European Union officials recently warned Apple against imposing charging speed limitations on third-party USB-C iPhone 15 chargers, and it looks as though the company is preparing to lift restrictions on wireless chargers from other manufacturers, too.

At present, newer iPhones support up to 15W wireless charging, but only when they’re paired with Apple-produced MagSafe chargers. Third-party wireless chargers, on the other hand, are limited to 5W-7.5W charging, meaning traditional wired chargers are usually a more efficient option unless you’ve invested in Apple’s own wireless charging tech.

However, a new rumor (via 9to5Mac) hints that Apple could lift this 5W-7.5W limit on third-party wireless chargers used with the iPhone 15 series. If true, non-Apple wireless chargers will be capable of juicing up the iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Ultra just as fast as MagSafe chargers (aka the best iPhone chargers).

Why would Apple do this? It’s hard to say for sure, since Apple has never disclosed why, exactly, it imposes this 5W-7.5W limit on third-party wireless chargers in the first place.

The company claims that the magnets in its MagSafe chargers “align themselves perfectly [with the iPhone’s charging coils] every time for faster wireless charging,” so perhaps it hasn’t trusted third-party manufacturers to achieve 15W wireless charging in a way that’s equally as efficient and – crucially – safe.

That stance could be changing with the iPhone 15, though, but we suspect Apple will only lift restrictions on next-generation wireless chargers using the Qi2 standard – i.e., those whose charging technology is based on Apple’s own MagSafe technology (to ensure safety).

Suffice to say, this is good news for anyone who’s reluctant to spend the big bucks on Apple’s expensive MagSafe tech. But it’s good news for your iPhone’s security, too.

Recent research revealed that hackers are using public charging stations to steal data and install malware in users’ iPhones. Cables in compromised charging stations can attach to your iPhone’s data pins, as well as its charging pins, whereas wireless chargers eliminate this risk of pin-to-pin data transfer.

Of course, we’re some years away from seeing Qi2-standard wireless chargers replace standard chargers in airports, train stations and shopping malls, but Apple’s potential commitment to levelling the charging playing feel can only bode well for the future.

Until this point we hadn’t heard much about the OnePlus 12. There has been the odd small leak here and rumor there, but now we’re hearing an almost complete specs list for the phone, and it’s a mixed bag of promising and, well, the same the OnePlus 11.

This comes from leaker Yogesh Brar, who has a reasonable track record, but they add the caveat that this is for an engineering configuration of the phone, which might mean some aspects could change before launch.

In any case, Brar claims that the OnePlus 12 will have a triple-lens camera, with a 50MP main sensor, a 50MP ultra-wide, and a 64MP periscope zoom camera. For reference, the OnePlus 11 has a 50MP main, 48MP ultra-wide, and 32MP telephoto.

As such, if Brar is right, then both the ultra-wide and zoom cameras will be different on the 12; both boasting more megapixels. That said, the description of the 64MP camera as being a ‘periscope’ suggests that it will also offer longer distance optical zoom than the 2x optical of the OnePlus 11, which was really intended for better-quality portrait shooting over capturing things farther away.

Typically, periscope cameras are used for 4x magnification optical zoom and beyond, with the likes of the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra using a periscope camera design to offer as much as 10x optical zoom. At a guess, we don’t imagine the OnePlus 12 will manage 10x magnification – as few phones do – but around 4x or 5x optical zoom seems very likely, if this leak is accurate.

The change in these two sensors could also mean improvements behind the scenes, such as a larger sensor size, though we don’t know that yet. It’s also worth noting that just because the main sensor is apparently 50MP once more, that doesn’t necessarily mean the hardware at play isn’t changing too, but it’s probably unlikely that OnePlus would switch out all three in a single generation.

More power but the same screen

As for the rest of the rumored specs, those are rather less exciting. Brar claims the OnePlus 12 will have a 6.7-inch QHD OLED screen with a 120Hz refresh rate, a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset, and a 5,000mAh battery with 100W charging.

On paper, the only change there is the chipset, and the one mentioned here is no surprise, since the OnePlus 11 uses the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2. Of course, there could be details that these specs don’t tell us; for example the screen might be brighter this year, but we’ll have to wait and see.

It’s also worth noting that the 100W charging speed may not apply in the US, as while the OnePlus 11 charges at 100W in most of the world, it’s limited to 80W there, due to the US using 110-volt outlets that can’t make the most of the company’s charging system.

Finally, Brar claims that the OnePlus 12 will actually launch this year, with a December release apparently planned in China. However, OnePlus has been known to launch phones in China initially, and then give them a global launch a month or so later.

It did exactly that with the OnePlus 11 (though even China didn’t get that until January, with the rest of the world getting it in February). So we might see a global OnePlus 12 launch in January of next year – which would still be a month earlier in the year than the OnePlus 11.

You might not have to wait until then for an exciting new OnePlus phone though, as the first OnePlus foldable could land before the end of 2023.

Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) 2023 event is happening soon (June 5, 2023) and like clockwork, the leaks are popping up. The rumors this time suggest iOS 17 will have a new lock screen that will turn your iPhone into a sort of smart display.

What gives this rumor more credence than others is the fact it comes from notable industry insider Mark Gurman from Bloomberg. He claims in a recent report that Apple is looking for a way to “make iPhones more useful when they’re [sitting] on a person’s desk or nightstand.” The tech is reportedly based on the customizable lock screen from iOS 16 which allows “users “to see small snippets of information”. 

Beyond that, not much else is known. Gurman’s anonymous sources state the iOS 17 features function similar to Amazon’s Echo Show displays and it’ll utilize a “dark background with bright text” similar to the Apple Watch's Nightstand Mode.

Smart home expansion

It's been known for a while now the company has been working on growing the smart home side of its business. All the way back in January of this year, rumors were floating around stating the tech giant is planning to launch a low-end iPad as the company’s first official smart home controller. Gurman’s report states it’s been “designed to control things like thermostats” and house lights, as well as “show video”.

It's hard to say whether or not Apple wants the iPhone to play a bigger role in its smart home plans. Sure, a smart display is useful for displaying basic information, but there has to be more to it than that. And we can't help but wonder how this will affect the Matter standard. 

The protocol is in dire need of some support, after all. Matter 1.1 recently launched, and what was supposed to be a major upgrade, but without more device-type support, it's a little underwhelming. Looking at Gurman’s leaks, there isn’t a single word about Matter, which is rather concerning.

Either way, mum's the word for now.  Gurman states that “an Apple spokeswoman declined to comment on [the company's] plans for iOS 17.”

A peek at the future

As for the rest of the report, it mostly consists of previously seen leaks like watchOS 10 getting widgets as part of a major revamp and the world premiere of the company’s VR headset. Some of the more interesting tidbits, however, include “significant changes to the iPhone’s Wallet app” plus an AirPlay upgrade “to make it easier for users to beam [content] to devices they don’t own.” Apparently, Apple spoke to some hotels "that offer TVs and speakers" to make the latter possible.

Be sure to stay tuned for our coverage of WWDC 2023. We do expect to see the official reveal of iOS 17.

After almost a year of working properly and being cleanly distributed through the Play Store, a popular Android screen recording app has turned on its users, recording their calls, stealing files, and even listening in to the sounds of the device’s environment.

Cybersecurity researchers from ESET found the app, named iRecorder - Screen Recorder, which was added to the Play Store in September 2021, turned sour in August 2022. 

In the year before malicious code was apparently added, more than 50,000 people had downloaded the app, the report said. 

Unknown motives

The malware that was subsequently added is based on the open-source AhMyth Android Remote Access Trojan (RAT), but was heavily modified. ESET says whoever modified the code took their time to understand the code of both the app and the back end. ESET’s researchers dubbed the malware AhRat.

The threat actors behind the compromise are unknown, and so are their motives. But given the functionalities of AhRat, all things point to an espionage campaign, the researchers said. After all, besides the screen recording feature (which isn’t malicious), the app can record ambient audio picked up by the endpoint’s microphone, and exfiltrate files such as saved web pages, images, audio, video, document files, and more.

“The AhRat research case serves as a good example of how an initially legitimate application can transform into a malicious one, even after many months, spying on its users and compromising their privacy. While it is possible that the app developer had intended to build up a user base before compromising their Android devices through an update or that a malicious actor introduced this change in the app; so far, we have no evidence for either of these hypotheses,” ESET researcher Lukáš Štefanko said. 

In other words, there’s a slight chance the app was taken over by malicious actors and used in a supply chain attack.

The iRecorder app versions 1.3.8 and older are not malicious, it was said, but if you updated it in the meantime, chances are - you’ve been compromised. The worst part is that the victims didn’t even need to grant the app any further permissions. The app has since been removed from the Play Store.

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Future iPhones could get a big boost from Apple’s new investment into 5G components, which could see the tech giant make a single chip for cellular, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity.

5G networks offer faster download speeds and superior reliability than their 4G equivalents, but the widespread adoption of 5G has been hampered by the need to develop expensive mobile infrastructure en masse. 

Now, Apple has announced a major new partnership with its long-term parts supplier Broadcom to build a number of “cutting edge” 5G components in the US. 

Why does this matter? As well as providing a huge boost to the US economy – to the tune of billions (and billions) of dollars – the move will reduce Apple’s reliance on third-party chip suppliers like Qualcomm and could mean that future iPhones boast 5G modems uniquely optimized for Apple devices. 

Qualcomm expects Apple to switch to its own in-house 5G modems from 2024 onwards, so in theory, the iPhone 16 line could be the first iPhone line to feature super efficient, Apple-produced 5G components.

Apple is widely believed to have begun work on its own 5G technology after purchasing  Intel’s modem division for $1 billion in 2020. The company signed a six-year deal with Qualcomm in the meantime to ensure that every iPhone since the iPhone 12 has been 5G-compatible, but it’s no secret that Apple is keen to bring more of its manufacturing process under one roof. 

For instance, Apple has also outlined plans to begin using proprietary custom displays in its new mobile devices from 2024 onwards, in a bid to reduce reliance on other component manufacturing partners like Samsung and LG.

More generally, the company’s extended partnership with Broadcom should boost the widespread adoption of 5G among 4G-using consumers. “5G technology is shaping the future of next-generation consumer electronics – and Apple is spending tens of billions of dollars to develop this field in the United States,” the company said in a statement. 

How much better is 5G?

5G speeds vary between locations, countries, carriers and devices, but in the right conditions, they can reach up to 10 Gbps. For context, that’s around 100 times faster than the average 4G download speed. 

However, that superior speed comes at a cost. Being significantly more complex than previous-generation mobile networks, 5G networks require more masts and more advanced (read: much larger) equipment in more places, which is expensive to produce and install. 

Apple’s multi-billion dollar investment should go some way to improving this still-underdeveloped 5G infrastructure – in the US, at least – but we’re still several years away from seeing 5G replace 4G in the main. 

We all remember our first device, whether it was a groundbreaking iPhone, an indestructible Nokia, or a pioneering Motorola DynaTAC. In a short time, we’ve gone from making calls and sending texts on brick phones to playing 3D games and streaming live 4K video on shiny, sleek handsets. The smartphone is as much a fashion item and part of popular culture as it is a productivity device in 2023.

But how much have you been keeping up with the innovative handsets, and the technological advances that enabled them over the past forty years? It’s time to test your knowledge with our quiz! 

Samsung Display has unveiled a handful of displays that could help to make our phones, tablets, and laptops more portable without reducing their screen size, and a display that can measure your blood pressure.

Currently being demoed at Los Angeles Convention Center in California as part of the SID Display Week 2023, the Rollable Flex display is a new screen that can unfurl like a scroll, morphing from just 1.9 inches long (49mm) to 10 inches (254mm). In a press release, Samsung explains it hopes this new screen can help “turn a difficult-to-carry large-sized display into a portable form factor.”

This is merely a demo right now – it'll likely be a while before a gadget puts Samsung Display’s Rollable Flex panel to use – but in the right hands we could see some interesting designs. Your tablet could roll up into a rod shape for carrying around, for example, and those of us who like a multi-monitor setup could carry a rollable second screen with us to use with our laptops.

Samsung Display is also demoing new folding screen designs that look to be perfect for smartphones – so we may see them used in follow-up devices to Samsung Electronics’ Galaxy Z Flip 4 and Galaxy Z Fold 4, or Google’s recently unveiled Google Pixel Fold.

Flex In & Flex Out is a screen type that can fold both ways. You can fold the screen in and close it like a book – protecting it with the outside case – or you can fold the screen out, so that you can still see the display and use your phone without needing it to be full size.

Samsung explains that this design would eliminate the extra external panel that many foldables rely on so they can be used while folded; without that panel, foldables could become lighter and thinner than the current best foldable phones.

Lastly, Samsung is demoing Flex Hybrid, a screen that combines folding and sliding technologies into one so that you can eek even more screen real estate out of your smartphone.

We don’t yet know when we'll see phones or tablets using these displays, but it likely won't be any time soon – and we can expect any such devices to be on the expensive side based on the currently prices of foldable phones.

A portable OLED biosensor

Beyond improving portability, Samsung Display also unveiled a new Sensor OLED screen that combines an OLED panel with biosensors. The upshot of this is a screen that has fingerprint scanning built-in, where most fingerprint-reading displays require an under-display module for this.

Obviously, you could use this kind of screen to unlock your phone with your fingerprint, but that’s nothing new. The real advantage is that this OLED display can apparently be used to check your cardiovascular health.

When the user places two fingers on the display, it use its light to measure how contracted or relaxed the blood vessels inside the fingers are, and this data can then be used to provide health information. According to Samsung, accurate blood pressure measurements require you to collect data from both arms, “the Sensor OLED display can simultaneously sense the fingers of both hands, providing more accurate health information than existing wearable devices.” 

As with the folding screens, Samsung hasn’t said when Sensor OLED will make its way to consumer smartphones – so your phone likely won’t be replacing the health tracking provided by the best smartwatches any time soon.

Apple is expected to debut its iPhone 15 line in September, but that hasn’t stopped leakers from speculating about next year’s iPhone 16 series.

We’ve already reported on rumors hinting that the iPhone 16 Pro and 16 Pro Max could be the biggest iPhones yet, and new CAD images obtained by 9to5Mac corroborate that suggestion. Now, though, we’re also hearing that the base iPhone 16 could borrow a key design feature from the iPhone 12 line.

According to Twitter leaker @URedditor, the iPhone 16 will sport a vertical camera layout, rather than the diagonal setup used on every iPhone since the iPhone 13. “This will make the device instantly recognizable as the latest model” in 2024, @URedditor writes.

Despite the rumored addition of a 48MP main lens on the base iPhone 15, Apple’s next vanilla flagship will reportedly stick with the same camera arrangement as the iPhone 14, so it figures that the company could shake-up the appearance of the iPhone 16 by, well, going back to what it knows.

Of course, this wouldn’t be the first time Apple has looked to its own product history for design inspiration. The company had seemingly abandoned the iPhone 4’s straight-sided aesthetic with the iPhone 6, before returning to it with the iPhone 12. The iPhone 15, meanwhile, will reportedly be reminiscent of the iPhone 11 by having slightly curved edges (see the images below). 

It should also go without saying that the iPhone 16 won’t use the same cameras as the iPhone 12. The latter uses two 12MP main shooters, and although the iPhone 14 likewise employs that now-outdated setup, the aforementioned 48MP main lens expected to arrive on the iPhone 15 will surely make its way to the iPhone 16, too.

As for what other features the iPhone 16 could introduce, we’re expecting the phone – or its Pro-level siblings, at least – to sport solid-state (i.e. haptic) volume and power buttons. The iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Ultra were widely rumored to get solid-state buttons, but Apple analysts recently poured water on those claims, adding that the feature is more likely to arrive with the iPhone 16 line owing to its technological complexity.

In addition to solid-state power buttons, the iPhone 16 Pro will reportedly get a periscope lens and a larger display, too, which has pretty much killed our excitement for the iPhone 15 Pro.

In other words, the iPhone 16 Pro could be a smaller (and potentially cheaper) version of the much-rumored iPhone 15 Ultra, which is expected to arrive this year in place of an iPhone 15 Pro Max. We’ll have to wait until September for confirmation of that phone’s existence, though, so stay tuned to TechRadar for the latest news on what is likely to be this year’s hottest smartphone launch. 

Apple has only just dropped iOS 16.5, but already there’s a public beta for iOS 16.6, the finished version of which will probably land in the next month or so, based on past form. This doesn’t look to be one of the biggest iOS updates ever, but there’s one potentially very useful new feature.

That feature is iMessage Contact Key Verification, which Apple actually announced last year, but is only now activating. If you and the person or people you’re messaging both enable this feature, then you’ll be alerted if Apple detects a potential intrusion – for example, if the cloud servers your messages are carried on appear to have been breached.

Contact Verification Codes can also be compared and verified in person or over a FaceTime call. So, all this is essentially a way of verifying that you’re talking to the person you believe you’re talking to, and that no one is eavesdropping on the conversation.

This is probably a level of security beyond what most people really need, especially as iMessage is already end-to-end encrypted. Indeed, when Apple announced the feature, it positioned this as something aimed at people facing "extraordinary digital threats," such as journalists and government officials.

It’s a feature that’s designed to stop “an exceptionally advanced adversary, such as a state-sponsored attacker,” so this isn’t something you should – in theory – need to avoid garden-variety hackers. That said, it’s something anyone can enable, so if you want that extra peace of mind, the option is now there.

Or it will be, anyway – while the feature is now visible, it doesn’t appear to be functional yet, according to BGR.

Few features to find

Presumably, then, Apple is still getting it set up, but with it visible in this iOS 16.6 beta, it seems very likely that the iMessage Contact Key Verification feature will fully launch in the finished version of iOS 16.6.

This seems to be the only feature that has been found in this iOS 16.6 beta, and handily Apple hasn’t provided any release notes for the beta. So, there may be more features lurking in there, and there may be additional features added in subsequent betas or the finished iOS 16.6 release.

But as we’re not aware of any functional changes in this current build, there’s probably no need to download it. And while it will definitely be worth grabbing the finished version, we might not see many new features until iOS 17.

There is a way to “brute-force” fingerprints on Android devices and with physical access to the smartphone, and enough time, a hacker would be able to unlock the device, a report from cybersecurity researchers at Tencent Labs and Zhejiang Unversity has claimed.

As per the report, there are two zero-day vulnerabilities present in Android devices (as well as those powered by Apple’s iOS and Huawei’s HarmonyOS), called Cancel-After-Match-Fail (CAMF) and Match-After-Lock (MAL). 

By abusing these flaws, the researchers managed to do two things: have Android allow an infinite number of fingerprint scanning attempts; and use databases found in academic datasets, biometric data leaks, and similar.

Cheap hardware

To pull the attacks off, the attackers needed a couple of things: physical access to an Android-powered smartphone, enough time, and $15 worth of hardware.

The researchers named the attack “BrutePrint”, and claim that for a device that only has one fingerprint set up, it would take between 2.9 and 13.9 hours to break into the endpoint. Devices with multiple fingerprint recordings are significantly easier to break into, they added, with the average time for “brute-printing” being between 0.66 hours and 2.78 hours.

The researchers ran the test on ten “popular smartphone models”, as well as a couple of iOS devices. We don’t know exactly which models were vulnerable, but they said that on Android and HarmonyOS devices, they managed to achieve infinite tries. For iOS devices, however, they only managed to get an extra ten attempts on iPhone SE and iPhone 7 models, which is not enough to successfully pull off the attack. Thus, the conclusion is that while iOS might be vulnerable to these flaws, the current method of breaking into the device via brute force won’t suffice. 

While this type of attack might not be that attractive to the regular hacker, it could be used by state-sponsored actors and law enforcement agencies, the researchers concluded. 

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Via: BleepingComputer

Samsung made a big song and dance about the bespoke Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipsets powering its Galaxy S23 phones, but new rumors suggest a similarly overclocked version of Qualcomm’s latest processor could be coming to other premium handsets very soon. 

That prediction comes from Weibo leaker Digital Chat Station (via Android Authority), who claims that Samsung’s “high-frequency version” of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 will be made available to “domestic” (i.e. Chinese) smartphone brands imminently. 

The leaker makes no mention of specific brands, but the likes of ASUS, OnePlus, Redmagic and Xiaomi could all utilize this upgraded processor in whatever as-yet-unreleased premium handsets they have in the pipeline for 2023 and beyond. 

If you’re into your number-crunching, Qualcomm’s ‘Made for Samsung’ Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset delivers slightly higher peak CPU and GPU clock speeds than its standard counterpart (3.36GHz versus 3.2GHz, and 719MHz versus 680MHz). 

The real-world performance differences between the two processors, however, are negligible. In our Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra review, we said “the S23 Ultra gains a slight edge over the OnePlus 11 ... but the Ultra's lead is so slight that you're unlikely to feel any real-world benefit." That "For Galaxy" Snapdragon seems “far more beneficial for Samsung Galaxy S23 series marketing campaign” than it is for the user.

In other words, while Qualcomm’s bespoke chipset does technically offer superior performance, it’s nigh-on impossible to perceive any tangible speed differences between the Samsung Galaxy S23 series and other Snapdragon 8 Gen 2-equipped phones like the OnePlus 11 and Honor Magic 5 Pro.

The upshot is that anyone hell-bent on owning the fastest and most powerful Snapdragon chipset around may have more options to choose from in a few months’ time. 

As for the chipset that could replace the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, we’re expecting Qualcomm to unveil the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 at its annual Snapdragon Summit, which takes place in November.

• If you're interested in smartphone performance, check out the best gaming phones

iOS 16.5 is now available to download on any iPhone newer than the iPhone 8, and despite being an incremental update, it’s an important one for your iPhone’s security. 

Thought to be the last iOS 16 update before the iOS 17 beta goes live in June, iOS 16.5 patches a nefarious loophole that allows anyone to access your contacts book from your iPhone’s lock screen (an issue that presumably arose as a result of Apple’s decision to improve lock screen customization in iOS 16 proper). 

Previous versions of iOS 16 have patched similar vulnerabilities concerning access to Messages and the Wallet app through the iPhone lock screen, so iOS 16.5 looks to have fixed the final threat in this particular set of security risks. 

Elsewhere, iOS 16.5 adds three security patches for issues related to WebKit, the browser engine used in Apple’s Safari app. These patches – which defend against threats regarding personal data leakage – were introduced with Apple’s first iPhone Rapid Security Response update in early May, but now anyone who missed that time-sensitive rollout can benefit from the security improvements. 

As for the non-security-related features introduced with iOS 16.5, the new update adds a series of Pride celebration lock screen wallpapers and a dedicated Sports tab in Apple News. The latter provides easier access to stories, scores, and standings for the teams and leagues you follow, with score cards now taking you directly to game pages.

iOS 16.5 patches various issues relating to Spotlight, CarPlay, and Screen Time, too. The full list of updates can be viewed on Apple’s dedicated iOS 16.5 release notes page. 

To download iOS 16.5, head to Settings, General, then Software Update, and follow the on-screen prompts. Alternatively, read our guide on how to update your iPhone to iOS 16, which contains more detailed instructions for the same steps. 

As mentioned, Apple is expected to debut its next major revision to iOS – iOS 17 – at WWDC 2023 in early June. Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman had previously reported that development on the Apple VR headset would lead to “fewer major changes” for iOS 17, but the seasoned Apple expert has since claimed that the upcoming update will actually provide several of users’ “most requested features.” 

In practice, this will likely mean a range of significant upgrades to existing iPhone features and apps, like CarPlay, Siri, and Messages. A series of rumored updates to Apple Maps, for instance, might finally make you switch from Google Maps.

Leakers are, however, divided over which iPhones will be compatible with iOS 17. Some report that iOS 17 will drop support for the iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X, while others have counterclaimed that iOS 17 will be compatible with all iPhones capable of running iOS 16.

At this stage, then, there's little certainty around which iPhones will be supported by iOS 17 – but we're sure to find out at WWDC 2023 come June 5.

After rumors that Samsung might be switching its in-house browser app's default search engine from Google to Bing – perhaps in time for the Galaxy S24 – a new report suggests that the change is no longer happening, which is no doubt a relief to Google.

This comes from the Wall Street Journal (via The Verge), and like the original rumor, there's not a whole lot to go off. The WSJ says that an internal review into whether Samsung should jump from Google to Bing has now been suspended, with Samsung apparently worried about disruption for users and souring its relationship with Google.

Those clearly negative aspects of any potential switch made the idea of it pretty inconceivable in the first place, though it sounds as though Samsung was thinking about it – perhaps impressed by the swift rolling out of various Bing AI features.

Staying number one

Another factor to consider in all of this is that we're talking about Samsung's own Internet Browser app: Google would of course still have been front and center in Chrome for Android. Nevertheless, the move would've made plenty of headlines.

We know that Google actually pays Apple to be the default search engine in Safari, an arrangement that's perhaps easier to swallow for Apple as it doesn't have a search engine of its own. Google then rakes in billions in ad revenue through searches run on iOS (and indeed Samsung handsets).

All that said, the WSJ cites "people familiar with the matter" as saying that Samsung "isn't permanently closing the door" on switching to Bing in the future – so Google executives might have some work to do yet.

Analysis: search is changing

One of the ways in which OpenAI and ChatGPT have changed the tech landscape is in giving Microsoft an intelligent chatbot that can return better search results in some situations. Google has since plugged its own Bard chatbot into various products, including its flagship web search engine.

That means that in future years, we might be spending less time opening up a web browser and typing out our queries, and more time interacting with a bot to get the information that we need. That in turn is likely to impact advertising revenues – both for Google and for web publishers.

It's difficult to predict how this is all going to play out, but we might get to a point where it's not so important for Google to be the number one search engine in Samsung's Internet Browser or Apple's Safari, if it's attracting users in other ways. In fact, it's something of a surprise that it's taken this long for web search to evolve beyond its original form.

There are all kinds of uncertainties going forward around how these bots grab their information and how the human beings who provide the content get compensated, but it's going to be interesting to see how the search landscape changes – and whether or not Bing (or anyone else) can truly challenge Google.

Apple has been paying attention to the rise of ChatGPT, Google Bard and other similar tools: so far this month the company has posted 28 job opportunities in the field of AI, which gives us a clear indication that Apple is ready to invest in this technology.

As spotted by 9to5Mac, one of the listings is for a Visual Generative Modeling Research Engineer. The role will be part of "a group that will shape the way generative AI technologies transform Apple's mobile computing platforms", the description says.

That sounds fairly ambitious to us. It's not clear exactly what these roles mean for users, but the number of roles that are now open and the language used in their descriptions would point to Apple taking generative AI very seriously.

AI with everything

There's plenty of artificial intelligence embedded into Apple products already of course – whether it's finding photos of your cat or recognizing Siri voice commands – but this seems likely to be on a whole new level in terms of what it's capable of.

Recent reports suggest that Apple knows it's falling behind the likes of OpenAI, Microsoft and Google in the AI race, and we've already written about the response that's needed from Apple if it wants to compete in this particular area.

Apple CEO Tim Cook is on record as saying that recent advances in generative AI are "very interesting" but has also said that Apple is going to be "deliberate and thoughtful" in its approach to the technology – so watch this space.

Analysis: apply here

You can search for AI-related jobs at Apple yourself, and you can see they cover a whole host of different teams and job titles. As you would expect, you need a lot of talent, experience and passion to meet the requirements for one of these posts.

The language is different across the various listings, but we've spotted references to " the next generation of natural language understanding capability of Siri" and "the pivotal shift of AI technologies that is leading the revolution in human-computer interaction".

That's the sort of language that makes us think Apple is taking generative AI very seriously. Whether or not Siri will morph into a ChatGPT-style bot remains to be seen, but it's one of the possibilities that this latest batch of job listings point to.

Apple knows that if it doesn't move fast on AI, someone else will. OpenAI just launched ChatGPT for iOS, while there are numerous other third-party tools that can bring top-tier artificial intelligence tools to your Apple products right now.

We recently detailed a two-second iPhone trick that lets you delete Safari tabs en masse, but that helpful shortcut is far from the only hidden iOS feature worth knowing about in 2023. 

We say ‘hidden’, but only hidden insofar as Apple doesn’t make a big song and dance about the myriad genuinely useful navigational tools scattered throughout iOS. 

We’ve highlighted 9 iOS tricks that every iPhone user should know elsewhere on TechRadar, but in this article, we've picked out five more handy iOS loopholes to help you navigate your iPhone faster – from keyboard shortcuts to calculator tricks. 

1. No more calculator headaches 

Most iPhone users will know the pain of having to re-enter digits in the calculator app after accidentally pressing a wrong number, but did you know that you don’t need to go back to square one in order to rectify your mistake? 

If you punch a wrong number in the calculator app, simply swipe left or right on the erroneous number to remove the last digit you entered incorrectly. You can do this trick as many times as you like, until the number screen returns to zero.

2. Scroll up with a single tap 

if you’re navigating lengthy web articles like listicles or shopping pages, it can be a nuisance to scroll all the way back up to the top of those pages using thumb swipes alone. Helpfully, tapping the status bar at the top of your ‌iPhone‌'s display – either the clock side or the battery side – will fast travel you back up to where you began. 

This trick works for browsers like Safari and Chrome, as well as in apps more generally. If you’re currently rocking an iPhone with a Dynamic Island – that’s the iPhone 14 Pro or iPhone 14 Pro Max – you’ll only be able to use this method when the Island isn’t in use. 

3. Turn your spacebar into a trackpad  

Okay, okay: we did include this particular trick in our other iOS tips guide, but the method for performing said trick has changed slightly since then. 

Did you know your iPhone has a hidden trackpad? It’s beneath (or rather, inside) the keyboard, and can be activated by long-pressing the spacebar. In other words, you don’t need to awkwardly click between words and letters to fix errors, and can instead surf through text from the comfort of your keyboard. 

What’s more, tapping the trackpad with another finger selects text, so your digits don’t need to venture into the top half of your iPhone’s screen at all, really. 

4. Avoid switching to the numbered keyboard 

This next trick will only save you about a second each time you use it, but every little helps, as they say. When typing on your iPhone’s keyboard, you’re probably used to manually switching to the numbered keyboard when typing, well, numbers. But did you know that you can make the transition between the alphabetical and numbered keyboards super-swift? 

Instead of tapping the ‘123’ tab in the bottom-left corner of the keyboard, hold it down and drag your finger to the number or symbol you want to input. When you let go, the keyboard will automatically revert to the alphabetical layout, saving you a couple of clicks in the process. Admittedly, this trick is a little fiddly to perfect at first – but with practice, it will make you feel like an iPhone master. 

5. Say goodbye to in-app ratings prompts

We’ve all been frustrated by those pesky 'rate this app' prompts that appear every so often when you open an app, but thankfully, iOS includes a helpful setting to banish them for good. 

Head to Settings, scroll down to App Store and deselect the In-App Ratings & Reviews toggle. Et voilà! No more annoying requests for feedback (you can thank us later). 

For more on keeping your tech clutter-free, read our guides on how to clean a phone charging port and how to close iPhone apps.