Latest Technology News

One-hundred and fifty-three in a series. Welcome to this week's overview of the best apps and games released for Windows 8.x/10 in the past seven days.

This week saw a surprisingly large number of applications and only a handful of games worth mentioning. If you followed the Best Windows Apps of the Week series you know that this is not often the case as games tend to dominate the Windows Store.

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According to a new survey 83 percent of app users say location is crucial to their app experiences, but nearly 40 percent are hesitant to share their location.

These are part of the findings of a study by Skyhook Wireless which looks at the extent to which people turn location services on or off for their apps and tries to understand why many smartphone users choose not to take advantage of the benefits sharing location can bring.

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Windows Insiders working with the preview builds of Windows 10 are used to the odd quirk here and there. Windows 10 Build 10586, released yesterday, is no different.

This latest build is widely believed to be the Threshold 2 release that is expected to roll out later this month. While it fixes numerous issues and adds new features when compared to the RTM build, it can also remove the Insider Hub. Here's how to get it back.

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Deciding whether to upgrade your operating system is always a big decision. It is one that should not be made lightly, especially when it is a major upgrade like Windows 10.

Over the years, there have been mixed reviews regarding Windows upgrades. I just need to mention the word 'Vista' and some IT folk breakout into a cold sweat!

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ASCII art is a graphics design technique dating back to the 1960s, where pictures are produced entirely from text characters.

The results are, well, basic. But they can have plenty of retro appeal, and producing them is a whole lot easier than you think.

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While I am not a hardcore gamer, I do enjoy gaming on both my PC and Xbox One. While playing single-player games can be fun, I much prefer the online multiplayer variants. I am still blown-away at the concept of playing a game against random people from around the world. Keep in mind, my first console was a hand-me-down Atari 2600 -- you younger cats probably take it for granted.

While playing against other people is cool on its own, I also like talking with them. Whether trash-talking or planning strategies, gaming with a headset is super great. If you are going to invest in a headset, however, you should do it right. I have been searching for a really nice headset for games, movies, music and chat and recently came across the Logitech G633 Artemis Spectrum RGB 7.1 Surround Sound Gaming Headset. When looking for accessories, Logitech is always a great place to start. Will the G633 continue the long tradition of quality?

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On Wednesday, the Investigatory Powers Bill was published in draft form, but it was in the wake of 9/11 that the UK government started its mass surveillance programs, spying on the online activities of British citizens. Under the guise of the 1984 Telecommunications Act, this surveillance was moved up a gear in 2005. Former deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg says that very few politicians knew about it.

Clegg only learned of the surveillance programs that were used to harvest emails, phone records, and texts in 2010, and questioned whether it was necessary. The former PM makes the revelations in an article for the Guardian in which he says that after Edward Snowden NSA and GCHQ spying revelations, "the knee-jerk response from the government was to play the man and ignore the ball".

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Microsoft is preparing a huge update to Windows 10, codenamed Threshold 2. We don’t know exactly when it will be made available, only that it’s coming this month.

In advance of that update, Microsoft is in the process of rolling out a new Insider Preview build which has all the hallmarks of being a test run of Threshold 2, or the Fall Update, as it’s likely to be known.

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My favorite video service is probably not what you expect. No, it is not Netflix or Hulu, but the free YouTube. Yes, when I am on my PC or tablet, I prefer watching Barnacules, iJustine and PewDiePie rather than Hollywood movies and prime-time TV shows. Say what you like, but I am certainly not alone in this regard.

Today, Google is improving YouTube in a really cool way -- it is delivering virtual reality. Using the search-giant's Cardboard face mask, you can experience VR-optimized content as if you are really there! Existing non-VR content can be viewed using Cardboard too.

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Given all the spying that goes on these days it's no wonder that people are looking for more private ways to get online and stay in touch with one another. Secure email -- which is what Edward Snowden chose to use for his communications with journalist Glenn Greenwald of The Guardian -- is proving more and more popular.

Unfortunately, not everyone is keen on such services. One such secure email provider, ProtonMail, has been taken down today, by a DDoS attack. Who would want to attack the service? That's the million dollar question and the list of potential attackers could be quite long. A bevvy of agencies have spoken out against encryption, going so far as asking for backdoors into data, blithely oblivious to the consequences of such action. ProtonMail was designed securely and doesn't possess records of correspondence, so law enforcement can't demand data.

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As we've seen with IBM's announcement earlier today, APIs are flavor of the development month at the moment.

Now the The Linux Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to accelerating the growth of Linux and collaborative development, is announcing the launch of an Open API Initiative to promote and facilitate the adoption and use of an open API standard.

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Kaspersky Lab has released a new report on the evolution of distributed denial of service (DDoS) and it shows some interesting figures, including the fact that a server was targeted for 320 hours straight.

The Kaspersky DDoS Intelligence Report Q3 2015 is based on the constant monitoring of botnets and observing new techniques utilized by cybercriminals. It shows that DDoS attacks remain highly localized, with 91.6 percent of the victims’ resources located in only ten countries around the world, although Kaspersky Lab has recorded DDoS attacks targeting servers in 79 countries total.

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Gartner predicts that by 2016 more than 50 percent of mobile apps will be hybrid, combining elements of both native and Web applications.

This allows apps to benefit from the portability of HTML5 Web apps along with a container that allows access to a device's native features. For businesses they offer faster development with easier updating and management.

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There’s no avoiding it; ad-blocking is a direct result of consumer demand. Adland has had its own way for too long and now the traffic is two-way we should view this as an opportunity to hit the reset button.

Let’s get this in context however; announcements such as Apple’s recent iOS9 update may have raised the profile of ad-blocking, but uptake is far from exponential. We’re not facing the Adpocalypse here, what we’re looking at is the balance being redressed.

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Clean sites with low load times and fewer pages to navigate are more likely to get consumers to spend money according to new research.

The survey by Instart Logic of 2,000 US consumers also shows that consumer confidence in a brand is tied to their quality of experience while online shopping.

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