If you're one of those tech enthusiasts whose week went in by a blur of a second, all thanks to standing in long queues at banks and ATMs because of the sudden demonetisation drive that the Modi government has sprung us on, here's www.indianweb2.com giving you a quick recap of some of the most important happenings in the tech sector this week.
Here are the Top 10 tech news you must know from this week:
1) Forget Bitcoins, Meet Zcash – A New Harder-to-Trace Virtual Currency
Zcash, a new virtual currency, has made its debut and has managed to grab quite a few eyeballs within a few days of its debut. The new digital currency has been conceived and executed by meticulous university academics to be entirely untraceable. In order to make the currency untraceable, Zcash developers have made use of advanced cryptography, unlike the now in-famous Bitcoin.
Zcash developers have used zk-Snark, a method developed by a team of top cryptographers at M.I.T. and in Israel– that allowed the Zcash transactions to be confirmed by the network without any recording of the involved Zcash addresses. There is also an option to opt out of this privacy function.
2) Revolution of 3D print heart on chip by Researchers of Harvard
A Harvard team has successfully developed six custom 3D-printable materials that could have the potential of reorganising the structure of a human heart tissue with embedded soft strain sensors. These are printable through continuous and automated processes and separate wells in the chip host of different tissues.
3) Indian Government is Preparing for a Cyber War, Says IT Minister
Indian Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad recently revealed that his government is currently in the process of preparing for a bloodless war, by strengthening its cyber security measures. In order to achieve in the same, the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-Inc.) has been strengthened.
According to Prasad, "National Cyber Coordination Centre has been set up to provide near real time awareness on situations and response rapidly as such Rs 9.85 Billion project to be completed in five years."
The phase I of the project has already been tendered and expected to be operational by March next year.
4) Gaana launches india’s first music streaming chatbot
The week saw popular music-streaming app Gaana debuting its Facebook Messenger chatbot, the Gaana Facebook Messenger chatbot. The chatbot is the world’s first music streaming chatbot inside the FB messenger app.
With the chatbot, Ganna offers the following features to its users:
a) Receive instant updates about all the fresh content on Gaana's official website.
b) Search for music on its official website.
c) Share their favourite content with their Facebook friends.
d) Send feedback to Gaana.
e) Go straight her to the app/website from the FB Messenger.
5) The 5 Hottest Emerging Technologies of 2016
The World Economic Forum has announced a list of the top 5 hottest emerging technologies of this year. They are as follows:
a) Next Generation Batteries as per renewable energy: Advancements in energy storage using sodium, aluminium and zinc-based batteries has now made it possible to have mini-grids that could provide round-the-clock, clean, reliable energy sources to an entire village.
b) Open AI ecosystem: With the advancements made this year, humans have reached a few steps nearer to smart digital assistants that will be able to help them with a vast range of tasks, right from keeping a track of their health, finances and even advising on what and what not to wear.
c) 2D Materials: With the production costs escalating at a great rate, 2D materials like Graphene are now being used in a wide range of applications, right from water and air filters to new generations wearables and batteries.
d) BlockChain Impact: Blockchain, the distributed electronic ledger behind the much famous online currency bitcoin, has the potential of having great economic and social impact. In fact, with the pace that it is developing, it could even fundamentally change the way the governments and market function.
e) Self Driven Cars: Autonomous vehicles had a field day in this year. Though not legal in various countries yet, the technology has the potential of boosting economies, saving lives and cutting pollution by a great deal.
6) Manipal Student Wins Prize for Designing Waterless, Odourless Loo for Railways
Vinod Anthony Thomas, a student of Manipal University, has designed a waterless and odourless toilet in order to solve all the toilet issues currently being faced by the Indian Railways. In fact, Vinod has won himself a second prize for his this very invention. The competition was held by the Indian Railways keeping in line with India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s much ambitious Clean India initiative.
The award-winning design takes care of the old, unhygienic way of disposal of human waste on the railway tracks by introducing a system of waste management that replaces the system of flushing with water and generation of foul smell with a conveyor system carrying waste in a hermetically sealed pocket to a large collection bin to store waste. This is run manually by a crank wheel. The bin effectively reduces the amount of waste by way of forced ventilation, and decomposition.
7) Ban on Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes makes E-wallets go mainstream
The Modi government's sudden move to withdraw Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes from being legal tender has spelled good times for the all the digital payment solutions startups in India. These startups had been facing tough times after a period of dramatic growth since their launch, and the demonetisation has been able to add a breath of fresh lives to these startups.
For example, India's largest mobile payment wallet, Paytm, saw its app downloads swell by three times and payments for offline transactions grow by five time in the first two days following the government's announcement. Another mobile payment wallet, MobiKwik, saw a solid 100 percent growth in its customer numbers day-on-day in the past week. The trend is similar in all other digital payment solutions startups.
8) Facebook is now testing new ‘Rooms’ feature in Messenger chat app
Social networking giant Facebook is now testing its new 'Rooms' feature in its Messenger chat app. It was in the year 2014 that Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook had first tried its hands on Rooms as a semi-anonymous social networking app, but it abruptly shut it down a year later in 2015.
FB is testing the integration of a the 'Rooms' feature in its Messenger chat app. Currently, the feature can also be used in Canada and Australia. Rooms are meant for public conversations about interests and topics. Reportedly, each of the room has a link that can be shared with anyone on the Messenger app so that anyone can join-in in the conversation.
9) Researchers develop 'smart' material that can de-ice any surface
A team of researchers have meticulously worked towards discovering a`smart' material that can be applied to any surface to repel ice. The discovered material, magnetic slippery surface (MAGSS), is able to outperform all the others ones that are currently in usage to repel ice.
While one side of MAGSS is coated with a magnetic material, the other side is a thin layer of magnetic fluid -a mixture of fluid and iron oxide nanoparticles. The magnetic fluid is on the outer side.
10) Hong Kong banks testing new biometric technology
Two Hong Kong banks are interested in testing the use of biometric authentication of securities trading under the Hong Kong's banking regulator's new regulatory regime, said information given out by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA). It was in September this year, that the authority had launched a new regime that allowed banks to use a "sandbox" to test new technologies on a limited basis before deploying them to the general public.
Here are the Top 10 tech news you must know from this week:
1) Forget Bitcoins, Meet Zcash – A New Harder-to-Trace Virtual Currency
Zcash, a new virtual currency, has made its debut and has managed to grab quite a few eyeballs within a few days of its debut. The new digital currency has been conceived and executed by meticulous university academics to be entirely untraceable. In order to make the currency untraceable, Zcash developers have made use of advanced cryptography, unlike the now in-famous Bitcoin.
Zcash developers have used zk-Snark, a method developed by a team of top cryptographers at M.I.T. and in Israel– that allowed the Zcash transactions to be confirmed by the network without any recording of the involved Zcash addresses. There is also an option to opt out of this privacy function.
2) Revolution of 3D print heart on chip by Researchers of Harvard
A Harvard team has successfully developed six custom 3D-printable materials that could have the potential of reorganising the structure of a human heart tissue with embedded soft strain sensors. These are printable through continuous and automated processes and separate wells in the chip host of different tissues.
3) Indian Government is Preparing for a Cyber War, Says IT Minister
Indian Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad recently revealed that his government is currently in the process of preparing for a bloodless war, by strengthening its cyber security measures. In order to achieve in the same, the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-Inc.) has been strengthened.
According to Prasad, "National Cyber Coordination Centre has been set up to provide near real time awareness on situations and response rapidly as such Rs 9.85 Billion project to be completed in five years."
The phase I of the project has already been tendered and expected to be operational by March next year.
4) Gaana launches india’s first music streaming chatbot
The week saw popular music-streaming app Gaana debuting its Facebook Messenger chatbot, the Gaana Facebook Messenger chatbot. The chatbot is the world’s first music streaming chatbot inside the FB messenger app.
With the chatbot, Ganna offers the following features to its users:
a) Receive instant updates about all the fresh content on Gaana's official website.
b) Search for music on its official website.
c) Share their favourite content with their Facebook friends.
d) Send feedback to Gaana.
e) Go straight her to the app/website from the FB Messenger.
5) The 5 Hottest Emerging Technologies of 2016
The World Economic Forum has announced a list of the top 5 hottest emerging technologies of this year. They are as follows:
a) Next Generation Batteries as per renewable energy: Advancements in energy storage using sodium, aluminium and zinc-based batteries has now made it possible to have mini-grids that could provide round-the-clock, clean, reliable energy sources to an entire village.
b) Open AI ecosystem: With the advancements made this year, humans have reached a few steps nearer to smart digital assistants that will be able to help them with a vast range of tasks, right from keeping a track of their health, finances and even advising on what and what not to wear.
c) 2D Materials: With the production costs escalating at a great rate, 2D materials like Graphene are now being used in a wide range of applications, right from water and air filters to new generations wearables and batteries.
d) BlockChain Impact: Blockchain, the distributed electronic ledger behind the much famous online currency bitcoin, has the potential of having great economic and social impact. In fact, with the pace that it is developing, it could even fundamentally change the way the governments and market function.
e) Self Driven Cars: Autonomous vehicles had a field day in this year. Though not legal in various countries yet, the technology has the potential of boosting economies, saving lives and cutting pollution by a great deal.
6) Manipal Student Wins Prize for Designing Waterless, Odourless Loo for Railways
Vinod Anthony Thomas, a student of Manipal University, has designed a waterless and odourless toilet in order to solve all the toilet issues currently being faced by the Indian Railways. In fact, Vinod has won himself a second prize for his this very invention. The competition was held by the Indian Railways keeping in line with India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s much ambitious Clean India initiative.
The award-winning design takes care of the old, unhygienic way of disposal of human waste on the railway tracks by introducing a system of waste management that replaces the system of flushing with water and generation of foul smell with a conveyor system carrying waste in a hermetically sealed pocket to a large collection bin to store waste. This is run manually by a crank wheel. The bin effectively reduces the amount of waste by way of forced ventilation, and decomposition.
7) Ban on Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes makes E-wallets go mainstream
The Modi government's sudden move to withdraw Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes from being legal tender has spelled good times for the all the digital payment solutions startups in India. These startups had been facing tough times after a period of dramatic growth since their launch, and the demonetisation has been able to add a breath of fresh lives to these startups.
For example, India's largest mobile payment wallet, Paytm, saw its app downloads swell by three times and payments for offline transactions grow by five time in the first two days following the government's announcement. Another mobile payment wallet, MobiKwik, saw a solid 100 percent growth in its customer numbers day-on-day in the past week. The trend is similar in all other digital payment solutions startups.
8) Facebook is now testing new ‘Rooms’ feature in Messenger chat app
Social networking giant Facebook is now testing its new 'Rooms' feature in its Messenger chat app. It was in the year 2014 that Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook had first tried its hands on Rooms as a semi-anonymous social networking app, but it abruptly shut it down a year later in 2015.
FB is testing the integration of a the 'Rooms' feature in its Messenger chat app. Currently, the feature can also be used in Canada and Australia. Rooms are meant for public conversations about interests and topics. Reportedly, each of the room has a link that can be shared with anyone on the Messenger app so that anyone can join-in in the conversation.
9) Researchers develop 'smart' material that can de-ice any surface
A team of researchers have meticulously worked towards discovering a`smart' material that can be applied to any surface to repel ice. The discovered material, magnetic slippery surface (MAGSS), is able to outperform all the others ones that are currently in usage to repel ice.
While one side of MAGSS is coated with a magnetic material, the other side is a thin layer of magnetic fluid -a mixture of fluid and iron oxide nanoparticles. The magnetic fluid is on the outer side.
10) Hong Kong banks testing new biometric technology
Two Hong Kong banks are interested in testing the use of biometric authentication of securities trading under the Hong Kong's banking regulator's new regulatory regime, said information given out by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA). It was in September this year, that the authority had launched a new regime that allowed banks to use a "sandbox" to test new technologies on a limited basis before deploying them to the general public.
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