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Starting in the second half of 2018, Android apps on the Google Play store will be required to target a “recent” Android API level and meet other new, additional requirements Google announced yesterday. “Google Play powers billions of app installs and updates annually,” Edward Cunningham, product manager at Android wrote in a post. “We relentlessly focus on security and performance to ensure everyone has a positive experience discovering and installing apps and games they love. Today we’re giving Android developers a heads-up about three changes designed to support these goals, as well as explaining the reasons for each change, and how they will help make Android devices even more secure and performant for the long term.” Early in the coming year, Play will begin adding “a small amount of security metadata” to each APK submitted for further authentication, and will require no effort on the part of the developer. Then come August, Play will require all newly submitted app...

Google’s on an uncompromising mission. It wants to give its users access to accurate information, unique content and the finest writers. It continually tweaks and improves its algorithms so that the best of the web gets the exposure it deserves. Unfortunately, there’s a flipside: a penalty. That’s the consequence of Google taking issue with something on your site. Sometimes a penalty is well deserved, but even if you know you’re in the wrong, you probably want to do something about it. What Is a Google Penalty? Google has been changing its ranking algorithms since December 2000. That’s when it released its toolbar extension. At the time, the toolbar update represented a sea change that would create the SEO industry as we know it. In fact, it was the first time PageRank was published in a meaningful or usable form. Over the next decade-and-a-bit, Google continued to refine the quality of its search results. Over time, it begins to eliminate poor quality content and...

What are the most crucial search engine ranking factors these days? Panelists at SMX East discussed their findings and provided practical advice for putting this data into action. As technology advances, search engines can refine their ranking algorithms to better determine relevance and return results that better align with searcher intent. Because these ranking algorithms are constantly being improved and refined, search engine ranking factors are always evolving. Factors that might once have had a huge impact on search rankings may no longer matter all that much, and new ranking factors (such as mobile-friendliness or HTTPS) can emerge to reflect changing technologies and user behaviors. So, what are the most important ranking factors today, in 2017? A panel at SMX East, “SEO Ranking Factors in 2017: What’s Important and What’s Not,” sought to answer that question. This panel featured data from large-scale studies performed by SEMrush and Searchmetrics, as well a...

According to WaBetaInfo, a popular website that tests new WhatsApp features early, the 2.17.70 beta WhatsApp update has confirmed group calls. Giving its over one billion users more power to connect, WhatsApp has confirmed group voice calls in its latest beta version of Android. According to WaBetaInfo, a popular website that tests new WhatsApp features early, the 2.17.70 beta WhatsApp update has confirmed group calls. "The 2.17.70 iOS update has very hidden references to group calls! Before it was an internal news, now it's all confirmed. "There are a lot of hidden references about group voice calls, but there is only one reference about group video calls. So group video calls are partially confirmed at the moment," WaBetaInfo tweeted on Sunday. It was earlier reported that the Facebook-owned messaging app was working on a group voice calls and could release the feature next year. Facebook already has a similar feature on Messenger. "WhatsApp 2.17.70 se...

Android Instant Apps are finally making their way to users on the Google Play store listings through a Try It Now button. The company confirmed the integration on Thursday and also announced several updates to the Google Play store. For the uninitiated, Android Instant Apps lets users access apps from search, social media, messaging, and other deep links without the need to stop and first install the app. You can now spot them on Google Play as well, and the company has provided a list of featured Instant Apps. The list includes BuzzFeed, NYTimes (Crossword), Hollar, Red Bull, Skyscanner, Onefootball Live Soccer Scores - these can now be tried out by users before actually downloading them. Notably, while the list is visible in India, no Try It Now button is showing up for us at the time of writing. Instant Apps were first introduced at I/O 2016 where Google had explained that the feature requires partner apps to be built with modules, which will mean that user will access...

A newly discovered flaw in the widely used Wi-Fi encryption protocol – WPA2 – could leave millions of users vulnerable to attacks, prompting warnings Monday from the US government and security researchers worldwide. The US government's Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) issued a security bulletin saying the flaw can open the door to hackers seeking to eavesdrop on or hijack devices using wireless networks. "Exploitation of these vulnerabilities could allow an attacker to take control of an affected system," said CERT, which is part of the US Department of Homeland Security. he agency's warning came on the heels of research by computer scientists at the Belgian university KU Leuven, who dubbed the flaw KRACK, for Key Reinstallation Attack. The KRACK attacks target Wi-Fi clients using the WPA2 protocol, and affected operating systems include Linux and Android, with version 6.0 and above said to be especially vulnerable. Also affected are Wi-Fi capable dev...

Voice search and digital assistants Link building User experience Featured snippets and Quick Answers Mobile-first index AI and machine learning Improving SEO in 2018 As it seems, 2018 will be an interesting year for SEO. Traditional SEO techniques are still effective, but a number of trends are in the works that could significantly alter the practice of optimizing for search. What is useful to understand while we proceed towards is 2018 is that SEO is already changing, and the ranking in the first organic spot is not the ultimate goal anymore. As search engines evolve, there are multiple opportunities to increase your search traffic without necessarily focusing on organic SERPs. The rise of featured snippets, PPC, voice search and local SEO can often yield better results than an organic ranking. That’s why it’s useful to keep up with the latest trends and discover how your brand can maintain a successful SEO strategy for the year ahead by blending establish...

Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft and other tech giants standing on the bleeding edge of AI/ML innovation are actively investing in the democratization of artificial intelligence. In the recent years, these companies have open-sourced many AI/ML libraries, tools or started offering these solutions as a part of their commercial offerings and cloud services. In this article, I'm going to review five machine learning tools that have been recently released for AI startups, developers and researchers . TensorFlow Object Detection API Object Detection API is a new feature integrated into TensorFlow, Google’s state-of-the-art software library for machine learning. The API provides a convenient way for ML developers and researchers to identify objects in images using optimized computer vision algorithms developed at Google. Object Detection API functionality comes with the MobileNets single shot detector optimized to run on mobile devices. Designed for the limited computat...

Apple has switched the default provider of its web searches for Siri on iOS and Spotlight on the Mac to Google from Microsoft's Bing. Apple has switched the default provider of its web searches for Siri on iOS and Spotlight on the Mac to Google from Microsoft’s Bing. Now if you ask Siri to search something on the internet, you will get Google results instead of Bing on iOS and Spotlight – a system-wide desktop search feature of Apple’s macOS and iOS operating systems. Apple’s web browser Safari on Mac and iOS already use Google search as the default provider, thanks to a deal worth billions to Apple (and Google) over the last decade, Tech Crunch reported on Monday. “Switching to Google as the web search provider for Siri, Search within iOS and Spotlight on Mac will allow these services to have a consistent web search experience with the default in Safari,” Apple said in a statement. “We have strong relationships with Google and Microsoft and remain committed to delivering...