The Wall Street Journal reports that Intel has a facility in Costa Rica where it stores legacy hardware for security research.
Intel’s issue reflects a wider concern: Legacy technology can introduce cybersecurity weaknesses. Tech makers constantly improve their products to take advantage of speed and power increases, but customers don’t always upgrade at the same pace. This creates a long tail of old products that remain in widespread use, vulnerable to attacks.
Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of the Ethereum blockchain, is proposing EIP-4488 as a way to help reduce gas fees.
After highlighting concerns regarding the transaction fees on the Ethereum network, Buterin suggested the new EIP-4488, saying that it would “decrease transaction calldata gas cost, and add a limit of how much total transaction calldata can be in a block.”
In other words, EIP-4488 would limit the total transaction calldata, where data from external calls to functions are stored, before reducing the calldata gas cost to remove the possibility of breaking the network.
A report from CNBC on Monday claims that Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey will step down from his role at the company.
It’s unclear who’s set to succeed Dorsey or the timing of a potential announcement. It’s also unknown why Dorsey, 45, would take a step back. But if he steps down, the next CEO will have to meet Twitter’s aggressive internal goals. The company said earlier this year it aims to have 315 million monetizable daily active users by the end of 2023 and to at least double its annual revenue in that year.
Update: Mr. Dorsey has confirmed the rumor and announced his resignation.
Wired is out with a cool story on Monday. Scientists fit albatrosses with sensor-laded backpacks to scan for infrasound.
Their wingspans, which can be 11 feet long, are lengthier than any human is tall. This allows them to spend considerable time simply floating on air currents above open waters, something that conserves energy as they embark on foraging trips. Not only do they fly across vast swaths of isolated ocean, but they don’t dive into the water, so any sensors attached to them wouldn’t get especially wet.
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EU member states agreed on a common approach for rules to be imposed on U.S. tech firms on Thursday. Reuters reported on the move, which could prove to be very significant.
The DMA has a list of dos and don’ts for online gatekeepers – companies that control data and access to their platforms – reinforced by fines of up to 10% of global turnover. The Digital Services Act (DSA) forces the tech giants to do more to tackle illegal content on their platforms, with fines of up to 6% of global turnover for non-compliance. The common position adopted by EU countries follows the main points proposed by Vestager, with some tweaks, with the European Commission as the main enforcer of the new rules despite an initial French proposal to give national watchdogs more power. Negotiations are expected to start next year, with the rules likely to be adopted in 2023.
MobyFox, which holds official licenses to just about every geek favorite brand you can imagine, has a site-wide sale. Using the promo code “BF2021,” you can score 20% off any Apple Watch band plus get free shipping. You’ll find officially-licensed Star Wars, Harry Potter, Marvel Comics, and DC Comics watch bands, plus plenty more. The company also features Hello Kitty, Power Puff Girls, Stranger Things, Arsenal, and Willy Wonka. There’s plenty more, so check it out for yourself. The nicest thing about MobyFox isn’t just the amount of geekery you can find. Their Watch bands all come with connectors for all series and sizes of Apple Watch, along with 22mm pins for many Android smart watches. On top of that, they provide a number of free Watch faces to match your chosen band. I’m looking forward to the Beskar Armor band, from The Mandalorian, that I’ve got coming my way.
Check out this review on some awesome MagSafe Wallets from Sinjimoru in this segment from Mac Geek Gab 900.
In a new AppleInsider podcast, former Apple employee Matthew Cassinelli to discusses the integration of Shortcuts in macOS Monterey. For those of us still getting used to the addition, it’s a conversation worth listening to.
Since the public release of macOS Monterey, users can now create, edit, and sync their iOS Shortcuts directly on a Mac. Announced earlier this year at WWDC, Shortcuts on macOS will also slowly replace the previous automation tool, Automator, bringing one system to the Mac, iPhone, and iPad. Matthew Cassinelli previously worked on the original Workflow app, which was acquired by Apple in 2017 and evolved into the Shortcuts app. After staying on the team at Apple for a short time, Matthew became an independent creator, helping others learn Shortcuts, and reporting on new actions available with every update.
[Headline corrected November 26 to clarify that Mr. Cassinelli was not an engineer at Apple.]
On Tuesday Apple revealed it is suing NSO Group for its Pegasus spyware that attacks iPhone users. TechCrunch writes that the company has begun alerting victims.
The alerts — which Apple says are designed to inform and assist users who may have been targeted by state-sponsored attackers — were also sent to a number of users in El Salvador. This includes 12 employees from El Faro, an online digital newspaper that has been notoriously critical of the government, as well as two leaders of civil society organizations and two opposition politicians.
Mashable writes how cast members of hit TV show The Office say that Apple, along with the iPod video, helped propel the show to stardom.
“It was young people with their iPods who knew how to set up an iTunes account because their parents didn’t,” Rainn Wilson said. “I think that blindsided everybody, including NBC, that we would be so popular with young people. The fact that we’re most popular with 22 to 25 year olds is really astonishing…”
Security researcher Jeremiah Fowler in cooperation with the WebsitePlanet research team found an unprotected database from Cronin. It exposed 92 million database records from employees and clients.
The exposed server was named “Cronin-Main” and many of the records contained references to Cronin. These records included internal data such as employee and client information. Also included in the dataset was a “Master Mailing List” with direct physical names, addresses, Salesforce IDs, phone numbers, and references to where the leads came from.
The French administration wants app stores and search engines to remove Wish after an investigation of its products. They found that many of the products listed in Wish don’t meet European standards.
When Wish is notified that it is selling a dangerous good, those products are removed from the marketplace within 24 hours as expected. And yet, “in most cases, those products remain available under a different name, and sometimes even from the same seller. The company doesn’t keep any log related to transactions of non-compliant and dangerous products,” France’s Ministry of the Economy says in its statement.
Apple temporarily halted sales in Turkey following a currency crash in the country, MacRumors reported. While the site was functional, customers could not add items to an online basket or check-out. The move occurred on Tuesday, but remained true at the time of this writing.
Right now, Apple’s Turkey storefront is up and operational, but no devices are able to be added to a virtual cart or purchased at this time because of the volatility. A Turkish lira is equivalent to approximately 0.078 U.S. dollars at the current time, and its value has been steadily falling since last week. Over the course of the last year, the Lira has dropped 45 percent vs. the dollar. There is no word on when Apple might resume sales in Turkey, but inflation is close to 20 percent and with Erdogan continuing to refuse to raise interest rates, the downward slide may continue.
WhatsApp is seemingly working on a feature that will allow users to control the playback speed of audio messages, something that already exists for voice notes. iMore spotted the development on a WABetaInfo post. Audio messages seem to be becoming increasingly popular, so I imagine this feature will be a welcome addition on the widely used app.
Audio messages are essentially forwarded voice notes, but while the latter can have its playback speed manipulated by the user, that isn’t the case with the former. According to a WABetaInfo post, that’s going to change — and has already done so for those who are testing the WhatsApp beta release. “The feature to play voice notes using different playback speeds was a huge success. After releasing the feature on WhatsApp beta for Android 2.21.9.10 and WhatsApp Messenger beta for iOS 2.21.90.11 updates, WhatsApp is now working on a new version of the feature, making it compatible with audio messages.”
Developer David Smith wrote how he tested the Apple Watch Series 7 while hiking in Scotland. Specifically, how the battery life compares to what he calls “adventure watches.”
What gives me some excitement about this experience is that it seems clear that an Apple Watch can already make a solid companion for a long backpacking trip. When I set off I was expecting to have to charge it completely every day, but in reality it is more like every third day. Which gets it under my threshold for consideration for use. Especially since bringing it means that I now have a fully programmable computer on my wrist.
Partnering with experts from NYU, Mass Amherst, Columbia, Marquette, and the ACLU, Gizmodo is planning to publish the Facebook Papers. It would be the first media outlet to do so.
We believe there’s a strong public need in making as many of the documents public as possible, as quickly as possible. To that end, we’ve partnered with a small group of independent monitors, who are joining us to establish guidelines for an accountable review of the documents prior to publication. The mission is to minimize any costs to individuals’ privacy or the furtherance of other harms while ensuring the responsible disclosure of the greatest amount of information in the public interest.
I look forward to storing a copy of the archive.
Apple is expanding its R&D footprint in Israel, AppleInsider reported. It is taking a lease one significant site in Herzliya Pituach, a city north of Tel Aviv. The company looks to be placing itself at the heart of the booming tech scene in the country (although many startups operate in Tel Aviv).
It’s not clear whether Apple will lease the entire building, but it is taking a reported 44,000 square meters, plus 650 parking spaces. This adds to the existing 31,000 square meters above ground, reports Globes, and 27,000 square meters underground. The original site housed 800 staff who worked for flash memory producer Anobit, and motion sensing company PrimeSense, both of which had been acquired by Apple. The mid-2015 expansion was reportedly intended to give those staff more room, rather than to make space for more employees.
The stars and showrunner Kerry Ehrin of The Morning Show had a long conversation with The Hollywood Reporter in which they reflected on season two of the show. They also voiced their hopes and ideas for season three. What’s interesting is that the series has not been renewed at the time of this writing. Other big Apple TV+ hits like Ted Lasso and Mythic Quest have. If The Morning Show does return, future seasons will hopefully be more coherent than the one that just finished.
The Morning Show team is waiting on a renewal from Apple. “We haven’t had an official pickup for a third season. We’re waiting on that,” said Ehrin, who has an overall development deal with the streamer. When asked if she envisions one or more seasons, or plans to take a beat before returning to The Morning Show‘s writers room, Ehrin replied: “That’s a huge question. I feel like the show has a lot of different projections that would work for it. I think right now, I just finished a season that has taken two years. I am just taking a break!”
On Monday, web hosting company GoDaddy revealed that it suffered a data breach that was discovered on September 6. It happened by way of a compromised password.
email addresses of up to 1.2 million active and inactive Managed WordPress customers had been exposed in an unauthorized third-party access.
If you’re having trouble with your Bluetooth, try resetting your Network Settings on your iPhone! Resetting your Network can do a whole bunch of things, learn more in this mini-segment from Mac Geek Gab 900.
Use this trick to create a shortcut to shut down your M1 MacBook Pro from Mac Geek Gab 900!
Learn how to connect multiple monitors to your M1 MacBook with this quick tip from Mac Geek Gab 900!
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