Mesh Networking: An alternative internet?
Currently, in order to exchange information on a computer or smartphone, we transfer it over the internet. This may take many different forms -- a web browser, email client, app or cloud storage -- but at the end of the day, you’re sending packets of information to another computer via the now-ubiquitous internet. Since we interact with this system all of the time, we no longer think about "going online". For many people, it’s just a natural state.
If you step back a little bit, you’ll remember that the internet isn’t the only way to transfer computer information. Disks, CDs and other physical media once dominated this space, and the term "sneakernet" was even coined to refer to physically transferring media from place to place. There were phone-based communication systems known as bulletin boards (BBSes), and larger endeavors like America Online or CompuServe, which used phone modems. These were limited to a maximum of 56 kilobits per second (kbps) over telephone lines and had a limited number of simultaneous users.
The 'age of automation' can benefit the security landscape
Artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning and automation are technology trends dominating discussions in many different industries at the moment and cyber security is no exception.
As cyber criminals become more advanced and the threat landscape continues to develop, businesses are looking to new technologies that can help secure their organization in a more proactive way.
The UK government's latest deluded idea: 'banning' underage sexting on social media
When the UK government is not busy looking for ways to invade internet users' privacy, it's looking for ways to restrict what they are able to do online -- particularly when it comes to things of a sexual nature.
The health secretary Jeremy Hunt has made calls for technology companies and social media to do more to tackle the problems of cyberbullying, online intimidation and -- rather specifically -- under-18-year-olds texting sexually explicit images. Of course, he doesn't have the slightest idea about how to go about tackling these problems, but he has expressed his concern so that, in conjunction with passing this buck to tech companies, should be enough, right?
Google brings 4K video live streaming to YouTube
While 1080p may look "good enough" to you, once you move to a higher resolution display, it is hard to go back. Prices for both 4K monitors and televisions continue to drop, meaning more and more consumers are buying them. During this past Black Friday, there were many such TVs being offered with big discounts.
Now that there are a healthy amount of these displays in the wild, content creators will be more motivated to release content in that resolution -- movies, TV, and video games. While Google added 4K playback to YouTube years ago, it did not offer live video streaming in that resolution. Today this changes, as the video site finally gets 4K live streaming -- including 360-degree streams. Best of all? Watching the streams won't require Microsoft Edge!
PC market shows signs of recovery
PC shipments will continue to decline in 2016, according to a new IDC forecast, but the drop will be slightly lower than previously expected. What's more, things will improve even more in 2017.
IDC expects PC vendors to ship a total of 258.2 million units this year, a figure which would be 6.4 percent lower than last year. The previous estimate was a 7.2 percent fall, which IDC announced in August. Growth will still be negative in 2017, but shipments are expected to decrease by just 2.6 percent compared to this year.
Symbol-to-accept strengthens multi-factor authentication
One of the more popular ways of securing logins in recent times has been the use of push-to-accept technology, sending a verification message to a user's mobile device.
However, this runs the risk of users inadvertently approving login requests that they didn't initiate. Adaptive access company SecureAuth is launching its new Symbol-to-accept technology to boost security without sacrificing convenience.
Netflix now lets you watch your favorite movies and TV shows offline
Many people stream their favorite movies and TV shows today through Netflix. The service, which boasts around 86 million subscribers, is available on all the major platforms, making it easy for users to enjoy it pretty much everywhere and on every PC, smartphone and tablet. That is, as long as there is a working Internet connection.
That changes today, as Netflix announces that it is also making its content available offline. Users are now able to download movies and TV shows and watch them while, for instance, traveling on an airplane or in a remote area. Here is what you need to know.
60 percent of enterprises have fallen victim to social engineering in 2016
A new study from cyber security company Agari reveals the scale of social engineering attacks on industrial organizations across the US.
Of over 200 security leaders surveyed 60 percent say their organizations were, or may have been, victim of at least one targeted social engineering attack in the past year, and 65 percent of those who were attacked say that employees' credentials were compromised as a result. In addition, financial accounts were breached in 17 percent of attacks.
Free online test can tell if you're 'pre-disposed' to negative or bad behavior
In the 2002 movie Minority Report, a law enforcement squad called "Precrime" arrests future criminals before they commit their act. Imagine if businesses could predict the future behavior of potential employees before hiring (or not hiring) them? That’s what Veris Benchmarks’ products aim to achieve.
The company also offers Veris Prime, is a free online test that you can take for yourself, and which measures your personal trustworthiness and shows how your results compare to white collar criminals.
C programming language showing signs of weakening in 2016
Created in 1972 by Dennis Ritchie, C is a dinosaur among computing languages. It’s large, powerful, and has dominated the programming ecosystem for over three decades. Technology changes every few years, and today there are hundreds of programming languages. It’s remarkable that one language has been able to remain so popular over the years, and there’s a reason for that.
Software developer Daniel Angel Munoz Trejo sums up C’s benefits well when he writes, "its closeness to the hardware, great portability and deterministic usage of resources make it ideal for low-level development for such things as operating systems kernels and embedded software. Its versatility, efficiency and good performance make it an excellent choice for high complexity data manipulation software...C is still unsurpassed when performance is the priority".
Get regular 'take a break' reminders with stretchly
Stretchly is an open-source tool which displays regular "take a break" reminders when you’re working on your PC, Linux system or Mac. There are plenty of similar tools around, but stretchly has some unusual touches which help it stand out from the crowd.
Application size isn’t a strong point: 134MB, really?! But that’s what you get with Electron apps, and at least there’s no need to install anything: just unzip and go.
New Android malware breaches over a million Google accounts
Researchers at cyber security company Check Point have uncovered a new malware variant that has breached more than a million accounts and is infecting over 13,000 Android devices a day.
Called Gooligan, the malware roots Android devices and steals email addresses and authentication tokens stored on them. With this information, attackers are able to access users' sensitive data from Gmail, Google Photos, Google Docs, Google Play, and G Suite.
AWS could become Amazon's biggest business
Holiday sales from Black Friday and Cyber Monday could very well help Amazon hit its target of $134 billion in annual sales, and Amazon Web Services (AWS) could make up for $12 billion of it
The company began offering web services to its customers over 10 years ago and in recent years this division has grown from a small to significant portion of the online retailer's business. AWS currently operates in 38 availability zones within 14 geographic locations and large companies such as Netflix, Adobe and Spotify have turned to the company for hosting and operating their websites and services.
Turn your Raspberry Pi into a 3D Christmas tree with this new board
If you need help to get into the festive spirit, and an Eggnog Latte from Starbucks isn’t quite cutting it, perhaps transforming a Raspberry Pi into an illuminated 3D Christmas tree will do the trick.
The Pi Hut has created a Christmas tree board kit that you simply assemble and plug into your Pi. Once done, sit back and feel the joys of the holiday season as they come rushing towards you. Ho, ho, and indeed ho.
Sentiment analysis helps sales teams measure customer reaction
One of the problems sales teams face is knowing how their pitches, presentations and marketing materials are perceived by the customer.
Cloud-based sales and content management platform Pitcher is hoping to offer teams better insight with its newly patented Sentiment Analysis Module (SAM).
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