An organization representing emergency services in more than 80 countries worldwide has said that Apple adding Advanced Mobile Location (AML) in iOS 11.3 is ‘huge news,’ having previously estimated that it would result in saving around 7500 lives over the next ten years … AML allows emergency services dispatchers to automatically pin-point the location of someone making a 911 call. It takes data from both GPS and WiFi chips to automatically transmit a location so precisely that it can not only identify the exact address, but sometimes even narrow down the location to a specific room....

It’s already Friday in Australia, and Apple’s Black Friday deals – aka ‘one day shopping event’ – have just gone live in the country. Apple is offering a Apple Store gift card worth up to A$210 (US$160) with the purchase of selected iPhones, iPads, Macs and Apple Watches … Apple’s Australian homepage has an ‘Imagination is a gift’ panel leading to a gifts page headed by the offer. Clicking through shows the following incentives in the form of an Apple Store Gift Card:...

The British government has backed a call by the country’s security services for client-side scanning for child sexual abuse material – aka Apple’s CSAM approach. Home Secretary Priti Patel has written an op-ed in which she indicates government support for the stance, while also attacking Facebook’s plans to make all Messenger chats end-to-end encrypted by default … Background Apple’s CSAM scanning plans were first announced a year ago. Instead of scanning photos stored on iCloud, which is the approach taken by other companies with cloud storage services, the iPhone maker wanted a more privacy-respecting approach....

Heading into the weekend, all of today’s best deals are headlined by a $70 discount on Apple’s Magic Keyboard for 11-inch iPad Pro. That’s alongside a Belkin USB-C GaN charger sale and these ESR MagSafe accessories. Hit the jump for all that and more in the latest 9to5Toys Lunch Break. Apple’s 11-inch Magic Keyboard sees $70 discount Alongside these ongoing M1 iPad Pro discounts, Walmart today is now offering the Apple 11-inch Magic Keyboard for $229....

Apple has announced that it will start ground truth surveys in Canada from today. Apple will be driving sensor-equipped car fleets around the country to collect road details, signage and landmarks throughout the year to improve Apple Maps in Canada. Apple will incorporate this information into its modern Apple Maps dataset, which is being rebuilt literally from the ground up. The company published its statement online and in local Canadian newspapers....

Headlines are whirling this week with talk of a cheaper iPhone, but Apple Senior Vice President of Marketing Phil Schiller is apparently balking at the rumors. Schiller allegedly admitted to the Shanghai Evening News (translation) in an interview that his company is not developing a cheaper smartphone to “grab market share away.” He reportedly said the iPhone 5 is the best iPhone for Apple and his company is not concerned with market share....

One of the reasons for the $999+ price-tag of the iPhone X is the cost of the Samsung-made OLED screen. The latest estimate is that Samsung charges Apple around $97 per display. Apple’s negotiating position has been weak, as Samsung has so far been the only company able to make the displays to the iPhone maker’s exacting standards in sufficient volumes. That looked set to change as Apple worked to bring LG on board as a second supplier for this year’s iPhones, but that plan now seems to be in doubt …...

A new profile of Apple Music’s VP, Oliver Schusser from Billboard takes a detailed look at how his leadership has affected the team as well as the service’s growth and results over the last year. Colleagues describe him as “a partner, a great listener and a champion of innovation” and he’s optimistic about the future of Apple Music. While Oliver Schusser has over 15 years experience at Apple in building the international operations for iTunes, taking over Apple Music happened just last year....

Just a week before Apple is due to announce its Apple News subscription service, expected to cost $10/month, at least two major US newspapers have reportedly not yet signed up. A report today says that neither The New York Times nor The Washington Post have as yet agreed to Apple’s terms – as we predicted last month … Business Insider says that it has talked to half a dozen publishing execs with knowledge of the negotiations....

From 9to5Toys.com: Apple is offering a rare sale on iTunes movie bundles yielding the lowest prices we’ve seen on digital downloads of 25 popular movie collections. Save even more by snagging a 20% off $60 iTunes gift card at ebay: $48. Bundles are available in SD/HD and start at $9.99 making a lot of these “buy one get two free” pricing (US Only). (Update: We’re hearing Apple is changing prices on many of these) Here’s the full list via:...

Ahead of next week’s iPhone 6 announcement, Apple has finally debuted the new design for its iTunes Connect web app that was initially shown off during the WWDC Platforms State of the Union. The new design features a more iOS-like look, similar to that of iCloud.com, and now gives developers even more information about their apps. Analytics feature have also been added for helping users track App Store page views and more....

New banks and credit unions across the world are continuing to adopt Apple Pay, and 40 additional institutions have joined Apple’s list of participating partners since the last refresh earlier this month. Check out the latest Apple Pay banks below: 1880 Bank Argent Credit Union Bank of Sullivan Byline Bank CFSB Emprise Bank EverTrust Bank Extraco Banks First Citizens Bank (IA) First Northern Bank and Trust First Security Bank Generations Bank Great Lakes First Federal Credt Union Grinnell State Bank Horicon Bank Illiana Financial Credit Union Inspire Federal Credit Union Kings Federal Credit Union Lamar Bank and Trust Members Cooperative Credit Union Monterey Credit Union North American Savings Bank Oconee State Bank PCSB Bank Raymond James Bank Regional Missouri Federal Credit Union River Valley Credit Union Sanborn Savings Bank Seamen’s Bank Sharonview Federal Credit Union State Bank Financial TAP FCU Texas Tech Federal Credit Union The Lowell Five The Middlefield Banking Company Union Square Credit Union United Bank (AR, CT, and MA now) Unity Catholic Credit Union In the UK, Danske Bank also joins the list of participating institutions while Tesco Bank no longer claims to only work with credit transactions....

Earlier this month, Apple launched a new campaign starring Harry Styles to promote AirPods and Spatial Audio. The ad, which features the song “Music For a Sushi Restaurant,” shows silhouettes of people dancing just like in classic iPod ads. Now the company has released a new TikTok filter that lets you star in your own AirPods ad with the silhouette effect. The filter is based on the AirPods advertisement with Harry Styles, and it also features the same song....

Following the release of iOS 14.7 earlier this week and iPadOS 14.7 today, Apple has now published the full details about the security fixes included in the updates. Apple says that iOS 14.7 and iPadOS 14.7 fix an array of security bugs, ranging from WebKit vulnerabilities to Find My vulnerabilities and more. Notably, Apple’s security updates webpage does not make mention of the Pegasus spyware that was used to target human rights activists, lawyers, journalists, and politicians....

Apple has pushed security updates to both iOS and OS X, ending their vulnerability to the FREAK exploit which allowed hackers access to personal data during encrypted sessions on a number of major websites. Android and Windows devices were also vulnerable. At the time the exploit was discovered, affected websites included American Express, Airtel, Bloomberg, Business Insider, Groupon, Marriott and, ironically, the FBI, NSA and White House sites. Hackers could force the sites to use a less-secure form of encryption that could be relatively easily cracked....

MacRumors points to a thread on the Apple Discussion Forums where Apple posted a firmware fix for the flickering issue on the Apple 24-inch LED Cinema Display stemming from Thunderbolt. The problem is specifically related to the 24-inch LED Cinema Displays connected to your Thunderbolt-enabled Mac rather than the glitches on the 2011 MacBook Pro causing flickering and lock ups under heavy load. It should be applied only when the display is connected to a Thunderbolt-enabled Mac....

After a barrage of criticism from Facebook today, Apple is yet again doubling down on its forthcoming App Tracking Transparency feature. The feature will launch to users in 2021, and Apple says it “does not require Facebook to change its approach to tracking users.” The statement in full: Furthermore, Apple emphasizes that the new tracking control features apply to all developers equally, including Apple itself. The company continues to point out that advertising is still possible even with the new App Tracking Transparency feature, with the purpose being to give users more control over their data by requiring explicit consent....

After skipping the initial release of iOS 14, Apple has just released HomePod Software 14.1 to the public with new features and improvements, including enhancements to Siri, Intercom, HomePod mini support, and more. iOS 14 brings Maps suggestions when the user asks HomePod about a specific location using Siri, and you can now easily open search results from HomePod on iPhone with Handoff. Apple has also enhanced the timer and alarm feature on the HomePod, which now offers options to let you change these settings for all your HomePods using Siri, in addition to letting users set a song from Apple Music as the alarm....

Update: iOS 15.6 beta 2 – as well as the other beta versions of iPadOS, tvOS, watchOS, and macOS – now available to public beta testers. Thirteen days after releasing the first beta of iOS 15.6, Apple is making available the second test version to all developers. Alongside that, the company is also seeding beta 2 of watchOS 8.7, tvOS 15.6, and macOS 12.5. Today’s build of iOS 15.6 beta 2 is 19G5037d....

Apple quietly updated its Powerbeats2 headphones to match Apple Watch Sport colors this week signalling a new move to focus audio accessories to the Apple Watch ecosystem. The new colors, which match the Apple Watch Sport Band colors of Blue, Black, Green, Pink and (updated) White, are available in Apple Stores but haven’t arrived at other retail locations yet. The Apple Watch can store and play 2GB of music without a tethered iPhone wirelessly via Bluetooth 4 and with watchOS 2 will get access to many more audio applications....