Quantcast
Channel: Digital Information World
Viewing all 27018 articles
Browse latest View live

New Study Explains Engineers Are Narrow Minded

$
0
0
Stereotyping in this generation is quite common, most people like to stereotype others on the basis of their caste, creed, ethnicity or race. With the help of stereotyping, it becomes easier to categorize or generalize people, which makes it simpler for everyone to understand that person. Previously, race, color, creed or ethnicity were the only ways to characterize people because living in a certain environment only makes it easier for others to predict the behavior of people. There are several studies to ranked people on the basis of their profession, this can be the way they associate things, their compassion or way of communication.

A recent study says that engineers are narrow-minded, the accusation might feel quite offensive for few, which is the reason there is a proper explanation behind this. According to the researchers, engineers are trained and educated in a way that they learn to opt logic which leads them to a certain answer. They do not have any way of thinking out of the box. In most cases, engineers are seen to work on their own without any assistance, they prefer to concentrate on work and interact less with others. However, not all engineers are introvert, which is the reason overall stereotyping is never appreciated.


When asked about the solution, experts said that the fault is not in the human mind or the profession in this case. Instead, the fault is in the education system where engineers are just asked to run down in numbers and they lose their sense of individuality or creativity. They become more goal or solution-oriented which is completely opposite to what we see in art or literature students. The research was conducted between two samples of recently graduated engineers and students who were studying engineering. The research concluded that just by having mindfulness, people can have better the ability to generate ideas as well as bringing originality to their thinking. This will help them step out of their algorithm thinking strategy making them more acceptable towards new ideas. Moreover, this will bring more originality to the work and more kindness in behavior helping them to minimize the number of times they think about being profit-oriented, which makes them more people-oriented.



Read next: The Growing Demand For Data Scientists (infographic)

1 in 4 Unsuccessfully Try Curbing Tech Use, Study Finds

$
0
0
When was the last time you glanced at your phone? It probably wasn’t too long ago, and it likely wasn’t the first time you checked it today, either. Whether you want to admit it, you’ll probably check it about a dozen more times before the day is over.

Many of us use the term “addicted” in a joking manner, but is it just a figure of speech, or do our behaviors really border on unhealthy?

WhoIsHostingThis surveyed 1,230 people about their device use to see how digital dependence affected their personal and professional lives, as well as their overall well-being.

It seems checking our phones has become second nature. In fact, a little over an hour was the longest any generation surveyed went without checking their phones, with millennials and Gen Zers checking their phones most frequently. Overall, an hour and 16 minutes was the longest people went without checking their phones on a daily basis.

If you don’t see your phone as the issue, you might suffer from “one more episode syndrome.” You sit down to watch your favorite Netflix show only to realize hours have flown by, and you’ve reached the series finale. While this may seem like a harmless indulgence, 31% said that just one to two hours of screen time left them feeling isolated.

However, screen time has evolved into a habit we just can’t quit. For the majority of respondents, waking up and scrolling through social media, checking emails, and catching up on the news was as routine as a morning cup of coffee. In fact, only a little over 1 in 10 admitted to doing something unrelated to technology first thing in the morning.

Daily Dependence on Tech
First activity upon waking up

But our technology use isn’t just interfering with our mornings; it could also be affecting our work performance. Fifteen percent of people had received warnings about their technology use at work. And a small handful of respondents didn’t get the message the first time, as 7% lost their job because of their inappropriate tech use.

Our devices aren’t especially helpful for our personal relationships, either. Friendships were most likely to be affected, with about 60% of people claiming technology got in the way of their relationships. Another 58% of people claimed technology negatively affected their relationships with their significant other and family.

Interpersonal Impacts

And while “catching up” may have meant meeting up in person in the past, this has changed too. The majority of respondents preferred to catch up via text message.

Additionally, half of respondents said they would rather spend a night in with their devices than go out with friends, but 45% of people believed they miss out on events due to their streaming services.

Yet, 48% of respondents said they dropped the ball on some obligation because of the time spent using devices.


WIHT’s research showed our dependence on technology is also getting in the way of personal goals. Nearly 2 in 5 people said their technology use kept them prioritizing their own well-being.

In fact, 65% of people said they’d like to go to the gym more often, with 61% saying their tech use was the reason they’re unable to achieve their goal.

Other goals people skipped out on were eating healthy, getting more sleep, reading more, and spending time with family. The majority (81%) agreed their tech use prevented them from getting a healthy amount of sleep.

how tech use affects our obligations

However, taking some time to unplug might be easier said than done. When nearly 2 in 3 people report using the internet to boost their mood, it becomes clear why so many respondents struggle to disconnect.

Quitting cold turkey doesn’t seem to work well, either. Fifty-five percent of respondents reported feeling restless, depressed, and moody when they tried to limit their technology use.

Unfortunately, the study found nearly 1 in 4 people were unsuccessful when trying to limit their technology use. If at first, you don’t succeed, though, try again.

Technology can be a great tool when used appropriately and, undoubtedly, makes our daily lives easier. However, it’s important to recognize the signs of unhealthy use.

The next time you find yourself mindlessly scrolling through Instagram, instinctively grabbing your phone, or binging TV, remind yourself to spend some time offline.

Read next: How to Free Yourself From Your Smartphone (infographic)

How To Advertise With Amazon In 2020 (infographic)

$
0
0
Which is your favorite soulless digital giant to advertise with? Facebook? Google? Instagram? (Uh, that’s part of Facebook but you get the idea.)

The appealing thing about these platforms is that they seem so open. Whatever you sell, however you sell it, there’s a way to market your business via Facebook or Google. Not like Amazon, where you have to be a card-carrying Amazon merchant to take advantage of their enormous customer base and powerful advertising tools, right? Wrong.

You don’t even have to sell through Amazon to advertise through Amazon. That’s one of the reasons it is becoming a go-to marketing resource for small businesses in 2020. But it’s not the only reason. First, there’s that customer base. More than 206 million unique visitors make their way to Amazon each month, a number that is only set to rise despite a growing movement to boycott the unscrupulous retail behemoth. That’s the equivalent of the population of Brazil (as long as we’re talking about boycotts.)

Perhaps more vitally, 56% of Amazon’s customers search Amazon for their desired product before looking anywhere else online. More than one in five won’t look elsewhere if they spot something appropriate to buy on Amazon first. And a quarter will head to Amazon even if they spot their desired object elsewhere – just to see if it is cheaper at Bezos’ place. In short, if your product is not visible on Amazon – even if it can’t actually be bought on Amazon – you’ve pulled the shutters down on a huge potential market.

However you sell online – through Amazon or elsewhere – there is likely to be a way you can exploit Amazon’s advertising mechanisms in your favor. There are four different methods for those who sell a tangible product.

Marketing tangible products on Amazon

The first method is called Sponsored Products, and adverts like this appear within Amazon among the search results or on other products’ pages. This technique is perfect for seasonal offers and clearances, or to boost the visibility of your products or offers. When customers click on this type of ad, it takes them to your product page – and you only pay when this happens.

Sponsored Brands are useful for raising brand awareness more generally. This time, clicking takes customers to either your product page or your store’s landing page – and again, you only pay when a customer clicks through.


The third type of advert is the Sponsored Display. This one doesn’t just appear on Amazon.com itself; it shows up on Amazon’s other websites and apps, as well as third-party sites. Guess what? You only pay for the advert when a customer clicks through. This one is great if you’re selling your product through Amazon and want to draw outside customers into your virtual store.

Finally, Stores themselves are a form of Amazon advertising that allow you to create your own ‘shop window’ on the site. And they are free.

Using Amazon to market other products and services

There’s no need to cry if your business doesn’t sell tangible products. Amazon Advertising still has a place for you. There are a number of other advertising methods available to draw attention to your service.

Display Ads are simple image adverts that you can show on Amazon, its subsidiaries, and other 3rd-party sites. And you don’t have to connect the ad to an Amazon store – customers can click through to Amazon or to your own business website. Costs vary, but are related to the number of impressions your ad gets.

Video Ads can appear on Amazon’s sites, but crucially they can also figure on Amazon’s devices such as Fire TV – making it seamless to get your video content in front of eager audiences. Your video ad can connect to a webpage of your choice, and the cost is dependent on the length and format of your video and exactly where it is placed.

Okay, so that’s what you can do. But how can you do it well?

Creating a quality Amazon Advertising campaign

There are several important steps to create a complete campaign via Amazon Advertising. And don’t forget to use the Amazon DSP platform to get your marketing visible right where you need it.

To begin with, your campaign needs a name. This serves a couple of purposes, so choose it well. In the first case, you will probably create a number of campaigns over the months and years – so giving them memorable names helps you to know which is which. And secondly, this is the name they’ll probably use at the award ceremony when your campaign wins big!

Unless you’re raising the profile of a particular brand, it is best to stick to one product for each campaign. But you can include variations, such as color. The point is to be direct and to compete with the precise products that your rivals are selling in the same category.

Next you need to decide on your monthly budget. This is an important point as you don’t want the bill to start adding up day after day. It is worth starting with a modest campaign to see how many clicks and impressions you’re getting, so that you know roughly how much to budget next time around. You also need to set an end date for your campaign. Otherwise it will keep running and running, and every time someone sees your advert your account will be charged.


Next, think about the keywords you want to use. Keywords are the search terms that get your product noticed. If you’re new to all this, it can be worth choosing ‘automatic targeting’ first time around, so that Amazon chooses the most appropriate keywords for your product and brand. However, sometimes the human touch is more effective.

So when you have time, do some study and figure out how to cook up some killer keywords for your product. You will need to bid for keywords and it can get expensive to choose the most popular ones, so it is worth learning more about keywords to help you identify some cheap but effective options. There are different bidding categories available for sponsored products campaigns, so learn them well before you blow your hard-earned marketing budget.

Another thing with keywords: it is possible – nay, advisable – to use negative keywords in your campaign. This makes it less likely that folk searching for something that isn’t quite your product will click on your advert – saving you from paying for that impression, since the customer is unlikely to shop with you anyway!

Finally, because Amazon is known for welcoming back return customers at a high rate, it is worth leaving your Product Display Adverts running indefinitely. “[O]ver half of Amazon’s U.S. shoppers make multiple purchases per month,” the company's marketing guide points out, “and 80% make purchases at least once a month. Use Product Display Ads to convert these consumers automatically, in real time, year round.”

There you have it. It is not difficult to get Amazon Advertising up and running for your business – but it does take a bit of work to do it brilliantly. Start by revising these notes through this visual guide to Amazon Advertising for small businesses, and get ready to join the Bezos gravy train!

A Small Business Guide to Advertising on Amazon - infographic


Read next: 52% of companies to increase their social media marketing budget in the year 2020

Study: 51 Percent Of Consumers Said They Have Called Out a Company On Social Media

$
0
0
Social media is no longer just a place for entertainment, it is quickly becoming one of the ways to advertise a business. People like to voice their opinions through social media, which means that’s where they come when they want to find out about business and that’s the exact place where they come to share views about their favorite shows, political views or just an interesting event. So, when it comes to marketing, the content used by businesses for marketing is rich, they keep in mind both positive and negative sides. The idea is to provide an open platform however people can share both positive and negative point of views about the same product.

Most of the brands have seen extreme backlash through social media because it is open, free and cater masses. In most cases, customers feel that calling out a brand on public platforms has earned them a better and quick response as compared to the time when they use official complaint services. To know more about this, a recent study was conducted by WhoIsHostingThis, where a sample of 1,000 individuals was evaluated to know how effective it is to use online platforms for voicing complaints.

According to the study, most individuals like to use Facebook (61 percent), Twitter (30 percent) and Reddit (11 percent) when they want to complain about something. The aim is to get a quick response and since Twitter has everything in public, getting a quick and positive response is easier whereas on Reddit people like to have lengthy discussions about their experience with the company or product. When compared to Facebook, the study explained that Twitter users are more likely to receive quick responses to complaints or same-day responses from the companies. The most shocking discovery was that 2 out of 5 users who used social media to voice their complaints were eventually banned or blocked by the companies on these platforms.

Apart from this, the study also provided a detailed insight into social media marketers' perception and how they analyze their competitors in the market. The study explained that 51% of the users have claimed that they have written a review about a company on their online platform. Out of these, men (53%) are more likely to call out a brand than women (50%). When generations were compared, it was concluded that millennials (53%) were more likely to use social media as a platform for calling out brands as compared to baby boomers (44%) and generation x (52%). While comparing the social media networks, the study explained that Facebook (61%) was used as the main medium to interact and call out a brand as compared to other social media networking sites including twitter (30%), Reddit (11%), YouTube (4%), Instagram (11%) or Snapchat (5%).


The study also explored what kind of businesses suffer most when the users review them positively or negatively on these platforms, results concluded that restaurants were reviewed the most. Apart from restaurants (30%), retail stores (10%), internet service providers (9%), airlines (5%) and automobiles related businesses (7%) were also reviews by the users. Most of the users have admitted that they review a business inline if they had a bad experience with the company, experienced poor customer service, found products expensive, observed poor treatment with employees or found the company dishonest. Around 53% of the users who have called out a business on social media sites have reported that they later saw a significant change in the behavior of the company after getting a bad or negative review.

WIHT recently explored trends in customer callouts by surveying over 1,000 individuals who voiced their own complaints via online platforms. Here’s what they discovered: People most often turn to Facebook when complaining about companies, followed by Twitter and Reddit. Compared to Facebook, Twitter users have a higher likelihood of receiving same-day responses from a customer service representative or business owner. 2 in 5 respondents who vented negatively about a brand online were eventually blocked by the company on social media.
As online complaints increase in popularity, marketers will want to know the underlying causes and expectations of consumers, when choosing to confront a business on social media.
Read next: Not Just Kids, 70% of the Parents Also Do Not Regulate Their Online Activities: Kaspersky Study

The State of Video Marketing And Trends To Watch in 2020 (infographic)

$
0
0
It has already been a couple of years since video started playing a crucial role in marketing. Back in 2017, 74% of all internet traffic was from videos and over 500 million people watched Facebook videos on a daily basis. Three years later, we can spot significant changes in light of all the predictions years ago. Facebook has its own video platform and fairly competes with YouTube in the struggle for users’ attention.

All these recent advancements prove that video is the future of marketing and in 2020, it will only gain momentum. If you want to know the current state of video marketing in detail and understand where it is heading in the nearest future, check out this infographic by Depositphotos.

3 video marketing trends for 2020

Short videos

In 2020, video marketing will resemble racing to some extent. YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook users want relevant information here and now and brands should aim to ensure that. A brand that managed to grab the user’s attention first, will win the race and get a lead or even a customer in the future.

The finding that 73% of marketing videos are shorter than two minutes is the evidence to support this. What’s even more interesting, last year, brands started repurposing YouTube ads into 6-second-long videos. They turn out to be enough for a viewer to get the message and decide if they would like to get acquainted with a brand, a product or services.

In brief, in 2020, marketing videos should be as short and concise as possible and 6-second-long bumper ads might not be the limit of an average video length.

Vertical content

We live in an era when a significant part of our communication and entertainment is via mobile devices. We talk in messengers with our friends and colleagues, share our experience on social media with thousands of followers, and watch hundreds of hours of videos to entertain and educate ourselves. The tendency of spending more and more time staring into black mirrors has turned out to be a reason for marketers to produce more vertical content. Moreover, vertical videos tend to show 90% completion rate in terms of ad views.

With this information in mind, marketers should perceive vertical videos as one of the main visual trends of 2020 and make every effort to provide an audience with content in the most convenient format.

Videos as a part of the omnichannel experience

In addition to a convenient format, videos should also be shown to an audience at the right time and place. For instance, Google’s research has shown that 55% of people watch online videos while shopping in-store. Some of them are using videos instead of a shopping list, while others turn to them for assistance in decision-making. What this means is that videos are not only there to entertain but also to make people's lives and decision-making easier.

If you make videos a part of the omnichannel experience, your results from a solid strategy might be even more impressive than you thought, thanks to the potential boost you might get with this format.

The State of Video Marketing 2019-2020: Numbers, Statistics, and Trends

Having analyzed the state of video marketing in 2019 and explored the trends that will be popular in 2020, you can not only give video marketing a chance, but achieve better results in terms of reach, engagement, and even brand recognition. You can also try to test new formats and lengths of videos and adapt the findings to your audience’s interests and demands.

Read next: How Smartphone Has Evolved Industries? The State Of Mobile In 2020 (Infographic)


About author:This post is written by Maria Sibirtseva. Maria is a former student at the University of Arts London, MA Publishing. Currently, a copywriter at Depositphotos who reads a lot, loves to travel (30+ countries), and explore new destinations.

Facebook now has a new option of ‘clear history’ available for its users but it doesn’t work the way you might think

$
0
0
We all have seen the evolution on the internet from using a card to dial-up for an internet connection to Wi-Fi and 4G devices being used for internet connections.

Nowadays, people rely way more on smartphone and social media platforms for almost all of the major tasks varying from looking for trending clothes to looking for potential customers for your new business.

Social media platforms provide a variety of opportunities for its users but along with that one of the major cons that users feel is their personal data being shared with various apps and websites without their knowledge.

According to Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook has finally launched its ‘Off-Facebook Activity’ tool aimed to help users to manage their personal data. This new tool also enables users to delete their data from third-party apps and websites that share their information with Facebook.

Originally this tool was announced back in 2018 and named as the ‘Clear History’ button when Facebook was accused of sharing personal information of millions of Americans with political consultancy Cambridge Analytica.

If you want to see the total amount of your personal data being shared with Facebook here’s some insight on how to do it: Simply visit on your browser facebook.com/off_facebook_activity/activity_list, or alternatively go to Settings > Your Facebook Information > Off-Facebook Activity > Manage Your Off-Facebook Activity. These steps will help you manage the information from individual apps and sites.

We counted the apps and websites that were sending data about us back to Facebook and it turned out to be a few hundreds ranging from local newspapers to online tools and after having a list of so many apps and services, it felt as if most of the websites a user is visiting or signing up probably end up sharing that data with Facebook.

Well, after pressing the button to remove all the data from our accounts it turned out that the clear history button is actually misleading as Facebook, in reality, doesn’t delete any data from the third-party apps but instead, it just de-links the data of the app from its own user data.



After using the clear history button it pretty much cleared our concept about its workings as this button doesn’t even stop the third-parties from sharing user data with Facebook in the future as well and if you want to completely end sharing of your personal information via such third-party apps you need to go to a different section in the Facebook account settings of your profile.

To be honest, it’s not just us but every user of the Facebook feel uncomfortable to see their personal history data being shared to Facebook and this type of user tracking isn’t something new Facebook is doing as this type of technology is being used by all the advertising firms to track down their potential consumers.

Read next: 51 Percent Of Consumers Said They Have Called Out a Company On Social Media

LinkedIn Now Offers Special Interview Preparation Tools

$
0
0
It doesn’t matter if you are a newbie or experienced professional, interviews at any work organization can make us all a bit nervous. While we all go in with optimistic thoughts and the aim to secure the job for ourselves by all means, deep inside we also have our fears and they, of course, originate because of the questions that the employers can ask.

But amidst all what you feel on the interview day, have you ever thought about a platform that could guide you about all the guaranteed common questions that can come in your interview? Linked announced about the similar idea with the name “interview preparation tools” last June.

The world’s largest social networking site for professionals had the plans to offer a separate section that includes all the questions that you should know the answer to for a successful interview. Hence on 24th Jan, the company implemented on them and decided to start off by being more specific, and the first industry that they are catering to is Sales and Finance with their new tools.

According to LinkedIn, users of the new preparation tool will find questions revolving account management, relationship management, sales development, and customer success. So it doesn’t matter if you are from the sales industry, want to go into investment banking, wealth management or corporate finance, these questions cover all of what can be asked from you.

Going into more detail, the Senior Director of Product Management Blake Barnes also explained that users can now depend on the interview preparation tools for more than 2 million jobs, that are to be found on LinkedIn in the field of Sales and Finance. It’s the best resource to prepare yourself and be more confident for the interview (which eventually puts up a great impression on the employer).

The Interview Preparation Tools can be accessed through the Applied Jobs page.



Read next: Microsoft's LinkedIn Is Curbing Inappropriate Profiles and Content from The Platform Via AI Technology

Latest Deepfake Technology Create More Convincing Videos Based on Audio Source Than Ever Before

$
0
0
A video of a woman appeared where she first said “Knowledge is one thing, virtue is another” and then she said, “Knowledge is a virtue”. The same voice with two conflicting videos is the work of the artificial intelligence (AI) system. She only said the first statement whereas in the second, the audio was turned into video through AI technology.

Researchers from three different institutes, Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, National Laboratory of Pattern Recognition in China and SenseTime, gathered to create the new method of deepfakes from audio sources.

AI joins together the audio with the video of some other person or the same person speaking it and develops a convincing video. The person shown in the video is like a puppet speaking the words of the audio source.

Firstly, a 3D face model is created on every frame of the video to analyze the geometry, pose and expressions of the person in the video. Then from it, the 2D landmarks of the face are created in which the mouth movements are focused. By doing so, the algorithm is to be trained on facial features only instead of the whole scene.

Then the 3D face mesh is reconstructed to match the movement of lips with the source audio clip, just like the text-to-video method.


According to researchers, highly deceptive audio-visual results can be achieved through this method. The results are said to be better than Face2Face from 2016 and “Synthesizing Obama” from 2017 with only little artifacts that are visible through a normal human eye.

An online poll was conducted in which 55% of the 100 participants rated the video as real.



It is the first end-to-end learnable audio-based video editing method. The video can be doubtful only if the voice of the audio is inconvincible. AI engineers and deepfake developers have been working on fake audio for years and the voice generated through algorithm can sound quite realistic.

Through this, the real voice of a person has used the words are molded as required which created a more realistic deepfake, a step forward in deepfake realism.

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, agents of Doomsday Clock, mentioned deepfake as one of the reasons that the world is about to end. It said videos generated through algorithm can make it difficult for common people and the decision-makers to distinguish truth from fake.

Researchers in their paper highlighted that they are aware of the misuse and manipulation of this advancing technology. Therefore, they support all the measures that must be taken in order to minimize potential exploitative practices.

Read next: New Facebook AI Could Revolutionize Point to Point Robot Travel Accuracy

Which eCommerce Platform will Dominate the Marketplace in 2020? [Infographic]

$
0
0
E-commerce is an ever growing market and you have to compete every other day to keep yourself ahead. Evolving e-commerce platforms and keeping up with the changes in SEO must be taken care of.

There is a number of eCommerce platforms that new online sellers and even established merchants get lost in. But the question is what are the top e-commerce platforms for 2020?

There are a few eCommerce platforms that are doing better than the rest. Some of those names include ‘Magento’, ‘Bigcommerce’ and ‘Shopify’. Similarly, ‘Wix’, ‘Woocommerce’, ‘Squarespace’, ‘Opencart’ and ‘Prestashop’ are also known for their distinctive features.

Online sales are growing with time, as in 2016 the total online spending was $1.9 trillion and in 2021, the spending is expected to be $4.5 trillion.

One of the reasons for popularity on eCommerce platforms is their connection with social media platforms. Instagram is working on its shopping feature, Pinterest with its shopping feature (Catalogs) and the H&M online fashion advice. In the last two years, there has been a 110% increase in social referral to retail e-commerce platforms.

Best Customer Experience on E-commerce Platforms

E-Commerce that provides a personalized experience has an onsite chat feature for conversational e-commerce and is with digital experience optimization in place of conversion rate optimization is considered to provide the best customer experience.

Around 90% of the CEOs of e-commerce platforms think their company provides the best e-commerce customer experience. Whereas, only 10% of the customers think that the companies are providing the best e-commerce experience.


Ecommerce platforms are deeply connected with the SEO efforts and a lot of users are directed through the better search results of e-commerce platforms. Shopify is ahead of its competitors when it comes to SEO results, that is according to GoGlobe infographic. Then is WooCommerce, 3dcart, Magento and Bigcommerce.

Market Capitalization of Ecommerce Platforms

Amazon is leading the e-commerce market capitalization with $860.5 billion. On the second spot is Shopify with $37.7 billion and then comes eBay with $32.1 billion.

Mobile users have a huge presence on e-commerce platforms, therefore it is important for e-commerce platforms to ensure the best mobile experience by making their apps and sites responsive. Shopify is believed to provide the best mobile experience, followed by Magento and Bigcommerce. Woocommerce and Prestashop are also among the best mobile experience providers to their mobile users.

There are around 1.7 million domain and Woocommerce, 29.1% (487,419) have the highest market share by domain. Squareshare is on the second spot with 310,795 (18.5%), Shopify (10.83%) is on the third spot with 181,371 and then comes Monstercommerce (5.07%) 84,852. Magento (4.18%) is also on the list with 70,014 market share, Wix (3.95%) with 66,167 whereas Rest (28.32%) is with 474,351 market share.

It is expected that this year, 81% of the retailers will have unified commerce platforms.

Shopify As Rising E-commerce Platform

Though Shopify is already doing well, it is expected that it will continue to grow in 2020 as well. Around 25% of the Shopify merchants have allowed social selling. It known for providing one of the best mobile experiences, as 73% of the traffic on Shopify is from mobile. Not only traffic but 61% of the sales are also from mobile.

Each platform is trying to rise above the others and there is no clear winner as yet. Every platform has its own significance and therefore it will cater to the needs of the market it dominates.

New technological features like the integration of chatbots and recommendation engines are important. The better the digital experience optimization, the better share in a growing market.



Read next: 70 Percent of All Web Domains Fail to Be Renewed One Year after Purchase

Google Paid the Highest Reward Amount, $6.5 Million in 2019 for Reporting Security Bugs

$
0
0
In 2019, through the Vulnerability Reward Program (VRP), around $6.5 million were paid to researchers for reporting security bugs, Google revealed in a report published on 28th January 2020.

The amount that was paid for qualifying bugs was from $100 to $31,337 and could rise for exploit chains.

Alpha Lab’s Guang Gong got $201,337 for remote code execution exploit chain on Pixel 3 devices.

The program was launched in 2010 and since then, the VRP rewards amount paid in 2019 was the highest, almost double the amount paid in 2018, $3.4 million, or in any other year.

The report published by Google said VRPs which started in 2010, was basically to cover the Google product areas like Chrome, Android, Abuse, etc.

The third-party apps on Google will also be cover under it by letting the impacted developers know and disclose the vulnerabilities.

In the last 9 years, the company has rewarded around $15 million to researchers for qualifying vulnerabilities that were reported through VRP.


In 2019 the baseline VRP payout reward was increased three times, from $5,000 to $15,000 and the maximum reward, given for high-quality reports, was doubled from $15,000 to $30,000.

Play Security Reward Program’s scope was also expanded by Google by including the apps with above 100 million installs. In the second half of the year, $650,000 were paid to researchers by the company for reporting qualifying bugs.

Last year, the Developer Data Protection Reward program was also launched through which researchers were welcomed bu Google to help it in identifying and mitigating the data abuse issues in Android apps, Chrome extensions and OAuth projects.

Google while explaining said the prize for full chain remote code execution exploit will be $1 million. The exploit must be with persistence and compromises the Titans M secure elements on Pixel devices.

If the exploits are identified on particular developer preview versions of Android, the top prize includes an additional 50%, making it $1.5 million.



Read next: Using Old iOS and Android phones can get your data hacked

Facebook will pay $550 million in Settlement for improperly collecting biometric data

$
0
0
Previously, Facebook was fined $5 billion from the Federal Trade Commission for its data privacy practices involving the Cambridge Analytica Scandal and now months later the social media giant is once again in the headlines with a heavy price tag due to its privacy practices.

On Wednesday, the tech behemoth revealed that it finally reached a $550 million settlement against the lawsuit class-action over the facial recognition software of the company.

The lawyers involved in this lawsuit state this settlement as the largest cash settlement for a privacy-related lawsuit and for now this settlement needs to be approved by the presiding District court.

The lawsuit action against Facebook was taken by an Illinois-based Facebook user who accused the tag suggestion feature of Facebook which predicts the Facebook users in photos through the biometric facial data gathered by the platform without the consent from users and by doing that Facebook was allegedly violating the biometric privacy law of Illinois which is considered to be the strictest law of the country. Even though Facebook denied any of such wrongdoings but this Illinois law pretty much stopped Facebook which is making all other tech firms nervous who are doing similar stuff.

According to the calculations of Bloomberg, Facebook is saving itself from paying a higher fee by paying a settlement fee now as the violation of such law could result in Facebook paying more than $6 billion.

This $550 million settlement by Facebook came during the time when Facebook was being accused of doing a variety of practices involving violations of user privacy and antitrust concerns to the political advertising policy of the firm as well.


This huge settlement amount by Facebook is notable because the criticism against the Facial-recognition software is increasing day by day and this isn’t the first time Facebook is accused of its facial-recognition practices as back in 2012, Facebook was forced to deactivate its technology for the European users due to a huge criticism from regulators.

Facebook will also be providing a ‘clear and conspicuous notice’ to the users regarding the software and will also be obtaining additional permissions from the users as part of its agreement with the FTC.

The social media giant reached a $550 million settlement with the users of Illinois and this settlement is for sure a mere drop for Facebook as the quarterly earnings report of Facebook show that the revenue generated by the platform rose to $21 billion at the end of 2019 and the company’s earnings also show an increase of nine percent in the Facebook’s user base.

During all this, CEO Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook was calm and optimistic about the earnings report call of the company.

Zuckerberg also addressed the issues faced by the company regarding the privacy of users and also discussed about the various steps the platform is taking to avoid such plague in future and even though it will take time but according to the CEO, the reputation of the social network will be back again in the future.


Photo: Reuters

Read next: New Facebook AI Could Revolutionize Point to Point Robot Travel Accuracy

Apple Has Another Record Holiday Quarter: Earns $91.8 Billion Revenue With 1.5 Billion Active Devices

$
0
0
Records have always been just a matter of time for Apple. Hence, moving on with the company’s 2020 Q1 performance, CEO Tim Cook has proudly reported that revenue of 91.8 billion and 1.5 billion active devices have been the two feats that Apple achieved this time.

For the first fiscal quarter of 2020, Apple had set an optimistic forecast revenue target of $85.5 billion to $89.5 billion. While this was much more than what they had forecasted in the same quarter of 2019, $84.3 billion to be exact, Apple achieved the target with a roar.

Setting up an all-time record for income and revenue, Apple made a revenue of $91.8 billion and profit of $22.2 billion. However, the main icing on the cake was also a massive increment in the number of active devices which moved from 1.4 billion last year to 1.5 billion by the end of the holiday quarter. The report also further revealed that almost 80% of the devices are running on iOS 13, making Apple go right on track and leading its customers to a bright future ahead.

Unfortunately, Apple no longer reports the number of units sold every fiscal quarter or year. But speculations regarding the active iPhones go in favor of the fact that Apple might have just crossed the 1 billion mark there as well since the number of iPhones sold in the last annual year were 900 million already and the trend shows that Apple’s active devices grow by 100 million or more with every passing year.

Meanwhile, Cook has also been very straight forward about how Apple is struggling to keep up with strong demand for Airpod and Apple Watch Series 3.

From the developer sites, Apple also reported that the iOS 13 is on 70% of the active iPhones as compared to 50% in last October and there was also an increase in iPadOS 13 adaption from 33% to 57%.

If you are still curious to know more, Apple did provide a breakdown of revenue by product category and Tim Cook was pretty much thrilled to declare that iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro did play a big role in fueling up the sales. Following are the numbers for Q1 2020



As the first quarter of fiscal year includes the months of October, November and December - the most lucrative period because of holiday shopping being on the rise, one can also assume that people are loving Apple’s products this year and there are high expectations from Apple Watch and Airpod 3 as well.

Q1 of 2020 also had the first quarter overview of Apple’s latest big gamble in the services industry with Apple Arcade and Apple TV+ already winning hearts. However, it seems like the company is not ready to give more details about the revenue that they earned from it as all of the subscription-based services were summarized in the data that relates to “Services”.

Read next: Apple’s New Security Measures Make Location Based Ads Less Effective

Legislative Bodies will have to pay Google for data requests, report by New York Times

$
0
0
Google will charge the legislative bodies for data requests ranging from $45 for a subpoena to $245 for a search warrant. Legislation has always allowed the tech-giant to charge for user data requests, but Google has never done it until now. Noting that, the fees might include some additional charges if the case demands it.

The aim and the purpose behind charging the law enforcement agencies is due to the manpower and resources spent on fulfilling a single request. Charges will force the law enforcement agencies to curtail excessive surveillance and focus on cases that are more important.

Google said that it will not request any reimbursement for cases involving life-threatening emergencies or if they are related to a child safety investigation.

Some of the law enforcement agencies are raising concerns over this new policy by Google. They believe that this will lead other companies to do the same as Google and will put pressure on the law enforcement to increase their budget or prioritize cases.

However, some departments are against this concern saying that this is a small fee and the departments only contact these companies when there is a major crime.

Although it is a good initiative by Google if you consider paying off the human power invested over this job, but it can pressurize law enforcement to not go in depth of most cases that might be more serious than the others – who knows.



Read next: Except For Google Other Tech Giants Including Facebook And Apple Increased Their Lobbying Spending In The Past Year

Facebook just published its 2019 performance report, The social network boasts 1.66 Billion Daily Active Users

$
0
0
According to the Q4 2019 performance of Facebook, the social media giant added more than 34 million daily active users (DAU) making a total of 1.66 billion DAU for the period.

In the North American market, Facebook added more than million more users where it is generating a majority of its revenue and along with that, once again Asia-pacific market is showing an immense growth in the users by adding around 14 million more daily active users.

The markets of the US and Canada are jointly giving more than 190 million active users to Facebook whereas Europe has more than 294 million daily active users and Asia-pacific is the market that is helping Facebook with the most revenue through its 641 million daily active users.

According to the insight on Facebook growth by the released Q4 2019 of Facebook, in order to boost the earnings of Facebook the company needs to increase its revenue per user in regions outside the US.

Facebook achieved a new milestone in getting more than 2.49 billion monthly active users (MAU).



This milestone of approximately 2.5 billion MAU was led by the Asia Pacific region where Facebook is reaching new markets and even though it will take some time for Facebook to convert its new users into lucrative targets for advertisers but with new features like of Facebook Pay in India and Indonesia Facebook is already building a major business eco-system on its platform.

According to the Q4 2019 report, Asia-pacific is again on top in terms of helping Facebook with the highest market of more than 1,038 million monthly active users whereas Europe has 394 million monthly active users and in the Q4 2019 US and Canada are giving around 248 million monthly active users to Facebook.

This time, Facebook also provided some insight into the usage of its Family of apps combined with its usage data of Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp.

The family metrics presented by Facebook displays its rough estimate of people using one or more products of Facebook including Instagram, Messenger or WhatsApp collectively known as Family of products. Any person who is registered or logged in to any of one or more Family products of Facebook and visited at least on the products is considered as a Daily Active People (DAP).

According to the Family Daily Active People chart provided by Facebook, the platform is now serving more than 2.26 billion active people on a daily basis which is a great deal of reach if compared to other social networking platform.

Along with providing insight on Daily Active People of the Family apps, Facebook also provided a usage chart of the monthly Family apps. The Q4 2019 performance chart of Facebook revealed that the social network gained around 2.89 billion monthly active users of the Family app at the end of 2019.

Facebook also boasted a $8.52 average revenue per user (ARPU) globally.



If you want some insight on the revenue of Facebook, the results of Q4 reveal that Facebook generated a total of $21 billion revenue through its Family apps and around $20 billion revenue was generated through advertising whereas only 41 billion was generated through other tools and this result revealed that the platform saw an increase of 25% in its this year’s revenue.

Along with an increase in revenue and users, there’s also an increase of 51% in the costs and expenses of the social giant as the social platform is making various efforts to clean up its platform and improve the content displayed on the platform.

The CEO Mark Zuckerberg in the earning call explained that, despite being the one to like the button just wanted to be understood by people for his doings and not liked for it.

During the fourth-quarter earnings call of the platform, Zuckerberg also stated his plans to change his tone and use this new approach to address the critics of the company as in the past the platform failed to communicate and share their views with its critics but not anymore.

This change of tone approach revealed by the CEO comes at the same time when the platform is accused of violating user privacy and involving the scandals of political ads so despite having a lot of people agreeing with the principles of the platform there are still so many people against it as well and now the only goal of the platform is to be understood by people as being like is just not enough.

Read next: Has Social Media Really Been Our Worst Enemy?

How The Content Oversight Board Will Function? Facebook Revealed It

$
0
0
Facebook’s oversight board member will be revealed in the next few months and the board will be functional soon, says the company.

Thomas Hughes, a digital rights advocate and the British human rights group article 19’s former executive director, will be the director of the oversight board administration. The other board members and staff are expected to be introduced in the coming months.

According to Brent Harris, head of governance and global affairs of Facebook, there are a few dozen candidates for board members and reportedly there will be 40 members in total. These members will have different backgrounds and different opinions about the platform.

Some of the content on Facebook and Instagram is considered problematic, the board will make decisions regarding it and will have the power to exercise authority over the decisions by the CEO, Mark Zuckerberg. In summers, the cases will be the first analyzed.

Initially, individual content that has been taken down from the platform will be presented before the board in two ways. Firstly, if anyone wants Facebook to reconsider their decision of taking down the content, they will have to submit an appeal o board in 15 days. Secondly, the company itself will refer to cases that might be complicated.


Later, the content that was not taken down from the platform will also be reviewed by the board and it'll decide whether Facebook took the right decision or the content should be removed from the platform. All decisions by the board might not be accepted by the company if they are against the local laws or are against the privacy policies of the platform.

All cases will be appraised within 90 days, said Facebook. However, some of the cases that need to be executed in the real-world will be looked into through a speed-up mechanism.

The decision by the board might result in various policy changes in the platform. First, the recommended changes will be analyzed and their feasibility will be checked before implementing. There could be some minor changes whereas as well as some complex changes, said the company.

Facebook sheds more light on How The Content Oversight Board Will Work
Photo: Johanna Geron/Reuters

Read next: Facebook now has a new option of ‘clear history’ available for its users but it doesn’t work the way you might think

Phishing Attacks in 2020 are Going to be More Personal and Sophisticated

$
0
0
Phishing scams remain one of the most widespread cybercrimes, even in 2020. These cons are easy to execute because they don’t need much or any technical knowledge. It is more of a mental game of tricking people online to submit their personal information.

Phishing scams also have a high success rate. So hackers and con artists find them to be quite profitable. Here’s what you can expect from phishing scams as we go further into 2020.

What is Phishing

If this is your first time running into the term “phishing,” here’s a brief explanation.

A phishing scam is a type of online fraud when hackers pose as a legitimate brand or company to gain your trust. They usually contact people through email, pretending to be a spokesperson of a well-known company.

The email can contain an offer, discount, or an invitation of some sort. Sometimes it urges to log in to an account to activate or review something.

The end goal is to trick you into clicking the link in the message, which will take you to a fake website. But don’t let the word “fake” fool you. These phishing sites look realistic, sometimes even identical to original websites. The level of effort scammers put into phishing nowadays is what makes these scams more challenging to detect.

Once you access the fake site, they ask you to log in, submit your information, or make a purchase. The forms that you see look like the original order forms provided by the real company. If you submit the information, scammers record your data and steal your credentials or financial info.

How is Phishing Going to Change in 2020

Besides being more frequent, this year, phishing scams are going to become more personal and even more sophisticated.

Hackers are turning to romance scams as a way of increasing their success rate. A romance scam is a type of internet scam when the con artist takes time to develop a relationship with the victim. They pretend to be someone else and engage in consistent communication with their target to build trust. They later proceed to the final step and trick the victim into sending money or personal details.

Scammers also make their phishing attempts more personal. They research everything they can find about their victim. For example, hackers can use personal information from social media accounts to make their scams more believable.

You can also expect scammers to take advantage of the evolving technology. Using AI systems can scale attacks beyond human capabilities. Hackers can use machine learning to increase the success rate of phishing attacks. One way to do so is basing new targets on previously obtained data.

Scammers won’t only target large organizations and businesses, but they will also turn to individual users. They can base attacks on personal data revealed on social media profiles, as well as other factors such as financial background and shopping habits. Those who make online transactions more often will become the primary targets of phishing scams.

How to Avoid the Scam

The most important question you might be asking is how to avoid the scam in the first place?

There are no security tools that will prevent phishing emails from finding their way to your device. In the end, spam filters don’t always work. But you can stay aware of the potential risks by educating yourself on the topic.

If you keep common red flags in mind, you can recognize a phishing scam.

If you have to protect a company or an organization, make sure to hold cybersecurity meetings. If that is not possible, at least have occasional awareness training. It will keep your employees up to date with recent scamming trends and security measures.

Speaking of security, it’s best to use a virtual private network, such as NordVPN, to encrypt all your internet traffic. It will hide your IP address and make it more difficult for third-parties to track you online. In other words, it guarantees some privacy, which doesn’t hurt when phishing attacks are getting personal. It also hides your credentials from anyone snooping on the network when you connect to public WiFi hotspots.

What’s more, you should set up multi-factor authentication wherever possible. It makes sure that scammers cannot exploit your credentials even if they end up stealing them.

Wrapping Things Up

Statistics show that one in every 25 branded emails is a phishing scam. Considering that an average user receives over dozens of emails per day, they can receive scam emails every other day.

If you have the habit of reading everything in your inbox, you can fall for these traps and end up giving personal information to the wrong people. To make sure it doesn’t happen, try to learn more about online scams and stay aware of the potential red flags when reading emails.

What’s more, take extra precautions, such as setting up MFA and using a virtual private network. In the end, make sure to pay attention to detail when accessing new sites through email links.


illustration: freepik

Read next: A phishing attack masked behind a date in the domain – Are we even safe anymore?

Apple's Location Tracking Bug has been fixed in the new iOS 13.3.1

$
0
0
Apple recently released a new iOS version 13.3.1 with the fix of many previous mobile bugs including FaceTime, Photo editing and more.

The new updates include a setting that allows users to disable the location checks previously performed by the new iPhone 11 U1 chip.

The new iPhone occasionally asked for the user's location even after being disabled for all services and apps.

As per Apple, it was because of the new U1 ultra-wideband (UWB) that needed to be switched off in certain areas under the international regulatory requirements.

iOS occasionally checked the user's location to determine whether the phone is in the restricted area or not.

However, the new iOS 13.3.1 includes a setting that allows users to disable U1 chip permanently so the phone can get rid of Occasional location checks.

Apple ran into some controversy when the security expert Brian Krebs pointed out that the new iPhones were asking location data even when users had switched off such tracking in settings.


Users are bit concern for their data as many big tech companies have rumored for using customers data without any restrictions. However, Apple claims that the location checking is only performed on the device, and no users data was saved.

To turn off the UWB, go to Settings > Privacy > Location Services > System Services and you will find a Networking & Wireless option.


Screenshot: iClarified

Besides U1 ultra-wideband chip fix, there are other updates as well.

The New update has Screen Time and Communication Limits as previously it allowed anyone to get round the Limits without first having to enter a passcode.

Apple has introduced support for Indian English for its virtual assistant Siri voices.

Another issue of failed push notifications is now fixed in the new iOS 13.3.1.

Read next: Apple’s New Security Measures Make Location Based Ads Less Effective

Google Translate Will Soon Be Able To Transcribe Lengthy Speeches In Real-Time

$
0
0
Google Translate will soon be able to transcribe lengthy lectures and translate it in real-time in another language. At an event in San Francisco, the company showed some of its upcoming artificial intelligence projects including this future feature.

Google has already introduced interpreter mode for its app that was only for the conversations but now lengthy speeches will be interpreted. The transcribe mode will allow users to attending lectures in any other supported language or watch foreign-language movies without subtitles and instead know what is being said in real-time.

At the time of launch, the feature will work with an internet connection and the translation will be on Google’s server instead of on personal devices. It will only produce results with live audio that will be captured through phone speakers.

As per reports, the feature will continuously analyze the words being captured, and the translation will change according to the context of the sentences and the punctuation used. Initially, there might be some weird translations but with time it will improve, as Google said it learns from the transcription of people.

Currently, the feature is tested with languages like Spanish, German, French, etc. There is no set date but is expected to be rolled out in the next few months and will be available on Android devices, first.


Photo: S3studio via Getty Images

Read next: Google AI Team Explains How Its Audio Recorder App Leverages On-Device Machine Learning

Google Chrome cannot move too fast in terms of privacy, says Justin Schuh

$
0
0
Chrome might be on top of other browsers, but it would be wrong to say that they can do whatever they want with the browser – it’s just not possible!

One of the leader at Google warned people that it is not possible for them to move Chrome too rapidly from one update to another. It will only bring more destruction to people. More importantly, seeing so many changes so quickly, the developers will move towards mobile apps. Moving too fast brings less good news and more bad news in terms of hurting the web.

It was during the Usenix Enigma security and privacy conference that Justin Schuh brought this topic into discussion mentioning that the content on the web is flourishing because of advertising revenue and if the developers and advertisers move away from the web, it will not be good for web market.

However, he also highlighted the fact that moving too slow is also not the option. There are many competitors of Google in the market who are continuously moving forward to beat Chrome, so if Google becomes slow, it will only leverage them.

Many browsers including Apple Safari, Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Edge, and Brave released new and advanced privacy features to curtail online tracking and Google were the last to follow them.

It is not a browser-centered problem, but rather a problem for the whole tech industry. Nobody is willing to pay to protect themselves from the advertisement on the internet, which is why it’s somehow the browser’s responsibility to protect the users.

Online tracking has created several privacy scandals, which is why companies are working hard to secure their users privacy. Not many at the conference agreed with Schuh, such as Tanvi Vyas from Mozilla who encouraged to move to contextual ads instead of throwing just any ad at the user. Also, she urged Google and Apple to add the web’s privacy protections into mobile apps.

However, Schuh said that the developers are already moving towards mobile and ad spending on mobile is already rising.

Schuh also added that small browsers have more leverage to experiment with new methods on their platform, however, being a giant limit you from enforcing anything at any time.

Eric Lawrence on the panel agreed with Schuh saying that it is not easy to make frequent changes if a company is operating at mass level. Google is already working slow and steady on securing user’s privacy along with other factors. Lawrence said Google is showing responsibility towards its users, which is prominent from its recent cookie policy change as well.

Considering the ongoing scandals, the advertisers, website publishers, and data brokers are becoming more and more sensitive and sensible of tracking the user. Not only do they continue to track their user, but also buy data from big companies to look into user’s interest for better ad targeting.

It is the reason why the tech-giants needs to take a step forward to curtailing tracking on the browser. Some Google tools are under development, while, some are functioning at the moment. Let’s see where it takes Google!

Read next: Data Disaster: Protecting Your Information from Physical Theft

Hat Tip: Cnet / Featured photo: @JoeBeOne / Twitter

Historical Site Affected By Climate Change Are Recreated With Google 3D Scans

$
0
0
Google is known for imitating historical sites online and now it is going a step ahead and recreating those sites technologically that are at risk of being disappeared due to climate change.

An Art & Culture collection with the name “Heritage on the Edge” will be launched with around 50 exhibitions that will illustrate the effects of changing climate on historical sites. Five locations with 3D details will also be recreated, making 25 models overall, using scans, photogrammetry, and footage through drones.

The models will include the clear portrayal of statues at Rapa Nui of Easter Island, Edinburgh’s new and old towns, Kilwa Kisiwani’s trading port in Tanzania, the Mosque City of Bagerhat in Bangladesh and Chan Chan, an ancient city of Peru.

Mobile-only augmented reality Pocket Galleries will also be featured to show the inside of two locations, of Nine Dome Mosque in Bangladesh and Gareeza Fort in Tanzania.

Google used ICOMOS and archival nonprofit CyArk to create these models. Google said the source material of CyArk can be downloaded by anyone and used for either research project or any other purpose. Site managers will be aided in conserving the history and share the efforts publically.

The models recreated might not save the site that is affected by climate change and the rising sea level by the company wants to take a step to slow down the climate change.

If nothing else, these models will at least store the historical sites digitally to let the coming generations how they looked like before decomposing.



Read next: The Environmental Impact of Unnecessary Emails
Viewing all 27018 articles
Browse latest View live