16-year-old Pakistani boy becomes a millionaire as EG beats CDEC Gaming to win The International

In the recently concluded Dota 2 tournament The International 2015, Evil Geniuses defeated CDEC Gaming to win $6.6 million. Of the five who became millionaires is Suma1L, the youngest player in video game history to win over a million dollars.

EG led by captain Peter "ppd" Dager, defeated CDEC Gaming in a score of 3-1 in a best-of-5 match.

EG's team comprises the much-experienced Clinton "Fear" Loomis, who is one of the biggest names in the North American Dota scene and plays the 'carry' role in EG. The others are Kurtis "Aui_2000" Ling, Saahil "UNiVeRsE" Arora and Sumail "Suma1L" Hassan Syed.

It was a grand final among the two teams that surprised the whole of the gaming world. CDEC was a team that entered the tournament as a wildcard entry and stunned all the teams who came its way. It defeated every team including EG, which got in its way in the quarters.

But EG fought back from the lower brackets and got its revenge against CDEC in the grand finale, which took place on August 8 at the Keyarena in Seattle. The world witnessed for the first time an American team lift the Aegis of the Immortal after defeating the Chinese team.


Sumail "Suma1L" Hassan Syed

But no other record or feat surpassed that achieved by the young Pakistani boy of 16, Suma1L, who dazzled the world with his gameplay and earned the biggest prize money in video games.

In an interview, Suma1L talks about the hardships he had to overcome playing Dota in the 15 years he spent in Pakistan. He narrates that he sold his bicycle to play Dota and how he had a hard time pursuing his passion being from a family with eight members and sharing his room with 3 siblings.

He has been playing Dota since he was eight and says that he plays for nine hours each day to keep up his performance. So far he has had a meteoric rise from being introduced to the professional Dota scene only last year to winning the biggest tournament.

Samsung Galaxy A8 review

EXPERT'S RATING(3)

READERS RATING

TOP FEATURES

1. Gorgeous display
2. Excellent battery life
3. Decent camera and performance

In The STORES

Samsung Galaxy A8 32 Gb ₹ 30,605 Snapdeal

Samsung Galaxy A8 (White) ₹ 32,500 Infibeam

Samsung Galaxy J5 8gb Black ₹ 12,399 Snapdeal

Samsung smartphones underwent a major reboot earlier this year with the launch of Galaxy S6and S6 edge, which was on top of the design rethink the company's mobile portfolio went with last year with Galaxy A. This reboot of the mobile strategy has continued since, across various price points, from the budget Galaxy J series to the almost-flagship Galaxy A series.

The latest in the Galaxy A lineup is Samsung Galaxy A8 worth Rs 32,500, which is the company's slimmest smartphone. But that's not the only noteworthy feature of the phone, which has a huge 5.7-inch screen, a big battery, and 16MP camera for starters. In our Samsung Galaxy A8 review, we take an in-depth look at the smartphone to see if it is the best phablet you can buy under Rs 35,000.

Design that turns heads



Last year's Galaxy Alpha was the first truly beautiful smartphone by Samsung, and the Galaxy A series has kept the momentum going since. Galaxy A8 is no exception, in fact it is among the best looking smartphones made by the company.

The smartphone balances the Samsung design language of 2012/2013 with the new look that the company is experimenting with this year. The body uses matte-finish plastic on the back, while the frame on the sides is metal. The metallic edges on the left and right are slightly bevelled, instead of the flat sides you usually see. Samsung has machined the Power and Volume buttons off metal too.

Plastic is, of course, not the most desirable material of construction in the smartphone industry, but the plastic used here is of good quality. Overall, the plastic-and-metal design works well for the Samsung Galaxy A8.

Below the display panel is Samsung Galaxy A8's fingerprint sensor, which is integrated into the hardware Home button. Flanking this physical key on both sides are the Task Switcher and Back soft-touch keys. You will find the 5MP camera, the speaker grille and the usual array of sensors above the display panel.



On the back are the 16MP camera, LED flash and the loudspeaker, which are arranged horizontally, a design choice we have seen in few Samsung phones since Galaxy S3. You get the usual branding on the back as well as the front of the smartphone. The left edge holds the housing for the sim card/microSD card slots.



Samsung Galaxy A8 holds the distinction of being the company's thinnest smartphone yet at 5.9mm; the handset weighs 151 grams. These make Galaxy A8 among the thinnest lightest and phablets you can find in the market right now, and a far cry from the company's mammoth Mega phablets.

In fact, Samsung Galaxy A8's design and dimensions betray the fact that it has a 5.7-inch screen. In fact, the smartphone is small enough to operate with one hand for most people.

An excellent display



Samsung Galaxy A8 has a 5.7-inch Super AMOLED screen with Full HD (1080x1920p) resolution, which may seem a little pale compared to the QHD (1440x2560p) resolution. However, we found Galaxy A8 to have among the best displays we have seen in the market recently. The Super AMOLED screen ensures that the contrast levels are great, though colours may seem a tad oversaturated.

The Samsung Galaxy A8 display panel is among the brightest we have seen, which is remarkable considering its price bracket. Even under direct sunlight you get excellent clarity - at just 50% brightness.

Hardware fails to dazzle

The India variant of Samsung Galaxy A8 is powered by the company's Exynos 5430 chipset, which has four high-power cores running at 1.8GHz and four low-power cores clocking a maximum of 1.3GHz. This chipset is designed on the 32-bit architecture, whereas the international model is powered by the 64-bit Snapdragon 615 chip.

Samsung Galaxy A8 packs 2GB of RAM and 32GB of internal storage. If you want to expand the storage, you can slip microSD card of up to 128GB capacity. However, there is a trade-off in this case: though the smartphone supports dual-sim, it can either hold a sim card or a microSD card on the second sim slot since Samsung has opted for the hybrid sim setup.

If you choose to forego the microSD card, you get access to two sim cards. Samsung Galaxy A8 can tap 4G speeds on both sim cards, but not at the same time; if one sim uses 4G, the second sim can only use 2G and 3G networks.

The rear camera of Samsung Galaxy A8 has 16MP resolution, whereas the front camera's sensor is rated at 5MP. Its battery capacity is 3,050mAh.

Clean software

Samsung has adopted a cleaner, trimmer UI since the launch of Galaxy S6 edge and S6 smartphones. This same software skin is used in Samsung Galaxy A8, this time based on Android 5.1 (Lollipop). So you get Google's set of apps, Microsoft's OneDrive, OneNote and Skype apps, along with the manufacturer's own S Voice, Galaxy Apps, and Music as well as a few utility apps.

Overall, the software is very light and the small number of preload apps makes it a breeze to use. You can enable Knox security via Settings in order to ensure greater security of the smartphone.

Though the Galaxy A8 smartphone is not too big to hold, Samsung has given provision for one-hand operation in settings, along with gesture control that work without a hitch. For example, you can double-tap the Home button to open the Camera app even if the phone is not in active use. Similarly, tapping the Home key in quick succession will turn on the one-hand mode.A decent performer

Samsung Galaxy A8's Exynos 5430 processor with 2GB RAM is consistent performer, though not the best you can get at this price range. Asus Zenfone Selfie and Zenfone 2 are definitely as fast Galaxy A8, and OnePlus 2 is a lot faster - and all three cost a lot less!

The Galaxy A8 user experience is very smooth, though we did notice some lag in opening apps from time to time. All the apps we used on the smartphone ran without a hitch, as did the resource-consuming Asphalt 8: Airborne. However, we did notice that the smartphone heats up a little when we use the internet for long or play games close to an hour.

Samsung Galaxy A8's fingerprint sensor can be used to unlock the smartphone, as well as to authenticate payments (though the feature has not been rolled out yet). Though you need to press the hardware button in order to wake up the smartphone from sleep, the phone is unlocked as soon as you place your thumb to unlock it.



One of the best features of Samsung Galaxy A8 is its battery life. The 3,050mAh battery lasts as long as 2 days with moderate usage. Even with high usage, you can eke out 1.25 days of battery life on one charge. Though the smartphone does not support fast-charging, the bundled charger can charge Galaxy A8 from naught to full in about 1 hour 20 minutes.

We had no issue with call reception quality as well as 4G speeds with Galaxy A8 smartphone.

Samsung Galaxy A8's excellent screen and great sound make for an excellent multimedia device. However, we would have appreciated a louder speaker as well as a change in its placement, since the speakers gets muffled easily.

Average camera

Samsung Galaxy A8 has a 16MP rear camera that captures a lot of details and delivers images with accurate colour reproduction and white balance. However, we noticed that the images did not come out as sharp as we have seen in the Galaxy S6's 16MP camera.

The camera has four key shooting modes: Auto, Pro, HDR and Night. You will be hard pressed to find the difference between the quality of images delivered by Auto and Pro modes.


HDR mode


Auto mode


Night mode

Verdict

Samsung Galaxy A8 is a good smartphone that offers great looks, an excellent display, great battery life and a decent camera, though the average performance and lack of a pedometer do not justify the price. A strong rival to the smartphone is HTC's One E9+, which has similar features but has 3GB RAM, better audio and faster performance, and costs about the same.

All in all, Samsung Galaxy A8 is a good buy if you want a smartphone that looks great and are ready to settle for a decent performer, though not a trailblazer, especially considering Samsung's Galaxy S6 is available in the market for just Rs 6,000 extra.

Tool to check malware in Twitter URLs

Computer scientists from Cardiff University have created an intelligent system to identify malicious links disguised in shortened URLs on Twitter. 

The system could identify potential cyberattacks with up to 83% accuracy within five seconds and with up to 98% accuracy within 30 seconds when a user clicked on a URL posted on Twitter and malware began to infect the device. 

"We are trying to build systems that can help law enforcement authorities make decisions in a changing cyber security landscape," said principal investigator on the project, professor Omer Rana. 

As people are increasingly using social networks such as Twitter to find information about events, the high volume of traffic around large-scale events creates a perfect environment for cyber-criminals to launch surreptitious attacks. 

The scientists collected tweets containing URLs during the 2015 Superbowl and cricket world cup finals, and monitored interactions between a website and a user's device to recognize the features of a malicious attack. 

"Attackers can hide links to malicious servers in a post masquerading as an attractive or informative piece of information about the event," said lead scientist Pete Burnap. 

URLs are always shortened on Twitter due to character limitations in posts, so it is incredibly difficult to know which are legitimate, Burnap said. 

Once infected the malware can turn your computer into a zombie computer and become part of a global network of machines used to hide information or route further attacks. 

"In a 2013 report from Microsoft these 'drive-by downloads' were identified as one of the most active and commercial risks to cybersecurity," Burnap said.

Sony Xperia C5 Ultra review

Sony's new Xperia C5 Ultra is a big screen smartphone that targets the selfie aficionados with its 13MP front camera and flash.

Sony has tried to make the phone less unwieldy by keeping the bezels narrower compared to its previous phablet offerings and balancing the thickness. The phone boasts of mid-range hardware and looks very similar to its premium offerings.

At Rs 29,990, the phone faces tough competition from value-for-money phones like the OnePlus 2 and Asus Zenfone 2 Deluxe. We try to find out if it's worth a buy in our review...

Build & design
Sony's no stranger to big screen phones. The Sony Xperia Z Ultra was one of the most attractive albeit unwieldy 6-inch+ device from the company. However, with the Xperia C5 Ultra, it has been able to strike a balance between good looks and ergonomics. We have to say we were very impressed with the nearly bezel-free display.

The screen to body ratio is large so you never feel you're holding an oversized smartphone in your hand. Unlike the Xperia Z Ultra, the phone is not super thin so the weight is well spread out making it easy to lug around the phone. Sony continues to stay loyal to the OmniBalance design philosophy but with soft, rounded edges and corners.

The front is largely dominated by the 6-inch screen flanked by a metal ring that surrounds the 13MP camera lens and flash at the top along with the sensor array and the Sony logo. There are also two grills at the top and bottom lip. The front panel is all glass and doesn't get smudged easily.



The phone is held together by an aluminium frame with rounded edges and soft nylon bumpers at the corners that help the phone's antenna to get the signal and also prevent dents if the phone experiences a fall. The volume rocker is located at the right edge with the typical Sony watch crown-shaped, metallic power button.

There's also a camera shutter key towards the bottom at the same edge. The keys offer decent tactile feedback and are positioned comfortably keeping in consideration the length of the phone. The left edge houses a flap that hides two slots for nano-sim cards and one slot for a microSD card. The 3.5mm headset jack is at the top while the micro-USB port sits at the bottom.



The phone has a unibody design so you can't remove the back panel.The back, made from plastic, is slightly curved and sports a soft touch finish. While it's glossy, the material helps in hiding smudges. The 13MP rear camera and a flash are also at the back. The plastic used in the back looks and feels premium.

Without doubt, the Sony Xperia C5 Ultra is a well built phone and one of the few devices with super-thin bezels.

Display
Sony Xperia C5 Ultra sports a 6-inch full-HD (1080x1280p) IPS display, mobile BRAVIA Engine and has a super Vivid mode that enhances the colour brightness and saturation of photos and videos on the phone screen. We found the display to be bright and vivid and viewing angles were sufficiently wide.



Colours looked accurate and graphics appeared sharp and crisp. You can even control the white balance of the display and set adaptive brightness. We found the default white balance made the screen appear a little bland. It's great that one can customize it.

The screen is slightly reflective but sunlight legibility was decently good. Touch response was great but it's not clear if the screen comes with Gorilla Glass protection.

Software
The Xperia C5 Ultra comes with Android 5.0 (Lollipop) out of the box with Sony's own UI and apps for music, videos and gallery. Sony's UI skin is not very heavy and doesn't hog on system resources. The experience of navigating across the UI was smooth but not as swift as it is on high-end devices such as the Xperia Z3+.

The phone also has some content marketplace apps and a What's New apps, which show curated content (such as apps, music, games) that users can buy. We feel that Sony has stuffed the phone with a lot of bloatware including third party apps like Line, AVG antivirus, and BigFlix. Thankfully, most of these apps can be removed.



The UI elements, including the notifications tray, app launcher and settings menu have been skinned but also borrow elements from the new Android 5.0 UI. System apps feature Material Design with a colour theme being omnipresent depending on what you choose in the Themes settings. The transition effects visible during launching and minimizing apps are also pleasant to look at. The app-switcher is also borrowed from Android 5.0 Lollipop but features the launcher for small apps which can float on top of other running apps.



The phone ships with some small apps,including a browser, timer, calculator and calendar. One can download additional small apps from the Play Store, or even turn a widget into a small app. Sony has also included software optimizations for one hand use including the ability to position certain UI elements on the left or right side of the display. You can swipe from the right corner to resize the screen for one hand use and even choose to move it to the right or left side of the screen.

The phone also offers a Simple Home mode that offers a grid-based simplified interface featuring frequently used app and a list mode for app launcher.

At the cost of repeating ourselves, we have to say that Sony's UI skin looks less intrusive and is well-balanced.

Camera
The Sony Xperia C5 Ultra sports a 13MP rear camera and a 13MP front-facing camera with a front flash.

The camera app offers a large number of settings in addition to Sony's Superior Auto mode that chooses the optimal settings as per the ambient light. You also get different scene options and the ability to switch the resolution of the pictures. Scene modes also include night mode and backlight correction HDR, among others.



The other modes that the app offers include Style portrait, Multi-camera, Sweep Panorama, AR Effect, Creative effect, and Face in picture Effect. There's no time shift video mode. The Multi-camera mode lets you hook other Xperia devices (phones or tablets) or a Sony Wi-Fi/NFC camera and record the same scene with multiple cameras.

The front camera takes good quality selfies in day light and even indoor selfies shot in in artificial light looked good. The pictures featured good amount of detail and the front flash came in handy while taking selfies in dark locations such as dimly lit restaurants. The camera has a wide-angled lens(88-degrees) so you can fit in more people in selfies.



(Front Camera)

The rear camera takes good quality pictures in most conditions including in low-light. We did find the Superior Auto mode a little inconsistent; it has a tendency to produce saturated colours. HDR mode photos had better contrast.



(Rear camera -- HDR mode)

The phone is capable of shooting 1080p video. Videos shot with the phone looked good and are fit for sharing moments and video chats.

Performance
Sony Xperia C5 Ultra is powered by a 1.7GHz octa-core (Cortex-A53) MediaTek MT6752 processor coupled with 2GB RAM. The phone comes with 16GB internal storage expandable up to 200GB via microSD card or by using a USB On-the-Go drive (or adapter plus USB drive).

While we did not notice any major lag while navigating through the phone's menu, launching apps and switching between them, the experience is not as smooth as it is on high-end devices and even some competing mid-range ones. Having said that, you may not really notice it while performing everyday tasks and it does a decent job if you're primarily using the device for multimedia consumption. We were able to play most popular video and audio file formats on the phone.

We were able to play games like Temple Run 2 and Leo's Fortune without encountering lag or freezes or heating issues but we did notice some minor frame drops while playing Asphalt 8.



The phone supports NFC, Bluetooth, WiFi and GPS connectivity options an has an FM radio tuner.

It offers excellent call quality and signal reception and we did not encounter problems while making calls even in areas where cell signal is relatively weaker. The phone was able to lock to GPS without any hiccups. We also used 4G data on Airtel's Delhi network and were able to get a good signal.

The sound output through the phone's front speaker grille (only the bottom one acts as a speaker) was loud and clear at moderate volume levels.

The phone is backed by a 2,930mAh battery and will last you more than a full day even if you put the screen brightness at the highest level and use a mix of 4G and Wi-Fi.

The phone can play video continuously for 6-7 hours.

You can boost the battery backup by using Sony's Stamina mode that shuts down battery-draining apps and data transfer when the screen is turned off and starts them again when it is turned on.

Verdict
Is the Sony Xperia C5 Ultra a good buy? It really depends on what you're looking for. If you're in the market for a premium phablet that also takes good selfies and offers a balanced software experience, this device is a good option. It is also fit for people who prefer a large screen for multimedia consumption and don't want to carry their tablets along. The phone is slightly overpriced for what it offers compared to phones in the same price range from Chinese brands but then you're paying a premium for the Sony brand. Also, there are not many 6-inch display-equipped devices available at the moment.

If you can make do with a slightly smaller display but need a selfie-focused phone, there are a number of good options available in the market. HTC offers some good selfie phones including the One E9+ and One M8 Eye. If you're not finicky about the brand and can live with a 5.5-inch display, the Asus Zenfone Selfie is an excellent option priced below Rs 20,0000. All these phones sport 13MP front camera and will satisfy most selfie addicts.

Facebook users being scammed with fake dislike button

Several security blogs claim there has been an influx of ads promoting early access to a Facebook dislike button since CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed the company is responding to requests for a "dislike" option by allowing users to express empathy in an easy way, similar to the like button.Scammers are using fake Facebook "dislike" buttons in an attempt to trick unwitting users into handing over money, having malicious code downloaded to their computers, and liking pages, Digiday reports.

Several security blogs claim there has been an influx of ads promoting early access to a Facebook dislike button since CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed the company is responding to requests for a "dislike" option by allowing users to express empathy in an easy way, similar to the like button.

Many people took that to mean that Facebook will be adding a dislike button, despite Zuckerberg saying that such an option wouldn't be advisable because it could encourage a Reddit-style system of upvoting and downvoting.

Nevertheless, scammers have leaped on the opportunity to use anticipation about the button to exploit users eagerly awaiting its introduction. One such scam uses the wording "Get newly introduced Facebook dislike button on your profile [sic]," adding that "Dislike Button is invite only feature [sic]."

The scam tricks the user into liking a page and sharing the link with their friends. Some of the scams are also directing users towards expensive premium rate mobile phone subscriptions, online surveys that generate the scammers income every time a user fills them out, or even downloading malicious software to their computers, security analyst Graham Cluley reports on his blog.

Hackread writes that it hasn't been confirmed that anyone has been infected with malware through the dislike button scam yet, but advises that users "stay away from these malicious links because they won't be providing you with access to the dislike button."

The Sophos Naked Security blog advises: "The important thing about a Facebook-provided Dislike button, of course, is that you wouldn't need to go to some random-looking third-party site to download it. So, Dislike button scams ought to be obviously bogus these days. After all, Facebook itself just reminded us that it doesn't have Dislike yet, but that if it gets one, it will be an official part of Facebook itself."

TECHNOLOGY

FACEBOOK IS BRINGING 360-DEGREE VIDEOS TO YOUR NEWS FEED

  

  10 

Facebook 360 Video

Facebook

More immersive video is coming to Facebook

Facebook bought virtual reality company Oculus in March of 2014. Now the world's largest social network is finally putting their VR acquisition to use directly on its main product. Today, Facebook announced 360-degree video, including initial videos from Star Wars, Vice News and even Mountain Dew.

The Star Wars Episode VII: Force Awakens video lets viewers speed the giant fallen Imperial Super Star Destroyer, while Vice's takes viewers to current-day Afghanistan. Both contain environments that play just as important a role as the subject of the videos themselves. As virtual reality becomes more prominent in our everyday lives, we may see 360 videos play a larger part in consuming media on the web.

With 360-degree video, Facebook users are able to put themselves in the center of the action. On a desktop computer, you can click around the video with your cursor. On mobile, you can move your phone in real space to shift perspective in the video, or drag the onscreen footage with your finger. With your phone or computer acting as a makeshift viewfinder, the solution is more affordable than investing in full-on virtual reality hardware like the upcoming Oculus Rift.

Facebook's 360 video in the timeline may not convince users to go out and buy a Gear VR or other similar headset. But those who already own a virtual reality headset like the Playstation VR or Oculus Rift can load up Facebook for the effect on certain videos. And with all Facebook users able to upload 360 video — not just brands — we may soon see an influx of moveable video content.

Videos that support the immersive video format are marked with a 360 video logo. Those interested in the nitty gritty specs can find Facebook's officially supported formats here. The videos that enable you to pan around can be had currently only on Android and desktop. iOS support of Facebook's 360 degree videos will arrive later on.