Boot up: more Android permissions, device growth?, Apple Maps updates

Samsung headquarters sees its corporate strategy office as the ‘control tower’. Photograph: Darren Staples/REUTERS

A burst of 8 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

Google Play now groups app permissions into groups of related permissions. For example, an app that wants to read your incoming SMS messages will require the "Read SMS messages" permission. When you install it via the Play Store, you'll see it asking for the "SMS" permission group.

Install the app and you're giving it access to all SMS-related permissions. The app can now automatically update and gain the ability to send SMS messages without asking you.

Do you have apps on your device that you trust to read SMS messages, but not send them? Those apps can now gain the ability to send SMS messages without prompting you — all the developer has to do is update the app.

The only way to prevent this from happening is to disable automatic updates and verify app permissions manually every time an app wants to update — as if that's a reasonable solution! If you do this, you'll also end up using outdated versions of apps, which is another security problem.

A month old, but: this is caused by the latest Google Play update - so the app that has solved the fragmentation problem is now the one that could cause a serious problem around permissions. Google really needs to fix this.

Worldwide combined shipments of devices (PCs, tablets, ultramobiles and mobile phones) are projected to reach 2.4bn units in 2014, a 4.2% increase from 2013 (see Table 1), according to Gartner, Inc. 

"2014 will be marked by a relative revival of the global PC market," said Ranjit Atwal, research director at Gartner. After declining 9.5% in 2013, the global PC market (desk-based, notebook and premium ultramobile) is on pace to contract only 2.9% in 2014. 

"Business upgrades from Windows XP and the general business replacement cycle will lessen the downward trend, especially in Western Europe," said Mr. Atwal. "This year, we anticipate nearly 60m professional PC replacements in mature markets." The traditional PC market (desk-based and notebook) will follow the same downward trend and is on pace to contract 6.7% in 2014 and 5.3% in 2015. 

It's coming to something when shrinking by 2.9% counts a "relative revival". (Thanks @pxr4t2 for the link.)

On the other hand...

WitsView Research Manager Eric Chiou noted, "Leading vendor Apple's tablet shipments remained low in Q2 2014, estimated at only 13m. Although the company will release new models in H2 2014, the impact will be limited. Moreover, iPad might experience its first decline since entering the market in 2010, with volume expected to drop from 74.3m in 2013 to 68.4m in 2014, mainly because Apple is unlikely to hold any major promotional or sales events."

Meanwhile, the second largest tablet vendor Samsung Electronics is endeavoring to meet tablet shipment quotas, but growth may not meet expectations, up only 14% year-on-year to 48m in 2014 because of poor performance in both entry- and high-end markets. The limited increase comes as the company's Galaxy Tab Pro has seen fewer-than-expected sales due to high costs and because tablet products with similar specifications to the company's Galaxy Tab Lite are being offered by many other tablet vendors.

Samsung has one problem, Apple has a very different one. (Thanks @Seoulite for the link.)

A year ago when Appirio said it was hoping to use data collected from employee wearables to negotiate a better deal on its health insurance bill, it seemed like a stretch. Could information that Appirio cobbled together about how many steps a couple hundred workers took each day convince an insurance company to lower its rates?

It turns out Appirio cut a significant chunk from its insurance bill by doing just that. "When our [insurance] renewal came up for 2014, they shaved 5 percent off our renewal because of what we invest in CloudFit," said Shannon Daly, vice president of HR Operations for Appirio. Five percent translates to $280,000 for Appirio, a consulting company that builds cloud projects for business customers.

CloudFit is the internal name Appirio gives to its wellness program which includes Fitbit trackers as well as a new service that uses Google Hangouts to offer employees live video sessions with a trainer.

An industrial use for wearables? Perhaps restricted to countries which have strange health insurance systems.

Wireless carriers are the latest to jump into the trade-in business. And there are some very interesting reasons why. In the past, everytime you upgraded to a new smartphone, you typically paid about $200 upfront for a phone that was worth about $650, and so the carrier had to book a $450 expense; it earned that money back over the course of your contract. But a huge wave of upgrades whenever a new phone was released meant a flood of expenses on the books, hurting profits, says Walter Piecyk, a managing director at BTIG's research unit.

With new leasing programs like Next (from AT&T), Jump (from T-Mobile), and Edge (from Verizon), that $650 cost of a new phone "is divided over about 24 months, and so the carrier can book all of your lease payments as revenue on Day One," says Piecyk, who follows the telecom industry. That looks better on their balance sheets.

The leasing programs allow regular upgrades, but they also require you to hand in your old phone when you do. As carriers try to shift more customers to the leasing model, NextWorth and Gazelle could face challenges getting inventory since so many smartphones will go right back to wireless operators. (NextWorth manages trade-in programs for some smaller wireless players such as MetroPCS.)

Analysts say Samsung, the world's biggest smartphone vendor is reaching the same point its U.S. rival Apple did in 2013 when it hit the smartphone growth wall.

"Second quarter profits were below expectations," said Choi Gee-sung, head of Samsung Corporate Strategy Office, at a monthly meeting with executives of Samsung's technology affiliates on July 1.

"There is a need to check whether the Corporate Strategy Office is doing its role as a control tower. Let's make greater efforts."

Senior Samsung executives are sided with Choi as they didn't hesitate to admit that Samsung's key businesses are being challenged.

Now, Samsung workers are ordered to become ? "problem solvers," "rule breakers" and "infra builders" ? to overcome today's difficulties and develop new products and creative services.

In a latest message to employees, co-signed by co-Samsung Electronics CEOs _ vice chairman Kwon Oh-hyun, consumer electronics president Yoon Boo-keun and mobile chief Shin Jong-kyun, they pledged to find new business models in wearable devices and Internet of Things (IoT) territories.

It's nice to be ordered to become a rule-breaker. (Samsung's preliminary second quarter results will be released today.)

In a statement to the Spanish stock exchange published by [the Spanish-based Wi-Fi company] Let¹s Gowex, it said that Jenaro Garcia Martin, chief executive officer and chairman, had resigned after telling board members "that the accounts of the company, for at least the last four years, were unfaithful and that he was responsible for this misrepresentation".

"The board, confronted by the expectation that the company would not be able to cope with its maturing current debt payments, agreed to file a voluntary request for bankruptcy."

In May this year, the company announced a 10-year deal under which it would provide free Wi-Fi to Newcastle and Gateshead. Let¹s Gowex has previously announced contracts in Dublin, Edinburgh, New York, Chicago, Miami, San Francisco and Madrid.

Huh.

tl;dr - Apple actually updates POI data now. If you see errors in your neighborhood, you can correct them with the 'Report a Problem' button on the Maps info screen. New data is pushed out by Apple's servers every single day, so the Maps app is now improving at a quick pace.

About time.

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