Technology - Google News

Samsung Galaxy S20 sales down 50% compared to the Galaxy S10 - PocketNow
Reddit CEO claims TikTok app is 'fundamentally parasitic' and spyware - USA TODAY
Apple and Samsung dominate top selling phone lists for 2019 - The Verge

Samsung Galaxy S20 sales down 50% compared to the Galaxy S10 - PocketNow

Posted: 28 Feb 2020 12:00 AM PST

The newly announced Galaxy S20 series of smartphones is reportedly performing worse than the predecessor Galaxy S10, The Korea Herald reports. On the first day of the Korean availability, sales for the current generation were down 50% compared to last year.

70,800 Galaxy S20 units were sold on first day, compared to 140,000 units of the Galaxy S10, and 220,000 units of the Galaxy Note 10, on day one.

Sales were affected by sharp declines in discounts for new phones and the number of visitors to offline stores due to coronavirus infection fears
The Korea Herald, citing an official from a local telecom company

It might be difficult to pin it down to one reason or the other. Whether it's the lack of subsidies and discounts, or fear of SARS-CoV-2, is unknown, but one thing is for certain: both the aforementioned reasons have economic backgrounds, as economies worldwide are taking a serious hit due to the outbreaks.

Source: The Korea Herald

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Reddit CEO claims TikTok app is 'fundamentally parasitic' and spyware - USA TODAY

Posted: 27 Feb 2020 02:07 PM PST

Edward C. Baig USA TODAY

Published 5:10 PM EST Feb 27, 2020

Reddit CEO Steve Huffman presumably won't be singing on TikTok anytime soon.

Huffman referred to the wildly popular short-form mobile video app as "fundamentally parasitic," in remarks he made Wednesday at a Silicon Valley conference. TikTok was formerly known as Musical.ly and compared to karaoke for the digital age.

"Maybe I'm going to regret this, but I can't even get to that level of thinking with them," Huffman charged, as reported by TechCrunch. "Because I look at that app as so fundamentally parasitic, that it's always listening, the fingerprinting technology they use is truly terrifying, and I could not bring myself to install an app like that on my phone."

Huffman added that he actively tells people, "'Don't install that spyware on your phone,'"

TikTok pushed back in a statement shared with USA TODAY. "These are baseless accusations made without a shred of evidence," a spokesperson said. The video-sharing service is owned by a Chinese company ByteDance.

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In a blog post this past November, TikTok U.S. general manager Vanessa Pappas indicated that the company was committed to "prioritizing data security."

"We have a dedicated technical team focused on adhering to robust cybersecurity policies, and data privacy and security practices. In addition, we periodically conduct internal and external reviews of our security practices in an effort to ensure we are keeping up with current risks."

Lawmakers though have fretted over how TikTok handles data. This past Sunday, the Transportation Security Administration said it has stopped allowing employees to use TikTok to create social media posts for the agency after Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer raised concerns about potential national security issues

Parents have also been concerned about their teens' obsession with the app. Earlier this month, TikTok announced a new Family Safety Mode, which gives parents and guardians more control over how much time their kids spend on TikTok.

Reddit has not responded to a USA TODAY request for comment.

Email: ebaig@usatoday.com; Follow @edbaig on Twitter

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Apple and Samsung dominate top selling phone lists for 2019 - The Verge

Posted: 28 Feb 2020 05:01 AM PST

Apple produced the two top selling phone models in the world last year, the iPhone XR and iPhone 11, according to reports by Counterpoint Research and Omdia. The iPhone 11's second place position was particularly impressive, given the phone was only on sale for just over three months in 2019. However, there were large disparities regionally, with a Samsung phone winning Europe, and an Oppo holding the top spot in China.

The disparity between the top sellers in North America and Europe is particularly striking. In the former, Apple completely dominated. Each one of the top five selling phones in the region was an iPhone, ranging from the budget iPhone 8 to the premium flagship iPhone 11 Pro Max. That's not much of a surprise with Apple owning roughly 50 percent of the US marketshare. In Europe, however, Samsung's mid-range A-series devices took the lead. The best selling phone in Europe was the Galaxy A50, and phones from the series made up three of the top five bestselling handsets (Apple's made up the other two).

The top ten worldwide was similarly filled with Samsung and Apple handsets, though it's interesting to see that none of Samsung's flagship phones made the cut. Omdia and Counterpoint Research differ slightly on the exact models that were the top sellers though. Omdia reports that Apple had five models in the top ten, Samsung had four, and Xiaomi's Redmi Note 7 took one. Meanwhile, Counterpoint Research says that six of the top ten phones were iPhones, three were mid-range handsets from Samsung, and the final handset was Oppo's A5, which it says also took the top spot in China.

Counterpoint's Research paints a bleaker image for Huawei, which it says didn't manage to get a single handset into the top ten worldwide. The closest was the Huawei P30, which was the fifth best-selling phone in China, behind handsets from Oppo and Vivo.

That doesn't mean Huawei did badly overall. All the analysts agree that the Chinese manufacturer was the second best-selling smartphone manufacturer in the world in 2019, behind Samsung and ahead of Apple for the first time, as its shipments increased between 2018 and 2019.

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