Author: Marcé

Initially, it looked like South Africans may have missed Google’s recent outage, but reports have started flooding in of people experiencing issues with some Google services. Most of the issues reported are with the Gmail service, while other apps also seem to be experiencing connection problems.  Some of the other services affected include Drive, Docs, Meet, Groups, Chat, Keep and Voice, which are all experiencing service disruptions. Google has confirmed that it knows about the issues and are reporting them live on its G Suite Status Dashboard. According to the local DownDetector website, people in Johannesburg, Pretoria and Cape Town…

Because it’s 2020, we’re not even surprised anymore. Last night, the credit bureau Experian announced that it had suffered a huge data breach which exposed the personal information of up to 24 million South Africans and about 800 000 businesses. TechCentral reported late yesterday that a suspected fraudster gained access to the personal information of individuals and businesses, but want to ensure customers that they have connected with banks to help prevent any fraud that may come of the hack. At the time of writing, we don’t know which data has been compromised as yet.  The South African Banking Risk…

We didn’t know what to expect from a major DStv showcase, but we didn’t expect the Multichoice-owned broadcaster to announce… wait for it… a rewards system.  Called DStv Rewards, the newly announced rewards system will give back to the people who’ve been loyal to the platform for many years, and of course, those that will sign up come the new generation of decoders that were also announced today.  Although details are scarce about the feature, we know that every DStv customer will automatically be signed up to receive rewards, no matter which package they’re subscribed to. We reckon this will…

Because Google Meet on a smartphone isn’t big enough, you can now use a Chromecast to join videoconferencing sessions on your TV. Google is now rolling out an update that’ll enable users to join Google Meet sessions using devices with Chromecast.  Although we’re not convinced this is the way forward, especially if you’re working from home and have family members who hog the TV during the day, it’s nice to have the option, we guess? This will allow you to see Anthony from finance’s pores in 4K on your massive display, if you really want to.  How does it work?…

Last month, WhatsApp launched the ability to add contacts using a QR code, and we questioned its safety. Now, Facebook’s other social platform, Instagram, is rolling out the same capability.  But this isn’t really anything new for the platform. Remember 2018? Yeah, we know it feels like aeons ago, but that’s when Instagram launched something called ‘Nametags‘ which generated unique codes using your Instagram handle, which people could easily scan it to follow you. This is pretty much the same thing.  This time around, however, the QR codes can be scanned from any camera app that has the ability to…

It’s easy to ask the question, ‘Why won’t someone just stand up to Apple?’. Yet it’s now becoming clear why no-one dares take on the corporation and its regulations. “Apple is attacking Epic’s entire business in unrelated areas,” Epic Games stated in the latest papers filed in its lawsuit again Apple. Well, that’s why, we guess.  Last week, Epic Games, the people behind the massively popular battle royale title Fortnite, served Apple with a lawsuit after it was kicked from the App Store for going against Apple’s regulations. Now, according to an announcement on the Epic Games Newsroom Twitter account,…

This is a twist in the Epic Apple debacle that no-one saw coming, but we’re not surprised at all. People have started selling iPhones with Fortnite preinstalled on eBay for ludicrous prices, following its removal from the Apple App Store. It’s Flappy Bird all over again, only this time people are seriously pissed off.  Shots fired Last week Apple removed the popular battle royale title from its App Store, making it virtually impossible to load the game on any i-device including iPhones. Shortly after, Google followed suit, removing Fortnite from the Play Store. This came after Fortnite developers Epic Games…

“We don’t want their equipment in the United States because they spy on us,” American president Trump said in an interview with Fox News this week.  Following the news that US licenses to trade with Huawei expired last week, the Chinese telecoms company is facing even more flack from the US which could affect its business. The Trump administration is further tightening restrictions by cutting off all access to US technology. Another kind of lockdown The US Commerce Department’s new rules, rolled out Monday, add an additional 38 Huawei affiliates in 21 countries to the Entity List, brings the total…

Huawei’s been facing a long, hard road of dealing with sometimes childish regulations set by the US government. The Chinese telecoms company was placed on the US Entity List in 2019, placing them under harsh sanctions that won’t allow them to trade with US-based companies, including Google.  However, the Trump administration has been issuing temporary licences, which allows current Huawei devices that run Google services to continue pushing out updates. This includes all Huawei devices pre-Mate 30 Pro. Now, the US Commerce Department has ceased giving out these temporary licenses, which means Google can’t push updates through to any Huawei…

Facebook also takes a hit at Apple App Store fee Last week, Apple faced backlash from Epic, the developers behind the popular battle royale game Fortnite, because of its 30% markup on all in-app purchases made on its i-devices. Fortnite is a free-to-play game, which means the devs only make money from IAPs. But thanks