Google

outsourcing-emotion:-the-horror-of-google’s-“dear-sydney”-ai-ad

Outsourcing emotion: The horror of Google’s “Dear Sydney” AI ad

2024 olympics, AI, Google, Google Gemini, Microsoft Copilot / /
Here's an idea: Don't be a deadbeat and do it yourself!

Enlarge / Here’s an idea: Don’t be a deadbeat and do it yourself!

If you’ve watched any Olympics coverage this week, you’ve likely been confronted with an ad for Google’s Gemini AI called “Dear Sydney.” In it, a proud father seeks help writing a letter on behalf of his daughter, who is an aspiring runner and superfan of world-record-holding hurdler Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone.

“I’m pretty good with words, but this has to be just right,” the father intones before asking Gemini to “Help my daughter write a letter telling Sydney how inspiring she is…” Gemini dutifully responds with a draft letter in which the LLM tells the runner, on behalf of the daughter, that she wants to be “just like you.”

Every time I see this ad, it puts me on edge in a way I’ve had trouble putting into words (though Gemini itself has some helpful thoughts). As someone who writes words for a living, the idea of outsourcing a writing task to a machine brings up some vocational anxiety. And the idea of someone who’s “pretty good with words” doubting his abilities when the writing “has to be just right” sets off alarm bells regarding the superhuman framing of AI capabilities.

But I think the most offensive thing about the ad is what it implies about the kinds of human tasks Google sees AI replacing. Rather than using LLMs to automate tedious busywork or difficult research questions, “Dear Sydney” presents a world where Gemini can help us offload a heartwarming shared moment of connection with our children.

The “Dear Sydney” ad.

It’s a distressing answer to what’s still an incredibly common question in the AI space: What do you actually use these things for?

Yes, I can help

Marketers have a difficult task when selling the public on their shiny new AI tools. An effective ad for an LLM has to make it seem like a superhuman do-anything machine but also an approachable, friendly helper. An LLM has to be shown as good enough to reliably do things you can’t (or don’t want to) do yourself, but not so good that it will totally replace you.

Microsoft’s 2024 Super Bowl ad for Copilot is a good example of an attempt to thread this needle, featuring a handful of examples of people struggling to follow their dreams in the face of unseen doubters. “Can you help me?” those dreamers ask Copilot with various prompts. “Yes, I can help” is the message Microsoft delivers back, whether through storyboard images, an impromptu organic chemistry quiz, or “code for a 3D open world game.”

Microsoft’s Copilot marketing sells it as a helper for achieving your dreams.

The “Dear Sydney” ad tries to fit itself into this same box, technically. The prompt in the ad starts with “Help my daughter…” and the tagline at the end offers “A little help from Gemini.” If you look closely near the end, you’ll also see Gemini’s response starts with “Here’s a draft to get you started.” And to be clear, there’s nothing inherently wrong with using an LLM as a writing assistant in this way, especially if you have a disability or are writing in a non-native language.

But the subtle shift from Microsoft’s “Help me” to Google’s “Help my daughter” changes the tone of things. Inserting Gemini into a child’s heartfelt request for parental help makes it seem like the parent in question is offloading their responsibilities to a computer in the coldest, most sterile way possible. More than that, it comes across as an attempt to avoid an opportunity to bond with a child over a shared interest in a creative way.

It’s one thing to use AI to help you with the most tedious parts of your job, as people do in recent ads for Salesforce’s Einstein AI. It’s another to tell your daughter to go ask the computer for help pouring their heart out to their idol.

Outsourcing emotion: The horror of Google’s “Dear Sydney” AI ad Read More »

loss-of-popular-2fa-tool-puts-security-minded-grapheneos-in-a-paradox

Loss of popular 2FA tool puts security-minded GrapheneOS in a paradox

2fa, android, Authy, Google, google play services, grapheneos, lineageos, ROMs, Tech, two-factor authentication / /

Just a bit too custom for their taste —

Losing access to Authy leads to another reckoning with Google’s security model.

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Scientist looking at a molecular model of graphene in a laboratory

Enlarge / Graphene is a remarkable allotrope, deserving of further study. GrapheneOS is a remarkable ROM, one that Google does not quite know how to accommodate, due to its “tiny, tiny” user numbers compared to mainstream Android.

“If it’s not an official OS, we have to assume it’s bad.”

That’s how Shawn Wilden, the tech lead for hardware-backed security in Android, described the current reality of custom Android-based operating systems in response to a real security conundrum. GrapheneOS users discovered recently that Authy, a popular (and generally well-regarded) two-factor authentication manager, will not work on their phones—phones running an OS intended to be more secure and hardened than any standard Android phone.

“We don’t want to punish users of alternative OSes, but there’s really no other option at the moment,” Wilden added before his blunt conclusion. “Play Integrity has absolutely no way to guess whether a given custom OS completely subverts the Android security model.”

Play Integrity, formerly SafetyNet Attestation, essentially allows apps to verify whether an Android device has provided permissions beyond Google’s intended models or has been rooted. Root access is not appealing to the makers of some apps involving banking, payments, competitive games, and copyrighted media.]

There are many reasons beyond cheating and skulduggery that someone might root or modify their Android device. But to prove itself secure, an Android device must contact Google’s servers through an API in Google Play Services and then have its bootloader, ROM signature, and kernel verified. GrapheneOS, like most custom Android ROMs, does not contain a Google Play Services package by default but will let users install a sandboxed version of Play Services if they wish.

Wilden offered some hope for a future in which ROMs could vouch for their non-criminal nature to Google, noting “some discussions with makers of high-quality ROMs” about passing the Compatibility Test Suite, then “establishing some kind of relationship we can use to trust them.” But it’s “a lot of work on both sides, including by lawyers,” Wilden notes. And while his team is happy to help, higher-level support is tough because “modders are such a tiny, tiny fraction of the user base.”

The official GrapheneOS X account was less hopeful. It noted that another custom ROM, LineageOS, disabled verified boot at installation, and “rolls back security in a lot of other ways,” contributing to “a misconception that every alternate OS rolls back security and isn’t production quality.” A typical LineageOS installation, like most custom ROMs, does disable verified boot, though it can be re-enabled, except it’s risky and complicated. GrapheneOS has a page on its site regarding its stance on, and criticisms of, Google’s attestation model for Android.

Ars has reached out to Google, GrapheneOS, and Authy (via owner Twilio) for comment. At the moment, it doesn’t seem like there’s a clear path forward for any party unless one of them is willing to majorly rework what they consider proper security.

Loss of popular 2FA tool puts security-minded GrapheneOS in a paradox Read More »

google-claims-math-breakthrough-with-proof-solving-ai-models

Google claims math breakthrough with proof-solving AI models

AI, AlphaGeometry, AlphaGeometry 2, AlphaProof, Biz & IT, Google, google deepmind, machine learning / /

slow and steady —

AlphaProof and AlphaGeometry 2 solve problems, with caveats on time and human assistance.

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An illustration provided by Google.

Enlarge / An illustration provided by Google.

On Thursday, Google DeepMind announced that AI systems called AlphaProof and AlphaGeometry 2 reportedly solved four out of six problems from this year’s International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO), achieving a score equivalent to a silver medal. The tech giant claims this marks the first time an AI has reached this level of performance in the prestigious math competition—but as usual in AI, the claims aren’t as clear-cut as they seem.

Google says AlphaProof uses reinforcement learning to prove mathematical statements in the formal language called Lean. The system trains itself by generating and verifying millions of proofs, progressively tackling more difficult problems. Meanwhile, AlphaGeometry 2 is described as an upgraded version of Google’s previous geometry-solving AI modeI, now powered by a Gemini-based language model trained on significantly more data.

According to Google, prominent mathematicians Sir Timothy Gowers and Dr. Joseph Myers scored the AI model’s solutions using official IMO rules. The company reports its combined system earned 28 out of 42 possible points, just shy of the 29-point gold medal threshold. This included a perfect score on the competition’s hardest problem, which Google claims only five human contestants solved this year.

A math contest unlike any other

The IMO, held annually since 1959, pits elite pre-college mathematicians against exceptionally difficult problems in algebra, combinatorics, geometry, and number theory. Performance on IMO problems has become a recognized benchmark for assessing an AI system’s mathematical reasoning capabilities.

Google states that AlphaProof solved two algebra problems and one number theory problem, while AlphaGeometry 2 tackled the geometry question. The AI model reportedly failed to solve the two combinatorics problems. The company claims its systems solved one problem within minutes, while others took up to three days.

Google says it first translated the IMO problems into formal mathematical language for its AI model to process. This step differs from the official competition, where human contestants work directly with the problem statements during two 4.5-hour sessions.

Google reports that before this year’s competition, AlphaGeometry 2 could solve 83 percent of historical IMO geometry problems from the past 25 years, up from its predecessor’s 53 percent success rate. The company claims the new system solved this year’s geometry problem in 19 seconds after receiving the formalized version.

Limitations

Despite Google’s claims, Sir Timothy Gowers offered a more nuanced perspective on the Google DeepMind models in a thread posted on X. While acknowledging the achievement as “well beyond what automatic theorem provers could do before,” Gowers pointed out several key qualifications.

“The main qualification is that the program needed a lot longer than the human competitors—for some of the problems over 60 hours—and of course much faster processing speed than the poor old human brain,” Gowers wrote. “If the human competitors had been allowed that sort of time per problem they would undoubtedly have scored higher.”

Gowers also noted that humans manually translated the problems into the formal language Lean before the AI model began its work. He emphasized that while the AI performed the core mathematical reasoning, this “autoformalization” step was done by humans.

Regarding the broader implications for mathematical research, Gowers expressed uncertainty. “Are we close to the point where mathematicians are redundant? It’s hard to say. I would guess that we’re still a breakthrough or two short of that,” he wrote. He suggested that the system’s long processing times indicate it hasn’t “solved mathematics” but acknowledged that “there is clearly something interesting going on when it operates.”

Even with these limitations, Gowers speculated that such AI systems could become valuable research tools. “So we might be close to having a program that would enable mathematicians to get answers to a wide range of questions, provided those questions weren’t too difficult—the kind of thing one can do in a couple of hours. That would be massively useful as a research tool, even if it wasn’t itself capable of solving open problems.”

Google claims math breakthrough with proof-solving AI models Read More »

chrome-will-now-prompt-some-users-to-send-passwords-for-suspicious-files

Chrome will now prompt some users to send passwords for suspicious files

Biz & IT, chrome, Google, passwords, safe browsing, Security / /

SAFE BROWSING —

Google says passwords and files will be deleted shortly after they are deep-scanned.

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Chrome will now prompt some users to send passwords for suspicious files

Google is redesigning Chrome malware detections to include password-protected executable files that users can upload for deep scanning, a change the browser maker says will allow it to detect more malicious threats.

Google has long allowed users to switch on the Enhanced Mode of its Safe Browsing, a Chrome feature that warns users when they’re downloading a file that’s believed to be unsafe, either because of suspicious characteristics or because it’s in a list of known malware. With Enhanced Mode turned on, Google will prompt users to upload suspicious files that aren’t allowed or blocked by its detection engine. Under the new changes, Google will prompt these users to provide any password needed to open the file.

Beware of password-protected archives

In a post published Wednesday, Jasika Bawa, Lily Chen, and Daniel Rubery of the Chrome Security team wrote:

Not all deep scans can be conducted automatically. A current trend in cookie theft malware distribution is packaging malicious software in an encrypted archive—a .zip, .7z, or .rar file, protected by a password—which hides file contents from Safe Browsing and other antivirus detection scans. In order to combat this evasion technique, we have introduced two protection mechanisms depending on the mode of Safe Browsing selected by the user in Chrome.

Attackers often make the passwords to encrypted archives available in places like the page from which the file was downloaded, or in the download file name. For Enhanced Protection users, downloads of suspicious encrypted archives will now prompt the user to enter the file’s password and send it along with the file to Safe Browsing so that the file can be opened and a deep scan may be performed. Uploaded files and file passwords are deleted a short time after they’re scanned, and all collected data is only used by Safe Browsing to provide better download protections.

Enter a file password to send an encrypted file for a malware scan

Enlarge / Enter a file password to send an encrypted file for a malware scan

Google

For those who use Standard Protection mode which is the default in Chrome, we still wanted to be able to provide some level of protection. In Standard Protection mode, downloading a suspicious encrypted archive will also trigger a prompt to enter the file’s password, but in this case, both the file and the password stay on the local device and only the metadata of the archive contents are checked with Safe Browsing. As such, in this mode, users are still protected as long as Safe Browsing had previously seen and categorized the malware.

Sending Google an executable casually downloaded from a site advertising a screensaver or media player is likely to generate little if any hesitancy. For more sensitive files such as a password-protected work archive, however, there is likely to be more pushback. Despite the assurances the file and password will be deleted promptly, things sometimes go wrong and aren’t discovered for months or years, if at all. People using Chrome with Enhanced Mode turned on should exercise caution.

A second change Google is making to Safe Browsing is a two-tiered notification system when users are downloading files. They are:

  1. Suspicious files, meaning those Google’s file-vetting engine have given a lower-confidence verdict, with unknown risk of user harm
  2. Dangerous files, or those with a high confidence verdict that they pose a high risk of user harm

The new tiers are highlighted by iconography, color, and text in an attempt to make it easier for users to easily distinguish between the differing levels of risk. “Overall, these improvements in clarity and consistency have resulted in significant changes in user behavior, including fewer warnings bypassed, warnings heeded more quickly, and all in all, better protection from malicious downloads,” the Google authors wrote.

Previously, Safe Browsing notifications looked like this:

Differentiation between suspicious and dangerous warnings.

Enlarge / Differentiation between suspicious and dangerous warnings.

Google

Over the past year, Chrome hasn’t budged on its continued support of third-party cookies, a decision that allows companies large and small to track users of that browser as they navigate from website to website to website. Google’s alternative to tracking cookies, known as the Privacy Sandbox, has also received low marks from privacy advocates because it tracks user interests based on their browser usage.

That said, Chrome has long been a leader in introducing protections, such as a security sandbox that cordons off risky code so it can’t mingle with sensitive data and operating system functions. Those who stick with Chrome should at a minimum keep Standard Mode Safe Browsing on. Users with the experience required to judiciously choose which files to send to Google should consider turning on Enhanced Mode.

Chrome will now prompt some users to send passwords for suspicious files Read More »

ars-is-seeking-a-seasoned-senior-reporter-for-all-things-google

Ars is seeking a seasoned senior reporter for all things Google

android, ars, Feature, Google, hiring, jobs at ars, Staff, Tech / /

get your ron on —

Got feelings about the future of AI and/or phone bezel width? Come apply!

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A photograph of

Enlarge / If you get hired for this position, you’ll be provided an assistant. It’s this guy. This guy is your assistant. His name is “Googly.”

Google is a company in transformation—but “from what“ and “to what“ are not always clear. To catalog and examine Google’s moves in this new era of generative AI, Ars Technica is hiring a Senior Technology Reporter to focus on Google, AI, Android, and search. While attention to so-called “consumer products” will be important, this role will be more focused on Google’s big moves as a technology and infrastructure company, moves often made to counter perceived threats from companies like OpenAI, Microsoft, and Perplexity. Informed skepticism is the rule around here, so we’re looking for someone with the chops to bring a critical eye to some deep technical and business issues.

As this is a senior role owning an important beat, it is not an entry-level position. We’re looking for someone who can primarily self-direct when it comes to their reporting and someone who is comfortable working remotely within a similarly remote team. We’d also like someone who can bring to the table deep and intelligent analyses on broader Google topics while also hitting smaller daily news stories.

This is a full-time union job with benefits.

All candidates:

  • Must have prior professional experience in technology journalism
  • Must be living in and eligible to work in the United States
  • Should expect to travel two to three times per year for major event coverage
  • Must be comfortable with fully remote work

The full job description and official details can all be found at the listing on the Condé Careers site. If this sounds like the job for you, please apply!

Ars is seeking a seasoned senior reporter for all things Google Read More »

google’s-play-store-wants-to-pivot-from-grab-and-go-to-an-active-destination

Google’s Play Store wants to pivot from grab-and-go to an active destination

advertising, AI, AI summaries, app stores, Google, google play games, Google Play Store, play store, Tech / /

It’s still a store, just with a different product —

If multi-app shopping doesn’t keep you there, maybe free Pixel gear will.

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Enlarge / I like the idea of clicking “Realistic,” “MMORPG,” and “Word” boxes, just to see what comes back.

Google

Google Play is a lot of things—perhaps too many things for those who just want to install some apps. If that’s how you feel, you might find “Google Play’s next chapter” a bit bewildering, as Google hopes to make it “more than a store.” Or you might start thinking about how to turn Play Points into a future Pixel phone.

Google Play’s “new way to Play.”

In a blog post about “How we’re evolving Google Play,” VP and General Manager of Google Play Sam Bright outlines the big changes to Google Play:

  • AI-generated app reviews and summaries, along with app comparisons
  • “Curated spaces” for interests, showing content from apps related to one thing (like cricket, and Japanese comics)
  • Game recommendations based on genres and features you select.
  • Google Play Games on PC can pick up where you left off in games played on mobile and can soon play multiple titles at the same time on desktop.
  • Play Points enthusiasts who are in the Diamond, Platinum, or Gold levels can win Pixel devices, Razer gaming products, and other gear, along with other game and access perks.

Those are the upgrades to existing Play features. The big new thing is Collections, which, like the “curated spaces,” takes content from apps you already have installed and organizes them around broad categories. I spotted “Watch,” “Listen,” “Read,” “Games,” “Social,” “Shop,” and “Food” in Google’s animated example. You can toggle individual apps feeding into the Collections in the settings.

It’s hard not to look at Google Play’s new focus on having users actively express their interests in certain topics and do their shopping inside a fully Google-ized space, against the timing of yesterday’s announcement regarding third-party cookies. Maybe that connection isn’t apparent right off, but bear with me.

The Play Store is still contractually installed on the vast majority of Android devices, but competition and changes could be coming following Google’s loss to Epic in an antitrust trial and proposed remedies Google deeply dislikes. Meanwhile, the Play Store and Google’s alleged non-compliance with new regulations, like allowing developers to notify customers about payment options outside the store, are under investigation.

If the tide turns against tracking users across apps, websites, and stores, and if the Play Store becomes non-required for browsing and purchasing apps, it’s in Google’s interests to get people actively committing to things they want to see more about on their phone screens. It’s a version of what Chrome is doing with its Privacy Sandbox and its “Topics” that it can flag for advertisers. Google’s video for the new Play experience suggests “turning a sea of apps into a world of discovery.” The prompt “What are you interested in?” works for the parties on both ends of Google’s Play space.

Google’s Play Store wants to pivot from grab-and-go to an active destination Read More »

google-halts-its-4-plus-year-plan-to-turn-off-tracking-cookies-by-default-in-chrome

Google halts its 4-plus-year plan to turn off tracking cookies by default in Chrome

Apple, chrome, Firefox, Floc, Google, google chrome, mozilla, privacy sandbox, Tech, third party cookies, tracking cookies / /

Filling, but not nutritious —

A brief history of Google’s ideas, proposals, and APIs for cookie replacements.

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A woman in a white knit sweater, holding a Linzer cookie (with jam inside a heart cut-out) in her crossed palms.

Enlarge / Google, like most of us, has a hard time letting go of cookies. Most of us just haven’t created a complex set of APIs and brokered deals across regulation and industry to hold onto the essential essence of cookies.

Getty Images

Google has an announcement today: It’s not going to do something it has thought about, and tinkered with, for quite some time.

Most people who just use the Chrome browser, rather than develop for it or try to serve ads to it, are not going to know what “A new path for Privacy Sandbox on the web” could possibly mean. The very short version is that Google had a “path,” first announced in January 2020, to turn off third-party (i.e., tracking) cookies in the most-used browser on Earth, bringing it in line with Safari, Firefox, and many other browsers. Google has proposed several alternatives to the cookies that follow you from page to page, constantly pitching you on that space heater you looked at three days ago. Each of these alternatives has met varying amounts of resistance from privacy and open web advocates, trade regulators, and the advertising industry.

So rather than turn off third-party cookies by default and implement new solutions inside the Privacy Sandbox, Chrome will “introduce a new experience” that lets users choose their tracking preferences when they update or first use Chrome. Google will also keep working on its Privacy Sandbox APIs but in a way that recognizes the “impact on publishers, advertisers, and everyone involved in online advertising.” Google also did not fail to mention it was “discussing this new path with regulators.”

Why today? What does it really mean? Let’s journey through more than four and a half years of Google’s moves to replace third-party cookies, without deeply endangering its standing as the world’s largest advertising provider.

2017–2022: FLoC or “What if machines tracked you, not cookies?”

Google’s big moves toward a standstill likely started at Apple headquarters. Its operating system updates in the fall of 2017 implemented a 24-hour time limit on ad-targeting cookies in Safari, the default browser on Macs and iOS devices. A “Coalition of Major Advertising Trade Associations” issued a sternly worded letter opposing this change, stating it would “drive a wedge between brands and their customers” and make advertising “more generic and less timely and useful.”

By the summer of 2019, Firefox was ready to simply block tracking cookies by default. Google, which makes the vast majority of its money through online advertising, made a different, broader argument against dropping third-party cookies. To paraphrase: Trackers will track, and if we don’t give them a proper way to do it, they’ll do it the dirty way by fingerprinting browsers based on version numbers, fonts, screen size, and other identifiers. Google said it had some machine learning that could figure out when it was good to share your browsing habits. For example:

New technologies like Federated Learning show that it’s possible for your browser to avoid revealing that you are a member of a group that likes Beyoncé and sweater vests until it can be sure that group contains thousands of other people.

In January 2020, Google shifted its argument from “along with” to “instead of” third-party cookies. Chrome Engineering Director Justin Schuh wrote, “Building a more private Web: A path towards making third party cookies obsolete,” suggesting that broad support for Chrome’s privacy sandbox tools would allow for dropping third-party cookies entirely. Privacy advocate Ben Adida described the move as “delivering teeth” and “a big deal.” Feedback from the W3C and other parties, Schuh wrote at that time, “gives us confidence that solutions in this space can work.”

Google's explanatory graphic for FLoC, or Federated Learning of Cohorts.

Google’s explanatory graphic for FLoC, or Federated Learning of Cohorts.

Google

As Google developed its replacement for third-party cookies, the path grew trickier and the space more perilous. The Electronic Frontier Foundation described Google’s FLoC, or the “Federated Learning of Cohorts” that would let Chrome machine-learn your profile for sites and ads, as “A Terrible Idea.” The EFF was joined by Mozilla, Apple, WordPress, DuckDuckGo, and lots of browsers based on Chrome’s core Chromium code in being either opposed or non-committal to FLoC. Google pushed back testing FLOC until late 2022 and third-party cookie removal (and thereby FLoC implementation) until mid-2023.

By early 2022, FLoC didn’t have a path forward. Google pivoted to a Topics API, which would give users a bit more control over which topics (“Rock Music,” “Auto & Vehicles”) would be transmitted to potential advertisers. It would certainly improve over third-party cookies, which are largely inscrutable in naming and offer the user only one privacy policy: block them, or delete them all and lose lots of logins.

Google halts its 4-plus-year plan to turn off tracking cookies by default in Chrome Read More »

google,-its-cat-fully-escaped-from-bag,-shows-off-the-pixel-9-pro-weeks-early

Google, its cat fully escaped from bag, shows off the Pixel 9 Pro weeks early

Gemini, gemini ai, Google, Google Gemini, Google Pixel, google pixel 9, google pixel 9 pro, ncc, Tech / /

Google Pixel 9 Series —

Upcoming phone is teased with an AI breakup letter to “the same old thing.”

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Top part of rear of Pixel 9 Pro, with

Enlarge / You can have confirmation of one of our upcoming four phones, but you have to hear us talk about AI again. Deal?

Google

After every one of its house-brand phones, and even its new wall charger, have been meticulously photographed, sized, and rated for battery capacity, what should Google do to keep the anticipation up for the Pixel 9 series’ August 13 debut?

Lean into it, it seems, and Google is doing so with an eye toward further promoting its Gemini-based AI aims. In a video post on X (formerly Twitter), Google describes a “phone built for the Gemini era,” one that can, through the power of Gemini, “even let your old phone down easy” with a breakup letter. The camera pans out, and the shape of the Pixel 9 Pro appears and turns around to show off the now-standard Pixel camera bar across the upper back.

There’s also a disclaimer to this tongue-in-cheek request for a send-off to a phone that is “just the same old thing”: “Screen simulated. Limitations apply. Check responses for accuracy.”

Over at the Google Store, you can see a static image of the Pixel 9 Pro and sign up for alerts about its availability. The image confirms that the photos taken by Taiwanese regulatory authority NCC were legitimate, right down to the coloring on the back of the Pixel 9 Pro and the camera and flash placement.

Those NCC photos confirmed that Google intends to launch four different phone-ish devices at its August 13 “Made by Google” event. The Pixel 9 and Pixel 9 Pro are both roughly 6.1-inch devices, but the Pro will likely offer more robust Gemini AI integration due to increased RAM and other spec bumps. The Pixel 9 Pro XL should have similarly AI-ready specs, just in a larger size. And the Pixel 9 Pro Fold is an iteration on Google’s first Pixel Fold model, with seemingly taller dimensions and a daringly smaller battery.

Google, its cat fully escaped from bag, shows off the Pixel 9 Pro weeks early Read More »

real,-actual-markdown-support-is-arriving-in-google-docs,-not-a-moment-too-soon

Real, actual Markdown support is arriving in Google Docs, not a moment too soon

aaron swartz, Google, Google Docs, Google drive, John Gruber, Markdown, markup, Tech, technical writing / /

### _Finally!_ —

It’s a big day for typing in plain-text fashion, for the good of syntax.

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Illustration of a factory machine, with a conveyer belt moving markup characters like and ## into a machine with the Google Docs logo.

Enlarge / In goes the sensible characters, out goes a document for which you almost always have to adjust the sharing permissions.

Aurich Lawson | Getty Images

The best time to truly implement the Markdown markup language into Google Docs was in the early 2010s, but yesterday was a pretty good time, too.

Google Docs was born from the conjoined features of a series of software company acquisitions (Writely, DocVerse, and QuickOffice), plus the remains of Google Wave, smooshed together into Drive by 2012. By that point, Markdown, a project of web writer John Gruber with input from data activist Aaron Swartz, had been solidified and gathering steam for about eight years. Then, for another decade or so, writing in Markdown and writing in Google Docs were two different things, joined together only through browser extensions or onerous import/export tools. An uncountable number of cloud-syncing, collaboration-friendly but Markdown-focused writing tools flourished in that chasm.

In early 2022, the first connecting plank was placed: Docs could “Automatically detect Markdown,” if you enabled it. This expanded the cursory support for numbered and unordered lists and checkboxes to the big items, like headlines, italics, bold, strikethrough, and links. You could write in Markdown in Docs, but you could not paste, nor could you import or export between Docs and Markdown styling.

Now, or at some point in the next 14 days, real, actual Markdown work can be done in Google Docs. Docs can convert Markdown text to its equivalent Docs formatting on paste or when imported as a file, and it can export to Markdown from the copy menu or as a file. Google’s blog post notes that this is “particularly useful for technical content writers as they can now convert Docs content to/from Markdown,” so as to use Google’s always-on syncing and collaboration in the interim stages.

As someone who doesn’t work as a technical content writer (at least in proper job title fashion), but does write a lot, allow me to say that this is also particularly useful for people who adopted Markdown as a kind of One True Style. It is hard to avoid being invited to collaborate on Google Docs, even if you primarily work elsewhere. It is even harder to remember all the different shortcuts for headlines, bullet points, and other text elements across various apps, web apps, content management systems, IDEs, and other writing platforms.

There’s no indication of which flavor of Markdown Google’s import and export functions will hew to, and Ars was unable to test the new function as of July 17. Markdown is intentionally not fully standardized by its author, leading to some kerfuffles and, eventually, an understanding that each version, like GitHub Flavored Markdown, has its own additions and changes.

By allowing for import/export, but even better, “Copy as Markdown” and “Paste from Markdown,” Docs is now a place where I can be a Markdown grouch and still play reasonably nice with others. You should see “Enable Markdown” show up in your Docs’ Tools > Preferences menu within the next two weeks.

Real, actual Markdown support is arriving in Google Docs, not a moment too soon Read More »

google’s-$500m-effort-to-wreck-microsoft-eu-cloud-deal-failed,-report-says

Google’s $500M effort to wreck Microsoft EU cloud deal failed, report says

Amazon, Antitrust law, cloud infrastructure, cloud market, cloud service providers, European Union, Google, microsoft, Policy / /
Google’s $500M effort to wreck Microsoft EU cloud deal failed, report says

Google tried to derail a Microsoft antitrust settlement over anticompetitive software licensing in the European Union by offering a $500 million alternative deal to the group of cloud providers behind the EU complaint, Bloomberg reported.

According to Bloomberg, Google’s offer to the Cloud Infrastructure Services Providers in Europe (CISPE) required that the group maintain its EU antitrust complaint. It came “just days” before CISPE settled with Microsoft, and it was apparently not compelling enough to stop CISPE from inking a deal with the software giant that TechCrunch noted forced CISPE to accept several compromises.

Bloomberg uncovered Google’s attempted counteroffer after reviewing confidential documents and speaking to “people familiar with the matter.” Apparently, Google sought to sway CISPE with a package worth nearly $500 million for more than five years of software licenses and about $15 million in cash.

But CISPE did not take the bait, announcing last week that an agreement was reached with Microsoft, seemingly frustrating Google.

CISPE initially raised its complaint in 2022, alleging that Microsoft was “irreparably damaging the European cloud ecosystem and depriving European customers of choice in their cloud deployments” by spiking costs to run Microsoft’s software on rival cloud services. In February, CISPE said that “any remedies and resolution must apply across the sector and to be accessible to all cloud customers in Europe.” They also promised that “any agreements will be made public.”

But the settlement reached last week excluded major rivals, including Amazon, which is a CISPE member, and Google, which is not. And despite CISPE’s promise, the terms of the deal were not published, apart from a CISPE blog roughly outlining central features that it claimed resolved the group’s concerns over Microsoft’s allegedly anticompetitive behaviors.

What is clear is that CISPE agreed to drop their complaint by taking the deal, but no one knows exactly how much Microsoft paid in a “lump sum” to cover CISPE legal fees for three years, TechCrunch noted. However, “two people with direct knowledge of the matter” told Reuters that Microsoft offered about $22 million.

Google has been trying to catch up with Microsoft and Amazon in the cloud market and has recently begun gaining ground. Last year, Google’s cloud operation broke even for the first time, and the company earned a surprising $900 million in profits in the first quarter of 2024, which bested analysts’ projections by more than $200 million, Bloomberg reported. For Google, the global cloud market has become a key growth area, Bloomberg noted, as potential growth opportunities in search advertising slow. Seemingly increasing regulatory pressure on Microsoft while taking a chunk of its business in the EU was supposed to be one of Google’s next big moves.

A CISPE spokesperson, Ben Maynard, told Ars that its “members were presented with alternative options to accepting the Microsoft deal,” while not disclosing the terms of the other options. “However, the members voted by a significant majority to accept the Microsoft offer, which, in their view, presented the best opportunity for the European cloud sector,” Maynard told Ars.

Neither Microsoft nor Google has commented directly on the reported counteroffer. A Google spokesperson told Bloomberg that Google “has long supported the principles of fair software licensing and that the firm was having discussions about joining CISPE, to fight anticompetitive licensing practices.” A person familiar with the matter told Ars that Google did not necessarily make the counteroffer contingent on dropping the EU complaint, but had long been exploring joining CISPE and would only do so if CISPE upheld its mission to defend fair licensing deals. Microsoft reiterated a past statement from its president, Brad Smith, confirming that Microsoft was “pleased” to resolve CISPE’s antitrust complaint.

For CISPE, the resolution may not have been perfect, but it “will enable European cloud providers to offer Microsoft applications and services on their local cloud infrastructures, meeting the demand for sovereign cloud solutions.” In 2022, CISPE Secretary-General Francisco Mingorance told Ars that although CISPE had been clear that it intended to force Microsoft to make changes allowing all cloud rivals to compete, “a key reason behind filing the complaint was to support” two smaller cloud service providers, Aruba and OVH.

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google-makes-it-easier-for-users-to-switch-on-advanced-account-protection

Google makes it easier for users to switch on advanced account protection

Biz & IT, Google, multi factor authentication, passkeys, passwords, Security / /

APP MADE EASIER —

The strict requirement for two physical keys is now eased when passkeys are used.

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Google makes it easier for users to switch on advanced account protection

Getty Images

Google is making it easier for people to lock down their accounts with strong multifactor authentication by adding the option to store secure cryptographic keys in the form of passkeys rather than on physical token devices.

Google’s Advanced Protection Program, introduced in 2017, requires the strongest form of multifactor authentication (MFA). Whereas many forms of MFA rely on one-time passcodes sent through SMS or emails or generated by authenticator apps, accounts enrolled in advanced protection require MFA based on cryptographic keys stored on a secure physical device. Unlike one-time passcodes, security keys stored on physical devices are immune to credential phishing and can’t be copied or sniffed.

Democratizing APP

APP, short for Advanced Protection Program, requires the key to be accompanied by a password whenever a user logs into an account on a new device. The protection prevents the types of account takeovers that allowed Kremlin-backed hackers to access the Gmail accounts of Democratic officials in 2016 and go on to leak stolen emails to interfere with the presidential election that year.

Until now, Google required people to have two physical security keys to enroll in APP. Now, the company is allowing people to instead use two passkeys or one passkey and one physical token. Those seeking further security can enroll using as many keys as they want.

“We’re expanding the aperture so people have more choice in how they enroll in this program,” Shuvo Chatterjee, the project lead for APP, told Ars. He said the move comes in response to comments Google has received from some users who either couldn’t afford to buy the physical keys or lived or worked in regions where they’re not available.

As always, users must still have two keys to enroll to prevent being locked out of accounts if one of them is lost or broken. While lockouts are always a problem, they can be much worse for APP users because the recovery process is much more rigorous and takes much longer than for accounts not enrolled in the program.

Passkeys are the creation of the FIDO Alliance, a cross-industry group comprised of hundreds of companies. They’re stored locally on a device and can also be stored in the same type of hardware token storing MFA keys. Passkeys can’t be extracted from the device and require either a PIN or a scan of a fingerprint or face. They provide two factors of authentication: something the user knows—the underlying password used when the passkey was first generated—and something the user has—in the form of the device storing the passkey.

Of course, the relaxed requirements only go so far since users still must have two devices. But by expanding the types of devices needed,  APP becomes more accessible since many people already have a phone and computer, Chatterjee said.

“If you’re in a place where you can’t get security keys, it’s more convenient,” he explained. “This is a step toward democratizing how much access [users] get to this highest security tier Google offers.”

Despite the increased scrutiny involved in the recovery process for APP accounts, Google is renewing its recommendation that users provide a phone number and email address as backup.

“The most resilient thing to do is have multiple things on file, so if you lose that security key or the key blows up, you have a way to get back into your account,” Chatterjee said. He’s not providing the “secret sauce” details about how the process works, but he said it involves “tons of signals we look at to figure out what’s really happening.

“Even if you do have a recovery phone, a recovery phone by itself isn’t going to get you access to your account,” he said. “So if you get SIM swapped, it doesn’t mean someone gets access to your account. It’s a combination of various factors. It’s the summation of that that will help you on your path to recovery.”

Google users can enroll in APP by visiting this link.

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google’s-greenhouse-gas-emissions-jump-48%-in-five-years

Google’s greenhouse gas emissions jump 48% in five years

AI, data centers, Google, greenhouse gas emissions, syndication, Tech / /

computationally intensive means energy intensive —

Google’s 2030 “Net zero” target looks increasingly doubtful as AI use soars.

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Cooling pipes at a Google data center in Douglas County, Georgia.

Cooling pipes at a Google data center in Douglas County, Georgia.

Google’s greenhouse gas emissions have surged 48 percent in the past five years due to the expansion of its data centers that underpin artificial intelligence systems, leaving its commitment to get to “net zero” by 2030 in doubt.

The Silicon Valley company’s pollution amounted to 14.3 million tonnes of carbon equivalent in 2023, a 48 percent increase from its 2019 baseline and a 13 percent rise since last year, Google said in its annual environmental report on Tuesday.

Google said the jump highlighted “the challenge of reducing emissions” at the same time as it invests in the build-out of large language models and their associated applications and infrastructure, admitting that “the future environmental impact of AI” was “complex and difficult to predict.”

Chief Sustainability Officer Kate Brandt said the company remained committed to the 2030 target but stressed the “extremely ambitious” nature of the goal.

“We do still expect our emissions to continue to rise before dropping towards our goal,” said Brandt.

She added that Google was “working very hard” on reducing its emissions, including by signing deals for clean energy. There was also a “tremendous opportunity for climate solutions that are enabled by AI,” said Brandt.

As Big Tech giants including Google, Amazon, and Microsoft have outlined plans to invest tens of billions of dollars into AI, climate experts have raised concerns about the environmental impacts of the power-intensive tools and systems.

In May, Microsoft admitted that its emissions had risen by almost a third since 2020, in large part due to the construction of data centers. However, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates last week also argued that AI would help propel climate solutions.

Meanwhile, energy generation and transmission constraints are already posing a challenge for the companies seeking to build out the new technology. Analysts at Bernstein said in June that AI would “double the rate of US electricity demand growth and total consumption could outstrip current supply in the next two years.”

In Tuesday’s report, Google said its 2023 energy-related emissions—which come primarily from data center electricity consumption—rose 37 percent year on year and overall represented a quarter of its total greenhouse gas emissions.

Google’s supply chain emissions—its largest chunk, representing 75 percent of its total emissions—also rose 8 percent. Google said they would “continue to rise in the near term” as a result in part of the build-out of the infrastructure needed to run AI systems.

Google has pledged to achieve net zero across its direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and to run on carbon-free energy during every hour of every day within each grid it operates by the same date.

However, the company warned in Tuesday’s report that the “termination” of some clean energy projects during 2023 had pushed down the amount of renewables it had access to.

Meanwhile, the company’s data center electricity consumption had “outpaced” Google’s ability to bring more clean power projects online in the US and Asia-Pacific regions.

Google’s data center electricity consumption increased 17 percent in 2023, and amounted to approximately 7-10 percent of global data center electricity consumption, the company estimated. Its data centers also consumed 17 percent more water in 2023 than during the previous year, Google said.

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