Weekly Wrap-up: Airtel’s Unethical Practices, Oneplus 5 Launch, India’s Internet Trends & More…

It’s Monday morning and time to do a quick wrap-up of the posts published on trak.in last week. If you were offline last week for any reason, this is a great way to catch up with all the tech-buzz!

Internet/Tech/E-Commerce

The 2017 Mary Meeker report shares some interesting stats on how we Indians are using the Internet and are consuming data at a rapid pace, the report credits Reliance Jio for bringing down data costs and mentions the onslaught of Chinese mobile manufacturers, who have dominated the Indian smartphone market.

Flock is a real-time team messaging and collaboration app, which combines the properties of project management, app-ecosystem and business collaboration features into one integrated platform.

Indians are three times more likely to use Iris scan as a mode of security clearance and identifying their own selves, compared to any other country. 9% of Indians are ok to use Iris scan, which is only 3% globally.

According to a report, users of Free WiFi offered by Google and Railwire were the ones most hit by the deadly Wanna Cry ransomware.

A Researcher has discovered a Chrome Bug Which Discreetly Records Audio/Video Without User Being Aware. Unfortunately, Google is in a denial mode regarding this issue and has refused to patch this bug, because they don’t consider it as a security vulnerability.

World’s largest music streaming app, Spotify has been planning to expand to Asia Pacific region for pretty long now, however, the company wasn’t able to finalise anything. Now after years of rumours, Spotify is finally entering the region starting with India, Thailand and Vietnam.

Skype, the Microsoft-owned company has just released a fresh update to its app and made it more engaging for the users. The user interface has been refreshed to make it simpler and more lively.

While cow traders are now choosing online marketplaces for trading cows, in the fear of cow vigilantes, and the law; a co-founder of a hugely popular online travel portal had to eat his own words, and quit Twitter after his insensitive remark triggered a massive backlash.

Business/Startups

In a clear cut indication that some concrete action would be taken against those companies which still haven’t appointed any women directors, SEBI Chairman Ajay Tyagi has said that penalties would be imposed now.

This is certainly unexpected. Govt. of India has decided to re-introduce Re 1 currency note after a gap of 22 years. The last time Re 1 note was printed, it was 1994.

Uber had decided to launch its own digital wallet in India, but it seems like the company will take the UPI route. Android Pay is also coming this year to India, so it made sense for Uber to integrate UPI on its platform.

After a crazy growth in the last 5 years, since the time Ola and Uber were introduced in the Indian market, the companies are seeing huge attrition from their platform. However, despite the efforts of the workers union, Uber and Ola refused to budge from their word.

Deputy Governor of Reserve Bank of India, S Mundra, has announced a series of banking reforms, which will create a more robust ‘safety net’ for the consumers. Besides, the option of bank portability was also talked, which will allow consumers to change their banks, without changing their bank account numbers.

We had heard about companies launching their own e-wallets, but for the first time in India, a State Government has launched its own wallet for the state. The youngest state of India, Telangana, has just got its own e-wallet and its called T Wallet

Amazon has filed for a patent tending to drone safety in India. This means that the company is planning to test this service on Indian shores as well.

Telecom/Mobile/Gadgets

An Airtel user from Sirsa, Haryana has alleged that Airtel retailers forcefully, without any consent, opening Airtel payment bank account in the garb of linking Aadhaar card with Airtel number.

Last week, India launched their newest satellite communications service in association with UK-based INMARSAT. Now, a new satellite phone service shall be extended to all Indian citizens, in a phased manner.

With less than a month away from it’s launch, OnePlus 5 is already one of the most discussed topics on i the ternet. With OnePlus 3T now being discontinued, the company will only focus on the sales of One Plus 5.

The base price of JioFiber broadband would be Rs. 500 offering 100GB (working out to just Rs. 5 per GB). Compared to this, Airtel offers fiber internet at Rs. 999 for 50GB a month, almost half the data usage at double the price.

A lot of companies offer after-sales insurance service, however Vodafone India has just entered this business with its ‘Vodafone Red Shield’ program. Smartphones don’t come with damage insurance and this is what the company is willing to offer.

Just after the release of the Nokia 3310 (2017), Nokia has now confirmed the launch of the next batch of the Nokia devices in the country, which includes the newly manufactured Nokia Android smartphones – Nokia 6, Nokia 5 and Nokia 3.

As per latest details coming in from some confirmed sources, there would be three major changes in the iPhone 8 design, which will force us to change everything we know about iPhones in general.

Andy Rubin, the father of Android has announced a new ‘Essential’ PH-1 smartphone, a part of the Essential product line, that looks stunning with an extremely high screen to body ratio and nearly bezel-less display.

Invisible TV, which is being made by Panasonic, would be first launched in India, among other countries. This way, India will hold the unique distinction of being one of the primary markets for the Invisible TV, which has generated a lot of curiosity in the past few months.

Airtel has asked Department of Telecom to cancel Jio’s license in Jammu & Kashmir, Jio has strongly denied the charges and counter-accused Airtel of retaliation.

We had heard about companies launching their own e-wallets, but for the first time in India, a State Government has launched its own wallet for the state. The youngest state of India, Telangana, has just got its own e-wallet and its called T Wallet

Others

After about two months of discussions and work, Ola has partnered with Mahindra, automobile manufacturer, to launch the Mass Electric Transport system in India, starting with Nagpur in Maharashtra.

Mumbai-based ePayLater, that allows users to check out from their cart immediately with an option to pay later, has partnered with IRCTC to allow users to buy their train tickets now and pay them a few days later.

Income Tax Department has now made the linking of your PAN Card with Aadhaar even more simpler. Now, all it takes is just an SMS to link it. Here is how you can do it right away.

While on one hand PM Modi and Govt. of India is going full throttle on encouraging digital transactions and cashless economy, India’s largest bank, State Bank of India, has some other plans.

In a widely circulated advertisement across almost all mainstream newspapers, Income Tax Dept. has reminded all about illegal cash transactions, and has asked the public at large to report such transactions.

Government has released strict guidelines to ensure safety of Aadhaar data. The guidelines have a whole set of 27 specified Dos and Don’ts which have been circulated among the government departments on how they should be handling all the sensitive data. The document issued by the Centre has a set of instructions, which the government departments now have to follow on a regular basis.

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