Apple Watch is too expensive for most consumers
One in ten US broadband households plan to buy a smartwatch in 2015, however, 84 percent of them won’t spend over $250 on the device, according to recent wearable research.
The survey, from Parks Associates, suggests that the price point of $100 (£65) to $250 (£160) is roughly equivalent to a high-end fitness tracker.
IoT Tech Expo arrives in London this December
The Internet of Things is definitely a technology that’s going to have a huge impact on our lives in years to come. According to IDC, the IoT market is set to be worth a staggering $1.7 trillion by 2020.
This December will see the launch of a new Internet of Things event designed to capitalize on this growing sector. The IoT Tech Expo Europe 2015 will be taking place at Olympia Central, London, on 2nd -- 3rd December, and is set to showcase the most cutting edge technologies from more than 100 exhibitors and 200 speakers.
Second zero-day flaw found in Adobe Flash thanks to Hacking Team
Earlier this week an exploit for Adobe Flash was revealed -- a shock, I know. Now a second is in the wild and already being used. Known by the catchy name CVE-2015-5122, security firm FireEye discovered the flaw buried in the Hacking Team leak and alerted Adobe to it.
Adobe has released a security bulletin stating "Critical vulnerabilities (CVE-2015-5122, CVE-2015-5123) have been identified in Adobe Flash Player 18.0.0.204 and earlier versions for Windows, Macintosh and Linux. Successful exploitation could cause a crash and potentially allow an attacker to take control of the affected system".
gImageReader extracts text from images, PDFs, more
Extracting text from a PDF can be very easy. Just select a section and copy it to the clipboard, or maybe -- in Adobe Reader -- click File > Save As Other > Text to save the entire document.
This all works just fine, too, until you come across a PDF which is all images. And that’s when you need something a little more powerful.
Here's how Windows Hello login works in Windows 10
One of the more intriguing new features of Windows 10 is Windows Hello. If you're sick of typing a password to log into your account, but don’t want to do away with security altogether, you can use this biometric feature to log in using your face or fingerprint.
Windows Hello works in conjunction with Microsoft Passport to lock down your system, but the facial recognition feature is only compatible with certain hardware. This fact means that it has been hard to try out Windows Hello, but over on SuperSite for Windows Richard Hay got his hands on an Intel RealSense 3D Camera (F200) and recorded a demo of how it works.
FTC could probe Apple Music over legality of 30 percent cut from streaming rivals
The launch of Apple Music has been one of the most controversial for some time. After complaints about the free trial period not generating income for record labels -- a problem seemingly sorted out by the intervention of Taylor Swift -- attention turned to how little the music streaming service paid artists the rest of the time.
Now Apple has a new problem, bringing Apple Music into the limelight for the wrong reasons once again. The Federal Trade Commission is currently considering whether to probe the company for antitrust violations. Reuters reports that the FTC could be on the verge of launching an investigation into the legality of the 30 percent cut Apple takes from other streaming music services such as Spotify.
Getting started with Windows 10 -- download the essential guide
The Windows 10 launch date is now little more than two and a half weeks away. While a lot of people have tried out the various preview builds that have been made available, the majority of people upgrading will be doing so with little to no knowledge of what to expect. Ahead of Microsoft's most important operating system launch for years, Lenovo has published a user guide that will help bring you up to speed.
Quite a lot has changed or been added since Windows 8.1, so there's much to learn. For those people who decided to stick with Windows 7 -- and there are many, many such people -- the jump is even bigger. Lenovo's guide serves as an excellent starting point for learning about what's new, how things work, and what's different. Think Windows 10 101: introducing the Start menu, Action Center, and more.
Microsoft's 'feeble' enterprise security and virus protection is the worst
Tests carried out by independent security labs AV-Test show that Microsoft is at the bottom of the league when it comes to enterprise security and virus protection. The tests pitted 11 security solutions against each other, and Microsoft's Endpoint Protection 2012 from the Microsoft Management Suite System Center 2012 was found to offer the weakest protection.
In both enterprise network security tests and virus detection tests, Microsoft trailed behind the competition in eleventh place. What's particularly concerning is that as the tool tested is bundled software, it's likely that it is precisely what many businesses are relying on for protection.
Chrome blocks access to torrent sites
Chrome users who download torrents may be thinking about switching to a different browser. Google's web browser is now blocking access to a number of big name torrent sites. This is not a case of Google taking the moral high ground about the rights and wrongs of torrenting, but part of the search giant's security program to protect users from "harmful programs".
Starting yesterday, downloaders found that access was blocked to ExtraTorrent and KickassTorrents, although the block was later lifted. The block remains in place for other torrent sites including kat.cr. Upon attempting to visit an affected site, would-be torrenters are greeted by a red, full-screen security warning that advises of the potential danger of the site in question.
Amnesty International seeks explanation for 'absolutely shocking' government surveillance
A court recently revealed via email that the UK government had been spying on Amnesty International. GCHQ had put Amnesty under surveillance -- despite this having previously been denied -- and now the human rights organization wants answers.
In a letter to the UK Prime Minister David Cameron, Amnesty International asks for an explanation for the surveillance. The Investigatory Powers Tribunal's (IPT) email made it clear that GCHQ had been intercepting, accessing and storing communications, something that Amnesty International's Secretary General, Salil Shetty believes "makes it vividly clear that mass surveillance has gone too far".
Windows 10 Mobile Insider Preview Build 10166 arrives on the Fast ring
Yesterday, Microsoft released a new Windows 10 Insider Preview build for PCs. That version was Build 10166. Today, the software giant releases a new Windows 10 Mobile Insider Preview, with the same build number. Try not to get the two confused.
The new mobile build is rolling out to Windows Insiders on the Fast ring now, and like its PC number-sake, it offers lots of small changes and feature tweaks, although the focus is mostly now on improving stability and squashing bugs. The Mobile release won’t be happening any time soon, but Microsoft is clearly keen to get all of the major issues dealt with quickly.
HP announces new PCs made for Windows 10
We're only weeks away from the official launch of Windows 10, or, as some people may think of it, Microsoft's correction to the problems of its last operating system. That means OEMs are busy readying products to push to market for the big day, and HP is among them.
The company is announcing an entire portfolio of computers that are designed to run this new operating system, though not all will ship with it.
Young people are all for equality in games
If game designers opt for a male protagonist thinking it would make it easier to tap into the predominantly male gaming audience, then they’re in for a nasty surprise.
A recent study conducted by Time has shown that most boys don’t really care which gender the main character is, as well as that they’re aware that women are underrepresented in video games.
Microsoft Power BI exits Preview -- will be generally available on July 24th
Data is the most important and valuable thing in the world. Diamonds and gold are just rocks in the ground by comparison. Want proof? Look at Google. Collecting information and storing data creates power and has huge value.
The problem with data, however, is that it only has value when it tells a story. In other words, you have to actually use the data you collect at some point. You can have giant SQL tables full of the secrets of the universe, but you need to be able to utilize and share it. Tableau is a popular visualization solution in the data analysis world, but it is clunky and confusing. Microsoft's solution, Power BI, looks much more promising and useful. Today, the company announces that it is exiting Preview and will be generally available on July 24th.
Leaked tool lets you download Windows Phone apps on a PC
Something that many Windows Phone users have been asking for is a little flexibility with how apps are downloaded and installed. One particular request is the ability to download apps using a PC rather than with a handset. A new tool leaked by a Microsoft employee makes this possible.
The appropriately-named Windows Phone Assistant is an official Microsoft tool that has been used internally. Nawzil released the software in response to a series of requests from people, granting greater control over apps. The leaked tool is available for anyone to download -- you just need to be running Windows Phone 8.1 GDR 2.
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