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Category: Internet & platforms (Page 1 of 8)

Google announces 10 new AI features for Chrome

From the Google Products Blog…

Today we share how we’re using the latest in Google AI to enhance your browsing experience. We’re building Google AI into Chrome across multiple levels so it can better anticipate your needs, help you understand more complex information and make you more productive when you browse the web:

1. Enhance your browsing with Gemini in Chrome

Starting today, we’re rolling out Gemini in Chrome to Mac and Windows desktop users in the U.S. with their language set to English, so you can ask Gemini to clarify complex information on any webpage (or webpages) you’re reading. It’ll be available to businesses in the coming weeks via Google Workspace with enterprise-grade data protections and controls. And we’re also bringing Gemini in Chrome to mobile in the U.S.

2. Get ready for your agentic browsing assistant

In the coming months, we’ll be introducing agentic capabilities to Gemini in Chrome. These will let Gemini in Chrome handle those tedious tasks that take up so much of your time, like booking a haircut or ordering your weekly groceries.

3. Make better sense of all your tabs

Gemini in Chrome can now work across multiple tabs, so you can quickly compare and summarize information across multiple websites to find what you need.

4. Find webpages you previously visited

For those frustrating instances when you want to jump back into a past project but don’t want to scroll through your history to find an important website you previously visited, soon you’ll be able to use Gemini in Chrome to recall it for you.

5. Work with your Google apps without changing tabs

We’ve also built a deeper integration between Gemini in Chrome and your favorite Google apps, like Calendar, YouTube and Maps, so you can schedule meetings, see location details and more without leaving the page you’re on.

6. Search with AI Mode right from the omnibox

You’ll have the option to quickly access Google Search’s AI Mode right from the Chrome address bar (what we call the omnibox) on your computer.

7. Ask questions and learn more about your current page

You can ask questions about the entire page you’re on right from the omnibox. Chrome can suggest relevant questions based on the context of the page to help you kickstart your search.

8. Combat more sophisticated scams with Gemini Nano

Safe Browsing’s Enhanced Protection mode already uses Gemini Nano to help identify tech support scams that try to trick you into downloading harmful software. Soon, we’ll be expanding this protection to also stop sites that use fake viruses or fake giveaways to trick you.

9. Say goodbye to dodgy notifications and unwanted permissions

Chrome now detects potentially spammy or scammy notifications and gives you the option of seeing them or unsubscribing. Since rolling out this feature, we’ve reduced unwanted website notifications for Chrome on Android users by around 3 billion each day.

10. Change compromised passwords in 1-step

Chrome already automatically and securely fills in your login credentials and proactively alerts you if any of your passwords are compromised. Very soon it’ll use AI as a password agent to go a step further, letting you change your saved passwords with a single click on supported sites.

https://blog.google/products/chrome/new-ai-features-for-chrome

Atlassian to acquire The Browser Company

From the Atlassian blog… (Also see details from The Browser Company)

Building the AI browser for knowledge workers – a browser that helps you do, not just browse.

Today, I’m excited to share an exciting step forward for Atlassian. We’ve entered into an agreement to acquire The Browser Company of New York, the team behind the incredible Dia and Arc browsers.

By combining The Browser Company’s passion for building browsers people love with Atlassian’s deep expertise on how the world’s best teams operate, we have the opportunity to transform how work gets done in the AI era…

Today’s browsers weren’t built for work. They were built for browsing – reading the news, watching videos, looking up recipes. And sure, you may do some of those things in your browser during the workday, but most of those tabs represent a task that needs to get done. A meeting to schedule. A design to review. A work item to update in Jira. A memo to write. Before you know it, it’s hard to see through the forest of tabs.

Knowledge workers need a browser designed for their specific needs, not one that’s been built for everyone on the planet. That’s what we will build with The Browser Company. Our vision is to make Dia the browser:

  • Optimized for the SaaS apps where you spend your day. Whether you’re working in email or a project management tool or a design app, your tabs will be enriched with context that helps move your work forward.
  • Packed with AI skills and your personal work memory to connect the dots between your apps, tabs, and tasks.
  • Built with trust and security in mind Security, compliance, and admin controls will be baked into every aspect of Dia.

https://www.atlassian.com/blog/announcements/atlassian-acquires-the-browser-companyhttps://browsercompany.substack.com/p/your-tuesday-in-2030

Brave integration deepens support for Unstoppable Domains

Brave announced that more than 2 million Unstoppable domains can now be used to display decentralized websites in Brave, a secure and privacy-centric browser that allows you to explore the Internet without being tracked. Through the Unstoppable Domains integration with Brave, creators can build decentralized content with a domain that they fully own and control – or explore the nearly 30,000 websites and counting that have been created using an Unstoppable domain. Brave integration goes beyond .crypto to include more top-level domains such as .nft, .x, .wallet, .bitcoin, .blockchain, and .dao.

Through the Brave integration with Unstoppable Domains, domains like Sandy.nft and Brad.crypto function just like normal Web2 addresses, but are hosted on the InterPlanetary File System (IFPS), a decentralized, peer-to-peer network. Brave offers a browser with native support for IPFS—meaning you don’t need to take any additional steps, or download any additional software, to access decentralized sites. Navigating to an IPFS URL is as simple as clicking a link. Native support for IPFS is a key piece of infrastructure for decentralized websites where both the domain and Web content are owned entirely by the user and distributed across a network of nodes.

https://brave.com/decentralized-websites/

W3C to become a public-interest non-profit organization

From the W3C…

The World Wide Web Consortium is set to pursue 501(c)(3) non-profit status. The launch as a new legal entity in January 2023 preserves the core mission of the Consortium to shepherd the web by developing open standards with contributions from W3C Members, staff, and the international community.

At the operational level, which is not changing, W3C Members are bound together for our technical work, united around the W3C’s mission to lead the web to its full potential by creating open standards that ensure that the web remains open, accessible, internationalized, secure, and interoperable for everyone around the globe.

We need a structure where we meet at a faster pace the demands of new web capabilities and address the urgent problems of the web. The W3C Team is small, bounded in size, and the Hosted model hinders rapid development and acquisition of skills in new fields.

We need to put governance at the center of the new organization to achieve clearer reporting, accountability, greater diversity and strategic direction, better global coordination. A Board of Directors will be elected with W3C Member majority. It will include seats that reflect the multi-stakeholder goals of the Web Consortium. We anticipate to continue joint work with today’s Hosts in a mutually beneficial partnership.

As important as all these points are, they only represent a change to the shell around W3C. The proven standards development process must and will be preserved.

W3C processes promote fairness, enable progress. Our standards work will still be accomplished in the open, under the W3C Process Document and royalty-free W3C Patent Policy, with input from the broader community. Decisions will still be taken by consensus. Technical direction and Recommendations will continue to require review by W3C Members – large and small. The Advisory Board will still guide the community-driven Process Document enhancement. The Technical Architecture Group will continue as the highest authority on technical matters.

Our transition to launch the legal entity includes concrete stages – adoption of Bylaws: filing for 501(c)(3) non-profit status; election and seating of a Board of Directors – all to transfer staff, Member contracts, and operations to the new structure.

https://www.w3.org/2022/06/pressrelease-w3c-le.html.en

Apple, Google and Microsoft commit to expanded support for FIDO standard

Apple, Google and Microsoft announced plans to expand support for a common passwordless sign-in standard created by the FIDO Alliance and the World Wide Web Consortium. The expanded capabilities will give websites and apps the ability to offer an end-to-end passwordless option. Users will sign in through the same action that they take multiple times each day to unlock their devices, such as a simple verification of their fingerprint or face, or a device PIN. This will be more secure when compared to passwords and multi-factor technologies such as one-time passcodes sent over SMS.

The platforms already support the FIDO Alliance standard, but previous implementations require users to sign in to each website or app with each device before using passwordless functionality. Today’s announcement extends these platform implementations to:

  1. Allow users to automatically access their FIDO sign-in credentials (referred to by some as a “passkey”) on many of their devices, even new ones, without having to re-enroll every account.
  2. Enable users to use FIDO authentication on their mobile device to sign in to an app or website on a nearby device, regardless of the OS platform or browser they are running.

https://fidoalliance.org/apple-google-and-microsoft-commit-to-expanded-support-for-fido-standard-to-accelerate-availability-of-passwordless-sign-ins/

Cloudflare collaborates with Microsoft and search engines to help improve websites’ search results

Cloudflare, Inc. announced it will work with Microsoft, Yandex, and other search engines to help businesses get the most timely and relevant search results to their customers. By participating in the IndexNow.org initiative, Cloudflare will allow websites to automatically notify search engines whenever content is created, updated, or deleted so they can be more efficiently crawled. Now, all Cloudflare customers can ensure users see the most up-to-date version of their content, all with a single click.

Search engines use a complex network of bots to crawl the ever-changing content on the Internet so people can find relevant, timely content. Today, approximately 45% of Internet traffic comes from web crawlers and bots. To help improve the efficiency of crawlers on the web, Cloudflare launched Crawler Hints, an easy way to signal to bot developers when content has been changed or added to a site, so they can make more efficient choices about what to crawl. Website owners will be able to improve site performance by reducing unnecessary bot traffic and to provide timely content, which ultimately helps improve search rankings. Now, Cloudflare is using the IndexNow standard to bring Crawler Hints to major search engines.

https://blog.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-now-supports-indexnow/ https://www.indexnow.org/index

dotCMS announces dotCDN

dotCMS, a hybrid content management system, launched dotCDN, a new integrated content delivery network (CDN). dotCDN enables faster content delivery through a reliable network of intelligent edge servers across the world and uses real-time analytics based on your content and network metrics to make sure users are always served content from the most optimal edge server. dotCDN can make both traditional and headless architectures perform fast, while still allowing for fully customized, context-based experiences and omnichannel marketing campaigns. dotCDN’s capabilities: 

  • dotCDN includes a workflow that will automatically invalidate pages, content and assets as they are updated and published or deleted in dotCMS.
  • dotCDN enables users to speed uncached requests across regions, so even content that’s not cached on the CDN is accessible.
  • dotCDN offers optional edge storage which statically stores files and replicates them across 4 continents. 
  • dotCDN monitors your content and traffic and can offer you different routing options and optimizations. 
  • See the traffic your CDN is getting with graphs and figures showing Bandwidth Used, Requests Served and the Cache Hit Rate.
  • dotCDN automatically monitors and stops many types of DDoS attacks. 

https://dotcms.com

W3C updates candidate for decentralized identifiers

The Decentralized Identifier Working Group has just published a second Candidate Recommendation Snapshot for the Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs) v1.0.

This document defines Decentralized identifiers (DIDs), a new type of identifier that enables verifiable, decentralized digital identity. A DID identifies any subject (e.g., a person, organization, thing, data model, abstract entity, etc.) that the controller of the DID decides that it identifies. In contrast to typical, federated identifiers, DIDs have been designed so that they may be decoupled from centralized registries, identity providers, and certificate authorities. DIDs are URIs that associate a DID subject with a DID document allowing trustable interactions associated with that subject. Each DID document can express cryptographic material, verification methods, or services, which provide a set of mechanisms enabling a DID controller to prove control of the DID.

Candidate Recommendation means that the Working Group considers the technical design to be complete, and is seeking implementation feedback on the document. The group is keen to get comments and implementation experiences on this specification as issues raised in the document’s Github repository. The group expects to satisfy the implementation goals (i.e., at least two, independent implementations for each of the test cases) by July 17, 2021.

https://www.w3.org/TR/did-core/

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