Technology

^{Amidst efforts to clamp down on circulation of fake news, instant messaging app WhatsApp has officially rolled out 5 forward message limit in India.}

^{Henceforth, Indian users will not be allowed to forward more than five chats at once.}

^{The forward limit was introduced by the instant messaging app last month.}

^{The company will also remove the quick forward button on the media messages, Whatsapp had said in a blog.}

^{"A few years back we added a feature to WhatsApp that lets you forward a message to multiple chats at once. Today, we're launching a test to limit forwarding that will apply to everyone using WhatsApp. In India - where people forward more messages, photos, and videos than any other country in the world - we'll also test a lower limit of 5 chats at once and we'll remove the quick forward button next to media messages," WhatsApp had noted in its blogpsot.}

^{It further sadi, "We believe that these changes - which we'll continue to evaluate - will help keep WhatsApp the way it was designed to be: a private messaging app. We are deeply committed to your safety and privacy which is why WhatsApp is end-to-end encrypted, and we'll continue to improve our app with features like this one."}

^{WhatsApp has received flak from the Indian government over fake news and false information being circulated on its messaging platform. Such messages have incited mob-fury, triggering multiple cases of lynching across the country.}

^{The government also warned the company that mediums used for propagation of rumours are liable to be treated as 'abettors' and can face legal consequences if they remain "mute spectators".}

^{WhatsApp had previously stated that it had launched new safety features, including a label that clearly identifies forwarded messages and controls for group conversations in the last few weeks.}

^{Rumours on WhatsApp have sparked off a spate of incidents involving mob fury, including one where five men were lynched on the suspicion of being child lifters in Maharashtra's Rainpada village of Dhule district.}

^{The Supreme Court too had asked parliament to consider enacting a new law to effectively deal with incidents of mob lynching, saying "horrendous acts of mobocracy" cannot be allowed to become a new norm.}

^{Sounding the bugle for its annual warfare with Apple right on its home turf, Samsung on Thursday launched its flagship Galaxy Note 9 -- a device with a mammoth 1TB memory, bigger battery and a Bluetooth-equipped S Pen.}

^{The smartphone will be available globally from August 24 and for the India market, it will be manufactured at Samsung's largest mobile manufacturing plant in Noida that was recently inaugurated by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.}

^{The 6.4-inch Note 9 comes in four colours and two variants -- 6GB RAM and 128GB in-built internal memory (expandable up to 512GB) and 8GB RAM with 512GB ROM that can be expanded up to 1TB with an additional 512GB microSD card -- a delight for the gamers and heavy-duty users.}

^{"The Note has always been our showcase for premium technology and industry defining innovations. It is designed for a level of performance power and intelligence that today's power users need," D.J. Koh, President and CEO of IT & Mobile Samsung Electronics, said at the jam-packed Brooklyn's Barclays Center in New York City.}

^{Both variants of the phablet will arrive in India by the end of this month and the price and exact availability date will be announced on August 10. However, not all the four colour models may initially make their way to India.}

^{"The pricing will play a bigger role in deciding whether Samsung wants to fight the Chinese players or continue its focus on the premium customers in India," Satish Meena, Senior Forecast Analyst at Forrester Research, told IANS over phone.}

^{The device that runs OS Android 8.1 (Oreo) will have the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 system-on-chip (SoC) for the US customers and the models powered by Samsung's very own "Exynos 9 Series 9810" chips will head to the rest of the world, including India.}

^{The device will sport dual camera system (12MP+12MP) with dual optical image stabilisation (OIS) at the rear -- with 2 times more powerful optical zoom and up to 10 times powerful digital zoom -- and an 8MP front shooter.}

^{Note 9 with Quad HD+ Super AMOLED display houses 4000mAh battery -- 21 per cent bigger that Note 8 -- that is paired with fast-charging technology compatible with both wired and wireless charging.}

^{When it comes to Stylus Pen (the company calls it S Pen), there is much more to experience this time.}

^{"S Pen now has remote control functionality along with Bluetooth connectivity and extremely fast charging," the company executive explained.}

^{"S Pen can control anything, from YouTube or photo gallery to operating the phone camera. It can guide entire presentations at office meetings. We have opened software development kit (SDK) for S Pen and will soon have more applications and features," he added.}

^{The fingerprint scanner is comfortably located just below the rear camera system.}

^{Note 9 also comes with dust and waterproof IP68 rating (including S Pen) and houses "Samsung Knox" enterprise mobile security solution pre-installed for enhanced security.}

^{The flagship smartphone has also retained the iconic 3.5-mm headphone jack.}

^{Aiming to empower enterprises and consumers to achieve more with its Windows devices, Microsoft on Tuesday added new entrants to its Surface family in India.}

^{The company launched Surface Book 2, which it says is the most powerful Surface ever and the Surface Laptop, in addition to the already available Surface Pro.}

^{"Surface embodies Microsoft`s mission to empower people to do more. Globally and in India, it`s encouraging to see the rapidly growing Surface community in, both, consumer and enterprise. Surface Book 2 and Surface Laptop have created new benchmarks in style, speed, security and enabling creativity," Anant Maheshwari, President, Microsoft India, told reporters here.}

^{Surface Book 2 is up to five times more powerful than the original, the company said.}

^{With PixelSense display, Surface Book 2 gives users the power of a laptop, the versatility of a tablet and the freedom of a portable studio in one device.}

^{The device features the latest 8th Gen Intel Dual-Core or Quad-Core processors and NVIDIA GeForce GPUs.}

^{For those seeking flexibility in the way they use their device, the Surface Book 2 supports four different modes, including Studio Mode, Laptop Mode, View Mode and even Tablet mode by simply detaching the screen.}

^{The device will be available in 13.5-inch or 15-inch options and claims to have a 17-hour battery life for long productivity sessions.}

^{The Surface laptop has a sleek, clamshell design and has 7th generation Intel Core processor and up to 14.5 hours of battery life to last through the day, the company added.}

^{At 1.25 kg and less than 14.5mm thin, the Surface Laptop features a signature keyboard covered in Alcantara material, along with a quiet and responsive keyset, large precision trackpad, and soft palm rest.}

^{Powered by Windows 10 in S mode1, a new Windows experience streamlined for security and superior performance, the Surface Laptop starts up and runs faster with InstantOn and an OS optimised for sustained performance.}

^{The devices are available in online Microsoft stores -- Amazon and Flipkart as well as Croma, Reliance, Vijay Sales and other authorized retailers in India.}

^{For commercial users, the new Surface Pro will be available through more than 150 commercial resellers.}

^{The Surface Laptop is available in various configurations, the starting price being Rs 86,999. One can get Surface Book 2 at a starting price of Rs 137,999.}