Eric David
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ObEN raises $10M to build AI-powered copies of real people for hospitality and retail
ObEN Inc., a Pasadena startup that builds virtual avatars powered by artificial intelligence, announced today that it has raised $10 million in funding from Hong Kong’s K11 Art Foundation. Combined with previous investments from Tencent, Softbank, HTC and others, this brings the startup’s total funding to date to more than $23.7 million. Founded in 2014, ObEN combines AI, 3D ...
Google Wallet and Android Pay merge into a single service called Google Pay
Google LLC announced today that it’s launching a mobile payment platform called Google Pay, which will combine peer-to-peer payments from Google Wallet and mobile payments with Android Pay into one service. According to Pali Bhat, Google’s vice president of product management for payments, the goal behind Google Pay — at least aside from annoying people who ...
University of Washington opens $6M VR research lab funded by Facebook, Google and Huawei
The University of Washington today announced the creation of the UW Reality Lab, a $6 million virtual and augmented reality research lab that was funded by equal contributions from Facebook Inc., Google LLC and Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. The lab will be part of the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering in Seattle, which is ...
Millions of Android users downloaded malicious flashlight apps on Google Play
Proving that flashlight apps are still as sketchy as ever, Google LLC has removed 22 malicious flashlight apps from Google Play after cybersecurity company Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. discovered that the apps were loaded with adware. Apps containing the adware, which Check Point calls “LightsOut,” had been downloaded by between 1.5 million to 7.5 million Android users ...
Zuckerberg’s personal challenge for 2018 is to ‘fix’ Facebook
Facebook Inc. had a stellar 2017 when it came to revenue, but the company’s public image was not so lucky, especially after it revealed that it unwittingly sold political ads to a Russia-backed organization. Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg admitted today that the Facebook is struggling with its fair share of issues, which is why he has decided to make fixing ...
Indian government denies reported breach of its national ID service
Indian newspaper The Tribune reported today that India’s national ID program has been breached, but the Indian government has rejected the paper’s claims. In its report, The Tribune said that it was able to buy access to an illegal database of citizen personal information for less than $8 (500 Indian rupees). According to the paper, the data came from a ...
In a challenge to Amazon’s Alexa, Roku pitches a voice assistant for home entertainment
Roku Inc. may have been an early pioneer for streaming media devices, but it lost some ground to competing devices from companies like Amazon.com Inc. and Google LLC Now the company wants to turn the tables by creating its own smart assistant to challenge Alexa and Google Assistant. Roku announced today that it’s developing the Roku Entertainment ...
UK may tax ‘ruthless profiteers’ such as Facebook for slow response to extremist content
A United Kingdom official wants to impose higher taxes on tech giants that don’t do their share to fight extremist web content. In an interview with the Sunday Times on Dec. 31, Ben Wallace, the U.K.’s minister of state for security, accused companies such as Facebook Inc. and Google LLC of passing off the burden of policing ...
Some mobile games can listen in on your TV viewing habits
Hundreds of mobile games on Google Play and the Apple App Store have software that can listen to your TV viewing habits through your smartphone’s microphone. According to a New York Times report Thursday, the creator of the software is Alphonso Inc., an analytics startup that helps advertisers track TV viewing data. More than 250 mobile ...
YouTube yanked from Amazon Fire TV four days early
The strained relationship between Google LLC and Amazon.com Inc. seems to be getting worse, as the YouTube app on Amazon’s Fire TV streaming device has been deactivated four days early. Google had already pulled YouTube from Amazon Echo Show in September, and Google announced earlier this month that it would also be pulling YouTube from Fire TV. ...