Digital Information World

YouTube changes things up quite frequently and a big part of the reason why that is the case has to do with the fact that the needs of its users tend to change as well and there is also the fact that YouTube is part of the larger Google machine that is attempting to compete with various other tech giants that are currently operating within the industry. Some of the new changes that are coming to the platform are relevant to creators that are operating on the platform.

One change is happening to the manner in which you can upload videos. Whereas previously you could choose to end up using the classic upload flow that was a traditional part of old school YouTube, this feature is now slowly being phased out for creators.

Most people use the newer upload flow though so this might not be all that much of an issue, although the fact that certain issues have been reported with the newer version will need to be addressed otherwise many creators would be forced to contend with a feature that they really don’t want to work with for a variety of reasons.

That said, the new upload mechanism has a lot of new features that the old one did not have as well, including a way to self certify your ads as being suitable for certain brands although YouTube would definitely still be regulating these ads to some extent. Also, bulk uploads are a new feature that would make the lives of many creators much easier than they might have been otherwise. Hence, the switch to the new upload experience might not be such a bad thing after all.

YouTube is also making it a lot easier for you to caption your videos. It has partnered with a lot of professional caption providers and have made it so that you can get discounted rates for captions and also incorporate captions into your videos through a few clicks rather than making it a whole long and drawn out process that would take a long period of time to finish properly.

Another change that is coming has to do with YouTube’s attitude towards adult content. The platform is attempting to specify what forms of adult content are and are not allowed. Graphic nudity is generally banned and this is going to continue to be the case, but it seems like YouTube is not going to be all that strict with people talking about personal experiences, sex education and the like, although much of this content would not be monetized which is something that is going to impact quite a few creators.

The subscription feed is also being changed. With iOS getting Topics in the feed a while ago, this is now going to be implemented into the Android app which is the sort of thing that would make it a lot easier for users to figure out what content they have in their feed and make it so that they can better organize their content all in all. This focus on the subs feed is definitely a welcome step in the right direction, one that would enable people to use YouTube much more efficiently.

All of the above mentioned updates were highlighted by Creator Insider channel in a new video (featured below):

Read next: YouTube Is Testing To Integrate Google Search Results With Video Search In Its Mobile App

We all know that iPhone is the most popular and best-selling smartphone cross the globe. However, Omdia has released a new set of data showing the iPhone 11 model has continued to remain the preferred choice of smartphone users across the globe even during the coronavirus pandemic.

The data provided by Omdia highlights smartphone sales across the globe during the first quarter of this year. The data indicates that iPhone 11 was the leading model across the globe with over 19.5 million sold units during Q1 2020. This displays a huge improvement as Apple sold around 13.6 million during the first quarter of the year 2019. iPhone XR was the leading model during the same quarter of last year.

However, the data also delineates how popular iPhone 11 has become among the people as compared to any other Android smartphone available out there in the market. Discussing Android smartphone sales, Samsung’s Galaxy A51 is considered to be the best choice of consumers in the world of Android smartphones. But, Samsung’s Galaxy A51 is far behind iPhone 11 as only 6.8 million units were sold during the first quarter of this year.

Now, we will discuss how Apple is dominating smartphone sales across the world. Apple made the top ten leading smartphones with four distinct iPhone models. Talking about the same thing for the South Korean company, Galaxy’s flagship production, the Galaxy S20+ model with 5G ranks only the 9th in the charts. Only 3.5 million units of Samsung’s Galaxy S20+ with 5G were sold during the quarter.

Overall, the data provided by Omdia displays that Apple evidently dominated the smartphone market the coronavirus pandemic for the entire mobile industry. The four iPhone models ranked in the top 10 smartphones generated worldwide sales of around 32.2 million units. In comparison, the best smartphones generated by Samsung only accounted for nearly 17.6 million units of all smartphone devices sold by the South Korean company during the first quarter of this year.

Overall, this is a piece of good news for Apple as the company is still not only dominating the smartphone market, it was also able to increase its market performance during the first quarter of this year despite the health crisis due to the coronavirus. The company sold 13.6 million units of iPhone XR during the first quarter of the year 2019 and 19.5 million units of iPhone11 during the first quarter of this year, these stats show a massive jump. It also indicates that the new-generation iPhone created by Apple is already more successful and popular as compared to its predecessor.

Also read: Research Ranks Popular Android Smartphones Based On How Long Their Security Updates Take To Reach To Device Owners

After going through 912 high and other major security bugs, Google engineers have come to the conclusion that such issues arise in Chrome because of memory safety issues.

Google while noting this down in the memory safety report said that Chrome’s security architecture has been designed in such a way in the first place that such bugs are bound to exist.

Furthermore, sandboxes help the internet browser to stop such bugs from taking over the hosting machines. The company claims that this move has helped the engineering team to stay ahead of the attackers but in reality that has barely been the case. In fact, the browser is already reaching the limit of what can be done with sandboxing and site isolation.

Moreover, this issue isn’t only limited to Google. Such bugs caused by memory safety have also been found in iOS and macOS. Microsoft has also openly claimed that it fixes and assigns CVE (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures) to 69% of the vulnerabilities caused by memory unsafety.

Besides that, analysis tell that more than 80 percent of zero-day vulnerabilities arise because of memory issues.

As sandboxing is gradually losing its benefit, Google is all ready to tackle the memory safety problems with “any and all means necessary”. By that, they also mean to explore the custom C++ libraries or taking advantage of the more safe languages like JavaScript, Rush, and Swift.

The tech giant Google in its Google Marketing Live event held last year announced two significant visual-based ads experiments. Gallery ads for Search campaigns were not that successful and they are set to evade this summer. However, Discovery ads have developed from the testing phase and Google has made Discovery ads available to all advertisers across the globe.

The company released Discovery campaigns quietly during the last month and announced the development this Wednesday. Discovery ads can be served in Gmail promotion and Social tabs, and across Google Search app’s Discover feed, and the YouTube Home and Watch Next feeds. Discovery ads will open up advanced channels for Google as well as advertisers.

You may have not yet seen ads in Discover feed as the company is trampling a bit slow in this aspect. According to Google, Discovery campaigns are offering scale for advertisers, but the company is very cautious here. Currently, only one ad slot is available in the Discover feed. The vice president of Google Properties and Ads Platform, Jerry Dischler explained to media outlets that Google is holding the quality bar exceptionally high in this space and the company will use machine learning to evaluate when a Discovery ad should be served.

In 2018, Google stated that the Discover feed has reached over 800 million monthly active users when the company announced the Discovery campaign. Currently, Google claims that YouTube, Gmail, and Discover have reached a combined audience of around 2.9 billion individuals, while Facebook reported on March 31 that Facebook’s family of apps has reached 2.99 billion monthly active users.

Discovery campaigns will offer Google an avenue into operating with social budgets and teams. Google has set up the Discovery ads in the Discovery campaign, and there are two ad formats available: Discovery ads with a single photo or multiple photos. As with image assets, people can have Google scan their website for photos, upload photos, or they can choose photos from a Shutterstock library.

Also read: Google Is Introducing A New Quick Settings Menu For Gmail Web Users

For RSAs (responsive search ads), Discovery ads will automatically serve a combination of descriptions as well as titles. Google will also display you a weekly impression evaluation which will be based on your geological targeting. If you want to allow Google to automatically select the ‘call to action’ phrase in your ads, you can also do so or you can choose from over ten options like ‘contact us,’ or shop now,’ etc.

Smart bidding is required in this campaign and you cannot use Frequency and Ad Rotation in this type of campaign. Google’s Discovery ads tips page suggests advertisers that they should select an average day-to-day budget at least ten times the amount of their target CPA bid. Advertisers should wait for at least 40 conversations prior to altering their campaign.

Will Google Be Able To Attract Facebook Advertisers With Its Discovery Ads?

Even though the world is moving towards the digital platforms in all aspects but the growth of digitalization also brings the risk of data breach and violations. There’s nothing scares more than your personal information being used without your consent and it’s not the first time Android app developers abused the permission granted by users.

Recent discovery by VPNpro reveals a new spyware app with over 100 million downloads on Google Play Store and the developer of this spyware app has some other shady apps with more than 50 million installs in the Play store.

According to the report by VPNpro, the developer of these apps masked the origins and technical abuses behind so many apps on Play Store.

Google has a history of pulling out the networks of apps that abuse the user permissions once installed. However, evaluating the right permission types for a developer or app is still a tricky job. And this is where some app creators try to play their dirty games by taking advantage of Android data permissions.

Even though Google always encourages developers to follow its guidelines but the abuse of user permissions should never be taken for granted as it puts millions of users at risk.

The developer blamed of spyware is Hangzhou-based QuVideoInc with its very popular app named VivaVideo. This free video editing app has more than 100 million installs on Play Store.

According to the reports by VPNpro, QuVideo has its three apps available on the Play Store and also on the Apple's App Store but the violations of permission on iOS devices can’t happen so easily.

To operate, Viva Video asks a variety of permissions which include the ability of the app to write/read to external drives and user’s specific GPS location. This permission of GPS enables the app to send the location data of users up to 14,000 times in a day even if the app is not being used.

According to VPNpro, these types of apps have Trojans hidden inside the apps which can steal bank information of users without them even knowing it at all.

The report by VPNpro mapped out more than six apps by the same developer that needs to be used with caution and after analyzing these apps have more than 157 million installs on Google Play Store and the numbers of these apps are huge.

The following are the six apps by the same developer:

Tempo - Music Video Editor with Effects
SlidePlus - Photo Slideshow Maker
VivaCut - Pro Video Editor APP
VidStatus - Status Videos & Status Downloader
VivaVideo PRO Video Editor HD
VivaVideo

Until Google takes strict action against permission abuse, the users should stop using such apps to secure themselves from being a victim of such abuse but it is completely up to the users to decide if they want these malicious apps installed on their phones or not.

Also read: Report Highlights 100+ Malicious Android Apps And Shady Developers Behind Them

The only way to be secure from being a victim is by paying attention to the permissions you’re allowing to these apps and if any permission seems out of ordinary the best solution is to uninstall the app from your phone.

Facebook has recently announced that its ‘New Product Experimentation team’ which focuses on various app features is bringing in a new app, called Collab.

This Collab app is very openly inspired by TikTok, and it is launching as an invite-only beta for iOS users at the moment.

The central idea is the same, this app allows the users to create and watch music videos and even lets them mash-up original videos.

The users will be able to add their own recordings and compositions to their videos. The app will also allow them to swipe across the platform to discover other pre-recorded videos that can be mashed up and merged to create new videos. Just like TikTok videos, users can share their creations on all their social media platforms with friends and family.

According to Facebook, this app is going to make people come virtually closer and have fun amidst this coronavirus pandemic, with the lockdowns and social distancing implementations.

The beta testing invites will be sent in batches, starting with people in the US and Canada first. Other people can also request to be in the waitlist from this page.

While the rationale behind producing an app like Collab is simple and sweet, allowing people to explore their innate musical talents when there is so much free time due to the shelter-at-home and social distancing conditions, there is still a small nagging question that arises in our minds. Why did Facebook have to bring something almost similar to what an already very famous app offers?

TikTok already has gained massive popularity amid this coronavirus crisis. It is even being used now for marketing by major brands, as they all had to cut down their production costs on advertisements. So, a lot of big and small brands turned to engage with TikTok stars to promote their products. This is an efficient, cost-effective way that allows personal engagement with the consumers too.

So, when TikTok was already there and serving so much, did Facebook really have to come up with another app like that? Honestly, this seems unnecessary cloning competition, which at the moment, does not make much sense. However, only time can tell if it will turn out to be better in features than TikTok or not? We will have to wait till it rolls out eventually to judge its pros and cons and draw comparisons between the two apps accurately.

For the time being, we can wish Facebook the very best of luck with their app and other features like Messenger Rooms and Shops that they have recently announced to launch.

The usage of Cards is one of the core aspects of Material Design by Google. The usage of cards allows you to separate things visually on applications, or a page. The company has now started to test a new User Interface for Google Search on the desktop web. The new UI is entirely based on Material Design cards.

Google Search for the smartphone has already been using cards to segregate search results for users and also to organize things such as the knowledge graph as well as news stories. However, Google Search for desktop has been using cards in a limited way until now. On the desktop, Google Search only used cards for Google News and Knowledge Graph, while Google separates the rest of the page by blank space.

However, Google is testing a different User Interface for desktop web version in Search results. As spotted by In the latest User Interface (UI), Google has placed each Google Search result in a specific 9to5Google, Material Design card. Moreover, the latest UI shows that a shadow effect has also been added to prominent results.

If any website contains multiple search results, these cards will be grouped in the form of a combined card. These combined cards will be easier to understand as compared to the existing method in which Google only indents the extra search results.

It is interesting to note that Google has not altered other top featured tabs in Search results such as the News tab, Images tab, and the Shopping tab.

According to TheSEMPost, Google has also tested this design back in the year 2016. Currently, it seems that the new test is fairly limited, and we are not sure whether the company will roll out this change for public use or not.

Apart from Card-based results, interestingly, Google is also experimenting with old layout in the search result pages, during some of our searches, we found that Google is still featuring blue title first and green URL beneath it while description box at the third position. This is probably an A/B test attempt from the search giant and its engineers to analyse how users are reacting on different layouts and colors, so that they could finalize what design trends they should stick to.

Read next: Google Is Introducing A New Quick Settings Menu For Gmail Web Users

On Wednesday, the social media giant, Facebook defended itself against research that Facebook was dividing users rather than bringing them together. Facebook’s algorithms are designed at getting people to spend extra time on the platform. However, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal, the Facebook research team stated in a 2018 presentation that these algorithms are responsible for exploiting the brain’s attraction towards divisiveness. The research team warned that if left unchecked, the social media platform will feed people ‘more and more divisive content while trying to gain their attention and increasing time spent on Facebook’s platform.

Mark Zuckerberg, CEO Facebook as well as other executives of the company sidelined the research. Guy Rosen, Facebook’s integrity VP, slammed the Journal report stating that the newspaper deliberately neglected critical facts that crippled its narrative.

Rosen stated in a post that the report uses isolated initiatives the company decided against as evidence that Facebook does not care about the bottom issues, and the report ignored the symbolic efforts Facebook did make. Mark Zuckerberg stated that the management of Facebook acknowledges that Facebook as well as other social platforms can indeed drive divisiveness, however, the benefits it provides can outweigh these issues.

This left an impression on people that Facebook is neglecting an issue that in fact Facebook has invested exclusively in. The report also cited a study performed by Facebook during 2016 which states that Facebook’s suggestion tools are responsible for 64% of all extremist group joins.

The company has faced criticism for many years for letting the hate to flourish across the network. While Rosen did not contradict the study but mentioned the initiatives Facebook has made since the year 2016 to combat misleading information, threats, and other abusive behavior.

CEO Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg also defended Facebook’s speech policies a day after the Wall Street Journal published the report. The report also stated that Facebook’s tools are adding to political polarization.

Zuckerberg was questioned about allegations of censorship on the social network during the company’s annual shareholder conference on Wednesday. He stated that giving voice to the masses is very beneficial even if it results in long periods of civil unrest. Zuckerberg while explaining his point stated that there is enough history that would recommend that giving individuals more voice results in them being very productive and beneficial for the society even if it contributes to more tension in the near term.

Facebook has also claimed for years that the platform contributes to ‘filter bubbles.’ Sheryl Sandberg, COO Facebook, stated back in the year 2019 that the individuals who spend more time on social platforms view more broad perspectives.

Twitter has recently announced some new changes in two of its features.

Back in December 2019, Twitter had introduced the new card format for List sharing.

When previously, lists needed to be shared on Twitter, it used to be done through long URLs. But since December 2019, the lists were given an image and a card title for each list that came in assorted colors. So, sharing of these lists on Twitter was made possible through these image-linked card list headers, and long URLs were obsoleted.

Twitter randomly generated these headers. While they made sharing certainly easy, and visually they were pleasing, users always felt that there was some room for improvement still.

Until now!

Recently Twitter has announced that it will now enable the users to customize their Twitter list header image.

They can add a photo or personal image in the top frame when they create or edit a Twitter list.

Now, this is something extremely cool! Although it is a minor change, it is still significant. It gives an extra level of personalization and character to the users, which will make the list creation and sharing more fun and more practical.

It will also help in better engagement with people and make the process of tweeting and sharing or adding people in lists smoother.

To make the lists more primed and proper, Twitter has been working on them for a while now. Before the launch of the card format header image in the list titles, Twitter had added an option for the users to pin their lists as swipe-able, with alternate news feeds and well-defined by various topics.

Now with these customizable banners for lists, there is another element that has been added to make the users more focused by letting them share their dedicated topic lists, making the flow of information continuous and more steady between different users.

Another change about which Twitter has made an announcement is the addition of a dedicated ‘+ALT’ button displayed on images that users upload on their timeline.

Through this special button, brief text descriptions of the uploaded image can be added. According to Twitter, the rationale behind this feature is to include everyone in the conversation, by facilitating the people who have different types of visual difficulties/impairments and who use screen readers to interpret images in tweets.

Twitter had included the alt-text description option with uploaded images in 2016, but it was a tedious process to enable the feature. It required to tweak with the settings and honestly, it was not so smooth for people who already faced difficulties.

So, this new designated +ALT button for images is a welcome and positive change, not to mention that it is completely hassle-free now!

Another advantage of this button is that more people will acknowledge the fact that they must include everyone in their conversation. Many of these users were not even aware of the alt-text description option that Twitter already offered. So, with an obvious indicator with every image they upload now, more people will find it considerate and more engagement from everyone will become possible while improving the user experience of people with some difficulties on Twitter.

This is going to make your images more search-able too!

Read next: Twitter is rolling out its new docked DM chat window for more web users

Many doctors and health professionals can't meet with their patients in person in the state the world is in right now, so they found ways to work around this with the pandemic going on. This involves a technique known as telehealth that allows them to communicate with patients, asses issues, give a prognosis and prescribe treatment. By using telehealth, doctors can meet the needs of patients while social distancing. Because of its convenience telehealth not only rose quickly, but is here to stay for the foreseeable future.

What is Telehealth?

Telehealth is when doctors meet with their patients virtually face to face using technology like computers, phones, and apps. They can use phone or video calls to talk with their patients about any health problems or concerns that they face. It works like a regular check-up by allowing the patient and doctor to talk with each other. The patient can discuss their current health, the doctor can ask questions and the patient can receive help with his or her concerns.

How Medical Professionals Can Utilize Telehealth

During this quarantine, people don't want to leave their homes unless it's an emergency. Telehealth allows them to ask doctors questions and bring up their concerns to find out if they should visit in-person. This protects both the patient and the doctor.

On top of this, doctors can easily take care of minor issues and give medical advice through this method. It also allows doctors to get their patients medication refills without them visiting the office for a check-up. This way, it can save the patient the trouble of travelling while allowing the doctor to meet by using technology.

Telehealth, HIPAA, and Data Security

An area of legitimate concern is HIPAA compliance, digital security, and protecting patient information when using telehealth. After all, how do you know that people won't hack into the system and steal your patient’s personal information? Medical professionals using telehealth technologies should ensure they are using a managed private cloud with guaranteed HIPAA compliance protections to ensure all data is safe and secure.Take the same care you would for electronic health information within the office setting and check with your host provider to ensure protections are in place when introducing telehealth and future new technologies.

While the internet does allow people to use many resources to their advantage, those same people can also face potential dangers through hackers. Due to this, telehealth seeks to keep sensitive information protected by using a private cloud. This allows the patients and clinic owners to feel at ease about it while addressing their health related needs. With all technologies comes care for HIPAA compliance and remaining in line with data security practices already in place.

Liquid Web, an expert in hosting, stated that “HIPAA requires that data be stored and remain available while it is needed, but also that it be permanently destroyed or deleted when its storage is no longer necessary. You have to set and enforce the right HIPAA and security policies, but a quality managed service provider has and can set up all of the cybersecurity tools you need.”

The Benefits of Telehealth

Telehealth technologies can provide a doctor or health care professional some major benefits to make their job easier and bring care straight to people more efficiently.

Quickly meet with patients that can't leave their home.
Maintain quarantine and social distancing while addressing the needs and concerns of patients.
Maintain security and privacy for patients through a managed private cloud.
Allow patients the option to meet online or in-person.

Due to its flexibility, telehealth provides many benefits that can improve health relationships for patients and doctors. It allows both sides to remain safe in emergency situations while addressing any health concerns that patients may have.

Telehealth is the Future

Telehealth stands out during this time as an effective way to communicate with patients and see if they need to visit a doctor. Make sure to keep your eyes on this new medical technique and see if you can invest in it or incorporate it into your business.

Photo: iStock

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Facebook’s Spark AR platform has come up with a recent update to its studio. New Augmented Reality filters have been added on Instagram, and they are quite wonderful!

Spark AR is a platform that provides updates in the world of Augmented Reality quite consistently. Back in November 2019, they provided some amazing new AR features and capabilities on Instagram, like Target Tracking and Native Slider.

Target Tracking lets the users anchor AR effects to specific images or objects in the real world, in real-time.

Native Slider is an optional controller that can be added in the Instagram app directly and can let the users pick out an AR effect, or make fine adjustments in those effects.

Now, Facebook has added some new features through this platform on Instagram. One of these features allows creators to play with some very complex and extremely dynamic filters that are enticing and attractive.

Then there is an AR Music feature that will let the users create filters that can respond visually to music. Another feature allows the users to apply special AR effects to any media on their camera or Instagram gallery.

This feature will allow the users to let the previously captured videos or photos in the phone spin out new AR effects through the gallery selection tools for Instagram filters.

To put it simply, with Media Library, users can use an old video or photo and put a filter on it, making it appear new.

With the Gallery Picker tool, one can easily transform a visual filter with media from their gallery while being able to bring some customization effects.

The AR Music feature will let the developers create special filters that can interact with music and directly uploaded musical tunes that are selected from Instagram’s music selection tool. It can also be an audio playing in the background that can be used to create new filters through this feature. This is going to bring an equalizer-type effect into filters while allowing the users to bring these musical AR effects into their Stories and Highlights on Instagram.

Aside from these features, Facebook has come up with special AR Sticker templates that will allow the users to customize their AR filters as per their desires and requirements.

These new features sound quite impressive. This is a commendable effort on Facebook’s part to keep working on features that can satisfy the aesthetic and creative sensibilities of its users all over the world.

AR effects have been there for a long time, with different apps trying to play around them in one way or the other, but now that Facebook has incorporated audio in these AR effects too, it has provided a highly dynamic experience. It is like a new life has been instilled in the effects and they can be reused again as per the creator’s creative intelligence.

Facebook has been focusing quite heavily on AI over the course of the past few months and a big part of the reason why that is the case has to do with the fact that the social media giant believes that AI is the next big thing. It’s fair to say that to a certain extent this is true, as AI has many applications in lots of different industries that are out there, many of which would be quite relevant to social media as well as wider plans that Facebook might have for the kind of future goals that the company would have set for itself.

One of the latest amazing things that Facebook’s AI has been able to do is insert people into photos. This may sound odd, but it is something that actually has a wide variety of uses. If you look at consumer usage you’d find that people might want to add deceased loved ones or people they are away from as well as a wide variety of other uses that people might find for something that would truly be quite impressive to behold.

However, with all of that having been said and out of the way, it is important to note that this AI might be business facing as opposed to consumer facing, and a big part of the reason why that is the case has to do with the fact that it can be found to be enormously useful in the world of filmmaking. After all, if an actor dies during a shoot or if the legacy of an old actor needs to be revived, this tech can make it so that the actor in question can be inserted into photographs and thereby made visible to audiences.

This is the sort of thing that industries such as Hollywood would pay quite a bit of money for. There is also the fact that a lot of digital studios that are involved in photography and the like would also pay quite a bit for it. These financial factors are most likely going to lead to Facebook to choosing to make this a business facing model, although the fact of the matter is that Facebook has a tendency to make pretty revolutionary tech consumer facing due to the reason that it is trying to normalize and propagate this tech on a large basis.

All in all, this is something that is going to change the world and it is a sign that Facebook’s AI may just be far more influential and revolutionary than anyone could have possibly ended up predicting at any given point in time.

HackerOne is a popular bug bounty network and this week the platform announced that it has rewarded $100 million to ethical hackers as of May 26 of this year. According to Martin Mickos, CEO HackerOne, the company’s bug bounty hunters have discovered around 170,000 vulnerabilities since the company initiated to deliver vulnerability reports to clients.

Currently, there are over 1,900 HackerOne clients, and more than 700,000 white-hat hackers are currently using this HackerOne’s platform to earn money for security vulnerabilities from different products. Mickos states that it is impossible for the company to exactly estimate how many cyber breaches it has averted till now. However, according to Mickos, we can estimate the number to be thousands or probably more than ten thousand.

Mickos stated that the average cost per breach is approximately $8 million, but it can save tens of billions. HackerOne paid a total amount of $10 million to hackers between the years 2014 and 2016, while the total amount of reward paid to white-hat hackers between the years 2017 and 2019 was $30 million. The bug bounty platform paid $50 million to ethical hackers between the second quarter of the year 2019 and the second quarter of the year 2020.

According to a chart provided by HackerOne, 12% of the ethical hackers who use the platform to report vulnerabilities earn more than $20,000 every year only from bug bounties. However 1% are paid rewards worth over $350,000 every year, and the platform pays more than $100,000 to 3% of the ethical hackers each year.

HackerOne stated that the company took five years to reach $20 million paid in bug bounties, the company reached this figure during the third quarter of the year 2017. It took only 3 years to reach the next $80 million. Recently, HackerOne paid $2.4 million in bug bounties in only six days. Two years ago, a survey of around 1,700 bounty hunters who were enrolled on the bug bounty platform, was performed. The survey discovered that top white-hat hackers will generate on average 2.7 times more income in the form of rewards as compared to the average income of a software engineer in the same region or country.

The platform announced in 2019 that the platform has helped around half dozen hackers to become millionaires. Santiago Lopez ranked first and earned more than $1 million during Mar 2019. The platform announced that Ron Chan from Hong Kong, Mark Litchfield from the United Kingdom, FransRosen from Sweden, Tommy Devoss from the US, and Nathaniel Wakelam from Australia earned over $1 million by hacking for enhanced internet security. Cosmin from Germany is the 7th HackerOne millionaire and Eric is the 8th one. Mickos says that the white-hat hackers may earn up to $1 billion in bounties within the coming 5 years while protecting us from persistent threats.

Businesses can struggle with properly organizing information to complete a project. Because of this, businesses developed content models as a way to keep track of everything. This article will help you to understand how and when to implement a content model in your business.

Attributes of Content Modeling

When you create content models for your business, you need to consider the different attributes: they make up the parts of content models. When it comes to content modeling, you will use three major attributes.

Relationships and Modules: the different points of a model and how they relate to each other.
Packages and Items: each needed action and the smaller plans to finish those actions.
Setting: the location for each package.

Each of these points allows you to organize your content model in a way that lets you see all of the necessary actions you need to take and the order that you should accomplish them. As described by Contentful, “You can think of each content type as an outline for your content; it tells you what data will be contained within each individual entry. You can also think of the content type as the ‘stencil’ for the ‘drawing’ that will be your entry.”

When to Use Content Modeling

You should use a content model for large projects that require organization. For example, if you want to organize a fundraiser, then you need to cover multiple points to organize it. This includes where you will do the fundraiser, how you will raise money, who needs to help out, and similar points.

If you need to keep track of multiple parts of the process, organize everything, and know when you should do each part, then your project will benefit from content modeling. It works as a great option for you to make sure that you cover everything necessary for a project to succeed.

In short, you should use content modeling for your projects when you need to know how to accomplish every task. This way, you can see the entire process and make sure that you complete the project.

How to Use Content Modeling

Content modeling works as a branching path: you see the major paths for the main points that you need to address and the parts that will lead you there. Let's go back to the fundraising example: you'll need to find a location, people to donate money, compensation for donations, and people to help you throughout the process.

These four points are your packages and you need to identify the items that will help you accomplish them. The items are the small steps that you need to take to finish each of your packages. For example, finding a location can include making phone calls, searching the city for different venues, reserving a place, and other similar points.

In short, content modeling helps you to see the whole picture and each action that you need to perform to finish a project.

Conclusion

You need to figure out how to use a content model if you want to effectively use it in your business. Doing so will help you to stay organized, figure out everything that you need for a project, and do so in an effective manner.

Illustration: Upklyak/Freepik

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Ransomware actors are extending their operations to the extent that the average ransom demand grew over ten times in only a year. There are more than a dozen operators in the RaaS (ransomware-as-a-service) game. Each operator has a host of affiliates that aim at business targets around the globe.

GandCrab group announced that it quits during mid of the year 2019, and since then the ransomware prospect has changed intensely. The RaaS model introduced by the GandCrab group has become a popular way for hackers to generate money.

The yearly progression of these threats is evident in various terms such as ransom demand and TTPs used by hackers who are operating significant ransomware operations. Group-IB, a cybersecurity company provided a report recently analyzing how ransomware threat changed in only a year since the year 2018.

The report states that ransomware attacks grew by 40% during 2019, and the ransom demand increased from $6,000 to nearly $84,000. Coveware also provided a set of data showing that the average ransom price increased to $111,605 during Q1 2020. Ryuk and Revil families are considered to be responsible for this increase.

The most common techniques used are spear phishing, external remote services, and drive-by compromise through exploit kits. The FBI during the RSA security meeting held in Feb noted that RDP is one of the most common techniques used to gain access to the compromised organization’s network.

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However, more advanced attackers use techniques that allowed them to gain access to more beneficial targets. Then the ransomware actors deploy their tools and start establishing persistence. Then the attackers evade the defense to acquire credentials, and then after stealing the files, the attackers ultimately encrypt files.

The report shows that even big-game operators such as Maze, Netwalker, Revil, Ryuk, or LockerGoga also used common techniques like RDP. The attackers also use phishing to initially access the victim network. The list of these actors has grown while some have also changed their names. Maze started a trend of leaking files during Nov 2019, and since then a lot of these operators have started to leak files unless they are paid the ransom money. Currently, a dozen of these operators have leak sites. Ransomware actors have also started to increase their ransom demand, and a demand of $1 million has become common.

Getty Images/iStockphoto

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Recently, the Annual Shareholders meeting of Amazon was held and Amazon’s CEO Jeff Bezos was asked about how he envisions what will change down ten years for the company?

He had a great response to this question. He said that the point to focus is that what will ‘not’ change even a decade later. That is what Amazon’s future vision circles around.

To further elaborate his point, he said that we have to consider the things that will still remain the same at the customers’ end even after so many years. People will always want a great and efficient delivery system; they will always want a wide array of products for selection within their easy grasp, and they will always want products that are lower in price in comparison to what other facilities or retailers provide.

No one will ever want a delayed delivery, or products at a higher price, and that makes absolute sense.

So when these things are going to remain constant, then this is what should be the center of focus for building business models around in the future as well. Good thing is that Amazon prides itself on providing these services amazingly well, and the wide popularity of the platform is what has made Jeff Bezos the richest person in this entire world. So, there is no need for Amazon to change its business policies.

Amazon’s current policies are entirely customer-driven, which makes them customer-obsessed. Their eagerness and willingness to satisfy their customer needs are what make them so successful. So, why would they change their policies in the future also, when customers will remain the same way and they will want to be catered the same way as Amazon does now?

Jeff Bezos has remained quite consistent about these views, which means that he is very clear about his vision, for now as well as for the future. He was asked this question last year at the Mars Robotics conference also, and he had the same answer then as well.

While Bezos believes that things will evolve in the future; the technology will advance, machine learning will become the new norm, and there will be many things that will change. We have already seen during the coronavirus pandemic that how our world has already changed so much within a few months. So, it is a definite thing that there will be a lot of changes in the future also, and we don’t know how the world will be 10 years later. But Bezos continues to believe that on the customer-front, they have got it all covered as that will remain unchanged then also.

In Wednesday’s online meeting, he also expressed his immense pride in the way his employees kept working in the crucial circumstances that the world got into because of the coronavirus pandemic. There were some firings recently, but Bezos said that they were not because of their activism, but due to the violations in the company’s internal policies.

A few of his views also suggest that he is open to bringing necessary changes when required, but the overall strategy and business model will not change. It will always remain customer-obsessed and will always work around the customers’ psyche, their needs, and how they want things in the future also.

Bezos calls himself and his workforce as quite inventive and innovative. They seem to continue with their inventive and creative streaks in the future also, and this is quite assuring.

In times when things are changing so drastically around the globe, it is good to know that at least Amazon’s basic principles will not change. Not now, not in the future.

Photo: David Ryder / Getty Images

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On Thursday, Facebook announced that users behind accounts with high reach will have to prove their identities. With the new initiative, the social media giant hopes that it will be able to make sure that users are viewing more authentic content from individuals and brands rather than seeing posts from bots or users concealing their real identities. Two years ago, the company made a similar change in which Facebook announced that it will require popular page owners to reveal their true identities as well as their locations.

The company required the viral page owners to disclose their identity and location as a lot of Facebook accounts of foreign content farms by using biased United States politics to game the social network’s algorithms, reach a high audience, and generate on ad revenue.

With the new change, account on Facebook’s network exhibiting ‘inauthentic behavior’ and contain content continuously going viral in the United States will be required to submit a form of ID. If the ID of a particular account does not match the identity of that Facebook account, or if any Facebook user denies to verify their ID, the social platform will decrease the distribution of that specific Facebook account’s viral content. This will eventually decrease the reach of content as the posts will pop in the feed of a reduced number of users.

Moreover, if Facebook detects that any one of these suspicious Facebook profiles is also the admin of any Facebook page, Facebook will ban those suspicious accounts from using the Facebook page. The company says that Facebook will ban profiles if they fail to verify themselves via the app’s Page Publisher Authorization Process. Facebook rolled out the Page Publisher Authorization Process back in the year 2018.

For years, Facebook has been encouraging people to use their real identities. These new changes are part of these efforts as well as the part of Facebook’s efforts to tackle foreign government influence campaigns. Facebook has also been combating the general spread of misleading information across its platform. Facebook also announced back in the year 2018 that political-leaning advertisers will have to prove their identities. The social media giant then extended the requirements back in the year 2019, with those political-leaning advertisers having to provide extra information. The extra information which political advertisers have to provide includes ID numbers issued by the government before posting ads on Facebook’s network. And during the coronavirus pandemic, the company has also taken new measures to reveal news posts that contain misleading information related to the coronavirus pandemic.

As the world is suffering from a novel pandemic coronavirus; all the health officials are asking people to follow social distancing norms and to take care of their hygiene. For a similar reason, some of the famous and influential tech platforms and companies are working to beat COVID-19.

Google, has created a brand new augmented reality tool that will help people follow social distancing norms and rules when they have to leave their house to fulfill some necessity. The project that Google has created is called 'Sodar'. It is an experimental project which was introduced by 'Experiments with Google' team in a Tweet.

The experiment will create a ring of two meters or a six-foot radius around the person using the AR tool, which will tell you how much distance you have from the person in front of you. The ring created with your phone's screen and back camera. This tool's primary purpose is to visualize how far six feet is and how much more distance is required to stay safe during the pandemic. Sodar will help people in adjusting to the new regular routine as the pandemic increases or decreases, and as lockdown goes on.

The technology of Sodar uses WebXR for visualizing the social distance guidelines for the users according to the environment and region they live in. Sodar is available on almost all the devices, but a few are still left on which it is not yet supported. People can use Sodar at their disposal and learn about proper distance meters.

Sodar is not an individual and detached app, and it doesn't have to be installed in order to be used. It is very easy to use in the sense that if you visit the website of Sodar, it will show you the 6-meter radius. However, if your device is not compatible with the site, then you won't be able to see the radius. If you have viewed the augmented reality animals on Google, you will also be able to view the radius with the virtual distancing indicator. The circle created by the indicator will not be 100% accurate, but it is very close to the real numbers. And it is the same distance which two people should maintain during these times.

This Augmented Reality tool by Google; considered very useful when it comes to fighting the spread of the Coronavirus. The boundary circle that the tool shows will help you keep yourself safe and keep the others safe (in case you have the disease, but it is still undetected). So, using this tools will help in keeping the communities safe from the spread of such viruses. Google probably took the inspiration from Snpachat's recent Lens update that leverages AR tech to help users manage safe distancing during the Covid-19 pandemic.

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Whenever you have to give your address or location to anyone, tell them their address in written form or on a call. Sometimes we also point in the direction of the address which the listener often forgets (before reaching the destination). Addresses are one of the most challenging things to find. It becomes a headache to reach a destination.

For this sole reason, Google decided to create a Plus Code system five years ago, which allowed the users of Google to share its location easily in an alpha-numeric format. So, whether you can’t find a specific address or if you are in the middle of nowhere, you can search the addresses easily. However, this location sharing wasn’t used a lot by the users. So, now Google is making the whole location sharing experience more accessible and quicker than ever (along with secure code plus sharing).

Starting from this week, Google for Android has made location sharing process easier. Whenever anyone wants to share their ‘exact’ current location, they can just select the blue dot by tapping on it. Once you tap on the blue dot, it will show personalized plus code, which can be shared with others or saved for later purposes. Now, whenever someone you share this code with adds the code in the Google location search bar, your location will appear on their screens. You can also share the phone number along with the plus code.

Apart from this process, the plus code of a separate location is also accessible by tapping and holding the map to add a pin – you will then be able to see the plus code of that place or position. The fantastic thing about these plus codes is that they are searchable in Google search and Google maps. So, this convenient way by Google can help in setting up meetings, meetups, events, gatherings, etc. these location pins can also be used as emergency locations if something life-threatening happens.

The technology behind the new Google map is open-source. It can also be used by other apps and mobile developers in their creations to provide these features to their customers. As Google recently made these features more prominent, they might become more commonplace as time passes. The updates of the plus codes are continuously rolling out for the android device users.

The new feature of Google maps creates a unique 6-digit code depending on the location. This feature is especially useful for countries with almost non-street names, and finding locations can be difficult. So, Google is making the lives of its users easier.

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YouTube is rolling out its video chapters feature on smartphones, tablets as well as desktop. The feature was initially tested in April. These Chapters make it convenient for you to skip to precisely where you want to go in a video.

For desktop users, the video with chapters will be that different from how videos have looked before. Little transparent breaks have been added into the bar which displays the progress of a video. These transparent breaks indicate where a chapter begins and ends. When a user scrubs over a section, they see the title of the chapter.

The feature works the same way on Android as well as iOS apps. You might wonder that your finger will get in the way of viewing where a specific chapter is. To address this issue, the app will prompt a haptic buzz when a user has arrived at a new chapter.

There is no limit on which video content chapters can be applied or which content creators can access the new feature. However, these video chapters cannot be applied automatically to every video as this feature is not powered by Google machine learning.

The new video chapters feature relies on the uploader/creator to put timestamps as well as the title of the chapter. A video must contain at least 3 timestamps that are longer than ten seconds. YouTube will remind the content creators to include chapters while uploading the video.

The company is planning to apply the chapters feature on YouTube Original content. However, a company spokesperson informed media outlets that chapters will not be features to paid movie rentals at its release. The feature will help you to skip to the next step of any video conveniently.

Also read: YouTube Is Testing To Integrate Google Search Results With Video Search In Its Mobile App

A UX designer at YouTube, Robert Thompson, and the product manager at YouTube, Matt Darby stated that YouTube’s teams actually went to homes of people to research how a person interacts with YouTube videos. YouTube is also working to develop a set of keyboard shortcuts as well as bringing gestures to navigate between various chapters to smartphones. However, both of these options are still in development phase.

YouTube is currently releasing the feature on mobile and desktop but plans to bring the feature to set-top boxes as well as gaming consoles.

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The Rise of Telehealth

What is Telehealth?

How Medical Professionals Can Utilize Telehealth

Telehealth, HIPAA, and Data Security

The Benefits of Telehealth

Telehealth is the Future

New Augmented Reality filters have rolled out for Instagram and they are simply amazing

You Might Soon Be Able to Put People in Photos Using Facebook’s AI

HackerOne, A Bug Bounty Platform Rewarded $100 Million To White-Hat Hackers Across The Globe

Content Modelling 101: How and Where to Implement

Attributes of Content Modeling

When to Use Content Modeling

How to Use Content Modeling

Conclusion

Ransomware Threats Increased By Fourteen Times In Only One Year

Amazon’s CEO continues to believe in a more customer-obsessed mode of working even ten years later

Facebook Announced That It Will Now Require The Accounts With High Reach To Prove Their Identities

Google's 'Sodar' is an AR tool for social distancing

Good News Android Users! You can now quickly share locations in Google Maps with Plus Codes

YouTube Expands Its Video Chapters Feature To All Desktop, Android and iOS Users