Your local boozer might be shut but the pub quiz lives on, with everyone from Helen Mirren to Stephen Fry asking the questions

In an unidentified magnolia room, Lenny Henry is yelling: “Let me hear you say: ‘YEAH.’” Next to his face, a live chat feed blurts out heart emojis and comments such as: “Hello, Sir Lenny!”. Or: “I’ve had the biggest crush on Lenny Henry since his Chef days.” Or: “Hi, my team name is Wuhan Clan.”

The Dudley comic is hosting the National Theatre’s online pub quiz, a pre-recorded broadcast, streamed via YouTube and Facebook. He is joined by Lesley Manville, Helen Mirren and Ian McKellen to pose 15 minutes’ worth of intensely difficult general knowledge questions to the public. And, bizarrely, to announce that: “I will pull interesting faces while you write the answer down,” before shooting his eyebrows to the sky and gaping his jaw as if he’s running an advertising campaign for his own tonsils. Still, this is lockdown living; everything’s a bit odd.

More than a quarter of India's population or 337 million people would use a smartphone in 2018 -- a 16 per cent growth which is the highest rate of any country in the world -- market research company eMarketer said on Thursday.

Since its last forecast, eMarketer increased its estimate for the smartphone audience in India by more than 31 million people.

This uptick is thanks to the growth in smartphone usage in urban areas, where affordable smartphones are becoming widely available, the research firm said in a statement.

"India still faces technological challenges that are holding back mass smartphone adoption. "Mobile Internet speeds are among the slowest in the world, around two-thirds of the population still lives in rural areas and feature phones are by no means obsolete," said Chris Bendtsen, Senior Forecasting Analyst, eMarketer.

Advertisers can still be optimistic about the future.

"Smartphones are getting cheaper, mobile data prices have fallen and urbanisation continues. Over the next four years, as speeds and rural reach improve, eMarketer expects the smartphone audience to reach close to half a billion users," Bendtsen noted.

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Aiming to disrupt India's mid-segment smartphone market, Samsung is set to launch four new smartphones -- two each in Galaxy "A" and Galaxy "J" series -- this month.

The upcoming Galaxy A6 and Galaxy A6+ smartphones could be priced between Rs 20,000 and Rs 25,000 while the devices in Galaxy "J" series could cost customers Rs 15,000 to Rs 20,000, industry sources told IANS on Friday.

Two of the four smartphones in the upcoming line-up would come with dual camera set-up, the sources added.

All of them will be made at the company's Noida facility. The smartphones will feature Samsung's super AMOLED "Infinity Display" -- bezel-less screen that creates an immersive viewing experience.

Notably, Samsung's flagship smartphones such as Galaxy Note 8 and Galaxy S9 series feature the "Infinity Display". Now, with the upcoming devices, the display feature would be introduced at lower price points in the Indian market.

The South Korean giant first introduced the "Infinity Display" in Galaxy S8 series in 2017.

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Illustration/Amit Bandre

New Delhi: On an average, a college student in India checks his mobile phone over 150 times a day, according to a study conducted by Aligarh Muslim University and the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR).

The research, titled "Smartphone Dependency, Hedonism and Purchase Behaviour: Implications for Digital India Initiatives", has been conducted in 20 central universities, where 200 students each were interviewed.

"Anxiety and fear of missing out on information make university students check their mobile devices as many as 150 times a day on an average, an activity which can have adverse effects on the students' health as well as academics. "Only 26 per cent of the respondents said they use smartphones primarily to make calls. The remaining respondents use smartphones for other purposes such as accessing social networking sites, Google searches and for entertainment such as watching movies," said Mohammed Naved Khan, the Project Director.

At least 14 per cent of the students use smartphones for three hours or less in a day while around 63 per cent of them use it for four to seven hours daily.

"It came as a shock to us that around 23 per cent (of students) use the devices for more than eight hours a day," Khan added.

According to the study, eighty per cent of the students own a mobile phone and most of them prefer smartphones owing to convenience in the installation of applications, host of features, and ease of use and also work as affordable substitutes for a computer. The study conducted by researchers at AMU has been funded by the ICSSR with an aim to understand various facets of smartphone dependency and addiction among college-going students.

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The 'No Mobile Phones' diktat issued by the Election Commission for voters at polling centres had a rather ambiguous implementation. While some carried it along inside the polling booth, others were asked to keep it out. With directions about phones not being allowed in the 100 meters vicinity of polling stations, the Election Commission had not made any provisions for safekeeping of phones.

Also Read: Election 2019: Mumbai scrapes through in voting report card

The rule ended up confusing voters across the city. Many were unaware of the 'no phone' policy and were left waiting outside the polling centres. The EC had issued such orders after some voters were found clicking pictures while voting during the last elections.

Salman Khan, SRK, Ranveer Singh, Kangana, Bachchans step out for voting

While most polling stations had police officials preventing voters from carrying their phones inside, there was no security checking of the bags that some voters carried, "thus making it difficult to ascertain if they were carrying a phone or not," said officials. Some centres also saw the police asking voters to hand over their phones to people standing behind them in the queue.

Dhanraji Yadav, who was at the Manohar Joshi Mahavidyalaya in Dharavi along with her family, said that police officials at the gate asked them if they were carrying any phones. "I waited with all the phones while my family voted. But while I was waiting there, the same police officials allowed other people to carry them by switching them off," Yadav said. An official said that the directives had come from the Election Commission of India. "We couldn't be responsible for everyone's phones and asked them to not bring them."

Also Read: Elections 2019: Regular voters find their name missing at polling booths

100m
Distance around polling booth where phones were not allowed

Election 2019: Prominent personalities, other Mumbaikars come out to caste vote!

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Representational picture

New Delhi: If you've ever felt disgusted when your partner paid more attention to his/her phone on a date then you are not the only one. Most adults in India paid more attention to their smartphone than their partner when they were together, a new study has revealed.

Sixty per cent of adults surveyed said their partner paid more attention to their own smart device when they were together on a date.

The study, titled "Three's Company: Lovers, Friends and Devices" and released on Wednesday by Intel Security, aims to understand the online behaviour of people and how it affects their relationship with friends and significant others.

Money, gifts and a dinner in a glamorous restaurant mean nothing in a relationship when the partners pay no attention to each other. The study found that 57 per cent of those studied had to compete with their partner's smartphone for attention on a first date.

An intrusion into a relationship leads to a quarrel which is corroborated by the fact that 75 per cent of the adults reported getting into an argument with a friend, significant other, or family member over being on a device while together.

The study involved 1,400 Indian adults who use an internet-connected device on a daily basis.

Amid this lack of attention in relationships, it was revealed that 46 per cent of couples share passwords to social media accounts, 38 per cent share passwords to personal email accounts and, interestingly, nearly 35 per cent of adults share their work-specific devices and accounts with their significant other.

Intel Security suggested using long passwords including numbers, and lowercase and uppercase letters, as well as symbols.

This Valentine's Day, if you are planning to make your partner smile, make sure to pay more attention to his/her words than the text on your smartphone.

Representational Image

Scientists have developed the first ultrasound-firewall that can prevent hackers from eavesdropping on hidden data transmission between smartphones and other mobile devices. The permanent networking of mobile devices can endanger the privacy of users and lead to new forms of monitoring.

New technologies such as Google Nearby and Silverpush use ultrasonic sounds to exchange information between devices via loudspeakers and microphones. More and more of our devices communicate via this inaudible communication channel. Ultrasonic communication allows devices to be paired and information to be exchanged.

It also makes it possible to track users and their behaviour over a number of devices, much like cookies on the Web. Almost every device with a microphone and a loudspeaker can send and receive ultrasonic sounds. Users are usually unaware of this inaudible and hidden data transmission.

Researchers from the St Polten University of Applied Sciences in Austria has developed a mobile application that detects acoustic cookies, brings them to the attention of users and if desired, blocks the tracking.

The app is, in a sense, the first available ultrasound-firewall for smartphones and tablets "The most challenging part of developing the app was to devise a method that can detect different existing ultrasound-transmission techniques reliably and in real time," said Matthias Zeppelzauer, who led the project.

Such ultrasonic signals can be used for so-called "cross-device tracking". This makes it possible to track the user's behaviour across multiple devices, and relevant user profiles can be merged with one other. In this way, more accurate user profiles can be created for targeted advertising and filtering of internet content.

Unlike their electronic counterparts when visiting web pages, up to now it has not been possible to block acoustic cookies.

"In order to accept voice commands, the mobile phone microphone is often permanently active. Every mobile application that has access to the microphone, as well as the operating system itself, can at any time without notice: activate the microphone of a mobile device, listen to it, detect acoustic cookies and synchronise it over the Internet," said Zeppelzauer.

Users are often not informed of this information transmission during ongoing operation. Only a permanent deactivation of the microphone would help, whereby the device as a telephone would become unusable. Researchers developed a procedure to expose the cookies and inform device users. For masking and blocking the ultrasonic data transfer, interference signals are transmitted via the loudspeaker of the mobile device.

Thus, acoustic cookies can be neutralised before operating systems or mobile applications can access them. Users can selectively block cookies without affecting the functionality of the smartphone. The masking of the cookies occurs by means of ultrasound, which is inaudible to humans.

"There is currently no technology on the market that can detect and block acoustic cookies. The application developed in this project represents the first approach that gives people control over this type of tracking," said Zeppelzauer.

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The OnePlus Bullets Wireless Z earphones come with a magnetic stripe on the earbuds that pause music when attached.

Xiaomi has finally launched the Mi 10 in India, and with starting price of Rs 49,999, it goes up against the likes of the OnePlus 8 and the OnePlus 8 Pro, which were recently launched in India. Here it is compared with the OnePlus 8 Pro.

The heavy use of smartphones is affecting our state of mind and now, the devices are ruining the sex lives of people too, a new study has found. The

As the novel coronavirus becomes pandemic, people are focused on stopping the spread of germs through largescale quarantines and everyday best practices like hand washing.

Mobile phones host cocktail of live germs, aiding spread of diseases and urging billions of users worldwide to decontaminate their devices daily, warned new study.

October turned out to be the best month for the Indian smartphone market because of the festivals. With the launch of some amazing and most anticipated smartphones

Soon after getting mixed responses for its latest device iPhone 7 and 7 Plus smartphones, Apple is rumoured to release two iPhones that will have curved, bezel-free displays next year.

2016 witnessed the launch of various smartphones built with new technologies and features.

Virginia-based security firm Kryptowire recently reported that there are few Android devices from a Chinese company that are infected with software that collects users’ personal information and conversation made through text messages and calls.

Nearly one in five mobile phones and one in four video game consoles shipped internationally is fake, as a growing trade in counterfeit IT and communications hardware weighs on consumers, manufacturers and public finances, according to a new OECD report.

As Samsung (re)unveiled its clamshell folding phone last week, I kept seeing the same question pop up amongst my social circles: why? I was wondering the same thing myself, to be honest. I’m not sure even Samsung knows; they’d win me over by the end, but only somewhat. The halfway-folded, laptop-style “Flex Mode” allows you […]

Google is reportedly on the verge of stepping up their hardware game in a way that follows the example set by Apple, with custom-designed silicon powering future smartphones. Axios reports that Google is readying its own in-house processors for use in future Pixel devices, including both phones and eventually Chromebooks, too. Google’s efforts around its […]

Apple is said to be developing its own competitors to popular over-ear noise-cancelling headphones like those made by Bose and Sony, Bloomberg reports, but with similar technology on board to that used in the AirPod and AirPod Pro lines. These headphones would also include a design with interchangeable parts that would allow some modification with […]

There are few more messages more timely than the opening line, “Dance your cares away, worry’s for another day” (or is it “worries?”). Today the familiar Fraggle Rock bass line returns, along with the titular felt underground dwellers, as the first of a new series of mini-episodes hits Apple TV+. Apple’s streaming service will post […]

1. Xiaomi Mi 10 vs OnePlus 8 Pro: A quick comparison of two flagship phones  India Today
2. “Too expensive!”: Does Xiaomi have an image problem in India?  TechPP
3. Xiaomi launches Mi 10 with 108MP camera: Price, offers and other details  Livemint
4. Can the Mi 10 Help Xiaomi Be Seen as a Premium Brand in India?  Gadgets 360
5. Xiaomi Mi 10 at Rs 49,999: Why it makes complete sense  India Today
6. View Full coverage on Google News

The Duchess of Sussex called Halifax MP Holly Lynch to thank her for spearheading an open letter accusing media outlets of sexist coverage with colonial undertones.

John Caudwell said 'nearly every wealthy person I know is thinking of leaving the UK including me if Labour get in' as he challenged John McDonnell during a face-to-face meeting.

Researchers at the University of Texas at Austin have developed a device they call a LAMP OSD which can plug into a smartphone to reveal whether a mosquito is the Aedes aegypti species.

Kanchamaiporn Saithong, 35, was found sprawled on the floor of his room lying on top of the two phones after he failed to turn up for work in the city of Chonburi.

WARNING GRAPHIC CONTENT: Supakhet Saraboon, 35, was discovered sprawled across his bed in Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya, central Thailand, on Monday night.

Apple's$149 Powerbeats 4 were spotted at a Walmart in New York over the weekend before the tech giant was able to make the official announcement of the new earbuds on Monday.

Apple and other tech companies have been accused of not doing enough to help French security services access two phones which belonged to suicide bombers from the Paris attacks.

Eleven of the greatest legends of Hollywood - among them winners of ten Oscars who together and $9 billion in earnings - had spontaneously gathered together in a single shot.

The cinematic beauty took the day in her stride as she showcased her personal style in a striking floral midi dress while manning the phones all in the name of charity.

'You look like a Teletubby!' These are words no man wants to hear. I suppose at least they didn't say I looked like the one with the handbag. I'll admit that Grado's headphones are on the large side

They're less bulky than over-ear headphones, and offer noise-cancelling and Bluetooth without making you look like one of Doctor Who's cyborg foes

If you're wearing headphones, what do you do when you have to politely inform someone at the checkout that no, you don't have a reward card, and nor are you interested in acquiring one?

'You look like a Teletubby!' These are words no man wants to hear. I suppose at least they didn't say I looked like the one with the handbag. I'll admit that Grado's headphones are on the large side

In court papers filed in California court on Tuesday, WhatsApp - which is owned by Facebook - said NSO, the Israeli firm, used its messaging service to spy on targets in May 2019.

As one of the world's most popular actor, Chris Hemsworth is no stranger to the perils of long-haul flights. 

Phones 4U founder JOHN CAUDWELL: The lockdown has gripped our economy in a deadly embrace - one from which it may never fully recover.

Mining magnate Andrew 'Twiggy' Forrest and media mogul Kerry Stokes drew widespread outrage for calling on Prime Minister Scott Morrison to dump an inquiry into the origin of coronavirus.

As John McDonnell stood up for his big moment to respond to the Chancellor's spending plans, Labour's MPs were much more interested in their mobile phones than his rambling speech.

The terrorists attempted to seduce the men into downloading a Snapchat-like app where racy photos could be exchanged, but this was actually a malware virus, the Israeli army said today.

Simon Weckert, from Germany, decided to trick the web mapping service Google Maps by walking through the streets of Berlin with 99 smartphones all connected to the app.

Though hardware solutions allow those who are visually impaired to type on mobile devices, a virtual keyboard offers users a quick way to type without having connecting a physical keyboard.

Google's development of a processor for Pixel phones and Chromebooks could materialize a chip as soon as early next year and could help the tech giant support on-board artificial intelligence.