus With Framework for GCCs, New 'Fund of Funds' for startups, CoE for AI Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced a national framework for Global Capability Centres (GCCs), a Rs 500-crore Centre of Excellence in AI for education, and a deep tech 'Fund of Funds' in the Union Budget. The framework will guide states in promoting GCCs in Tier-2 cities, enhancing talent and infrastructure, building byelaw reforms, and fostering industry co...