You can assign Google Home speakers to specific rooms now

While we’re covering the #madebygoogle event (expect more posts soon), Google has been prepping some of its existing apps and services for the new devices. One of them is the revamped Google Home app. We reported about this yesterday but we weren’t able to talk about one new important feature owners of multiple Google Home speakers (or those who plan to buy the new Google Home Mini and Max). The app will now let you assign a specific Google Home speaker to a specific room. So, if you assign your Google Home to your bedroom and say “OK Google, turn off the bedroom,” then it’ll switch off all smart devices in your room, including the speaker itself. This, of course, will only work if you have more than one speaker and with the release of the Home Mini, Google seems to be preparing for the possibility of you adding more Google Home speakers in your house.

Source: Android Authority

Sonos One speaker to get Google Assistant support in 2018

The Sonos One speaker is shaping up to be the most competitive in terms of supporting the major virtual assistants out on the market. The speaker, which is the company’s answer to the Amazon Echos, Google Homes, and Apple HomePods of the world, is going to open public beta support for Amazon’s voice assistant, Alexa. This time, Google’s own Google Assistant will be joining the fray. It’ll get all the features Assistant offers on other devices. What we don’t know is if these two virtual assistants will work side by side or if there will be specific models per system. On top of these two, the Sonos One is also getting Siri Support through AirPlay 2 in the coming year, making it a pretty formidable speaker/smart home hub.

Source: The Verge

Got a Yahoo account? Then you’ve been breached

Remember that 2013 Yahoo breach that supposedly affected one billion accounts? Well, it got worse. Yahoo just announced that all its three billion user accounts have been affected by the hack. This hack exposed things like name, email address, hashed passwords, birthdays, phone numbers, and in some cases, “encrypted or unencrypted security questions and answers.” What the hackers weren’t able to obtain were the passwords in clear text as well as bank or credit card information linked to Yahoo accounts.

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Report hints at release dates for the new Google Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL

Leaked render of the Google Pixel 2 XL

The Google event, which is where we’re expecting to see the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL, is almost upon us. But information about the new devices are still cropping up online. This time, the latest leak from Evan Blass (@evleaks) hints at the release date for the two devices. The Pixel 2 will supposedly be arriving this month on October 19^th, to be specific, while the Pixel 2 XL will be coming next month on November 15^th. According to Blass’s story on VentureBeat, there could also be a pre-order period for both devices ahead of the release but it wasn’t stated when that would be. With the Pixel 2 supposedly coming out a couple of weeks after this event, we won’t be surprised if that happens immediately.

When it comes to price, the Droid Life reported a few weeks ago that the Pixel 2 will reportedly retain last year’s prices at US$649 for the 64GB version and US$749 for the 128GB. And the Pixel 2 XL gets a price bump from US$769 for the 32GB to US$849 for the 64GB model and from last year’s US$869 for the 128GB model to US$949 for the same storage size.

Source: Android Authority