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Google was caught in a controversial privacy issue with how its browser, Chrome would log users in to their Google account, even without their consent and given the fact that it happens automatically for almost all of Google services.

The issue seems to have been escalated with Chrome 69, as before that users were allowed to keep their login status private, and it's rather too bad for rolling out this sort of change that hinges on privacy without spelling it out to users.

The company, however have assured Chrome users of a reversal of the automatic log-ins to its services with Chrome 70 by the addition of an option to disable the automatic sign-in, and it will allow users to turn off web-based sign-in linking within the browser.



Albeit, the purpose for the browser logging into Google account is to enable the syncing of bookmarks, passwords and perhaps other web preferences, which you can choose to share with other devices.

Google claims that the change was to simplify the way Chrome handles sign-in, making it easier for users to sign into any Google service, and also sign into Google Account with the account picture right in the Chrome UI, so that you can see your sign-in status.

If you sign out, either directly from Chrome or from any Google website, you’re also completely signed out of your Google Account, according to Google.

Chrome 70 will offer a straight out-of-the-box setting that disables the link between the browser with Google services and users that have the feature disabled, when signing into a Google service will not be signed into Chrome.

Upcoming Chrome 70 to disable the controversial automatic sign-in to Google services



The open-source web browser, Brave made headlines as the first browser to bring onion routing from the Tor Project as an option to its private tabs, which feature Mozilla had earlier touted as coming to Firefox in collaboration with Tor Project.

While the browser is notable for its ad-blocking functionality, with the option for private tabs made possible by the collaboration of Tor Project's technology to keep sites from tracking users online.

Brave had recently overhauled the browser Core that mimics Google Chrome, which version lacked support for the Tor privacy technology, but the latest Brave release is perhaps the first Core beta to add the Tor technology.

Brave browser is built on Blink engine, which is also the engine powering Google's Chrome developed by Brendan Eich, the co-founder of the Mozilla project and creator of JavaScript.

The browser is notorious for its assertiveness to protect its users from online prying and spying through its separation of the computer from the site communicating with it by sending network traffic via intermediate servers, thus preventing the websites from keeping logs of browsing history, including your IP address.

Albeit, Brave browser had earlier included a system called Brave Payments, which allow users to send crypto-tokens called Basic Attention Tokens to publishers: YouTubers and Twitch video game streamers.

Now, the Core system update changed the Brave Rewards moniker, with the actual reward approach; though still funded by promotional BAT to compensate creators somewhat for revenue lost as a result of Brave blocking their ads.

The Core beta also brings support for Google's Widevine technology for digital rights management and copy protection, which is prerequisite for watching streaming videos.

Brave browser is getting own ad system; still blocking ads and ad trackers



The Internet giant, Google is marking its 20th anniversary today and has postulated what the next 20 years will look like; which is quite contrast to its earlier mission of organizing the world’s information and making it universally accessible.

Google is planning an eminent shift from traditional aspects of search to semantics: what it calls the new way to find information, while this is hugely driven by some fundamental shifts in how we do search today.

The semantic search ideology moves away from just queries to providing a rather more contextual information to a given search; as it tends to surface information related to your interests, even when you have not used that specific query.

Google also hopes to shift from answers to journeys: To what it assumes as helping searchers to continue from where they left off or even learn more new interests. And the shift from text to a more visual way of finding information, including bringing more visual content to Search and completely redesigning Google Images to help users find information easily.

These advancements are nonetheless harping on its AI, which it deems as improving the ability to understand language in ways that weren’t possible when the search engine first started.

While AI can have more promising effects, like predicting areas that might be affected in a flood, or helping to identify the best job opportunities, but AI can also dramatically reduce the reach of your marketing campaigns.

The added intelligence will indeed engage more users into Google services, albeit the Internet marketers may be displaced by the automated task of information discovery as it becomes more or less dictated by Google's whims.

Google's postulated Next 20 Years of Search looks bleak for Internet marketers



Mozilla is working on a security service that can check and notify users when their email addresses have been involved in a data breach, which service is in partnership with Troy Hunt, Firefox Monitor will proactively check for your information and alert you if you are affected in a compromise.

While Troy Hunt's "Have I Been Pwned" service catalogs billions of emails that are exposed in data breaches, Firefox Monitor API will have access to the database, and will afford users the ability to search their email address, and if exposed in a data breach, will be informed specifically, where and when the compromise took place.



The "Have I Been Pwned" service was launched in 2013, and often emails discovered in data breaches hadn’t been made public, as companies tend to keep the compromise secret longer until they have figured out what actually happened, which is not always in the customers' best interest.

The service offer you the option of registration to allow it to proactively monitor and alert you if you’re ever affected by any breach in the future.

And the Firefox Monitor functions much like Hunt’s Have I Been Pwned, allowing users to search email addresses on the service to check if the email was exposed in a data breach, and it’ll show when the mishap happened; albeit alert on a data breach will be of little use if you’re not following good password rules in the first instance.

Mozilla, however made it clear that Firefox recent new features centered around security and privacy are top priorities going into the future for the browser.

Firefox Monitor: Mozilla looks to solve the problem of data breaches from the browserside



Google Feed is a service that brings relevant news, both local and international, sourced from popular media platforms to the Google App, offering information across different range of topics which are sorted to meet individual preference.

While the service is part of Google Now since it was originally introduced, the primary focus was on news content, including articles and videos around topics that a user would mostly care about, made possible by AI input.

It pulls information from topics you are following by using your Google and Chrome browsing history to improve results and customize the news contents according to your preference.

Now, Google has rebranded the Feed to "Google Discover" with new eight-pointed icon, and the bottom bar featuring the icon and a label; while this icon appears in a colored version when viewed from the search bar. And it employs the Topic Layer in the Knowledge Graph to predict your level of expertise on a topic and help you further develop those interests. For instance, you’re learning to play guitar, it will deduct that you might need beginner content about learning chords or let's say you’re already a skilled musician, you may see a video on more advanced techniques.



Google has also added a prompt to encourage searchers to “Check out Discover,” with its brand-colored version of the icon.

The ‘Google Discover’ in contrast to the erstwhile Feed, is more obvious and reflects the intended functionality: ability to follow topics to see timely news information within the feed, including movies, politics, sports, and much more.

According to Google, the Discover will have the capability to pull information and articles that are very relevant, using the same technology as Full Coverage in Google News to bring you a variety of perspectives on the latest news.

And it will takeover Google Now on Android and iOS Google Search apps, as well as the left-side page on the search results homescreen for devices like the Google Pixel.

Google Discover (formerly Google Feed) coming to the mobile web, with slew of new features



Oracle's removal of JavaFX from the Java Development Kit (JDK) 11 has given rise to the first open standalone release of the Java-based rich client technology, JavaFX 11, which will avail developers a client application platform.

The JavaFX 11 is an open source, next generation platform for desktop, mobile and embedded systems built on Java; which comes as a collaborative effort from many independent developers and companies with the goal of producing an efficient and modern, fully featured toolkit for building rich client applications.

While Oracle claimed the removal was inline with its overall desire to get rid of noncore modules from the Java Development Kit or stand the JDK as independent modules.

The standalone JavaFX modules can no longer have permissions by default, as the modules are now loaded by the application class loader, while applications that sort to run with a security manager enabled by default will need to specify a custom policy file, using "-Djava.security.policy", to grant permissions to each of the JavaFX.

Albeit, the now open source JavaFX will be able to use GTK 3 by default on Linux platforms where the GTK 3 library is present, which prior to JavaFX 11, the GTK 2 library was the default.

The new features in JavaFX include the public FX Robot API, which has been added to support simulating user interaction such as typing keys on the keyboard and using the mouse as well as capturing graphical information.

And the known issues with this release is that JavaFX crashes with OpenJDK 11 on Ubuntu 18.04 Linux machines when the XWayland window server is enabled whenever the FX window toolkit code uses GTK 3 on Linux, which is the default for JavaFX 11.

It is however recommended to use the Xorg server instead of the Wayland server when running JavaFX applications as a workaround.

The Java-based rich client technology, JavaFX 11 standalone release



It's no loner news that Microsoft and Amazon have integrated their respective digital assistants, Alexa and Cortana; the next step in the collaboration between the two companies is that Alexa-powered devices will soon be able to tap into Skype to place or receive audio/video calls to/from other devices.

While the initial partnership saw the implementations of the Cortana skill on Alexa devices, with the ability to summon Alexa from Windows 10 devices and the Xbox game console.

Skype, which had hitherto remained Microsoft’s exclusive in the partnership is now purported to be coming on board later this year, albeit the capability is already available for Amazon's Alexa-powered devices in the US and Canada.



The worldwide roll out will follow soon this year, which will allow users of Alexa-powered devices to tap into Skype to place Skype audio and video calls to other devices, accept calls, or even place calls via Skype to cellular phones and landlines.

This new partnership means that if you're about hanging out, let's say in your neighborhood and wish for the company of your friends, you can just tap your Alexa device to place a Skype call to your "old friends" by simply saying: “Alexa, call Dave on Skype,” or say “Alexa, answer” for an incoming call.

And perhaps too, you'll be able to order from your favorite local restaurant and have it delivered in a jiffy all from the comfort of your living room.

Alexa users, get ready for Skype as Microsoft is bringing the service to Amazon's hardware



The Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC) is a set of extensions to DNS which provides DNS clients (resolvers) origin authentication for DNS data; the specifications are for securing certain kinds of information provided by the Domain Name System (DNS) on Internet Protocol (IP) networks.

While the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) voted on the first ever change for the cryptographic key that helps protect the Domain Name System (DNS), in a bid to make the internet more secure.

The main driving force for the improvement in DNS security remains that the rollover will help in the continued evolvement of Internet technologies and deployment of IoT facilities.

Initial plan to roll the DNS root KSK was paused in 2017 due to unexpected error, specifically the data raised questions related to how ready validating resolvers were for the roll over that was scheduled to be implemented. ICANN analyzed the data and determined that there were indications that a relatively small percentage of resolvers were likely to be negatively impacted by the KSK rollover, but it also established that the data was unsuitable for determining the number of end users that would be impacted.

But the ICANN Board have now agreed to proceed with plans to roll over the key for the DNS root beginning on October 11, 2018, which change is remarkable as it will be the first successfully in place since 2010.

ICANN stated that minimal user impact from the rollover is expected, as a small percentage of internet users would see problems in resolving domain names, and so they will have problems reaching their destination websites.

The change, however should have little impact for enterprise users, since more than 99% of such users resolvers are validating and will not be affected by the KSK rollover; as most enterprises have their software set on automatic key rollovers or they've manually installed the new key already.

Though, there's no assurance that every network operator will have their 'resolvers' properly configured, yet it is expect that the vast majority have access to the root zone.

What's the impact of ICANN enforcement of DNS Security Extensions change?



Google's Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) is an open source initiative aimed to improve the performance of sites on the mobile web; which goes beyond just websites to include other applications on the mobile Web.

While Google had earlier partnered with several publishers and technology companies in pushing the AMP project to build more features and functionality, the company has now moved the project to a consensus-seeking open governance model.

The open governance model (a system defining how decisions are made) for AMP will focus on agility with feedback from the developers and organizations that have been using it.

Some of the significant changes proposed in the new model, includes: having working Groups with ownership of certain aspects of AMP (UI, infrastructure and documentation), with clear mechanisms for input and well-defined decision making process, replace the informal teams that exist now.

And the power to make decisions in the AMP Project have moved from single Tech Lead to a Technical Steering Committee (TSC) which is made up of representatives from companies that have committed resources to build the AMP project.

The main goal remains to encourage a wider variety of voices at different levels of contribution, such as code contributions, determining the future direction of AMP and what features and the bugs to be fixed.

It will ensure that the voices of those who do not contribute with code, but are nonetheless impacted by AMP, will be heard.

The company is also exploring the possibility of moving AMP to a foundation in the future, and seek the input of the TSC, the AC, and the community over the coming months.

Google pushing Accelerated Mobile Pages Project (AMP) to Open Governance Model



Twitter's real-time update set the service apart from other social networks and lending more to its credence, as natural conversation is supposed to be spontaneous. But earlier last year, the company decided to switch to algorithmic timeline to the backlash of its users, who maintains that the former timeline is preferred, against the supposed option to get the tweets they’re most likely to care about to appear at the top of the feed.

The argument that when a user follow hundreds of people on Twitter — or maybe thousands — that it can feel like you’ve missed some of the most important tweets with real-time update, which Twitter cited for the switch notwithstanding, many users revolted with “Death to Twitter” in a campaign against the change.

Now, the company has announced new changes that make it super easy for users to choose to see a chronological feeds from the people they follow, instead of the machine-learning algorithmic timeline that tends to surface tweets based on your past interactions.

And Twitter will allow those users who wish to opt out of the use of algorithmic timeline to choose what tweets they deem more important.

Twitter's product lead, Kayvon Beykpour, states that the company is making it easier for people to have more control of their timelines and will be testing the new changes in the coming weeks.

The company claims to have learned that when showing the best Tweets first, that users find it more relevant and useful, but they've decided to heed the feedback from people who at times prefer to see the most recent tweets.

If you wish to switch back to algorithmic timeline, simply adjust your setting for "Show me the best Tweets first" from your "Account Settings" page, click Under Content, look for "Timeline" and toggle the box next to "Show me the best Tweets first" to change the setting at any time.

Twitter makes it super-easy to Switch back to the Reverse Chronological Timeline

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