This week Microsoft released Microsoft Teams backgrounds, including but not limited to "retro" concepts involving Clippy. There's a wide variety of options available with the Microsoft Teams Backgrounds collection, both branded and unbranded. They've got FOX shows, FOX Sports, NBC shows, NBC Sports, Xbox, Black History Month, Women's History Month, Pride, "Holiday background", and now Nostalgia.
Windows 11 may not be quite ready for primetime, but Microsoft isn't letting that stop it from launching its latest features for the hybrid workplace, including updates to Teams and new Fluid support across more apps. For meetings mixing together in-person and remote participants - which look likely to persist well beyond 2021 - Microsoft has new video calling features in Teams to give everyone an equal spotlight.
Office 2021 for PC and Mac is coming later this year, Microsoft has confirmed, but despite what many believe you won't need an Microsoft 365 subscription in order to use it. Although Microsoft has shifted its focus in recent years to subscription-based software and services, particularly as it weaves in cloud functionality and storage from OneDrive, there's still a subset of users that would prefer the familiarity of an upfront purchase instead.
There's a newly fully-functional Microsoft Office app available now for Apple's iPad. This app isn't free - it's part of Microsoft's Office subscription program(s). The least expensive option for acquiring functionality from this newly updated Microsoft Office app is approximately $6.99 per month. If you're looking for an app that's different from the iPhone version of the app, don't - It's listed under the same title.
Microsoft 365 for Mac has been updated with native support for Apple Silicon, with the core Office apps now running at their best on chipsets like the M1 in the newest MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and Mac mini. The update, released today, also brings a redesign to Microsoft 365, bringing it in line with the rest of macOS Big Sur.
There has been a lot of coverage lately about the Chinese government's ability to use the likes of Huawei and ZTE to spy on the US but it seems that a different country may have successfully pulled that off instead. According to multiple sources, at least two US government agencies have had their emails snooped on by hackers who are believed to be backed by a nation-state, specifically Russia.
Data breaches are neither new nor spectacular, at least until the names and accounts of higher-ups get dragged into the news. For example, a recent Twitter hacking incident that involved the accounts of very high-profile users made it big in the news and led to arrests faster than your usual hacking. Now it seems that the accounts of possibly hundreds of high-ranking executives in countries around the world have also been compromised and a lone "threat actor" is making the bold move to sell this information in the dark corners of the Web.
![Word 365 gets voice transcription but with some weird restrictions [Update]](https://www.slashgear.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Microsoft-Word-transcribe-1280x720.jpg)
Microsoft 365 is getting a handy new Word feature today: voice transcription. With this, you can either upload a recording to Word or record something new within the app itself and have Word automatically transcribe it for you. The implementation within Word sounds like it's fleshed out and quite capable, but there are some big restrictions you should be aware of before you dive feet first into the world of Microsoft 365 transcription.
Zoom might be the household name for video conferencing these days because of convenience (and hype) but its rivals are slowly but surely surpassing it in terms of features. Microsoft, in particular, is building up Teams to go beyond the usual end-users and turning into something that would better appeal to business customers that pay Microsoft big bucks. For this round, it's adding the ability to have as much as 20,000 participants in a meeting as well as choosing a branded background, for a price, of course.
When Microsoft created Teams to compete with then rising communication star Slack, it probably didn't predict a workplace that would instantly become practically virtual because of a pandemic. That has become an opportunity and a motivation for the company to quickly push out features that will help workers, managers, and employers adjust to what has been dubbed as the new normal. Microsoft is now announcing its biggest feature dump for Teams yet and it unsurprisingly starts with trying to one-up the video conferencing king, Zoom.
Microsoft delivered a news alert today tipping a "massive" phishing campaign using COVID-19 and Excel files to hook in unsuspecting users. Much like MOST phishing campaigns, users could avoid any harmful nonsense by avoiding downloading attached files or entering personal information prompted by email. This email campaign began on May 12, 2020, and posed as the Johns Hopkins Center to deliver a so-called "WHO COVID-19 SITUATION REPORT."
Microsoft 365 is getting new text predictions, echoing Gmail's Smart Compose by adding easier ways to compose replies in Outlook. The new feature will suggest words and phrases as users write messages in Outlook.com and Outlook on the web, based on predictions as to what they're likely to want to say.