PAKISTAN NEWS:
Navigating the digital transformation route for Pakistan:
Digital transformation is the integration of digital technology into most, if not all, areas of a society, fundamentally changing how you operate and deliver value to your end-users and consumers. Digital transformation is no longer a buzzword for Pakistan and in order for any country to progress, it is imperative that they derive learnings from the crises they face and find innovative solutions for them. Last year, during the monsoon season, unprecedented rains flung the city of Karachi (which accounts for around 25% of the country’s GDP) into darkness, disconnection, and misery. For a city that is considered the metropolitan hub of the country, being disconnected in terms of electricity and/or internet for several hours (or even days in some areas) means a loss of billions to the economy, not to mention the misery it causes to our citizens.
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KIA to spearhead apple car project under Hyundai motors:
Reports have surfaced that the Korean automotive giant Hyundai will spearhead the highly anticipated Apple car project. Experts and famed reviewers in the business reckon the company will soon pen a lucrative partnership with Apple Inc. Hyundai had previously released a statement on all platforms, notifying its followers that the company is open to cooperating with international firms whose bread and butter is EV manufacturing.
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Next macbook air will be lighter and thinner with smaller bezels:
Apple’s next MacBook Air is expected to be thinner and lighter than before with smaller bezels. These MacBooks will reportedly be released by the end of the year and the report also reveals a few other changes coming to Apple’s upcoming notebooks. Other than a lighter chassis and reduced display bezels, the new MacBook Air laptops will have a smaller footprint overall. We will get to see Magsafe charging make a return with the new laptops as well. Moreover the distinctive design refresh of the MacBook Air laptops will make them stand out from the MacBook Pros.
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Zong launches China international roaming offer:
Strengthening its industry-leading international roaming services portfolio, Zong 4G, has introduced China International Roaming offer for its prepaid customers. The China International Roaming Power Offer gives the subscribers 150 Minutes, 150 SMSs, 2GB of data with a validity of 15 days for only PKR 3,199 + Tax. The offer can be activated by dialing *4255#.
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Google says goodbye to giant internet balloons idea:
Google’s parent-company Alphabet is scrapping a company set up to build giant balloons to beam the internet to rural areas. Loon was a long-term experimental bet from the tech giant’s “X” business unit. But it failed to get costs low enough to make it sustainable, its chief executive said in a blog post on Thursday announcing the winding-down. The balloons were the size of tennis courts and self-navigating.
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Realme c20 goes official with a 5,000 mah battery:
Realme has launched another entry-level offering that goes by the name of C20 that starts for only $105, but with a large 5,000 mAh battery, a tall display, and an octa-core processor. The first market to see the phone is Vietnam, but it should be arriving in other regions shortly. The screen is a 6.5-inch 720p LCD panel with a waterdrop notch at the top for the selfie camera and a large bottom bezel. The rear panel has a two-tone design with a thick strip going down the main camera carrying the Realme brand name. There is only a single camera in the square-shaped module beside an LED flash.
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Honor magicbook 14 and 15 launched with 11th gen intel cpus:
Honor revealed two new laptops at the brand’s Honor V40 5G launch event. Announced as the MagicBook 14 2021 and MagicBook 15 2021 respectively, both variants boast a similar spec-sheet as well as price.Despite its not-so-old transition, Huawei’s former subsidiary has taken 2021 by storm, announcing a high-end product range and updated functionality.In terms of features and specifications, the Honor MagicBooks are powered by the 11th Gen Intel Core i7-1165G7 processor, topped with NVIDIA’s MX450 GPU. Both variants come with dual-channel 16GB DDR4 RAM, coupled with a standard 512GB PCI NVMe Solid State Drive (SSD).
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Huawei Nova 7 SE 5g LOHAS edition launched with new mobile chip:
In April last year, Huawei announced the Huawei 7 Nova SE, and almost 9 months after its release, the company has not announced the Huawei Nova 7 SE 5G LOHAS Edition. The handset comes with similar specifications and aesthetics aside from the new Mobile platform. The Nova 7 SE LOHAS Edition looks exactly like the Huawei 7 SE launched last year. It features a 6.5-inch IPS LCD with a punch hole on the top left, 1080 x 2400 pixels resolution, and a 20:9 aspect ratio. The fingerprint sensor is mounted on the right.
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Criminals use pubg to sexually assault and murder a teenager:
Important information regarding the sexual assault and murder of a 13-year-old boy in Lahore has surfaced, revealing that the murderers had befriended him through an online game, PUBG. Lahore DIG Investigations, Shariq Jamal, while addressing a press conference said that the police had arrested three suspects, Atta Ullah, Mussawar Iqbal, and Muhammad Naveed, in the case.
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Honor v40 5g finally launched:
Huawei’s ex-subsidiary, Honor, has finally unveiled its first product as an independent company. The handset’s launch was pushed forward twice due to unknown reasons but the company has finally managed to pull it off. The premium looking device comes with Dimensity 1000+ chipset, a new 50 MP camera, and speedy charging.
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Infinix announces hot 10 play with a massive battery & helio g25 chipset:
Last year, Infinix announced the Hot 10 and Hot 10 Lite Smartphones as entry-level devices with reasonable features. Now the company has added a play variant to the series that comes with Android 10 Go Edition, a 6.82-inch display, and a 6000 mAh battery. Aesthetically, the handset looks like its siblings the Infinix Hot 10 and Hot 10 Lite. It has a similar rectangular camera bump and a subtle paint job at the back. The fingerprint sensor is also mounted at the back.
INTERNATIONAL NEWS:
Samsung to set up a $10 billion silicon chip plant in texas:
A new report from Chinese media claims that Samsung is looking to invest $10 billion for a new chip manufacturing plant in Texas, US. This would make it the world’s most advanced chip fabrication plant in the world as the current generation of smartphone chips top out at 5nm. Once set up, this would also pose a serious competitive threat to Samsung’s biggest rival, the Taiwanese Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC). Besides Samsung, TSMC is the only chip-making company that offers 5nm chips for smartphones.
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Google to leave Australia:
Google has threatened to pull out of the Australian market if a new law governing its relationship with news publishers goes ahead. The government is introducing a law to address a long-bubbling row over whether tech giants should pay for news that appears in search or is shared on their platforms.
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Will biden bash big tech?:
The world’s leading technology nation has a new president, and one who seems pretty hostile to Silicon Valley. On this week’s Tech Tent, we ask just what a Biden administration might have in store for America’s tech giants.
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Cyber criminals publish more than 4,000 stolen sepa files:
Cyber criminals who stole thousands of digital files belonging to environmental regulator Sepa have published them on the internet. The public body had about 1.2GB of data stolen from its digital systems on Christmas Eve. Sepa rejected a ransom demand for the attack, which has been claimed by the international Conti ransomware group. Contracts, strategy documents and databases are among the 4,000 files released.
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Gaming firms fined nearly £7m for restricting european sales:
Valve, owner of online PC gaming platform Steam, and five other publishers have been fined a total of €7.8m (£6.9m) for restricting cross-border sales of PC video games. So-called geo-blocking means games are locked, so that a cheaper licence intended for less well-off European countries cannot be used elsewhere. That stopped gamers “shopping around” for the best deals, said EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager.
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Social media giants grilled on hate content:
Social network executives have been grilled by MPs on the role their platforms played in recent events in Washington which saw a mob break into Congress. All said that they needed to do more to monitor extremist groups and content such as conspiracy theories. But none had any radical new policies to offer. The government has recently set out tough new rules for how social media firms moderate content.
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Malware found on laptops given out by government:
Some of the laptops given out in England to support vulnerable children home-schooling during lockdown contain malware, BBC News quoted as saying. Teachers shared details on an online forum about suspicious files found on devices sent to a Bradford school. The malware, which they said appeared to be contacting Russian servers, is believed to have been found on laptops given to a handful of schools. The Department for Education said it was aware and urgently investigating.
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London cabbies plan to sue for damages:
Thousands of London taxi drivers plan to sue Uber for damages alleging the ride-hailing firm operated unlawfully.The planned group legal action could, if successful, hit Uber with a bill for millions of pounds.
The action, part of a planned anti-Uber campaign by black-cab drivers this year, claims it didn’t follow private hire rules between 2012 and 2018.Uber said it “operates lawfully in London and these allegations are completely unfounded”.The group action, which will be launched by law firm Mishcon de Reya, will allege that for six years Uber operated unlawfully in London.Taxi rules in London mean that people have to contact a centralised office for minicabs, whereas they can hail a black cab on the street.
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A wristband that tells your boss if you are unhappy:
At first glance the silicone wristband could be mistaken for one that tracks your heart rate when you are doing exercise. However, the wearable technology, called a Moodbeam, isn’t here to monitor your physical health. Instead it allows your employer to track your emotional state. The gadget, which links to a mobile phone app and web interface, has two buttons, one yellow and one blue. The idea is that you press the yellow one if you are feeling happy, and the blue one if you are sad.
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How covid turbocharged the qr revolution:
“Our customers love it,” says Michael Schatzberg, the co-founder of a US restaurant group. He is talking about using QR codes (quick response codes), a technology from the 1990s, which is proving to be very useful in the Covid era. Many restaurants have turned to the tech, which allows customers to see a menu, order and pay just by pointing their smartphone at the black, barcode-like squares.”They don’t have to wait. They can just pay and leave without asking for the bill,” says Mr Schatzberg, whose restaurants include Duke’s and Big Daddy’s in New York.