In a recent legal filing, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL), and its Pennsylvania chapter raised concerns about a new investigative technique employed by the police, involving Google’s search technology. The technique, known as a keyword search warrant, gained attention after its pivotal role in a 2016 case where a Pennsylvania woman was raped.
Following the assault, law enforcement sought information from Google on users who had searched the victim’s name or address in the week leading up to the incident. Google responded by providing the IP address of an individual who had searched the victim’s address shortly before the crime. This breakthrough led to the monitoring and subsequent arrest of a corrections officer, who was convicted based on this evidence.
Privacy vs. Investigation
However, the EFF and NACDL argue that keyword search warrants represent a significant threat to privacy rights. They liken these warrants to digital dragnets that allow the government to extensively delve into private information. Michael Price from the NACDL Fourth Amendment Center emphasized the need for the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to consider the constitutionality of such warrants.
Legal and Societal Ramifications
The debate surrounding these warrants has intensified, especially in the context of the US Supreme Court’s recent decisions. Privacy advocates fear that these broad investigative techniques might not only infringe on privacy but could also be used to prosecute individuals seeking abortions in states where it’s illegal.
While Google ceased its response to geofence warrants in December, EFF’s Andrew Crocker emphasized that this change amplifies the importance of scrutinizing the legality of keyword search warrants. With law enforcement increasingly seeking innovative investigative tools, the potential popularity of these warrants raises concerns regarding citizens’ privacy and constitutional rights.
As legal battles unfold and technology continues to evolve, the balance between effective law enforcement and safeguarding individuals’ privacy remains a key challenge for courts and lawmakers alike.
Google Search will soon be able to help users find doctor appointment availability so they can schedule their health checkups without having to rely on a third-party service. On Thursday, the update was unveiled at Google’s second annual healthcare-focused event, The Check-Up. Aside from the Google Search update, the Mountain View, California-based company announced plans to integrate support for detecting atrial fibrillation (AFib) into Fitbit fitness-tracking devices to help people receive alerts for signs of an irregular heart rhythm at its virtual event. Google also unveiled a series of Health AI updates aimed at transforming smartphones into stethoscopes or ultrasound machines for early diagnosis in even the most remote locations.
Google Search is rolling out the ability to find appointment availability for doctors and local care providers by partnering with healthcare providers and a number of scheduling solution providers. The search results will show users the available appointment dates and times for doctors in the area.
When you use Google Search to look for a specific practitioner or facility, the appointment availability will appear. Once you’ve found a suitable appointment date, click the Book button next to the available slot. You will be directed to a third-party booking site.
Image source: www.theweek.in
In the United States, Google is collaborating with a few healthcare providers and scheduling solution providers, including MinuteClinic at CVS. In the coming days, the feature will be rolled out to users searching in English in the United States. However, it is hoped that it will eventually be available in other markets.
Fitbit also announced that, in addition to Google appointment booking, it is developing an AFib algorithm that will work with the existing optical Photoplethysmography (PPG) sensor on its wearables to detect and alert users about irregular heart rhythm. The algorithm is currently being reviewed by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Fitbit is expected to release an update for consumer fitness-tracking bands and smartwatches in the near future. According to Google, its in-house algorithm correctly identified undiagnosed AFib 98 percent of the time, citing internal research.
Apple, for example, has built-in support for detecting and alerting users about AFib. Fitbit’s move, on the other hand, could bring AFib detection to a wide range of price points.
Google also announced that health information panels on YouTube will be expanded to markets such as Brazil, India, and Japan. Previously, it was only available in the United States.
Separately, at The Check Up event, Google announced its early-stage developments under the Health AI division. One of these advancements is the use of a smartphone’s built-in microphones as a stethoscope.
When placed over the chest, Google’s inbuilt microphones are used to record a participant’s heart sounds, according to research.
The latest study looks into whether a smartphone can detect heartbeats and murmurs, according to the company. However, because it requires specific hardware inputs, the detection will be limited to specific smartphone models. In a blog post, Greg Corrado, Google’s Head of Health AI, said, “We’re currently in the early stages of clinical study testing, but we hope that our work can empower people to use the smartphone as an additional tool for accessible health evaluation.”
Google is also investigating photos from smartphone cameras to help detect diabetes and non-diabetes diseases with partners such as EyePACS and Chang Gung Memorial Hospital.
Apart from using smartphone cameras to detect heartbeats, murmurs, and diabetes signs, Google has announced that it is working on using artificial intelligence (AI) and smartphones to provide maternal ultrasound screening. Northwestern Medicine has partnered with the company to develop and test its models for expanding research.
The overall research into combining AI and smartphones to improve healthcare is still in its early stages, and it may take some time and additional effort to bring to the general public.
A Google India report summarizing the top search trends in India for 2021 was released today by the company. The list reveals what Indians looked up the most in news, sports, entertainment, and other categories throughout the year. The top five trending search topics on Google Search Trends in India in 2021 were ‘Indian Premier League,’ ‘CoWIN,’ ‘ICC T20 World Cup,’ ‘Euro Cup,’ and ‘Tokyo Olympics.’ Following the last COVID-19 outbreak in the country, many internet users turned to Google to look for COVID vaccines and hospitals. This year searches for ‘oxygen cylinders’ and ‘CT scans’ saw a spike in ‘near me’ searches as people looked for ways to combat the deadly virus. Similarly, Google searches for food deliveries, tiffin services, and takeout restaurants increased this year, according to the company.
Image source: hindustantimes.com
Google’s Most Popular ‘How To’ And ‘What Is’ Queries
In April and May, India was hit hard by the second wave of COVID-19, which resulted in an increase in cases and deaths. The ‘How to’ section topped the search chart during the massive crisis, with queries like ‘How to increase oxygen level’, ‘How to make oxygen at home’, and ‘How to register for covid vaccine’. These are the year’s top three ‘how to’ searches. ‘What is Black Fungus?’ and ‘What is Remdesivir?’ was the most popular ‘what is’ searches. ‘What is Taliban?’ and ‘What is the factorial of hundred?’ ranked highly as well.
2021 Searches For “Near Me”
This year’s ‘near me’ searches were dominated by services related to the pandemic. While many people searched for vaccines, Covid tests, Covid hospitals, oxygen cylinders, and CT scans as they fought the second wave of COVID in the first half of the year, searches for vaccines, Covid tests, Covid hospitals, and searches for oxygen cylinders and CT scans also increased. In addition, Google revealed that people looking for food deliveries, tiffin services, and takeout restaurants increased as a result of the intermittent lockdowns.
Aryan Khan and Neeraj Chopra: Two Of The Most Sought-After Celebrities
With his historic performance at the Tokyo Olympics, where he won independent India’s first-ever medal in athletics, Neeraj Chopra topped the list of most searched personalities. Following him was Shahrukh Khan’s son Aryan Khan, who faced a major controversy in October after he was arrested by the NCB in connection with a suspected drug case on board the Cordelia cruise ship. The list also included PV Sindhu and Bajrang Punia, two other 2020 Tokyo Olympic medalists. A few high-profile people topped the list, including Elon Musk, Shehnaaz Gill, and Raj Kundra.
Google’s Most Popular Movies Of The Year
Regional cinema piqued the interest of Google users in India this year, with Tamil drama film Jai Bhim topping the list, followed by Bollywood titles Shershaah, Radhe, and Bell Bottom. Godzilla vs Kong and Eternals, both from Hollywood, were among the year’s most popular films in the country.
Google’s Most Popular Recipes
Because people stayed at home for the first few months of the year, many of them appear to have used Google to find new recipes. ‘Enoki Mushrooms’ was the top-searched recipe on Google in India this year, though ‘Modak’ and ‘Cookies’ were also popular. The top recipes searched on Google this year included comfort foods like ‘Methi Matar Malai’ and ‘Palak,’ as well as immunity-boosting ‘Kada.’
Trending Sports Events On Google
The Indian Premier League, the ICC T20 World Cup, and the Euro Cup were the top three sports events searched on Google in India, according to Google. The Tokyo Olympics and the Copa America were the next events on the calendar.
Trending News Events on Google
This year, the Tokyo Olympics dominated the ‘news events’ category on Google in India. Black Fungus, Afghanistan news, West Bengal elections, and tropical cyclone Tauktae were the next items on the agenda.
Global Trends
Google also revealed the top search trends around the world, in addition to the top trends in India. The top search trend is ‘Australia vs India,’ followed by ‘India vs England,’ ‘IPL,’ ‘NBA,’ and ‘Euro 2021.’ These come from over 70 countries and include ‘Australia vs India,’ ‘India vs England,’ ‘IPL,’ ‘NBA,’ and ‘Euro 2021.’ It’s worth noting that Google’s Year in Search results for 2021 doesn’t directly suggest the most popular searches on its site. Instead, the company views the searches as “trending queries” that saw a significant increase in traffic over a “sustained period” in 2021 compared to 2020. The algorithm that compares the percentage increase in trending searches also takes into account a minimum threshold to keep very small search volumes off the list. Last year, the top Google search queries were ‘coronavirus,’ ‘US election results,’ and ‘PM Kisan Yojana,’ but this year, the top trending query was ‘Indian Premier League,’ which surpassed all others.
Online learning has witnessed a new escalating demand from students, teachers, and parents especially with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic last year. To unleash all the potential of E-Learning and providing students with the best learning resources, Google has revealed some new features for Google Search. The company will be adding five new tools in Google Search for enhancing online learning quality through the same. Currently, Google is working to provide better answers for STEM concepts, complex equations, representing 3D graphics of chemical molecules, etc. This will help both students and teachers to teach and understand the concepts of science and mathematics in a much better way.
Since the classes are conducted online for both school and college students, the teachers can use these tools to enhance their presentations and study modules. Google has added these new five features as a part of the company’s L.E.A.R.N initiative. Currently, the added features will be available in the English language only but in the future, other languages are expected to be added. The Google Search will have educational overviews, examples, practice problems, learning resources from many websites, and more. So, let’s have a look at the new features for Google Search.
Abundant
resources for STEM concepts.
STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) concepts are specifically focussed on newly added features in Google Search. A student or a teacher or any individual can find many useful examples, videos, and overviews to learn any STEM concept they want to. Science and maths are two very crucial subjects and with the right foundation basis, students can have a lot of choices in their future. With the advent of e-learning, we can access study materials from anywhere and Google is making the journey easier and much interesting.
Image Source: learndigital.withgoogle.com
Practice,
Practice, and Practice
After learning, they can also practice a set
of questions to evaluate themselves. This will especially help the students who
are preparing for some entrance exam like NEET or JEE. They can solve plenty of
problems in Physics, Chemistry, and Maths. Google will also provide learning
resources from top learning websites like Byju’s, Chegg, Education Quizzes,
Gradeup, Toppr, Careers360, Vedantu, OpenStax, etc. One can also search a
specific topic of any subject to find related problems and resources. So, the
learning resources are unlimited for whoever wants to take a step forward and
enhance their skills.
Implementation
of Augmented Reality (AG)
What can be better if a student can have a lab-like experience from their home? Practical lessons are always much more exciting than theory classes and that’s the reason why we used to wait for our practical days in school. Google with the help of AG will show 3D views of several models covering the chemistry, biology, and physics concept. From the simple 3D view of a double bond to a 3D view of the human skeleton, everything is feasible via Google Search. After you search a topic in Google, an option will come “View in 3D” and then you can visualize by clicking on it.
Solving
mathematics problems
While some of us find mathematics as a cakewalk, many of us really struggled or still struggle while solving mathematics problems. Google Search can now provide you a step-by-step solution to a math problem. You can go on the search bar and type the equation or you can click a picture using Lens in the Google App. Google Search is working to add more variety of mathematics problems in the search as it has established partnerships with Symbolab, Mathway, etc. These explanations will be provided in 70 different languages. This feature is of great advantage to parents as they can help their kids solve complex math problems after they get a better hold of them.
Navigating
Complex Questions
Apart from helping you find resources for understanding the basic concepts of STEM subjects, Google Search is also working to advance the search. In the upcoming weeks, the company claims that it can also provide you solutions to complex questions and not just any STEM concepts. For example, you type an entire question of organic chemistry in the search bar and the tool will show you the related concept to that question as well.
Annasha Dey is an NIT student, who apart from studying engineering is also a content writer. She has a great interest in photography, writing, reading novels, and travelling as well. She is a foodie who loves socializing and hanging out with her friends. She is also a trained Kathak dancer and a big fashion enthusiast. Dey also loves watching TV series, which includes F.R.I.E.N.D.S. and Big Bang Theory. To be a better writer she prefers to read more
With the recent launch of iOS14 and iPadOS14, users have noticed that the queries show search results without Google Search. This is an indication that Apple is trying to build its search engine and has no further plan to use Google Search as the default search engine. Since the user queries can be answered without the support of Google, it can be said that Apple is making a pretty fast and impressive development on the way to its own search engine. This Cupertino Company with efficient search capabilities in iOS14 and iPadOS14 has proved that it will be soon ready to challenge Google’s search engine and replace it for once and all.
If we
go a little backward in time we can connect the dots as Apple earlier this year
posted job openings for search engineers. So, Tim Cook was determined for a
long time to create the company’s default search engine followed by
incorporating it in the latest version of iOS, that is, iOS14. Now, when users
type a query on the home screen it displays a direct link to the websites
without opening in Google Search.
Why is Apple creating a new search engine?
Recently,
the relationship between Apple and Google has gone sore thus bringing the two
under antitrust scrutiny. The US antitrust authorities have threatened the
payment made to Apple by Google for securing the position of default search
engine on iPhones and iPads. The web search capability of Apple’s smartphones
always plays a major role in deciding the overall in-house development of the
company. So, if they can successfully make an alternative search engine, it
will increase the value of the company and make it independent of Google
Search. According to some industry experts, Apple is creating its search engine
mainly to attack Google. The former has not made any major official
announcement regarding the search engine but where there is smoke there is
fire.
Strategies
and plot twists
In
2018, Apple hired John Giannandrea, Google’s head of search to improve the existing
AI capabilities of the company and to boost the performance of Siri, the
virtual assistant. John came with eight years of experience in working with the
Google search engine. John’s hiring along with the recent opening for search
engineers will create a very strong team for the development of an alternative
search engine. So, if the relationship between Google and Apple comes to an end
in terms of the Google search engine, Apple will not face any adverse
situation.
After
the case launched by the US Department of Justice last week, Bill Coughran,
Google’s former engineering chief, said that Apple already has a credible team
if they want to go for developing a more general search engine. Many search
marketing experts also noticed that the activity of Applebot has increased
ridiculously in recent weeks. Applebot is iPhone’s web crawler and the
increased rate of crawling means that it is trying to gather more information
from the internet. In the new iOS14, Apple’s home screen shows a list of search
suggestions generated by Apple’s search engine and not Google. The search
result is based on AI thus showing results according to the common queries.
Will
apple become a strong competition?
Standing up to Google as a strong rival could take years, but currently, Apple has shown excellent developments with the alternative search engine. Apple has both a good team of engineers and capital to sign up for a long-term investment. Since the beginning, Apple has focused more on developing every bit of its product in-house starting from the smartphones to the watches. It wants to create a very strong integration between the hardware and the software components. But, for a long time, Apple was stuck with Google’s search engine. Though Apple still has the option to choose between keeping Google Search as the default search engine or become its rival, the stakes are high for the latter option.
Sridhar
Ramaswamy, Google’s former head of advertising, said that to build a search
engine it should have 20bn-50bn pages in its active index. Along with this, the
system has to rank the pages within milliseconds when the user runs a query. It
will be extremely difficult for Apple to create a search engine as big as
Google but it is not impossible.
Annasha Dey is an NIT student, who apart from studying engineering is also a content writer. She has a great interest in photography, writing, reading novels, and travelling as well. She is a foodie who loves socializing and hanging out with her friends. She is also a trained Kathak dancer and a big fashion enthusiast. Dey also loves watching TV series, which includes F.R.I.E.N.D.S. and Big Bang Theory. To be a better writer she prefers to read more
