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Rate Gain launches REMO, its first AI-powered digital employee to enhance workplace communication

Rate Gain launches REMO, its first AI-powered digital employee to enhance workplace communication its first AI-powered digital employee, to boost workplace communication and employee well-being. REMO supports open dialogue, emotional check-ins, and aligns with the company’s AI strategy to enhance human-centric experiences. The first AI-powered digital employee, REMO, has been introduced by Rate Gain Travel Technologies Limited, a global supplier of AI-driven SaaS solutions for the travel and hospitality sector. The program seeks to promote organisational openness, worker well-being, and workplace communication. Developed as an always-on conversational AI, REMO is a member of Rate Gain’s People and Culture team. It gives workers a private, accepting setting in which to discuss professional goals, voice issues, give feedback, and check in on their emotional health. REMO encourages candid discussion and is available at any time to lower obstacles to communication. This rollout is in line with Rate Gain’s overarching AI strategy, which emphasises augmenting rather than replacing the human experience in the workplace. Rate Gain aims to instil empathy, individuality, and psychological safety into its organisational culture by incorporating AI into its internal processes. By providing a scalable internal communication and engagement solution, REMO also demonstrates the company’s efforts to adjust to the demands of a remote workforce. As a tool, it keeps changing in response to employee interactions, giving the business a better understanding of employee expectations and workplace sentiment.

West Bengal, Maharashtra, and Rajasthan are being watched as new hotspots for cybercrime

West Bengal, Maharashtra, and Rajasthan are emerging as new cybercrime hotspots, prompting the Centre to direct immediate crackdowns and faster investigations. The MHA is enhancing inter-state coordination through Joint Cyber Coordination Teams and workshops to tackle the growing threat. The Centre has instructed states to take immediate action by stepping up crackdowns, accelerating investigations, and clearing backlogs in order to stop the problem from getting worse. This is because districts in Rajasthan, West Bengal, and Maharashtra are quickly becoming new hotspots for cybercrime. Sources claim that to combat the growing menace of cybercrime, Union Home Secretary Govind Mohan met at a high level last month with senior officials from hotspot districts and ranges, along with other top officers. Directors General of Police (DGPs), commissioners from every state and Union Territory (UT), their designated state cybercrime chiefs, and officials from areas designated as hotspots for cybercrime attended the meeting. Jharkhand has long been a hotspot for cybercrime, but new hotspots have surfaced in the Bharatpur Range (Rajasthan), Mumbai (Maharashtra), Kolkata (West Bengal), and Dumka (Jharkhand), according to sources. According to sources, district SSPs who were present at the conference were instructed to reduce cybercrime. “To combat cybercrimes quickly, the government has requested that states seek technological assistance from the Centre. A meeting will be scheduled to prioritise the investigation because of new hotspots that have raised worries among cybersecurity organisations, according to a senior official. Under the Indian Cyber Crime Collaboration Centre (I4C), the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has formed seven Joint Cyber Coordination Teams (JCCTs) to improve enforcement and collaboration. These teams work in places that have been identified as having significant levels of cybercrime activity and complicated, multi-jurisdictional issues, such as Mewat, Jamtara, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Visakhapatnam, and Guwahati. To improve coordination between law enforcement agencies across states and UTs, the MHA reported that seven JCCT workshops were held in Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Guwahati, Visakhapatnam, Lucknow, Ranchi, and Chandigarh.

Samsung nears wide-ranging deal with Perplexity for AI features

Samsung is nearing a major deal to invest in and integrate Perplexity AI’s search technology across its devices, including the Galaxy S26 and Bixby assistant. The partnership may reduce Samsung’s reliance on Google and marks Perplexity’s largest mobile collaboration to date. Samsung Electronics is close to signing a comprehensive agreement to invest in Perplexity AI and integrate the artificial intelligence startup’s search technology at the forefront of the South Korean company’s products. According to people with knowledge of the situation, the two businesses are negotiating to integrate Perplexity’s search capabilities into the Samsung web browser and preload the startup’s software and assistant on future Samsung devices. According to insiders who asked not to be named because the discussions are confidential, the companies have also talked about integrating Perplexity’s technology into Samsung’s Bixby virtual assistant. According to the sources, Samsung intends to make the Perplexity integrations public as early as this year to make the service the default assistant choice for the Galaxy S26 phone line, which is scheduled to go on sale in the first half of 2026. The precise specifics, however, are still subject to change as they have not been finalised. According to the sources, the IT behemoth is also anticipated to be among the largest backers of Perplexity’s upcoming investment round. At a $14 billion valuation, the business is in advanced talks to raise $500 million. The extensive partnership might help Samsung lessen its reliance on Google, a division of Alphabet Inc., and open the door for it to collaborate with a variety of AI developers, much like Apple Inc. does with its products and services. The agreement, which comes after a recent integration agreement with Motorola, would be Perplexity’s largest mobile cooperation to date. Perplexity and Samsung representatives choose not to comment. Earlier this year, in April, the two businesses began talking about a cooperation. According to the persons, the two parties met in South Korea in recent weeks and are now nearing a deal. According to the sources, Samsung and Perplexity have also talked about developing an AI-powered operating system and an AI agent app that can access features from Perplexity and other AI helpers. Apple has expressed interest in collaborating with Perplexity as well. Perplexity has been proposed by the iPhone manufacturer as a Google Search substitute and as a replacement for ChatGPT integration in the Siri voice assistant. During recent testimony at a Google antitrust lawsuit, Apple’s senior vice president of services, Eddy Cue, stated, “We’ve started some discussions with them about what they’re doing because we’ve been pretty impressed with what Perplexity has done.” How Perplexity’s relationship with Samsung, one of Apple’s most ardent competitors, might impact that is unknown.

Apple’s ‘Big AI’ problem that Google, Microsoft and Amazon do not have to deal with

Apple faces a significant AI disadvantage due to limited infrastructure, delayed investments, and reliance on rivals like Google for AI resources. Meanwhile, competitors like Google, Microsoft, and Amazon lead with robust AI ecosystems, cloud infrastructure, and advanced models. Apple is allegedly at a disadvantage in the AI space, even though IT behemoths like Google, Microsoft, and Amazon are making quick progress in this area. According to a recent analysis, the iPhone manufacturer lacks the necessary infrastructure and sustained investment in fundamental AI technologies that its rivals have spent years, if not decades, creating, despite its efforts to advance AI programs. For instance, Apple postponed its intended redesign of Siri earlier this year because the update, which was supposed to bring Siri into the age of generative AI, wasn’t yet complete. According to a Business Insider story, Apple could have to create essential AI components from scratch if it hopes to modernise Siri to the level of its rivals. This would be costly and time-consuming, and it might take years. If not, it might have to rely more on rivals or buy out start-ups in bulk to catch up. Google’s decades-long head start in AI technology Certain AI building elements are necessary for the creation of a successful AI product. While Microsoft and Amazon have some of the fundamental AI building blocks in place, Google already has almost all of them. Google can introduce AI consumer tools like Veo, Flow, and Imagen because it owns the deep stack of technologies that underpin its AI building blocks, including data, chips, data centres, cloud businesses, and ways to distribute the goods. Transformer, the ground-breaking architecture underlying contemporary generative AI, was created by Google in 2017. Since their introduction in 2016, Google’s AI processors, known as Tensor Processing Units (TPUs), have become essential components of both Google products and third-party developers’ use of Google Cloud. Decades of data collection and online indexing are also advantageous to Google. In order to make these tools available to clients, the company uses data centres, a cloud business, and a massive dataset to train its potent AI models. How Amazon and Microsoft are thriving in this space while Apple is not Some of these foundational components, such as cloud infrastructure, AI models, specialised AI teams developing the technology, and even relationships, are shared by Amazon and Microsoft. In contrast, Apple does not have this kind of infrastructure or access, and it lacks many of these resources. Apple still depends on Google data centres for services like iCloud backups since it does not have enough large-scale data centres of its own. Apple even asked to use Google’s TPUs for recent AI training, thereby stealing infrastructure from a direct competitor. According to reports, Apple is lagging behind Google by almost seven years in the development of AI chips for data centres. Despite having access to vast amounts of data from its devices, Apple has been cautious about using such data for AI training because of its privacy-first principles. Its capacity to create and improve large-scale models is thus limited. Additionally, according to the report, Apple has fallen behind in terms of attracting and keeping elite AI talent. How may this be a risk to Apple Apple’s delayed investment in AI infrastructure may become a major issue if generative AI ends up changing how people use computers, including laptops and smartphones. Apple is still putting the fundamentals together, while other tech behemoths are introducing complete, powerful AI systems.

India’s national cybersecurity competition, Hack Sky, is launched by Kaspersky and MIT Bengaluru

Kaspersky and MIT Bengaluru have launched Hack Sky, a national 48-hour hackathon from July 29–30, 2025, to train young cybersecurity talent against real-world digital threats. The event includes AI, infrastructure, and social engineering challenges, with prizes and expert mentoring for winners. A new effort is bringing India’s most talented young people to the forefront of digital defence as cyberattacks increase in complexity and impact. Global cybersecurity pioneer Kaspersky and the Manipal Institute of Technology (MIT), Bengaluru, are collaborating to develop Hack Sky, a 48-hour hackathon that will be held nationwide on the MIT Bengaluru campus from July 29 to 30, 2025. Students, young professionals, and cyber enthusiasts between the ages of 16 and 25 are invited to participate in this intense, real-world cybersecurity competition to put their talents to the test, create workable defences, and tackle new digital threats, such as deep fake misinformation, industrial infrastructure attacks, and scams powered by artificial intelligence. “Developing the next generation of cybersecurity professionals is crucial as cyber threats become more sophisticated and widespread,” stated Evgeniya Russkikh, Head of Cybersecurity Education at Kaspersky. “Hack Sky is a platform that allows researchers, coders, and aspiring white-hat hackers to address real-world threats and create meaningful solutions.” A Hackathon with Real-World Impact Hack Sky is a challenge based on the actual cybersecurity battlefield; it’s not only about code. Three challenging challenge tracks are part of the hackathon, which was created by Kaspersky’s worldwide team: Under Siege: Participants will identify weaknesses and create defence plans for Industrial Control Systems (ICS), which are the foundation of vital infrastructure. AI vs. AI: This track challenges participants to develop tools to identify and neutralise a new type of digital deceit, including deep fakes, false information, and scams created by artificial intelligence. Trapping the Honey Trapper: This task, which tests social engineering defence, focuses on spotting and stopping phoney identities and online traps intended to trick people and obtain private information. The winning team or individual will receive ₹1 lakh in cash, cybersecurity training from Kaspersky, and one-on-one mentoring from top international experts as part of the grand prize. MIT Bengaluru, MAHE, supports the prize, demonstrating the school’s dedication to providing tech education that is relevant to the industry. A Growing Cybersecurity Ecosystem In October 2024, Kaspersky and MIT Bengaluru signed a formal Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), which Hack Sky abides by. The collaboration seeks to create a long-term cybersecurity innovation pipeline by exchanging knowledge, developing curricula, and providing skills training. “Hack Sky is a Launchpad, not just a competition,” stated Dr. Iven Jose, Director of MIT Bengaluru. “We’re connecting academia and industry with this event, assisting students in solving high-impact problems and providing them with hands-on experience in the future of cybersecurity.” Beyond the Hackathon: Gamified Learning On July 31, one day after the hackathon ends, Kaspersky will organise its well-liked Kaspersky Interactive Protection Simulation (KIPS) to wrap up the event. In a high-stress setting, this gamified cybersecurity training experience helps participants develop their strategic thinking and incident response skills by simulating actual corporate intrusions.

WhatsApp Launches Official App for Apple iPad with Full Feature Support

WhatsApp is now available on the Apple iPad, offering full support for calls, messaging, and multitasking features. The app uses end-to-end encryption and syncs across devices. Following years of requests from tablet users seeking a smoother method of accessing the company’s end-to-end messaging service, Meta announced the debut of WhatsApp for Apple iPad users. Owners of Apple iPads may now share their screen, use the front and rear cameras, and make voice and video chats with up to 32 people using WhatsApp. Slide Over, Split View, and Stage Manager on compatible devices are a few iPadOS multitasking features. This enables users to send messages or view multiple apps simultaneously while online browsing. While on a call, users can also browse the web. Users of Apple iPads will also be able to use the conversation lock feature. Meta mentioned that the software was available for download through the software Store and encouraged users to submit comments. Users’ Magic Keyboard and Apple Pencil devices can also be used with Meta’s WhatsApp for iPad. “Regardless of the platform or device you’re messaging on, WhatsApp for iPad uses our industry-leading multi-device technology to keep everything in sync across your iPhone, Mac, and other devices while protecting your messages, calls, and media with end-to-end encryption,” Meta wrote in a blog post announcing the update.

Joint Airtel-Jio-Vi initiative: Will the telecom behemoths unite to combat fraud and cybercrime

Joint Airtel-Jio-Vi initiative: Airtel has proposed a joint initiative with Jio and Vodafone Idea to combat rising telecom-related cybercrimes and frauds, citing over 1.7 million complaints in early 2024. The plan calls for real-time fraud intelligence sharing and cross-network coordination to strengthen user safety. Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, and Vodafone Idea (VI), India’s three main private telecom companies, may unite in an uncommon attempt to fight telecom fraud, scams, and cybercrime. The second-largest telecom provider in India by market share, Airtel, claims that it just sent a call to action to Jio and Vodafone, urging them to band together to combat these nefarious frauds and scams. The telecom giant claims that in the first three quarters of 2024, India received over 1.7 million complaints about cybercrime, which led to losses of ₹11,000 crore. India has recently witnessed a notable increase in cybercrime, ranging from identity theft to phishing links, “digital arrest” frauds, and fraudulent loan offers and payment forms. Customers received the following message from Airtel last week: “Airtel is now The Safe Network.” To keep you safe, our fraud detection tool prevents bogus URLs from opening. Additionally, for the past month, Airtel has begun adding “scam” cautions before suspected texts for a large number of consumers. However, the operator led by Sunil Mittal aims to do more. “…it became clear that more coordinated industry action was required, given the recent alarming rise in phishing attempts and malicious URL-based scams targeting unsuspecting individuals.” In letters to Telecom Secretary Neeraj Mittal and TRAI Chairman Anil Kumar Lahotia, it stated that these sophisticated fraud schemes frequently take advantage of the lack of cooperation between service providers. “Through real-time fraud intelligence sharing and cross-network coordination, this initiative would bring all TSPs together to collaboratively detect, prevent, and mitigate telecom fraud and scams across our networks,” Airtel continued. The challenge for Jio, Vodafone, and the other two companies involved in this program is to prevent unsolicited commercial communications (UCC), which are the source of the majority of scams, without interfering with the enterprise services that are properly provided by the telecom networks. This might include establishing a centralised platform for data sharing, which raises additional privacy concerns. However, that is a matter for another time. Currently, it is up to Ambani-led Jio and Vodafone Idea to agree to Airtel’s proposal for a collaborative task force to combat cybercrime based on telecoms.

Department of Telecommunications Launches FRI Tool to Detect Risky Mobile Numbers in Cyber Frauds

The Department of Telecommunications has launched the Financial Fraud Risk Indicator (FRI) to help banks and payment platforms identify risky mobile numbers linked to cyber fraud. Platforms like PhonePe, Paytm, and Google Pay are integrating the tool to enhance transaction security. The Financial Fraud Risk Indicator (FRI), a new multi-dimensional analytical tool created as part of the Department of Telecommunications’ (DoT) Digital Intelligence Platform (DIP), was unveiled on Wednesday. Its purpose is to assist financial institutions in preventing cyber fraud by providing them with advanced, actionable intelligence. In order to combat financial crime and cyber fraud, FRI facilitates improved intelligence sharing with banks, UPI service providers, and other financial organizations. A cell phone number can be categorized as having a Medium, High, or Very High risk of financial fraud using this risk-based criteria. In the event that a mobile number is deemed to be at high risk, the action is expected to assist banks, non-banking financial institutions, and UPI service providers in giving enforcement top priority and implementing further client protection measures. The digital payment provider PhonePe, which was among the first to implement FRI, has utilised it to reject transactions associated with Very High FRI mobile numbers and to show a notice on the screen as part of the PhonePe Protect feature. According to the DoT, PhonePe is working to show a proactive user alert for Medium FRI numbers before authorising the transaction. PhonePe, Paytm, and Google Pay, which collectively manage over 90% of UPI transactions, have begun integrating DIP notifications into their systems, the DoT claims. Fraud detection According to the department, “this classification is the result of inputs obtained from various stakeholders, including intelligence shared by banks and financial institutions, reporting on DoT’s Chakshu platform, the National Cybercrime Reporting Portal (NCRP), and the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4Cs). The list of mobile numbers that were disconnected due to their involvement in cybercrime, failure to re-verify, and violating limitations is shared by the DoT every month. Financial fraud also frequently uses these numbers. The life of a cell number used in cyber frauds is usually a few days, and complete verification might take several days, therefore, the DoT believes that an advanced signal of risk associated with such numbers is quite important. As a result, when a stakeholder flags a suspected mobile number, it is subjected to multi-dimensional analysis, which determines whether it carries a Medium, High, or Very High financial risk. It is then promptly shared with all stakeholders via DIP.

OpenAI Acquires Jony Ive’s AI Startup io for $6.4 Billion in Major Hardware Push

OpenAI is acquiring Jony Ive’s AI device startup, io, for $6.4 billion in an all-equity deal, marking its major push into hardware. I’ve will lead design efforts at both OpenAI and io, while io integrates with OpenAI’s San Francisco teams. On May 21, 2025, OpenAI announced that it would acquire Jony Ive’s AI device startup, io, for roughly $6.4 billion in an all-equity transaction, solidifying the AI company’s entry into the hardware market. The company said in a statement that Ive will be taking on “deep creative and design responsibilities across OpenAI and io.” Ive and LoveFrom, his “creative collective,” will continue to operate independently. According to OpenAI, while io will be coming in-house. Ive and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman wrote in a blog post on May 21 that Ive launched io a year ago with the help of Apple alums Scott Cannon, Tang Tan, and Evans Hankey, who temporarily filled Ive’s position at Apple after he left. In order to collaborate more closely with the research, engineering, and product teams in San Francisco, the io team—which is dedicated to creating products that inspire, empower, and enable—will now join with OpenAI, according to the post. OpenAI, which already controls 23% of the business, stated that it is paying $5 billion in the deal. Ive is “the greatest designer in the world,” according to Altman’s post on X. This is by far OpenAI’s biggest acquisition to date, and it comes weeks after the business agreed to pay $3 billion to acquire the AI-assisted coding tool Windsurf. Before that, in 2024, OpenAI paid an unknown amount to purchase the analytics database startup Rockset. To launch LoveFrom, Ive declared in 2019 that he was leaving Apple, where he had served as chief design officer for several years. In 2020, Airbnb announced that I had been advising the business on hiring and upcoming features. Last year, the New York Times revealed that LoveFrom’s designers were working on projects for Christie’s, Airbnb, and Ferrari at the time, and that the company’s clients pay it up to $200 million annually. Ive and designer Marc Newson formed LoveFrom, according to the company’s website, but it makes no mention of io or what the business does. Apple’s most recognisable products, such as the iPod, iPhone, iPad, and MacBook Air, were all designed by Ive. Additionally, he contributed to the design of Apple Park, the company’s new Cupertino headquarters, which was started in 2004 and formally opened in 2019. As competitors like Google, Anthropic, and Elon Musk’s xAI are making significant investments and frequently releasing new products, OpenAI, which was recently valued at $300 billion in a funding round spearheaded by Soft Bank, is scrambling to remain ahead of the competition in the generative AI space. Strengthening its hardware operations is one way to keep ahead of the competition. To advance its hardware objectives, OpenAI in November named the former leader of Meta’s Orion augmented reality glasses project to lead its robotics and consumer hardware initiatives. The position would “initially focus on OpenAI’s robotics work and partnerships to help bring AI into the physical world and unlock its benefits for humanity,” according to a statement made at the time by Caitlin “CK” Kalinowski. Additionally, in November, OpenAI invested $400 million at a valuation of $2.4 billion in Physical Intelligence, a robot company based in San Francisco. Among the other investors was Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. By creating extensive AI models and algorithms to drive robots, the business aims to “bring general-purpose AI into the physical world,” according to its website.

Massive Facebook Data Leak Exposes 1.2 Billion User Records, Hacker Claims

Facebook Data: A hacker claims to have leaked data from 1.2 billion Facebook users, including emails, phone numbers, and more. Researchers verified part of the sample, raising concerns about Meta’s data security and ongoing scraping issues. In response to Cyber News, Facebook’s parent company, Meta, sent a brief message along with a link to a newsroom article from four years ago titled “How we combat scraping.” “This assertion is not new. A Meta representative stated, “We revealed this years ago and have since taken action to stop such events from occurring. Meanwhile, looked into a data sample that had information on 100,000 distinct Facebook user records that the attackers had added to the post. The data seems valid based on the contents of the sample rather than the entire dataset. The team claims that the dataset consists of: User IDs Names Email addresses Usernames Phone numbers Locations Birthdays Genders Researchers advise exercising caution regarding the veracity of the attacker’s claims regarding “1.2 billion Facebook user records,” despite the fact that they are remarkable. For starters, this is only the second post the attackers have ever made that contains alleged Facebook records that were scraped. Although the quantity was substantially smaller, data purportedly collected from Facebook was also included in another attacker’s post. Researchers speculated that after publishing one post, they were able to extract further data to reach 1.2 billion entries. The social networking site would flag another case of user data being scraped in bulk if the Facebook data scrape were verified. According to the team, this calls into doubt the company’s stance on the protection of consumers’ personal information. Recurring incidents indicate a tendency toward reactive security measures as opposed to proactive ones, especially when it comes to safeguarding critical yet publicly accessible data. Millions may be vulnerable to phishing, scams, identity theft, and long-term privacy problems due to the absence of more robust protections and transparency, the researchers stated. A dataset of that size can be used in a variety of ways by threat actors since it makes it simple for hackers to automate attacks, releasing hordes of bots that target each user in the dataset with minimal human intervention. Since malicious actors are aware that the email addresses in the dataset belong to Facebook members, they can utilise one of the several Facebook phishing methods to target Facebook users. Threat actors frequently try to use APIs for malicious ends. Attackers targeted Shopify, GoDaddy, Wix, and OpenAI’s APIs earlier this year. Actors with financial motivations frequently try to misuse the same method to gain access to cryptocurrency wallets. “A pattern of reactive rather than proactive security measures is evident in repeated incidents, especially when it comes to safeguarding sensitive but publicly visible data.” Since APIs enable communication between various services, the majority of well-known services would not be possible without them. Attackers, however, manage to leverage lawful APIs for malicious ends, such as retrieving significantly more data than the software applications were designed to do. Facebook data scraping is not unheard of. For instance, Meta acknowledged last year that it had used publicly available Facebook and Instagram data to train its AI virtual assistant. In 2021, however, a different hacker shared details about more than 500 million Facebook users, including locations and phone numbers. The Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC), the European Union’s top data privacy body, fined Meta €265 million ($266 million) for the leak.

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