Apple Touts ‘Differential Privacy’ Data Gathering Technique in iOS 10
With the announcement of iOS 10 at WWDC on Monday, Apple mentioned its adoption of “Differential Privacy” – a mathematical technique that allows the company to collect user information that helps it enhance its apps and services while keeping the data of individual users private.
During the company’s keynote address, Senior VP of software engineering Craig Federighi – a vocal advocate of personal privacy – summarized the concept in the following way:
We believe you should have great features and great privacy. Differential privacy is a research topic in the areas of statistics and data analytics that uses hashing, subsampling and noise injection to enable…crowdsourced learning while keeping the data of individual users completely private. Apple has been doing some super-important work in this area to enable differential privacy to be deployed at scale.
Wired has now published an article on the subject that lays out in clearer detail some of the practical implications and potential pitfalls of Apple’s latest statistical data gathering technique.
Differential privacy, translated from Apple-speak, is the statistical science of trying to learn as much as possible about a group while learning as little as possible about any individual in it. With differential privacy, Apple can collect and store its users’ data in a format that lets it glean useful notions about what people do, say, like and want. But it can’t extract anything about a single, specific one of those people that might represent a privacy violation. And neither, in theory, could hackers or intelligence agencies.
Wired notes that the technique claims to have a mathematically “provable guarantee” that its generated data sets are impervious to outside attempts to de-anonymize the information. It does however caution that such complicated techniques rely on the rigor of their implementation to retain any guarantee of privacy during transmission.
You can read the full article on the subject of differential privacy here.
Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.
Related Roundup: iOS 10
Tag: privacy
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Apple Removes Game Center App From iOS 10 Developer Beta
Six years after making its debut in iOS 4, Game Center has now been quietly removed from Apple’s mobile operating system, as a few initial iOS 10 beta testers have noted. Although the company has given users the ability to delete some of its pre-installed apps with the new OS, it appears Game Center in particular is permanently deleted. It is unclear, however, whether the app might be made available to download from the App Store when iOS 10 goes public this fall.
As pointed out by MacRumors’ sister site TouchArcade, Game Center is still not completely gone away as a service. In the release notes for the first beta of iOS 10, Apple explains that if a developer wants Game Center-like leaderboards in their app, they will have to implement such features themselves.
• The Game Center app has been removed. If your game implements GameKit features, it must also implement the interface behavior necessary for the user to see these features. For example, if your game supports leaderboards, it could present a GKGameCenterViewController object or read the data directly from Game Center to implement a custom user interface.
• A new account type, implemented by the GKCloudPlayer class, supports iCloud-only game accounts.
• Game Center provides a new generalized solution for managing persistent storage of data on Game Center. A game session (GKGameSession) has a list of players who are the session’s participants. Your game’s implementation defines when and how a participant stores or retrieves data from the server or exchanges data between players. Game sessions can often replace existing turn-based matches, real-time matches, and persistent save games, and also enable other models of interaction between participants.
When it was introduced, Game Center was presented as a way for users to visit a centralized hub of all of their gaming applications on iOS, although not every game supported Apple’s app. Game Center provided profiles, achievements, leaderboards, status updates on friends’ most recently played games, and a specialized “Turns” tab to keep track of games that used asynchronous multiplayer features.
Apple appears to be addressing multiple user issues with its stock apps in the iOS 10 developer beta, allowing for the removal of over 20 of its first party applications, a long-requested feature many users have been asking for over the past few years.
Read up on more iOS 10 features in our tidbits post here.
Related Roundup: iOS 10
Tag: Game Center
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Apple Pay Expanding to France, Hong Kong, and Switzerland
Apple confirmed during its WWDC 2016 keynote that Apple Pay will be expanding to France, Hong Kong, and Switzerland over the next few months in partnership with Visa, MasterCard, and American Express.
Visa and MasterCard will be supported in all three countries, while American Express will also be available in Hong Kong. The specific credit, debit, and prepaid cards that can be used in each country vary depending on the participating issuers listed below.
France
Participating banks and issuers in France at launch will include Banque Populaire, Boon, Caisse Epargne, Carrefour Banque, Orange, and Ticket Restaurant.
Apple Pay will be accepted at many retailers in France, including Apple, Bocage, Boulanger, Cojean, Dior, Le Bon Marché, Louis Vuitton, Orange, Pret a Manger, Sephora, and elsewhere contactless payments are accepted.
Hong Kong
Participating banks and issuers in Hong Kong at launch will include the Bank of East Asia (BEA), Bank of China (Hong Kong), DBS Bank (Hong Kong), Hang Seng Bank, HSBC, and Standard Chartered.
Apple Pay retailers in Hong Kong include 7-Eleven, Apple, Colourmix, KFC, Lane Crawford, Mannings, McDonald’s, Pacific Coffee, Pizza Hut, Sasa, Senryo, Starbucks, ThreeSixty, and elsewhere contactless payments are accepted.
Switzerland
Participating banks and prepaid issuers in Switzerland at launch will include Bonus Card, Cornèr Bank (Cornèrcard), and Swiss Bankers.
Apple Pay will be accepted at many retailers in Switzerland, including ALDI SUISSE, Apple, Avec, Hublot, K Kiosk, Lidl, Louis Vuitton, Mobilezone, Press & Books, SPAR, TAG Heuer, and elsewhere contactless payments are accepted.
Related Roundup: Apple Pay
Tags: American Express, Visa, Hong Kong, France, Switzerland, MasterCard
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Samsung Galaxy Note 7 edge invite leaks with 2 August event date
The next Samsung Galaxy Note device has been leaking more and more of late with an expected launch event soon, now a Galaxy Note 7 edge invite has slipped out.
The Samsung Galaxy Unpacked 2016 event invite was snapped and sent into SamMobile by one of its sources. There was another leaked tease just yesterday suggesting these are real and the rumoured 2 August launch event is actually coming.
READ: Samsung Galaxy Note 7 official looking teaser leaks ahead of launch, expected soon
The event invite uses #TheNextGalaxy and says: “The next edge is just around the corner”. The main image is also shaped like a 7 backing up rumours that the Note 6 will be skipped to put the device in line with the Galaxy S7 and the iPhone 7. Of course the leaked invite also backs up the already rumoured 2 August event date too.
What’s clear from the text is that Samsung will be revealing a Galaxy Note 7 edge. What’s not so clear is if that will be the only device, or if there will be a non-edge variant also.
So far the expected specs for the Galaxy Note 7 edge include a 5.8-inch QHD Super AMOLED display with curved edge, Snapdragon 823 and Exynos CPU variants, 6GB of RAM and up to 128GB storage, USB-C, IP68 build, plus a 4000mAh battery with wireless charging.
READ: Samsung Galaxy Note 6 / Note 7: What’s the story so far?
PS VR Aim Controller promises 1:1 precision for virtual shooters
The PlayStation VR headset might not be the only new PS4 accessory you’re grabbing this fall, as Sony unveiled this add-on for use with the game Farpoint. The PS VR Aim Controller picks up where the PlayStation Move shooting attachment and Sharp Shooter left off a few years ago, promising direct 1:1 tracking — wherever you point the controller, your in-game gun points the same way. Farpoint is a PS VR exclusive and developer Impulse Gear is already claiming it enables “things in Farpoint that just are not possible in a standard FPS game.” We’ll hopefully have a chance to judge that on the E3 show floor this week, but first you can check out a trailer below.
Follow all the news from E3 2016 here.
Source: PlayStation.Blog
North Korean hackers stole US fighter jet blueprints
As part of a years-long cyber attack, North Korean hackers have allegedly stolen 42,000 materials from South Korean organizations and government agencies, including blueprints for F-15 fighter jet wings.
The hacking began in 2014 and was first detected in February, according to South Korea’s police cyber investigation unit. Reuters reports that more than 40,000 of the materials stolen were defense-related.
However, none of the defense-related materials were secret, and there was no security breach, said a Defense Ministry official. Representatives for the two organizations affected most recently, including Korean Air Lines, also stated that the leaked documents were not classified.
The hackers don’t appear to have any plans to act on the stolen documents and North Korea isn’t exactly known for its aerospace expertise, so we probably don’t have huge cause for concern. However, if the attacks continue, other military secrets could be at risk.
“There is a high possibility that the North aimed to cause confusion on a national scale by launching a simultaneous attack after securing many targets of cyber terror, or intended to continuously steal industrial and military secrets,” the cyber investigation unit told Reuters.
Police traced the hacking back to an IP address in the North Korean capital, according to Reuters, which was identical to one used in a 2013 cyber attack against South Korean banks and broadcasters. The North denied accusations for that attack.
In March, South Korean officials reported that the phones of some 40 security officials had been breached by the North. Cyber security firms Kaspersky and Alienvault Labs also found evidence that the Sony Pictures hack of 2014 originated from North Korea. The North Korean government has denied all of these accusations as well.
The good news is that with the recent theft, South Korean police have disrupted the North’s campaign, according to The Hill. Whether that’s temporary or permanent is not yet clear, but the North has been extremely persistent so far, and is unlikely to give up because it got caught this time.
[Image: Ed Jones/AFP/Getty Images]
Via: The Hill
Source: Reuters
macOS Sierra Tidbits: Apple File System, RAID Support, and More
Apple yesterday announced macOS Sierra, the latest version of its Mac software platform and renamed successor to OS X El Capitan. The first beta was released to developers following yesterday’s keynote, providing early adopters with a closer look at what’s new.
Apple File System
Apple File System, or APFS, is a next-generation file system for Apple products based upon the iOS, macOS, tvOS, and watchOS software platforms, ranging from the Apple Watch to a Mac Pro.
APFS, which supports nearly all of the features of HFS+, is optimized for Flash/SSD storage and features strong encryption, copy-on-write metadata, space sharing, cloning for files and directories, snapshots, fast directory sizing, atomic safe-save primitives, and improved file system fundamentals.
Apple has posted an Apple File System Guide on its Developer Portal with technical details and other documentation.
The file system is available in pre-release beta for Apple developers on macOS Sierra and is scheduled to ship in 2017.
RAID Support
Apple has reintroduced the ability to create and manage RAID volumes in Disk Utility on macOS Sierra, pleasing a number of Mac users who were left disappointed when the functionality disappeared in OS X El Capitan.
“Anywhere” Dropped From Gatekeeper
Apple has removed the Gatekeeper option to allow apps to be downloaded from “anywhere” by default in System Preferences > Security & Privacy, resulting in a warning dialog when you attempt to open an app from an unidentified developer. “Mac App Store” and “Mac App Store and identified developers” remain selectable.
‘Anywhere’ option missing? Does OS X 10.12 fully disallow unsigned apps? #Gatekeeper #Sierra pic.twitter.com/yBfrhllaJA
— patrick wardle (@patrickwardle) June 14, 2016
Apps from unidentified developers can normally be opened by clicking the “Open Anyway” button in System Preferences > Security & Privacy, but the macOS Sierra release notes indicate that this button does not work in the first beta. A workaround solution is to hold down the Control key, click on an application, and choose “open.”
Default Text Size in Notes
Optimized Storage
macOS Sierra has a new optimized storage function that frees disk space on your Mac by automatically storing rarely used files in the cloud and keeping them available on demand. It can also help you find and remove old files you no longer use.
During its WWDC 2016 keynote, Apple briefly showed slides that indicate which types of files are stored or deleted.
Old files that are backed up to iCloud include ePub books you’ve read, books in iBooks you’ve read, old screenshots, iTunes U courses you’re not using, full-resolution photos, Mac App Store apps you’re not using, old presentations, old PNGs and JPEGs, old RAW files, old text files, old word processing documents, old documents, languages you’re not using, played iTunes podcasts, old home videos, fonts you’re not using, old Mail attachments, old illustrations, movies in iTunes you’ve watched, dictionaries you’re not using, viewed iTunes TV shows, iTunes songs you don’t listen to, old clippings, old spreadsheets, and instructional system videos.
Old files that can be found and removed include redundant Mail data, previous OS X installers, Apple Music playback caches, Safari web caches, cached iBooks animations, event logs, cached Map tiles, fault and error logs, iTunes inactive downloads, cached iBooks covers, trash after 30 days, Safari Web Cache, Configurator iOS files, Quick Look thumbnails, iTunes IPSW files, state dump logs, iBooks inactive downloads, archived Safari Reading List, persistent logs, Mac App Store inactive downloads, Xcode caches, old iPhone backups, Configurator inactive downloads, iTunes orphaned database temporary files, and TTL log files.
Siri Preferences
Read and contribute your own tidbits to the macOS Sierra: All The Little Things discussion thread.
Related Roundup: macOS Sierra
Tag: Apple File System
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Apple Drops Requirement for tvOS Games to Use Siri Remote as Controller
Apple has quietly dropped the requirement that tvOS developers make their games playable using the Siri Remote as a controller.
The policy change was discovered in an update to an existing Apple TV support document covering the use of game controllers, and highlighted by MacRumors’ sister site TouchArcade as a revision that will surely be welcomed by developers.
The MFi-compatible Nimbus Steelseries Controller
The updated document now recommends to developers: “When designing a tvOS game, you may require the use of an MFi game controller, but where possible you should also support the Siri Remote.”
The wording reflects a subtle but significant softening of the company’s previous stance on Siri Remote controller support. At the launch of the fourth-generation Apple TV last year, Apple initially encouraged game developers to support the Siri Remote included with the device, but eventually hardened its stance by stipulating the support as a necessary requirement.
That vexed some developers who complained that the Siri Remote simply didn’t function well as a controller for more complex games that involved finer grained control and subtler movements.
The reversed stance therefore paves the way for developers to bring games to Apple TV that would have previously been considered unplayable on the platform.
On the flip side of course, it’s also likely to mean that some games which subsequently appear in the Apple TV App Store will be out of reach of users who do not own a compatible third-party MFi game controller.
At WWDC on Monday, Apple demoed an updated Remote app for the fourth-gen Apple TV and tvOS which mirrors the functionality of the Siri Remote and also allows users to play games using their iPhone.
The company also announced an updated version of tvOS that includes new functionality and features for Siri, single sign-on and more.
Related Roundups: Apple TV, tvOS 10
Tags: MFi Program, Siri Remote
Buyer’s Guide: Apple TV (Neutral)
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DoDo Wonderland: A solid, adorable endless runner (Review)
Overview:
DoDo Wonderland is a Jetpack-Joyride inspired endless runner, that has you in control of a cute dodo bird as you avoid obstacles and collect coins while getting as far as you can.
Developer: MYFREEAPPS.DE
Cost: Free (with ads)
Impressions:
DoDo Wonderland, or DoDo Superbird Endless Runner as it’s called in the Play store, is one of those addicting little runner games like Jetpack Joyride or Temple Run, with an infectious charm and simple mechanics that make it accessible to everyone. The art is cute, and appealing to the eye and the music is jaunty and uplifting, although I wish the song loop was a bit longer.
Gameplay is straightforward, tap the screen to make the bird rise, and release to let him fall. You can collect power ups like magnets to pull in coins, and a points multiplier, and you can kill the enemies on screen by landing on them to gain a bit of distance points as well. Simple, and accessible if not entirely original. The game doesn’t do enough to up the difficulty, however, and after a while it becomes very easy to get far without being hit once. I would have liked to see some more challenge thrown in once you pass a distance milestone, to add some gratification to beating high scores.
There are upgrades to acquire using the in-game coins, which boost your abilities and power up effectiveness, but they are rather pricey. Thankfully, there are no microtransactions to worry about, but the ads can be a bit intrusive at times, pulling you from the game to watch a video ad too often for my tastes.
Conclusion:
There isn’t too much to say about DoDo, it’s simple and innocent while still being fun and engaging. It’s certainly easier than similar games in it’s genre, and definitely appeals to kids more than anyone else. I’d certainly recommend this one for the kids’ tablets as a great alternative to Jetpack Joyride or Temple Run.
Download DoDo Wonderland from the Google Play Store.
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Beme: A Snapchat and Vine hybrid with big ambitions (Review)
Overview:
Beme is a video sharing social networking app that aims to be the most natural and true to life social video sharing app.
Developer: Beme Inc.
Cost: Free
Impressions:
Beme is a sort of hybridization of Snapchat and Vine. It’s a social network app about sharing short clips and videos, as well as reactions to other users content. The catch is, you can’t see what you’ve recorded until it’s published, and there is no editing. This makes every Beme video more natural and less gimmicky compared to some other social video apps. I will say that Beme clips have to try harder to be funny, and are generally less entertaining than Vines due to lack of editing abilities, but the more simple ‘slice of life’ feel to the clips is a welcome breath of fresh air.
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Beme as an app is fairly straightforward. You simply hold the button for the camera you want to record on, point at what you want to record, and hold the button till you’re satisfied. The video is automatically uploaded and shared, and that’s when you can see what you’ve captured. It certainly takes a bit of practice to get right, but once you do it’s as easy as Snapchat to quickly record and share some great moments.
Beme also has a pretty solid community, and it’s steadily growing. There are categories in the Discover section, where you can see clips based on trending topics, or locations both local and international. You can follow friends, and send direct clips between them, as well as discover new trending users to follow. Scrolling through the categories grants you neat snippets of everyday life in places all over the world. Sure, some are hits and most are misses, but sometimes Beme managed to surprise me with a neat clip or an interesting event captured by a user somewhere.
Conclusion:
I can see Beme as a popular app for celebrities to adopt over Snapchat for it’s more natural and organic feel as opposed to Snapchat, but it has a long way to go before it can reach that kind of mass appeal. It certainly has the potential to get there, as even in the early days it has some solid content and is so simple to use that I can see it catching on quickly. I’m rooting for Beme in this crowded social sharing app world we live in, and I hope to see it succeed.
Download Beme from the Google Play Store
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