MacRumors

Apple today seeded the fifth beta of iOS 10 to developers for testing purposes, one week after seeding the fourth beta and approximately two months after first unveiling the new operating system at its 2016 Worldwide Developers Conference.

iOS 10 beta 5 is available as an over-the-air download to those who installed the first four betas or the beta configuration profile and it's available for direct download via Apple's Developer Center.

iOS 10 is a major iOS update with a ton of new features and design tweaks, including a new Lock screen experience with 3D Touch-enabled notifications, a more easily accessible camera, a redesigned Control Center, and a new widgets screen. According to Apple, iOS 10 is the company's biggest iOS update ever released.

Over the beta testing period, Apple is tweaking the features introduced in iOS 10 to refine them ahead of the public release of the operating system. In iOS 10 beta 4, Apple introduced new emoji characters and a redesigned look for many existing emoji, a Control Center intro, new Accessibility features, changes to the Notification Center, and more. New changes found in the fifth iOS 10 beta will be listed below.

iOS 10 is currently available to developers and public beta testers, with a full public release planned for the fall. For full details on iOS 10, make sure to check out our iOS 10 roundup. To see what's new in iOS 10 beta 5, head over to our tidbits post where we've rounded up some of the most notable changes.

Last year, it was reported that Apple has poached Samsung engineers to develop battery technologies for its widely rumored electric vehicle, and now another unnamed South Korean company may be involved with the project.

Korean site ETNews now reports that a small Korean battery company, which comprises 20 or so employees described as "expert technologists in batteries," has been tapped to co-develop batteries for the so-called Apple Car.

Apple is planning to independently develop its own batteries for electric vehicles based on the Korean company's patented hollow battery technology, according to the report. They are described as cylindrical lithium-ion secondary batteries with a thickness of two fingers and uniquely hollow centers.

Because batteries create most heat from the center due to chemical reactions, this company has created batteries where air flow and cooling are smooth in the center of batteries and this can minimize installation of separate cooling device or a device that prevents over-heating. They are also advantageous in high output. By utilizing this space, it is easy to design parallel connection, which is to expand battery capacity, in these batteries.

The report does not disclose the company's name due to its recently signed non-disclosure agreement with Apple.

MacRumors went searching and uncovered a European Patent Office patent application for a hollow type secondary battery filed by Korean company Orange Power. According to its website, the company has 25 employees in R&D, and 33 total, which together with the patent application suggests it could be Apple's secretive partner. At this point, however, it remains purely speculation.

Apple recently appointed Bob Mansfield, a longtime senior executive at the company, to oversee development of the electric vehicle, said to be codenamed "Project Titan" internally. He is believed to lead a team of hundreds of engineers from the likes of Tesla, Ford, GM, battery company A123 Systems, and elsewhere. The vehicle could be street-ready between 2019 and 2021, according to various reports.

Apple Granted Patent for 'Articulated Vehicle'

Update: The "articulated vehicle" patent assigned to Apple was actually a typographical error made by the law firm handling the submission for BAE Systems. A Request for Certificate of Correction has been filed by the law firm to correct the error.

Upon reviewing the above-identified patent, Patentee noted a typographical error which should be corrected. Applicant erroneously listed the wrong Assignee on the Issue Fee Transmittal filed July 7, 2016. The assignment, noting the proper Assignee BAE SYSTMS HÄGGLUNDS AKTIEBOLAG, was submitted for recordation as set forth in 37 CFR 3.11 before issuance of the patent.

The error now sought to be corrected is inadvertent and of typographical nature, the correction of which does not constitute new matter or require reexamination.

Taiwanese manufacturer Foxconn is developing glass casings and OLED displays for smartphones in an attempt to secure orders for the tenth-anniversary iPhone next year, according to Japanese website Nikkei.

The report claims Foxconn has been developing glass chassis for at least one year, and developing its own OLED display technologies through its Sharp acquisition. It would be competing with Samsung, and China's Biel Crystal and Lens Technology, to win orders.

KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said Apple will switch to non-aluminum casing, with glass being the most likely candidate, for the majority of new iPhone models in 2017. Kuo and multiple other sources also expect next year's iPhone to have a thinner and lighter OLED display in a move away from LCDs. Earlier reports said Samsung would be a primary supplier of OLED panels for future iPhones.

Samsung's Galaxy S7 sets the benchmark for OLED-based smartphones, and makes a strong case for Apple's rumored shift towards the display technology. iPhones have used various LCD display technologies since the original model launched in 2007, but OLED panels are often thinner, brighter, and more energy efficient than their LCD counterparts. The technology, however, can be more expensive to produce.

Apple's tenth-anniversary iPhone is shaping up to be a significant upgrade, compared to the relatively incremental refresh expected from this year's iPhone 7. The rumored switch to glass casing and OLED display will mark the first major overhaul of Apple's smartphone since the iPhone 6 launched in late 2014, given that this year's iPhone is expected to retain an iPhone 6s-like design.

The FCC's enforcement bureau announced today it has reached a settlement with AT&T that will see the carrier pay $7.75 million for allowing scammers to charge thousands of customers approximately $9 per month for a sham directory assistance service.

AT&T has agreed to issue full refunds to all current and former customers who received unauthorized third-party charges from January 2012 onwards. The refunds are expected to total $6.8 million, while AT&T will also pay a $950,000 fine to the U.S. Treasury.

The scam was uncovered by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration while investigating two Cleveland-area companies Discount Directory, Inc. (DDI) and Enhanced Telecommunications Services (ETS) for drug-related crimes and money laundering. During the investigation, DEA officials discovered financial documents related to the scam that primarily targeted small businesses.

AT&T received a fee from the companies for each charge AT&T placed on its customers’ bills. Although DDI and ETS submitted charges for thousands of AT&T customers, they never provided any directory assistance service. Neither DDI, ETS, nor AT&T could show that any of AT&T’s customers agreed to be billed for the sham directory assistance service. Phone companies like AT&T have a responsibility to ensure third-party charges are legitimate and were approved by the consumer.

AT&T is required to cease billing for nearly all third-party products and services on its wireless bills, and can only reinstate charges of that kind with express informed consent from customers. The carrier also must revise its billing practices to ensure that third-party charges are clearly identified on bills, and offer a free service for customers to block third-party charges.

In 2014, AT&T similarly agreed to pay $105 million in fines and refunds for unauthorized third-party subscriptions and premium text messaging services. T-Mobile also reached a $90 million settlement with the FTC, which accused the carrier of "cramming" unauthorized SMS subscriptions like horoscopes on bills. The FCC has taken more than 30 enforcement actions against carriers for related cases since 2011.

Back in May, KGI analyst Ming-Chi Kuo reported that the next-generation MacBook Pro will include an OLED "touch bar" above the keyboard and Touch ID support, with a subsequent part leak of the machine's chassis supporting the idea of this touch bar replacing the current row of function keys.

A source who has provided reliable information in the past has informed us that the new MacBook Pro models, expected to be launched in the fall, will feature a Touch ID power button as well as the previously-reported OLED touch-sensitive function keys.

If placed in the power button, the fingerprint sensor would allow users to wake the MacBook Pro and authenticate its security in one touch, similar to waking up an iPhone by pressing the Home button while simultaneously activating Touch ID.

Beyond the Touch ID power button, the OLED touch panel is rumored to be contextual, displaying different controls and user prompts depending on which apps and programs are open on the MacBook Pro. Designer Martin Hajek created a few renders with the OLED panel earlier in the summer, but didn't include what the Touch ID button might look like.

With the announcement of macOS Sierra at WWDC this year, Apple introduced another way for users to gain access to their Macs while still keeping the device secure, called Auto Unlock. The feature works with an Apple Watch to automatically unlock a password-protected Mac when an authenticated and unlocked Apple Watch is nearby, so it would still only be available to those Mac users who also have an Apple Watch.

In addition to Touch ID and the OLED panel, the new MacBook Pro is expected to be slightly thinner than the current generation thanks to new metal injection mold-made hinges, have thinner speakers aligned on the side of the keyboard, and introduce support for USB-C. According to KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, the new MacBook Pro will be "the most significant upgrade ever undertaken by Apple."

The state of the current Mac lineup is causing turmoil for users interested in upgrading their machines on the eve of the big refresh this fall, but with no word yet from Apple, even the launch period is somewhat muddled. The new MacBooks could be revealed in September, alongside the iPhone 7 and new Apple Watch models (now believed to be split into two editions), but the company could also opt to hold refreshes for the Mac until a separate event later in the fall, perhaps in October.

After recording its first quarterly sales decline since 2003 this year, the doom and gloom sentiment surrounding Apple has reemerged. Some critics believe that Apple is doing too many things at once, or wrongly placing its focus on areas like Apple Watch bands rather than its core product lineup.

Apple's stock also remains down over 13 percent from its 52-week high, and investors perhaps have at least some reason for concern. Rumors suggest, for example, that the next iPhone will be an incremental improvement over the iPhone 6s, with more significant changes not coming until 2017.

In a new Fast Company interview alongside CEO Tim Cook, Apple services chief Eddy Cue acknowledged that technology companies are "only as good as the last thing" they did.

"Look," says Cue, who somehow manages to look both like a man who just woke up and a compact ball of perpetual energy, "one thing you know if you’ve been in technology a while, you’re only as good as the last thing you did. No one wants an original iPod. No one wants an iPhone 3GS."

Cook admitted that Apple can "sometimes fall short," but indirectly added that the "Apple is doomed" narrative has existed during his entire 18-year span at the company.

"Is Apple making more mistakes than we used to? I don’t have a tracker on that." […] "We have never said that we’re perfect," he continues. "We’ve said that we seek that. But we sometimes fall short." […]

"What tends to happen with Apple, not just today but in the 18 years I’ve been here," says Cook, "is that invariably some people compare what we’re doing now to a vision or a product that somebody says they will create in the future."

Fortunately for Cook, he said he doesn't "read all the coverage on Apple that there is," and instead focuses on pushing the company into a future that is bigger and broader. "I want Apple to be here, you know, forever," he said.

As Cue says, grinning at the ambition: "We want to be there from when you wake up till when you decide to go to sleep." Cook himself is only slightly less brash. "Our strategy is to help you in every part of your life that we can," he says, "whether you’re sitting in the living room, on your desktop, on your phone, or in your car."

Earlier this year, Above Avalon analyst Neil Cybart said Apple is on track to spend a record $10 billion on research and development this year, up nearly 30 percent from 2015, and significantly more than the little over $3 billion per year it was spending on R&D just four years ago.

Cybart said the increased spending undoubtedly points towards development of the widely rumored Apple Car, suggesting that the company will pivot into the automobile industry. But if Cook's recent teaser about "great innovation in the pipeline" is any indication, Apple could have other plans in store too.

Apple Maps and Public Beta Testing

One other interesting anecdote in the wide-ranging interview: Apple Maps is the reason why iOS public beta testing exists.

Apple now does public beta testing of its most significant software projects, something that Jobs never liked to do. In 2014, the company asked users to test run its Yosemite upgrade to OS X. Last year, it introduced beta testing of iOS, which is the company’s most important operating system. "The reason you as a customer are going to be able to test iOS," Cue says, "is because of Maps."

Full-length interview: Playing The Long Game Inside Tim Cook's Apple

Just a month before the iPhone 7's expected unveiling, a few new images allegedly depicting the device's bare main logic board have surfaced on Chinese microblogging site Weibo (via Steve Hemmerstoffer), showing the major part before any of the device's chips have been added onto the circuit board.

Not much context is given in the images thanks to the lack of chips, but it is widely believed that the 2016 iPhone will house a next-generation A10 processor, produced solely with a variant of TSMC's 16-nanometer manufacturing process used on the A9. Although Apple picked TSMC for its 10nm production, that process is believed to begin ramping up towards the end of 2016 and beginning of 2017.

In June, Weibo was the source of another internal iPhone 7 leak that showed dual SIM trays as a possibility for this year's iPhone. Today's logic board leak, however, shows a space for the SIM slot that appears nearly identical to current iPhones and smaller than the leaked dual-SIM tray, suggesting that the dual-SIM leak was also false.

The iPhone 7 and 7 Plus will feature a flush pressure-sensitive home button in place of the physical switch button found on previous iPhones, according to a Bloomberg report filed this morning.

Citing people familiar with the matter, the news outlet said that the new models will have a pressure-sensitive button "similar to trackpads in the latest MacBook line" that will provide feedback to the user via a vibrating haptic sensation instead of a true physical click.

Last month, Mac Otakara cited unspecified supply chain sources that it claimed confirmed the veracity of an April Stormmedia report suggesting the same thing. MacRumors has also heard the same rumor from DigiTimes and analysts at Cowen and Company, but Bloomberg's report today substantially increases the likelihood that the rumor is indeed accurate.

In addition, the article claims that the dual cameras now widely expected on the larger iPhone 7 will produce brighter photos with more detail, "according to a person who has used a prototype version of the upcoming device".

Both sensors, which each capture color differently, simultaneously take a picture, and the device produces a single, merged photograph, said the person.

The dual system sharpens photos taken in low-light environments, the person said. The combination of the merged photos from the two camera sensors also allows users to zoom while retaining more clarity, the person added.

Elsewhere, Bloomberg noted that the new iPhones will have no antenna bands running across the back of the handsets, and Apple will remove the headphone jack in favor of connectivity via Bluetooth and the Lightning port. That will make room for a second speaker, said the paper's source, who preferred to remain anonymous.

Other rumored features for the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus not included in the article include a faster TSMC-made A10 processor, faster LTE and Wi-Fi, a slightly larger battery, and a minimum 32 GB of base storage.

Apple is expected to launch the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus next month. Pre-orders could begin Friday, September 9, ahead of retail availability on Friday, September 16, according to noted leaker Evan Blass.