Both Apple and Google are having a hard time regulating all the third-party COVID-19 contact tracing apps that popped up on their app stores recently, as people begin to venture out of their homes. From a report: As The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this month, some of those applications aren't transparent in what they're doing with your data. Now, New York Attorney General Letitia James is urging the tech giants to ensure that those applications aren't capable of collecting sensitive personal health information, to minimize any invasive data collection and to guarantee that they truly delete consumer information. James said in a statement: As businesses open back up and Americans venture outdoors, technology can be an invaluable tool in helping us battle the coronavirus... But some companies may seek to take advantage of consumers and use personal information to advertise, mine data, and unethically profit off this pandemic. Both Apple and Google can be invaluable partners in weeding out these bad actors and ensuring consumers are not taken advantage of by those seeking to capitalize on the fear around this public health crisis."

The European Commission announced Tuesday that it's launching two antitrust investigations into Apple's App Store rules and the Apple Pay platform. From a report: The Commission, the executive arm of the EU, said it will assess whether Apple's rules for app developers on the distribution of apps via the App Store breach EU competition rules. While companies can place their apps on the App Store at no cost, Apple charges companies 30% from in-app purchases and 30% on subscriptions for the first year, then 15% thereafter. Spotify, which competes directly with Apple Music, feels this is unfair and filed a formal complaint in March 2019. Kobo, an e-reader company that competes with Apple Books, has also filed a complaint. Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager, in charge of competition policy, said in a statement: "Mobile applications have fundamentally changed the way we access content. Apple sets the rules for the distribution of apps to users of iPhones and iPads. It appears that Apple obtained a 'gatekeeper' role when it comes to the distribution of apps and content to users of Apple's popular devices. We need to ensure that Apple's rules do not distort competition in markets where Apple is competing with other app developers, for example with its music streaming service Apple Music or with Apple Books. I have therefore decided to take a close look at Apple's App Store rules and their compliance with EU competition rules."

Ahead of Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference starting next week, the company has today launched a new version of its Apple Developer App to better support its plans for the virtual event. TechCrunch reports: Notably, the app has been made available for Mac for the first time, in addition to a redesign and other minor feature updates. With the needs of an entirely virtual audience in mind, Apple has redesigned the app's Discover section to make it easier for developers to catch up on the latest stories, news, videos and more, the company says. This section will be regularly updated with "actionable" content, Apple notes, including the latest news, recommendations on implementing new features, and information about inspiring engineers and designers, alongside new videos.

It has also updated its Browse tab where users search for existing sessions, videos, articles and news, including the over 100 technical and design-focused videos found in the WWDC tab. The WWDC tab has also been updated in preparation for the live event starting on Monday, June 22. The redesign has added a way to favorite individual articles, in addition to session content and videos. Plus it includes new iMessage stickers along with other enhancements and bug fixes. The app, which was previously available on iPhone, iPad and Apple TV, is also now offered on Mac.

In the "quick launch bar" of Windows 10, native app icons "support a shortcut menu for commonly or frequently performed tasks in the app. This menu can be invoked by right-clicking the app's quick launch bar icon," writes the Windows Club site -- adding that Mac users can use similar functionality when opening a web browser from the MacOS dock.

But now Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge are working on similar "App Shortcuts" that allow users to do things like send email or composing tweets directly from the Windows 10 taskbar or macOS dock. Slashdot reader techtsp shares their report: Right now, Chromium does not allow users to start a key task within a progressive web app through the Windows 10 taskbar. This is exactly what Chromium-based web browsers are now trying to change.

This feature will enable web developers to add support in Chromium for shortcuts defined in a Web App Manifest. As a result, Chromium progressive web apps can offer App shortcuts for their quick launch bar icon much like native apps.

The App shortcuts feature is currently in development on Microsoft Edge. Meanwhile, Google Chrome 85 is in the Dev channel.

NBC News reports that in various parts of America, "States that had committed to using contact tracing apps or expressed interest are now backing away from those claims." The few states that have rolled them out have seen only tepid responses. And there are no indications of any momentum for the apps at a national level... A survey of state health officials from Business Insider this week showed that only three states — Alabama, North Dakota and South Carolina — said they were going to use the software provided by Apple and Google. The number hasn't grown since the same three states reported interest last month, and none has launched an app with the Google-Apple software...

Even the World Health Organization has piled on. "Digital tools do not replace the human capacity needed to do contact tracing," WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a briefing this week, adding that more evidence was needed and that the WHO would convene experts to share information...

A handful of states — North Dakota, South Dakota and Utah — launched apps without the support of Apple and Google, but none saw widespread adoption. More states, including Washington, have considered doing so or have launched test versions, and it's possible that apps will gain momentum closer to the fall, when they might be taken up by more employers, schools and universities and at related football games.
Two months ago Google and Apple announced a joint project to build a contact-tracing app -- which was supported by the governor of America's most populous state, California. But now a spokesperson for California's public health department tells NBC News that the state isn't currently using any apps or cellphone tracking technology.

"Most of the contact tracing work (notifying people who have been in close contact with an infected person to prevent the disease from spreading to others) can be done by phone, text, email and chat."

Apple has removed two podcast apps from its Chinese app store, following government pressure to censor content. The Guardian reports: Pocket Casts and Castro were both pulled from distribution in China after the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) demanded that the apps stop allowing content that breached the country's restrictive speech laws. "We believe podcasting is and should remain an open medium, free of government censorship," Pocket Casts said. "As such we won't be censoring podcast content at their request. "We understand this means that it's unlikely that our iOS app will be available in China, but feel it's a necessary step to take for any company that values the open distribution model that makes podcasting special." Pocket Casts said it was contacted by the CAC through Apple "around two days before the app was removed from the store." Castro Podcasts said it was not given a specific reason for its removal, but that it thought it may have been to do with the promotion of Hong Kong's protests in its "discover" section.

Apple CEO Tim Cook on Thursday announced a $100 million project focused on the systemic barriers to opportunity and dignity faced by the black community, with special emphasis on education, economic equality and criminal justice reform. Details: The effort will begin in the U.S., then expand internationally over time.
It will be led by Lisa Jackson, the former EPA administrator who has led Apple's environmental efforts for the last several years.
Apple is also addressing internal issues, promising to boost its hiring of underrepresented minorities and increase its spending with black-owned suppliers. YouTube announced a multiyear, $100 million fund dedicated to "amplifying and developing the voices of Black creators and artists and their stories," according to CEO Susan Wojcicki. From a report: "At YouTube, we believe Black lives matter and we all need to do more to dismantle systemic racism," Wojcicki wrote in a blog post. "We're committed to doing better as a platform to center and amplify Black voices and perspectives." As an example of content being funded under the new initiative, Wojcicki announced that this Saturday, June 13, YouTube will host livestream fundraising event produced by YouTube Originals, called "Bear Witness, Take Action."

Before June each year, content and media platforms in China anxiously anticipate a new round of censorship as the government tightens access to information in the lead-up to the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown. This year, Chinese users lost access to two podcast apps -- Pocket Casts and Castro Podcasts. From a report: Neither apps are searchable within Apple's Chinese App Store at the time of writing. Pocket Casts, which was acquired by a group of American public radio companies in 2018, tweeted that it "has been removed from the Chinese App Store by Apple, at the request of the Cyberspace Administration of China," the country's internet watchdog. When Pocket Casts asked for clarification, Apple's app review team told the podcast firm to contact the CAC directly, an email seen by TechCrunch showed.

"We will most likely contact them to find out more, though we weren't given that option to stop the app from being removed, only as a potential solution to have it re-instated. The very small amount of warning we were given between there being a problem, and our app being completely removed from the Chinese app store was quite alarming," a spokesperson for Pocket Casts told TechCrunch. "We assumed that what they'd want us to remove are specific podcasts, and possible some of the Black Lives Matter content we'd posted."

Apple's stock price hit a record high of $1.53 trillion, making it the first U.S. company to reach that mark. MacRumors reports: Market capitalization is simply the share price multiplied by the number of outstanding shares of the company's stock, yielding the company's overall stock market value. At a current price of around $352 per share and with roughly 4.3 billion shares outstanding, Apple's market capitalization is now at around $1.53 trillion. After hitting an all-time high share price in late January, Apple's stock slid along with the rest of the market amid the global health crisis, with Apple's share price falling 35% from its peak by late March. A strong and steady recovery brought Apple back up to a fresh all-time high last Friday, and it has continued to gain in recent days.

With people around the world self-isolating at home in order to curb the spread of Covid-19, Apple has received a patent for software that would allow people to take group selfies while socially distancing from one another. CNN reports: The US Patent and Trademark Office recently granted Apple a patent for the software that would allow for "synthetic group selfies," or socially distant group selfies. The software would allow a user to invite others to participate in a group selfie that would arrange multiple people into a single image. It would remove the background image from other users' selfies and place them into the user's photo.

While it appears as if Apple filed for the patent as a response to the pandemic, the tech giant originally filed for the patent in 2018 and it received it June 2. Whether Apple decides to move forward with the patented software remains to be seen, but it would be the perfect way for people to create memories with one another while still socially distancing.

Apple is preparing to announce a shift to its own main processors in Mac computers, replacing chips from Intel, as early as this month at its annual developer conference, Bloomberg reported Tuesday, citing people familiar with the plans. From the report: The company is holding WWDC the week of June 22. Unveiling the initiative, codenamed Kalamata, at the event would give outside developers time to adjust before new Macs roll out in 2021, the people said. Since the hardware transition is still months away, the timing of the announcement could change, they added, while asking not to be identified discussing private plans. The new processors will be based on the same technology used in Apple-designed iPhone and iPad chips. However, future Macs will still run the macOS operating system rather than the iOS software on mobile devices from the company. Bloomberg News reported on Apple's effort to move away from Intel earlier this year, and in 2018.

According to Bernstein analyst Toni Sacconaghi, Apple should acquire privacy-focused search engine DuckDuckGo to put pressure on Google Search and tap into lucrative advertising revenue. 9to5Mac reports: According to Sacconaghi, Apple should acquire DuckDuckGo for around $1 billion as a way to put more pressure on Google and capture the advertising revenue that comes from the search industry. As reported by Street Insider, acquiring DuckDuckGo could serve as a 'stalking horse' to pressure Google: "Google is clearly the dominant force in search today. However, we suspect the company's fear of 'rocking the boat' -- which could compromise $15B in profits it captures today from iOS -- may ultimately limit its freedom of action with Apple. Conversely, Apple may be in a stronger position than at first glance, given it controls the keys to the kingdom on who can monetize iOS search. However, it remains uncomfortably dependent on Bing to act as a counter weight to Google -- hence our suggestion that Apple acquire its own search engine. Finally, Microsoft Bing may (counterintuitively) have the most 'option value' vis-a-vis the status quo -- although it remains to be seen how aggressively it will pursue this opportunity." What do you think of Sacconaghi's suggestion? Do you think Apple should cut ties with Google and acquire DuckDuckGo?

The Apple Watch's Fall Detection feature is being credited as helping save an unresponsive man in Chandler, Arizona. AppleInsider reports: Fall Detection, introduced on the Apple Watch Series 4, can detect if a user takes a hard fall and will alert local emergency services if they don't respond within 60 seconds. The potentially life-saving capabilities of that feature were on display on April 23, when police dispatchers in Chandler received a 911 call from an automated voice, according to local media outlet KTAR. The auto-generated message indicated that an Apple Watch wearer had fallen and was not responding, and also provided authorities with the exact latitude and longitude of the man's location. When officers and the Chandler Fire Department showed up, they found that the man had fainted and collapsed.

Apple today informed developers that it has launched a new open source project that's designed to let those who develop password management apps create strong passwords compatible with popular websites. From a report: The new Password Manager Resources open source project allows password management apps to integrate website-specific requirements used by the iCloud Keychain password manager to generate strong, unique passwords. "Many password managers generate strong, unique passwords for people, so that they aren't tempted to create their own passwords by hand, which leads to easily guessed and reused passwords. Every time a password manager generates a password that isn't actually compatible with a website, a person not only has a bad experience, but a reason to be tempted to create their own password. Compiling password rule quirks helps fewer people run into issues like these while also documenting that a service's password policy is too restrictive for people using password managers, which may incentivize the services to change," the company said.

Maddie Stone, writing for OneZero: For the past eight years, I've been working mainly on a late 2012 iMac. I'm no Luddite, but the computer has held up well over the years, and I've never felt the need to replace it. Recently, though, my iMac developed its first serious tic: The fan has started to power on loudly every time the computer goes to sleep. While the computer is long past warranty, I decided to call up Apple to see if the company could offer any help. When I did, I learned my iMac is considered "vintage" and was told Apple won't touch it. [...] According to Apple, "vintage" devices are those that the company discontinued selling more than five and less than seven years ago. Once Apple hasn't sold a product for seven years, it's considered "obsolete," meaning the company won't offer any repair services. But vintage products exist in a liminal space: Despite what I learned when I called Apple Support, Apple Stores as well as AASPs (Apple Authorized Service Provide) can, in theory, repair them for you "subject to availability of inventory, or as required by law," according to Apple.

In practice, people in the repair community told me Apple isn't particularly interested in fixing vintage tech. "The AASPs I've spoken to in the past have told me they don't bother with customers looking to repair older devices," said Rob Link, a right-to-repair advocate who owns a company that sells repair parts for older devices including iPhones, iPods, and iPads. In the past, Link said, he would call up AASPs to see if they had older parts to sell "but I would stop when no one did." "If you're taking in a vintage piece of equipment [to an AASP], outside of them still having something sitting on the shelf from years before, you're not going to be able to get service," said Adrian Avery-Johnson, the owner of Bridgetown Electronics Repair, an independent repair shop located in Portland, Oregon.

Following the rioting and looting from the death of George Floyd, Apple has a message for those who power on a stolen iPhone: "This device has been disabled and is being tracked. Local authorities will be alerted." Forbes reports: Apple CEO Tim Cook sent a message to his employees as those protests escalated, saying that "there is a pain deeply etched in the soul of our nation and in the hearts of millions. To stand together, we must stand up for one another, and recognize the fear, hurt, and outrage rightly provoked by the senseless killing of George Floyd and a much longer history of racism." Cook went on to say that "at Apple, our mission has and always will be to create technology that empowers people to change the world for the better. We've always drawn strength from our diversity, welcomed people from every walk of life to our stores around the world, and strived to build an Apple that is inclusive of everyone."

These words were being digested as the tech giant made the decision to close the majority of its U.S. stores for the safety of those staff and its customers, stores that had only just reopened after the COVID-19 shutdown. Apple has unsurprisingly become a favored target of looters, given the likely spoils on offer, and the decision was taken to remove stock from shop floors and shutter locations. It has long been known that Apple operates some form of proximity software that disables a device when it is taken illegally from a store. Until now, though, little had been seen of that technology in action. Well, thanks to social media, we can now see the message that greets a looter powering up their new device: "This device has been disabled and is being tracked," it says. "Local authorities will be alerted."

Apple has released iOS 13.5.1 today, which the company says "provides important security updates and is recommended for all users," albeit without much detail in the change log. But as noted by Twitter account Apple Software Updates, the update is meant to patch out the kernel vulnerability used by the recent Unc0ver jailbreak. The Verge reports: Apple's support page lays things out more clearly -- the update was designed to prevent an application from being able to "execute arbitrary code with kernel privileges." In other words, iOS 13.5.1 is designed to block jailbreaking. The Unc0ver jailbreak was particularly notable in the iOS jailbreaking community because it was available on the then-current iOS 13.5, allowing users of the latest Apple devices to install new software features outside of Apple's gated App Store.

An anonymous reader quotes Forbes: When Apple announced Sign in with Apple at the June 2019 worldwide developers conference, it called it a "more private way to simply and quickly sign into apps and websites." The idea was, and still is, a good one: replace social logins that can be used to collect personal data with a secure authentication system backed by Apple's promise not to profile users or their app activity... Unsurprisingly, it has been pushed as being a more privacy-oriented option than using your Facebook or Google account.

Fast forward to April 2020, and a security researcher from Delhi uncovered a critical Sign in with Apple vulnerability that could allow an attacker to potentially take over an account with just an email ID. A critical vulnerability that was deemed important enough that Apple paid him $100,000 through its bug bounty program by way of a reward. With the vulnerability already now patched by Apple on the server-side, Bhavuk Jain published his disclosure of the security shocker on May 30.
It applied "only to third-party apps which used Sign in with Apple without taking any further security measures," the article points out , adding that the researcher who found it "said Apple carried out an internal investigation and determined that no account compromises or misuse had occurred before the vulnerability was fixed."

But they also quote an SME application security lead at ImmersiveLabs who said he "would have expected better testing around this from a company such as Apple, especially when it is trying to set itself a reputation as privacy-focused."

"Apple is in the process of reopening 100 U.S. retail stores," reports Apple Insider, adding "as expected, those outlets look a lot different post-coronavirus." For example, the company is performing temperature-checks at the door and requiring facial coverings before entering the store. Apple has also indicated that it will provide facial coverings to customers if need be. As you approach the Apple Store, you should notice some changes right away. In the Lynnhaven Mall in Virginia Beach, Virginia, the Apple Store had multiple employees outside to guide customers into lines — one line for walk-ups, and another for reservations. While waiting in line, an employee asks you a series of four questions and takes your temperature:

- Do you currently have a fever?
- Do you currently have a cough?
- Are you currently experiencing any respiratory issues?
- Have you been in contact with any suspected or confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the last 14 days?

Answering "yes" to any question will prevent you from entering the store, even if wearing a mask. Answering "no" across the board will allow you to have your temperature checked. Apple assures customers that data isn't being recorded...

Apple retail is enforcing social distancing measures by mandating six feet of space between customers, reducing the number of products on display, and rearranging store features to allow for more space between them... If a device is handed from customer to employee, the employee will wipe it down on receipt, before beginning service or operation of the device. There are multiple stations with disinfecting wipes and hand sanitizer...

Customer occupancy and store hours have also been reduced, with Apple encouraging customers to purchase online or opt for curbside pickup when possible.

Bluetooth accessory maker Tile has written to the European Union accusing Apple of abuse of power and of illegally favoring its own products. From a report: According to a report by Financial Times, in a letter sent on Tuesday to the European Commissioner for Competition, the accessory maker said that Apple is making it harder for users to use Tile products on iPhone because it has its own rival Find My app. Tile asked the EU to investigate Apple's business practices, echoing previous calls made by the accessory maker in the United States. Specifically, Tile complains about changes Apple made to location services in iOS 13, which encourage customers not to use always-on location tracking. In addition, Tile said changing these options involve navigating between "complex settings not easy to find."