Google Pixel 4a could launch alongside Pixel 4 and 4 XL

Code uncovered from the latest version of Google's Camera app suggests that there is a third Pixel pixel device coming in the next wave of Google product launches. 

The discovery was made by 9to5Google, who dug into the code of the latest Camera leak and discovered a string of code showing three codenames alongside a product identifier which clearly indicates that these are Pixels from this year. 

Under code "isPixel2019" the three devices are codenamed Coral, Flame and Needlefish. It's the latter of the trio that seems to be a mystery third device.

It's already been established that the Coral and Flame are the Pixel 4 and Pixel 4 XL, begging the question: what is Needlefish?

In other code, it's discovered that it is, indeed, a Qualcomm-powered device, and the code from the camera app confirms that it is a Pixel. Which also confirms that it's a device which must have a camera.

The most logical conclusion then is that it's a smartphone. With the Pixel 4 and 4 XL being quite pricey flagships, the suggestion is that it is a more affordable Pixel phone launching alongside the two premium devices.

It would make sense, and many other hardware manufacturers seem to be going down that route. iPhone launched the 11 alongside the 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max. Samsung launched the Galaxy S10e alongside the S10 and S10+.

Perhaps the only fact that makes it seem unlikely is that the 3a and 3a XL have only been out for a relatively short amount of time.

If Google is to launch an affordable Pixel 4 alongside the other two, perhaps that's evidence that its 3a and 3a XL sales have been stronger than the more expensive ones, and that they should have launched them at the same time.

With this device only being mentioned in code, we don't yet know anything more concrete about it. There have been a number of leaks surrounding the 4 and 4 XL, but little - if anything at all - has surfaced regarding an upgraded version of the 3a.

For now, we'll be pocketing this in the "maybe" tray, and saving it until we hear any more evidence. There's always a possibility that it's merely a product Google is testing, and might not even become an officially launched smartphone.

Thieves are now using AI deepfakes to trick companies into sending them money

The publication reported last week that a UK energy company’s chief executive was tricked into wiring €200,000 (or about $220,000 USD) to a Hungarian supplier because he believed his boss was instructing him to do so. But the energy company’s insurance firm, Euler Hermes Group SA, told the WSJ that a clever AI-equipped fraudster was using deepfake software to mimic the voice of the executive and demand his underling pay him within the hour.

“The software was able to imitate the voice, and not only the voice: the tonality, the punctuation, the German accent,” a Euler Hermes spokesperson later told The Washington Post. The phone call was matched with an email, and the energy firm CEO obliged. The money is now gone, having been moved through accounts in Hungary and Mexico and dispersed around the world, the Post reports.

Later, after a second request from the thieves was made, the energy firm CEO called up his actual boss, only to find himself handling calls from both the fake and the real versions of the man simultaneously, which alerted the CEO to the ongoing theft. Euler Hermes declined to name the energy firm or its German parent company.

This may not be the first time this has happened. According to the Post, cybersecurity firm Symantec says it has come across at least three cases of deepfake voice fraud used to trick companies into sending money to a fraudulent account. Symantec told the Post that at least one of the cases, which appears to be distinct from the one Euler Hermes has confirmed, resulted in millions of dollars in losses.

The situation highlights the fraught nature of AI research, especially around the artificial creation of video and audio. While none of the big Silicon Valley companies with large, capable AI research institutions are openly developing deepfake video software, some are working diligently in the audio realm.

Google's controversial Duplex Service uses AI to mimic the voice of a real human being so that it can make phone calls on a user’s behalf. A number of smaller startups, many of which are located in China, are offering up similar services for free on smartphones, sometimes under questionable privacy and data collection terms. Meanwhile, researchers at tech companies and in academia are trying to develop deepfake-detecting software. Other researchers are unearthing the extent to which a convincing deepfake can be generated and purposed using even smaller amounts of data.

In other words, deepfakes are here, and they can be dangerous. We’re just going to need better tools to sort out the real from the fake.