Hack Android and you could win $200,000.

There are essentially two types of hackers out there. Those who use their skills for good and those who use them for evil. Google has recently called upon the former group for an extremely important bit of research; to see if there's an exploit that can remotely affect a wide variety of android devices over the globe, with no information about the target devices given except the phone numbers and Gmail addresses.

However Google does not expect from the hackers to give up this information out of the kindness of their hearts. Google is offering $200,000 for the next six months to whoever finds such a flaw , while the second will get $100,000. Google already rewards people who find bugs and exploits in Google's software but this is on another level. Google's Project Zero team , on Google's blog posted about this contest. What makes this contest special is that before this , the most a person could win after finding a bug was $10,000.

Since there is a lot of money involved , google firstly advises researchers to submit each bug as soon as they find it , rather than waiting until several bugs are found and then strung together into an exploit chain. Google will only allow the person who first submitted the bug to use it as a part of their exploit chain later on. 

The exploit must work on Google's current flagships , The nexus 6p and 5, and they must be running any Android  (7.x) build. The contest includes users to begin with nothing but phone number and email addresses and then compromise that phone without having any kind of physical access to it. 

While the first and the second person to submit the complete exploit bug will win $200,000 and $100,000 respectively, there's another $50,000 to be won by people who come up with other clever bugs.

While many researchers will be down with Google's contest , there will also surely be people that realize that these exploits, to the right party, could mean a lot more than $200,000. Google has posted the rules for its contest on this site as well as a short FAQ. The contest will be over in March 2017, Specifically the 14th of March. Well then, get cracking!

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10 hidden features of iOS you probably weren't aware of.

It's only been a couple of days since the release of Apple's iOS 10 but as usual, the new version of the software was a hit. In just around 24 hours , approximately 15% of Apple's enormous user base upgraded to iOS 10  and after 48 hours of its release over 20% of the user base upgraded to the newer version of the OS. There have been many upgrades over the iOS 9 in this newer release but some of these features are hard to find as they may not have been included during the unveiling of the Software.

Here are 10 of them for you to try out:

Turn your phone camera into a virtual magnifying glass

Thanks to a new accessibility feature , iOS 10 users can now use their iPhone cameras to really zoom in on text or an object at a distance. To try out this feature go to Setting > General > Accessibility > Magnifier. Once enabled , you can activate the magnifier by clicking the home button thrice. The zoom feature with the Magnifier on is much more powerful than the normal camera zoom you would normally use in the camera application.

Quickly access your camera from your lock-screen

If you cant get those important shots at a time of need because it simply takes too much time unlocking your phone and then going into the camera app, with iOS 10 you can directly take a picture from the lock-screen. Just swipe up to the right and iOS will open up the camera app.  

Use Siri to find hard to find photos 

This is a really handy feature for those times when you're not in the mood to search your galley for a particular photo. Siri now lets you search a photo based on the time, date and location of the photo. So for example in iOS you can simply open up Siri and say "show me photos from January 6th"  and you will get a list of photos that were taken that day. You could also add a location and Siri would then provide you with all the photos taken in that location. Furthermore you could use all three variables to get a specific photo. This is a feature which is unrivaled through all mobile platforms and a personal favorite of mine.

Quickly Access related photos.

Apple's Photos app in iOS received a major overhaul. One of the features worth mentioning here is that you can swipe up on any particular photo and iOS will give you a list of related photos. This feature is also very useful and cool. 

Find your misplaced Apple watch with ease

If you have an Apple watch running watch OS 3.0 , iOS 10 allows users to find their watches using the Find my phone app. From within the app the user can erase the contents of their apple watch , place it in lost mode, or simply have the device play a sequence of sounds (if the watch is connected to the internet) for easy tracking.

Quickly browse through only your unread emails

From within the mail app if you click on the icon in the lower left hand corner of the screen , Mail will only show you the list of emails that are still unread. hitting the icon again will bring you back to the normal view.

Limit what can be seen on your Lock-Screen

Thanks to the new "Raise to Wake" feature, iOS 10 users can now conveniently pick up their phones to look at important notifications. This can be quite a useful feature but at times when you have to keep your privacy in check , it can be a worrisome feature as well. 
 However dont worry as iOS 10 has got your back. It lets you control what shows up on your lockscreen so that your personal info does not show up whenever someone picks up your phone. Simply go to Settings> Touch ID and Passcode and scroll down until you this screen 

        
Intelligent photo searching

With iOS 10 , searching for photos has become a lot easier as you can now search for photos by specific people (thanks to facial recognition) For example users can now search for photos that have a dog in them and iOS will give you a list of photos that have a dog in them. You can also search by environments. For example if you search for photos that have a beach in them then iOS 10 will give you just that.

Re-Enable touch to unlock

If you're not a fan of physically pressing the home button first and then putting your finger on the fingerprint sensor to unlock your phone, Then iOS 10 has a fix for that too. You can now just rest our finger on the sensor to unlock your phone. Activate this by going into settings > general > accessibility > Home button and then selecting "Rest finger to open"

Send Handwritten notes and doodles in Messages  

If you turn your iPhone into landscape mode you will notice a squigly line in the bottom right had corner of the keyboard. If you tap that you will be able to send handwritten notes and doodles to the other person in the messages app.

  

 Thats it folks! Hope you learned something new by reading this article. Will you try it for yourself now? Let us know by commenting down below. And also Share if you think this article was helpful!
 
  

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The iPhone 7 does not like razor blades.

 As is the case when any new phone from a tech giant is released, Apple's latest iPhone was also put to through the torture test by none other than the famous you-tuber , JerryRigEverything.

In his video he showed us the many ways he beat, cut and scorched Apple's iPhone 7. He bent the phone until it would bend or break , he scratched the fingerprint sensor and the back plate of the phone with a full blown razor blade.

The Youtuber uses special tools to test the durability of the phones. he has accounted varying degrees of sharpness to each tool and he notes that normally phones would start to scratch at level 6 ( on a scale of two to nine in terms of sharpness). This was the case with the iPhone too as we see in the video. When he got to level 6 , the phone began to show noticeable scratches and at level 7 the scratches were even deeper. According to the Youtuber , Coins and keys wont easily scratch the screen on the phone but anything sharper would most definitely would. 

The real fun then began when he took out his keys to use them to scratch the back plate of the iPhone 7. As expected the matte black version of the iPhone 7 held up pretty well but was still no match for the razor blades. Other than the back plate, JerryRigEverything also tested out the lens on the camera. He came out with the same results as he did while testing the screen. The lens had a resistance level of 6 to scratches , again meaning that keys and coins wont easily scratch it.

After testing the back of the phone he moved back to the screen again. However this time he took it to another level. He took a lighter to the screen to see how much could the screen take before buckling up. The iPhone 7's screen took about 10 seconds before the pixels started getting hot and turned black , but soon after the pixels recovered and the screen became "cool to the touch" , he said.

Then to end it all, He grabbed hold of the iPhone 7 by both hands and performed his spine test. Not even the iPhone was able to survive this as not long after he kept bending the device, JerryRigEverything found out that the display would start to detach from the body of the phone itself meaning it isn't that flexible. he also added that bending it in the wrong way could cause the waterproof adhesive to give way , leading to less protection against possible water intrusion. 

To end his review of the durability of the iPhone 7, he stated that he was happy with the build quality that Apple provided with its latest offering.

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Samsung's Galaxy S7 is better than The iPhone 7 in terms of camera optics.

Among the most hyped features of the newly released iPhone 7 is its camera performance. Therefore it only seemed normal to compare it to one of the best camera phones out there. The Galaxy S7. The Galaxy S7 has one of the best camera's in the smartphone industry right now and perhaps many would even say it is "the best".

However when the iPhone was compared to the Galaxy S7 , the S7 came out on top.  Its a surprise and a little disappointing as we know apple as the company that makes world class shooters to tuck into your pocket.

The Apple iPhone 6s was also compared to the S7 back in March but the S7 still blew it out of the park.  Since then no other company could challenge the smartphone camera King, Until, the iPhone 7.  Everyone had high hopes for the iPhone 7 but were once again let down by apple.

However Apple did manage to surprise us with the dual cameras on the iPhone 7 Plus. The two cameras when combined take great shots but the main feature associated with dual cameras is not currently present in the iPhone. This makes it even harder for people looking to buy that perfect camera phone. 

See for your self the difference betwween the pictures taken on both the S7 and the iPhone 7. 

First: Iphone 7
Second: Galaxy S7

  
Another set:

And another:

Dont get me wrong. The camera on the iPhone 7 is excellent. Its greater than most other smartphones currently in the market and is also one of the best Smartphones in terms of camera performance, Its just that the camera on the Samsung Galaxy S7 (Apple's arch rival) is better. 

Which camera performs better in your opinion? let us know in the comments section down below. 

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Still playing pokemon Go? Pokemon Plus accessory now available for $34.99

Even though Pokemon go isn't as popular now as when it was first released , many users still actively play the game. We've got good news for you if you are one of those people. The Pokemon Go Plus accessory is now available for $34.99 . The package includes a wrist band and a poke ball shaped Google maps maker.

When paired with an android phone running 4.4 or above that supports Bluetooth 4.0, you can catch Pokemon without even looking at your phone. Whenever you're near a Pokemon the device will vibrate and flash green .Then all you have to do is press a button to throw a poke ball. If you successfully catch the Pokemon the device will flash and vibrate again.

You're probably wondering if you can interact with Pokestops with the device. Well you can. The device will flash blue and vibrate when you are near a stop. Then by pressing a button you can receive items. Walking with the Plus accessory also counts steps so those can be used in hatching your eggs.

The accessory is currently available at several retailers such as Amazon, GameStop, and the Nintendo UK  online store . The Pokemon go plus requires 0.37 version of the Pokemon or above and this version of the game currently cannot be played on rooted devices.

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Android Nougat 7.0 has 4 hidden treasures.

Excited to download Nougat?Once you get past the core new features , you'll find that theres even more that you can do. There are a series of hidden features that you can explore to tune up your phone. Some of you might already know these features but for those who dont, here are the 4 big hidden features in Android Nougat 7.0.

1.Clear all button for apps

In previous versions of android whenever you pressed the overview button (recents button) , you would get a list of apps that are currently open and you had to swipe one by one to clear every single app. This could be fine at first but over time could get really annoying. However Android Nougat has a fix for that. The "Clear all" button. Although available in custom android roms, stock android never had this feature baked into it.  

2.System UI Tuner

The system Ui Tuner gives you even more power to customize your phone. To enable it, pull down the notifications bar and go tot he quick setting menu. From there press and hold the settings icon until it spins and you'll get a prompt to enable System UI Tuner. From there you can adjust what you want to see in your status bar and in which order should the icons appear. While marshmallow also had the System UI Tuner, android nougat steps it up a bit and lets you rank different types of notifications in order of importance. 

  
3.Emergency info and contacts screen.

Android Nougat comes with a neat new feature which is also very practical in real life situations. It lets you input some information on an emergency screen and then once you save it , anyone can view that info even if the phone is locked.

You access it by clicking on "users" in your main settings menu and then tapping "emergency information"   

Once there you will have two screens, on the first you can input a variety of information for emergency purposes , such as your blood type , medications you take etc. The second screen lets you list your emergency contacts. Apple had made this feature available in 2014 but this is the first time the feature has natively arrived on android.

  
4.Make any app work in split screen mode

A major new feature that android nougat came with was the multi window function. However now all apps were supported to run in this split screen mode, but theres a way you can do that too. 

Just go into your settings , then go to about phone and software info. Then tap the "build no" repeatedly until a popup shows that you are now a developer. You have now successfully enabled the developer options in your settings. Now go back to the main settings page and go to the developer options. 

At the bottom of the page you will see an option to make all activities resizable. Now you can use any app in split screen mode whether or not its supported.

One of the main attractions of Android is that you can customize the user interface according to your liking and these features will further help you do just that.


 

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Android Vs iOS. How should you Choose your next phone?

Apple's recently unveiled iPhone 7 is a very tempting upgrade , whether you currently have an iPhone or have been considering buying one. But for a lot of people the yearly bazaar encompassing Apple's iPhone event is a reminder that they aren't really certain where they stand between the Android versus iOS debate.

It has been a tradition of Google to make a few jabs at Apple when ever it releases a new version of Android or a new nexus. On the Flip side, not a single Apple event passes by without Apple bragging about how iOS is better than Android. Each smartphone company , whether it be Apple, HTC, Samsung, LG or Huawei, has their own style of building phones and presenting them to the consumers. 

So the question a hand here. iOS or Android? Nowadays the answer to this question depends on less concrete factors. For example the phone's features, specs ad price. People look more at the theoretical factors while looking to buy their phone like a specific operating system that suits them best. This is because on paper , all flagship phones are looking increasingly alike, with comparable specs and focused competitive price points.

In the end it boild down to your own preference, whether you like a particular OS over the other, since most smartphones are capable of doing all the required tasks anyways. Its about the ecosystem that you perform those tasks in , and that matters most these days. For example if you opt for an android phone, you will have to choose from literally hundreds of option and each phone will have a different user interface on top of android, because the only "pure Android" are the nexus devices.

The question about iOS versus Android is a pretty personal one , and while you'll find opinionated people on both sides of the spectrum, its not until you consider your priorities and your preferences that you'll be able to make the decision thats right for you.

 

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