Look at how this works. Is it just advertising?
Could an intelligence or criminal organization be using this too?
Lenovo
Accused Of Using ‘Rootkit-Like’ Methods To Sneak Software Onto
Clean Windows Installs
When acquiring a new notebook
or desktop, one of the first things many power users do is wipe it
clean. No one likes the "junk" that comes preinstalled,
and if time is available, sometimes it's just preferable to start
fresh. But what if that was easier said than done? What if that
preinstalled junk became more like a plague, persisting even through
a fresh install of Windows?
You might think, "That's crazy. Impossible."
Well, it is crazy, but it's definitely not impossible.
It
seems that installing some asinine malware
on customer PCs wasn't enough to satisfy Lenovo's
insatiable appetite for intrusion, as it's recently been discovered
that the company's installed what's effectively a rootkit
onto a range of its notebooks, including Flex and Yoga models.
The root of this problem, no pun, is something
called Lenovo Service Engine, in effect low-level firmware that's
able to detect whether or not certain files exist in the installed
OS. In this case, it seems
only Windows 7 and
8 are affected. [So
far. Bob] In the event files this rootkit wants are not
present, they'll automatically be fetched from the Internet, and
subsequently installed.
(Related) Et tu, Microsoft?
Is Windows
10 Spying On You? Privacy Fears Raised As OS Secretly Contacts
Microsoft Regardless Of Settings
Windows 10 has raised some privacy concerns over
its default settings, which share speech, calendar and contact
information with Microsoft. However, it has emerged that even
if the user chooses not to share anything with Microsoft at all, the
system will still regularly contact Redmond.
According to ArsTechnica,
Windows 10 pings Microsoft during certain tasks without explaining
why or even giving any indication that contact is taking place, with
the news site having to use specialist tools to make the discovery.
For my Intro to Computer Security students.
What the
U.S. Military Has Learned About Thwarting Cyberattacks
… The Department of Defense has found that the
lion’s share of successful cyberattacks are made possible by poor
human performance. Indeed, a key element of our thesis is that most
organizations place too little emphasis on changing behavior and too
much on technical safeguards.
We suggest that companies should follow the U.S.
military’s example. It is strengthening its cybersecurity by
applying the methods used by the U.S. Navy’s nuclear-propulsion
program, whose safety record is second to none. These include a
robust program of training, reporting, and inspections, as well as
six operational excellence principles.
(Related) First, scare the pants off them. This
is probably not too frivolous, but I really don't care – it
will grab their attention and possibly keep them awake.
Not Even
Close: The State of Computer Security (with slides) – James Mickens
by Sabrina
I. Pacifici on Aug 12, 2015
“In
this bleak, relentlessly morbid talk, James Mickens will describe why
making computers secure is an intrinsically impossible task. He will
explain why no programming language makes it easy to write secure
code. He will then discuss why cloud computing is a black hole
for privacy, and only useful for people who want to fill your machine
with ads, viruses, or viruses that masquerade as ads. At this point
in the talk, an audience member may suggest that Bitcoins can make
things better. Mickens will laugh at this audience member and then
explain why trusting the Bitcoin infrastructure is like asking
Dracula to become a vegan. Mickens will conclude by describing why
true love is a joke and why we are all destined to die alone and
tormented. The first ten attendees will get balloon animals, and/or
an unconvincing explanation about why Mickens intended to (but did
not) bring balloon animals. Mickens will then flee on horseback
while shouting “The Prince of Lies escapes again!”
Probably not how Facebook would want to be seen by
the world, if they thought about it.
Facebook
cancelled a student's internship after he highlighted a massive
privacy issue
Facebook cancelled a Harvard student's internship
after he created a Google Chrome plugin that highlighted
serious privacy flaws in the social network's messaging service,
Boston.com reports.
In May, computer science and mathematics student
Aran Khanna built Marauder's Map. It was a browser plugin that made
use of the fact that people who use the Facebook Messenger share
their location with everyone they message with by default.
… Earlier this week, Khanna
published a case study for the Harvard Journal of Technology Science
about his experience.
… On the afternoon of the 29th, three days
after my initial posts, Facebook phoned me to inform me that it was
rescinding the offer of a summer internship, citing as a reason that
the extension violated the Facebook user agreement by "scraping"
the site. The head of global human resources and recruiting followed
up with an email message stating that my blog post did not reflect
the "high ethical standards" around user privacy expected
of interns. According to the email, the privacy issue was not with
Facebook Messenger, but rather with my blog post and code describing
how Facebook collected and shared users' geo-location data.
Anyone could have done this, if they had searched
(Googled) for loopholes.
Google is
testing drones in US airspace by piggybacking on Nasa exemption
… Documents seen by the Guardian also reveal
technical details of Google’s drone, which is capable of speeds of
up to 100 mph and weighs less than 25kg (55lb). The papers also
reveal Google’s safety plans should a drone lose contact with its
operator.
… Certificate of Waiver or Authorization (COA)
… let public organisations like the military, state universities
and police or fire departments experiment with unmanned aerial
systems (UAS), as long as they meet safety standards. But COAs come
with restrictions. FAA regulations state that a public agency must
own or exclusively operate the drone in question, and that commercial
operations are prohibited.
I don't get it. Indians have faces too. I have a
half-dozen Indian faces in my class.
Facebook
struggles to sell advertising in India
… Facebook has 132
million users in India, trailing only the 193 million in the United
States, according to the company, and the country is critical for the
Menlo Park, California, social network's global expansion.
But so far, the payoff
has been small: Facebook earns 15 cents per user in India every
quarter, compared to the $7 to $8 it makes on each U.S. user,
according to analysts.
Facebook does not break
out its revenues in India, but Neil Shah, an analyst at Counterpoint
Research, a Hong Kong-based technology consulting firm, estimates it
brings in $15 million a quarter, far behind the $350 million he
estimates Google earns there per quarter.
Oh joy! (Can you get carpal tunnel syndrome from
texting?)
Twitter
Lifts 140-Character Limit for Direct Messages Today
Twitter Inc.’s 140-character limit is a defining
characteristic of the social media service, both frustrating and
liberating users’ public expression.
But the company believes that sacred limit doesn’t
need to apply to private messaging. Starting Wednesday, Twitter is
enabling users to send messages with unlimited characters directly to
each other through its private-chat function.
… Twitter’s move is yet another admission
that it needs to make the service more useful and easier to navigate.
Over the past few months, for instance, it has begun curating more
content for users in an attempt to organize the chaos, and it intends
to double-down on curation with the forthcoming live-events product
called Project
Lightning.
Perhaps we should upgrade all those huge TVs in
our classrooms?
http://www.techradar.com/news/television/this-device-can-transform-any-tv-into-a-touchscreen-1301676
This device
can transform any TV into a touchscreen
There's big business in creating TV-sized
touchscreens. Microsoft, for instance, developed the Surface
Hub, a digital whiteboard for conference rooms. It's likely only
a matter of time before Apple follows suit with a full-size iPad or
Apple
TV with a
touch-enabled remote.
But Touchjet, the company behind the Pond pico
projector, has other plans.
Instead of buying a touch-enabled screen that
might be able to function as a standard TV, it plans on turning your
tube into a massive Android 4.4 Kitkat-powered touchscreen using the
same technology you'd find in your remote.
An infrared sensor is embedded in a camera that
sits on top of the TV and plugs into the back of your screen via an
HDMI cable. After tracking your finger movements using infrared
light, the data is then interpreted by a processor and transformed
into touch gestures that Android can process. Once calibrated, the
sensor transforms your TV into a digital easel, an office whiteboard
or an impossibly large Candy Crush playing field.
Might be a good way to introduce my students to
Data Analysis.
Fantasy
Football League Invokes IBM Watson APIs to Improve Fan Experience
In a move that could have broad implications for
how APIs get used within the context of advanced analytics
applications, Edge
Up Sports, an organizer of a fantasy football league, revealed
today that it plans
to make use of IBM Watson cloud services to make it simpler for
more fantasy football players to participate in the league.
Edge Up Sports CEO Ilya Tabakh told
ProgrammableWeb that the fantasy football league
organization will initially make use of the APIs that IBM
gained when it acquired AlchemyAPI earlier this year.
Specifically, Edge Up Sports will invoke text analytics and sentiment
analysis APIs to make it easier for fans to aggregate various media
reports about specific players they may be tracking.
For all my students? The wrong kind of “self
improvement” App? Do these sell because we believe we need them?
The Startup
Behind Popular Selfie-Editing App Facetune Raises $10 Million, Plans
for New Products
In the world of Instagram, Facebook and Snapchat,
you are only as cool as your last post. And in that world, editing
the pimple out of your vacation selfie and pimping out your latest
party photo is serious business. It’s also turbo-charging the
growth of mobile photo-editing startup Lightricks.
Lightricks,
the Jerusalem-based company behind the super popular Facetune
app, has just closed its first-ever round of outside funding.
The photo editing startup raised a $10 million round led by Israeli
VC firm Carmel Ventures, according to an announcement released today.
Facetune, which is currently the second most
popular paid app according
to App Annie’s ranking, lets users retouch photos.
I was very excited until I realized these are two
separate programs...
MIT Robots:
Now able to punch through walls and serve you beer
(Related) Convergence? You no longer have to
pour beer over your cereal?
New
Hefeweizen beer – HefeWheaties created from Wheaties after they
team up in Minneapolis
… Only presented in the Twin cities, the
limited-edition Hefeweizen was created after the joint venture of
local craft brewery Fulton and Wheaties. HefeWheaties has been
created after the team up of the two Minnesota-based companies and it
is the first alcohol partnership for Wheaties. People
are calling it “beer for champions” in the local
market.
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