Technologies

Google to require vaccinations as Silicon Valley rethinks return-to-office policies

Apple, Facebook, Twitter and Netflix are also updating their COVID-19 protocols.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai on Wednesday told employees the company will require vaccinations for employees working on the company’s campuses, a move that comes as the highly contagious delta variant of the COVID-19 virus spreads across the world. The policy will begin in the US and expand to other regions over the next few months.

Pichai also delayed the company’s mandatory return to office to Oct. 18, pushing back the date from an earlier goal of September.

«Getting vaccinated is one of the most important ways to keep ourselves and our communities healthy in the months ahead,» Pichai wrote in an email to employees. «I know that many of you continue to deal with very challenging circumstances related to the pandemic.»

Pichai said the policy will be implemented according to local conditions, and he would share guidance and exceptions for people who can’t get vaccinated due to medical or other protected reasons.

The announcement comes as regions around the world have seen coronavirus cases surge due to the delta variant. In California, Google’s home state, some counties have mandated masks again for people gathering indoors.

Google isn’t alone in re-evaluating its return-to-work protocols because of the latest wave of the pandemic. Apple said last week that it would also postpone its date for returning to the office by a month. More than half of Apple’s stores will require customers and employees to wear masks, regardless of vaccination status, starting on Wednesday, according to Bloomberg.

Facebook also said on Wednesday that it would require workers on its US campuses be vaccinated. Netflix will require vaccinations for casts of its US productions, Deadline reported. Twitter said it’s closing the company’s opened offices in New York and San Francisco and pausing future office re-openings. The company said that the office closures are temporary but they don’t have a new timeline for reopening. «We’re continuing to closely monitor local conditions and make necessary changes that prioritize the health and safety of our Tweeps,» a Twitter spokesperson said in a statement.

Uber on Thursday also pushed its global return to office date back to Oct. 25, a delay from its original goal of September. In an internal note to employees, which an Uber representative shared with CNET, CEO Dara Khosrowshahi added that «local circumstances will continue to dictate when it makes sense to bring employees back in a given city,» and that some offices will remain open for employees to come into voluntarily, if local health guidelines allow. Uber will also require employees be fully vaccinated to come into the office, beginning in the US before expanding to other countries. In addition, all Uber employees around the world must now wear masks if they’re in the office.

Google’s return-to-office policies have caused major tension among the tech giant’s employees, who have complained the rules are applied unevenly. Earlier this month, CNET reported that Urs Hölzle, one of Google’s most senior and longest tenured executives, told employees he’d be working remotely from New Zealand. The announcement rankled lower-level workers who called the relocation «hypocritical» because they said he had in the past been unsupportive or remote work.

CNET’s Queenie Wong and Abrar Al-Heeti contributed to this report.

Technologies

Little Caesars Wants ChatGPT to Order Your Pizza for You

You can personalize your pie and place your order without leaving the chatbot.

When it comes to building the perfect pizza, you need perfectly structured crust, quality cheese, well-seasoned sauce and fresh, delicious toppings. Oh, and artificial intelligence, naturally.

Or at least that’s what Little Caesars is saying.

Starting today, you can order Little Caesars through a new app inside ChatGPT. OpenAI’s chatbot can customize and order pizzas, or you can use ChatGPT to receive recommendations based on your budget, preferences, dietary restrictions or the number of people you need to serve.

«Today’s consumers are turning to Gen AI as part of how they search for everything, including where to get their next meal,» Greg Hamilton, chief marketing officer at Little Caesars, said in a statement. «We recognize this shift and want to meet our customers where they already are and be the go-to for their pizza occasions. The process is as natural and intuitive as having a conversation. It’s not just about technology for technology’s sake — it’s about making life a little easier for people who love great pizza.»

How ordering a pizza with ChatGPT works

To get started, you’ll need to launch ChatGPT on your desktop or mobile device. On the ChatGPT interface, go to the Apps menu and select Little Caesars. You will need to connect your accounts by signing into your Little Caesars account or creating one. From there, you can get started with ordering.

You can simply type in something like, «Pizzas for five people with no meat,» and you’ll get personalized recommendations for pizzas and sides that match your preferences. From there, you can tailor your order further by swapping toppings, adjusting amounts or adding an order of cookie dough brownies.

Once you review your order, you can checkout through the Little Caesars app and then your order will go to the nearest location for you to pick up when ready. You can also schedule an order ahead of time and track your order in real-time through the app.

The new ordering function is now available across all Little Caesars locations in the US, and many locations in Mexico and Canada.

Not interested in using AI? The Little Caesars app and website are still available, or you can always pick up the phone and call.

Technologies

Don’t Lose Your Texts: How to Move Away From Samsung Messages Before It Shuts Down

Samsung is deactivating its long-standing Messages app in July. Here’s what to do next.

Samsung is closing the book on its proprietary texting platform this summer. After years of slowly phasing out the software in favor of a more unified experience, the company is finally pulling the plug on its Messages app this July. While many Galaxy owners have already been using Google’s version for years, those holding onto the legacy interface now have a firm deadline to migrate their conversations before the service goes dark.

On a page with information about the switch, Samsung points to instructions on how to swap over to Google’s Messages app, including for phones that are still on Android 12 and Android 13. Samsung has historically preinstalled its own Messages app on Galaxy phones, but began transitioning toward Google Messages as early as 2021.

To encourage people to switch to Google Messages, Samsung’s instructions list new features offered by Google Messages, like RCS-enabled texting for features like typing indicators, easier group chats and sending higher-quality images. Google’s Messages app also has AI-powered spam detection and spam filters, multi-device access to messages and some built-in Gemini AI features. It’s also the app that most Android phones use as their default texting app, including Samsung’s more recent Galaxy S26. There are other SMS texting app alternatives in the Google Play Store if you don’t want to use the one made by Google.

Samsung has not said when exactly in July messaging will no longer work in the app. A Samsung representative didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. Once the app is deactivated, only messaging to emergency services will work on Samsung Messages.

While Samsung did stop including it as the default texting app in 2021, it wasn’t until 2024 that Samsung stopped preinstalling the texting app alongside Google Messages. The Galaxy S26 can’t download the Samsung Messages app, and other phones won’t be able to download it after the app’s July sunset.

Samsung said users of Android 11 or lower aren’t affected by the end of service, but would also likely benefit from switching to a supported texting app like Google Messages. To switch to Google Messages, the company asks users to download the app if it’s not already installed and to set it as the default SMS app when prompted after launching it.

The post also notes that anyone using an older Galaxy Watch that runs on Samsung’s Tizen operating system will no longer have access to their full conversation history since these watches cannot use Google Messages. Samsung said that they will still be able to read and send text messages, but the company’s newer watches (Galaxy Watch 4 and later) that run WearOS will still have access to full conversations.

Technologies

New AT&T Elite 2.0 Phone Plan Boosts Wireless Hotspot and Data Performance

For customers willing to pay for it, the new top plan offers more high-speed data and performance than the former one.

Only a few weeks after overhauling its unlimited phone plans, AT&T has added a new plan to the top of the lineup that offers more data and performance — for a higher price. The AT&T Elite 2.0 plan is available now.

For a single line, Elite 2.0 costs $110 (plus taxes and fees). As more lines are added, the per-line price goes down. AT&T customers can mix and match plans on an account, but if we assume everyone is signing up for the Elite 2.0 plan, the costs break down like this:

• One line: $110
• Two lines: $100 per line, $200 total
• Three lines: $85 per line, $255 total
• Four lines: $75 per line, $300 total
• Five lines: $75 per line, $375 total

To compare it with AT&T’s next-priciest option, the Premium 2.0 plan costs $90 for a single line, or $55 per line on an account with four lines.

What’s included in the AT&T Elite 2.0 plan

For those amounts, the plan includes unlimited high-speed 5G data, prioritized even during network congestion, just like the Premium 2.0 plan, and 250GB of hotspot data (up from 100GB for the other plan). It also includes cellular access for one smartwatch and one tablet per line.

For travelers, Elite 2.0 has unlimited international talk, text and 20GB of high-speed data per month in 210 countries. The Premium 2.0 plan has unlimited talk, text and high-speed data, but only for 20 Latin American countries.

Aside from the data amounts, the Elite 2.0 plan includes AT&T Turbo, a feature normally offered as an add-on that increases data performance for video calling, gaming and streaming on 5G-capable devices. For other plans, AT&T Turbo costs $7 per line per month.

(AT&T Turbo is a separate feature from AT&T Turbo Live, which is designed to boost performance in certain crowded venues such as concerts or sporting events.)

AT&T Elite 2.0 vs Premium 2.0

	Price for 1 line, per month	Price for 4 lines, per month	High-speed data	Mobile hotspot	International Call/Data	AT&T Turbo
AT&T Premium 2.0	$90	$220 ($55 per line)	Unlimited	100GB	Unlimited talk, text and high-speed data in 20 Latin American countries; unlimited texting from US to 200+ countries	Not included
AT&T Elite 2.0	$110	$300 ($75 per line)	Unlimited	250GB	Unlimited talk, text and 20GB high-speed data in 210 countries	Included