Google just announced that it will soon drop support for the first- and second-generation Nest Learning Thermostats. The devices won't stop working completely, but remote access is going away, as are software updates and compatibility with the Google Home app. The older Nest Learning Thermostats that are losing support include the second-generation units for the U.S., released in 2014, as well as the European version of the second-gen thermostat, which also went on sale in 2014. The original Nest Learning Thermostat, which was released only in the U.S., landed in 2011. Google says it will drop support for the thermostats starting October 25, 2025. Besides no longer receiving software updates, the older Nest Leaning thermostats will lose Nest and Google Home app support, meaning no more out-of-home control.

Has your Google smart speaker been giving you the silent treatment lately? Over the past several days, owners of Google's Nest and Nest Hub devices have been reporting that Google Assistant has stopped responding to basic commands such as "What's the weather" and "What time is it?" Perplexed Nest users had been turning to Google's support team for possible solutions, but with little success. Luckily, Google just told Android Authority that it's deployed a fix and that "all users should be up and running now." The problems appear to have begun earlier this week, with Nest users on Reddit and other forums complaining that their smart speakers were going silent when asked the most basic commands.

Google is facing an onset of privacy concerns after it announced it plans to dissolve the Nest brand in favor of a new, all-purpose smart home division, called Google Nest. As part of the decision, existing users of Nest smart thermostats, security cameras and other products will be forced to migrate their information over to a Google account. The announcement, made at Google's I/O developer conference last week, has caught the eye of some users and experts who say it gives them little control over the future of their Nest data and, as a result, their privacy. When Google acquired Nest in 2014 for $3.2 billion, Nest pledged to keep the data it collects on its users separate from Googles other services. 'When you work with Nest and use Nest products, that data does not go into the greater Google or any of its other business units,' Tony Fadell, former CEO of Nest, told BBC in 2015.