BAKKACIMA BLOG

STOPCOVID App was released three weeks ago and the French government will be holding a press conference today to give an update on the app. In particular, this conference is a good opportunity to share some numbers. Over the past three weeks, 1.9 million people downloaded the app on the App Store or Play Store. Out of those 1.9 million people, 1,814,048 users opened the app and activated  STOPCOVID . The app can be disabled and you can also delete your personal data whenever you want. 23,953 people have deactivated the app over the past three weeks. And 460,000 people simply uninstalled the app. The government has little information about who’s using the app and where  because it doesn’t ask you to register with your name and address. So, the government will run surveys to learn more.  The government also says that people may feel like the coronavirus outbreak is over in France — there are still new cases every day so it’s far from over.

In a post on the WhatsApp blog, the company has announced that digital payments for people and small businesses have just started. That is to say that  WhatsApp now has a new big feature, which is person-to-person payments. It’s just gone live in the past few hours, though only in one country right now: Brazil. Brazil for now is only the first step, obviously, and although no promises have been made of the feature making its way north to the U.S. or to other countries, it’s highly likely it will. This mirrors the way WhatsApp became so dominant in the first place - its multi-platform presence. Brilliant though the Messages app on iPhone is - and even though it’s probably about to see  a big upgrade announced by Apple in the coming days, its best experience is across Apple devices. Features such as invisible ink text, animated balloons and more are only visible on iPhone and iPad, for instance.

Messenger -- Facebook is really trying to make it private (that only you and Facebook should have access to the theoretically private conversations contained within).   Facebook is testing new ways to secure its app, specifically on an unspecified number of iOS devices, the social-media giant has added a second layer of protection to Messenger's inbox. If enabled, users will need to either re-enter their passcode, or engage Touch ID or Face ID before they can read all their juicy messages.  This is the idea behind the change -- If someone gets access to your unlocked device, this security feature provides an additional barrier that will prevent the bad actor from reading your Messenger messages. Engadget was able to get a statement from a Facebook spokesperson, although there's not much there.  The spokesperson said, "We want to give people more choices and controls to protect their private messages, and recently, we began testing a feature that lets you unlock the Messen...

Vivo just launched new flagship smartphones on Monday - The X50, X50 Pro, and X50 Pro+.  The X50 Pro and X50 Pro+ comes with a feature never seen on a phone before. It's called the 'Gimbal Camera System,' and it's a tiny gimbal module, "modeled after actual gimbals," Vivo says. The GCS moves the camera in the opposite direction of shaking motions, providing clearer handheld shots. Vivo says the system widens the rotation angle, as well as the anti-shake area, compared to other stabilization methods. That means it should be able to compensate for some very jerky movements. The results, the company claims, should be "super clear images." The X50 Pro and X50 Pro+ both have a quad camera setup on the back, with a periscope lens that allows up to 60x optical/digital zoom mix. Only the X50 Pro+, however, has Samsung's 50-megapixel 1/1.3-inch ISOCELL GN1 sensor as its primary camera, notable for Dual Pixel/Tetracell tech, which should help produce very ...

GIPHY is a top source for the best and newest GIFs and animated stickers online, ranging from funny GIFs, reaction GIFs, unique GIFs and what have you. Giphy already powers many of the GIFs you can post on Facebook. But now the social network wants to invest more in the platform. “Giphy makes everyday conversations more entertaining, and so we plan to further integrate their GIF library into Instagram and our other apps so that people can find just the right way to express themselves,” Facebook’s VP of product, Vishal Shah, said in today’s announcement.  According to Axios, the social network is spending $400 million to buy Giphy. But naturally, many people have questions about acquisition. Will Facebook start using Giphy for data collection and ads? What about access? Will the service remain open to other social media services including Twitter? 

Both the Edge Plus and S20 Plus have massive displays, top-tier Snapdragon 865 processors with 5G modems, sophisticated quad-lens rear cameras, big batteries and oodles of RAM. But it’s the execution of these oft-requested features that separates these two handsets, and leads us to a clear winner. The Edge Plus has no resistance against submersion, which is pretty disappointing for a device that costs so much. Additionally, the Edge Plus’ nearly 2 millimeters of added thickness makes it pretty chunky compared to Samsung’s offering, and that will only be exacerbated once you slap a case on Motorola’s phone. Continue reading..

Video Teleconferencing service, Zoom, announced that the platform now has more than 300 million daily active meeting participants. Zoom CEO Eric S. Yuan, last month shared that the company had hit 200 million daily active meeting participants. That means the company has added more than 100 million users in roughly three weeks' time. Previously, Zoom reported that it had a total of 10 million users at the end of December 2019.This incredible stat was shared during a company webinar with Zoom CEO Yuan and later detailed on the company’s website.

The Australian government's new coronavirus contact tracing app which was released on Sunday, was downloaded 1million times in just 5 hours of launch, that is, approximately 1 out of every 25 Australians is using the app.   COVIDSafe  uses Bluetooth to connect with other phones within 1.5 metres (4.9 feet) which also have the app installed. If they are in contact for over 15 minutes (fiftheen minutes), the app records data such as the date, time, contact distance and duration, and the other user's encrypted identification code. This information is stored on the user's phone for 21 days, after which it is automatically deleted.

If you remember the Facebook’s dedicated Gaming app, yes, it has gone live now on  Android. And this is even months before its planned release on june this year.  The social media giant pushed the app out two months prior to its scheduled unveiling amid a global pandemic that’s left people all over the world isolated at home. Over the weekend, The New York Times announced the upcoming release, noting that Facebook’s

It is going to be an entirely new different platform of financial services. The company started exploring the idea lately last year and accessed  possibilities with banks and credit unions. According to TechCrunch, the internal project has led to the creation of physical and virtual debit cards.

The giant instant messaging company WhatsApp is imposing additional restriction on how often a message can be shared on its platform in its latest effort to tackle the spread of misinformation.

Every now and then, WhatsApp does fish out a list of old phones for which support is discontinued and if you have an old phone lying around as a backup, you might want to read on.

Google  might finally be bringing its default messaging app on Android up to speed with Apple's iMessage.