Shut down Windows 10 telemetry with Win10 Spy Disabler
Windows 10 brought us Cortana. Edge. A brand new Start Menu. Oh, and a host of new and extended ways for Microsoft to capture data on your activities.
Fortunately 2015 has also seen the growth of a whole new market for programs to turn these technologies off again, and Win10 Spy Disabler is the latest example.
Please, sir, I want some porn
UK consumers of porn will have to ask their ISP to provide them with access to X-rated content. As the government continues its futile bid to sanitize the web, new customers signing up for internet access with Sky will find that an adult content filter is enabled by default.
This means that anyone wanting to view content that has been deemed 'adult' will have to contact Sky to lift the block. The decision to make the content filter opt-out rather than opt-in was taken after it transpired that a mere 3 percent of existing users had taken the step of switching it on in the first year since its introduction in 2013.
New HTTP 451 error indicates pages have been blocked or censored
It's not every day that a new HTTP error code is introduced -- there are, after all, a limit to the number that could possibly be needed -- but it may not be long before you encounter a 451 error. The code has been made a new standard by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) to indicate when sites have been taken down for legal reasons.
Described as an 'HTTP Status Code to Report Legal Obstacles', it is hoped that 451 errors will introduce a new level of transparency about sites that have been killed by governments or law enforcement agencies. In some ways it is an extension of the 403 (Forbidden) error, but it provides a little more information as to why a particular site cannot be accessed.
Human behavior is the biggest threat to company security
A new survey of cyber security professionals from information management company Nuix shows that businesses are placing greater emphasis on insider threats.
The report reveals that 71 percent of respondents report that they have an insider threat program or policy, and 14 percent say that they allocate 40 percent or more of their budget to insider threats.
Get it for FREE! PowerArchiver 2015 Standard, worth $22.95 only from Downloadcrew Giveaway!
Everybody needs some way of compressing and extracting files, but sometimes the built-in zip capabilities in Windows just don’t cut it. And what happens if you receive a file compressed in some format you’ve never heard of?
The answer lies with PowerArchiver 2015. This is one of the most comprehensive archiving tools you’ll find, capable of extracting from over 50 different formats. It can also write to all key formats too, including --of course -- Zip, as well as 7-zip, TAR, GZIP and even ISO.
Microsoft has a bright future, says Goldman Sachs
Goldman Sachs thinks Microsoft is making a comeback. The investment banking firm has produced a 22-page document -- titled Righting a Wrong -- looking at Microsoft’s current business, the recent changes it has made and it’s future opportunities.
The research analyzes Microsoft’s core businesses of Azure, Windows and Office and believes that the future looks bright for the company, going as far as to change its stock rating from Sell to Neutral.
Another nail in the coffin for Flash as Facebook defaults to HTML5 video
The demise of Flash has been long, lingering, and painful -- and highly over due in many people's books. There has been a spate of high profile ditchings of Flash recently: Speedtest.net, Twitch, Chrome and Netflix to name but a few. Now Facebook has thrown its hat in the ring switching to HTML5 video.
This is a move that is browser-agnostic, and means that every single video you see on the social network will default to HTML5. While many will see this as a cause for celebration, the change does not completely spell the death of Flash -- it will continue to be used on Facebook for many games.
KickassTorrents now has its own movie release group
There has been something of a clamp down on torrent sites around the world in recent years, but that doesn’t mean they're going away. It may be slightly harder to get a torrent fix these days, but where there's a will there's a way. One of the biggest names still on the scene is KickassTorrents, and it has now ventured into new territory by starting a release group of its own.
Over the last few days, the group -- under the handle KATRG -- has been pushing out numerous Blu-ray rips and screeners. There's no sign of Star Wars: The Force Awakens just yet (although it's surely not long before it makes an appearance), but there are some big releases out there including The Hateful Eight, The Peanuts Movie, and The Revenant.
Armed gang uses Grindr to target victims for gay-bashing
Dating services are big business these days, and they offer a modern way to meet a life partner. But there's also a dark side. Tinder is perhaps the most well-known dating app, and Grindr is a near identical service aimed at gay and bisexual men.
Police in London are warning that the app -- which is available for iOS and Android -- is being used by an armed gang to set up fake dates with men. With two million people using the app around the world, Grindr offers rich pickings for homophobes to look for victims.
Insane bug makes it incredibly easy to hack many Linux systems
Linux is usually touted as the operating system of choice for those concerned about privacy, but a recently discovered bug makes it unbelievably simple to bypass authentication. A vulnerability in Grub2 -- the bootloader used by many Linux distros -- means that all it takes to take control of a computer is to press the backspace key 28 times.
Two researchers from the Cybersecurity Group at Spain's Polytechnic University of Valencia published a paper that reveals just how easy it is to gain access to many Linux systems. It's not a problem that Ubuntu, Red Hat, and Debian users need to worry about too much as patches have already been issued, and users of other distros can make use of an emergency patch in the Grub2 git repository.
More 4K content on the way to your TV very soon
2016 is shaping up to be the year of 4K. Some is already available and much more is on the way, and there is a growing number of TVs that can handle it. For those purchasing a new set in the near future it is a prudent move to future-proof and be ready for what is coming.
Now UltraFlix is announcing its plans to provide a lot more content in the way of movies, TV shows and concerts, all using this new technology. The company boasts more than 1,000 Hollywood pictures as well as IMAX documentaries.
Stop doing quizzes on Facebook if you place any value on your privacy
You might think that talking about Facebook and privacy in the same breath is a little odd. The two just don’t go hand in hand, surely? Trying to use Facebook whilst maintaining your privacy is an exercise in futility, right? Well, yes, it’s certainly true that hitting a social network is not the thing to do if you want to fly under the radar, but many people do not realize just how easy it is to unwittingly hand over reams of personal information to companies and persons unknown.
While a majority of users are aware that anything they post -- essentially -- becomes Facebook's property, and can be exploited in a variety of ways. Anything shared to the social network can be used to dig up an ever-more accurate picture of who you are, where you are, what you do, what you like, and who you know. Quizzes, personality tests, friend comparisons, and year in review apps, however, are blackholes for personal data -- and the huge range of apps from Meaww have been singled out as being a major cause for concern.
Rdio shuts down December 22nd, provides a way to save your music
Recently streaming music service Rdio was purchased by Pandora which plans to merge it into its own offering. That process is about to become complete in the next few days, but there is good news for Rdio users, or at least as much as they can expect.
The streaming service will cease operations on December 22nd. The good news, if there is any in this, is that users will be able to save their music.
Outlook online to get a better address book and flight confirmations
Outlook has been a popular desktop app for what seems like ages and now it's online aiming to compete with services like Gmail and Yahoo. In order to differentiate itself from rivals Microsoft needs extras that attract customers to its offering.
Now the company is announcing a couple of updates including improvements to the address book and flight notifications for busy travelers.
Enterprise mobility will be the main IT focus in 2016
According to a new report from Harris Poll announced this week, enterprise mobility will top IT investments in 2016. The survey reveals that more than 90 percent of IT Decision Makers (ITDMs) see enterprise mobility as the critical function for customer engagement, competitiveness and operational productivity in 2016.
Additionally, nearly three in four (73 percent) respondents indicate that they intend to mobilize their whole organization.
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