United News of Bangladesh

Chinese tech giant Huawei is thinking about rolling out 6G equipment and subsequent networks by 2030 when the world is only just starting to get used to 5G networks and 5G phones. The localised leading global ICT solutions provider's Rotating Chairman Eric Xu broke the news at the company's global analyst summit in Shenzhen.  Read Huawei to invest more in car tech Xu highlighted the importance of unveiling the importance of 6G to the industry and individuals at the conference. The company will also soon unveil a white paper to tell the regulators and players what 6G is. The ICT solutions provider is now working on two things related to 6G. Xu said, "First, we are working with other players in the industry to define what 6G is. We want to discuss with businesses and consumers what 6G will look like." Read Huawei brings financial aid, free service for Asia-Pacific SMEs "Second, driven by our vision and the possible definition of 6G, we are also researching basic science and cutting-edge technologies, aiming to realise the 6G that we define together." End/UNB/M/MA/2126

Walton Digi-Tech Industries, a subsidiary of Walton Group, has launched three new models of All-in-One PC. The PCs of Unify S22 series are available in the market now.  Walton officials said they had previously marketed several models of Unify Alpha22 series All-in-One PCs. The new series has been released with updated and new features. Also read: Walton launches 2 new 2nd generation compressors All-in-One PC is an ideal device for those who feel comfortable working in a certain place for a long time. The devices can also be easily used as a means of any kind of work or entertainment at home. The models in this series include Intel's 10th generation Pentium Gold, Core i3 and Core i5 processors. All the variants have 8 GB 2666 MHz dual-channel DDR4 RAM, which can be expanded up to 32 GB. All models have a 1TB hard drive as well as dual storage for 128GB SSD in the Pentium Gold and Core i3 variants and 256GB SSD in the Core i5 variant. Also read: Walton to export electronics products to Mali, Senegal Also, all the new models feature a 21.5-inch anti-glare full HD display with an aspect ratio of 16:9. The graphics unit has Intel UHD 630 graphics and an Intel H410 chipset. In addition to the Ethernet port, there is built-in Wi-Fi for internet connectivity. Bluetooth is available for file-sharing or wireless connectivity with advanced built-in speaker facilities. A special feature of the devices is its 2-megapixel camera, which is suitable for video-conferencing. Also read: Walton Home Appliance & Electronics Products can make your life convenient The prices of Unify S22 series range from Tk43,950 to Tk56,850 depending on the models. Students can get a scholarship of up to Tk1 lakh while purchasing the device, read a press release issued on Saturday.

Google broke Australian law by misleading users about personal location data collected through Android mobile devices, a judge found Friday. The Federal Court decision was a partial win for the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, the nation’s fair trade watchdog, which has been prosecuting Google for broader alleged breaches of consumer law since October 2019. Justice Thomas Thawley found that Google misled Android mobile device users about personal location data collected between January 2017 and December 2018. Also read: Google celebrates Pahela Baishakh with new doodle “This is an important victory for consumers, especially anyone concerned about their privacy online, as the court’s decision sends a strong message to Google and others that big businesses must not mislead their customers,” Commission Chair Rod Sims said in a statement. “We are extremely pleased with the outcome in this world-first case,” he added. Google is considering an appeal to the full bench of the Federal Court. “The court rejected many of the ACCC’s broad claims,” a Google statement said. “We disagree with the remaining findings and are currently reviewing our options, including a possible appeal,” Google added. The judge ruled that when users created a new Google account during the initial set-up process of their Android device, Google misrepresented that the “Location History” setting was the only Google account setting that affected whether Google collected, kept or used personally identifiable data about their location. But another Google account setting titled “Web & App Activity” also enabled Google to collect, store and use personally identifiable location data when it was turned on, and that setting was turned on by default. The judge also found that when users later accessed the “Location History” setting on their Android device during the same time period to turn that setting off, they were also misled because Google did not inform them that by leaving the “Web & App Activity” setting switched on, Google would continue to collect, store and use their personally identifiable location data. Similarly, between March 2017 and Nov. 29, 2018, when users later accessed the “Web & App Activity” setting on their Android device, they were misled because Google did not inform them that the setting was relevant to the collection of personal location data. Also read: Google gets into sleep surveillance with new Nest Hub screen Google said the digital platform provides “robust controls for location data and are always looking to do more.” The commission is seeking court orders and financial penalties against Google to be determined later. The Australia Institute Center for Responsible Technology, a Canberra-based think tank, said the case “highlights the complexity of Big Tech terms and conditions.” “The reality is most people have little to no idea on how much of their data is being used by Google and online platforms,” the Center’s Director Peter Lewis said in a statement. Lewis said reading most terms and conditions takes an average of 74 minutes and requires a university education, according to the institute’s research, and more comprehensive consumer data protection was needed.

The Treasury Department of US on Thursday slapped six Russian technology companies with sanctions for supporting Kremlin intelligence agencies engaged in “dangerous and disruptive cyber attacks.” But only one of them stands out for its international footprint and partnerships with such IT heavyweights as Microsoft and IBM. That company, Positive Technologies, claims more than 2,000 customers in 30 countries, including major European banks Societe Generale and ING, as well as Samsung, SK Telecom of South Korea and BT, the British telecommunications giant. Also read: Microsoft server hack has victims hustling to stop intruders Its clients also include the FSB, a successor to the KGB that “cultivates and co-opts criminal hackers” who carry out ransomware and phishing attacks, the Treasury Department said. The U.S. said big conventions hosted by Positive Technologies are “used as recruiting events” by the FSB and the GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency. GRU agents are the swashbucklers of Russian intelligence. The agency stands accused of spearheading the hack-and-leak operation that interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election to favor Donald Trump. Its agents also conducted the most damaging cyberattack on record, the runaway 2017 NotPetya virus that did more than $10 billion in global damage, its victims including the shipping giant Maersk and pharmaceutical company Merck. The CEO of the software industry-supported Internet Research Institute in Moscow, Karen Kazaryan, said he was not familiar with most of the Russian IT companies sanctioned on Thursday. But Positive Tech is well-known in the industry for its annual Hack Days conference, which is scheduled for May 20-21 at a Moscow hotel. Also read: Microsoft buying speech recognition firm Nuance in $16B deal Former CIA analyst Michael van Landingham applauded the naming and sanctioning of Russian IT companies known to have aided and abetted malign government activity. “Naming specific companies can create incentives for educated and skilled Russians who might be able to obtain jobs elsewhere where they don’t support Russian state hacking,” he said. Positive Tech’s specialty is identifying vulnerabilities in popular software such as Microsoft’s Windows operating system. The world’s intelligence agencies regularly lean on companies like it not to disclose potent vulnerabilities publicly when they find them but to instead quietly share them for hacking adversaries’ networks. The U.S. did not accuse Positive Technologies of any such behavior and the Treasury Department declined to answer questions about the company’s activities beyond a press release.

Localised global ICT solutions provider Huawei will invest more in components for intelligent vehicles.  The Chinese telecom giant's Rotating Chairman Eric Xu announced this at the 18th Global Analyst Summit in Shenzhen on Monday.  The announcement came after the recent disclosure of the financial report of 2020, where the company saw comparatively slower growth than previous years. Read Huawei brings financial aid, free service for Asia-Pacific SMEs. "Moving forward, we will continue to find ourselves in a complex and volatile global environment. A resurgence of Covid-19 and geopolitical uncertainty will present ongoing challenges for every organisation, business, and country," Xu said. "We believe deeply in the power of digital technology to provide fresh solutions to the problems we all face. So we will keep innovating and driving digital transformation forward with our customers and partners to bring digital to every person, home, and organisation for a fully connected, intelligent world."  Read Huawei posts 3.8% growth in 2020. The first Huawei Global Analyst Summit took place in 2004 and has been held annually ever since. This year's summit, "Building a Fully Connected, Intelligent World," will run from April 12 to 14 with several breakout sessions where industry experts from around the world can share their unique insights and discuss future trends, read a press release. Read Huawei to disclose steady business performance in 2020.

Global smartphone brand Oppo has started a new campaign where anyone can win Oppo F19 Pro by posting picture and video on the company's official Facebook page. The campaign started on April 7 and will continue till April 11. To participate in this competition, the participants will have to take colourful videos or photos that represent AI Color Portrait mode and share the video or photo in the comment box with the hashtag #AIColorPortrait #ColorYourself. Read OPPO F19 Pro Review with Price in Bangladesh Also, they will have to share this post on their timeline and tag at least three friends and family members and make it public. The campaign is open for all. Three winners will be selected randomly and one of them will get an Oppo F19 Pro handset, the other two will get exciting gifts. The winners of the campaign will be announced on Oppo's Facebook page and they will have to claim their prize within 24 hours of that announcement. Read realme 8 Pro Full Review: 108MP prime camera with superb photographic features AI Color Portrait Video is a new feature that resembles AI Color Portrait photo. The feature can recognise the human subject in the video, differentiate them from the background, and retain only the colours of the subject in the video. It works in real-time so users can preview the footage while recording it. This feature even works with up to two people in the shot and also supports both the front-facing and rear cameras.     Oppo F19 Pro has dual-view video, AI Color Portrait video, sleek and smart design, powerful battery, 30W VOOC Flash Charge 4.0 and many more features. This handset is now available at Tk28,990. Read Best Upcoming Phones in April 2021 in Bangladesh: Official and Unofficial

Over 60,000 people in Bangladesh gained digital skills amid the pandemic with the support of Microsoft. The company made the announcement in a media statement released on Thursday. "From laid-off factory workers to retail associates and truck drivers, millions of people have turned to online learning courses from GitHub, LinkedIn, and Microsoft during the pandemic to help prepare for and secure the most in-demand roles, including customer service projects management and data analysis," it said. Microsoft's announcement builds on the company's efforts to help people by extending free LinkedIn Learning and Microsoft Learn courses and low-cost certifications, that align to 10 of the most in-demand jobs, throughout 2021.  Also read: Microsoft server hack has victims hustling to stop intruders The next stage of the initiative sets a new foundation for a skills-based economy through a suite of new tools and platforms designed to connect skilled job seekers with employers.  "The pandemic has changed everything, and the post-pandemic world will be a lot different than what we knew of it," said Afif Mohamed Ali, country managing director of Microsoft Bangladesh, Bhutan, Brunei, and Nepal. "We are standing on the brink of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR), which will fundamentally bring alchemical change and significantly impact all industries, including the job market It has become vital for individuals to learn and improve the skill set that will help them emerge stronger in the post-pandemic world." "So, we have collaborated with LinkedIn to double our efforts to support the development of a more inclusive skill-based labour market, to create more alternatives, greater flexibility, and access learning paths to connect more people with new job opportunities," said Afif. Also read: TikTok owner picks Oracle over Microsoft as US tech partner LinkedIn plans to help 250,000 companies globally make skills-based hires this year through new and existing hiring products.  The company will provide both new ways for job seekers to demonstrate their skills and new tools for employers to connect to candidates based on their skill proficiencies including, LinkedIn Skills Path, LinkedIn profile features, and LinkedIn Skills Graph.  "More and more, we are seeing skills-based hiring becoming critical in our world of work. We've seen people across the globe express a desire to learn and build their skills, and organisations too, are hiring based on skills instead of traditional qualifications," said Olivier Legrand, managing director and vice-president of LinkedIn Asia Pacific and China. "LinkedIn, together with Microsoft, are committed to helping everyone shift towards a skills-based economy. In 2021, we will continue our efforts to equip job seekers with the right resources to pick up new skills, and connect them to opportunities, as well as aim to help 250,000 organizations make a skills-based hire." Read City Bank partners with Microsoft to enable its employees to work from home

Grameenphone has recently launched Grameenphone Explorers 2.0, the second batch of its youth-development initiative, to ensure the growth of skills and expertise among future leaders. The 12-week-long programme officially began with the orientation session on April 1. At the programme, ICT State Minister Zunaid Ahmed Palak said, "Initiatives like Grameenphone Explorer 2.0 are key enablers that help devise how the youth of this country can prepare themselves to contribute to the growth of our great nation and unlock new opportunities for our future generations." Also read: Grameenphone announces 15,500 4G towers in country GP Explorers is an innovative upskilling initiative from Grameenphone – targeted to unleash the youths' potential and transform their mindset towards skills of the future. This year, GP Explorers 2.0 is set to feature a wide range of virtual and real-time engagements between the participants and mentors, focusing on building their communication proficiency, entrepreneurship skills, and digital skills. The programme also targets grooming their personalities to face the immensely competitive local and global job markets. Also read: Grameenphone provides Tk 30 crore to workers welfare fund Also,70% of the learning is designed to take place online with interactive digital tools, and 30% of live classes involve collaborative activities. GP Explorers 2.0 will also hold regular counselling and experience sharing sessions for the aspiring youths' deep cognitive support. Grameenphone CEO Yasir Azman said, "The first season of GP Explorers has seen significant impact from the three-month programme; the-then trainees are now confidently getting into corporate ecosystems. We are optimistic about finding more of such future leaders, this time with GP Explorers 2.0." Also read: Grameenphone introduces portable pocket router Over 1,400 students from 67 renowned educational institutions had applied to be a part of GP Explorers, from where only 357 were chosen to be eligible for the campaign, read a press release.

Facebook said Tuesday it has removed hundreds of fake accounts linked to an Iranian exile group and a troll farm in Albania. The accounts posted content critical of Iran’s government and supportive of Mujahedeen-e-Khalq, a dissident group known as MEK. In many cases, the Facebook and Instagram accounts used fake profile names and photos. Facebook determined the accounts were being run from a single location in Albania by a group of individuals working on behalf of MEK. Facebook found other telltale clues suggesting a so-called troll farm, in which workers are often paid to post content, including misinformation, to social media. Facebook says it removes such accounts based on how they behave, not on the material they post. Read: Facebook data on more than 500M accounts found online For one, researchers found that the activity seemed to follow the central European workday, with posts picking up after 9 a.m., slowing down at the end of the day, and with a noticeable pause at lunch time. Facebook, however, said it did not find evidence of people being paid. “Even trolls need to eat,” said Ben Nimmo, who works on Facebook’s global threat intelligence investigations, on a conference call with reporters Tuesday. The National Council for Resistance in Iran, an umbrella group that includes MEK, said in a statement that that no accounts affiliated with it or MEK have been removed. The group also denied the existence of an Albanian troll farm affiliated with MEK. MEK is a leading group opposing the Iranian government. It killed Americans before the 1979 Islamic Revolution and was labeled as a terrorist organization by the State Department until 2012. Nevertheless, U.S. politicians from both parties including Rudy Giuliani and Newt Gingrich have given paid speeches to MEK in the past. The network of fake accounts was most active in 2017 and again in late 2020, Facebook said. In all, more than 300 accounts, pages and groups on Facebook and Instagram were removed as part of the company’s action. Around 112,000 people followed one or more of the Instagram accounts. In some cases, the fake accounts used photos of Iranian celebrities or deceased dissidents. A small number of the more recent Instagram accounts appear to have used profile pictures that were computer generated.

ZTE Corporation, a major international provider of telecommunications, enterprise and consumer technology solutions for the Mobile Internet, has recently released the 5G Messaging Technical White Paper. The white paper aims at building the 5G killer service to better serve the public and thousands of industries, said a press release on Saturday. The messaging service is the basic service for operators. ZTE, by virtue of its 5G network technologies, took the lead in proposing the 5G Messaging solution. Also read: ZTE launches 5G smartphone pre-sale “With the advent of the latest technological evolution, standard development and terminal development of 5G networks, 5G Messaging is divided into three categories of messaging services--5G Short Message Service (SMS), 5G Rich Media Messaging and 5G Internet of Things (IoT) Messaging. 5G Short Message Service According to the 3GPP technical standards and terminal capabilities, the 5G networks and terminals will support SMS over NAS (Non Access Stratum), which is an SMS function based on 5G NR access. “The 5G SMS still provides the basic SMS services, with the functions and experiences being the same as those of the traditional SMS.” 5G Rich Media Messaging For a long time, the functions and experiences of the traditional text messages cannot satisfy the requirements of users, and restrict the development of industry applications. In the 5G era, the traditional text messaging is upgraded to GSMA UP2.4 with 5G rich media messaging and business messaging services, to complete a comprehensive upgrade of its functions, features, experiences and services. Also read: China's ZTE, local telecom firm start 5G technology trial in Uganda 5G Internet of Things (IoT) Messaging With 5G IoT Messaging standards and technologies that feature massive connections, low bandwidth, and lightweight, 5G IoT Messaging has achieved the messaging communication and commercial applications among objects, people and applications. ZTE is a leading equipment vendor for the global 5G Messaging platform. With rich experience in network construction, ZTE also has the excellent commercial operation experience in the world's largest messaging platform, where single LAN exceeds 100 million user scale and massive terminals are well-adapted. Also read: ZTE data center construction team awarded by DCD