BGR Daily Breaking Stories

Daily Headlines WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 2015

HTC One M9 vs. Galaxy S6: Which big flagship phone did Qualcomm just tease? With MWC around the corner, Qualcomm took to Twitter to tease that a new smartphone with a top-shelf Snapdragon 810 chip inside is going to soon launch. So far, only LG’s G Flex 2 packs the 64-bit octa-core processor, having already been announced at CES 2015 in January.  MORE → Yet another sign that Apple Pay is the breakthrough mobile payments hit we needed Chase Bank on Tuesday evening disclosed that more than 1 million of its customers have already provisioned debit and/or credit cards with Apple Pay. What’s more, the bank continues to see growth in Apple Pay adoption with each passing month, certainly an encouraging sign for Apple’s nascent mobile payments platform, and yet another indication that Apple Pay may succeed where similar products in the U.S. have repeatedly failed.  MORE → A recipe for disaster? Comcast may soon launch a mobile phone service Calling your cable company’s customer service department when you have a problem with your TV, home phone or Internet service can often be an infuriating experience. Sad though it may be, cable companies in the U.S. are known far and wide for providing poor customer care, and they are regularly ranked at the bottom of studies that focus on customer service and customer relations. Soon, the rage experienced by some cable subscribers may reach an all new level when their service goes out. Why? Because they won’t even be able to reach Comcast customer care if their home phone and Wi-Fi-only mobile phone service are both powered by the same equipment.  MORE → Galaxy S6 Edge: ‘Exorbitant’ prices and supply shortages might make it a tough sell Samsung might have a harder time selling the curved Galaxy S6 Edge version, not only because the phone will be expensive at launch, but also because of yield issues with curved displays. Ars Technica has learned from a source who has seen the devices that the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge will have “rather exorbitant price points,” with the latter model expected to encounter supply shortages, at least at launch.  MORE → Apple hit with massive half-billion dollar blow in patent trial Apple lost an iTunes-related patent case, Bloomberg reports, with a jury having decided to award Smartflash a massive $532.9 million in damages. Smartflash was looking for $852 million, whereas Apple said the three patents part of the trial were worth $4.5 million at most.  MORE → Why the NSA SIM hack might be far more serious than you think A few days ago, a report revealed that spy agencies including the NSA and GCHQ, managed to bypass the security of SIM card manufacturer Gemalto and gain access to valuable encryption keys that protect cellphone signals. Even though Gemalto denied the reports, but The Verge points out that the hack might be more serious than initially believed, as it could give agencies the ability of infecting any phone using these specific SIM cards with additional spyware programs.  MORE → How Apple plans to retake its place at the top of the music business Apple is developing it’s own iTunes music streaming service, and that’s not exactly a secret considering that it already owns Beats Music. But Business Insider has learned more details about this secret music project and suggests the company is preparing a massive overhaul for its iconic iTunes service in the process.  MORE → You have a brand-new reason to visit Alaska – it’s just legalized pot Given that smoking marijuana is sometimes the only way to understand certain statements made by one of its former governors, it’s all too proper that Alaska this week became the third state in the U.S. to legalize pot. The Associated Press brings us word that smoking, growing and possessing pot is now legal in America’s biggest state “thanks to a voter initiative aimed at clearing away 40 years of conflicting laws and court rulings.”  MORE → Microsoft’s Office 365 now free for even more people… but there’s a catch Microsoft on Monday announced that its Office 365 productivity suite is available free of charge to even more users than before, as long as they fall within two specific categories of users.  MORE → Microsoft’s Office 365 now free for even more people… but there’s a catch Microsoft on Monday announced that its Office 365 productivity suite is available free of charge to even more users than before, as long as they fall within two specific categories of users. DON'T MISS: Text this ‘Magic’ number and you can get anything you want  MORE →