GoKawiil
Tech News
Bank of America sent customers an email titled "Protecting your finances in the AI World," urging them not to share banking usernames or passwords with AI assistants or agents acting on their behalf. The bank confirmed to TechCrunch that the email is authentic, noting customers remain responsible for account activity resulting from any credentials they voluntarily share, subject to applicable consumer protections.
Google announced Genie 4, a real-time world model that builds on Gemini Omni and can maintain a consistent simulated environment for up to two minutes, double its Genie 3 predecessor. Users can alter scenes in real time with natural language prompts, including weather, camera movement, and new objects or characters, while the model generates ambient sound and adaptive human dialogue. Genie 4 works alongside Gemini 3.8 Flash, which breaks down prompts into steps, and is currently limited to select trusted testers in a research preview.
Google has rolled out a voice recorder feature inside Gemini Notebook, confirmed in version 1.63.1002728510 for Android and also available on iOS, seemingly to all regions rather than just the US. Tapping the microphone icon in the Sources tab or on the homepage starts recording, with the audio uploaded to Google's servers for automatic transcription and a 'source guide' summary.
A SIM Manager connector has surfaced in Gemini on a Pixel 9 running Android 17 QPR3 Beta 2, letting the assistant set up new eSIM profiles, convert physical SIMs to eSIMs, transfer or restore profiles, and delete them. Google has not announced the feature, and it does not appear on non-Pixel devices tested, suggesting an early or accidental rollout. Testing confirmed the connector actually triggers the eSIM setup process rather than just displaying placeholder prompts.
Android Authority uncovered a new Gemini Live interface hidden in version 17.70.10.ve.arm64 of the Google app, replacing the current pill-shaped audio visualizer with a circular button surrounded by animated dots and a glowing blue background. The design appears to extend Google's previously spotted 'Neural Expressive' visual style, which features gradients and animated elements, into the Gemini Live voice assistant. The feature is still under development, showing visual glitches, and Google has not indicated a rollout timeline.
Google DeepMind released Genie 4 in research preview, a world model that generates photorealistic, interactive environments with real-time audio including music, ambient sound, and dialogue. The new model allows mid-simulation prompt edits like changing weather or camera angle, maintains consistent scenes for up to two minutes, and offers improved physics and more lifelike characters compared to last year's Genie 3. It's currently available to select testers, with broader access planned for Google AI Ultra subscribers.
Turkish developer Emir Karşıyakalı created Aikon, an app that lets Nokia 6300 phones running S40 or S60 access Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini and Grok through a Go server that relays and compresses chatbot replies into readable chunks. The app supports photo analysis, voice messages up to 30 seconds, offline reading via memory card, and eight languages, and has been open-sourced for others to extend.
Google DeepMind released Genie 4 in research preview, a world model that generates photorealistic, interactive simulated environments with synchronized audio including music, ambient sound, and dialogue. Users can edit scenes mid-simulation, such as changing weather or camera angles, and the model can maintain a consistent scene for up to two minutes, twice as long as its predecessor Genie 3. Gemini now acts as a planning layer that directs Genie 4's visual generation, including an experiment where it broke down robotics tasks for real-time simulation.
Google DeepMind has released Genie 4, an upgraded world model that generates interactive virtual environments frame by frame from text prompts, now with audio support and more realistic human characters. The new version uses Gemini 3.8 Flash as a guiding agent to track goals and keep simulations consistent, though DeepMind says scenes still only hold together for a few minutes before losing context. Genie 4 also retains the ability to alter weather, add elements, or move the camera mid-simulation, as in Genie 3.
Mozilla is rolling out two new capabilities to Firefox's Smart Window AI browsing beta: a tool that auto-fills web forms using data pulled from a user's open tabs, and a 'watch' feature that monitors specified webpages for changes like sales or job postings. The form-fill feature works on text fields with four or more entries and sends source-page data to Google's Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite model, while the watch feature checks pages daily or weekly and notifies users via the Tasks button or desktop alerts. Both features launch first on desktop in the US and Canada, with wider rollout planned for coming months.
Google announced Genie 4, a new AI world model that generates interactive experiences lasting up to two minutes, doubling the length possible with its predecessor Genie 3. The update adds real-time editing via natural language prompts, audio generation, and runs on Gemini 3.8 Flash, though Google warns object permanence can degrade over longer simulations.
A WIRED software reporter ran a day-long comparison of six always-on AI agents installed on an iPhone: Meta's Muse, OpenAI's Dots, Instinct, Anthropic's Claude Duet, Google's Gemini Spark and xAI's Grok Bot. The agents vary widely in price and access, from Meta's free Muse app to OpenAI's $100-a-month Dots, with Claude Duet only released as a wait-listed preview the night before testing.