Google announced a range of new artificial intelligence-powered features in its translation application at its Live from Paris virtual event on Wednesday.
The new features include more contextual translation options with descriptions and examples, a redesigned app for Apple’s iOS operating system, and an augmented-reality translation feature through Google Lens.
Contextual options mean that words and phrases with different meanings will be translated based on the context of the text.
“Whether you are trying to order bass for dinner or play a bass during tonight’s jam session, you have the context you need to accurately translate and use the right turns of phrase, local idioms, or appropriate words depending on your intent,” said Xinxing Gu, Google’s product manager.
English, French, German, Japanese and Spanish will be introduced in the coming weeks, he said.
On Monday, the Alphabet-owned company launched a new conversational AI service called Bard to compete with rival ChatGPT, an AI service created by OpenAI.
The service aims to create innovative ways to engage with information, from language and images to videos and audio.
The Google Translate app, which recently received a fresh look on the Android operating system, will get a new design on iOS in few weeks.
The restructured app on iOS will offer a larger space for typing and more accessible entry points for translating conversations, voice input and lens camera translation.
Google has also added new gestures to make the translation app more accessible.
They include the ability to select a language with fewer taps, holding the language button to pick a recently used language with a swipe, and swiping down on the home screen text area to quickly bring up recent translations.
Thirty-three new languages are now available on-device in the Translate app — including Basque, Corsican, Hawaiian, Hmong, Kurdish, Latin, Luxembourgish, Sudanese, Yiddish and Zulu, Google said.
“Advances in AI have given us the ability to translate images with Lens, which enables you to search what you see using the camera on your device,” said Mr Gu.
“In a big step, advanced machine learning also means that we are able to blend translated text into complex images, so it looks and feels much more natural.
"Soon, we will expand web image translation to give you more options for translating image-based content regardless of how you search for it."
Google Lens is a set of vision-based computing capabilities that can understand what users are looking at and use that information to copy or translate text, identify plants and animals, explore locales, discover products, find visually similar images and other useful actions.
The Google Translate app is used by more than 1 billion people globally.
The company has also announced its plan to add an “immersive view” feature to Google Maps that will let users feel like they are in a place.
Google is initially introducing this feature in London, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco and Tokyo.
It plans to extend it to other cities, including Amsterdam, Dublin, Florence and Venice, in the coming months.
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Why are asylum seekers being housed in hotels?
The number of asylum applications in the UK has reached a new record high, driven by those illegally entering the country in small boats crossing the English Channel.
A total of 111,084 people applied for asylum in the UK in the year to June 2025, the highest number for any 12-month period since current records began in 2001.
Asylum seekers and their families can be housed in temporary accommodation while their claim is assessed.
The Home Office provides the accommodation, meaning asylum seekers cannot choose where they live.
When there is not enough housing, the Home Office can move people to hotels or large sites like former military bases.
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Key changes
Commission caps
For life insurance products with a savings component, Peter Hodgins of Clyde & Co said different caps apply to the saving and protection elements:
• For the saving component, a cap of 4.5 per cent of the annualised premium per year (which may not exceed 90 per cent of the annualised premium over the policy term).
• On the protection component, there is a cap of 10 per cent of the annualised premium per year (which may not exceed 160 per cent of the annualised premium over the policy term).
• Indemnity commission, the amount of commission that can be advanced to a product salesperson, can be 50 per cent of the annualised premium for the first year or 50 per cent of the total commissions on the policy calculated.
• The remaining commission after deduction of the indemnity commission is paid equally over the premium payment term.
• For pure protection products, which only offer a life insurance component, the maximum commission will be 10 per cent of the annualised premium multiplied by the length of the policy in years.
Disclosure
Customers must now be provided with a full illustration of the product they are buying to ensure they understand the potential returns on savings products as well as the effects of any charges. There is also a “free-look” period of 30 days, where insurers must provide a full refund if the buyer wishes to cancel the policy.
“The illustration should provide for at least two scenarios to illustrate the performance of the product,” said Mr Hodgins. “All illustrations are required to be signed by the customer.”
Another illustration must outline surrender charges to ensure they understand the costs of exiting a fixed-term product early.
Illustrations must also be kept updatedand insurers must provide information on the top five investment funds available annually, including at least five years' performance data.
“This may be segregated based on the risk appetite of the customer (in which case, the top five funds for each segment must be provided),” said Mr Hodgins.
Product providers must also disclose the ratio of protection benefit to savings benefits. If a protection benefit ratio is less than 10 per cent "the product must carry a warning stating that it has limited or no protection benefit" Mr Hodgins added.
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