MacRumors

Apple has updated its website to indicate that the iPhone X launches in three additional Latin American countries in early December.

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Namely, the iPhone X will be released in Colombia starting December 1, Chile on December 7, and Brazil on December 8. The device will be available from select carriers and authorized resellers in each country.

In Brazil, the iPhone X will also be on display and available to purchase from the country's two Apple Stores at VillageMall in Rio de Janeiro and the Morumbi shopping center in São Paulo. Inventory will likely be extremely limited.

iPhone X will start at 6,999 Brazilian reals in Brazil, the equivalent of slightly more than $2,150 USD based on current exchange rates. That's more than double the iPhone X's starting price of $999 in the United States.

Apple's prices in Brazil being significantly higher than in the United States is partly the result of the country's 60 percent duty on imported products valued up to $3,000, and likely other factors such as stricter labor laws.

Apple hasn't provided iPhone X pricing information for Chile or Colombia, or release dates for other countries in South America.

iPhone X first launched November 3 in the United States and over 50 other countries. The device was also released in Israel today and arrives in 13 additional countries, including Malaysia, South Korea, Thailand, and Turkey, tomorrow.

iPhone X orders on Apple's website now ship in an estimated 1-2 weeks around the world, down from 5-6 weeks after the device first launched.

Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Related Forum: iPhone

Apple's one-day Black Friday shopping event is now live in Australia and New Zealand, offering customers free Apple Store gift cards worth up to A$210 or NZ$210 with the purchase of selected new Apple products today.

black friday apple au nz
The deals are available through Apple's online store, and at Apple retail stores in Australia, through November 24. Apple's terms and conditions state each customer is limited to two gift cards per product category.

For the Mac, eligible models include any new 12-inch MacBook, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, iMac, and Mac Pro, including custom configurations ordered online. Mac mini and refurbished Macs do not qualify.

Australia

• 9.7-inch iPad: $70 gift card
• iPad mini 4: $70 gift card
• iPad Pro: $140 gift card
• iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus: $70 gift card
• iPhone 6s or iPhone 6s Plus: $70 gift card
• iPhone SE: $35 gift card
• Apple Watch Series 1: $35 gift card with select models
• Mac: $210 gift card with select models

New Zealand

• 9.7-inch iPad: $70 gift card
• iPad mini 4: $70 gift card
• iPad Pro: $140 gift card
• iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus: $70 gift card
• iPhone 6s or iPhone 6s Plus: $70 gift card
• iPhone SE: $35 gift card
• Apple Watch Series 1: $35 gift card with select models
• Mac: $210 gift card with select models

Apple will likely extend its Black Friday event to the United States, Canada, Europe, and select other regions tomorrow. In the U.S., the gift cards could be worth up to around $150 to $160 based on currency exchange rates.

Black Friday marks one of the few times in a year that Apple offers deals on its products. Be sure to read our Black Friday roundup for several other deals on Apple products and accessories, and larger discounts in some cases.

Related Forum: Community Discussion

Shipping estimates for the iPhone X have improved across Europe and Asia today, with many regional online Apple stores now quoting delivery within the first eight days of December.

France, Belgium, Germany, Netherlands, Czech Republic, and the United Kingdom now all show shipping dates between December 1 and December 8, suggesting Apple's production ramp-up efforts are paying dividends well beyond U.S. shores.

Screen Shot 8
Slight variations in shipping dates can be found in other European countries such as Italy and Spain, which show estimates between December 1 and 11. Meanwhile, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Sweden, and Switzerland currently give a 1 to 2 week estimate.

Elsewhere, regional online stores in Asia, including China, Japan, and Singapore, quote delivery dates of between 1 and 2 weeks. The same also goes for New Zealand, while Australia now offers a more specific date range of between December 1 and 8.

U.S. shipping estimates for iPhone X improved on Wednesday to 1 to 2 weeks, but prior to today, estimates across Europe and Asia remained at 2 to 3 weeks.

Back in early November, Apple CEO Tim Cook said the company was working to ramp up iPhone X production week by week, with the aim of getting the new smartphone out to customers "as soon as possible."

Previously, rumors had suggested the device would be available in severely limited numbers until well into next year, but the balance between supply and demand already looks to be easing worldwide.

Related Forum: iPhone

The U.K. government announced in Wednesday's annual budget that it plans to clamp down on tax avoidance by increasing the tax it collects from online giants such as Apple and Amazon.

In his Treasury speech to the Commons, Chancellor Philip Hammond said income tax would be charged on royalties relating to U.K. sales, even when they are paid to a low-tax jurisdiction and would not normally be taxed in the UK under current rules.

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The new rules are due to come into effect from April next year, and estimates suggest they will raise approximately 800 million pounds ($1.07 billion) in extra tax over the next five years. However, Hammond admitted they would only go some way to balancing out the taxation treatment of digital firms, and that more would have to be done to tackle tax avoidance.

Multinational digital businesses pay billions of pounds in royalties to jurisdictions where they are not taxed and some of those relate to UK sales.

This does not solve the problem, but it does send a signal of our determination and we will continue work in the international arena to find a sustainable and fair long-term solution that properly taxes the digital businesses that operate in our cyberspace.

Apple recently came in for criticism when the so-called Paradise Papers revealed that the company sidestepped a 2013 crackdown on its controversial Irish tax structure by moving the majority of its offshore cash holdings to the small island of Jersey, a self-governed territory with loose ties to the United Kingdom.

The papers showed that Apple's two key Irish subsidiaries were managed from the Jersey offices of offshore tax law firm Appleby from 2015 until early 2016. Apple reportedly chose Jersey after exploring several potential tax havens, such as Bermuda and the Cayman Islands.

Apple apparently turned to Jersey after European officials began to crack down on the so-called "Double Irish" tax structure it had exploited. The loophole allows for multinational corporations to funnel revenue through an Irish subsidiary, which in turn sends that money to another Irish subsidiary that has residency in a tax haven. The practice has enabled Apple to save billions of dollars in taxes globally.

Apple responded to the revelations contained in the Paradise Papers by saying that it made regulators in the U.S. and Ireland, and the European Commission, aware about the reorganization of its Irish subsidiaries, and added that the changes haven't reduced its tax bill.

Last year, the European Commission ordered Ireland to collect $14.5 billion in back taxes from Apple, after it concluded that the country's tax agreements with the tech giant represented "illegal state aid". Both Apple and the Irish government are currently appealing the ruling.

Apple has repeatedly highlighted its position as the largest taxpayer in the world and reiterated the fact that it holds overseas cash because that's where the majority of its products are sold. Apple CEO Tim Cook has said that Apple is willing to repatriate some of its offshore cash holdings into the U.S., but he also recently said that tax reform is "sorely needed" first.

Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Popular writing program Ulysses received an update to its iOS app today, bringing a revised interface and full compatibility with iPhone X.

Various interactions in the Ulysses UI have been reworked, and the app now fully complies with the all-screen design of the iPhone X's OLED display.

Ulysses iPhone X
Beyond the changes induced by the iPhone X screen, the update brings redesigned editors for objects like images, annotations, notes, and footnotes. The text counter has also been tweaked based on user feedback, as has the automatic fullscreen mode.

In addition, Ulysses now also supports Face ID, Apple's new facial authentication system, to complement its privacy options, which previously only offered passcode protection. With Face ID enabled, writers can unlock their text libraries with a simple glance.

Lastly, the app ships with a new default editor theme, featuring sparsely applied colors and bold black headlines, which the developers say is simpler, cleaner, and more typographic.

Ulysses can be downloaded for free on the App Store and the Mac App Store. After a 14-day trial period, a subscription is required to unlock the app on all devices. A monthly subscription costs $4.99, while a yearly subscription is $39.99. Students can use Ulysses at a discounted price of $11.99 per six months. The discount is granted from within the app.

Tag: Ulysses

Apple supplier Foxconn says it has stopped interns from working illegal overtime at its factory in China, after reports emerged that at least six students worked eleven-hour days on iPhone X production lines.

Today's announcement follows a Financial Times report earlier this week that revealed around 3,000 students worked at its iPhone X assembly plant in Zhengzhou, as the firm struggles to catch up with demand for the smartphone after production delays.

foxconn iphone production

A worker assembles iPhones in a Foxconn factory

Apple on Tuesday said an audit had confirmed "instances" of student interns working overtime at the supplier facility in Henan province, and both Apple and Foxconn said they would take remedial action to stop the practice, which breaches Chinese laws preventing children from working more than 40 hours per week.

"Apple is dedicated to ensuring everyone in our supply chain is treated with the dignity and respect they deserve," the tech giant said today in a statement given to the BBC. "We know our work is never done and we'll continue to do all we can to make a positive impact and protect workers in our supply chain."

Foxconn, which operates the intern program, told the BBC in a statement that it had taken "immediate action to ensure that no interns are carrying out any overtime work". It added that "interns represent a very small percentage" of its workforce in China and that the breach of labour laws was inconsistent with its own policies.

Foxconn is thought to hire large numbers of seasonal workers each year to assemble the latest iPhone models in time for the busy holiday shopping season. The FT report, citing an anonymous Foxconn employee, said there can be up to 20,000 workers producing up to 300,000 iPhones per day. However, this year it appears the manufacturer has found it particularly challenging to keep up with demand for the iPhone X, which Apple has described as being "off the charts".

As per its supplier responsibility efforts, Apple requires manufacturing partners like Foxconn to limit working hours to no more than 60 hours a week, with a mandatory rest day once every seven days.

Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Tag: Foxconn
Related Forum: iPhone

Amazon has made its Echo Buttons, the company's "first Alexa gadgets", available to pre-order on its U.S. website. First announced in September, the $20 accessories come in packs of two and are designed to allow Amazon Echo owners to play family trivia games with the voice-activated smart speakers.

echo buttons
About 3 inches (76mm) wide and 1.5 inches (38mm) tall, the Echo Buttons each have a multi-color LED on top that lights up the push button. The devices are powered by two triple-A batteries and connect to Echo speakers via Bluetooth.

Amazon says the buttons will work with four Alexa skills when they ship on December 19 in time for the holidays, including name-that-song game "Beat the Intro" and "Fourth Down Football Trivia", with support for more sound effect and quiz games expected further down the line.

Echo Button Alexa Skills
The Echo Buttons are compatible with all old and new Echo devices as well as the forthcoming Echo Spot, but they don't work with the Amazon Tap, Amazon Fire TV, or any other non-Echo device.

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Facebook is continuing its seemingly relentless trend of copying Snapchat with the testing of a new feature that plays on the latter's chat streak challenge, which encourages users to "keep your streak going" when messaging friends.

Facebook Messenger streaks include an emoji status to indicate friends that a user is currently in a streak with – who they've messaged for at least two days in a row – and encourages them to keep chatting to keep the streak alive.

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A spokesperson for Facebook Messenger who spoke to Mashable confirmed its testing of the feature, saying it was a way "to see at a glance fun facts about the people you message with".

"For example, a lightning bolt may appear next to the name of a person you've messaged with for at least three days in a row, and a counter will indicate how many consecutive days you've been chatting. We're interested to see if people enjoy this insight, but we don't have any additional information to share at this time."

Streaks have been a popular feature with younger Snapchat users for some time, with many seeing them as a fun, addictive challenge to see how long they can make a streak last for. Whether or not the trend catches on with the wider age demographic of Messenger users is a different proposition, and will undoubtedly dictate the chances of a wider rollout.

In its last straight-up feature clone, Facebook created a facsimile of Snapchat's day-long, vanishing post idea in Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Instagram, which gained 100 million users following the Snapchat-like update last year.

Popular third-party iOS podcast app Overcast reached version 4.0.1 on Thursday, bringing some much-requested features including a new true-black dark theme and sleep timer option.

overcast

New Black dark theme compared to Light theme with System font option enabled

The new Black theme, shown above, joins the existing Light and Dark themes, and has been designed with the iPhone X in mind, offering a slick new look for the smartphone's 5.8-inch OLED display as well as being easier on tired eyes.

As before, users who like to change things up depending on the time of day (or night) can swipe up or down with two fingers to quickly change between a light and dark interface – the only difference being that the Light-Switch gesture now simply chooses the most recently used dark theme.

In another neat UI appearance tweak, users can now also opt to turn on the system font for whichever theme they choose.

Elsewhere, there's a new sleep timer option that stops playback at the end of the currently playing episode, plus a bunch of smaller improvements including one that's supposed to fix auto-resume playback after taking a call.

Overcast 3.1 is available as a free ad-supported app for iPhone and iPad from the App Store. [Direct Link]

Shipping estimates for the iPhone X have improved to 1 to 2 weeks in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico, suggesting Apple's efforts to ramp up production have successfully resulted in greater supply.

The 1 to 2 week shipping estimates are an improvement over the previous 2 to 3 week shipping estimates that have been available since November 15. iPhone X models ordered today in the United States and Canada will now arrive by early December, well ahead of the holidays.

iphonexshippingestimates1to2weeks
For Europe, Asia Pacific, and the Middle East, iPhone X shipping estimates are still at 2 to 3 weeks, but those estimates should also improve over the course of the next few days.

In addition to improving shipping estimates for devices purchased now from the online Apple Store, Apple has also been sending out iPhone X pre-orders more quickly than expected. Many MacRumors readers who had late November and December shipping estimates after ordering have already received their devices or are expecting them soon.

Apple retail stores are also receiving regular shipments and customers who check stock on Apple.com early in the morning and use stock-tracking tools like iStockNow have been able to make purchases with no wait time.

Back in early November, Apple CEO Tim Cook said Apple was working to ramp up iPhone X production week by week, with the aim of getting the new smartphone out to customers "as soon as possible."

Ahead of the iPhone X launch, rumors suggested the device would be heavily constrained and in short supply until well into 2018, but given the improvements we're already seeing, supply/demand balance will likely be reached earlier than originally expected.

Related Forum: iPhone

Apple traditionally shares a touching holiday ad in November or December, and this year's spot, Sway, was uploaded to the company's YouTube channel this afternoon.

The ad shows off both the iPhone X and the AirPods, featuring a woman dancing through a snowy city to the song "Palace" by Sam Smith. She runs into a partner, imagines sharing an AirPod with him, and the two of them go on to briefly fall in love before returning to reality where they pass by each other in the street.


Past Apple holiday ads have been well-received and have even won awards, including the company's 2013 ad "Misunderstood," featuring an iPhone 5s being used to capture holiday activities like baking cookies and decorating a Christmas tree.

Last year's ad featured Frankenstein's monster participating in some holiday cheer.

Apple premium reseller Expercom this week launched a few discounts on high-end build-to-order configurations of the iMac and MacBook Pro. All of these selections include models that have the best sale prices in comparison to the other Apple resellers, and many configurations aren't on sale anywhere else this week, allowing those planning on making a big purchase to save a bit of money on a new Apple computer this holiday.

macbook imac 2017 duoNote: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When you click a link and make a purchase, we may receive a small payment, which helps us keep the site running.

Below we've listed the Macs on sale, along with their price at Expercom and any relevant comparison to the same or similar configurations sold at B&H Photo, Adorama, MacMall, and Apple's own refurbished online store.

13-inch MacBook Pro

  • Late 2016, 2.4GHz i7, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD - $1,499.00 at Expercom

15-inch MacBook Pro with Touch Bar

27-inch Retina 5K iMac

Expercom's sale includes many more Macs and ends on November 25. For more of the latest savings heading into the holidays, be sure to check out our Black Friday Roundup.

Related Forum: Community Discussion

The latest Black Friday deal has gone live today, and this time it's for the Apple Watch Series 1, which debuted alongside the Series 2 in September 2016. The Series 1 models lack the advancements of 2017's Series 3 -- like LTE and a faster processor -- but the older Apple Watch is still a reliable device, and now with a cheaper entry price over at Macy's, it makes for a great holiday gift.

The retailer has the Apple Watch Series 1 discounted by $70 beginning today, with 38mm models running for $179.00 and 42mm models priced at $209.00. In terms of overall Black Friday deals, we know that Target will match this $70 off Series 1 deal beginning tomorrow when sales there go live. So if you're looking to get some shopping done a little early, Macy's offer is the first notable Apple Watch Series 1 deal happening this holiday season.

macys series 1 saleNote: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with LivingSocial. When you click a link and make a purchase, we may receive a small payment, which helps us keep the site running.

Here's every Apple Watch Series 1 device available in Macy's sale:

As a point of comparison, the new non-LTE Apple Watch Series 3 models are priced at $329 (38mm) and $359 (42mm). Sales on Series 2 models have been appearing frequently throughout the fall, with the most recent dropping 38mm cases to $229 and 42mmm cases to $259. Until Black Friday sales, no notable deals had yet to arrive for the Series 1 devices following the launch of Series 3 in September.

If you purchase the Series 1, be aware that in comparison to higher-cost versions it has a slower S1P processor, lower water resistance (so it is not suitable for swimming), a display that doesn't get as bright, slightly lower battery life, and no LTE or GPS support. Otherwise, you'll be able to access all of the expected Apple Watch features like activity tracking, notification and phone call support with a connected iPhone, and more.

Also of note is an Apple Music deal going on at LivingSocial, where you can get a four month subscription to Apple's streaming music service for free. This deal essentially adds one extra month (priced at $9.99/month) onto Apple Music's existing three month free trial, and is only available to new subscribers signing up for an individual membership plan.

As always, you can visit our Black Friday Roundup to keep track of the latest deals going on heading into Thanksgiving and Black Friday. Some sales will begin going online a bit early today, but the bulk will see activation when retailers first open their doors tomorrow night between 5:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. local time.

Related Roundup: Apple Watch 10
Tag: Macy's
Buyer's Guide: Apple Watch (Caution)
Related Forum: Community Discussion

Apple will release a second-generation iPhone SE in the first half of 2018, according to Taiwan's Economic Daily News.

iPhone SE four colors
The report claims the tentatively named iPhone SE 2 will be assembled exclusively by Taiwanese manufacturer Wistron at its factory in Bengaluru, India, where some assembly of the current iPhone SE occurs.

The rumored release date window lines up with an earlier report from Focus Taiwan claiming a new iPhone SE will ship in the first quarter of 2018, which encompasses January through March of next year.

Apple introduced the current iPhone SE at a media event on March 21, 2016, and the device launched later that month. Given the rumored launch dates, the iPhone SE 2 could certainly be unveiled in March too.

Indian website Tekz24 previously reported that the next-generation iPhone SE will be powered by Apple's A10 Fusion chip, with 2GB of RAM, 32GB and 128GB storage capacities, a 12-megapixel rear camera, a five-megapixel front camera, and a slightly larger 1,700 mAh battery.

Tekz24 isn't a website we're familiar with, and it doesn't have an established track record of reporting on Apple rumors, so don't place too much faith in those tech specs until if and when they are confirmed by other sources.

The current iPhone SE looks much like the iPhone 5s, including its smaller four-inch display preferred by a subset of customers. The device is powered by Apple's A9 chip, like the iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus, and it has 2GB of RAM, a 12-megapixel rear camera, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and Touch ID.

Apple hasn't fully refreshed the iPhone SE since it launched, but it did double the available storage capacities to 64GB and 128GB in March. It also dropped the device's starting price to $349 a few months ago.

Related Forum: iPhone

iveApple chief designer Jony Ive is scheduled to give a talk on the "future of design" at the Hirshorn Museum in Washington, DC, next week.

Beginning at 3 p.m. local time on Wednesday, November 29, the one-hour speaking engagement has been arranged in collaboration with Smithsonian Magazine, with free places being offered on a first-come, first served basis.

[Ive] has been described as one of the most powerful people in the world’s most valuable company and is a 2017 honoree of the Smithsonian’s American Ingenuity Awards (the "Golden Globes of intellect"), which honor revolutionary breakthroughs in the arts and sciences, education and social progress. Ive will be joined in conversation by Rick Tetzeli, Editor At Large of Fast Company and author of the bestselling biography Becoming Steve Jobs: The Evolution of a Reckless Upstart into a Visionary Leader.

All advance tickets for the program have been claimed, but anyone interested in attending can join the waitlist online or walk up on the day for a chance to get a seat. Any open seats may be released to walk-up visitors 10 minutes before the program.


Ive's last public talk was at October's TechFest 2017, an event held in New York City. Earlier this month, Ive also sat down for an interview with design, architecture, and fashion magazine Wallpaper* to discuss the Apple Park campus, which he had a hand in designing, as well as the iPhone X. Most recently, TIME interviewed Ive about the smartphone, after the device appeared in its 25 Best Inventions of the Year list.

Google has seen fit to return YouTube to Amazon's display-based Echo Show smart speaker, two months after the video service was pulled from the device. The original removal angered Amazon and led to conflicting public statements on both sides over the move, but the two companies appear to have resolved the dispute.

The return of YouTube is particularly timely for Amazon, which is expanding its video services on the Echo Show with additional support for Vimeo and Dailymotion. An Amazon spokesperson gave the following statement to The Verge:
amazonechoshow

"We're excited to offer customers the capability to watch even more video content from sources such as Vimeo, YouTube, and Dailymotion on Echo Show. More video sources will be added over time."

According to Google, the reason for the service's removal on Echo Show devices back in September was because "Amazon's implementation of YouTube on the Echo Show violates our terms of service, creating a broken user experience."

That issue now looks to have been resolved with a UI change – the new version of YouTube on Echo Show has a completely different interface that is much more in keeping with how the service appears in a desktop web browser, as shown in a video uploaded by VoiceBot.ai, embedded below.


YouTube account holders accessing the device using an Echo Show can now see their subscriptions, video recommendations, and control autoplay – all of which were missing in the Amazon-designed, voice-control optimized interface.

However, The Verge reports that there are now issues with YouTube's voice-control integration, and the Echo Show still doesn't automatically play videos fullscreen, with an "Alexa, zoom in" voice command required to display videos in that way.

Vivaldi web browser, the spiritual successor to Opera 12, released version 1.13 on Wednesday, introducing an easier way of managing multiple tabs, as well as new file download features and other improvements.

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In line with the Norwegian team's aim to make Vivaldi the most feature-rich and customizable browser available to power users, the developers have created the new Window Panel. This opens a tree-style view of tabs to the side of the browser window, offering an easy overview of all open tabs as a list.

From there, users can conveniently manage tabs by dragging them to change their order, grouping tabs by topic to save space, tiling Tab Stacks to compare several web pages side by side, and hibernating unused tabs or Tab Stacks for better performance.

Within the new Panel, it's also possible to mute sound in specific tabs and pin tabs to ensure they always stay open. The Vivaldi team says it is planning to bring even more functionality to this feature in the near future.

window panel
The latest release of the Vivaldi browser also brings a number of improvements to file downloading, based on community feedback. Users now get a warning dialog when closing the browser before a download is complete. It's also now possible to pause and resume downloads, while a download speed indicator has been added to the progress bar.

Elsewhere, Vivaldi's window handling code has been rewritten, providing performance benefits that are especially noticeable on older, slower hardware.

Vivaldi browser is a free download for Mac available directly from the Vivaldi website.

Apple computer scientists working on autonomous vehicle technology have posted a research paper online describing how self-driving cars can spot cyclists and pedestrians using fewer sensors (via Reuters).

The paper by Yin Zhou and Oncel Tuzel was submitted to the moderated scientific pre-print repository arXiv on November 17, in what appears to be Apple's first publicly disclosed research on autonomous vehicle technology.

appleautonomousdrivingtestlexus
The paper is titled "End-to-End Learning for Point Cloud Based 3D Object Detection", and describes how new software developed by Apple scientists improves the ability of LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) systems to recognize objects including pedestrians and cyclists from a distance.

Self-driving cars typically use a combination of standard cameras and depth-sensing LiDAR units to receive information about the world around them.

Apple's research team said they were able to get "highly encouraging results" using LiDAR data alone to spot cyclists and pedestrians, and wrote that they were also able to beat other approaches for detecting 3D objects that rely solely on LiDAR tech. The experiments were limited to computer simulations and did not advance to road tests.

Apple famously has a secretive research policy and has kept its work under wraps for many years, but over the last 12 months, the company has shared some of its research advancements with other researchers and the wider public, particularly in the area of machine learning.

In December 2016, Apple said that it would start allowing its AI and machine learning researchers to publish and share their work in papers, with the first paper appearing just a few weeks following the announcement.

Additionally, in July of this year, Apple researchers initiated the "Apple Machine Learning Journal", a blog detailing their work on machine learning, AI, and other related topics.

This new policy of openness could help Apple retain employees who do not want to keep their progress a secret, but the latest research into autonomous vehicle technology also lets regulators see that the company is making progress in this area. Last December, Apple told federal regulators it was excited about the technology and asked them not to restrict testing. In April, the company also filed a self-driving car testing plan with California regulators.

Apple CEO Tim Cook has called autonomy "the mother of all AI projects". During an August 2017 earnings call, Cook re-emphasized Apple's deep interest in the technology, and even hinted Apple's work on autonomy could be used for more than vehicles.

Apple has presumably been working on an autonomous driving system since 2014, when rumors of its efforts to create an electric vehicle first surfaced. Apple has now moved away from creating a full vehicle and is said to be focusing on self-driving technology instead.