Apple adds macOS feature designed to prolong the lifespan of MacBook batteries

Apple is adding a new Battery Health Management feature to the latest version of macOS Catalina. The arrival of 10.15.5 will bring the new feature, which is designed to increase the overall lifespan of MacBook batteries by reducing the maximum charge in certain instances.

Rather than focusing on things like specific app usage, the feature determines battery health based on charging patterns and temperature history. That means if you’re the kind of users who constantly has their laptop plugged in during use (as a majority of us currently do, thanks to stay at home orders), you may be the prime target.

The feature is designed to primarily operate in the background, though users will be able to toggle it on and off in the Energy Saver Preferences under settings. It’s designed have a limited impact on device charging time. No word on how it will ultimately impact the battery’s lifespan. System performance, on the other hand, should be unaffected.

The feature is rolling out as part of the developer seed today and will be included in the final version of 10.15.5. It’s compatible with all MacBook models sporting Thunderbolt 3.

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New Google Play policies to cut down on ‘fleeceware,’ deepfakes, and unnecessary location tracking

Google is today announcing a series of policy changes aimed at eliminating untrustworthy apps from its Android app marketplace, the Google Play store. The changes are meant to give users more control over how their data is used, tighten subscription policies, and help prevent deceptive apps and media — including those involving deepfakes — from becoming available on the Google Play Store.

Background Location

The first of these new policies is focused on the location tracking permissions requested by some apps.

Overuse of location tracking has been an area Google has struggled to rein in. In Android 10, users were able to restrict apps’ access to location while the app was in use, similar to what’s been available on iOS. With the debut of Android 11, Google decided to give users even more control with the new ability to grant a temporary “one-time” permission to sensitive data, like location.

In February, Google said it would also soon require developers to get user permission before accessing background location data, after noting that many apps were asking for unnecessary user data. The company found that a number of these apps would have been able to provide the same experience to users if they only accessed location while the app was in use — there was no advantage to running the app run in the background.

Of course, there’s an advantage for developers who are collecting location data. This sort of data can be sold to third-party through trackers that supply advertisers with detailed information about the app’s users, earning the developer additional income.

The new change to Google Play policies now requires that developers get approval to access background location in their app.

But Google is giving developers time to comply. It says no action will be taken for new apps until August 2020 or on existing apps until November 2020.

“Fleeceware”

A second policy is focused on subscription-based apps. Subscriptions have become a booming business industry-wide. They’re often a better way for apps to generate revenue as opposed to other monetization methods — like paid downloads, ads, or in-app purchases.

However, many subscription apps are duping users into paying by not making it easy or obvious how to dismiss a subscription offer in order to use the free parts of an app, or not being clear about subscription terms or the length of free trials, among other things.

The new Google Play policy says developers will need to be explicit about their subscription terms, trials and offers, by telling users the following:

• Whether a subscription is required to use all or parts of the app. (And if not required, allow users to dismiss the offer easily.)
• The cost of the subscription
• The frequency of the billing cycle
• Duration of free trials and offers
• The pricing of introductory offers
• What is included with a free trial or introductory offer
• When a free trial converts to a paid subscription
• How users can cancel if they do not want to convert to a paid subscription

That means the “fine print” has to be included on the offer’s page, and developers shouldn’t use sneaky tricks like lighter font to hide the important bits, either.

For example:

This change aim to address the rampant problem with “fleeceware” across the Google Play store. Multiple studies have shown subscription apps have gotten out of control. In fact, one study from January stated that over 600 million Android users had installed “fleeceware” apps from the Play Store. To be fair, the problem is not limited to Android. The iOS App Store was recently found to have an issue, too, with more than 3.5 million users having installed “fleeceware.” 

Developers have until June 16, 2020 to come into compliance with this policy, Google says.

Deepfakes

The final update has to do with the Play Store’s “Deceptive Behavior” policy.

This wasn’t detailed in Google’s official announcements about the new policies, but Google tells us it’s also rolling out updated rules around deceptive content and apps.

Before, Google’s policy was used to restrict apps that tried to deceive users — like apps claiming a functionally impossible task, those that lied in their listing about their content or features, or those that mimicked the Android OS, among others.

The updated policy is meant to better ensure all apps are clear about their behavior once their downloaded. In particular, it’s meant to prevent any manipulated content (aka “deepfakes”) from being available on the Play Store.

Google tells us this policy change won’t impact apps that allow users to make deepfakes that are “for fun” — like those that allow users to swap their face onto GIFs, for example. These will fall under an exception to the rule, which allows deepfakes which are “obvious satire or parody.”

However, it will take aim at apps that manipulate and alter media in a way that isn’t conventionally obvious or acceptable.

For example:

• Apps adding a public figure to a demonstration during a politically sensitive event.
• Apps using public figures or media from a sensitive event to advertise media altering capability within an app’s store listing.
• Apps that alter media clips to mimic a news broadcast.

In particular, the policy will focus on apps that promote misleading imagery that could cause harm related to politics, social issues, or sensitive events. The apps must also disclose or watermark the altered media, too, if it isn’t clear the media has been altered.

Similar bans on manipulated media have been enacted across social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter and WeChat. Apple’s App Store Developer Guidelines don’t specifically reference “deepfakes” by name, however, though it bans apps with false or defamatory information, outside of satire and humor.

Google says the apps currently available on Google Play have 30 days to comply with this change.

In Google’s announcement, the company said it understood these were difficult times for people, which is why it’s taken steps to minimize the short-term impact of these changes. In other words, it doesn’t sound like the policy changes will soon result in any mass banning or big Play Store clean-out — rather, they’re meant to set the stage for better policing of the store in the future.

 

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India says video conference app Zoom is ‘not safe’

India said today Zoom is ‘not a safe platform’ and advised government employees to not use it as the video conference service surges in popularity in many nations including the world’s second largest smartphone market as billions of people remain stuck at home due to the coronavirus crisis.

“Zoom is a not a safe platform,” the Cyber Coordination Centre (CyCord) of India’s ministry of home affairs said in a 16-page (PDF) advisory. The advisory also includes guidelines for users who still wish to use Zoom for their private communications.

The move comes as several companies including Google, Apple, NASA, and Tesla have urged — or warned — their employees from using Zoom, which has amassed over 200 million users. German and Taiwan have also banned the use of Zoom in their nations. But the firm, with market cap of over $40 billion, has also come under scrutiny — and become subject of a lawsuit — after several of its security and privacy lapses emerged in recent weeks.

MHA issues advisory, says Zoom not secure video conferencing platform for private individuals. Mentions guidelines for those who still want to use it. pic.twitter.com/b900JOw1Si

— Prasar Bharati News Services (@PBNS_India) April 16, 2020

Zoom has been trending in India in recent weeks, too, in a surprise as enterprise services rarely get traction with consumers in the country. Several Indian ministers in India have also tweeted pictures that showed they were using Zoom in recent weeks.

The app is being downloaded more than 450,000 times a day for the last two weeks in India, research firm Apptopia told TechCrunch. This week, India also started a competition for startups to develop a secure conferencing app.

Zoom chief executive has Eric S. Yuan has apologized for the security lapses and pledged to prioritize focus on users’ privacy and security over development of new features. The firm recently also recently hired former Facebook security officer Alex Stamos as an advisor.

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EU lawmakers set out guidance for coronavirus contacts tracing apps

The European Commission has published detailed guidance for Member States on developing coronavirus contacts tracing and warning apps.

The toolbox, which has been developed by the e-Health Network with the support of the Commission, is intended as a practical guide to implementing digital tools for tracking close contacts between device carriers as a proxy for infection risk that seeks to steer Member States in a common, privacy-sensitive direction as they configure their digital responses to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Commenting in a statement, Thierry Breton — the EU commissioner for Internal Market — said: “Contact tracing apps to limit the spread of coronavirus can be useful, especially as part of Member States’ exit strategies. However, strong privacy safeguards are a pre-requisite for the uptake of these apps, and therefore their usefulness. While we should be innovative and make the best use of technology in fighting the pandemic, we will not compromise on our values and privacy requirements.”

“Digital tools will be crucial to protect our citizens as we gradually lift confinement measures,” added Stella Kyriakides, commissioner for health and food safety, in another supporting statement. “Mobile apps can warn us of infection risks and support health authorities with contact tracing, which is essential to break transmission chains. We need to be diligent, creative, and flexible in our approaches to opening up our societies again. We need to continue to flatten the curve – and keep it down. Without safe and compliant digital technologies, our approach will not be efficient.”

The Commission’s top-line “essential requirements” for national contacts tracing apps are that they’re:

• voluntary;
• approved by the national health authority;
• privacy-preserving (“personal data is securely encrypted”); and
• dismantled as soon as no longer needed

In the document the Commission writes that the requirements on how to record contacts and notify individuals are “anchored in accepted epidemiological guidance, and reflect best practice on cybersecurity, and accessibility”.

“They cover how to prevent the appearance of potentially harmful unapproved apps, success criteria and collectively monitoring the effectiveness of the apps, and the outline of a communications strategy to engage with stakeholders and the people affected by these initiatives,” it adds.

Yesterday, setting out a wider roadmap to encourage a co-ordinated lifting of the coronavirus lockdown, the Commission suggested digital tools for contacts tracing will play a key role in easing quarantine measures.

Although today’s toolbox clearly emphasizes the need to use manual contact tracing in parallel with digital contact tracing, with such apps and tools envisaged as a support for health authorities — if widely rolled out — by enabling limited resources to be more focused toward manual contacts tracing.

“Manual contact tracing will continue to play an important role, in particular for those, such as elderly or disabled persons, who could be more vulnerable to infection but less likely to have a mobile phone or have access to these applications,” the Commission writes. “Rolling-out mobile applications on a large-scale will significantly contribute to contact tracing efforts also allowing health authorities to carry manual tracing in a more focussed manner.”

“Mobile apps will not reach all citizens given that they rely on the possession and active use of a smart phone. Evidence from Singapore and a study by Oxford University indicate that 60-75% of a population need to have the app for it to be efficient,” it adds in a section on accessibility and inclusiveness. “However, non-users will benefit from any increased population disease control the widespread use of such an app may bring.”

The toolbox also reiterates a clear message from the Commission in recent days that “appropriate safeguards” must be embedded into digital contacts tracing systems. Though it’s less clear whether all Member States are listening to memos about respecting EU rights and freedoms, as they scrambled for tech and data to beat back COVID-19.

“This digital technology, if deployed correctly, could contribute substantively to containing and reversing its spread. Deployed without appropriate safeguards, however, it could have a significant negative effect on privacy and individual rights and freedoms,” the Commission writes, further warning that: “A fragmented and uncoordinated approach to contact tracing apps risks hampering the effectiveness of measures aimed at combating the COVID-19 crisis, whilst also causing adverse effects to the single market and to fundamental rights and freedoms.”

On safeguards the Commission has a clear warning for EU Member States, writing: “Any contact tracing and warning app officially recognised by Member States’ relevant authorities should present all guarantees for respect of fundamental rights, and in particular privacy and data protection, the prevention of surveillance and stigmatization.”

Its list of key safeguards notably includes avoiding the collection of any location data.

“Location data is not necessary nor recommended for the purpose of contact tracing apps, as their goal is not to follow the movements of individuals or to enforce prescriptions,” it says. “Collecting an individual’s movements in the context of contact tracing apps would violate the principle of data minimisation and would create major security and privacy issues.”

The toolbox also emphasizes that such contacts tracing/warning systems be temporary and voluntary in nature — with “automated/gentle self-dismantling, including deletion of all remaining personal data and proximity information, as soon as the crisis is over”.

“The apps’ installation should be consent-based, while providing users with complete and clear information on intended use and processing,” is another key recommendation. 

The toolbox leans towards suggesting a decentralized approach, in line with earlier Commission missives, with a push for: “Safeguards to ensure the storing of proximity data on the device and data encryption.”

EU privacy experts push a decentralized approach to COVID-19 contacts tracing

Though the document also includes some discussion of alternative centralized models which involve uploading arbitrary identifiers to a backend server held by public health authorities. 

“Users cannot be directly identified through these data. Only the arbitrary identifiers generated by the app are stored on the server. The advantage is that the data stored in the server can be anonymised by aggregation and further used by public authorities as a source of important aggregated information on the intensity of contacts in the population, on the effectiveness of the app in tracing and alerting contacts and on the aggregated number of people that could potentially develop symptoms,” it writes. 

“None of the two options [decentralized vs centralized] includes storing of unnecessary personal information,” it adds, leaving the door open to states that might want their public health authorities to be responsible for centralized data processing.

However the Commission draws a clear distinction between centralized approaches that use arbitrary identifiers and those that store directly-identifiable data on every user — with the latter definitely not recommended.

They would have “major disadvantage”, per the toolbox, because they “would not keep personal data processing to the absolute minimum, and so people may be less willing to install and use the app”.

“Centralised storage of mobile phone numbers could also create risks of data breaches and cyberattacks,” the Commission further warns.

Michael Veale, a backer of a decentralized protocol for COVID-19 contacts tracing that’s being developed by an EU coalition of privacy and security experts, told us: “It is good to see the document clearly lay out how you can achieve contact tracing in a decentralised, privacy-preserving way. However, some Member States might be confused, as they think that if they go for PEPP-PT [a separate EU initiative to standardize contacts tracing apps, by distributing tools and processes, whose spokesman previously told us it will support both centralized and decentralized approaches], they get privacy and decentralisation. In fact, PEPP-PT has removed mention of DP-3T from its website, but has not published any alternative white paper or code for scrutiny for its own system.”

We’ve reached out to PEPP-PT for comment.

Discussing cross-border interoperability requirements, the Commission’s toolbox highlights the necessity for a grab-bag of EU contacts tracing apps to be interoperable, in order to successfully break cross-border transmission chains, which requires national health authorities to be technically able to exchange available information about individuals infected with and/or exposed to COVID-19.

“Tracing and warning apps should therefore follow common EU interoperability protocols so that the previous functionalities can be performed, and particularly safeguarding rights to privacy and data protection, regardless of where a device is in the EU,” it suggests.

On preventing the spread of harmful or unlawful apps the document suggests Member States consider setting up a national system of evaluation/accreditation endorsement of national apps, perhaps based on a common set of criteria (that would need to be defined).

“A close cooperation between health and digital authorities should be sought whenever possible for the evaluation/endorsement of the apps,” it writes. 

The Commission also says “close cooperation with app stores will be needed to promote national apps and promote uptake while delisting harmful apps” — putting Apple and Google squarely in the frame.

Earlier this week the pair announced their own collaboration on coronavirus contracts tracing — announcing a plan to offer an API and later opt-in system-level contacts tracing, based on a decentralized tracking architecture with ephemeral IDs processed locally on devices, rather than being uploaded and held on a central server.

Given the dominance of the two tech giants their decision to collaborate on a decentralized system may effectively deprive national health authorities of the option to gain buy in for systems that would give those publicly funded bodies access to anonymized and aggregated data for coronavirus modelling and/or tracking purposes. Which should, in the middle of a pandemic, give more than a little pause for thought.

A note in the toolbox mentions Apple and Google — with the Commission writing that: “By the end of April 2020, Member States with the Commission will seek clarifications on the solution proposed by Google and Apple with regard to contact tracing functionality on Android and iOS in order to ensure that their initiative is compatible with the EU common approach.”

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EU lawmakers set out guidance for coronavirus contacts tracing apps

The European Commission has published detailed guidance for Member States on developing coronavirus contacts tracing and warning apps.

The toolbox, which has been developed by the e-Health Network with the support of the Commission, is intended as a practical guide to implementing digital tools for tracking close contacts between device carriers as a proxy for infection risk that seeks to steer Member States in a common, privacy-sensitive direction as they configure their digital responses to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Commenting in a statement, Thierry Breton — the EU commissioner for Internal Market — said: “Contact tracing apps to limit the spread of coronavirus can be useful, especially as part of Member States’ exit strategies. However, strong privacy safeguards are a pre-requisite for the uptake of these apps, and therefore their usefulness. While we should be innovative and make the best use of technology in fighting the pandemic, we will not compromise on our values and privacy requirements.”

“Digital tools will be crucial to protect our citizens as we gradually lift confinement measures,” added Stella Kyriakides, commissioner for health and food safety, in another supporting statement. “Mobile apps can warn us of infection risks and support health authorities with contact tracing, which is essential to break transmission chains. We need to be diligent, creative, and flexible in our approaches to opening up our societies again. We need to continue to flatten the curve – and keep it down. Without safe and compliant digital technologies, our approach will not be efficient.”

The Commission’s top-line “essential requirements” for national contacts tracing apps are that they’re:

• voluntary;
• approved by the national health authority;
• privacy-preserving (“personal data is securely encrypted”); and
• dismantled as soon as no longer needed

In the document the Commission writes that the requirements on how to record contacts and notify individuals are “anchored in accepted epidemiological guidance, and reflect best practice on cybersecurity, and accessibility”.

“They cover how to prevent the appearance of potentially harmful unapproved apps, success criteria and collectively monitoring the effectiveness of the apps, and the outline of a communications strategy to engage with stakeholders and the people affected by these initiatives,” it adds.

Yesterday, setting out a wider roadmap to encourage a co-ordinated lifting of the coronavirus lockdown, the Commission suggested digital tools for contacts tracing will play a key role in easing quarantine measures.

Although today’s toolbox clearly emphasizes the need to use manual contact tracing in parallel with digital contact tracing, with such apps and tools envisaged as a support for health authorities — if widely rolled out — by enabling limited resources to be more focused toward manual contacts tracing.

“Manual contact tracing will continue to play an important role, in particular for those, such as elderly or disabled persons, who could be more vulnerable to infection but less likely to have a mobile phone or have access to these applications,” the Commission writes. “Rolling-out mobile applications on a large-scale will significantly contribute to contact tracing efforts also allowing health authorities to carry manual tracing in a more focussed manner.”

“Mobile apps will not reach all citizens given that they rely on the possession and active use of a smart phone. Evidence from Singapore and a study by Oxford University indicate that 60-75% of a population need to have the app for it to be efficient,” it adds in a section on accessibility and inclusiveness. “However, non-users will benefit from any increased population disease control the widespread use of such an app may bring.”

The toolbox also reiterates a clear message from the Commission in recent days that “appropriate safeguards” must be embedded into digital contacts tracing systems. Though it’s less clear whether all Member States are listening to memos about respecting EU rights and freedoms, as they scrambled for tech and data to beat back COVID-19.

“This digital technology, if deployed correctly, could contribute substantively to containing and reversing its spread. Deployed without appropriate safeguards, however, it could have a significant negative effect on privacy and individual rights and freedoms,” the Commission writes, further warning that: “A fragmented and uncoordinated approach to contact tracing apps risks hampering the effectiveness of measures aimed at combating the COVID-19 crisis, whilst also causing adverse effects to the single market and to fundamental rights and freedoms.”

On safeguards the Commission has a clear warning for EU Member States, writing: “Any contact tracing and warning app officially recognised by Member States’ relevant authorities should present all guarantees for respect of fundamental rights, and in particular privacy and data protection, the prevention of surveillance and stigmatization.”

Its list of key safeguards notably includes avoiding the collection of any location data.

“Location data is not necessary nor recommended for the purpose of contact tracing apps, as their goal is not to follow the movements of individuals or to enforce prescriptions,” it says. “Collecting an individual’s movements in the context of contact tracing apps would violate the principle of data minimisation and would create major security and privacy issues.”

The toolbox also emphasizes that such contacts tracing/warning systems be temporary and voluntary in nature — with “automated/gentle self-dismantling, including deletion of all remaining personal data and proximity information, as soon as the crisis is over”.

“The apps’ installation should be consent-based, while providing users with complete and clear information on intended use and processing,” is another key recommendation. 

The toolbox leans towards suggesting a decentralized approach, in line with earlier Commission missives, with a push for: “Safeguards to ensure the storing of proximity data on the device and data encryption.”

EU privacy experts push a decentralized approach to COVID-19 contacts tracing

Though the document also includes some discussion of alternative centralized models which involve uploading arbitrary identifiers to a backend server held by public health authorities. 

“Users cannot be directly identified through these data. Only the arbitrary identifiers generated by the app are stored on the server. The advantage is that the data stored in the server can be anonymised by aggregation and further used by public authorities as a source of important aggregated information on the intensity of contacts in the population, on the effectiveness of the app in tracing and alerting contacts and on the aggregated number of people that could potentially develop symptoms,” it writes. 

“None of the two options [decentralized vs centralized] includes storing of unnecessary personal information,” it adds, leaving the door open to states that might want their public health authorities to be responsible for centralized data processing.

However the Commission draws a clear distinction between centralized approaches that use arbitrary identifiers and those that store directly-identifiable data on every user — with the latter definitely not recommended.

They would have “major disadvantage”, per the toolbox, because they “would not keep personal data processing to the absolute minimum, and so people may be less willing to install and use the app”.

“Centralised storage of mobile phone numbers could also create risks of data breaches and cyberattacks,” the Commission further warns.

Discussing cross-border interoperability requirements, the toolbox highlights the necessity for a grab-bag of EU contacts tracing apps to be interoperable, in order to successfully break cross-border transmission chains, which requires national health authorities to be technically able to exchange available information about individuals infected with and/or exposed to COVID-19.

“Tracing and warning apps should therefore follow common EU interoperability protocols so that the previous functionalities can be performed, and particularly safeguarding rights to privacy and data protection, regardless of where a device is in the EU,” it suggests.

On preventing the spread of harmful or unlawful apps the document suggests Member States consider setting up a national system of evaluation/accreditation endorsement of national apps, perhaps based on a common set of criteria (that would need to be defined).

“A close cooperation between health and digital authorities should be sought whenever possible for the evaluation/endorsement of the apps,” it writes. 

The Commission also says “close cooperation with app stores will be needed to promote national apps and promote uptake while delisting harmful apps” — putting Apple and Google squarely in the frame.

Earlier this week the pair announced their own collaboration on coronavirus contracts tracing — announcing a plan to offer an API and later opt-in system-level contacts tracing, based on a decentralized tracking architecture with ephemeral IDs processed locally on devices, rather than being uploaded and held on a central server.

Given the dominance of the two tech giants their decision to collaborate on a decentralized system may effectively deprive national health authorities of the option to gain buy in for systems that would give those publicly funded bodies access to anonymized and aggregated data for coronavirus modelling and/or tracking purposes. Which should, in the middle of a pandemic, give more than a little pause for thought.

A note in the toolbox mentions Apple and Google — with the Commission writing that: “By the end of April 2020, Member States with the Commission will seek clarifications on the solution proposed by Google and Apple with regard to contact tracing functionality on Android and iOS in order to ensure that their initiative is compatible with the EU common approach.”

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Apple said to be working on modular, high-end, noise-cancelling over-ear headphones

Apple is said to be developing its own competitors to popular over-ear noise-cancelling headphones like those made by Bose and Sony, Bloomberg reports, but with similar technology on board to that used in the AirPod and AirPod Pro lines. These headphones would also include a design with interchangeable parts that would allow some modification with customizable accessories for specific uses like workouts and long-term wear, for instance.

The prototype designs of the new headphones, which are set to potentially be released some time later this year (though timing is clearly up in the air as a result of the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, and Apple’s general tendency to move things around depending on other factors), are said to feature a “retro look” by Bloomberg, and include oval ear cups which connect directly to thin arms that extend to the headband. The swappable parts include the ear pads and headband cushion, both of which are said to attach to the headphone frame using magnetic connectors.

These will support Siri on board, along with active noise cancellation and touch controls, but most importantly for iOS and Mac users, they’ll also feature the simple connection across multiple devices that are featured on AirPods and some of Apple’s Beats line of headphones.

Apple has already released Beats over- and on-ear headphone models with AirPod-like features, including cross-connectivity, and that feature onboard noise cancellation. The Bloomberg report doesn’t seem to indicate these new models would be Beats-branded, however, and their customization features would also be new in terms of Apple’s available existing options.

Bloomberg also previously reported that Apple was working on a smaller HomePod speaker as part of its forthcoming product lineup, and a new FCC filing made public this week could indicate the impending release of a success to its PowerBeats Pro fully wireless in-ear sport headphones.

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TSMC reports $3.9B Q1 profit, but slashes outlook for the year

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) beat analyst estimates after reporting its net profit almost doubled in the quarter that ended in March, and said it was hopeful to sustain momentum in the current quarter but slashed its industry and foundry outlook for the year.

The Taiwan-headquartered company, which counts Apple among its clients, reported profit of NT$116.99 billion ($3.9 billion) on $10.31 billion revenue in the quarter that ended on March 31, higher than NT$105.8 billion profit that analysts had estimated (per Refinitive), and up 90.8% from the same period last year.

The Q1 profit is also 0.8% higher than Q4 2019, but the revenue dropped by a 2.1% during the period. The world’s largest contract chipmaker said its net profit margin in the quarter was 37.7% and operating margin 41.4%.

Many analysts were keenly watching TSMC’s earnings today to evaluate how the coronavirus crisis is impacting product demand. Apple, which will report its quarterly earnings later this month, said earlier this year that it did not expect to meet its revenue guidance in Q1.

A closer look at TSMC’s earnings today shows that the revenue it clocked from smartphones dropped by 9%. Research firm IDC estimates that smartphone shipment will declined 2.3% to 1.3 billion units this year. TSMC makes chips for a range of other equipments including laptops and home devices.

Another concern looming on TSMC’s performance is tied to Huawei, which based on estimates, accounts for nearly 10% of Taiwan’s company’s revenue. The U.S. could impose restrictions on TSMC and others that would prevent them from selling to the Chinese company.

now let me update this, after listening to TSMC.

They slashed industry outlook for the year.
Slashed foundry outlook for the year.
And pared back its own growth outlook for the year.
Yeah, 2Q looks nice..but brace yourself for 2H

— Tim Culpan & environs (@tculpan) April 16, 2020

Wendell Huang, VP and Chief Financial Officer of TSMC, did not address these concerns, but said the company expects revenue in Q2 to be “flattish ” — which is still impressive as several analysts have substantially slashed their Q2 estimates.

On a conference call with reporters, the company’s executives, however, pared back their growth outlook for the year citing weakening demand due to the coronavirus pandemic, and also slashed their industry and foundry outlook.

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