Peter Wells joins the show and we’ll talk about how the Lenovo Superfish issue is affecting dozens of other apps as well. Should you be worried?
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Show Notes
Today’s guest: Peter Wells of Reckoner, Australia
Headlines:
ReCode reports Google is buying some of the tech intellectual property behind mobile payments system Softcard, formerly ISIS, the system created by AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile USA. Google also inked a distribution deal for Google Wallet with the the three US carriers. All three carriers will pre-install Google Wallet on their Android phones, starting later this year.
Today Google started accepting requests to use Inbox for Work according to Tech Crunch. “Google Inbox” has been available since late last year by invite, but didn’t integrate with “Google Apps for Work”. Google’s Director of Project Management, Alex Gawley, said the Inbox for Work experience will be indistinguishable from the consumer version. Google Apps for Work sys admins can request an invite by emailing inboxforwork@google.com. Invites should start arriving next month.
Ars Technica reports two US FCC commissioners, Ajit Pai and Michael O’Reilly have requested the commission delay its vote on Open Internet Rules for 30 days and make the entire proposal available for public review. The FCC usually does not release final drafts of rules publicly to reduce lobbying. Exceptions have been made in the past such as in the case of a change in rules on media ownership in 2003. The FCC is scheduled to vote on the new rules Thursday and DTNS is preparing a special roundtable discussion for Friday’s show.
Paul Thurrot on his still fresh and new thurrot.com reports Microsoft is delivering the first major update to the Microsoft Band fitness wearable and Microsoft Health online service. The updates includes new health and fitness insights, support for cycling, and a web app that allows you to view your data in a more detailed dashboard on any Web browser. Still no word on when more Microsoft Bands will be available for those who didn’t get in on the initial ‘measured launch’.
9 to 5 macfound an image on Pebble’s servers of a smartwatch with a color e-ink display, a larger bezel, and smaller buttons. Pebble quickly removed the image. 9 to 5 adds the image bears out what their sources say about latest pebble, which also includes a revamped OS, a battery life that compares to the first gen Pebble and no touchscreen.
After reports that the NSA and GCHQ had stolen its SIM keys, Gemalto said it would look into the matter. CNET reports Gemalto’s first statement says “Initial conclusions already indicate that Gemalto SIM products are secure.” Gemalto plans to release the full results of its investigation this Wednesday Feb 25th at a press conference in Paris at 10:30am.
News From You:
habichuelacondulce submitted the PC World article that a class action lawsuit has been filed against Lenovo in the US District Court for the Southern District. of California. Plaintiff Jessica Bennett, on behalf of the class, complained her laptop was damaged, her privacy invaed, her computer performance degraded and her bandwidth used by Superfish. Lenovo issued a fix to remove Superfish and its compromised certificate from all browsers on affected Lenovo computers. Meanwhile the Komodia software used by Superfish to intercept HTTPS traffic has been disovered in several other programs.
MacBytes wanted to let us know about another announcement from last week’s annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in San Jose. The BBC reports on a project to scan the Amazon Forest in Brazil, using a drone equipped with LIDAR or Laser Illuminated Detection And Ranging– to peer through the thick forest canopy. The project hopes to locate geoglyphs or large geometric patterns in the ground. More than 450 geoglyphs have been found in places where the forest has been cut down. The project could help answer questions about the size and complexity of Amazonian civilization prior to european contact.
Discussion Section Links: Superfish
Pick of the Day: Hindenburg via Anders
My good friend and former coworker, Nick Dunkerley, has developed an excellent audio editing tool specifically for radio and podcast work. It’s called Hindenburg, and I use it almost every day – It has filtering and compression and that sort of thing, it can record Skype conversations (in separate tracks), etc. has lots of keyboard shortcuts and can be picked up in a few minutes
Anyway, as mentioned in full disclosure, I know Nick and the others behind the company, I was the first alpha tester and have remained in frequent touch with them for feedback, input and feature requests.
The name, I should say, comes of course from the (in-)famous radio piece from the airship disaster – I’ve always thought it was slightly morbid, but hey…
Cheers, and keep up the good work,
Anders
And Simplenote via Peter Wells
and a very quick pick from me, you mentioned iftt’s new Do Camera last week on the show, and it has already made it to my home screen. Why? Well I’m very frustrated with Evernote, I much prefer the speed and simplicity of Simplenote- but I always wanted a way to take quick picks of serial numbers, receipts, etc for work, without those photos clogging up my camera roll. Do Camera allows me to do just that! You can turn off “Save to Camera Roll” in settings, then take those little “important for a few minutes” photos on your phone, and know they’ll immediately be uploaded to Dropbox or your preferred cloud service.
Tuesday’s guest: Patrick Beja, DTNS contributor and independent podcaster.