Opera browser sold to a Chinese consortium for $600 million

After a $1.2 billion deal fell through, Opera has sold most of itself to a Chinese consortium for $600 million. The buyers, led by search and security firm Qihoo 360, are purchasing Opera’s browser business, its privacy and performance apps, its tech licensing and, most importantly, its name. The Norwegian company will keep its consumer division, including Opera Apps & Games and Opera TV. The consumer arm has 560 workers, but the company hasn’t said what will happen to its other 1,109 employees.

The original deal, announced in February, reportedly failed to gain regulatory approval. While expressing disappointment that it was scrapped, Opera CEO Lars Boilesen says “we believe that the new deal is very good for Opera employees and Opera shareholders.” The acqisition was approved by Opera’s board, and the company now has 18 months to find a new name, according to Techcrunch.

The company actually makes more of its $616 million in revenue from Opera TV and the other consumer division products that it’s keeping in the deal. “For Opera shareholders we are selling approximately a quarter of the company for $600m, which is an attractive price for this part of our business,” Boilesen says.

Opera is the fifth most popular desktop browser with a meager 1.9 percent share, but it does hold a very respectable 10 percent of the mobile market. The company has been especially innovative in mobile, having introduced built-in ad-blocking, data and video compression and a built-in VPN. It’s unclear if the new owners will continue that trend, but current CEO Boilesen will reportedly head the firm under its new ownership. However, the deal is still subject to regulatory approval.

Via: Techcrunch

Source: Opera

Germany plans to require ‘black boxes’ in self-driving cars

Self-driving cars in Germany might end up having “black boxes” that can record details of accidents, similar to planes, Reuters reports. Sources say that the proposal from Germany’s Transport Minister, Alexander Dobrindt, will also require that riders stay seated in front of the steering wheel, though they won’t have to pay attention to traffic or actually steer. As you’ve probably guessed right now, the legislation follows the recent Tesla Autopilot-related driver death. Regulators and car companies alike will have to work even harder to prove the safety of self-driving cars.
Specifically, the proposal will require the boxes to record data when self-driving modes are turned on. It’ll note when drivers enable the feature, and when they take over for manual driving, to help determine who exactly is at fault during an accident. While it’s only a draft at the moment, the proposal is expected to be sent to other German legislative bodies this summer to be approved.

Source: Reuters

GSK Launches First ResearchKit Study by a Major Pharmaceutical Company

British pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline recently announced the launch of a new clinical study, Patient Rheumatoid Arthritis Data from the Real World (PARADE), which will gather medical data and patient feedback using an iOS app powered by Apple’s ResearchKit. Notably, GSK is the first major pharmaceutical company to implement ResearchKit into its research, which it hopes assists in lessening “the burden of patients in clinical studies by reducing the frequency of doctor visits.”

The company noted that while it’s “not testing a medicine right now,” ResearchKit is helping put it on the path of a medicinal development process — centered mainly around rheumatoid arthritis — thanks to the insight and health goals of each patient that Apple’s research framework provides. Through surveys and the sensors on an iPhone, the GSK PARADE app gathers info on symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis, including joint pain, fatigue, and mood.

“Our goal is to engage with patients in a new way that integrates the research into their daily lives versus the traditional model that requires patients to travel to their doctors’ offices,” said Rob DiCicco, Vice President of Clinical Innovation at GSK. “By making research as easy and accessible as possible for patients, we have the potential to disrupt the model for how we conduct research in the future and ultimately improve patient health.”

The current goal is to track the activity and “quality of life measures” of 300 patients over a 3-month period using GSK’s app. On the patient side of things, users will be able to access a dashboard which shows their own personal recordings and data from the study that they can easily share with their own healthcare providers to further investigate into more effective treatment and recovery plans.

GSK encourages anyone 21 years or older to participate in the ResearchKit-enabled trial by downloading the GSK PARADE app for free on the App Store. [Direct Link]

Tags: ResearchKit, GSK
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Apple Maps Expands Transit Data to Honolulu and Kansas City

Apple Maps has been updated with comprehensive transit data for the U.S. cities of Honolulu, Hawaii and Kansas City, Missouri, enabling iPhone users in the areas to navigate using public transportation, including buses and commuter rails.

Transit routing options in the Kansas City metropolitan area include RideKC buses and the downtown KC Streetcar. Directions extend to most suburbs in both Kansas and Missouri, including Overland Park, Olathe, Independence, Lee’s Summit, Shawnee, Blue Springs, Lenexa, and other smaller communities.

Transit routing options in Honolulu include TheBus buses, with directions extending to destinations across the entire Oahu island.

Apple introduced Transit in Maps as part of iOS 9 in select cities around the world, including Baltimore, Berlin, Boston, Chicago, London, Los Angeles, Mexico City, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Sydney, Toronto, and 30 cities in China.

The feature has since expanded to a number of additional cities and regions around the world, including Atlanta, Denver, Miami, Montréal, Portland, Rio de Janeiro, Sacramento, Seattle, and New South Wales, Australia.

(Thanks, Ram!)

Tags: Apple Maps, Transit
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Pokemon Go server problems: Why does the game keep stopping?

Pokemon Go’s monumental success is being blighted by server problems. It’s been widely reported, right from the start, that the servers weren’t quite up to the job of hosting the game, because it was so popular.

But what do all these server problems mean for the game? What should you do when Pokemon Go has server problems? How will you know if Pokemon Go has stopped working?

Pokemon Go: What is a server?

Let’s start at the beginning. Everything you do online relies on servers: they are the computers or the programs that manage and host the information that all online services need.

This website has servers, Gmail has servers, Netflix has servers and Pokemon Go has servers. You connect to these servers to send and receive information through the Pokemon Go app using the data connection on your phone.

What are the Pokemon Go servers?

The Pokemon Go servers are essential because they contain and coordinate the information that the app on your phone needs. When the app talks to the servers, there will be an exchange of information so that your app is in synchronisation with the game and everyone else is in sync with the game.

For example, if team Valour loses a gym, every Pokemon Go player in the area will know that, because the information is synced to the servers and all the apps are updated.

As you move around the game, your phone is constantly syncing with the servers. It’s this that uses the data allowance on your phone and this, sadly, that keeps failing.

Pocket-lint

Why do the Pokemon Go servers keep failing?

Servers fail for a number of reasons. In the case of Pokemon Go, high demand is likely to be the cause. When a server or servers can’t deal with the number of requests for information, the app doesn’t get a response and the game stops.

High demand can usually be dealt with by adding more servers, something that Niantic Labs is almost certainly doing. You’ll sometimes find that the game is a little slower, and this is almost certainly due to increased server demand.

In the case of Pokemon Go over the weekend of 16/17 July, there was also reports of a DDoS attack. In this type of deliberate attack a server is bombarded with requests so that it can’t respond and the server then fails and no one can get in.

Pokemon Go did confirm there were server problems on Saturday 16 July, posting on Twitter.

Trainers! We have been working to fix the #PokemonGO server issues. Thank you for your patience. We’ll post an update soon.

— Pokémon GO (@PokemonGoApp) July 16, 2016

The issues causing the server problems have been identified. Trainers should once again be able to search for Pokémon in the real world.

— Pokémon GO (@PokemonGoApp) July 17, 2016

What happens when the Pokemon Go servers fail?

There are lots of different results of the Pokemon Go servers failing. Here’s a few ways you’ll be able to tell if there’s a server problem from the Pokemon Go app, running from the least serious to the most significant. 

The app is slow, with the spinning Poke Ball sync indicator in the top left-hand corner appearing regularly
The Pokemon Go app says “error” in a banner across the top
You can’t access a PokeStop, or it says “try again later” when you’ve not collected from it
The game freezes mid-capture of a Pokemon
The game freezes mid-battle
You can’t open the Pokemon Go app
The Pokemon Go app says log-in failed, or that your username wasn’t recognised

For number 1 above, that sync indicator is pretty common, but can appear with very little impact on the game. If something isn’t happening and that sync symbol appears, you know it’s struggling to talk to the servers. 

For the most serious stuff in numbers 4 and 5, this is likely caused because the information generated in a capture or battle is more significant. The app can crash when it’s expecting to update information and it doesn’t happen – you’ll have to restart the app. 

For points 6 and 7, this suggests that your app isn’t getting any response at all. Often in times of high server load, those who are in the game will stay in the game, those outside the game won’t be able to get in. Don’t worry about the username not being recognised: once the server responds again, it will be recognised.

How can I check the Pokemon Go server status?

Some organisations provide status webpages so you can easily check if there are problems and hopefully Niantic Labs will offer something for Pokemon Go soon. 

However, there are a number of websites you can use to check the status of servers, such as Down Detector, which has a specific Pokemon Go map. We can’t guarantee that this is accurate, but it’s worth a check – and this is what it looks like.

Down Detector

What should I do when the Pokemon Go server fails?

There’s a whole range of things you can try and we’ve covered those in detail in our feature on Pokemon Go problems.

Hopefully this information helps through trying to figure out what all the Pokemon Go server issues are about!

• Pokemon Go: How to play and other tips and tricks
• Help! Pokemon Go isn’t working: How to fix common Pokemon Go problems
• Can’t get Pokemon Go in your country yet? Here’s how to download it now
• What is Pokemon Go and why is everyone talking about it? 
• Pokemon Go: Best, worst and craziest places people have found Pokemon
• London through the eyes of Pokemon Go
• Pokemon Go: 11 amazing, mind-boggling facts about the AR game

Maxthon browser reportedly collects sensitive data without asking

Moving to an alternative web browser is no guarantee that you’ll be less susceptible to privacy and security issues. Researchers at Exatel have published a report claiming that Maxthon’s browser transmits sensitive user information, whether or not you enroll in the software’s User Experience Improvement Program. The data includes not only things you’d expect for support, such as software versions and whether or not ad blocking is turned on, but also your entire web history — including Google searches. The info is encrypted (the ZIP file that stores it is even disguised as an image file), but Exatel’s discovery clearly shows that it wasn’t too difficult to crack with some reverse engineering.

We’ve asked Maxthon about the report and will let you know if it has a response. In its forums, the company did acknowledge that it collected info outside of UEIP, but maintained that it wasn’t scooping up anything that “involves the user’s privacy.” That’s an odd statement when history and searches are the very definition of private content. While Maxthon may not be doing anything wrong with the info it receives, there’s a risk that an attacker could intercept that content and use it to learn more about potential targets. And that’s no small issue when estimates suggest that there may be hundreds of millions of Maxthon users worldwide.

Via: ThreatGeek, Myce, Reddit

Source: Exatel (PDF)