Some Mac App Store Apps ‘Damaged’ Due to Authentication Issues
A growing number of MacRumors readers and Twitter users have been experiencing an issue with some Mac App Store apps displaying a “damaged” error when opened since late Wednesday. The issue appears to be rather widespread, affecting popular apps such as 1Password, Acorn, Byword, Call of Duty 2, DaisyDisk and Tweetbot.
Mac App Store apps with a “damaged” error (Image: Graham/Twitter)
Mac users are prompted with this error message when opening Mac App Store apps:
“App Name” is damaged and can’t be opened. Delete “App Name” and download it again from the App Store.
Tweetbot developer Paul Haddad tweeted that the issue appears to be related to expired receipts for authentication certification, and speculated that the receipts now using SHA256 encryption may be causing problems with older OS X versions.
Wonder if the receipt now being SHA256 is causing problems with old OS versions? pic.twitter.com/ozOssXWlBR
— Paul Haddad (@tapbot_paul) November 12, 2015
http://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsThe issue, however, also appears to affect some users running OS X El Capitan, leading Haddad to believe that Mac App Store apps contacting Apple’s servers simultaneously may be causing a “self inflicted DDOS on Apple’s receipt generation service.”
Haddad says that rebooting your Mac on OS X 10.10 or later may resolve the issue, while some users have been forced to reinstall apps from the Mac App Store, disconnect from and reopen the Mac App Store or simply reenter their Apple ID password.
More details will be provided as they are known. Apple has been reached for comment.
Discuss this article in our forums
TalkTalk to offer its customers free upgrades after last month’s cyber attack
TalkTalk, the MVNO carrier in the UK that was hacked back in October (the third attack suffered by TalkTalk in 2015), has today detailed its plans to recover from the online attack that saw the personal details of over 150,000 customers stolen in the incident. The plan is basically to offer free upgrades to all of its customer, including those that weren’t affected by the hack, to help quell the anger caused by charging a termination fee to customers wishing to end their contracts early because of the hack.
The upgrades will not extend the customer’s current contract, and will become available to activate between the 1-31 December via a dedicated upgrades page, consisting of the following options:
- TV content including movies, kids entertainment and sports
- A mobile SIM with a monthly allowance of free texts, data and calls
- Unlimited UK landline and mobile calls
- A broadband health check by experienced engineers
- Security bundle that includes – HomeSafe, a web filter, F-Secure anti-virus protection, and additional calling features such as Caller Display, Last Caller Barring, Anonymouse Caller Reject and Voicemail
TalkTalk has stated that the loss of sales and service capability is expected to cost the company around £30-35million. So far, there has been 4 arrests in connection with the hack, with a 20-year old and 3 teenagers being apprehended by UK police.
If you are a TalkTalk customer, are you happy with the way the company has dealt with the hack? Does the promise of free upgrades help smooth things over, or are you biding your time until your contract finishes so you can leave without penalty charges?
Source: TalkTalk
Via: Engadget
Come comment on this article: TalkTalk to offer its customers free upgrades after last month’s cyber attack
Google’s Wallpaper Art app adds culture to your Chromebook
Do you often stare at your Chromebook display (or any other device running Chrome OS) wishing you could gaze upon the many artworks in the world, all from the comfort of the display in front of you? Well, Google has a side project called the Cultural Institute that goes around digitizing works of art from all over the world, from museums, galleries and archives. Once the piece of art has been digitized, the image is then placed online for all to see. Which is all well and good, I hear you say, but what has this to do with the Chrome OS? Well, the Cultural Institute’s Art Project has just released a Chrome OS app called Google Wallpaper Art that will update your wallpaper every day with an image of a piece of art.
Whether it’s Picasso, Van Gogh, Monet, perhaps something more contemporary or even street artists from around the world, a new image of a different artwork will find its way to your Chrome OS device every morning. If you aren’t keen on the day’s chosen image, you can simply move on to the next wallpaper in line. To get your hands on the Google Wallpaper app, all you have to do is visit the Chrome Web Store and add it to the Chrome browser. As yet, the app is only compatible with the Chrome OS.
Source: Francois Beaufort (Google Plus)
Via: 9to5Google
Come comment on this article: Google’s Wallpaper Art app adds culture to your Chromebook
‘Sensible Soccer’ is getting a modern remake
For kids growing up in the early 90s, the Commodore Amiga was the pinnacle of gaming hardware. It was no doubt helped by classic titles like Sensible Soccer and Cannon Fodder, which were the brainchild of Sensible Software founder Jon Hare. It’s been eight years since the last Sensible Soccer game hit the Xbox 360, but with Codemasters still holding on to the licence, Hare’s decided it’s about time for a reboot: Sociable Soccer.
Source: Sociable Soccer (Kickstarter)
See London through the eyes of a self-driving car
When a driverless car glides down the street, avoiding pedestrians and stopping at traffic lights, what exactly does it see? Is the machine’s perspective of the world so different to you and me? To give us an inside look, ScanLAB Projects strapped a laser scanner to a Honda CR-V and cruised through the streets of London. Although the car was being driven by a human, the LIDAR (light detection and ranging) equipment performed similarly to how it would in a driverless car. Like radar or sonar, this involves firing a laser in every direction and then measuring the time it takes to reflect back off nearby objects. These timings are then collected, analyzed and collected again to give the car a real-time picture of its surroundings. ScanLAB Projects is a London design company that uses the technology for art and visualisation purposes; they’ve already scanned museums, an underground railway line and the arctic circle. Its latest video — produced for the New York Times Magazine — combines the LIDAR recordings from the drive for a beautiful, eery look at the city.
Via: Gizmodo
Source: New York Times Magazine
ICYMI: Trekkie health scanner, car vending machine and more
Today on In Case You Missed It: A vending machine for cars (by Carvana) just launched in Nashville, removing the necessity of talking to a car salesman — or anyone, really — before driving off in a new ride. Stanford engineers made a health scanner device that can detect a tumor in your body based on the energy vibration that it sends out. And two crowdfunded devices aim to help snoring sleepers put a sock in it. The first, Nora, comes with a pillow that deflates or otherwise moves, to reposition the offending sleeper’s head. The other, Silent Partner, is a nose wearable that allegedly creates a quiet zone around the sleeper by sending out canceling sound waves.
Nest sells home surveillance in discounted packs of three
If you’re looking to create a low-level surveillance state within your own home, Nest has a bundle deal for you. Beginning this weekend, Nest will sell its WiFi camera in a three-pack for $497. That’s $100 off if you were to purchase the Nest Cams individually for $199. So you can either outfit your house with multiple cameras or give them out as gifts while saving yourself some cash. The bundle is available online at Nest.com, Amazon and Apple.com and in brick and mortar Best Buys and Home Depots.
Source: Nest
Firefox for iPhone and iPad Launches on App Store
Following a soft launch and months of testing, Mozilla has released Firefox for iOS on the App Store for free. The WebKit-based web browser for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch features a Firefox-like design, Intelligent Search, Firefox Accounts, Visual Tabs, Private Browsing mode on iOS 9 or later and more.
The web browser’s features are best suited for users that also use Firefox on Mac or PC:
- Intelligent Search: Suggested search results and list of search options, including Google, Bing, Yahoo, DuckDuckGo, Twitter, Amazon and WordPress
- Firefox Accounts: Firefox browser history, passwords and open tabs synced between Firefox on the desktop and your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch
- Visual Tabs: A card-based grid of intuitive visual and numbered tabs easily let you find content for future reference
- Private Browsing: Firefox won’t remember any of your history or cookies, but new bookmarks will be saved
Mozilla Firefox was once a leading desktop web browser for PCs and Macs, but it has lost significant market share since Google launched its own Chrome web browser in late 2008. Firefox is now the fourth most popular desktop browser in many countries, trailing behind Chrome, Internet Explorer and Safari.
Mozilla was initially opposed to releasing Firefox on iOS because of Apple’s policy that requires third-party browsers to use its own WebKit framework and JavaScript engine, but the company eventually reversed course and announced plans to release an iOS app in December 2014.
Firefox for iOS is free on the App Store for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch and requires iOS 8.2 or later. The app is written in Swift 2.0 and open source on GitHub.
Discuss this article in our forums
Nexus Protect launched in Canada
Protecting your smartphone in case the worst happens usually requires buying an additional policy and/or relying on your mobile phone insurance but an increasing trend among manufacturers is to offer their own additional cover.
Nexus 6P / 5X in video:
.rvs_wrapper
width: 350px;
.rvs_wrapper.align_left
float: left;
.rvs_wrapper.align_right
float: right;
.rvs_wrapper.align_center,
.rvs_wrapper.align_none
width: 100%;
.rvs_wrapper.align_center
text-align: center;
.rvs_wrapper.align_center.cbc-latest-videos ul li
float: none;
display: inline-block;
vertical-align: top;
.rvs_wrapper.cbc-latest-videos:not(.align_none) ul li:nth-child(2n+1)
clear: both;
.rvs_title
font-weight: 600 !important;
margin: 0 !important;
font-size: 24px !important;
.rvs_wrapper.align_right .rvs_title
padding-left: 20px;
.rvs_title a
font-family: ‘Roboto Condensed’;
color: #3a3a3a;
.rvs_wrapper.cbc-latest-videos ul
padding-top: 10px;
.rvs_wrapper.align_left.cbc-latest-videos ul li,
.rvs_wrapper.align_none.cbc-latest-videos ul li
padding: 0 15px 0 0;
.rvs_wrapper.align_right.cbc-latest-videos ul li
padding: 0 0 0 15px;
float: right;
.rvs_wrapper.align_center.cbc-latest-videos ul li
padding: 0 7px;
.rvs_wrapper.cbc-latest-videos ul li > a
font-weight: 400;
.rvs_wrapper.cbc-latest-videos ul li > a .yt-thumbnail
margin-bottom: 0;
@media only screen and (min-width : 480px)
body #page .rvs_wrapper.cbc-latest-videos ul
width: 100% !important;
@media only screen and (max-width : 480px)
body #page .rvs_wrapper.cbc-latest-videos
width: 100%;
float: none !important;
overflow-x: auto;
overflow-y: hidden;
body #page .rvs_wrapper.cbc-latest-videos ul
overflow: auto;
max-height: none;
body .rvs_wrapper.cbc-latest-videos ul li
float: left !important;
clear: none !important;
Not to be left out, Google joined the likes of Apple, HTC and Samsung by launching Nexus Protect alongside its new Nexus 6P and Nexus 5X smartphones and while initially only available in the US, Google has rolled out Nexus Protect in Canada.
Nexus Protect is great if you’re known for bumping and damaging your phone as it covers you for accidental damage and/or device malfunction for an additional year on top of the standard 1 year warranty. The service costs $69 and $89 for the Nexus 5X and the Nexus 6P respectively and covers up to 2 incidents during the two-year period, with a $79 excess payable for each claim.
The expansion into Canada may be as far as Google extends Nexus Protect or we may see the service launched in other countries where the new Nexus devices are on sale. Either way, we’ll keep an eye on this and let you know when we have more information.
What do you think? Do you have either of the new Nexus devices and do you want Nexus Protect to come to your country? Let us know your views in the comments below guys!
WSJ: Facebook’s Instant Articles aren’t bringing in a lot of money
The 20 participating publishers of Facebook’s Instant Articles program just aren’t getting as much money per post as they do for pieces posted on their own websites. As a result, the social network is now testing new advertising schemes, according to The Wall Street Journal. At the moment, each Instant Article can only have one 320 x 250 pixel-banner per 500 words of content, whereas a publication’s website would usually have three to four. Plus, the initiative doesn’t allow animated ads. The project’s manager, Michael Reckhow, told the WSJ that since receiving feedback from the publishers, Facebook has been experimenting by adding more banners to random pages, even animated and interactive ones.
Source: The Wall Street Journal
AIVAnet 