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Andrew Orr

Since 2015 Andrew has been writing about Apple, privacy, security, and at one point even Android. You can find him most places online under the username @andrewornot.

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Articles by Andrew Orr

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Over 24,000 People Sign Data Privacy Petition to Stop Facebook Extremism

Andrew Orr ·

A petition signed by over 24,000 people has been delivered to Congress from Fight for the Future, Senator Ron Wyden to encourage a federal data privacy law. The impetus? Far-right extremism on social media websites such as Facebook.

Coalition members urged lawmakers to protect against attacks like that on the Capitol last year by addressing Facebook’s data-fueled algorithmic manipulation.

When Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen testified before Congress in October, she named algorithmic manipulation as the platform’s source of power. Algorithmic manipulation is only possible with invasive and copious personal data on individual people, harvested via mass surveillance.

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This Man Predicted the Modern Smartphone in 1953

Andrew Orr ·

Here’s a cool story from Open Culture to start the week. In 1953, Mark R. Sullivan, director of Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company, made a prediction in a newspaper.

Here is my prophecy: In its final development, the telephone will be carried about by the individual, perhaps as we carry a watch today. It probably will require no dial or equivalent and I think the users will be able to see each other, if they want, as they talk. Who knows but it may actually translate from one language to another?

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Everything You Wanted to Know About How Encrypted Email Works

Andrew Orr ·

ProtonMail published a nice blog post explaining how encrypted email works, and the various protocols that companies use.

End-to-end encryption for messages sent between ProtonMail users is automatic, and our integrated OpenPGP support makes it easy to send and receive PGP-encrypted E2EE messages to people that use PGP with other email providers. Proton also informs you when your messages are protected by E2EE with a small blue padlock (for other ProtonMail users) or green padlock (for OpenPGP users).

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FCC Ruling Opens up to 1,200MHz of Spectrum for Wi-Fi 6E

Andrew Orr ·

A ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit backs an FCC decision to open up to 1,200MHz of spectrum for Wi-Fi 6E.

While Wi-Fi 6 connections make more reliable and efficient use of the same spectrum that’s been in use for the last couple of decades, especially when multiple devices are connected, Wi-Fi 6E routers will work at 2.4GHz and 5GHz plus the new 6GHz band. That has enough room for up to seven maximum capacity Wi-Fi streams to broadcast in the same area at once without interfering with each other or using any existing spectrum.

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Saudi Activist With EFF Sues DarkMatter Group for Hacking iPhone

Andrew Orr ·

Saudi human rights activist Loujain AlHathloul, along with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, is suing DarkMatter for hacking her iPhone. DarkMatter Group was created and run by former U.S. intelligence operatives.

Reuters broke the news about the hacking program called Project Raven in 2019, reporting that when UAE transferred the surveillance work to Emirati firm DarkMatter, the U.S. operatives, who learned spycraft working for the National Security Agency and other U.S. intelligence agencies, went along and ran DarkMatter’s hacking program, which targeted human rights activists like AlHathloul, political dissenters, and even Americans residing in the U.S.

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Brace Yourselves: New HDMI 2.1a Standard to Debut at CES 2022

Andrew Orr ·

CES 2022 will see the introduction of yet another HDMI standard: 2.1a. What will it do? Both good and bad things.

Let’s start with the good: HDMI 2.1a is an upcoming revision to the HDMI 2.1 stack and adds a major new feature, Source-Based Tone Mapping, or SBTM. SBTM is a new HDR feature that offloads some of the HDR tone mapping to the content source (like your computer or set-top box) alongside the tone mapping that your TV or monitor is doing.

More HDMwhy, am I right?

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Apple's Policies Force Tumblr to Ban Certain Tags for iOS Users

Andrew Orr ·

Tumblr has been banning a host of tags from its iOS app in an effort to comply with Apple’s app review policies.

Some of the banned tags make sense for a platform trying to scrub itself of sensitive content — “porn,” “drugs” and “sex” are banned, for instance. Others are incomprehensible (or troubling if you think about them for too long), like the aforementioned “Tony the Tiger” and “Eugene Levy.” Even tags with the numbers 69 and 420 are banned.

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President Biden Signs 'National Defense Authorization Act' Into Law for Cybersecurity

Andrew Orr ·

The National Defense Authorization Act of 2022 lays out voluntary cybersecurity practices for private companies that handle critical infrastructure in the U.S.

But provisions all rely on the voluntary participation by industry, which owns and operates the vast majority of the nation’s critical infrastructure. Despite bipartisan calls after massive breaches at SolarWinds, Microsoft Exchange, Colonial Pipeline and other hacks, the NDAA made it through the House without mandatory incident reporting requirements for the private sector.

I disagree on the “voluntary” part. Make it mandatory, otherwise we end up with T-Mobile’s half-dozen breaches in the span of four years.

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T-Mobile Data Breach Leaves Customers Vulnerable to SIM Swapping

Andrew Orr ·

T-Mobile has had another data breach, although a report suggests this one is less severe than the one in August. Only a small set of customers have been affected, but they could be vulnerable to a SIM swapping attack.

This is where a malicious actor will change the physical SIM card associated with a phone number in order to obtain control of said number. This can, and often does, lead to the victim’s other online accounts being accessed via two-factor authentication codes sent to their phone number. The document says that customers affected by a SIM swap have now had that action reversed.

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Proposed Bill Would Make Social Media Companies Responsible for Disinformation

Andrew Orr ·

A bill sponsored by state Sen. Brad Hoylman (D-Manhattan) aims to hold social media companies accountable for disinformation.

The legislation adds a section to the state’s penal code, adding a new cause of action for public nuisance allowing the state Attorney General, city corporation counsels or private citizens to bring lawsuits after companies or individuals for “knowingly or recklessly” contributing to things like promoting self-harm or vaccine disinformation.