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<ul><li><keyword id="4936066" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="whatsapp-business" source="Orion">WhatsApp Business</keyword> is a good tool that helps small businesses manage their communication.</li><li>You can set up greeting messages to automatically greet new customers.</li><li>You can also set up an away message to inform your customers that you cannot immediately respond.</li></ul> <keyword id="790242" type="General" weightage="80" keywordseo="whatsapp" source="Orion">WhatsApp</keyword> Business comes with a host of tools to help businesses connect with their customers, answer their queries and sell their products. The tools offered by WhatsApp include greeting messages and away messages. It is important to reply to messages from customers on time as a delayed response may impact the image of your business. If you are running a <keyword id="6359222" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="small-business" source="Orion">small business</keyword>, it may be difficult to always respond to customers on time. To make it easier for you to respond to customers, you can use the greeting message and away message features on WhatsApp Business. <cmsannotation type="cmsannotation" annotationid="What is greeting message feature" comment="subhead" text="What is greeting message feature">What is greeting message feature</cmsannotation> The greeting message feature allows you to set up a greeting when they message you for the first time or after a long break. This allows them to feel welcomed, without you having to reply to each message immediately. <cmsannotation type="cmsannotation" annotationid="How to set up WhatsApp greeting message" comment="subhead" text="How to set up WhatsApp greeting message">How to set up WhatsApp greeting message</cmsannotation> <div type="image" title="G" msid="102900638" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;How to set up WhatsApp Business greeting message&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div> <ul><li>Open WhatsApp Business app on your phone and click on the three dots menu and then click on “Settings”.</li><li>Now, click on “Business tools” and then click on “Greeting message”.</li><li>Turn on the “Send greeting message” toggle.</li><li>Now, click on the edit button and customise the greeting message.</li><li>You can also select the recipients based on your preference.</li><li>Now, tap on “Save”.</li></ul><cmsannotation type="cmsannotation" annotationid="Away message" comment="subhead" text="Away message">Away message</cmsannotation> Away message is another helpful tool that allows you to inform your customers that you are currently unavailable to respond. This feature can be enabled in your non-working hours so that your customers know that they will have to wait a bit longer to get a reply. <cmsannotation type="cmsannotation" annotationid="How to set up WhatsApp away message" comment="subhead" text="How to set up WhatsApp away message">How to set up WhatsApp away message</cmsannotation> <div type="image" title="A" msid="102900663" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;How to set up WhatsApp Business away message&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div> <ul><li>Open WhatsApp Business app on your phone and click on the three dots menu and then click on “Settings”.</li><li>Now, click on “Business tools” and then click on “Away message”.</li><li>Turn on the “Send away message” toggle.</li><li>You can now customise the away message as per your business.</li><li>You can then change the schedule to match your non-working hours.</li></ul>Just like the greeting message, you can also select the recipients for away messages. SEE ALSO: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/personal-finance/news/how-to-find-unclaimed-bank-deposits-using-udgam-portal/articleshow/102830161.cms">Have unclaimed bank deposits? Here’s how to find it using UDGAM portal</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/news/indian-pc-market-declines-for-fourth-consecutive-quarter-reports-15-decline/articleshow/102822733.cms">Indian PC market declines for fourth consecutive quarter, reports 15% decline</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/mobile/news/india-crosses-the-2-billion-mark-in-its-journey-to-become-a-smartphone-manufacturing-powerhouse/articleshow/102760757.cms">India crosses the 2 billion mark in its journey to become a smartphone manufacturing powerhouse</a>

How to use auto-reply messages on WhatsApp Business

<ul><li><keyword id="790242" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="whatsapp" source="Orion">WhatsApp</keyword> is reportedly working on an update to disappearing messages.</li><li>This will prevent the app from saving media from disappearing messages.</li><li>Here’s everything you need to know about the upcoming update from WhatsApp.</li></ul>WhatsApp had started testing disappearing messages in 2020 and the complete rollout began last year. The feature was aimed at offering users more control over messages and text shared is retained by the other users. One of the flaws of this feature was that WhatsApp was auto-saving the media on the device, rendering the disappearing messages feature useless. According to a <a href="https://wabetainfo.com/whatsapp-is-introducing-some-changes-to-media-visibility/">report</a> by WaBetaInfo, WhatsApp is reportedly working on a new update that will rectify this. The new feature was spotted in the Android 2.22.4.14 and should be available to all users soon. WhatsApp will now stop auto-saving media from the chats and groups in which disappearing messages have been turned on. This will make the chats more secure and will make the disappearing messages feature more useful. <cmsannotation type="cmsannotation" annotationid="Here’s how you can still save photos and videos" comment="subhead" text="Here’s how you can still save photos and videos">Here’s how you can still save photos and videos</cmsannotation> However, users will still be able to manually save photos and videos from chats and groups where disappearing messages have been turned on. So, this feature is still not completely foolproof. Then again, you can always take a screenshot if you wish to retain media, something which cannot be done on apps like <keyword id="6358096" type="General" weightage="80" keywordseo="snapchat" source="Orion">Snapchat</keyword> as they inform the sender that you have taken a screenshot. <cmsannotation type="cmsannotation" annotationid="Other upcoming features" comment="subhead" text="Other upcoming features">Other upcoming features</cmsannotation> A recent <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/apps/news/whatsapp-might-soon-limit-forwarding-messages-in-groups-to-curb-the-spread-of-misinformation/articleshow/90634763.cms">report</a> has revealed that WhatsApp is also working on a feature that will limit the number of times you can send a forwarded message to group chats to one. This is aimed at reducing spam and preventing the spread of misinformation. The Facebook-owned messaging app is also working on bringing reactions to the app. This will allow you to reply to messages with reactions, similar to the reaction button on Facebook. SEE ALSO: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/apps/news/heres-how-to-use-one-whatsapp-account-on-two-phones/articleshow/90636271.cms">Here’s how to use one WhatsApp account on two phones</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/mobile/news/oneplus-10-smartphone-expected-to-be-launched-with-a-mediatek-dimensity-9000-chipset/articleshow/90720258.cms">OnePlus 10 expected to be launched with a MediaTek Dimensity 9000 chipset</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/news/meta-is-working-on-virtual-coins-for-its-apps-that-employees-have-nicknamed-zuck-bucks-a-report-says/articleshow/90709984.cms">Meta is working on virtual coins for its apps that employees have nicknamed 'Zuck Bucks', a report says</a>

WhatsApp will stop saving media from disappearing messages — here’s how you can still save photos and videos on your phone

<ul><li>Users can reply to stories with voice notes or images</li><li>Famous app developer Alessandro Paluzzi spots this new feature.</li><li><keyword id="7895310" type="General" weightage="50" keywordseo="latest-instagram" source="Orion">Latest Instagram</keyword> features and updates in 2022</li></ul><keyword id="819905" type="General" weightage="100" keywordseo="instagram" source="Orion">Instagram</keyword> is reportedly planning to introduce a new feature that will let the users reply to Stories via voice notes and images. Currently, you can reply to Instagram stories via GIF, text, or the available reactions. Alessandro Paluzzi, well known for reverse engineering apps, has spotted this feature. As per Paluzzi, the feature will allow users to send direct voice note replies and it is currently under development. <div type="twitter" handle="alex193a" handlename="Alessandro Paluzzi" image="http://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/1498236922724073474/2itncOmh_normal.jpg" favoritecount="109" retweetcount="29" status="#Instagram is working on the ability to reply to Stories with voice messages 👀 https://t.co/6fQNSxB04e" createdat="1648305467000" id="1507728527550038030"></div> It’s unclear by when can we see the feature debuting on Instagram as Meta hasn't announced anything about it yet. Paluzzi also noted that Meta is working on a feature that will give users the freedom to arrange their posts as they prefer, but details are limited about this one too. <keyword id="3127494" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="insta" source="Orion">Insta</keyword>gram has recently launched a feature where users get notified when someone likes their story. While for reactions to stories, users still get to see it in their direct messages. With this new feature, you can like Insta stories without pinging user’s direct messages. New Instagram updates and features in 2022 The Meta-owned platform has rolled out a bunch of other features like a chronological feed, story links, story auto-captions, social fundraising, subscriptions, and many more. In 2022, Instagram has introduced an enhanced tag feature, making it easier for creators to receive credit for their work. In Mexico, Canada, US, Instagram has rolled out long-awaited 3D avatars that will give new representation to users. The idea behind this feature is to take users across Metaverse with all their digital belongings. With the scheduling live in Instagram profile feature users are now able to separate their live stream from stories and posts. Subscription is a big feature for creators and influencers as it allows them to monetise their content. This feature is restricted to selected users and hopefully, it will be rolled out for a wider user base. See also: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/news/instagram-starts-testing-new-feature-to-support-social-movements-through-hashtags/articleshow/90513248.cms" data-type="tilCustomLink">Instagram starts testing a new feature to support social movements through hashtags</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/apps/news/whatsapp-is-testing-increasing-file-size-limit-from-100mb-to-2gb/articleshow/90487646.cms" data-type="tilCustomLink">You might soon be able to send up to 2GB of files on WhatsApp</a>

Instagram reportedly working on a feature that will let users reply to stories with voice notes and images

<keyword id="790242" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="WhatsApp">WhatsApp</keyword> on Thursday launched the much-awaited 'Disappearing Messages on its platform for both Android and iOS users that will automatically delete new messages sent to a chat after seven days when turned on. In a one-to-one chat, either person can turn disappearing messages on or off. In groups, admins will have the control on the new feature. "Our goal is to make conversations on WhatsApp feel as close to in-person as possible, which means they shouldn't have to stick around forever. That's why we're excited to introduce the option to use disappearing messages on WhatsApp," the company said in a statement. The Facebook-owned platform is starting with the seven-day limit "because we think it offers peace of mind that conversations aren't permanent, while remaining practical so you don't forget what you were chatting about". The feature will be rolling out to over two billion active users globally this month. The platform has over 400 million users in India. Once enabled, new messages sent in the individual or group chat will disappear after seven days. The most recent selection controls all messages in the chat. "This setting won't affect messages you previously sent or received in the chat. In an individual chat, either user can turn disappearing messages on or off. In a group chat, only group admins can turn disappearing messages on or off," WhatsApp informed. If a user doesn't open WhatsApp in the seven-day period, the message will disappear. However, the preview of the message might still be displayed in notifications until WhatsApp is opened. "When you reply to a message, the initial message is quoted. If you reply to a disappearing message, the quoted text might remain in the chat after seven days". If a disappearing message is forwarded to a chat with disappearing messages off, the message won't disappear in the forwarded chat. "If a user creates a backup before a message disappears, the disappearing message will be included in the backup. Disappearing messages will be deleted when a user restores from a backup," WhatsApp explained. WhatsApp said that people should only use disappearing messages with trusted individuals. For example, it's possible for someone to forward or take a screenshot of a disappearing message and save it before it disappears. "Copy and save content from the disappearing message before it disappears. Take a photo of a disappearing message with a camera or other device before it disappears," the company advised. By default, media you receive in WhatsApp will be automatically downloaded to your photos. If disappearing messages are turned on, media sent in the chat will disappear, but will be saved on the phone if auto-download is on. SEE ALSO: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/finance/banks/news/rbi-and-indian-banks-wait-as-supreme-court-adjourns-loan-moratorium-hearing-to-november-18/articleshow/79057919.cms">RBI and banks caught in the crosshairs as the Supreme Court adjourns loan moratorium hearing for a second time to November 18</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/stock-market/news/sbi-share-price-rises-over-6-after-strong-earnings-with-analysts-pegging-it-to-be-the-first-to-recover-among-public-sector-banks/articleshow/79055329.cms">SBI rallies over 6% after strong earnings with analysts pegging it to be the first to recover among public sector banks</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/policy/foreign-policy/news/donald-trump-vs-joe-biden-us-election-result-and-relations-with-india-and-pm-modi/articleshow/79022098.cms">If Joe Biden wins, he’ll be the third US president to deal with Modi — Here’s how that could play out</a>

WhatsApp launches new tool that makes week-old unread messages disappear

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Justin Sullivan/Getty ImagesFacebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg speaks during the F8 Facebook Developers conference on May 1, 2018 in San Jose, California.</div></div></div><ul><li>Facebook kicked off its big annual conference F8 on Tuesday, but there was something noticeably missing from its presentation: The News Feed.</li><li>While Mark Zuckerberg and execs talked up talked up the possibilities of everything from Instagram stories to virtual reality, the News Feed - the core of the current Facebook experience - didn't get much love.</li><li>The News Feed has caused constant headaches for the company around fake news and Russian disinformation campaigns, and Facebook is now diversifying its core business to focus less on the feature.</li><li>Facebook is stepping back from providing tools to post in the public eye, and it points to a future in which the News Feed is less important than ever.</li></ul> Facebook has a message for the world: We're back, baby.On Tuesday, CEO Mark Zuckerberg took to the stage for the keynote presentation at the company's annual F8 developer conference. Confident and <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/mark-zuckerberg-jokes-about-congressional-testimony-2018-5">cracking jokes </a>, the 33-year-old executive seemed far more at ease than he ever did during his marathon Congressional testimony last month.The social network is attempting to shift the conversation past the Cambridge Analytica scandal and the related privacy woes that have dominated headlines recently. <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/facebook-f8-event-live-coverage-2018-5/#oculus-go-is-shipping-today-23">To this end, it made a bevy of big new announcements at the first day of the conference</a> - from a dating app that will rival Tinder, to wild new virtual reality features.But there was one key Facebook product that was almost entirely absent from the speeches and announcements by Zuckerberg and other executives: The News Feed.News Feed sits at the core of the traditional Facebook experience. It's what you see when you open the app, a literal feed of news from all your friends. But it's also a double-edged sword. Though wildly successful, it has created huge issues for the company - including the spread of fake news and the spread of Russian disinformation in the wake of the 2016 US election.Smarting from successive crises, Facebook has already made significant changes to the News Feed, reducing the prominence of news outlets and introducing further context in the feed while cracking down on misinformation.Early in his speech, Zuckerberg recapped these changes among the others it is making as it attempts to fix its laundry list of mistakes. But there was little in the way of new announcements around the News Feed.Just look at what did get announced on Tuesday:<ul><li>Instagram is overhauling its entire Explore section, sticking augmented reality features in its camera, letting developers integrate with its Stories feature, and <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/instagram-getting-video-chat-feature-2018-5">adding group video chats</a>.</li><li>Messenger is adding real-time language translation, AI-powered auto-replies to help small businesses, and semi-gimmicky augmented reality objects that brands can send in messages. Plus, it teased the <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-messenger-redesign-2018-5">major redesign</a> it has in the works. </li><li>WhatsApp is gaining group video calling, third-party stickers, and new tools for big businesses to access the platform and handle customer messages.</li><li>Oculus, Facebook's virtual reality division, announced the launch of the <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-vr-headset-oculus-go-review-2018-4">$199 Oculus Go headset</a>. It also teased some wild tech that lets you recreate virtual spaces using old videos.</li></ul>Meanwhile, the main Facebook app got a few notable updates, chief among them a <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-dating-tinder-match-group-iac-response-2018-5">new dating service</a> - news of which sent the stock of Tinder's parent company plummeting. It is also introducing <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-testing-downvote-button-2018-2">upvotes and downvotes</a> that let users vote on comments Reddit-style, and making Groups its own tab in the app. But the public News Feed itself got very little attention. One of the only announcements directly concerning it was the ability to share augmented reality objects in posts with friends, the ultimate utility of which remains to be seen.Part of this absence of news seems to be a result of the last news cycles of the last few months: Under intense pressure from both media and government, Facebook has been more focused on fixing the News Feed that exists, rather than promising any monumental changes to the technology. But it also points to a broader shift in how Facebook is diversifying its business. The company is no longer a single, monolithic social network - it is a whole suite of disparate apps and service. While the core Facebook service still makes the lion's share of money for the company, Instagram is growing fast, <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-04-10/instagram-looks-like-facebook-s-best-hope">and stands to contribute 18% of the company's overall revenues in 2018</a>.Facebook is now eyeing up the financial possibilities of its other apps. WhatsApp's changes open the door to larger businesses using the platform. The Oculus Go slowly nudges virtual reality closer to proper mainstream adoption, which brings with it the same kind of opportunities that Apple and Google enjoy with smartphones. The last few years burned Facebook, and Zuckerberg and other executives now freely admit they weren't ready for how their platform would be misused. The ultimate result: Facebook seems to be focusing more on products that foster person-to-person and small-group communications, and moves away a little from the grand bazaar that is the News Feed.By broadening its business, Facebook is making sure it isn't keeping all its eggs in its basket - and lessening its reliance on a product that has brought it no end of trouble. <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-iphone-battery-dead-replacement-difficult-hard-2018-3">Why Apple makes it so hard to get a new iPhone battery</a></h3> <div> </div> </div>

One thing was missing from Mark Zuckerberg's big speech - and it signals a major shift for Facebook

<a href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Peru-Virus-Outbreak/d005dfe383444e2f83d4d4e7c015770e/7/0">Rodrigo Abd/AP</a>People wearing masks walk through the Lima, Peru airport on Friday. On Sunday, the country closed its borders for 15 days.<ul class="summary-list"><li>The coronavirus outbreak has caused some countries to completely close their borders, trapping American tourists abroad in places like Honduras, Peru, and Morocco.</li><li>These trapped Americans have been speaking to news outlets, saying the US government has done little to help them get home.</li><li>An anonymous State Department official told Bloomberg on Tuesday that US citizens should not expect help getting them home, like the help given earlier to Americans in Wuhan.</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/?hprecirc-bullet">Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories</a>.</li></ul>Possibly thousands of American tourists have been stranded abroad thanks to coronavirus travel restrictions, and an anonymous State Department official says they shouldn't expect the US government's help getting them home.As the world tries to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, a few countries have closed their borders entirely.That has left "perhaps thousands" of Americans, according to NBC News estimates, trapped abroad in locked-down countries, which include Honduras, Peru, and Morocco.US citizens trapped in these countries spoke to <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/coronavirus-americans-abroad-scramble-get-home-n1161576">NBC News</a> and <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/17/politics/americans-stranded-in-peru/index.html">CNN</a>, pointing out that the US government has done little to help them.On Tuesday, a State Department official, speaking anonymously, told <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-17/americans-stuck-abroad-told-not-to-wait-for-u-s-assistance" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Bloomberg</a> that these citizens shouldn't expect the government's help getting them home. This appears to be a reversal from the aid the department offered Americans abroad early in the outbreak, when the government chartered flights out of Wuhan, China.CNN spoke to several Americans trapped in Peru, where the president instituted a 15-day border closure on Sunday. All said they had reached out to the State Department, but received "minimal to no response."Jesse Curry, who is staying with family in Peru, said he tried and failed to book a flight as soon as he heard the news Monday morning. Since then, he's had a tough time getting in contact with the State Department."I received one response to a tweet; otherwise it's been email auto replies and forever-ringing phones," he said. "Even the emergency number just rang and rang."On Monday, the US Embassy in Peru said that "American citizens who have not been able to reschedule their flights out of Peru should arrange lodging for the duration of the quarantine period."Some of the trapped Americans in Peru have joined a WhatsApp group where they are keeping each other updated.<a href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/China-Outbreak-US-Evacuees/b95cf83bf11244f49635e7378d6330ba/3/0">Ringo H.W. Chiu/AP</a>An airplane that was used to evacuated Americans out of China is seen on January 29, 2020, at an air base in Riverside, California."Currently, we are emailing and calling our states' politicians, and spreading the word through social media in hopes of gathering attention," Daniel Voznyarskiy, a Washington resident stuck in Peru, told CNN."Our biggest worry is that these next 15 days won't end there, and that there may be an extension, noting the country's inability to handle such cases," Voznyarskiy added.NBC News spoke to Americans experiencing a similar situation in Morocco.Phil and Jerri McMannis from Boston, Massachusetts, told NBC News they have been trying to get home from Morocco since Friday, when an impending border closure was announced. Though the border closure did not go in to effect until Sunday, the couple struggled to get a flight."The local people are offering to help and are talking to us, but our own government has said nothing," McMannis told NBC News, adding that he had reached out to the US Embassy and his senators.Mary Marland of Colorado flew to Morocco on Friday for a wedding as the announcement was being made. She and her family tried to rebook to leave Sunday, but ran into the same problems as the McMannises."Information is unreliable. Every cancellation happened without a rebooking option, and I've spent hours on the phone will the airlines," Marland said.Now she's worried about begin stuck at their Tangiers hotel longterm, where breakfast for the family costs $90."I am terrified of the idea that this is going to go on beyond this week," she said.When NBC News reached out to the State Department for comment on these cases on Tuesday, a spokesperson said that while the US government had evacuated hundreds of citizens in the last few weeks, "such flights do not reflect our standard practice and should not be relied upon as an option for US citizens abroad who may be impacted by the ongoing spread of COVID-19."However, after making that statement the US Embassy in Morocco confirmed that they were arranging 300 flights out of Agadir and Marrakesh to London in the following days.When reached for comment on Wednesday, a State Department spokesperson said that they had "no higher priority than the safety and security of US citizens overseas.""We are aware the governments of several countries have announced suspension of air travel. We are considering all options to assist U.S. citizens in these countries," the spokesperson wrote."We are continuously assessing travel conditions in all areas affected by COVID-19, and will continue to update our travel advisories and safety information for U.S. travelers as situations evolve."They offered the following advice to the American citizens in the impacted countries:<ul><li>Monitor the relevant embassy website for information</li><li>Enroll at <a href="https://step.state.gov/">STEP.state.gov</a> to receive updates</li><li>Follow the advice of the <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/index.html">CDC</a> and local health authorities</li><li>Check with your airlines for updates</li><li>Monitor the State Department COVID-19 <a href="https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/traveladvisories/ea/covid-19-information.html">website</a></li></ul><ul class="read-more-links"><li>Read more:</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/pandemics-that-changed-the-course-of-human-history-coronavirus-flu-aids-plague?r=US&amp;IR=T">11 pandemics that changed the course of human history, from the Black Death to HIV/AIDS - to coronavirus</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/tourism-industry-asking-150-billion-aid-coronavirus-jobs-2020-3?r=US&amp;IR=T">Tourism execs are asking for a $150 billion bailout, saying the economic impact to the travel industry will be worse than the 9/11 attacks and the 2008 recession combined</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-talk-to-older-family-members-about-the-coronavirus-2020-3?r=US&amp;IR=T">Here's the conversation I had to get through to my older family members about coronavirus - and why it's important to redefine 'acts of love' during a pandemic</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-anxiety-therapy-advice-self-care-2020-3?r=US&amp;IR=T">Why you shouldn't judge yourself for having coronavirus anxiety, according to a therapist</a></li></ul> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/economist-weighted-voting-could-help-save-us-democracy-2018-5">A top economist has a radical plan to change the way Americans vote: weighted voting</a></h3>

Americans trapped abroad by coronavirus travel bans say the government isn't doing enough to get them home

Getty Images/Spencer PlattKen Smith and Dr. Matthew Phillips were standing on the sidelines of their 16-year-old sons' lacrosse game when they both noticed the same thing - every one of the teens in the stands was looking down at their phones instead of at the action in front of them. The moment made clear to both of them just how addicted kids were to their phones. And it served as a kind of inspiration for <a href="https://www.socialjudo.com">SocialJudo</a>, a smartphone monitoring app the duo created and recently launched. Both Smith and Philips had both heard the horror stories about teens and their smartphones. From the moment kids receive their first phones, they face threats including cyberbullying, distracted driving, and sexual predators.The two dad had each separately looked at the options for monitoring their teens' smartphones, but neither was impressed. The typical monitoring methods and apps involved breaking into teens' phones and going through all their data. Neither Smith nor Philips wanted to spy on his kid; each thought that looking at his kid's texts was akin to rummaging through his bedroom drawers. So they set out to create an alternative and sketched out what they as fathers wanted from a smartphone monitoring app. The result is SocialJudo, an app parents install on their kids' phones. The app logs kids' texts and calls, and allows their parents to monitor their activity on social apps like Instagram, Snapchat and WhatsApp. Parents can also configure SocialJudo to alert them when it sees certain phrases or their their kids access particular websites. The app was launched June 1 and has over 200 families using it. SocialJudo recognizes some 50,000 slang terms for different behaviors like pot smoking or sex. Parents can set the app to send them alerts whenever their child receives or sends a text with one of the flagged terms. Parents can then view the texts in the SocialJudo app on their phones. The app also allows parents to track their kid's location and to set up geofences that alert them when their kid goes into an area they've labeled off limits.Before SocialJudo, neither Smith nor Phillips had ever developed an app. Philips is a brain surgeon, and Smith works with RFID technology in cars."It's felt like the biggest, longest, fastest roller coaster ride without a seatbelt," said Phillips of the journey so far. While other startups grow with an eye on the bottom line, Smith and Phillips are trying to stay focused on the needs of parents. Both of their sons got a driving permit recently and each quickly started asking to borrow a car. That got Phillips and Smith thinking about adding new capabilities to SocialJudo. They now have in development a texting-and-driving feature that will automatically mute all calls (except for the ones from Mom and Dad, of course) and send an auto reply to any incoming text messages. <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/dangers-toddlers-using-smartphones-dan-siegel-2015-11">Your smartphone may be stunting your child's development</a></h3> Please enable Javascript to watch this video

From dads to startup founders - meet the duo behind SocialJudo, a new teen monitoring app

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image">Justin Sullivan</div></div></div>Google revealed <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/everything-google-announced-at-io-keynote">a handful of slick new products this week</a> that showed off its impressive artificial intelligence and machine learning tech chops. Its <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/google-assistant-2016-5">new conversational assistant</a>, for example, will take its traditional search product to the next level, letting users ask it questions, find suggestions, or book services through text chat in its <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/google-launches-allo-2016-5">new messaging app Allo</a> or voice, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/google-home-voice-assistant-2016-5">in its new smart speaker, Home. </a>Google's building on many years of research, development, and data collecting here and it shows. Although Home is essentially a follow-up to Amazon's Echo speaker, Google has much more experience with voice search and natural language processing. Ask Home a question, like "How tall is Steph Curry?" and you can follow-up with "What's his jersey number?" and Home will know who you're still talking about, where Alexa can only handle single queries. "Our ability to do conversational understanding is far ahead of what other assistants can do," Google CEO Sundar Pichai boasted of Google's technology. "We're an order of magnitude ahead of everyone else."But despite Google's behind-the-scenes smarts, the company will have some serious challenges ahead to get people actually using its new products. <h2>Playing catch up </h2>For one, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/google-io-announcements-didnt-break-new-ground-2016-5">they're already late to the game</a> and not actually available yet.Jan Dawson, chief analyst at Jackdaw Research, sums it up <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/googles-new-products-reflect-push-into-machine-learning-1463598395?mod=e2twd">for The Wall Street Journal:</a>"The technology looks good in principle, but there's a significant risk that Google is coming into some of these markets too late to make a difference."Assistant, Home, and Allo all nebulously launch "later this year." When they do finally hit the real world, Allo in particular will have to stand out in an already very crowded messaging space. One developer I talked to at IO highlighted the challenge perfectly when he sheepishly told me how he'd been peer-pressured into buying an iPhone because his loved ones used iMessage. It was easier for him to switch phones than to convert them to an operating system-agnostic chat app like WhatsApp.That's an extreme example but the point stands: messaging apps aren't useful if your friends haven't downloaded them. <h2>Making the benefits worth the creep factor</h2>To overcome that hurdle and convince people to convert from Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, Snapchat, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/google-wont-kill-hangouts-app-2016-5">Hangouts</a>, or whatever else, as their main means of messaging, Google will need to convince people that having AI manage your life is <a href="https://twitter.com/search?f=tweets&amp;vertical=default&amp;q=allo%20creepy&amp;src=typd">more convenient than it is creepy. </a>At the ire of some privacy advocates, you'll have to <a href="http://arstechnica.com/security/2016/05/incensing-critics-google-engineer-ends-push-for-crypto-only-setting-in-allo/">sacrifice the end-to-end encryption</a> that's a staple in iMessage or WhatsApp to get the full benefits of Assistant (though Allo does have a fully encrypted incognito mode). The allure of Assistant is that it can make <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/google-launches-allo-2016-5">messaging more productive</a> by auto-suggesting replies based on your speech patterns and through image recognition and "remembering" things about you to tailor recommendations (for example, it could know you're vegan and suggest restaurants accordingly).But do you want Google <a href="http://www.theverge.com/2016/5/19/11713786/google-allo-every-keystroke-a-google-search">becoming your voice</a>? What's the <a href="http://time.com/4341201/google-io-home-allo/">cost of convenience</a>?As <a href="http://archive.is/H8LpW#selection-197.0-197.288">Apple blogger Marco Arment points out</a>, Google's vision of the future has missed the mark before:As we hurtle towards a future potentially powered by artificial-intelligence and we grapple with what that means for our daily interactions, Google needs to prove that the benefits it can bring us from dancing so close to <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/charliewarzel/how-google-leapfrogged-the-creepy-line?utm_term=.qdW0AEBx8a#.jizJO7roLy">that "creepy line"</a> are worth it. That's the only way it can make up ground after launching too late. <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-spacex-falcon-9-rocket-cargo-launch-landing-video-2016-5">SpaceX made history again - watch its rocket deploy a satellite and land safely back on Earth</a></h3> <div> <div> <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="RvZzFjMzE6mlSBqKY6CFLTt-oCLoE8Fo" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div> </div> </div> </div>

Google's new products prove it has still the best tech chops - but it might not matter

<ul class="summary-list"><li>More than 13,000 Americans have been stranded abroad as countries close their borders and restrict travel to try to quell the coronavirus pandemic.</li><li>Americans stranded in Peru and India told Business Insider that the US embassies there have failed to adequately communicate with citizens, often giving outdated or even incorrect information.</li><li>The State Department told Business Insider it "has continued vigorously to prosecute its historic mission to bring Americans home from hard-to-reach areas and cities hardest-hit by the virus."</li><li>Left to their own devices, citizens have begun organizing online independently of the US government to try and get home.</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/?hprecirc-bullet">Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories</a>.</li></ul>When Jesse Curry and his family arrived in Lima, Peru, on March 13, the Florida native said life in the South American city seemed impervious to the novel coronavirus without a mask in sight. When they woke up on March 15, that all changed.That Sunday, Peru's president, Martin Vizcarra, issued a 15-day nationwide state of emergency and abruptly closed the borders to halt the spread of the novel virus, leaving thousands of foreign tourists stranded in the country.International border closures and travel restrictions have left more than 13,000 Americans stranded in foreign countries across the world, the <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/international/489143-state-department-under-fire-as-americans-remain-stranded-abroad?fbclid=IwAR0Hj4YhK-C65kd5zGcVy32WwRbVytcTyM6pTUHsFMEL5VdVz3FISuyvRzw">Hill reported</a>. Since the early days of the outbreak, the State Department has repatriated more than 5,000 US citizens from 17 countries.US travelers stuck in Peru and India told Business Insider the US embassies have not been forthcoming, and the little information they have received is vague, outdated, or even wrong.But some US embassy employees have pointed the finger at the State Department. One foreign service officer told <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/20/politics/state-department-coronavirus-confusion/index.html">CNN</a> that "every embassy is just making it up as we go along" because the agency hasn't given them better guidance."The State Department is rising to meet the historic challenge posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, every day, all over the world," a spokesperson for the State Department told Business Insider. "The State has never before undertaken an evacuation effort of such geographic breadth, scale, and complexity in its more than 230-year history."Left to their own devices, Curry and about 2,500 other Americans citizens stranded in Peru have resorted to organizing and creating their own information networks online."Without any information to make decisions, people don't know if they're going to be here a week, two weeks, a month, two months, three months - and it's really unnerving," Curry told Business Insider.<h2>Americans stuck abroad say the US embassies have been no help</h2>Curry, who works as a software developer, told Business Insider that he first discovered that foreign tourists were rushing to fly home before the borders shut on March 16. He immediately reached out to the US Embassy in Lima to see how his family, including his mother, wife, and two children, could get home to Tampa, Florida. With only a vague auto-reply message, he called its emergency line to no avail."Since then, the communication from them has been extremely limited and the information is often outdated if not just completely wrong," Curry said. "Right now the US embassy is closed as far as I can tell. Nobody's really answering at all."New Yorker Eliana Ojeda and her four-year-old son came to visit family in Peru and are now stuck at her aunt's house."I only speak for myself, but the USA embassy in Lima sucks. You can't do anything through the phone, only by email, and it took days for a response," Ojeda told Business Insider.An American living at the center of the coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan, China, expressed nearly identical frustrations with the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/americans-center-wuhan-coronavirus-outbreak-are-outraged-with-the-us-2020-1">US embassy's lack of communication in the early days of the outbreak</a>.In the absence of the US embassy, Americans citizens stranded in the country began organizing on WhatsApp and in a Facebook group called "<a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/195698985200275/">Americans Stuck in Peru</a>" to take stock of how many were stuck in the country and share updates. Americans have also created Facebook groups in other countries, including <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/3074503132580088/about/">Ecuador</a> and India.Peter Barbot, a 29-year-old scuba diving instructor stranded in New Delhi, India, said he contacted the US embassy about India's ban on all international flights to the country, but also received little information and vague, uninformative messages. So he also started an "Americans Stuck in India" Facebook group.Curry said he's helped other Americans in Peru find pharmacies to fill prescriptions, sign up for the STEP service online, and register for the US-organized flight when the site kept crashing on mobile devices. <a href="https://step.state.gov/">STEP</a> is a service the State Department offers to keep Americans informed of travel advisories when they're in other countries.Although the embassy now sends daily updates to those enrolled in the STEP program, Curry and others say there is still no clear answer on when they will be able to return home."If you look at the flights that people have been able to book that have later been canceled, it really paints a picture that we could be here indefinitely," Curry said. "The communication from the State Department is not helping that at all."<h2>One American said the State Department is doing what it can and the real problem is 'pushy Americans'</h2>Michael and Anne Goins were ready to board a bus tour of Machu Picchu the day the country's borders closed.Instead of exploring the Incan ruins, the husband and wife from North Carolina headed straight to Cusco, Peru, to try to catch a plane back to the United States - and after 2.5 hours of waiting, they were 20 people away from getting on the last plane out.The 65-year-old optometrist said he's also had difficulty getting in touch with the staff at the American embassy. But Goins came to the State Department's defense, suggesting the real problem was "pushy" Americans."We've all tried to reach out to them - they're short-staffed because they've evacuated [essential employees]" Michael told Business Insider. "I'm a little frustrated with the people that piss and moan. We live in an instantaneous society and everyone wants this stuff done yesterday. This isn't how it works. Everything takes time."Although Goins had faith that the federal government would find a way to repatriate its citizens, he expressed anxiety about Anne running out of her medication, which is unavailable in the country. His private practice and his employees in Wilmington, North Carolina, also hang in the balance with Michael well-past his allotted vacation time."This was a dream trip for us," Michael said. "But we'd like to get home now."The first US evacuation flights out of Peru left the country nearly a week after the country abruptly closed its borders, including medically vulnerable citizens and Peace Corps members.President Donald Trump, Vice President Mike Pence, and State Department officials made conflicting statements about organizing military transport to evacuate citizens in Peru, but the US ultimately decided not to send military aircraft on Saturday, the <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/americans-stranded-after-peru-closes-borders-over-coronavirus-11584827948">Wall Street Journal</a> reported.On March 24, Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida announced that a "competent official" was being sent to Peru to take over evacuation operations after he complained to the federal agency that "the Ambassador essentially abandoned the post to return to Washington," the <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/international/489256-senior-state-department-official-headed-to-peru-to-bring-home-stranded">Hill</a> reported.<h2>Flight cancellations and border closures complicate Americans' ability to get home</h2><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-airlines-flight-shutdown-us-covid19-2020-3">Airlines have canceled thousands of flights</a> as the coronavirus has wreaked havoc on the travel industry. At least <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-global-airlines-stopping-flights-suspending-operations-2020-3">55 global airlines</a> have completely stopped flying scheduled flights due to travel bans, airspace closures, and low demand for travel.That means, in many cases, the US government evacuating its citizens could be some people's best hope right now.Curry and other Americans received an email that the US was working on getting flights for citizens if they register for them. Despite registering his family almost immediately, Curry said he has yet to receive any confirmation or when his family could get a flight back home.While he and his family remain fairly comfortable, another citizen from Missouri, Zoe Parham, told Business Insider she and a friend hitched rides and rode buses from a small rural town to get back to Cusco or Lima so they could try and make a flight home. But her flight and many others were canceled without notice after Peru tightened travel restrictions.Ojeda said she was told Americans had to sign a waiver agreeing to pay the US back for their evacuation flights home. Meanwhile, scammers have preyed on the desperation to leave the country offering fake private charter flights out of Peru that often don't exist."We ask [the US] for help, but they charge us for the flight for more then $800 per person," Ojeda said. "We are trying to survive in a country that is not even ours, but then we need to pay the US to take us back home."The State Department didn't immediately respond to a request for comment on charging citizens for flights home.The agency was able to bring home more than 1,000 Americans in Morocco five days after the country also abruptly closed its border on March 15, The Hill reported. A military charter evacuated the US women's football team in Honduras, but hundreds of Americans are still in the country."The State Department has continued vigorously to prosecute its historic mission to bring Americans home from hard-to-reach areas and cities hardest-hit by the virus," a spokesperson for the State Department told Business Insider.The agency said it's done what it can in the mass hysteria prompted by the novel virus, but that wasn't comforting to Curry, whose family is still stuck in Peru."I think that the State Department's response thus far I would categorize as criminally incompetent," he said. "I don't think that I could see any way to handle a situation like this any worse."Get the latest <a href="/coronavirus-covid19">coronavirus analysis and research</a> from Business Insider Intelligence on how COVID-19 is impacting businesses.

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