Google

Google has issued an update for its Chrome browser for Android, with the focus on increasing its security.

According to Google software engineer Jay Civelli, who posted on the Google Chrome Blog today, the latest 18.0.1025308 update of Chrome for Android strengthens its sandbox. The Android and desktop versions of Chrome use a multi-process architecture to ensure that if one tab hangs or crashes, it doesn't affect other tabs, or at least affects only the minimum number of tabs.

Apple's unveiling of its new, overhauled iTunes has been touted by the company as its way of "going back to our roots with an incredibly clean design," but underneath the shiny veneer there are also a number of security vulnerabilities that have been patched — 163 of them.

Google won't be able to compete with the attention lavished on Apple for the launch of the sixth-generation iPhone, but it did announce the notable milestone late tonight of half a billion device activations.

"Today is a big day for Android... 500 million devices activated globally, and over 1.3 million added every single day," said Hugo Bara, Android's director of product management, in a Google+ post. It's not clear how many devices are replacing older ones, though.

Google launched an open source course building web application for the growing list of K-12 and big-name universities developing online classes.

The barebones website is a lightweight way to bring course material online, track student engagement (with web traffic and surveys), and evaluate performance. “We want to use this launch to show that Google believes it can contribute to technology in education,” says Google’s Director of Research, Peter Norvig.''

Google has acquired VirusTotal, a free web service that inspects suspicious files against the most commonly deployed anti-virus solutions.

Founded in 2004, the service also allows users to input suspect URLs to scan websites for malware threats. According to an announcement on VirusTotal's website, the company is a longtime partner of Google.

'How can we build the next Google?' is a common question at events and the question came up again at the conclusion of the StartUp Games, a business competition inspired by the 2012 Paralympics, in the heart of London's Tech City.

This time though, the person answering the question was someone from Google in the form of Debu Purkayastha, the man responsible for the company's acquistions and investments. Building a brand as successful as the one he works for comes down to two things, Purkayastha stressed.

The wars on privacy between search engines and web browsers continue despite Google's $22.5 million fine after the company was caught placing cookies on users' computers. Google took advantage of an Apple Safari bug that allowed the search engine engineers to bypass settings and place a cookie on the user's computer even if browser settings disallowed cookie placement. A lawsuit was filed, and the FTC ruled that Google must pay a fine for infringing on end-user's rights.

Browsing "Incognito" on Chrome for iOS may help protect users' privacy, but it was having the opposite effect on their saved passwords.

The Next Web reported earlier today that numerous iPhone and iPad users had been complaining about their saved passwords vanishing in the recently updated Chrome iOS app. According to a thread on the Chrome development site Chromium, the problem had to do with closing an Incognito tab after browsing anonymously. But it seems the Chrome folks heard the gripes:

Google, which settled a privacy case with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) last week, is building a "red team" dedicated to solving privacy problems.

The team will be focused on tracking down and fixing privacy risks within the company's products, services, and businesses processes. Its existence came to light after a Google posted a job advertisement seeking a "Data Privacy Engineer, Privacy Red Team".

Google is ending its stand-alone Postini email security offering and merging it into its Google Apps products as part of a consolidation move to simplify its services.

The move comes almost five years after Google purchased Postini in September 2007 for about $625 million. Since the acquisition, Google has been integrating Postini's products, personnel and processes into Google's Enterprise Division.