Verified Calls is Google’s way of amplifying caller ID in such a way that you can quickly tell if a caller is a legitimate business or not. With this feature now available, businesses can sign up to use Verified Calls which makes it possible for them to better inform you why they are calling. In other words, you won’t even have to answer the call to know why that legit business is trying to contact you. 

For users, it’ll help make it easier to avoid spam calls and make it possible to immediately verify if a call is from a company they trust. For businesses, this new feature can increase call answer rates and could help build trust between you and possible

Google has long been locked in a battle with cybercriminals who create and submit malicious apps to the Play store that somehow sneak past the company’s protections. One especially pervasive and problematic piece of malware is the one dubbed Joker, aka Bread. In the latest round, Google was forced to put the kibosh on 17 malicious apps uploaded in September that tried to infect unsuspecting users with the Joker malware.

SEE: Top Android security tips (free PDF) (TechRepublic) 

In a blog post published on Thursday, security firm Zscaler explained that it discovered and identified the 17 apps and alerted Google, which then removed the offending programs. In total, there were around 120,000 downloads for the identified apps before Google was

I am a proud user of a Google Pixel 4–there are features on that phone that I cannot imagine being without. Only, thanks to the Android 11 update, I’ve had to do just that. When Android 11 was officially released, I jumped on it immediately. I’d been using the beta version of the latest iteration of the platform on a Google Pixel 3 and it was running flawlessly. The big difference is the Pixel 3 wasn’t connected to a carrier (it only had Wi-Fi access), so there were features I wasn’t actively testing. But then, those features so rarely break, so why would I concern myself with a SIM card on a test phone?

Because sometimes we forget that the primary purpose of a phone

Android has a lot of tricks up its sleeve. Some trickle out such that everyone knows about them as soon as they hit, while others go under the radar. There are even some features that roll out to the platform which are device specific. This happens to be an issue that irks certain users, especially when a particular feature is really handy and it’s not available for their device.

Such is the case with some of the features that Google adds to the Android platform on Pixel devices. It happens more than you might think. Fortunately, some of those features eventually find their way to stock Android. One such feature that has yet to find

Google announced last month its latest addition to the Pixel family, the Pixel 4A, and this smartphone could be yours with our latest sweepstakes. TechRepublic is granting one grand prize winner an unlocked Google Pixel 4A, priced at US$350.

The Pixel 4A features a 5.8-inch OLED display, a 3,140 mAh battery, Android 10 OS, and 128 GB storage. Google’s Pixel 4A is also equipped with a 12MP rear camera lens that captures 4K video and an 8MP front camera lens. Check out CNET Senior Editor Lynn La’s Google Pixel 4A review to find out why she likes this budget smartphone (CNET is a sister site of TechRepublic).

To enter this sweepstakes,