US-based virtual search start-up acquired by Facebook to boost AI capabilities is?

India's largest online retailer Flipkart has forged an alliance with video streaming service Hotstar and launched a video advertisement platform. It is part of a broader strategy to generate more revenue from the booming video advertising business. The new platform, Shopper Audience Network, will allow brands to target consumers through personalized video ads on Hotstar. Flipkart plans to leverage data from its massive user base and help brands connect with potential consumers using these targeted ads.

Kenya has been chosen as the home-country for a Google-affiliated company to start its first-announced commercial deal that will deliver internet access to remote areas using high-altitude balloons. The high-altitude balloons have already been deployed in emergencies in Peru and Puerto Rice, where they helped regions devastated by floods and hurricanes.

The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) along with National e-Governance Division has developed 'Parinam Manjusha', digital academic repository, to provide digital mark sheets, migration certificates and pass certificates to students from CBSE-affiliated schools in Kerala, whose board exam academic documents have been lost or damaged in the recent floods. This academic repository has been integrated with DigiLocker. Over 1,300 schools are affiliated to the CBSE in Kerala. The digital academic documents are digitally signed by the Controller of Examinations of CBSE which make them legally valid digital document as per the IT Act. These documents are also having QR codes and such documents can be verified for the authenticity using the DigiLocker mobile app. The students are asked to visit https://digitallocker.gov.in and https://digitallocker.gov.in and download their academic documents using the login-id / password.

Goyal felicitated the artists who participated in this initiative by giving them cash awards and appreciation certificates. He also felicitated artists who won the top prize in the national transporter's in-house Station Beautification Contest. They worked for 7 railway stations. This innovative competition was organized among zonal railways in December 2017. More than 62 stations across zonal railways were beautified under this initiative by utilising skills of local artists, mostly using local art form, painting style, local themes or contemporary arts.

Department of Financial Services (DFS), Ministry of Finance and National Informatics Centre (NIC) have jointly developed a mobile app called Jan Dhan Darshak as a part of financial inclusion (FI) initiative. This app will act as a guide for the common people in locating a financial service touch point at a given location in the country. While over 5 lakh FI touch points (Bank branches, ATMs, Post Offices) have been mapped on this App, approx. 1.35 lakh Bank Mitras would be on-boarded by 01.12.2018. Phone number of bank branches are available in the app, with the facility of call button for integrated dialling.

Election Commission of India has developed cVIGIL, a mobile app, for the upcoming Lok Sabha election. 'cVIGIL' stands for 'Vigilant Citizen'. It is expected to be launched on 18th March 2019. It will be available on Google Playstore. Complaints regarding the model code of conduct and violations can be lodged in during election time. To lodge a complaint, a voter should download the app from Google Play Store. Photos and two-minute video clippings regarding the violation including threatening of voters, causing enmity between voters on caste and religious lines, character assassination of candidates, can be uploaded via the app. Complainants also have the option to remain anonymous. Within 100 minutes of filing the complaint, the complainant will receive feedback on the action taken.

Technology giant Google has recently announced the launch of a training programme for journalists with an aim to raise awareness against misinformation and providing new tools to the fourth estate against fake news. The Google News Initiative India Training Network will provide training to 8,000 journalists in English and six other Indian languages in the next one year. The network will select 200 journalists from cities across India, who will hone their skills in verification and training during five-day boot camps that will be organised for English and Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Bengali, Marathi and Kannada. The focus of the training will be fact-checking, online verification and digital hygiene for journalists, using a curriculum built by experts.

In a 747-page response to the US government, Mark Zuckerberg-led social media giant Facebook has admitted it shared its users' data with 52 technology companies including Alibaba, Huawei, Lenovo and Oppo. Facebook's data-sharing partnerships with Apple, Amazon and eye-tracking technology company Tobii are due to continue beyond October 2018.

Alibaba and SoftBank-backed Paytm registered over 137 million UPI transactions in September, becoming the leading contributor to Unified Payments Interface (UPI) payments with over 33% of the overall market share. One97 Communications Limited, that owns the brand Paytm, is enabling BHIM UPI for offline payments and over five million offline merchants, out of its 9.5 million merchant-base, now accept Paytm UPI.

WhatsApp launched an India-focused fact-checking feature to combat fake news and rumours starting with the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections. Developed in collaboration with India-based media skilling startup PROTO, the tip line feature will help create a database of rumours to study misinformation during elections as part of a research project commissioned and assisted by WhatsApp.