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Swiss Army Seeks Private Messenger 'Threema' Over WhatsApp

Andrew Orr ·

Switzerland’s army told its soldiers not to use foreign messengers such as WhatsApp, due to privacy concerns. Instead, the recommendation is to use private messenger Threema, a Swiss app.

Army spokeswoman Delphine Schwab-Allemand, in an e-mail on Wednesday confirming reports on the issue in Swiss media, seemed to soften the army’s position, saying that there was a “recommendation” that troops use Threema. It took effect on Jan. 1. She added that the army cannot and does not want to tell troops to use a particular app on their private devices.

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Twitter Reaction Videos Being Tested With Retweets on Platform

Andrew Orr ·

TechCrunch reports that Twitter reaction videos are being tested as a new way to engage with the platform.

Twitter says it’s only running the test with a small subset of iOS users for now and will monitor feedback from the group to see how the feature goes. The company says it wants to give users “more creative ways to express themselves” which tracks with its generally experimental vibe lately.

I get that companies need to compete with each other but not everything has to copy TikTok.

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How Apple Books+ Could Boost The Bundle

Charlotte Henry ·

Earlier this week there was speculation about Apple launching an audiobooks service. Joe Wituschek of iMore is positive about the prospect and outlines how it could enhance the Apple One bundle.

The great thing about Apple Books+, if it does come to fruition, is that Apple could do something even better than Amazon: it could bring both businesses together. Right now, Kindle and Audible are two separate products that, while they do work together in certain ways, are confusing as to what you get with each. Apple could offer both books and audiobooks under its subscription service, making pricing and what you get out of it much clearer. While it’s unclear how pricing would shake out, having everything under one roof alone would be a great way to differentiate itself from its competitors.

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Dapper Labs First NFT Company to Register as Lobbyist for US Government

Andrew Orr ·

Vancouver-based Dapper Labs has recruited Crossroads Strategies as a lobbying firm. The NFT company is the first of its kind to do so.

The company reported that it would lobby for “Policy related to NFTs, blockchain and financial services.” Aside from recruiting a lobbying firm, Dapper Labs also recruited Alison Kutler as its new head of government affairs back in November 2021. Kutler is the former chief of the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau and special advisor to the chairman of the FCC from June 2015 to Apr 2017.

‘PDF Expert’ for iOS Lets You Convert PDFs to Word, More
Cool Stuff Found

'PDF Expert' for iOS Lets You Convert PDFs to Word, More

Andrew Orr ·

PDF Expert’s latest update lets you convert PDFs to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, JPG, PNG, TXT, and other formats. The built-in PDF converter is a part of the PDF Expert PRO subscription at US$49.99/year. The PRO subscription also allows you to edit the text and images in PDFs, sign documents, redact sensitive data, and more. The current PDF Expert PRO subscribers get the new converting functionality at no extra cost.

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Norton Antivirus Now Includes a Crypto Miner in its Software

Andrew Orr ·

Norton antivirus has added a cryptocurrency miner to its software that it takes a 15% commission on. The link to the FAQ can be found below.

Update: This has been updated to include a quote from a NortonLifeLock spokesperson. They want to mention that it’s an opt-in feature: “Norton Crypto is an opt-in feature only and is not enabled without user permission.”

There is also a way to opt-out if you let it mine crypto but you changed your mind. However, it’s a bit more complicated than turning a toggle off:

“If users have turned on Norton Crypto but no longer wish to use the feature, it can be disabled through Norton 360 by temporarily shutting off “tamper protection” (which allows users to modify the Norton installation) and deleting NCrypt.exe from your computer.”

Today on The Mac Observer‘s Daily Observations podcast, we mentioned several free alternatives to Norton that don’t include a crypto miner.