Apple May Also Show iPad Mini 4 September 9th

Posted: August 10, 2015 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

New leaks show a thinner, 6.1 millimeter fourth generation iPad Mini. Appleinsider.com reports that renderings found by generally reliable KGO Securities show a lot of design cues taken from the iPad Air 2. The latest mini may have an A8 processor like the Air 2, and 8 megapixel camera. If Apple goes ahead and rolls out the 13 inch iPad Pro September 9th along with the new iPhone 6S models, this new mini may be featured as well.

From the ‘not so good news’ department…a security researcher showed a $30 gadget he made at Defcon 2015 that will open keyless cars and garage doors that use rolling codes. Rolling codes let cars and garage doors skip to a new code each time, preventing thieves from nabbing the code as it transmits through the air. Engadget.com says this device jams the signal to the car or garage door motor and records the code. When the driver hits the fob or remote the next time the car or garage opens…making them think all is well, but the crook can return later and use the stored code the car or door never received, and steal at his leisure. Many car companies are aware of the issue, and have switched to codes that expire, but the security researcher hopes his demonstration will force car makers and garage door companies to upgrade older models, too. He says his own car is susceptible to such an attack.

Firefox Exploit Found in Wild…Patch it Now!

Posted: August 7, 2015 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

On Wednesday, an ad was spotted on a Russian news site for a nasty exploit in Firefox that uploads sensitive files. Yesterday, Mozilla pushed out a security update to close it off. If you run Firefox, go to the ‘about Firefox’ tab, download the update, and restart. It’s version 39.0.3. Interestingly, Mozilla says Firefox for Android is not effected, and some ad-blocking software acts to protect machines, but if you are running Windows or Linux, download the patch now!

Speaking of security, that brings up your privacy. The Electronic Frontier Foundation has just dropped Privacy Badger 1.0, their browser extension that blocks some of the sneakiest trackers that try to spy on your Web browsing habits. The EFF notes that more than a quarter million users…including yours truly….have already installed the Alpha or Beta releases of Privacy Badger. Version 1.0 includes blocking of certain kinds of super-cookies and browser fingerprinting—the latest ways that some parts of the online tracking industry try to follow Internet users from site to site.

Nope, Even Your Fingerprints Aren’t Safe

Posted: August 6, 2015 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Nope, on some Android handsets, even your fingerprints aren’t safe. FireEye researchers showed the Black Hat conference in Vegas 4 new ways of harvesting fingerprints, including one that can be done remotely at large scale. According to zdnet.com, the hacks work primarily on Samsung, Huawei, and HTC handsets. The researchers say the hacks are possible mainly because the manufacturers don’t fully lock down the sensor. Since these phones just require system privilege instead of root, jailbroken phones are more at risk, too. All three vendors have patched problems since being notified, but any prints that are taken in one kind of hack are out there forever. The FireEye researchers say iPhone fingerprint sensors are quite secure since they encrypt fingerprint data from the scanner.

Apple Music is now up to 11 million users trying out the 90 day free trial, According to the company’s Eddy Cue. Macrumors.com reports that of those, 2 million are test driving the more pricey family plan. Here’s an amazing App Store number that Cue shared, too…since 2008, Apple has paid out 33 billion to developers for apps!

Airbus Working on Hypersonic Plane; Facebook Patents Friend List Creditworthiness

Posted: August 5, 2015 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Airbus appears to be developing a hypersonic jet that would fly from London to New York in just one hour. For comparison, the Concorde needed three and a half hours to travel the same distance, and regular commercial flights need seven to eight hours for the trip. The hypersonic plane just take three hours to get you from San Francisco to Paris or from Tokyo to Los Angeles. Businessinsider.com says the new Airbus jet, described in a recently discovered patent application, would reach speeds as high as Mach 4.5, or four and a half times the speed of sound. Comparatively, the Concorde reached top speeds of Mach 2 in its glory days.
It would use a variety of engines that would serve different purposes, and power would be provided by various forms of hydrogen stored aboard.
Two turbojets under the fuselage and a rocket motor in the rear would be used during takeoff. The Airbus would lift off the runway vertically like the Space Shuttle, and the turbojets would be shut down and retracted into the belly of the plane right before it reached the speed of sound.
The rocket motor would then be used to climb to a cruising altitude of more than 100,000 feet. Then that engine would be shut down and retracted into the fuselage, and the ramjets on the wings would push the Airbus to a top speed of Mach 4.5.
The bad news is that the hypersonic jet might be extremely expensive. Airbus says the aircraft can be used for both military and commercial applications. In the latter version, the airplane would have enough room for just 20 passengers.

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Facebook has been awarded a patent that could help filter spam emails and offensive content, improve searches and, according to thenextweb.com, allow lenders to use your social habits to determine a credit approval. Under the process described, if you apply for a loan, your lender could potentially check out the credit rating of your Facebook friends. The average credit rating of your friends collectively needs to be at least a minimum credit score for your loan to be approved. Do you know your friends’ credit scores? Yeah, I don’t either. Scary stuff!

Twitter Toys with Dedicated News Tab

Posted: August 4, 2015 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Twitter is experimenting with a new tab for featured news…you may be one of the iOS or Android users that has noticed it popping up along with the other icons at the bottom of your Twitter screen. Hit it to check what’s currently happening in the world. When you touch a news item, it opens up a screen with an image, block of text and link from the source, and also but a list of tweets from other publishers and Twitter users about the item. As with test features in the past, a limited universe of users will see it, and it may not be permanent.

One of the best features of the original iPhone was Visual Voicemail…a great feature that continues to this day. It freed us from the aggravation of listening through voicemails in order, then deleting or saving them as the phone carriers made us do to use more minutes. Now, Apple’s taking it a step further, and another killer feature may show up in iOS 10 in 2016. Apple is testing having Siri record and transcribe messages from missed calls, and sending them to iCloud where you can read them as text later.

Leak Has More Reveals About iPhone 6S

Posted: August 3, 2015 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

In a leak similar to one last year near the release date of the iPhone 6, we now know a bit more about the successor iPhone 6S. The next generation handset will be slightly thicker to accomodate the Force Touch and Taptic Engine features borrowed from the Apple Watch. Force Touch tells the handset different things, depending on how hard you press on the screen, while the Taptic Engine gives it a more versatile vibration motor for alerts. Despite the increase in thickness from 6.9 to 7.1 mm, there is still a bump on the back for the camera…which has unduly bothered some in the tech media…despite the fact that nearly everyone else buys a case for their iPhones that negates that issue.

As rumored earlier, Nokia has sold its HERE mapping business to a group made up of Audi, BMW, and Daimler’s Mercedes-Benz. Previously, it was rumored that Uber, Amazon, Facebook, and Apple had shown interest. The German car makers are dropping $3.07 billion for the service. It was probably only a matter of time before some car makers started to ‘roll their own’ for their navigation systems.

BMW & PG&E Are Paying $1500+ To Charge i3’s in Off Hours

Posted: July 31, 2015 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A year and a half pilot program is starting in California to encourage electric BMW i3 owners to charge them up in off-peak hours. To reduce stress on the power grid, BMW iChargeForward is giving incentives of up to $1540 in gift cards if owners don’t charge during high demand hours. Under the program, cnet.com says BMW can delay charging by up to an hour if data from PG&E says it’s warranted. Drivers can still override this with a smartphone app if they need to drive somewhere sooner than that. BMW plans to up the trial group to as many as 400 owners soon.

A heads up for Nvidia Shield tablet owners…it’s been one of the top selling tablets for Android users the last year, but the company is recalling a large subset of them because the battery can burst into flames. Gizmodo.com reports that all Shield tablets made between July 2014 and July 2015 are involved. Under the recall, the company will send you a new tablet with a less fire prone battery. They say if you have one of the tablets, stop using it now!

Amazon Destinations Expands to Bay Area and NorCal

Posted: July 30, 2015 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Amazon site Amazon Destinations, which launched in April, has now added several areas, to cover a total of 35 cities and 6 metro regions, including the Bay Area and Northern California. According to techcrunch.com, the site isn’t intended as a full boat travel service…but more for planning and booking weekend getaways near where people live. Hotels and the like don’t pay upfront to participate, instead amazon keeps a percentage of what users pay as a commission. It now covers the Northwest, all of California, Texas, as well as Southeast and Northeast areas.

Great news for full blown Apple fanboys and fangirls…Apple’s spaceship shaped Campus 2 headquarters will have a visitor center with and observation deck and store. Appleinsider.com reports that the visitor’s center will be a free standing glass walled structure keeping the theme of the main spaceship building. It will apparently have a cafe in addition to the store, and will be open 7-7 weekdays and 9-7 on weekends. Now, ultra fans can eat an apple at Apple, and go home with even less money after buying lots of Apple branded merchandise.

Amazon Drones? How About Drones Launched From A Delivery Van?

Posted: July 29, 2015 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

While Amazon is trying to get the FAA to let them use a band of protected airspace to fly their delivery drones in, Workhorse has applied to that agency for special permission to launch delivery drones from the back of its electric cargo vans! As the van tools around, the roof-mounted HorseFly UAV selects, transports, and drops off the correct parcel right outside its recipient’s front door. Besides driving the route, all the driver has to do is watch to make sure the drone’s landings go ok. Engadget.com reports that the HorseFly drone can fly for up to a half hour carrying 10 lbs. This idea may ‘fly’ better than Amazon’s plan to have drones fly from their warehouses all the way to people’s homes.

Yes, at long last, it’s here…and by most accounts, it’s good. The antidote to terrible Windows 8, Windows 10 is out. According to bgr.com…somewhat in jest…the best new feature is that it’s NOT Windows 8, but actually there’s a lot more. The beloved Start menu is back, for starters. Probably the best new feature is a decent web Browser called Microsoft Edge…which is faster, sleeker, and far less clunky than Internet ‘Exploder.’ Microsoft hasn’t actually killed old Internet Explorer yet, but will be nudging companies to leave it and move on. The Cortana voice assistant is pretty good, but doesn’t work with all systems…some computer microphones, for example, don’t support it well. You will see the update tool appear, but be aware unless you really want to dive into the weeds to update right away, you’ll be put in line for the update to be pushed out to you.

Take Note- Samsung Rollout Event a Couple Weeks Away

Posted: July 28, 2015 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Apple’s iPhone 6 and 6+ sales have exploded, but Samsung has had pretty disappointing numbers for the metal clad Galaxy S6 and Edge. The Galaxy Note series has done pretty well, though. Samsung has announced Galaxy Unpacked, a rollout event in New York for August 13th. According to theverge.com, look for announcements about the Galaxy Note 5 and the Galaxy S6 Edge Plus. The new Notes have been dropping in September, so it’s thought that Samsung has moved the event up in order to get the drop on Apple…which is expected to show the iPhone 6S in September.

Mobile developer NextBit is cooking up something cool for Android users. NextBit is run by alums of Google, Apple, HTC, and Amazon, and they brought out app transfer software last year called Baton…which works like Apple’s Handoff to let you move smoothly from one device to another and continue with what you were working on, watching, or listening to seamlessly. Recode.net says now they’re working on their own handset. They are claiming it will be very cool, and ‘not for everybody.’ Is this a take on the old Apple mantra ‘Think Different?’ We’ll apparently know soon.

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