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PayPal to become a payment option in Samsung Pay, including in-app, online and in-store

Samsung users will be able to choose PayPal as their preferred method of payment in-app, online and in retail stores through the Samsung Pay mobile payments platform, the companies announced today. The strategic partnership will initially be available to Samsung Pay users in the United States before expanding to other countries, says Samsung.

In addition to supporting PayPal at point-of-sale via Samsung Pay, the deal will also see Samsung Pay being added as a method of payment in-app and online for PayPal’s Braintree merchant base.

The move to connect PayPal’s wallet with Samsung Pay will open up PayPal to millions of stores, Samsung and PayPal both noted. Its mobile payments technology, a rival to Apple Pay and Google’s Android Pay, works both with NFC point-of-sale system and those using traditional mag strip technology. Because Samsung Pay supports Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST) technology, it can replicate a card swipe – allowing Samsung Pay to work nearly anywhere that payment cards are accepted.

To increase its adoption in-store, PayPal last year partnered with major stakeholders like Visa and MasterCard for store payments. And in April 2017, PayPal said it would work with Android Pay as well, to support both mobile payments in apps and those in brick-and-mortar retailers.

That said, Samsung Pay is not yet one of the most-used payment technologies in the U.S., according to recent data.

According to a Boston Retail Partners survey on mobile payments released earlier this year, Apple Pay now has the largest percentage of supporting U.S. merchants, with 36 percent accepting the technology, up from 16 percent the year before.
PayPal was a close second with 34 percent acceptance, followed by MasterCard PayPass (25%), Android Pay (24%), Visa Checkout (20%), Samsung Pay (18%), Chase Pay (11%) and private label mobile wallets with 4%.

In addition, PayPal just last week announced an expanded relationship with Apple, which allowed the payments platform to be included as a payment option for App Store purchases that’s now accessible via Apple’s mobile devices, both in the U.S. and in 11 new markets. The news quickly sent PayPal’s stock soaring.

The Samsung Pay tie-up is another example of PayPal’s plan to increase adoption via partnerships and deals, rather than trying to out-compete its mobile payment rivals with an “us vs them” strategy.

For PayPal, getting a foothold in mobile is critical to the future of its business. As the company said today, it processed $102 billion in mobile payment volume and two billion mobile payment transactions last year.

“At Samsung, we pride ourselves on our open model of partnership and collaboration, which helps us deliver the best experiences to our customers,” said Injong Rhee, CTO and Head of R&D, Software and Services of the Mobile Communications Business, Samsung Electronics, in a statement. “We are excited to be partnering with PayPal, one of the largest payment platforms in the world, to offer our global consumers a richer mobile wallet experience,” Rhee added.

PayPal and Samsung already had a working partnership in place ahead of this new deal. For instance, PayPal and Samsung worked together on mobile payments back in 2014, and was added as a payment method in Samsung smart TVs the following year.

The PayPal integration will soon be live in the U.S. on Samsung smartphones, including devices like the Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8+. Samsung did not announce a timeframe as to when PayPal support in Samsung Pay would expand outside the U.S., only saying that it would also arrive “soon.”

Telegram agrees to delete terrorist content in Indonesia following partial block

SoAs.in July 17, 2017 Apps , Business , Tech

Messaging app Telegram has agreed to block terrorist-related content in Indonesia after the government threatened to block the service over fears it was enabling terrorist communication.

The country’s Ministry of Communication and IT blocked the web-based version of the messaging service on Friday and has threatened to do more. ISIS has heightened attacks in Indonesia and the Philippines this year, and the chat app has long been seen as a key communication tool.

In response to the partial block, Telegram CEO Pavel Durov said the company would remove ISIS-related channels flagged by the government and develop better systems.

“It turns out that the officials of the Ministry recently emailed us a list of public channels with terrorism-related content on Telegram, and our team was unable to quickly process them. Unfortunately, I was unaware of these requests, which caused this miscommunication with the Ministry,” Durov recounted on his public Telegram channel.

That principally means Telegram will create “a dedicated team of moderators with knowledge of Indonesian language and culture to be able to process reports of terrorist-related content more quickly and accurately.” But Durov also said he had personally opened communication with Indonesian officials to make the process more efficient.

The Telegram CEO started working on the service as early as 2012 with his brother Nikolai following Edward Snowden’s NSA leaks. The service passed 100 million active users last year, of which “several million” are in Indonesia.

In his latest missive, Durov — who previously founded Russian Facebook rival VK — added that his company is “no friend of terrorists,” that’s despite some in the security community insisting otherwise. Durov went on to reveal that Telegram blocks “thousands of ISIS-related channels per month.”

In the aftermath of the Paris attacks in 2015, for one, it purged a range of terrorist content. That was particularly controversial because Durov seemed to admit months earlier that Telegram was aware that some of its users were from ISIS.

“Privacy, ultimately, is more important than our fear of bad things happening, like terrorism,” Durov said on stage at TechCrunch Disrupt San Francisco in September 2015, although he did go on to explain that ISIS would simply use another app if not Telegram.

Google Duo Android App Surpasses 100 Million Downloads

SoAs.in July 16, 2017 Apps , Mobile , Tech

Google’s mobile video calling app, Google Duo has recently surpassed 100 million downloads on the Google Play Store. The app was just introduced last year in Google I/O 2016 and was officially released in August 2016 for Android and iOS platform. The video calling app has achieved the 100 million downloads milestone on the Google Play Store a month before its first anniversary. The number of downloads and ratings itself speak of the app’s popularity and utility

The Alphabet-owned company initially introduced Google Duo as a relatively simple video calling app with an intuitive user interface. Its streamlined design philosophy allowed the service to be even more accessible than many of its competitors, though its limited capabilities may have hindered its growth in the beginning. Google eventually tweaked its product strategy and decided to allow users to make audio-only calls using Google Duo, with that particular functionality rolling out worldwide in mid-April. One month later, the service started gaining traction again and its volume of Android downloads doubled in the last few months. The sole number of installs given by the Google Play Store isn’t equal to the number of active users, though recent trends still suggest that millions of people are using Google Duo on a fairly regular basis. It’s currently unclear whether the aforementioned addition of audio-only calls is the main reason for its recent popularity surge, though it likely didn’t hurt, with many previous Google Play Store reviews complaining about the app’s one-dimensional nature.

In light of recent developments, it’s possible that the tech giant continues introducing new major features to Google Duo in hopes of capturing an even wider audience and maintaining its recently gained traction. Being a Google-made app, the service is expected to be fully compatible with the upcoming stable release of Android O that’s expected to hit the Pixel, Pixel XL, and compatible Nexus devices by the end of summer. More details on the upcoming additions to Google Duo and general software-related efforts of Alphabet’s subsidiary should follow in the coming weeks, if not sooner.

Google Duo grabbed 5 million downloads in the very first week of its initial release and reached 50 million figure just couple of months ago. In the past two months, the app’s huge eminence among youth helped it surpass 100 million downloads.

Google Duo offers basic yet effective user interface that helps users stay connected through video calls in high definition even with low-bandwidth networks. Google’s Duo app allows users to call anyone from their contact list with end-to-end encryption.

The app offers several unique features which include automatically switching between Wi-Fi and cellular networks, Knock-Knock feature for Android that lets users see a live preview of the caller even before answering. The app also offers audio-only calls, in case you are not up for a video call.

Google is focusing on both its Allo and Duo apps, to make them much more competitive against others. We hope many mlre features to come over both the apps in upcoming months.

The latest that is getting rumored is the web version of Allo. We have received various leaks reporting the functionality to be same as that of Whatsapp Web.

Machine learning to make Android more secure

SoAs.in July 14, 2017 Android , Apps , Mobile , Tech

If you use an Android smartphone running Android 6.0 Marshmallow or above, then you must have noticed every new app asking for permissions. This was a feature added by Google to let users have more control over an app. Users have the ability to decide what parameters of the device an app has control over so as to make a safer ecosystem.

The edit history goes as far back as your current editing session, meaning the moment you exit out of a note, undoing and redoing will no longer be possible.

Google Keep is a pretty neat app: while it’s not meant to replace heavier apps like Google Docs or even Microsoft Word, it’s perfect for quick memos and reminders. Just as you’d expect from any note keeping app, it lets you add and save texts, images, voice recordings, and even hand drawn memos. One feature that’s been missing for the longest time, however, is the ability to undo and redo the changes you’ve made.

For example, if a torch app is asking for access to your contacts, the AI should be flagging it for review. Similarly, a calculator app shouldn’t need many permissions either. Google is also creating separate categories for new app, since existing categories would limit the functionalities of the AI. “Most coloring book apps don't need to know a user's precise location to function and this can be established by analyzing other coloring book apps,” wrote Google.

However, over the course of time, app developers have cleverly made it necessary for the user to give the app access to almost all the parameters of the device for vested interests. This had led to the bombardment of bloatware on the Android ecosystem. This also makes Google’s attempt of keeping the Android ecosystem clean completely useless.

Google though, hasn’t given up and is now using the power of artificial intelligence to deal with rogue apps asking for permission to every parameter of your smartphone. Google is utilising its prowess in the field of machine learning to sort out the apps that are vicious.

Well, that changes with the latest version of Google Keep. After the update, you will have two arrows in between the “+” and the overflow menu buttons right inside the editing bar – yes, these are the all-new undo and redo controls. This means that if you want to get rid of the most recent change, you can do so with a simple tap, and bring it back with another simple tap. It’s worth noting (no pun intended), however, that the edit history goes as far back as your current editing session, meaning the moment you exit out of a note, undoing and redoing will no longer be possible.

A new algorithm will now create clusters of mobile apps with similar capabilities. It will sort apps into different categories based on the app meta data such as app description and number of installs. Then, peer groups are used to identify anomalous, potentially harmful signals related to privacy and security; from each app's requested permissions and its observed behaviours.

The correlation between different peer groups and their security signals helps different teams at Google decide which apps to promote and determine which apps deserve a more careful look by security and privacy experts. Google will also use the data to help interested app developers improve privacy and security of their apps.

What’s satisfying to see is that Google is trying hard from its side to utilise the best of technology and deal with the issues of cyber privacy. Machine learning will go a long way in creating an Android ecosystem that’s safe and sound.

The update should be rolling out as we speak in the Play Store:

The Google Play Store has millions of apps, but it has known to let malicious apps through quite easily at times. Google is taking new steps to manage this, and much like most of the company’s newer initiatives, it involves artificial intelligence. The technique is called peer grouping, and it uses a machine learning algorithms to pick out the bad apps from the good ones. The AI’s job is to pick out the apps that may be malicious, and they’re brought to a human’s notice, who then decides whether to oust the app from the Play Store.

“To protect our users and help developers navigate this complex environment, Google analyses privacy and security signals for each app in Google Play. We then compare that app to other apps with similar features, known as functional peers,” the company wrote in a blog post on the Android Developers Blog. The idea is to find similar apps and pick out the ones that may be asking for permissions they shouldn’t require.

Google Play Store Game Sale

SoAs.in July 02, 2017 Apps

Google Play Sale: Movie Rentals And TV Shows

First off, anyone can now rent any movie from Google’s catalog for only $0.99, including major studio releases such as Disney blockbuster Beauty and the Beast, Jordan Peele’s subversive social horror-drama Get Out, John Wick: Chapter 2, and much more. Each movie typically goes for $4.99.

Here’s the bummer, though: customers may only use the deal once. You have to pay up the regular price for the next flick, so choose the first one well.

For those more geared to watching TV series, however, Google Play is also offering shows at half the price.

To rent a movie and see shows at 50 percent off, simply go to Google’s film and TV catalogue and choose from there.

Google Play Sale: Games And Apps

As for the games, some titles are now going for 80 percent of their regular price, including premium titles such as Final Fantasy Tactics, Call of Duty: Black Ops Zombies, Lara Craft GO, Reigns, and more.

Google didn’t leave out apps too. For apps with subscription tiers, the sale offers discounts of up to 50 percent for one year, so you can now enjoy New York Times, Memrise, TuneIn, and NeuroNation subscriptions for half the price.

Google Play Sale: Other Discounts You Shouldn’t Miss

Google is also offering discounted prices for books, with some going for 50 to 80 percent less than their original price. But for the more musically inclined looking for an alternative to Spotify, Tidal, or Apple Music, Google is also offering four months free of Google Play Music for those who subscribe during the sale period, so this might be the perfect time to try out Google’s music streaming service. Google Play Music typically costs $10 a month.

If you have a Google account — which you probably already have — and a supported payment method, you should be good to go. The sale on all Google Play items runs through July 6, while the discounted movie rental lasts until a little while later, on July 13. But users must redeem all offers by Aug. 13. The discounts will take effect when you check out.

Google offers random sales throughout the year on certain items, but this is the first time it’s hosting a store-wide sale, so have your wallet ready if you see anything of interest.

Elsewhere, popular PC games market Steam is also currently hosting its famous annual summer sale, which lasts through July 5. If you have cash left after combing the Play Store for good deals, head over to Steam to get good finds too — that is, if you haven’t already.

Seen any alluring offers yet? What do you think about Google Play’s summer sale? As always, if you have any thoughts, suggestions, or opinions, please feel free to sound them off in the comments section below!

Google Maps is not reliable in India

SoAs.in June 25, 2017 Apps , Business , buy , Cash , Credit , Donate , Insurance , Loans , Payment , Sell , Tax , Tech , Trading

Google Maps is not reliable in India, or at least that is what the Indian government sustains. According to Survey of India, a governmental agency designed to do the mapping and surveying of the countries’ territory, Google Earth and Google Maps are not accurate and have not been authenticated in India. The agency has designed a map for Indian citizens. It is free and approved by the government.

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It is widely known that India and Cambodia have protested against Google Maps previously, for not accurately presenting their borders. Cambodia has also made allegations against Google with respect to their Thai-Cambodian border, which according to them was misleading and not accurate. Apart from the diplomatic issue, the Indian Government considers that these apps could be used to find a restaurant, but not other important buildings.

Do Not Rely On Google Maps If You Are In India

The web mapping service provided by the American corporation Google offers satellite images, panoramic views, analyses traffic conditions on the spot, has a route planning system and a street view option. You can download the Google Maps app on your phone and use it to go by car, by foot or by public transportation.

It is hard to say if Indian citizens will obey the Indian government and use their own created version of maps or they will continue to use Google Maps. According to them, the traffic system in India is very complex and therefore the topographic data need to be constructed with the help of engineers. Also they advertise that the maps made by Survey of India will be cost-free and reliable to all citizens. There are no explanations as to how the app will be updates and how often. The reactions online were not so positive and it seems that not many are thrilled with the Indian government’s requirement.

Apple Is Quietly Scrubbing the App Store

SoAs.in June 22, 2017 Apple , Apps , buy , Credit , Donate , Insurance , Loans , News , Payment , Sell , Tax

Apple has made a small, but important change to its App Store guidelines that could have a profound impact on the apps available in its marketplace.
Following the company's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) earlier this month, Apple changed its App Store review guidelines to now ban "apps created from a commercialized template or app generation service," according to TechCrunch, which found the change. In other words, any apps that are made with tools that produce copycat programs could be rejected from Apple's marketplace.
While most apps available to the company's iPhones are originally designed using traditional design tools, like Apple's own XCode program, there are thousands that rely upon templates. In most cases, the template-based apps are designed by developers who don't have formal coding knowledge or simply want to get a program to the App Store quickly to capitalize on a trend. For instance, after the simple game Flappy Bird become an overnight success in the App Store, thousands of clones that used a similar template flooded the App Store in hopes of attracting users to their similar gameplay.

However, the new App Store guidelines would allow Apple (AAPL, -0.16%) to ban certain apps that egregiously use templates to deliver software. The revised guidelines will ostensibly help Apple manage spam apps that are designed with templates to quickly get programs into the App Store that serve ads or perform unnecessary functions for developer financial gain.
There are several legitimate template-based app services available to users, allowing them to quickly create programs for Apple's iPhone. They include services like PhoneGap and TapJet, as well as Apple's own app suite with IBM, which allows corporate customers to create programs for their operations using pre-defined features.

So far, Apple hasn't targeted those companies, and although the company cites commercialized templates in its new guidelines, it's unlikely it will turn its attention to those services. According to TechCrunch, which has been analyzing the change, Apple has removed "hundreds of thousands" of apps as part of a broader App Store scrubbing over the past year. But Apple has left popular template-based services alone and is instead focusing on less-useful services that quickly produce lookalike apps for users to scam or spam iPhone owners.

For its part, Apple hasn't commented on the how the change might affect developers and users, and the company doesn't share its app removal tally with the public.

International Yoga Day 2017: 6 iOS apps that will help you achieve your fitness goals

SoAs.in June 21, 2017 Android , Apps , Business , buy , Cash , Credit , Donate , Insurance , Loans , Mobile , Payment , Sell , Tax , Trading

From fitness to meditation, here are five apps, that will help you live healthier.

While Yoga is a practice that roots into the ancient Hindustan, for years the practice seemed to have been somewhat lost with many not exercising it. However, since a couple of years, especially, Prime Minister Narendra Modi proposed the idea of International Yoga Day at the United Nations General Assembly in 2014, we see the art to have been reborn in every household. People across the globe are now realizing the importance of exercise and yoga. And so, since 2014 now, June 21 is recognized as the International Yoga Day worldwide.

Quite interestingly, the reason why Yoga Day has been designated especially to June 21, is because the twenty-first day of the month of June is the longest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere. It is also important to understand that the idea behind the day is not just to practice Yoga on this one day, but to inculcate the habit of healthy living across all individuals.

In fact, Yoga teacher Nidhi Mohan Kamal says, “Yoga is a way of life. The panic deep breathing is known to increase lung capacity and thereof the health of the heart. In performing the asanas – breathing, focus and physical effort teaches us to let go and trust ourselves. The whole process is about meditating and calming oneself.”

Now, with the lifestyle the majority of this world is living, it’s not exactly easy for every individual to dedicate time to go to a gym, or join a yoga class, or sometimes, afford any of that. Therefore we bring you a compilation of some of the best iOS apps for beginners, amateurs, and pro, to help you practice healthy living from wherever, whenever.

Mobile app icon designing tips: important for all app developers

SoAs.in June 21, 2017 Android , Apps , Business , buy , Cash , Credit , Donate , Insurance , Loans , Mobile , Payment , Sell , Tax , Trading

Mobile app development is gaining huge momentum as a large number of people are looking forward to have an app either for their businesses or for daily work. In order to attain success from your app development, it is important to create an attractive app icon. This is because it will help you in getting more downloads. Appinventiv is a great company where mobile app developers pays a lot of attention on creating an awesome icon that can grab the attention of target audience.

If you are a budding mobile app developer and looking forward to create a great app icon then you should take into account some important things. This is because your icon can be the biggest difference between your app being recognized or blatantly overlooked.

Tips for designing the great mobile app icon

Focus on simplicity

In order to come up with a great design, you should avoid using a lot of colors or images. You should not forget that the best icon pays attention on one element or concept instead of covering every feature into your small icon.

If your user has to make a lot of attempts to understand the details of your icon, you will not able to achieve the goal. So, don't forget to keep it simple and focused.

Avoid using too much text

There is no denying that long words are hard to read especially in such a small space. In fact, you should use the first letter of your brand to make it readable.

Several mobile app developers are considering this factor, thus you should also pay attention to this factor to attain success.

Choose good colors

It is important for you to make sure that your app icon looks great on several different backgrounds. So, you should use vibrant colors so as to make your app stand out from the crowd.

Choose the color carefully and attract a large number of people towards it.

Use perspective

It is believed that standardization is good to some extent only. By using perspective, you can achieve interesting results.

In addition, you can also come up with a design that is vivid as well as fresh.

Icon should introduce the main feature of the app

Good icon explains the most important function of an app. Music apps usually include notes, or music instruments.

On the other hand, chatting apps use conversation bubbles. This is one of the most important factors that should not be overlooked.

Test the icon

After designing your icon, check how the icon looks on iOS as well as Android. You can even get some views from third parties.

This will help you in refining the design of your icon.

Conclusion

There is no denying that your icon is the strongest connection that you will have with your esteemed users. This is the first thing that they will see in the app stores.

In addition, users interact with your app every time they use your application. Hence, as a mobile app developer, you should pay attention to all the important tips that helps in coming up with a great app icon.

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