The 2019 Back to School sales are starting with Apple. The MacBook Air price has been lowered to US$1,099 and updated with True Tone.
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.
Articles by Andrew Orr
Here's How to Protect Yourself Against the Zoom Zero Day
Security researcher Jonathan Leitschuh recently published information of a Zoom zero day vulnerability. Here’s how to protect yourself.
Hong Kong Protesters Use AirDrop to Bypass Great Firewall
Hong Kong protesters have been using AirDrop has a way to get around China’s Great Firewall. They can send messages to Chinese people this way, like information on the protests, pro-democracy messages, and even information about the Tiananmen massacre of 1989.
“Did you know? Over the past month, Hong Kong has seen three massive rallies, with as many as 2 million people taking to the streets,” read one such AirDropped poster. “Don’t wait until [freedom] is gone to regret its loss. Freedom isn’t god-given; it is fought for by the people.”
Leak Claims 2019 iPhone Will Have Rectangular Logic Board
The iPhone X and XS had an L-shaped logic board and battery. A leak claims to show that the 2019 iPhone will move back to a rectangular shape. This could mean bigger batteries.
Sadly we can’t gain any information from the PCB design. Questions about the iPhone XI’s port of choice are still looming. We already know what the iPhone XI and XI Max will look like, but hardware info is rather limited at this point.
40,000 Households in Kentucky Don't Have Internet Access
A study of data from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and the U.S. Census Bureau shows internet access across America. Kentucky is the worst state with 40,000 households without internet access. America’s Internet Divide The data is from 2017, which is the most recent information. Income and education both played a role in…
Apple Texas Hold'Em App is Back for 10 Year Anniversary
In celebration of the 10 year anniversary of the App Store, the Apple Texas Hold’em game is back. Apple Texas Hold’em Apple released its game in 2006 for the iPod and eventually the App Store. Now it’s back: Apple’s Texas Hold’em is back! To celebrate the 10 year anniversary of the App Store, we’ve brought…
Huawei CEO Says Apple is His Model for Privacy
Huawei CEO and founder Ren Zhengfei says he takes inspiration from Apple, saying his company won’t share user information with others (via CNBC). Huawei’s Privacy Mr. Zhengfei says that users control their data, not his company: Data is owned by our customers, not us. Carriers have to track every user, otherwise no phone calls could be…
Bill Gates Said Steve Jobs Was a Master of 'Casting Spells'
In an interview, Bill Gates talked about Steve Jobs, saying he was a master at “casting spells” to keep Apple from dying. Kind of odd to see a businessman like him use language like “casting spells” but I guess that’s analogies for you.
While it’s really easy to imitate the bad parts of Steve, Gates said, “I have yet to meet any person who in terms of picking talent, hyper-motivating that talent,” who could match him. “He brought some incredibly positive things along with that toughness.”
Jobs was a singular case, Gates said, where Apple was on a path to die and goes on to become the most valuable company in the world. There aren’t going to be many stories like that, he said.
Apple Tests Biometric Login for iCloud.com
Apple is testing biometric login for iCloud.com. If you’re a beta tester for iOS 13, iPadOS, or macOS Catalina, you can go to beta.icloud.com and login with Face ID/Touch ID. Web Login So far, iPhone and iPad users haven’t been able to access iCloud web apps. If you navigated to the website you couldn’t use…
UK ISPA Hates Mozilla's DNS Over HTTPS Privacy Tool
If you use your internet service provider’s default DNS, they can see everything you do on the web. It comes as no surprise that ISPs don’t like privacy tools like Mozilla’s DNS over HTTPS (DoH) technology in Firefox. The UK Internet Services Providers’ Association (ISPA) declared Mozilla a 2019 Villain, alongside President Trump.
ISPA Internet Villain
Mozilla – for their proposed approach to introduce DNS-over-HTTPS in such a way as to bypass UK filtering obligations and parental controls, undermining internet safety standards in the UK
Amazon Alexa Voice Recordings are Stored Indefinitely
In a letter to U.S. senators Amazon said it keeps your Alexa voice recordings indefinitely unless you manually delete them.
In the letter to Coons, Amazon noted that for Alexa requests that involve a transaction, like ordering a pizza or hailing a rideshare, Amazon and the skill’s developers can keep a record of that transaction. That means that there’s a record of nearly every purchase you make on Amazon’s Alexa, which can be considered personal information.
Apple 2019 Revenue Up 15% at $39 Billion From App Store
Apple 2019 revenue for the first half of this year is up 15% from last year, topping US$39 billion from the App Store.
According to a new report from Sensor Tower, the iOS App Store and Google Play combined brought in $39.7 billion in worldwide app revenue in the first half of 2019 — that’s up 15.4% over the $34.4 billion seen during the first half of last year. However, at that time, the $34.4 billion was a 27.8% increase from 2017’s numbers, then a combined $26.9 billion across both stores.
Engineer Yi-Chi Shih Faces Prison for Smuggling US Military Chips to China
Yi-Chi Shih, an electrical engineer, faces up to 219 years in prison for smuggling U.S. military chips to China.
Laurene Powell Jobs Joins Earth Alliance Group
Earth Alliance aims to help address threats to the earth like climate change. Laurene Powell Jobs joins Leonardo DiCaprio and Brian Sheth.
House Democrats Ask Facebook to Stop Libra Cryptocurrency
A group of Democrats on the House Financial Services Committee wrote a letter asking Facebook to stop its Libra cryptocurrency plans.
Prepare for 64-Bit Mac Apps With Go64
Go64 is a free piece of software that checks your Mac for 32-bit apps, which won’t work after macOS Mojave. Although you can do this manually with System Report, Go64 goes further. It takes an inventory of the apps on your Mac and see which ones are still 32-bit. Then, it helps you visit the developer’s website or search the web for update/upgrade information. It then keeps track of upgrade costs so you can add 64-bit apps to your budget. It’s made by St. Clair Software, makers of other great Mac apps like App Tamer, Default Folder X, Jettison, and HistoryHound. Best of all, Go64 is completely free. Download: Go64
Futurebook is a Parody Dystopian Social Media Site
Futurebook is a parody social media website by Open Rights Group. It aims to give people an example of what a future without privacy would look like. Yeah, even less privacy than we have today.
Futurebook is a parody social media website designed to warn users about how changes in Government policy could negatively impact rights to freedom of expression and privacy and disrupt user experiences online.
The website features disabled comments, invasive advertising, blocked content and throttled streaming. These are all potential outcomes of UK digital policy developments after leaving the European Union.
Apple Releases App Store Government Removal Requests
As part of its annual transparency reports, for the first time Apple has released data for App Store government removal requests from 2018.
Over 2 Billion User Records Exposed in Orvibo Data Breach
Orvibo makes smart home products, and researchers found a leak in its database that exposed over two billion user records. This included usernames, email addresses, passwords, and precise locations.
The data breach affects users from around the world. We found logs for users in China, Japan, Thailand, the US, the UK, Mexico, France, Australia, and Brazil. We expect that there are more users represented in the 2 billion plus logs.
We first contact Orvibo via email on June 16. When we didn’t receive a response after several days, we also tweeted the company to alert them to the breach. They still have not responded, nor has the breach been closed.
Utterly ridiculous. It’s one thing to leak data, and other thing to ignore the problem and not fix it.
Apple Stocks Gain as Much as 3.3% Despite Trade War
Despite the trade war between China and the United States, Apple stocks have jumped as much as 3.3% in the past three weeks.
Rico Zorkendorfer Left Apple to Join Bumblebee Spaces
Rico Zorkendorfer left Apple in April where he worked in the industrial design team. He recently joined startup Bumblebee Spaces.
Xiaomi Threatens to Sue Writers Who Cry Copycat Over 'Mimoji'
I wasn’t going to bother with Xiaomi’s new “Mimoji” until I learned the company is threatening to sue journalists who call it a copycat without providing evidence. It sounds like it’s only writers in China and not journalists in other countries, but that shouldn’t matter.
As Gizmochina notes, PR head Xu Jieyun posted the app’s naming timeline, and said that the “functional logic difference between the two products is huge.” It also promised “the next phase of action” against people who said it was copying Apple’s Memoji without proof.
Ireland Opens Probe into Apple Privacy Policy
Ireland’s Data Protection Commissioner (DPC) has opened its third Apple investigation, this time examining its privacy policy.
The Complete List of Google Alternatives
Sven Taylor put together an awesome list of Google alternatives. Search, email, browsers, and more are included in this gigantic list. Thanks to the TMO reader who emailed this to me.
A growing number of people are seeking alternatives to Google products that respect their privacy and data. This guide aims to be the most exhaustive resource available for documenting alternatives to Google product.