MWC 2021 day one wrap-up

“It is great that MWC is back,” Samsung UK’s James Kitto said, opening up this year’s presser. “And behalf of everyone at Samsung, it’s great to be back at MWC.”

What, precisely, it means to be “back” in 2021 is another question entirely. Samsung was, of course, one of a number of major industry players who announced that they would not be exhibiting at this year’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. It was hard not to see an echo of last year’s event, when key players pulled out, one by one, forcing the GSMA to cancel the event altogether.

This year’s event is different for myriad reasons. For one thing, MWC’s traditional timeframe of late-February/early-March put the event directly in the crosshairs of COVID-19’s arrival in the EU. For another, this time out, the organizing body had another year to prepare.

A look at Hall 3 #MWC21 for @saschasegan pic.twitter.com/Z5V6MHqT4A

— Sean Kinney (@seankinneyRCR) June 28, 2021

The simplest route would have been to do what the CTA did with CES and go all-virtual. The first all-virtual CES had plenty of issues of course, but attempting an in-person element ahead of a widespread vaccine rollout in the U.S. would have, at best, complicated things by orders of magnitude.

COVID-19 continues to be a concern in Spain – as with much of the world. The GSMA opted to go ahead with the event this year, however, after pushing MWC back several months from its standard dates. The company has implemented all sorts of safety measures, but judging from early videos taken at the event, social distancing ought not to prove an issue on the show floor this year.

Image Credits: Samsung/Google

It seems safe to assume that most who are “attending” the event are doing so virtually – a list that includes the vendors themselves.

Samsung is among those high profile companies that presented a pre-recorded virtual press conference. Perhaps companies still see value in being attached to this sort of event even if it’s virtual, or maybe the on-going partnership with the organization is worth nurturing. The cynical part of me wonders how many of the sponsored sessions just couldn’t be reversed.

Samsung and Google preview wearable platform ahead of next Galaxy Watch launch

Samsung’s event was arguably the biggest of the day, but the presser felt like little more than a placeholder. The biggest news of the press conference was an expansion of a partnership Google announced at I/O last month, while much of the rest of the stream was pointing toward an Unpacked event happening later this summer.

Image Credits: Samsung

In fact, the event closed with a black and white slide reading “See you soon at the next Unpacked,” in case you didn’t get the hint. Bottom line: no hardware.

Lenovo, on the other hand, didn’t hold back. That’s due, in part, to the fact that the company releases a tremendous amount of hardware, so why not tie it to MWC, right?

The list of announcements inluces a new version of the Smart Clock Google Assistant alarm clock with a built-in wireless charging pads for phones and several tablets, including the Yoga Tab 11 and 13, which sport combination hanger/kickstand. The 13-inch system also doubles as an external monitor, which is when the kickstand really comes in handy.

Image Credits: Lenovo

TCL got out ahead of the event early, with the announcement of NXTWEAR G – a wearable OLED cinema display. The headmounted device approximates a 140-inch display with a 16:9 aspect ratio. The company also offered a better look at the 20 Pro 5G, which is coming to the States at just a dollar short of $500, featuring a snapdragon 750G processor and a headphone jack to boot.

TCL NEXTWEAR G

Those are your top line headlines for the show so far. The event runs through July 1st, so still plenty of show left, whether or not anyone will be there to see it in person.

 

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Samsung and Google preview wearable platform ahead of next Galaxy Watch launch

Samsung’s Mobile World Congress presser was, once again, all about wearables. The big news at this evening’s (or afternoon’s, timezone dependent) event was our best look yet at a redesigned interface for the company’s line of Galaxy Watches.

One UI Watch – which takes its name for the Galaxy mobile interface — will share a design language with the one found on the company’s line of Galaxy phones. The upcoming One UI Watch will debut at an upcoming Unpacked event later this summer, sporting the new UI, as well as the forthcoming joint Samsung/Google platform.

Image Credits: Samsung/Google

It was first teased at I/O last month that the two technology powerhouses would be teaming up on a wearables project. We still have little in the way of information about it, however, – including what it will actually be called.

The partnership was initially announced as a “unified platform” that would allow developers to create a single app for both Google’s Wear OS and Tizen, the open-source operating system Samsung has long relied on for its own smartwatches. As we noted at the time, third-party app development has proven a considerable hurdle for both companies as they look to take on Apple’s dominance of the space.

Among the benefits of the partnerships is that once a watch-compatible app has been downloaded on a connected smartphone, it will also be downloaded to the app. Along with first-party Google apps like Maps and YouTube Music, the list includes Spotify (naturally), Calm, Strava, Adidas Running and Sleep Cycle.

Image Credits: Samsung/Google

“Samsung and Google have a long history of collaboration and whenever we’ve worked together, the experience for our consumers has been dramatically better for everyone,” Google SVP Sameer Samat said in a release tied to the news. “That certainly holds true for this new, unified platform, which will be rolling out for the first time on Samsung’s new Galaxy Watch. In collaboration with Samsung, we’re thrilled to bring longer battery life, faster performance, and a wide range of apps, including many from Google to a whole new wearable experience.”

Such a partnership seems odd at first blush – Samsung long ago eschewed Google’s wearable operating system in favor of its own heavily customized version of Tizen. Ultimately, however, it seems the two are united against the monolith that is Apple – which currently enjoys somewhere in the neighborhood of 40% of the global market. Samsung is in second, but even with Fitbit under its wing, Google’s still got a ways to go.

Samsung will also be showing off improved development tools that make it easier to create things like watch faces for the platform.

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An internal code repo used by New York State’s IT office was exposed online

A code repository used by the New York state government’s IT department was left exposed on the internet, allowing anyone to access the projects inside, some of which contained secret keys and passwords associated with state government systems.

The exposed GitLab server was discovered on Saturday by Dubai-based SpiderSilk, a cybersecurity company credited with discovering data spills at Samsung, Clearview AI and MoviePass.

Organizations use GitLab to collaboratively develop and store their source code — as well as the secret keys, tokens and passwords needed for the projects to work — on servers that they control. But the exposed server was accessible from the internet and configured so that anyone from outside the organization could create a user account and log in unimpeded, SpiderSilk’s chief security officer Mossab Hussin told TechCrunch.

When TechCrunch visited the GitLab server, the login page showed it was accepting new user accounts. It’s not known exactly how long the GitLab server was accessible in this way, but historic records from Shodan, a search engine for exposed devices and databases, shows the GitLab was first detected on the internet on March 18.

SpiderSilk shared several screenshots showing that the GitLab server contained secret keys and passwords associated with servers and databases belonging to New York State’s Office of Information Technology Services. Fearing the exposed server could be maliciously accessed or tampered with, the startup asked for help in disclosing the security lapse to the state.

TechCrunch alerted the New York governor’s office to the exposure a short time after the server was found. Several emails to the governor’s office with details of the exposed GitLab server were opened but were not responded to. The server went offline on Monday afternoon.

Scot Reif, a spokesperson for New York State’s Office of Information Technology Services, said the server was “a test box set up by a vendor, there is no data whatsoever, and it has already been decommissioned by ITS.” (Reif declared his response “on background” and attributable to a state official, which would require both parties agree to the terms in advance, but we are printing the reply as we were not given the opportunity to reject the terms.)

When asked, Reif would not say who the vendor was or if the passwords on the server were changed. Several projects on the server were marked “prod,” or common shorthand for “production,” a term for servers that are actively use. Reif also would not say if the incident was reported to the state’s Attorney General’s office. When reached, a spokesperson for the Attorney General did not comment by press time.

TechCrunch understands the vendor is Indotronix-Avani, a New York-based company with offices in India, and owned by venture capital firm Nigama Ventures. Several screenshots show some of the GitLab projects were modified by a project manager at Indotronix-Avani. The vendor’s website touts New York State on its website, along with other government customers, including the U.S. State Department and the U.S. Department of Defense.

Indotronix-Avani spokesperson Mark Edmonds did not respond to requests for comment.

Read more:

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Google and India’s Jio Platforms announce budget Android smartphone JioPhone Next

Jio Platforms, run by India’s richest man (Mukesh Ambani), and Google on Thursday unveiled the JioPhone Next, an affordable Android smartphone, as the top Indian telecom operator makes further push to expand its reach in the world’s second largest internet market.

The Indian firm, which secured $4.5 billion investment from Google (and another $15.5 billion from Facebook and others) last year and shared plans to work on low-cost smartphones, said the JioPhone Next is aimed at helping roughly 300 million users in India who are still on 2G network upgrade their gadget to access faster networks.

The phone, which is “powered by extremely optimized Android” mobile operating system, will first launch in India on September 10 ahead of the festive season in the country, and will eventually be made available outside of India, said Mukesh Ambani, chairman of Reliance Industries, at its annual general meeting Thursday.

The JioPhone Next will be an “ultra-affordable 4G smartphone,” claimed Ambani, though he didn’t reveal the price or the hardware specifications of the handset.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai said Thursday the company has also entered into a 5G cloud partnership with Jio Platforms. “It will help more than a billion Indians connect to a faster and better internet, support businesses in their digital transformation, and help Jio build new services in sectors like health, education and more — laying a foundation for the next phase of India’s digitization,” said the chief executive of Google, which last year committed to invest $10 billion in India.

As part of the 5G cloud partnership, Google is also winning a major Google Cloud customer in Reliance, said Pichai.

“They will be able take advantage of Google’s AI and machine learning, e-commerce, and demand forecasting offerings. Harnessing the reliability and performance of Google Cloud will enable these businesses to scale up as needed to respond to customer demand,” he added.

Ambani unveils the JioPhone Next at Reliance’s Annual General Meeting on Thursday.

The JioPhone Next will ship with a range of features, including Read Aloud and Translate Now that will work with any text on the phone screen, including web pages, apps, messages, and even photos. It also features a “fast, high-quality camera” which will support HDR, and the JioPhone Next will be protected by latest Android releases and security updates, Google said, though it didn’t share the precise duration when this coverage will be offered. (Most smartphone vendors offer security and new Android software support for about two years after the launch.)

“We have worked closely with the Jio team on engineering and product development on useful voice-first features that enable these users to consume content and navigate the phone in their own language, deliver a great camera experience, and get the latest Android feature and security updates,” Google said in a statement.

Even as most smartphones that ship in India, the second largest market, are priced at $150 or less, customers looking for a smartphone priced under $100 are left with little choice. And that choice has further shrunk in recent years.

Research firm Counterpoint told TechCrunch that the sub-$100 smartphones accounted for just 12% of the Indian smartphone market, down from 18% in 2019 and 24% in 2018. Sub-$50 smartphones represented just 0.3% of the entire market in 2020, down from 4.3% in 2018.

Smartphone makers are aware of this whitespace in the market, but have found it incredibly challenging to meet this demand. Some, including Jio Platforms earlier explored a range of feature phones to reach small cities and towns of India. Jio Platforms’ KaiOS-powered feature phone, called JioPhone, had amassed 100 million customers as of late February this year.

In a recent report to clients, analysts at UBS said that after accounting the recent price surge of memory component, any smartphone priced at or under $50 is likely selling at cost.

“While this move by Jio will accelerate 2G to 4G migration, we evaluated how interesting this space would be for other smartphone manufacturers, especially key players like Xiaomi. Xiaomi, the unit market leader in smartphones in India, is unlikely to follow up with a $50 smartphone, in our view,” they wrote in the report, obtained by TechCrunch.

Google, too, has previously made several efforts — $100 Android One smartphones program in 2014 and low-resource intensive Android Go operating system in 2017 — to expand the reach of its handsets. The company has also backed KaiOS, which powers popular feature phones.

The JioPhone Next is a “momentous step in our Android mission for India, and is the first of many that our Android product and engineering teams will embark on in India,” Google said in a statement. “We are also actively expanding our engineering teams in India, as we continue to work on finding ways to answer the unique needs of India’s smartphone users.”

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Security flaws found in Samsung’s stock mobile apps

A mobile security startup has found seven security flaws in Samsung’s pre-installed mobile apps, which it says if abused could have allowed attackers broad access to a victim’s personal data.

Oversecured said the vulnerabilities were found in several apps and components bundled with Samsung phones and tablets. Oversecured founder Sergey Toshin told TechCrunch that the vulnerabilities were verified on a Samsung Galaxy S10+ but that all Samsung devices could be potentially affected because the baked-in apps are responsible for system functionality.

Toshin said the vulnerabilities could have allowed a malicious app on the same device to steal a victim’s photos, videos, contacts, call records and messages, and change settings “without any user consent or notice” by hijacking the permissions from Samsung’s stock apps.

One of the flaws could have allowed the theft of data by exploiting a vulnerability in Samsung’s Secure Folder app, which has a “large set” of rights across the device. In a proof-of-concept, Toshin showed the bug could be used to steal contacts data. Another bug in Samsung’s Knox security software could have been abused to install other malicious apps, while a bug in Samsung Dex could have been used to scrape data from user notifications from apps, email inboxes, and messages.

Oversecured published technical details of the vulnerabilities in a blog post, and said it reported the bugs to Samsung, which fixed the flaws.

Samsung confirmed the flaws affected “selected” Galaxy devices but would not provide a list of specific devices. “There have been no known reported issues globally and users should be assured that their sensitive information was not at risk,” but provided no evidence for this claim. “We addressed the potential vulnerability by developing and issuing security patches via software update in April and May, 2021 as soon as we identified this issue.”

The startup, which launched earlier this year after self-funding $1 million in bug bounty payouts, uses automation to search for vulnerabilities in Android code. Toshin has found similar security flaws in TikTok, and Android’s Google Play app.

Mobile security startup Oversecured launches after self-funding $1 million, thanks to bug bounty payouts

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Global smartphone market continues rebound with 26% Q1 bump

More signs of the global market righting the ship after a disastrous 2020. New figures from Gartner point to 26% increase in global sales year over year for the first quarter of 2021. The overall increase is an impressive one, though it comes after a couple of years of market slow down, followed by a step drop amid the pandemic.

Manufacturers got hit from all sides last year. 2020 kicked things off with a manufacturing slowdown, as China and greater Asia were the first to be impacted by the effects of Covid-19. In the following months, global demand slowed, as shutdowns were instated and job loss and economic issues massively hampered sales.

Image Credits: Gartner

The new Gartner numbers maintain the same global top three manufacturers as this time last year. Samsung’s overall market share grew from 18.4- to 20.3%, courtesy of budget devices, returning to the number one spot.

Apple had managed to push its way to number one in Q4, on the strength of its belated 5G push. The company dropped down to number two for the first quarter – the same position it held this time last year. Overall, its market share is up around 2% y-o-y to 15.5, according to the figures. The top five are rounded out by three Chinese manufacturers — Xiaomi, Vivo and Oppo – as Huawei’s struggles continue.

Thus far, global chip shortages appear to have had little impact on shipments.

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