Apple buys AR startup for $30 Million to bolster its own AR headset

Apple has bought Vrvana for $30 million. The AR development company has likely caught Apple's eye for its work on AR headsets which can help the company in its own efforts to create their AR headset. Apple is famously pushing AR as a future interface and its ARKit framework has fueled various apps used on iPhones and iPads and which will likely translate to a headset provided the right components and input mechanisms are available.

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LG G6 Plus comes to Canada

LG is making a larger variant of its LG G6, the LG G6 Plus, available in Canada.The LG G6 Plus offers all of the features of the flagship, like the 5.7" FullVision display, with the added bonus of additional storage and premium sound.    

“We’re excited to offer the LG G6 Plus to Canadians through an exclusive partnership with Videotron,” said Puneet Jain, Head of Marketing at LG Electronics Canada Inc. “Videotron has been a fantastic carrier partner over the years and was actually the first to offer the premium V Series device to Canadians. The LG G6 Plus continues this tradition of firsts.” 

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Android smartphones still tracking user location even if location services are off

An investigation by online news service Quartz reveals that Android smartphones continue to collect and send data to Google even if these settings are voluntarily turned off by users. Quartz says Google is collecting the addresses of nearby mobile phone masts and sending them back to Google. The details were collected even when location services were turned off on the phones, no apps had been installed and there was no SIM card in the phone

A Google spokesperson told Quartz that the cell tower addresses were included in information sent to the system Google uses to manage push notifications and messages on Android phones since early 2017. While it is understandable that Google and its apps require location data for improved accuracy, it is alarming that user settings are so blatantly disregarded by the core OS. Granted, there's no imminent danger of getting hacked or exploited simply by sharing location data, the lack of transparency and the cavalier attitude Google has taken with user location data raises a red flag for other types of user data the company might be collecting. In response, Google is saying that it isn't storing this data and it will turn off the collection feature so it works as originally advertised.

Source: Quartz

Waze and the City of Toronto sharing traffic data to help motorists navigate better

Toronto Mayor Tory announced the City of Toronto will become the next partner in Waze’s Connected Citizen’s Program. This is to help alleviate the growing traffic situation in the GTA.  Last month, .Waze’s third-annual Driver Satisfaction Index found that Toronto drivers are the second-least satisfied of all Canadian cities surveyed

The partnership will create a two-way data flow between Waze and the City of Toronto, benefiting drivers all over the GTA. Waze will have access to the city’s real-time data, better helping drivers to avoid road closures, construction and traffic jams while Toronto will receive anonymous driving data from Waze’s more than 560,000 drivers in the GTA, giving the city additional visibility into traffic patterns for decision making.

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