Google services down for users around the world

SAN FRANCISCO, United States - Popular Google services including Gmail and Drive were down for many users around the world on Thursday, with the US technology giant telling affected people they were "aware of a service disruption."

Frustrated customers in countries including Australia, Japan, France and the United States complained online of the outage and tracking website DownDetector reported Google services were down in every continent. 

"Anyone else having issues with @gmail in Australia?" one person tweeted.

Another Twitter user, in Brooklyn, New York, wrote: "Nearly 16 years in and this is the first time I can remember Gmail being completely down." 

Google's @Gmail Twitter feed replied to the posts with: "Thanks for reporting. We are aware of a service disruption at the moment."

The message contained a link to a Gmail service details page that told users "we are continuing to investigate this issue," and to check back later.

As well as English, the Gmail Twitter feed replied to people in French, Japanese, Portuguese and German.

Responding to an AFP inquiry, Google said to refer to the G Suite Dashboard for status updates.

Agence France-Presse

Huawei to support its devices after Google Android bar

LONDON - Huawei will support its smartphones and tablets by providing security updates and services, it said, after Google barred it from updates to the Android operating system.

But the Chinese technology firm did not say on Monday what would happen with phones it sells in the future, which are unlikely to have access to Google's popular services, including Gmail, YouTube and maps unless a special licence is obtained.

Huawei's devices in its home market use a custom operating system based on open source Android but do not include access to any Google services, which are banned in China. But Google's curbs will hugely damage Huawei's global appeal.

"Huawei will continue to provide security updates and after-sales services to all existing Huawei and Honor smartphone and tablet products, covering those that have been sold and that are still in stock globally," a Huawei spokesman said by email.

"We will continue to build a safe and sustainable software ecosystem," Huawei, which aspires to leap-frog Samsung to be the world's biggest smartphone maker, said.

"As one of Android's key global partners, we have worked closely with their open-source platform to develop an ecosystem that has benefitted both users and the industry," it added.

Almost half of the 208 million phones Huawei shipped in 2018 went outside mainland China, and Europe is the most important overseas market where its devices had a 29% market share in the first quarter of 2019, technology research firm IDC says.

The Google loss was likely to cost Huawei all of its smartphone sales outside China as "device purchasing is now almost entirely driven by the ecosystem," industry analyst Richard Windsor said.

"Huawei will not lose access to Android itself, which is open source, but Android devices outside of China must offer access to Google services in order to have any prospect of being sold," Windsor added.

TRADE BLACKLIST

Google, owned by Alphabet Inc, said it would enact restrictions on Android updates after US President Donald Trump added Huawei to a trade blacklist, making it extremely difficult for it to do business with US counterparts.

"We are complying with the order and reviewing the implications," a Google spokesman said.

Huawei, which is the largest supplier of telecom networking equipment, is at the centre of trade tensions between Beijing and Washington. The United States has said its gear could be used by China to spy on Americans, allegations Huawei has repeatedly denied.

Google said its Google Play app store and the security protections from Google Play Protect would continue to function on existing Huawei devices.

As well as restrictions on the software running its devices, Huawei faces the prospect of losing access to some of the US hardware suppliers it needs to produce its technology.

Chipmakers including Intel Corp, Qualcomm Inc , Xilinx Inc and Broadcom Inc have told their employees they will not supply critical software and components to Huawei until further notice, Bloomberg reported.

Founder and chief executive Ren Zhengfei said on Saturday that Huawei's growth "may slow, but only slightly" due to the US restrictions and that it would be "fine" even if Qualcomm and other American suppliers would not sell it chips.

Huawei's chip arm HiSilicon had been secretly developing back-up products for years in anticipation of the unlikely scenario that Huawei may one day be unable to obtain advanced chips and technology from the United States, President He Tingbo said in a letter to staff dated May 17.

(Reporting by Paul Sandle Editing by Georgina Prodhan and Alexander Smith)

source: news.abs-cbn.com

You can now 'unsend' Gmail messages

MANILA - Have you ever made the mistake of writing a very personal e-mail and then accidentally hitting "reply all" to everyone?

That will not be a problem anymore as Gmail now gives users the option to cancel the delivery of an e-mail within five to 30 seconds from having hit the send button.

You can enable the "Undo Send" function by navigating to your "Settings" menu located directly below your profile picture. There, you'll be given the option to "Enable Undo Send."

Google has already started updating accounts but it could take two weeks for everyone to see the changes.

The feature has been available to Google Labs' users for some time, and was inserted recently into the app version of the web-based email service, "Inbox." -- with a report from ANC Alerts

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Gmail available in Burmese, the email's 74th language

SAN FRANCISCO, United States - Google said Wednesday that Gmail is now available in Burmese, marking the 74th language for the popular email service.

"As a country of 53 million, Myanmar's recent opening-up has triggered an explosion of people coming online," Google product manager Brian Kemler said in a blog post.

"As recently as 2011, a mere 500,000 Myanmar citizens were able to access the Internet, which was less than one percent of the population," he added.

He said the number of people in Myanmar who can get online has grown to 2.6 million, as the availability of mobile phones has increased.

Kemler noted that "our team has been working hard to ensure Google is ready to support this new community in their own language."

"To capture the nuances of this language and make sure the translations were accurate, consistent and complete, we relied on an array of Myanmar speakers from within the country, and around the world," he said.

"In April 2013 we launched Google Search in Myanmar, and today we're excited to announce that Gmail now supports Myanmar (Burmese), our 74th language."

A quasi-civilian regime that came to power in 2011 has ushered in a new era of political openness in the Asian country but a clause under the junta-era constitution still bars Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi from the presidency.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com