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WhatsApp is testing an all-knowing AI chatbot that will live in your search bar
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WhatsApp is slated to receive a pair of AI-powered upgrades aiming to help people answer tough questions on the fly, as well as edit images on the platform.

Starting with answering questions, the upgrade integrates one of Meta’s AI models into the WhatsApp search bar. Doing so, according to WABetaInfo, would allow users to directly input queries without having to create a separate chat room for the AI. You'd be able to hold a quick conversation right on the same page. 

It appears this is an extension of the in-app assistants that originally came out back in November 2023. A screenshot in the report reveals WhatsApp will provide a handful of prompts to get a conversation flowing.

It’s unknown just how capable the search bar AI will be. The assistants are available in different personas specializing in certain topics. But looking at the aforementioned screenshot, it appears the search bar will house the basic Meta AI model. It would be really fun if we could assign the Snoop Dogg persona as the main assistant.

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AI image editing

The second update is a collection of image editing features discovered by industry expert AssembleDebug, after diving into a recent WhatsApp beta. AssembleDebug discovered three possibly upcoming tools – Backdrop, Restyle, and Expand. It’s unknown exactly what they do as not a single one works. However the first two share a name with other features currently available on Instagram, so they may, in fact, function the same way.

Backdrop could let users change the background of an image into something different via text prompt. Restyle can completely alter the art style of an uploaded picture. Think of these like filters, but more capable. You can make a photograph into a watercolor painting or pixel art. It’s even possible to create wholly unique content through a text prompt.

WhatsApp's new image editing tools

(Image credit: AssembleDebug/TheSPAndroid)

Expand is the new kid on the block. Judging by the name, AssembleDebug theorizes it’ll harness the power of AI “to expand images beyond their visible area”. Technology like this already exists on other platforms. Photoshop, for example, has Generative Expand,  and Samsung's Galaxy S24 series can expand images after they have been adjusted by rotation. 

WhatsApp gaining such an ability would be a great inclusion as it’ll give users a robust editing tool that is free. Most versions of this tech are locked behind a subscription or tied to a specific device.

Do keep in mind neither beta is available to early testers at the time of this writing. They're still in the works, and as stated earlier, we don’t know the full capabilities of either set. Regardless of their current status, it is great to see that one day WhatsApp may come equipped with AI tech on the same level as what you’d find on Instagram especially when it comes to the search bar assistant. The update will make accessing that side of Meta software more convenient for everyone.

If you prefer to tweak images on a desktop, check out TechRadar's list of the best free photo editors for PC and Mac.

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Don’t panic, iPhone users – Google Maps is still bringing Live Activities to your lock screen
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Google announced around this time last year that it was working on the addition of Live Activities support to the Google Maps app for iPhone and iPads, and slated it for release later in 2023, but so far it still hasn’t been released. However, new assets found in the latest version in the app indicate that Google is still working on this feature, and the wait may soon be over.

The feature will display turn-by-turn directions on the Lock Screen and in the Dynamic Island of iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 15 series handsets, providing users with real-time ETAs, directions for driving, biking, walking, public transit, and more kinds of navigation. Users can look forward to all of that in easy-to-read live notifications without having to unlock their phones and opening the app. 

I wonder if this feature will also be present on iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro models’ Dynamic Islands, and would assume this would become standard for future iPhone models. It would also be nice to see a similar feature for Android devices (Dynamic Islands is a feature that’s exclusive to modern iPhones). 

Young woman using smartphone in Sydney

(Image credit: Getty Images)

A sign to keep your hopes up

A contributor at MacRumors, Aaron Perris, looked into the app’s assets after its most recent update, and found signs that users can remain hopeful that Google hasn’t given up adding these features to Google Maps on iPhone, despite the delay. 

This is reassuring, as while the new features were still in development as of August of last year, after that there were no strong indications that Google was pushing forward with it until now. MacRumours says that this recent discovery suggests that we might see the new feature soon. 

Apple has also opened up the Live Activities API for third-party iPhone app developers in iOS 16.1’s release. Developers have since made some handy apps and added some useful support features to existing apps, like DoorDash and United Airlines, thanks to the Live Activities API.

As an Android device user, I’m pretty jealous – this sounds like an awesome feature that makes it easier to get up and go, and stay on the move. It will make commuting with the help of your iPhone safer and more convenient, as well. I understand why iPhone users might be getting antsy after such a long delay and limited communication from Google, but it’s worth it for the Google Maps team to get it right.

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Meta Connect 2023 live blog: Meta Quest 3, VR and AI announcements
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Welcome to the TechRadar live blog for Meta Connect 2023. We'll be keeping you updated with everything that’s announced at this year’s Meta event as it happens, as well as giving you our expert thoughts on all the hardware and software that’s announced.

This year we know the headline item will be the Meta Quest 3, a new VR headset set to replace the Oculus Quest 2 (the most popular VR headset ever made). Meta has called the Quest 3 its “most powerful headset” yet, but beyond this, its price and that it’ll have full-color mixed reality like the Meta Quest Pro there’s a lot we still don’t know – chiefly when it will release.

Alongside the Quest 3, Meta will likely show off other VR and AR tech it's working on (though expect a lot of the stuff to still be in fairly early development stages, based on previous years’ keynotes), as well as AI advancements it's developing. 

Meta Connect 2023 is here! I'm Hamish and I'll be with you for the next hour or so as Meta takes us through all of its VR and AI announcements. The biggest of which will be the Meta Quest 3 VR headset.

I'm super excited to see this new device, especially its mixed reality capabilities, as this seems to be a major focus for Meta. The Meta Quest Pro left a lot to be desired in this department, though, so the Quest 3 needs to be a big improvement if it wants to convince us that mixed reality is the future of XR tech.

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Adobe Summit 2023 live: all the news and announcements from Day One
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Welcome to our live coverage of Adobe Summit 2023. For the next two days (June 8 – 9), we’re on the floor at ExCel London to see what’s new from Adobe. 

CEO Shantanu Narayen will be kicking things off in the opening keynote, He’ll be joined by other Adobe execs and industry leaders to reveal the latest work from the company, and its impact. Expect plenty of focus on productivity, personalization, creativity, and, of course, AI. 

Day One is about to start – and we'll be here to provide all the updates as they happen.

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Security update live blog
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Share your thoughts on Cybersecurity and get a free copy of the Hacker’s Manual 2022. Help us find how businesses are preparing for the post-Covid world and the implications of these activities on their cybersecurity plans. Enter your email at the end of this survey to get the bookazine, worth $ 10.99/£10.99.

Want to hear what the thought leaders in ZTNA and SASE have to say on the future of business and enterprise security? Then download our free PDF bookazine, “SASE and ZTNA: Writings from the frontline”

Nordsec adds encrypted cloud storage for business offer

NordLocker

(Image credit: NordLocker)

Just days after it announced that it had received investments of $ 100 million, Nordsec, the holding company for the popular NordVPN, has added yet another product to its portfolio. Nordlocker for business is its second product that targets the multi-billion dollar enterprise security market. After NordLayer, NordLocker is a secure cloud storage service that competes with the likes of Wasabi.

“We introduced NordLocker as a robust file encryption tool in 2019. Since then, the product has undergone a few solid development phases and is now positioned as an end-to-end encrypted cloud storage option with a file encryption solution,” says Aivaras Vencevicius, head of product at NordLocker. “It was only natural for us to move forward and launch an encrypted cloud service for business clients to offer a secure, convenient, and cost-effective way to store and manage their data.”

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Security update live blog
  • No Comments

Share your thoughts on Cybersecurity and get a free copy of the Hacker’s Manual 2022. Help us find how businesses are preparing for the post-Covid world and the implications of these activities on their cybersecurity plans. Enter your email at the end of this survey to get the bookazine, worth $ 10.99/£10.99.

Want to hear what the thought leaders in ZTNA and SASE have to say on the future of business and enterprise security? Then download our free PDF bookazine, “SASE and ZTNA: Writings from the frontline”

Nordsec adds encrypted cloud storage for business offer

NordLocker

(Image credit: NordLocker)

Just days after it announced that it had received investments of $ 100 million, Nordsec, the holding company for the popular NordVPN, has added yet another product to its portfolio. Nordlocker for business is its second product that targets the multi-billion dollar enterprise security market. After NordLayer, NordLocker is a secure cloud storage service that competes with the likes of Wasabi.

“We introduced NordLocker as a robust file encryption tool in 2019. Since then, the product has undergone a few solid development phases and is now positioned as an end-to-end encrypted cloud storage option with a file encryption solution,” says Aivaras Vencevicius, head of product at NordLocker. “It was only natural for us to move forward and launch an encrypted cloud service for business clients to offer a secure, convenient, and cost-effective way to store and manage their data.”

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Windows 11 update has system-wide live captions to help boost its accessibility aims
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Despite Windows 11 being sequestered behind hardware requirements such as TPM, Microsoft is doing its best to make its latest OS as accessible as possible for the deaf and hard of hearing communities, with all new system-wide live captions. 

Available today (April 5) after Microsoft's event, the brand new live captions feature allows users who may be deaf, hard of hearing or those who just like subtitles to easily access captions across all audio experiences and apps across Windows. 

Live Captions will also work on web-based audio, allowing users to view auto-generated captions on websites and streaming services that might not otherwise support or have the best captions. 

Unfortunately, it is currently unclear if Microsoft will be bringing the live captions feature to Windows 10, in order to let as many users as possible utilize this useful accessibility feature. 

Analysis: an accessibility win that is not accessible for everyone

There is no denying that more accessibility options are a good thing regardless of where you use them yourself or not, however, Microsoft deserves as much criticism as praise for this new feature as, for now, they’re keeping it exclusive to Windows 11. 

With Windows 11’s growth recently being shown to have dramatically stalled in March, it makes sense that Microsoft’s latest OS may need some more killer features to tempt users into upgrading from Windows 10, however holding accessibility features random certainly is not the way to do it. 

While holding this feature to ransom would be bad enough if upgrading was a simple one-click process, Windows 11 does not make things that easy as it infamously requires TPM 2.0, a feature that many computers, manufactured before 2017, do not have.

Mercifully, captioning services are becoming more and more common across web pages and streaming services, you can even listen to all of our articles, for instance, however, these services all have their potential problems and require individual set up, so it's far from a perfect solution. 

With Microsoft having only just announced this new feature for Windows 11 during their hybrid work event, we can only hope that it is not too long before the tech giant sees sense and brings this feature to older versions of Windows to benefit all users, rather than just those on Windows 11.

TechRadar – All the latest technology news

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Windows 11 update has system-wide live captions to help boost its accessibility aims
  • No Comments

Despite Windows 11 being sequestered behind hardware requirements such as TPM, Microsoft is doing its best to make its latest OS as accessible as possible for the deaf and hard of hearing communities, with all new system-wide live captions. 

Available today (April 5) after Microsoft's event, the brand new live captions feature allows users who may be deaf, hard of hearing or those who just like subtitles to easily access captions across all audio experiences and apps across Windows. 

Live Captions will also work on web-based audio, allowing users to view auto-generated captions on websites and streaming services that might not otherwise support or have the best captions. 

Unfortunately, it is currently unclear if Microsoft will be bringing the live captions feature to Windows 10, in order to let as many users as possible utilize this useful accessibility feature. 

Analysis: an accessibility win that is not accessible for everyone

There is no denying that more accessibility options are a good thing regardless of where you use them yourself or not, however, Microsoft deserves as much criticism as praise for this new feature as, for now, they’re keeping it exclusive to Windows 11. 

With Windows 11’s growth recently being shown to have dramatically stalled in March, it makes sense that Microsoft’s latest OS may need some more killer features to tempt users into upgrading from Windows 10, however holding accessibility features random certainly is not the way to do it. 

While holding this feature to ransom would be bad enough if upgrading was a simple one-click process, Windows 11 does not make things that easy as it infamously requires TPM 2.0, a feature that many computers, manufactured before 2017, do not have.

Mercifully, captioning services are becoming more and more common across web pages and streaming services, you can even listen to all of our articles, for instance, however, these services all have their potential problems and require individual set up, so it's far from a perfect solution. 

With Microsoft having only just announced this new feature for Windows 11 during their hybrid work event, we can only hope that it is not too long before the tech giant sees sense and brings this feature to older versions of Windows to benefit all users, rather than just those on Windows 11.

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Zoom will now let you live stream your boring old meetings to Twitch
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If you're looking to liven up your next business Zoom meeting, the company has now revealed that users will be able to livestream video directly to popular online streaming platform Twitch.

In a blog post announcing a whole host of new upgrades and features, the video conferencing giant said that call hosts will now be able to livestream their meeting or webinar to Twitch directly, rather than manually configuring the stream as a custom livestreaming service.

Zoom says that the move will help its customers, “streamline the process of sharing content within their communities and extend their reach” although quite how interesting your weekly team catch-ups will be to a wider audience remains to be seen.

Zoom & Twitch

The feature is available to Zoom users everywhere now, but anyone looking to start a Twitch stream will need to have approval from the Zoom account owner or admin, which should help cut down on potential slip-ups.

Alongside the Twitch news, Zoom also announced users will soon be able to share computer audio and other content with breakout rooms.

This feature, which Zoom says will create, “a more cohesive experience for participants,”  can be enabled when the host begins to share content, or while sharing is in progress.

Livening up your video calls appears to be something of a trend for Zoom, which also recently announced new animated avatars. With choices ranging from cat to cow, raccoon, bunny, dog and more, the avatars not only replace the original video feed, but also mirror the user’s head movements and facial expressions courtesy of a few AI tricks.

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> Zoom is getting into the customer service business

> New Zoom feature could save you from an embarrassing blunder

> Zoom update delivers quick hack for more productive meetings

Zoom has also given administrators the ability to configure  virtual backgrounds to reset to a chosen default after each meeting, reportedly to help avoid situations whereby sensitive data is exposed in a virtual background.

And when it comes to video, the company has also recently rolled out a feature that allows meeting hosts to add a video to the virtual waiting room. This video will play while participants wait to be allowed into the call, and admins can also now enable and disable the watermark feature in the middle of a meeting.

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