Check out the Syncwire UNBREAKcable, an MFi-Certified Lightning cable bend-tested for 30,000 charging cycles. It features a TPE jacket exterior and tinplate-wrapped inner wires. And it’s $10.99 through our deal.
YouTube Calls Cryptocurrency Videos ‘Harmful Content’
In a crackdown called ‘The Crypto YouTube Carnage’ the company has been deleting cryptocurrency videos en masse, labeling them as “harmful or dangerous.”
As years’ worth of videos started disappearing from several crypto YouTubers’ channels, many began speculating about the giant’s motivations. Some believe that YouTube is sensing a rise of new, blockchain platforms that can compete for creators both by offering them better “job security” and a higher cut of earnings.
Happy Holidays from The Mac Observer!
It doesn’t matter if you’re into Christmas, Hanukkah, Festivus, Solstice, or any end-of-the-year holiday. The Mac Observer hopes this weekend is a wonderful time for you, and that you get to take a day or two off to relax. We’re taking (the rest of) Tuesday and Wednesday off, but we’ll be back on Thursday, December 26th, with iPhone, iPad, and Mac coverage, along with a fresh TMO Daily Observations episode, too.
What Are the Privacy Implications of iPhone 11 Ultra Wideband?
The iPhone 11 models have a new chip called U1 to enable ultra-wideband (UWB). It allows for precise location tracking. Apple says it lets these phones have “spatial awareness” so the iPhone 11 Pro can figure out its location in relation to other U1 chips. A use-case is pointing your iPhone at another iPhone so AirDrop will prioritize that device when it comes to sharing files. But what happens when retail stores can track your chip?
Essentially, the new chip is a marketer’s dream in a box. Shops already track your purchases, leading to cases like the infamous 2012 case where Target unintentionally divulged a teen’s pregnancy to her father. When a store has UWB-enabled access points, it will be easy to monitor a phone’s location indoors and track what you considered purchasing in addition to what you actually purchase.
How to Send a Last Minute Gift Through the iOS App Store
Got an unexpected guest coming to Christmas dinner? Don’t panic – you can send last-minute gifts through the iOS App Store.
Sir Jony Ive Donating £100,000 to Daily Mail Tree-Planting Campaign
Former Apple Chief Design Officer Sir Jony Ive has donated £100,000 to a campaign that will plant orchards in schools across Britain.
Track Santa's Journey Around the World
It’s that time of year ago – to follow Santa and Mrs. Claus on their journey around the world! Google’s Santa Tracker is ready and waiting for Santa to take off on his journey delivering presents around the globe. You can follow that journey as Christmas day begins.
Uber Founder Travis Kalanick Quits Company Board
Uber’s controversial founder and former CEO, Travis Kalanick is leaving the company’s board, Techcrunch reported. It appears Mr. Kalinick has sold all of the stock he had in the ride-hailing service
Kalanick, who was forced out as Uber CEO and eventually replaced by Dara Khosrowshahi through shareholder action, with support of the board, in 2017, has been in the process of selling off his considerable ownership stake in the company through successive sales of his shares. Just last week, Kalanick sold around $383 million in shares and reduced his overall stake to less than 10%, per an SEC filing. UPDATE 7:35 AM PT: In fact, it looks like Kalanick has actually sold all his remaining stock, with the SEC filings to show up on the web likely after the Christmas holiday, per the FT. The share sales started when Uber’s restriction on the sale of stock for private investors and employees expired six months after the company’s IPO.
How the Makers of 'Jumanji: Next Level' Used The Mac Pro and Pro XDR Display
Filmmaking and animation was an obvious target market for the Mac Pro as it was revealed. In a blog post, Lunar Animation, the animation studio behind ‘Jumanji: Next Level’ revealed how they used the devices in their work.
With the texture issues we were encountering on the iMac Pro, we opened the same scene on the Mac Pro and all of the textures loaded up completely fine. This makes sense, as there is double the graphics memory for textures (32GB instead of 16GB). We were then surprised to see that it was playing back in real time without pre-caching, because even with clamped textures on the iMac Pro, we weren’t getting a consistent 24 frames-per-second during playback. We then unlocked the 24 frames-per-second cap on the playback and got speeds of up to 134 frames-per-second. This allowed us to review, change and preview everything at lightning speed avoiding the need to create proxy textures and models, and we were able to work with the content directly.
Russia Disconnects From Internet in Tests
Russia announced it successfully completed a series of tests that disconnected the whole country from the internet.
Pentagon Warns Military Not to Use Home DNA Kits
A Department of Defense memo warns U.S. military members about the privacy risks of home DNA kits.
The memo provides little details on how genetic profiles could endanger security, other than noting that potential “inaccuracies” in health information could pose a risk to military personnel, who are required to report medical issues. Most of the health reports provided by DNA companies typically pertain to medical risks, though, such as a predisposition to cancer, rather than diagnosing a condition.
Cosmologist Dr. Andrew Friedman (#2) - TMO Background Mode Interview
Dr. Andrew Friedman is an astronomer, cosmologist, and data scientist. He’s currently an NSF funded Assistant Research Scientist at the University of California at San Diego Center for Astrophysics & Space Sciences. He is also a Research Affiliate in the MIT Program in Science, Technology and Society. He holds a Ph.D. in Astronomy and Astrophysics from Harvard.
We chatted about the apparent, seemingly contrived conflict between science and religion. We explored some of the sources of this conflict and how, with a good perspective, they are not really at odds. We looked at faith, both in science and religion, Gödel’s incompleteness theorem, proof of God’s existence, varying views about what God is, approaching the subject with humility, and how the Bible cannot really serve as a science textbook. Join us as we get our theology hats on.
Robocall Fines Rise to $10,000 Per Call
Congress approved a bill on Thursday that raises the fine for robocall eras up to US$10,000 per call. It’s called the Telephone Robocall Abuse Criminal Enforcement and Deterrence Act (TRACED).
Once TRACED is enacted, the Federal Communications Commission could fine robocallers up to $10,000 per call. It also would require major carriers like AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile to deploy a new technology called STIR/SHAKEN into their networks, which will make it easier for consumers to know if they’re receiving a call from a spoofed number.
Speaking of spoofed numbers, the trick many robocallers use nowadays is to make it appear as if the number they’re calling from is one in your area. Different one each time, making it harder to trace.
Spotify Encourages Journalists to Plug in Random USB Drives
As part of a promotion for a podcast, Spotify sent USB drives to journalists. But the move was criticized by computer security researchers.
But anyone with basic security training under their hat — which here at TechCrunch we do — will know to never plug in a USB drive without taking some precautions first.
Plugging in random USB drives is a bigger problem than you might think. Elie Bursztein, a Google security researcher, found in his own research that about half of all people will plug into their computer random USB drives.
I doubt anyone at Spotify was clueless about the security risk. But negative publicity is still publicity.
Mac Apps Have to be Notarized by February 2020
Apple says that Mac apps distributed outside of the Mac App Store have to be notarized by February 3, 2020, an attempt to increase security.
Twitter Trolls Used Animated PNGs to Attack Epileptics
Twitter has blocked the use of animated PNGs on its platform after trolls used them to attack people with epilepsy.
NYT and Location Data, Last Minute Gift Picks – TMO Daily Observations 2019-12-23
Dave Hamilton and Andrew Orr join host Kelly Guimont to discuss the latest location data reporting, and last minute gift ideas.
Apple Offers Free Two-Day Delivery for its Products
If you live in an area with an Apple store offering courier delivery, you’re in for a treat this holiday season.
A Look Back at The Decade's Worst Hacks
As the decade comes to an end, we’re all in a reflective mood. Wired looked back at some of the worst cybersecurity incidents of the last 10-years.
Over the last decade, hacking became less of a novelty and more of a fact of life for billions of people around the world. Regular people lost control of their data, faced invasive surveillance from repressive regimes, had their identities stolen, realized a stranger was lurking on their Netflix account, dealt with government-imposed internet blackouts, or, for the first time ever, literally found themselves caught in the middle of a destructive cyberwar. It’s been apparent for decades that an increasingly computerized world would inevitably invite constant digital threats. But the actual evolution of hacking—with all its scams, criminal black markets, and state sponsored forces—has been characteristically human, not a sterile, dispassionate artifact of an unknown future.
App Store Offering Free Treats From Christmas Eve
Apple will give free gifts to users via the App Store between December 24 and December 29, with a new present to unwrap each day.
Sling TV Adds News Channels and $5 to Monthly price
Sling TV, the live-streaming TV service, added more news channels such as MSNBC and Fox News to its plans on Monday. Existing users will see a $5 increase in their monthly price, 9to5Mac reported.
The price jump means both Blue and Orange service plans will now start at $30/month each. Sling divides channels by plans to make access more affordable. Subscribers who want all channels can subscribe to plans at a new price of $45/month. Sling TV adds that the price increase is the first for the Blue plan since it launched four years ago and the first for the Orange plan since June 2018. During that period, new channels and features including Cloud DVR Free have been added to the service.
CasVPN 1-Year Subscription: $9.99
We have a deal on CasVPN, a VPN that unblocks your favorite movies and TV shows with buffer-free UHD video streaming and unrestricted P2P File Sharing, all with unlimited downloads. 1 year is $9.99 through our deal.
AirPods Pro and Bluetooth Latency
As with most Bluetooth devices, audio latency is a problem with AirPods. However, the composer and software developer Stephen Coyle found that Apple noticeably reduced it with the new AirPods Pros.
Looking to the AirPods first, there’s a very encouraging trend occurring. They drop from 274ms to 178ms going from the first to second generation, and the AirPods Pro take it down even further, to 144ms. While a 130ms reduction may not seem like a lot, the perceptual difference from this makes the AirPods Pro tantalisingly close to seamless. Keyboard clicks are near enough to their corresponding keypresses that they feel like they’re actually related to them, not just the cacophony of blips they had seemed before. Tapt is playable, but only just; there’s still additional cognitive load caused by the delay, which I’m sure affects other rhythm-based games equally, and risks upsetting the playability of games that rely heavily on audio cues. However, it’s a lot better, and it looks like things are heading very much in the right direction.
Apple Removes ‘ToTok’ App After its Reveal as Spying Tool
Apple has removed a chat app called ToTok after an investigation revealed it was a government spying tool.