Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 on Flipkart, Reliance Jio Subscribers, and More: Your 360 Daily

2017 has just begun, and we’re already presented with the depressing news that the most commonly-used password in 2016 was, ‘123456’. What’s more depressing that other commonly used passwords included ‘123456789’ and ‘qwerty’.

We’re living in a day and age where our online existence is probably as valuable as life itself, at least to many of us. It is hence disheartening to see people using such easy-to-guess passwords that hackers can exploit, and take control of so many important things - like your bank account, your social media, your email, among others.

We strongly urge our readers to create hard-to-guess passwords that preferably are gibberish to others, but may mean something to you (like an acronym, maybe). Or better yet, use a password manager, so you don’t have to keep remembering all of them. And never ever, ever, ever, use the same password at multiple places.

With that in mind, here's today's 360 Daily with a summary of everything that happened in the world of tech today.

Redmi Note 4 teased, to be Flipkart exclusive
The Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 has picked up steam, as the phone maker is teasing details little by little, before its official launch on 19th January in India. As it turns out, Flipkart will be the exclusive launch partner of this smartphone. As of now, other Xiaomi products are available on all major ecommerce platforms, its own online store at mi.com, and offline partners too. Partnering with cricketer Ravindra Jadeja, the e-commerce player created buzz around the launch on Twitter.

Reliance Jio about 25 percent away from its subscriber target
Less than four months after its launch, Reliance Jio has bagged 72.4 million subscribers, as per parent company's quarterly results. The company had originally targeted 100 million subscribers, and it looks it’s only a quarter of the journey away from the milestone. Reliance Jio suggested that it is still facing issues with connecting calls to other operators, and is blaming the latter for it.

In other telecom news, Airtel’s upgraded network in Delhi-NCR will supposedly offer ‘4G-like’ speeds even on 3G.

Google Pixel has multiple issues (yet again), on sale at Snapdeal
As if there already weren’t way too many issues with Google Pixel and Pixel XL smartphones, here are two more that cropped up today. First, the audio distortion issue faced by a few people is reportedly related to hardware, requiring a replacement which Google is offering to affected users. Next, there are also reports of Mac users facing issues while transferring data to the phones over USB.

Hardware Issues Make Pixel Phones Feel Like Expensive Beta Products

In other Pixel news, the two smartphones are now officially available on Snapdeal with cashback worth Rs. 10,000 and other offers.

Hotstar will bring Marvel, Lucasfilm titles to India with Disney onboard
Hotstar has partnered with Disney India to bring popular titles to India. These include Marvel, Pixar, Lucasfilm, that are owned by Disney and will include titles from its own studio as well. Some popular franchises from the aforesaid studios include the Iron Man series, The Avengers, and Star Wars, among others.

iPhone 8 could be more water and dust resistant than iPhone 7
Although the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus are already IP67 certified for dust and water resistance, the upcoming iPhone 8 is rumoured to have IP68 certification. This means Apple’s 2017 iPhone can survive deeper underwater.

ICICI blocks PhonePe UPI transactions
ICICI Bank has come under fire as it blocked all transactions from Flipkart’s PhonePe and Yes Bank (that use the same virtual payment address). Apparently it's because ICICI thinks there are security concerns with Yes Bank giving access to UPI data to a “non-banking application” like PhonePe. UPI was designed to be interoperable, unlike mobile wallets.

Galaxy Note 7 was exploding because of its battery, claims probe
A report suggests that the battery was the cause of the explosive controversy surrounding the Galaxy Note 7. Samsung was expected to reveal the results of the in-depth investigation by the end of this month.

Moving on, take a look at what we know up until now about the upcoming Galaxy S8.

Google AMP Lite to work better on devices with low RAM, poor Internet
Google AMP has already helped make webpages load faster on mobile devices. Here comes AMP Lite, which is designed for smartphones that are low on RAM, or that have under poor Internet coverage. Having said that, 4G is proliferating in India and many phones under Rs. 10,000 today have more than 2GB of RAM. In any case, AMP Lite claims to achieve a 45 percent overall reduction in data use.