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Apple AI has a major security flaw that can be broken with just a few lines of code; WeChat quietly launched "WeChat Encyclopedia"; Banana responds to the elimination of the brand department: a new department will be established

Shirley2024/08/16

summary

Taobao's transaction volume increased, but its revenue decreased; Huawei's three-fold screen was reportedly released in September; NASA will verify that "Mars exploration" can be 90% cheaper

Apple Intelligence was found to have a major security flaw that can be hacked with just a few lines of code

On August 15, Apple Intelligence was about to be launched, and a guy exposed the security flaws of Apple Intelligence with a few lines of code.

At the 2024 Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), Apple released Apple Intelligence, an AI feature that will be included in iOS 18.1. As it is about to be officially launched in October, a "civilian expert" found a major flaw in the beta version of Apple Intelligence provided by macOS 15.1.

Developer Evan Zhou successfully manipulated Apple Intelligence using prompt injection, bypassing the expected instructions and allowing the AI ​​to respond to arbitrary prompts. It turns out that it is vulnerable to "prompt word injection attacks" like other AI systems based on large language models. (Source: New Intelligence)

Interpretation of Alibaba's financial report: Taobao's transaction volume increased, but revenue decreased

"With the stabilization of market share, we started to accelerate monetization this quarter," said Wu Yongming, CEO of Alibaba Group and Chairman and CEO of Taobao Group. "But there are several factors to consider. The live broadcast and 10 billion yuan subsidy we launched have brought high user return rate and repurchase rate, and it will take some time for these new monetization methods and products to be effective. This is also the direction we will focus on in the next few quarters."

Wu Yongming said this against the backdrop of Taotian Group's high single-digit GMV (transaction volume) growth in the second quarter of this year, but revenue fell by 1%. Dragging down the overall performance was direct retail, with a quarterly revenue decline of 9%. Although customer management revenue grew by 1%, it grew slower than transaction volume because low-profit goods dragged down commission rates. Alibaba's management is confident in its ability to balance these investments with stable profit improvements, and expects the growth rate of customer management revenue to gradually keep pace with the growth rate of transaction volume in the next few quarters.

CFO Xu Hong said in the Q&A session of the earnings conference that the new fee rate measure, which will be implemented from September, will be reflected in the last seven months of the 2025 fiscal year (April 2024 to March 2025). He also said that Alibaba will take special measures to take care of small and medium-sized enterprises, such as refunding part of the fees for merchants whose GMV is below a certain threshold.

Alibaba's total revenue in the second quarter was 243.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 4%. Adjusted EBITA was 45 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 1%. Throughout the performance meeting, the management mentioned profitability and monetization rate many times, saying that some currently loss-making businesses will improve efficiency and profitability within one or two years, significantly reduce losses, and reach break-even. (Source: Late Finance)

Douyin's food delivery business leaves the e-commerce sector and returns to local life

On August 15, Douyin Takeaway, which was originally part of Douyin's e-commerce instant retail business, announced internally last week that it would return to Douyin's local life business line. This is the second structural adjustment of Douyin's takeaway business in half a year.

In early April of this year, Douyin Takeout had undergone a change of ownership, when it was adjusted from Douyin's local life business line to Douyin's e-commerce business line.

Then, along with the structural adjustment, Douyin's food delivery also underwent a series of changes. Starting from June 15, the original Douyin life service "group purchase and delivery" business stopped adding new merchants; on June 24, the Doudian·home food delivery platform was officially launched. Later, some media discovered that the "food delivery" entrance was also launched in the "Hourly Delivery" channel of Douyin Mall, and the service covered most cities.

However, just four months after the takeaway business was incorporated into e-commerce, changes came again and the team was reclassified back to the local life sector. (Source: 36Kr)

A new generation of electronic Moutai: Huawei's three-fold screen will be released in September

On August 15, blogger Dingjiao Digital hinted that Huawei's three-fold screen will debut in September, codenamed Iceland. Huawei is currently conducting internal training for the new generation of folding screens to compete with the iPhone 16 series. The blogger also previously revealed that Huawei's new generation of three-fold screens will be "electronic Moutai", indicating that this new phone is very popular and is expected to be sold at a premium through scalper channels.

Last year, new products such as Huawei's Mate 60 series and Mate X5 series became hot items. The official platform of Mate X5 sold out in 1 second, and there were long queues in offline stores. In third-party channels, the Mate X5 had a premium of 4,000 to 6,500 yuan during the first sale. At that time, some netizens said that it was a good deal to grab a Mate X5. The phone was called the annual financial product and the "electronic Moutai" of the technology industry.

After a year, Huawei's three-fold screen, which has revolutionized the mobile phone industry, is about to debut. This device adopts a double-hinge design and has an ultra-flat inner screen of about 10 inches. Both product strength and pricing are expected to set new records. (Source: Fast Technology)

SoftBank reportedly in talks to develop AI chips with Intel to rival Nvidia

On August 15, it was reported that SoftBank had discussed with Intel about producing artificial intelligence chips to compete with Nvidia, but the plan failed because the US chip manufacturer had difficulty meeting the requirements of the Japanese group.

People familiar with the matter said SoftBank will accelerate the combination of Arm's design and Graphcore's technology to produce products that compete with Nvidia. SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son plans to invest billions of dollars in an attempt to put SoftBank at the center of the artificial intelligence boom. He has put forward ambitious plans that include chip production. (Source: Financial Times)

Banana responds to the complete elimination of the brand department: a new "Public Affairs Department" has been established and is recruiting

On August 15, it was reported that Jiaoxia recently changed its organizational structure - the brand department was completely eliminated, all employees in the public relations department resigned, and the marketing department was merged into the sales department. Jiemian News had previously learned the news from an insider, who continued to say that the adjustment took place in early July, and the number of employees in the original brand department of Jiaoxia was about 40 to 50.

Interface News called the company's phone number regarding this matter, but no one answered. The customer service hotline operator of Jiaoxia responded to Interface News that the company's operations are currently normal and the aforementioned adjustments are normal organizational structure adjustments and upgrades. "The company's public relations are still there, and the newly established department is called the 'Public Affairs Department', and is gradually recruiting people for related positions."

The operator also said that except for the brand department, there are no major adjustments in other departments of the company. (Source: Jiemian News)

WeRide reportedly postpones US IPO pricing to next week

On August 15, people familiar with the matter said that WeRide has postponed the pricing of its Nasdaq IPO to next week in order to update transaction documents and add new investors. WeRide was originally scheduled to determine the IPO price today. (Source: IFR)

Garmin Enduro 3 smartwatch exposed: 51mm dial, Elevate 5 heart rate sensor, 100m water resistance

On August 16, German technology media WinFuture.de published a blog post sharing a high-definition rendering of the Garmin Enduro 3 smartwatch. The Enduro 3 smartwatch is only available in one size, 51mm dial, and looks basically the same as the Enduro 2, protected by a sapphire glass lens and surrounded by a dark gray/black titanium watch case.

The Enduro 3 smartwatch has yellow trim around the top button and comes with a fabric strap that matches the case, including solar charging and water resistance up to 100 meters (about 328 feet). Sources indicate that the Enduro 3 will use the Elevate 5 heart rate sensor, which will further improve measurement accuracy, and the watch can detect skin temperature. (Source: IT Home)

WeChat Encyclopedia is launched to compete with Baidu and Toutiao for market share

On August 15, it was reported that WeChat quietly launched the "WeChat Encyclopedia" product. When users open WeChat search (i.e. WeChat search), the system will display the corresponding encyclopedia content on the content page. The platform does not specifically emphasize that this is the result of "WeChat Encyclopedia". Users can only tell that it is WeChat Encyclopedia from the linked domain name (baike.weixin.qq.com).

In addition, an encyclopedia section has been added to each channel in the header area of ​​WeChat search. If users only want to read encyclopedia content, they can search for keywords from this channel to go directly to the search results.

Similar to the previous launch of the functions of news flash, search discovery, and questions, WeChat was also very low-key this time, and was directly launched without any marketing promotion. From the results page of "WeChat Encyclopedia", it can be seen that "WeChat Encyclopedia" did not come out of nowhere. At the end of the entry, the system will prompt the user, "The content comes from Sogou Encyclopedia", and users can also give feedback on the entry, such as text content problems, image text, video problems, etc. (Source: Guo Jing's Internet Circle)

NASA will work with Rocket Lab to verify that "Mars exploration" can be 90% cheaper, scheduled to take off in October

On August 16, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which is currently struggling with the "stranded American astronauts" in the International Space Station, is about to accept a commercial project - a spacecraft launch test that is committed to reducing the cost of transportation from Earth to Mars by 90%.

According to documents on NASA's official website, a pair of spacecraft produced by Rocket Lab, a U.S. listed company, will take off from the Cape Canaveral launch site in Florida in October this year and embark on a 200 million-mile journey to Mars.

The mission, called the Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorer (ESCAPADE), is all about saving money. NASA's last two missions to Mars orbit (the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter in 2005 and MAVEN in 2013) cost more than $500 million each.

Therefore, under the logic of NASA's "outsourcing to private organizations to save costs", the agency established the Small Innovative Planetary Exploration Mission (SIMPLEx), with the goal of spending no more than $55 million per mission (excluding rocket launch costs). (Source: Cailianshe)

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