Android malware has been an issue over the past year. Granted, most of the numbers we see out of security software companies are inflated — including malicious apps from third-party sources and ignoring small download figures — but that’s not to say that we can just brush that dirt off our shoulders.

Google knows this, and has for a while. Despite the fact that downloads of malicious apps are down 40 percent between the first and second half of 2011, seeing that 14,000, 30,000, or even 260,000 devices have been affected by this or that malicious app requires action. That said, Google is adding a new security layer to the Android Market: codenamed Bouncer.

Originally, the Android market implemented three different methods for ridding the market of malware: sandboxing, permissions, and malware removal. Sandboxing keeps one app from infiltrating another, with one very important exception: permissions. Google sees its permissions system as a layer of security in and of itself, but permissions can actually be seen as a vulnerability. In some cases, the reasons behind the permissions a developer asks for aren’t immediately obvious to the user, and it can be tough to check everything, especially to the novice user.

Past that, Google’s always been good about removing malware from the market as soon as the company becomes aware of it, and in some cases, has even remotely wiped affected devices of malicious apps. The tool is a useful one to say the least, but it’s not enough.

Bouncer adds another level of security to the platform, automatically scanning new and existing apps for known bits of malicious code. Google has actually been scanning apps whenever new malicious code is discovered, but Bouncer will automate the process, scanning for known spyware and trojans, too. Bouncer runs every new application on Google’s cloud infrastructure and simulates how it’ll run on a device. That way, Google can see straight away whether an app is misbehaving and flag it accordingly.

Another smart feature is that Bouncer isn’t 100 percent automated. Once something is flagged, there’s a manual process for confirming the app is indeed malicious, reducing the risk of false positives.

To be quite honest, the Android platform is way more secure than most people think. I spoke with Android VP of engineering Hiroshi Lockheimer, and he seems to feel the same way. “There’s this impression that Android is a huge target for malware, and I really don’t think that’s the case,” said Lockheimer. Google polices the Market, scans for known malicious code (though most instances of flagging in the past have been from users notifying Google), and is quick to act when an issue pops up. But where the platform has fallen short (in one respect), is the developer registration process.

Becoming an Android developer is as easy as pie. I actually did it myself just to see how easy it is, and it literally takes five minutes and $25. After clicking accept a few times, you’re good to go. In fact, developers can register under pseudonyms if they’d like.

From a certain perspective, this is amazing. It allows young entrepreneurs to offer a product to millions of users for a very low cost, lowering the bar for developers who can’t afford to jump through Apple’s hoops. At the same time, it makes it easy for malware writers to get the ball rolling.

Sophos blogger Vanja Svajcer said it best:

The requirements for becoming an Android developer that can publish apps to the Android Market are far too relaxed. The cost of becoming a developer and being banned by Google is much lower than the money that can be earned by publishing malicious apps. The attacks on the Android Market will continue as long as the developer requirements stay too relaxed.

With Bouncer, Google is recognizing this issue without making things difficult on developers. Devs will still be able to submit an app and see it in search results within minutes — Bouncer’s scanning process only takes seconds — and they’ll still be able to register for $25 and a few clicks on “Accept.”

But… now that Bouncer is in place, previous offenders will have a much more difficult time sneaking back on to the platform by registering under a new name. According to Google’s blog post, the search giant will be “analyzing new developer accounts to help prevent malicious and repeat-offending developers from coming back.”

This is what I believe will make the biggest difference when it comes to the threat of Android malware, and I’m more than thrilled that the company is making it a priority moving forward.

Editor’s Note: Bindu Reddy is the CEO of MyLikes and was formerly Group Product Manager at Google. She was the first product manager for the project that evolved to become Google+. Her Google+ profile can be found here.

Larry Page recently announced that he is quite thrilled with Google+’s explosive growth — with 90 million registered accounts and 80% of the people engaging on a weekly basis across all Google properties. The problem, of course, is that very few of these 90M users are actively publishing on Google+. The Google+ strategy of fine-grained sharing of personal content using Circles has not been very effective. It takes a lot of effort to create and maintain circles, and Facebook has proven that most users seem to be comfortable sharing personal content such as family albums and baby pictures with their complete social graph.

It is indeed a tall order for Google+ to win against Facebook in this area of communicating and sharing with your friends and family as it needs a significant exodus of a your social graph from Facebook.

One area where Google+ seems have gained traction is public sharing and broadcasting – a la Twitter. It has been impressive to see Google execute nimbly by adding multiple features to emerge as the iPhone of publishing platforms.

However, in order to take considerable user attention away from Facebook, Google+ needs to solve the biggest issue with public sharing — it is far less universal compared to communicating with friends and family.

There were 60 million active content creators on Twitter. Compare this to the 2 billion-plus Internet users and 800 million active Facebook users. Even if you include the few million users who are active in other public places like MySpace and Tumblr, only around 5 percent of the world’s Internet population is currently sharing on public profiles.

In order to make public sharing universal, user behaviour needs to change dramatically. The good news is that Google touches pretty much every Internet user and is in a great position to make this happen. Here are some ideas on how they can do this:

Most new users who start Google+ or Twitter accounts discover that it is really hard to get a following. Even importing Facebook or email contacts doesn’t help, because one-way follow semantics result in only a few of those contacts following you back.

The suggested-user list approach only serves to make things worse. New users end up following a bunch of famous personalities, with whom they do not have any meaningful interactions. Some brave souls end up posting a few times, but after seeing little or no engagement on their posts, give up pretty soon.

Behavior in online communities is very-peer driven and when people see similar, like minded people posting and interacting with others, they tend to follow suit. Google has the technology chops to suggest following these types of people instead of celebrities.

If we could get people to post about topics that they care about and get them to connect with people who both care about the same topics and are at the same audience level, we will see a lot more high-fidelity content and engagement as opposed to simply re-sharing the most popular image/video on the web.

For example, I am into technology, politics, fashion and food. As part of their onboarding process, Google+ could prompt me to post on these topics (even surfacing existing conversations as inspiration) and based on these posts suggest I circle other people who have the same interests and are likely to interact with me.

Over time, suggesting more of these kinds of relevant, actively engaged people, not only ensures that new users connect with people they want to meet, but also rewards activity with a larger audience.

This new “interest graph” is inherently a lot more valuable to the user than the “social graph” which simply moves your offline friends online.

The serotonin kick that you get from having strangers taking the time to read your post and make intelligent comments will soon get addictive, and kick-start a virtuous cycle of publishing and consumption.

One of the biggest issues with sharing publicly is having to deal with trolls, stalkers and unwanted spam comments/messages. I can tell from personal experience, that this issue is exacerbated if you are a woman. This is one of the main reasons you don’t see that many women sharing on Google+.

Google+ needs to identify and actively deactivate spam accounts who post irrelevant links on posts. While everyone should be allowed to like and re-share your posts, by default Google+ should only allow for comments with no-moderation from people you circle. All other comments should only be posted once the commenter has been reviewed by the publisher. Again technology could help with automatic flagging of comments for review.

Of course, users like Robert Scoble, can and will choose to turn off moderation but my bet is a large number of people would rather review comments in some way before having them show up on their profiles. In contrast, Twitter avoids this problem by simply not having any commenting features.

Email is still one of the primary ways people share information with each other. Every day, millions of videos, links to articles and documents are shared via email.

Just like Google calender integration, Gmail could detect when you are sharing a public link/video and automatically cc that message to post on your public profile. This feature would immediately give Google millions of new active publishers.

Similarly, users on Blogger and YouTube should be able to share blog posts and comments by checking a box that gives them the option to share the content on Google+.

Allowing the user to choose and customize the post that is published on Google+ will ensure that Google+ posts continue to have high fidelity and user profiles don’t turn into noisy “dead-feeds” of information.

—

Twitter has already shown the world how much of an impact public sharing can have even with a small percentage of people doing it. One can only imagine how much bigger the impact will be if this number becomes 5 times what it is now.

Revolutions, large scale social change, shaking up entrenched “old boys networks” all become more possible, when everyone has a voice and an audience.

We are in the middle of a huge shift in how information is created and curated on the Internet. Making publishing more universal plays very well to Google’s strength as an information company. In line with Google’s mission, its algorithms can work their magic to organize this information and make it universally accessible.

Google has more than 40 core products, and hundreds depending on how you count them. Even with over 30,000 employees, that’s a lot to support. In the name of refocusing, today the company announced that Picnik, Sky Map, Urchin, Needlebase, Google Message Continuity, and the Social Graph API are all headed for the deadpool, open source, or absorption into more central divisions.

Today’s culling follows this summer’s shut downs of Google Labs and most of the products internally developed by former acquisition Slide. While Google has long encouraged experimentation, its found itself overextended. The company needs all hands on deck fighting the wars for social, mobile, and the cloud.

Google typically reassigns employees from scrapped projects rather than fire them. The teams from Picnik and Sky Map could increase the concentration of product leaders working on Google+. With any luck they can give Google’s social network a more human feel.

Now, the fate  of the forsaken:

Picnik – The browser-based photo editor Picnik will be shut down on April 19th and its team likely integrated in to Google+ and Picasa. Premium customers will receive refunds. Google+ already offer Creative Kit, which includes basic editing, filters, and decorations. Picnik uses almost an identical interface, but includes advanced editing , frames, and seasonal effects that could soon show up in Google’s other photo products soon.

Google Sky Map – The augmented reality star gazing Android app will become open source. Google appears to be moving away from standalone apps, given the recent deaths of Disco, Photovine, and Pool Party. This will make it easier for the iOS developers of Starmap and Star Walk to develop Android versions.

Social Graph API – Google’s graph of public interconnections between people on services like Twitter and Flickr will be deprecated on April 20th. The API allowed developers to pull in information about their users to improve their products, but Google says “The API isn’t experiencing the kind of adoption we’d like”. Google will instead be working on catching up to Facebook by developing its own social graph with Google+.

Google Message Continuity – No more resources will be wasted on a cloud backup system for on-premise enterprise email. Google will dedicate itself to support for its fully cloud-based enterprise system Apps, which has proven much more popular.

Urchin and Needlebase – The acquired client-based predecessor to Google analytics and its data management platform are being formally shut down. The Urchin team is now work on browser-based analytics, while Google is still considering whether to integrate or simply eliminate Needlebase.

A firm handshake and hearty pat on the back to all those working on these projects. Remember, you don’t have to toil away on more small features. Consider this your opportunity to go Do Great Things.

Google appears to have made some changes to its account creation process. Whereas before, all it took was an email address of any kind and some basic demographic data, now you are required to create both a Gmail account and a presence on Google+. This doesn’t strike me as a user-friendly change.

On one hand, it’s harmless in a way: you create a throwaway email address and a dummy G+ account if you don’t want to use them. Problem solved. But is that really a step people should have to take if they just want to use Google Docs or YouTube? Certainly Google will say that this is all about the integration of services, but part of the attraction of Google services has always been how you can just use one or the other. This forced-signup device smells of an attempt to boost G+ numbers, and is reminiscent not of the Google of yore, but of the Apple and Facebook of today.

Some services haven’t yet updated their account creation pages, and at the moment you can use this URL to go straight to the old account creation screen. It seems doubtful that this loophole will remain open for long.

Not only will this lead to the creation of many derelict G+ and Gmail accounts, but people who are not interested in G+ and have not cared to educate themselves on it may be bothered by the notifications, circlings, and other features they didn’t ask for. I know that G+ is the new glue holding Google’s services together, but it’s a little early to be forcing it down people’s throats, don’t you think?

And note that in the G+ sign-up screen, it is not explicitly mentioned that you are “joining Google+,” though that is clearly what you are doing. Instead, you “create your Google profile. It’s how you represent yourself publicly on the web.” Then, seemingly apropos of nothing, it describes Google+, again without saying you’re joining it. Is this a mere technical bugaboo that most people will not care about? Maybe. But Google’s definition and application of G+ is already nebulous enough without this deliberately vague initiation.

Google can’t be afraid people aren’t engaging with its products, Gmail included. Google+ perhaps, though it’s still new and fairly unformed. But why this clumsy, user-unfriendly solution? Why not just ask if people want to create an account? Or if a Google+ account is just the sharing features of your Google account, why not be straightforward about it?

[via Google Operating System and Hacker News]

Update: for reference, here’s what the old account signup screen looked like (DOB, location, CAPTCHA, EULA below):

Google generally gets in hot water when it is thought to be abusing its pole position in the search industry. But it’s no use denying that while some moves skirt the edges of abusing monopoly, others are more than welcome. During natural disasters, for instance, Google has provided helpful links and resources for people who want to donate or volunteer. And their logo doodles pay homage to personages and events many people would otherwise have overlooked.

Today must rank among the best applications of their choice placement: a link on the Google homepage and thousands of shares have produced a mind-blowing 4.5 million signatures on their anti-SOPA petition.

When I wrote Kill Switch a few months ago, there were some petitions linked to that had tens of thousands at the time and now as many as 150,000 (the Whitehouse.gov one got just over 100,000). And the petition at Avaaz is almost to 1.5 million. The grassroots opposition to these bills has been immense, more so in fact than other rather terrifying bills like NDAA, perhaps on account of the fact that SOPA and PIPA are directly aimed at internet freedoms.

Regardless, 4.5 million is a hell of a lot, and in one day as well. I just wrote earlier today how we need to improve the way that the internet and our governing authorities interact, but things like this are certainly among the best applications of existing online methods. The numbers may, of course, be considered somewhat inflated and less salient than 4.5 million written signatures complete with social security number and voter address, but that’s not really the point. 4.5 million people took the time to go to this page, inform themselves, fill out the pertinent information to register their discontent.

It was also shared quite widely, as many of our readers will surely be able to attest; according to Facebook’s stats, it has been shared over 344,000 times, Google shows over 125,000 shares on Google+, and surely a few of those 2.4 million #SOPA, #stopSOPA, etc. tweets pointed to Google’s petition as well.

You can sign the petition here if you haven’t already, and contact your legislators here.

If Twitter continued to sell its firehose to Google, fewer searches would occur on Twitter’s internal search engine where the microblog platform can serve its own ads. That’s why sources familiar with the negotiations tell me Twitter wouldn’t renew the data access deal at any price, or at least set a ludicrously high price to sink the deal. Cash and increased visibility on Google Search was more valuable to Twitter in 2009 when it was still trying to gain serious traction. But by July 2011 Twitter was more established and ready to try monetizing without Google. A firehose deal would have impeded this, so it’s understandable why Twitter walked away.

There are a lot of conflicting reports on exactly how negotiations went down, stirred up by the launch of Google Search plus Your World (Search+) which favors Google+ results. Regardless of the exact details, the underlying fact is that it the inclusion of tweets in Google Search wasn’t the best thing for Twitter.

[Update: As Liz Gannes points out, Twitter did do a firehose deal with Bing. However, Twitter may have seen Microsoft and Bing as less of a threat, and viewed exposure to Bing's early adopters as more advantageous than exposure to Google searchers.]

Actually, I think backing out of the Google firehose deal was a courageous move for Twitter. It showed the company was willing to bet on continued growth and making Promoted Tweets, Accounts, and Trends work as a major revenue stream. Since these sponsored content types are artificially injected into Twitter Search results and the home page, they wouldn’t have appeared in Google Search.

Unfortunately for the end-user, no deal means Search+ isn’t quite as useful as it could be, as Steven Levy describes. Google has the ability to point to relevant Twitter accounts in its People and Pages Box since they’re not strapped with rel=nofollow, but doesn’t currently. Maybe Google will change that soon in the name of offering the most relevant results. Maybe it will change that years down the road due to pressure from the FTC or Justice Department. By then Google may have weathered the monopoly paradox and accomplished its goal of using its natural dominance in search to grow Google+. We’ll have to wait and see.

Meanwhile, Twitter Search still needs a lot of improvement, particularly around surfacing relevant older tweets. Hopefully with time it will come to encompass functionality Google Search could have provided.

As John Battelle says, the politics surrounding data access make it very complicated for anyone to offer comprehensive personalized search. So for now, real-time search remains fragmented and less effective than it could be, but Twitter has a chance to stand on its own two little bird talons.

No trip to CES 2012 would be complete without spending some up close and personal time with ViewSonic's new phone for the Americas, the ViewPhone 3. Known internationally as the V350 -- which we scored a hands-on with at last year's MWC -- this model retains its dual-SIM heritage and brings a few upgrades such as an 800MHz CPU and Android 2.3. Along with a 3.5-inch HVGA, TFT-LCD display and a 5 megapixel camera (sans LED flash), the phone features 802.11b/g/n, quadband GSM and 7.2Mbps HSDPA with unknown bands (save for 850MHz, anyway). The handset has a plasticky feel, but is also well-proportioned and fits comfortably in the hand. We were less impressed with the quality of the LCD screen, which is rather low-res and distorts easily when viewed from angles.

While the hardware is rather passable as a budget phone, the software is cluttered with superfluous features and effects that detract from the user experience -- both in terms of performance and navigation. Given the dual-SIM nature of this phone and its availability as an unlocked device for $279, it's actually somewhat of a rare breed. Loaded with a proper ROM, it could certainly appeal to the right crowd. For some further insight into the ViewPhone 3, be sure to check the video after the break.

Gallery: ViewSonic ViewPhone 3 hands-on

Continue reading ViewSonic ViewPhone 3 hands-on (video)

ViewSonic ViewPhone 3 hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 13 Jan 2012 16:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Microsoft this morning announced that it has signed a patent licensing agreement with Android device manufacturer LG, its eleventh deal of the kind.

Microsoft says effectively 70 percent of all Android smartphones sold in the United States today are covered under its patent portfolio, not mentioning the fact that they’re also suing Motorola Mobility and NOOK maker Barnes & Noble over their Android devices.

Continuing a tradition that we hope will stand the test of time, Microsoft’s head of communications, Frank Shaw, took to Twitter to taunt Google.

First, Shaw tweeted “Hey Google – we are the 70% #anotherandroidlicense” with a link to their press release, and later said:

Can we just agree to drop the patents-as-weapons meme? When effective licensing enables companies to share IP, the metaphor falls apart

The second one is of course a bit disingenuous, since pretty much every player in this industry employs patents as weapons, will at some point, or wishes they were in a position to do so.

Shaw isn’t alone in his endeavor to try and get a response out of the Google camp, by the way.

Here’s Brad Smith, Microsoft’s EVP and General Counsel, tweeting:

It's time to recognize that in #patent world, lawsuits are the 1%; license agreements are the 99%. #anotherandroidlicense

And here’s Horacio E. Gutiérrez, Corporate VP and Deputy General Counsel, tweeting:

How should the smartphone industry resolve IP disputes in the software stack? Let’s try licensing

We love this stuff. We want more. Come on, Google, it’s your turn. Keep this going.

Update - no comment needed:

hey @robinwauters Google is responding like crazy on G+ i'm sure and it will show up in their search results shortly. tcrn.ch/xQzWiZ

There’s blood in the water surrounding Google Search+ (what we’re now calling Google Search Plus Your World). The Electronic Privacy Information Center recommends the FTC look at Search+ for possible privacy or antitrust concerns. Meanwhile, Twitter’s General Counsel Alexander Macgillivray provides apparently damning evidence for why Search+ unfairly skews search results towards Google+ content instead of the most relevant results.

A search for World Wrestling Entertainment Twitter handle ”@wwe” returns 5 Google+ results above the fold, but no sign of Twitter. But wait, Google Search doesn’t properly process symbols like ‘@’, so searches for “@wwe” and “wwe” produce the same results. Furthermore, if you haven’t received the Search+ rollout yet and try searching “@wwe” you get the same results as those with Search+ enabled, minus the Google+ People and Pages sidebar.

Folks asked for examples. Here’s what a user searching for “@wwe” will be shown on the new @Google. http://t.co/QvaF9m35—
Alex Macgillivray (@amac) January 11, 2012

So to be clear, the only thing that Macgillivray’s screenshot shows is that Search+ is just piling on an additional Google+ sidebar that doesn’t show Twitter or other relevant social network profiles. Oh, and that it’s ridiculous that Google Search doesn’t understand symbols. In this case, results aren’t being re-ranked to favor Google+.

Still, EPIC’s Executive Director Marc Rotenberg tells the LA Times that regarding Search+, ”We believe this is something that the FTC needs to look at”. EPIC is currently considering drafting a letter to the FTC.

EPIC believes that by surfacing in search results the private content shared with a user by their friends, Search+ may violate privacy. I personally don’t buy that argument. Yes, it’s a bit shocking to see private content in Google Search results where we’ve come to expect only public content. However, private content isn’t exposed to anyone that couldn’t already see it, so I think EPIC is fear mongering around privacy. Last week I shot down a similar EPIC stunt claiming Facebook Timeline violates privacy.

What hold more weight is EPIC’s insinuation that Search+ could have antitrust implications. EPIC writes in its statement, “Also, Google’s changes come at a time when the company is facing increased scrutiny over whether it distorts search results by giving preference to its own content.”

As Marketing Land’s Danny Sullivan explains, Google has sufficient data on Twitter and Facebook to show their profiles in its People and Pages sidebar. Only Google+ results appear there, though. Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt says Google is open to talking with Twitter and Facebook about expanded access to their data, even though it wouldn’t need it to make People and Pages more fair.

Google makes for a great political football, so it’s not surprising that EPIC and Twitter are attacking. Their claims are over the top, though. The issue isn’t privacy, or primary search results for topics (though I take issue with the largely irrelevant Google+profiles appearing in the typeahead for name searches).

The issue is that Google has the data to surface its competitors in People and Pages, but doesn’t. Hey, maybe this is all a clever ploy to bring antitrust scrutiny to Facebook’s deal with Microsoft’s Bing to sour its IPO.

[Update: EPIC has issued a formal letter to the FTC requesting an investigation of Search+ for being anti-competitive. Bloomberg reports that the FTC will indeed expand its existing antitrust investigation into Google to encompass Google+]

For a different view, check out TechCrunch’s Devin Coldewey’s article “A Google+ Tempest In A Teacup” about why Google isn’t obligated to include Twitter’s results in the People and Pages Juice Box.

[Image Credit: Kensten via Fox's The Simpsons]

What most alarms me about today’s “Google Search Plus Your World” announcement is how it will distort name searches. When I Google someone’s name, I’m typically looking for a Wikipedia entry, their Twitter account, a personal website, or an author page on their blog. Today, Google Search handles this well, often returning these as the top results. But *thanks* to Search Plus Your World, soon I’ll see Google+ profiles more prominently even though they’re rarely what I’m looking for.

I tried Google searching the names of about 30 friends, celebrities, and bloggers. Without the new Search Plus Your World feature, their Google+ profiles appear around result #8 if they had one. That seems about right. For most people there are around 7 results more relevant to me than their G+ profile.

Once Search Plus Your World rolls out though, Google+ profile links for these people will appear in the search bar typeahead, and may have significant increased prominence in results. Pushed down or out will be results or typeaheads of what I’m actually looking for. Because that could be Twitter profile, I understand why Twitter is so pissed about the new changes, and I agree there could be antitrust implications.

Take Google’s own example. Before the changes, if I search for “Trey Ratcliff”, his Google+ profile is the 5th result. If I type in “Trey Ra”, Trey Ratcliff’s Wikipedia entry appears in the typeahead. As shown above after the changes, just typing in “Trey R” will surface his profile in the typeahead, and may push out his Wiki page. Personalization is fine, but the juiced Google+ profile results are too aggressive. They could push people to opt out of personalization entirely (in your Google Search settings), try Bing, or coerce businesses into focusing on G+.

Sure, there are use cases where this could be helpful, like if I’m actively trying to find the Google+ profile of someone with a common name that I’m connected to through friends. But honestly, if that’s specifically what I’m looking for I would have just searched within Google+.

The fact is that Google isn’t my whole world, and Google+ profiles aren’t that relevant. Many were hastily set up and not filled out, some aren’t frequently updated, and links to someone’s primary presence on the web isn’t listed or is buried. The reason I search with Google in the first place is that I’m confident it will return the most relevant results. By making Search Plus Your World opt out and skewing results to aid its own interests, that confidence is shaken.

I know getting people to sign up for Google+ is crucial to tying people’s behavior across Google products to their identity to power ad targeting. But seriously Google, best-in-class search is why we love you. Is it really worth sacrificing your integrity to drive signups?

When I watch this promo video for Search Plus Your World, all I see are little hands messing with perfectly good search results.