Microsoft and Google team up to fight hotels' personal Wi-Fi hotspot blocks
Hotels are keen to extract money from guests, and in a bid to try to force them into paying for internet access, the industry is trying to gain permission to block personal Wi-Fi hotspots. Microsoft and Google are usually rivals, but the two companies are putting up a united front to fight these plans.
The American Hospitality & Lodging Association and Marriott International has asked the Federal Communications Commission for permission to use network management hardware that could prevent guests from creating and sharing their own private hotspots. The argument against this is that hotels are essentially requesting permission to block access to unlicensed parts of the wireless spectrum.
How to use Microsoft's recovery images for Surface and Surface Pro
If you're thinking of starting afresh with your Surface or Surface Pro in the New Year, Microsoft just made your life a little easier. The company has just released a series of recovery images for Surface devices that can be downloaded and used to restore the Windows tablet to the state it was in when you first bought it.
As this restore feature is something that's built in by default, you might be wondering what the value of these recovery images is. Well, there's always the possibility that your existing recovery image is corrupt, or you may even have freed up some space by wiping it out. Now you can get it back.
A simple fix could have prevented the JPMorgan mega-breach
JPMorgan Chase could have avoided one of the most damaging cyber attacks in history with a simple security fix.
The bank, which was struck in late August, revealed in October that the attackers had made off with the data of 76 million households and 7 million small businesses. The scandal was reported to have started with just one compromised password.
Microsoft and the Irish government appeal case over emails stored in Ireland
By now you've likely heard that the US is trying to seize emails held by Microsoft on foreign soil, something that you'd think it has no right to do. After all, the US government may have some reach, but grabbing from another nation seems to be extending it quite far. Both company and country are baulking at the prospect.
None of us wishes for a criminal to not be caught, but we want it to be done legally. Now Microsoft has officially filed its amicus brief in the New York court of appeals, with general counsel Brad Smith.
1980s technology can be used to hack any smartphone
German researchers have discovered that technology from the 1980s can be used by hackers anywhere in the world to spy on your phone calls and text messages.
The Signaling System 7 (SS7) network, which is still in use today, could allow hackers using an African or Asian network, for example, to hack into a US or UK-based mobile.
Santa Claus has Linux in his sack -- PCLinuxOS 2014.12 is here
Christmas is almost here, and I am so excited! Yes, I am looking forward to getting gifts, but more importantly, I like giving them. When you reach a certain age, a gift becomes just another thing taking up space in your home. The gifts I really want -- processors, RAM, graphics cards -- are too expensive to ask friends and family for. Some nice underwear and socks will do me just fine -- my current pairs are holier than Christmas itself.
Luckily, Linux is free, and makes the perfect gift for the nerd in your life. Today, Santa Claus pulls Linux from his sack a bit early -- PCLinuxOS 2014.12 sees release, and it looks awesome. If you have never tried a Linux-based operating system before, this is a great choice.
Sorry Apple fans, your precious Macs are at risk -- beware of Thunderbolt-injected rootkits
Apple makes really great products; Mac computers included. I respect the closed garden and restrictive hardware from a quality perspective, but I take umbrage with the high prices and questionable business practices. While OS X may look pretty from the outside looking in, after playing with it for long periods of time, it becomes apparent that all which glitters is not gold. My interest in Apple's operating system was very short-lived, as Microsoft's Windows is just a superior product.
Apple promoters are quick to point out the safety and security of Macs, as Apple is less likely to be targeted by malicious software and contains fewer vulnerabilities. As the smart people know, however, OS X is only "safer", as it has a far smaller install base. In other words, because of its lack of popularity, bad guys pay less attention -- its increased safety and security is a myth. I hate to break it to you Apple fans, but it turns out your precious Macs are currently at risk. Comically, this vulnerability is found in Thunderbolt -- you know, that wildly unpopular standard that Apple seems to love, but its accessories are too costly for many users. True, some Windows machines have Thunderbolt, but it is mostly an Apple affair, and now the fruit-logo company's computers are vulnerable because of its method of implementation.
Rockstar Consortium sells patents for $900 million, ending Android lawsuits
The patent wars are cooling down. Rockstar Consortium's litigation against numerous Android handset manufacturers has come to an end after the group sold 4,000 patents to RPX Corp. The intellectual property risk mitigation company bought the patents for $900 million, ending lawsuits against HTC, LG and Samsung.
Apple, BlackBerry, Ericsson, Microsoft, and Sony formed Rockstar Consortium back in 2011 to purchase around 6,000 patents from the bankrupt Nortel Network Corp for $4.5 billion. 2,000 of the patents had previously been shared between the members of the consortium, and the remainder have now exchanged hands for less a quarter of the original sale price.
Konnichiwa, Mozilla! KDDI Fx0 is first-ever Firefox OS smartphone for Japan
Smartphones are in the hands, pockets and purses of many people nowadays, but the type of phone varies. In the real world, you see lots of iPhones and Android phones, but beyond that, not much else. Sure, people still use BlackBerrys, and every once in a while you might experience a Windows Phone sighting, but phones based on Apple and Google's mobile OSes are really the only two horses in the race.
Even rarer than seeing a Windows Phone in the wild, is seeing a Firefox OS handset, despite its availability in many countries. In the USA particularly, Firefox OS phones have been available online, but not in the typical outlets, like Best Buy or directly from carriers. Today, Mozilla announces the first-ever Firefox OS device for Japan, and it is beautiful. With that said, will citizens of the Land of the Rising Sun actually take notice?
BetaNews 2014 -- the top news stories, editorials and guides from the past year
It’s that time of the year again when news sites and search engines look back at the stories and events that shaped the year. The top stories on BetaNews are obviously going to be different -- mostly -- from the top stories on other sites because we focus on technology. So in other words don’t expect Kim Kardashian "breaking" the internet to appear anywhere in our list. Although that’s not to say she won’t make an appearance somewhere…
Because BetaNews offers a mix of content, we’ve put together three top 10 lists -- News, Opinion/Editorial, and Guides. With news, it's not necessarily the biggest stories of year that make the list, but rather the content that was viewed the most. All three lists are presented, as ever, in reverse order.
Santa boards a flight to hand out Windows tablets to all
It's that time of the year when our thoughts turn towards a large man in a red suit. Despite his jolly nature, he still manages to sometimes terrify small children, as he did mine. However, the prospect of gifts generally gets them over the hump, and perhaps it's what worked on a recent flight between London and Boston.
The people who boarded the recent Virgin Atlantic flight were treated to a visit from the jolly old man, but more importantly, he had gifts in hand.
Apple's year-end is about security
When it comes to security, Apple can and should do better. It is one of the biggest offenders, after all, making quite a few serious mistakes in this area. One of its most-important services, namely iCloud, has been instrumental in this year's celebrity photo leaks scandal, better known as The Fappening. And, more recently, a weakness in its OS X deployment software for iOS apps has exposed hundreds of thousands of iPads and iPhones to the WireLurker malware. And these are just two examples. Unsurprisingly, as the year draws to an end, security remains a talking point in Apple's case.
Let's start with the good news, first. Apple has pushed an update for OS X 10.10 Yosemite, 10.9.5 Mavericks, and 10.8.5 Mountain Lion, seemingly for the first time, to quickly fix a critical vulnerability discovered in NTP (Network Time Protocol), a protocol which is widely used to synchronize device clocks with dedicated servers. Normally, OS X updates are not applied automatically, but this one is apparently so critical that it is.
HoneyView adds BPG support
Bandisoft has updated its free image viewer HoneyView with support for Fabrice Bellard’s new BPG image format.
BPG (Better Portable Graphics) is an efficient compressed graphics format which can deliver much smaller file sizes than JPG, while also supporting extra features like transparency.
It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas 2024
You send a command from your smartphone and your house automatically decorates itself with a holographic Christmas tree complete with decorations and a suitably conifer-like smell.
Sound like science fiction? Maybe, but this is among the predictions by the authors of a new book that looks at how technology is changing our lives and how we do business.
Icecream PDF Converter extracts text to DOC, ODT, RTF
Utilities developer Icecream Apps has released Icecream PDF Converter 1.3, extending the program with new text extraction tools.
The program can now extract the text from one or more PDFs, saving it in DOC, ODT, RTF and TXT formats.
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