Software & Apps - Page 19

New research from vpnMentor indicates VPN usage across Brazil has skyrocketed more than 1500% since the ban of Elon Musk's social media platform X, formerly Twitter.

Following a legal dispute between X and Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, Musk decided to halt all operations of the social media platform across Brazil. Furthermore, the Moraes instructed X to appoint a new legal representative by 7:97 PM Friday ET, which X didn't fulfill the request and informed the Supreme Court justice it won't be complying with the demands.

Following the deadline passing Moraes instructed Brazil's National Telecommunications Agency to block access to X. The instruction was passed on to more than 20,000 IPS across the country. In addition to the general population being severed from X there is also the R$50,000 ($8,900) fine for both individuals and companies using VPNs to circumvent the X ban and still access the Musk's social media platform. Despite the looming threat of an extremely expensive fine, VPN access across Brazil has surged by 1600%.

Windows 11 has slowly been gaining in market share for quite some time, with most of its new users directly coming from the current leading operating system based on total users, Windows 10.

Microsoft announced it was ending support for Windows 10 in October 2025, and since then, the Redmond company has been pushing Windows 10 users to make the leap to the latest version of Windows. Following the end-of-support, Windows 10 will no longer receive security updates and support from Microsoft.

Unfortunately for both Microsoft and Windows 10 users, adoption isn't happening at the speed that Redmond would like, with reports indicating Windows 11 adoption has been much slower than previous operating system generations.

The Steam Hardware & Software Survey results for August 2024 show that Windows 10 has been dethroned as the most popular operating system among PC gamers. Yes, this means Windows 11 is proving to be very popular with PC gamers, with the operating system sitting on a majority 50% market share (49.17% to be exact), an increase of 3.36% from July 2024.

The Steam Hardware & Software Survey results show that Windows 10's market share has dropped by 3.07%, almost the same amount that Windows 11's share has grown. This suggests that more PC gamers are jumping to Windows 11 directly from Windows 10.

Although Windows 11 has struggled to overtake Windows 10 as the world's most popular operating system among all PC users, it looks like PC gamers have been transitioning steadily. This probably comes down to the fact that modern PC games and platforms like Steam, Xbox, EA, and Ubisoft are optimized for Windows 11 alongside tech like DirectX.

Telegram is facing a tumultuous future following the arrest of the company's CEO and founder, Pavel Durov, who was taken into custody by French authorities for the alleged distribution of child sexual abuse material, facilitation of drug trafficking, and more.

If you are a Telegram user it's possible the app is facing significant headwind, with Durov's allegations claiming the CEO was complicit in aforementioned points, and also facilitated organised fraud and various other illegal transactions. Why does this put Telegram in between a rock and a hard place? Telegram's brand is an anti-moderation, anti-regulation, anti-government messaging service that prioritizes security and any inference from a governing body.

Durov's personal story is part of that brand, which includes the Telegram founder creating the popular messaging app as a retaliation to facing pressure from Russian authorities to hand over personal data from what he also created, VKontakte, Russia's largest social media platform at the time. Durov fled Russia and launched Telegram, which now has more than 950 million active users globally on a monthly basis.

Although not directly mentioned in the release notes, Microsoft's new 'intelligent media search' for Windows 11 is referenced in the latest Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 27695 (Canary Channel). What does it do? Well, once confirmation is given, media files on your device will be scanned and scraped (and transcribed with AI) and then indexed for spoken word search.

In some ways, Microsoft's new 'Intelligent media search' for Windows 11 is reminiscent of the controversial Recall feature that was quietly put on hold before the launch of Microsoft's new Copilot+ AI PCs. Recall was a system that would have your PC take screenshots of everything you do and then use an AI model to index and make your PC history searchable.

This sounds much more practical, especially if you can set and select which audio and video files to scrape, scan, and transcribe with AI. For those who record meetings or work with video used as a reference, it sounds like a great addition to Windows 11 and a great use of local AI. Searching a long video for specific words or topics sounds extremely useful.

Microsoft has announced its hosting a Windows security meeting at its Redmond headquarters next month, and the meeting will focus on the meltdown that was the CrowdStrike outage that caused 8.5 million Windows machines to enter infinite boot loops that required physical intervention for remediation.

Aidan Marcuss, the corporate vice president of Microsoft Windows and devices wrote on the Windows Experience Blog the meeting will be held on September 10 and is called the "Windows Endpoint Security Ecosystem Summit". The summit will be attended by CrowdStrike, along with key partners in Windows security who will all sit down for a discussion about improving resiliency and protecting critical infrastructure.

The meeting comes after CrowdStrike rolled out a faulty driver update to its Falcon Sensor cybsecurity software, resulting in an error within the kernel of machines, which then caused approximately 8.5 million Windows machines to be thrown into infinite bootloops. Some of the systems that were down were also critical infrastructure such as emergency services, telecommunications providers, airport systems, financial systems, and more.

The head of Amazon Web Services (AWS) has suggested that in the future developers may need to be required to learn different skills as they won't necessarily be coding anymore.

According to AWS head Matt Garman, going forward 24 months or "some amount of time" the requirements for developers will have changed, with the AWS specifically saying "coding in 2025 may be different than it was as a developer in 2020." While Garman didn't specifically name the catalyst for what will change the coding landscape, the answer appears obvious - the rise of sophisticated artificial intelligence programs.

AWS has stated that Garman wasn't issuing a "warning" to developers, but the sentiment still rings true - the coding landscape will look very different over the next few years, especially considering how much it has already changed since the rise of AI-powered tools. For example, AWS has let go of hundreds of good as of April, and according to Garman the amount of time writing code for a product is going to continually reduce, and the job will be more focussed on knowing what the customer needs.

Apple is quietly preparing for the big release of iOS 18 alongside its line-up of new iPhone's, and ahead of the launch the company has rolled out a change to the terms of conditions of Apple Cash, which also applies to its upcoming Tap to Cash feature expected to debut in coming OS update.

Apple sent out an email to Apple Cash users that informs them as of October 4 users will have to verify their identity when sending more than $500 total per week via Apple Cash. The email states the $500 a week limit also applies to any support payment card in Wallet, and that once the change has rolled out "prior P2P (peer-to-peer) transactions will count toward this limit".

Furthermore, these transfer limit changes also applies to any money users receive. Prior to this change Apple required users to provide some personal details for specific Apple Cash functions. This update to Apple Cash also affects the upcoming Tap to Cash feature that was unveiled at Apple's WWDC event in June. This new feature enables iPhones and Apple Watches to become payment terminals, which means users can simply pay each other by softly touching their devices together.

Google has many apps, and many of which users install right away when they fire up a new PC. Unfortunately, there isn't one place you can go to find all of these apps and easily install them. Until now.

Google has announced the "Essentials" app, a new way for users to quickly setup their new PC with all of their most-used Google applications. Google explained in a new announcement that Essentials is designed to make it easy to "discover and install many of" the company's best Google services on Windows.

The new app comes in two sections; the first being a collection of shortcuts to its productivity apps such as Google Docs, Sheets, Drive, etc, and the second being a collection of gaming-related apps such as Google Play Games.

The Control Panel is being replaced by the Settings app, according to recent update by Microsoft on its support blog that outlines all of the tools in-built with Windows.

The Windows Control Panel was first added to Windows 1.0 throughout the mid-80s and quickly became the hub to access everything that regarded system customization. However, Microsoft added an update to its support page that states the Control Panel is being "deprecated in favor of the Settings app" as the Settings app offers users a much more modern and streamlined experience.

Notably, Microsoft states the old-school Windows tool is still included in modern Windows versions for compatibility reasons as not all settings are present within the Settings app. But Microsoft plans on migrating all of the settings within the Control Panel over to the Settings, after which I expect will usher in the end of Control Panel as it will be rendered obsolete.

Windows 11's Recall feature was put on ice following a whole lot of controversy after it was revealed, but Microsoft is ready to thaw out the ability for Copilot+ PCs, it seems.

Pavan Davuluri, who is Corporate VP of Windows and Devices at Microsoft, updated a previous blog post on Recall - where the news of the feature being pulled was given - to say that it's set to go live, at least in testing, in Windows 11 preview builds in October.

Davuluri explained:

An exclusive report posted earlier this month by CSO detailed a deal between CrowdStrike and Action1 to purchase the cloud-based patch management and vulnerability remediation company for nearly $1 billion.

Now, a new report has claimed that deal has fallen a part following Action1 declining the acquisition offer by CrowdStrike. The new report by CSO states Action1 has decided to stay independent to keep full control of the company in an effort to not let dilution impact the brand's "ability to innovate."

Mike Walters, president and CEO of Action1 comment on the collapse of the deal, saying that one of the main reasons why Action1 declined the offer was over "customer trust", which presented itself after emails leaked about a potential acquisition by CrowdStrike was in the works.

VideoProc Converter AI is an excellent choice for your video-related tasks. It packs real video processing power including AI enhancement capabilities and audio/video production features with Full Hardware Acceleration speed. It's incredibly easy to use. But is it safe to use or is it worth it?

Here's a full overview of VideoProc Converter AI, exploring every aspect of the program. Keep reading.

VideoProc Converter AI is a one-stop AI-powered video and image enhancement toolbox for superior image quality and processing speed. It features three AI modules for video/image enhancement and several tools for video processing.

The GPU-Z team has just released v2.6.0 of its legendary software, with added support for new graphics and GPU architectures. You can download GPU-Z v2.6.0 right here (9.7MB download).

This isn't a big game-changing release of GPU-Z, but rather it includes support for multiple variants of NVIDIA's current-gen Ada Lovelace-powered GeForce RTX 40 series GPUs, as well as Qualcomm's new Snapdragon X Elite, correct AMD Zen 5 processor temperatures, and so much more.

AMD's new Zen 5-based CPUs get correct temperatures with GPU-Z 2.6.0, which includes the Ryzen AI 300 series "Strix Point" laptop CPUs, and the Ryzen 9000 series "Granite Ridge" desktop CPUs. On the Intel side of things, there's support for Raptor Lake-U and Meteor Lake's Arc-based GPU. The team at TechPowerUp have also provided support for GPUs based on Arm64 and Qualcomm's new Snapdragon X series processors inside of Copilot+ laptops.

Windows 11's update for August is reportedly slowing down some PCs, and in other cases it's failing to install, plus for gamers it's interfering with Valorant's anti-cheat system.

Windows updates failing to install is hardly a new phenomenon - it happens more often than it should - and Windows Latest flags up that there are various complaints from Windows 11 users about patch KB5041585 refusing to play ball.

The tech site observes that it has received complaints from readers about being unable to install the cumulative update, and there are posts in Microsoft's Feedback Hub too.

Microsoft has been pushing Windows 10 users to adopt Windows 11 since the new operating system was released in 2021, but the Redmond company has been hitting the marketing campaign especially hard since it announced Windows 10 support will be ending in October, 2025.

Windows 10 is still by a large margin the world's most popular operating system, according to data from Statcounter, and since the end-of-support announcement, Microsoft has been rolling out new advertisements in Windows 10 to push users over to Windows 11. Some of these advertisements came in the form of full-screen ads. Additionally, Microsoft has begun integrating more advertisements within Windows 10, which has caused many users to express negative feedback about the changes.

Microsoft has now officially recognized this feedback from both Windows 10 and 11 users, writing, "To honor our user's feedback, these invitations will no longer begin with the April 2024 monthly security update. We will share a new timeline in the coming months." Microsoft initially planned on rolling out these full-screen advertisements for Windows 11 to more swaths of Windows 10 users, but Redmon conceded in a Microsoft 365 advisory post that it will pause Windows 11 ads for managed Windows 10 devices.

It was only a few days ago that Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro signed a 10-day ban on Elon Musk's social media platform X, formerly Twitter, over the platform breaking many of the country's regulations.

The ban severed access to X for local residents. According to Maduro's speech, which CNBC translated, the reasoning is that the social media platform violated "all of the rules" of the nation's telecommunications regulator. Maduro said X is "inciting hatred, fascism, civil war, death and confrontations among Venezuelans." According to the nation, the temporary ban will give the platform time to respond to the changes.

Following the ban and other threats of banning the popular messaging app WhatsApp, VPN demand is surging across Venezuela, according to new research from vpnMentor. According to the cybersecurity and research lab, VPN demand has skyrocketed by more than 494% following X being officially blocked, with the demand surging on Thursday after the order went through by Venezuela's National Telecommunications Commission.

Elon Musk has sat down for a historic interview with former US President Donald Trump, as the interview has marked the biggest the platform has seen so far.

The recent interview dominated X, formerly known as Twitter, and throughout the conversation, listeners reached around 1 million. The surprisingly lengthy conversation covered numerous topics and would be more easily consumed in 1-hour long segments, which Musk recommended following the conclusion of the interview. Musk has since taken to his personal account to share some stats on the Spaces post, with the Tesla CEO sharing a post by the official X account stating the Spaces post received 73 million views between 7:47 PM and 10:47 PM ET.

Additionally, during that same period, there were 4 million posts about the conversation, which generated a total of 998 million views. Musk wrote in the sharing of the X post that the "Combined views of the conversation with @realDonaldTrump and subsequent discussion by other accounts now ~1 billion" . The conversation between the SpaceX CEO and Trump was delayed by 40 minutes as a "massive" DDOS attack hit the social media platform. It eventually went live with less bandwidth than what Musk was testing for earlier in the day.

Windows 11 could get a change to the Start menu which would make it easier to deal with your apps, rather than having them in a long list that you're forced to scroll through.

In case you didn't guess, we're talking about the All Apps section of the Start menu in Windows 11, which is currently laid out in a clunky list format - but all that could change if clues in testing are anything to go by.

You may recall that Microsoft is testing a grid layout instead of the current scroll-athon of a list, and also that a new category view was spotted in testing quite recently.

The CrowdStrike outage knocked out approximately 8.5 million Windows machines around the world, some of which were running critical infrastructure such as emergency services, hospitals, and airports.

The outage was caused by a faulty driver update that was rolled out to CrowdStrike's cybersecurity software. The update resulted in an estimated 8.5 million Windows machines being thrown into boot loops that called for physical intervention to be fixed. The fix, being relatively simple, was the cherry on top of the scenario as all an individual would need to do is boot the machine into Windows Recovery Mode / Safe Mode and delete some files from the CrowdStrike's install folder.

However, this was a nightmare for IT people responsible for thousands of machines. The outage cost Delta approximately $500 million, and the estimated 8.5 million Windows machines that were taken down is an estimation based on CrowdStrike customers that have opted into crash reports, which means it's at least 8.5 million, not total.