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Google and Amazon Need to Get it Together

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Let's start this out with a disclaimer; this is an opinion/rant. Do with it what you will. We all know there is some stiff competition between the two Titans; Google and Amazon. But can they please get over their back-and-forth bickering already? It is costing their users like you and me a lot of missed entertainment! About the time Amazon started selling their FireTV devices, they decided stop selling Google products that it saw as direct competition. At the time, this included Google's Android TV devices and has grown to include their Google Home Smart Assistants. Amazon has even gone so far to not just exclude these devices from its search results, but actually display THEIR devices instead! Note the search results for "google home": In an act of apparent retaliation, Google has pulled its YouTube service from availability on Amazon devices. Quid Pro Quo, eh Google? This has gone back and forth several times, with occasional arrangements bringing t

So, Is AnTuTu Benchmark Infecting Us With Malware?

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AnTuTu Benchmark is the go-to for many who want to test out their phone's capabilities. As of this posting, it has a 4+ Star Rating, with over 925,000 reviewers on Google Play. Recently I was in need of a Sprint-compatible phone that would work where my temporary (6-month) office would be. Not wanting to break the bank, I settled on the Essential Phone (pleasantly surprised, for sure). I decided to load up and run the obligatory AnTuTu Benchmark. Irrelevant to this post, but it scored pretty well. A couple days later, while browsing through my phone memory using Solid Explorer, I noticed something odd...so odd that it made my heart skip a beat. Keep in mind, I have Solid Explorer set to show hidden files, cause why not? Well, I noticed quite a lot of hidden files with random filenames. My mind immediately went to Malware, as this seemed pretty typical of Malware I've fought on Windows machines for decades. At first I didn't make the connection....but later that