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Browser maker Brave has acquired a search engine project that prioritizes user privacy , a distinction it hopes will set it apart from Google , the undisputed leader in internet search. On Wednesday, Brave said it had purchased Tailcat , which was developed by Cliqz, a privacy-minded subsidiary of Germany's Hubert Burda Media . Tailcat, which Burda shuttered in 2020 , was designed to show results without logging user search activity or building a profile. Terms of the deal weren't disclosed, but Burda now is a Brave shareholder. Power up your Android Get the latest news, how-to and reviews on Google-powered devices in CNET's Google Report newsletter. Brave plans eventually to show search ads through Brave Search , as the Tailcat technology is now called. Brave opened up a waiting list Wednesday so beta testers can try it out in coming weeks, with general availability scheduled for late spring or summer. The startup hopes to pay users for seeing the ads, like … [Read more...] about Brave takes on Google with privacy-focused search engine

A year ago, ZDNet spoke with Google Brain director Jeff Dean about how the company is using artificial intelligence to advance its internal development of custom chips to accelerate its software. Dean noted that deep learning forms of artificial intelligence can in some cases make better decisions than humans about how to lay out circuitry in a chip. This month, Google unveiled to the world one of those research projects, called Apollo, in a paper posted on the arXiv file server , "Apollo: Transferable Architecture Exploration," and a companion blog post by lead author Amir Yazdanbakhsh. Apollo represents an intriguing development that moves past what Dean hinted at in his formal address a year ago at the International Solid State Circuits Conference, and in his remarks to ZDNet . In the example Dean gave at the time, machine learning could be used for some low-level design decisions, known as "place and route." In place and route, chip designers use software to … [Read more...] about Google’s deep learning finds a critical path in AI chips

Google's last surviving VR product is dead. Today the company stopped selling the Google Cardboard VR viewer on the Google Store, the last move in a long wind-down of Google's once-ambitious VR efforts. The message on the Google Store , which was first spotted by Android Police , reads, "We are no longer selling Google Cardboard on the Google Store." Google Cardboard was a surprise hit at Google I/O 2015 and moved the entry point for VR lower than anyone had imagined previously. The device was a literal piece of cardboard, shaped like a VR headset, with special plastic lenses. Google built a Cardboard app for Android and iOS, which would let any suitably high-end phone power the headset. The landscape display split into left and right views for your eyes, the phone hardware rendered a VR game, and the accelerometers did 3-DoF (degrees of freedom) head tracking. There was even a cardboard action button on the handset that would boop the touchscreen with a capacitive pad, so you … [Read more...] about Google’s VR dreams are dead: Google Cardboard is no longer for sale

In 2023, will civilians fly around the moon for the first time? According to Japanese entrepreneur Yusaku Maezawa , the answer is yes. He is bankrolling the DearMoon mission, which is intended to take a group of eight people to the moon on SpaceX's still-in-development Starship and loop around Earth's natural satellite on a six-day mission. The project, announced by Maezawa and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk in 2018 , originally planned to invite artists from around the world to experience. The criteria for "artists" was never clearly defined, but on Tuesday, in a new promotional video for the mission, Maezawa announced that DearMoon would be opened up to practically everyone across the globe. "I began to think that maybe every single person who is doing something creative could be called an artist," he says in the video, which you can view below. CNET Science From the moon to your inbox. Get the latest space stories from CNET every week. Maezawa outlines "two key … [Read more...] about SpaceX moon mission to take eight people ‘further than any human has ever gone’ from Earth

Huawei is a global telecommunications supplier and phone manufacturer, but it remains a pariah in countries like the US. There's been a huge amount of scrutiny of the Chinese company in recent years, and countries like the UK and Sweden have banned the use of its equipment in their 5G networks. Huawei's phones are also virtually invisible in the US despite their huge popularity around the world. The company's chairman predicted that 2020 would be "difficult" for Huawei, and there certainly were challenges. The US continued to pressure allies to block Huawei from their next-generation 5G wireless networks. In July, the UK banned Huawei from its 5G infrastructure: The company's equipment must be removed by 2027 -- a decision that Huawei found "disappointing" as 5G becomes increasingly mainstream -- and UK carriers will be unable to install Huawei 5G gear starting in September 2021 . In Belgium, a pro-Huawei influence campaign used fake accounts to … [Read more...] about Huawei ban timeline: Chinese company may start making electric vehicles this year