AI hackers will make the world a safer place — hopefully

The spotlights whirl in circles and transition from blue to purple to red and back to blue again. Basking in the glow is a stage constructed to resemble something out of a prime-time singing competition. But instead of showcasing would-be pop stars, the backdrop is built to push 21kW of power while simultaneously piping 3,500 gallons of water to cool its contestants. Those seven competitors were actually server boxes autonomously scanning and patching vulnerabilities.

The DARPA Cyber Grand Challenge (CGC) at the Def Con hacker conference last week pitted these AI systems — housed in the same enclosures you’d find in an IT department — against one another in a digital version of capture the flag. The government research agency is doing its best to add some pizzaz to the event with all the lights and play-by-play announcers. The reality is, though, that this is more than just an e-sports event: The outcome of this competition and the innovation it spurns could change the way the United States government and companies deal with software vulnerabilities and cyber attacks.

The seven teams, which consisted of universities, researchers and companies, built and programmed their AI “bots” to find, diagnose and fix software flaws in a highly competitive environment. The systems also have to defend themselves against other teams attacking the vulnerable code (or flag) on their own server while trying to launch counterattacks. Yeah, it’s complicated. It’s like being handed a series of puzzle with no directions on how to solve them while trying to keep your friends from figuring out the same brain teasers.

Except these brain teasers have the potential to bring down the internet or leave serious vulnerabilities in code that could be exploited by nefarious hackers and nation states. At this early stage, things are looking promising. One of the flaws handed to the bots was the SQL Slammer denial-of-service bug that brought down the net to its knees in 2003 as it propagated to 75,000 servers in 10 minutes. Two of the bots recognized and patched the flaw, with one of them doing so in just five minutes. That’s quicker than a security researcher sitting down at their desk and launching the tools needed to reverse-engineer a bug like that.

The whole thing is being projected on screens to the audience using visualizations that resemble TRON. The arena view is compelling if a bit confusing (the audience was subjected to a 10-minute explainer about each element in the artwork). It’s a bit of a dog-and-pony show to enhance the importance of what’s happening. While we’re being wowed with bright lights and canned commentary, the machines have been hacking away at code for 12 hours at break-neck speeds. They are the rockstars of Def Con, the new Monoliths of 2001 with silkscreened names and flashing LEDs that will change the future of computing.

Behind all the Hollywood-style presentations the actual story of the boxes is that the AI technology in these bots scans code, finds vulnerabilities and patches it so quickly that it has the potential to reduce cyber attacks and squash software flaws before they have a chance to do any harm. A company could throw a new application or OS into a bot like these and find flaws before it even ships. That reduces not only the number of patches being released, but the holes left in applications by bad code before a customer even installs it.

Just don’t expect to see these systems out in the wild anytime soon, DARPA director Arati Prabhakar told Engadget. “This is not a two-year journey,” he said. “I don’t think it’s a 50-year journey either. In a decade I think you’re going to see a huge change.”

DARPA wants this event to help drive innovation in this area. “A few of the specific steps that are gonna happen will probably happen from these competitors,” Prabhakar said. Indeed, this how the agency operates. It did the same thing with its Urban Challenge for autonomous cars. Now we have semi-autonomous systems on the road while full autonomy is being researched by every major automaker and Goole. But like those early cars that went a few years and veered off course, these systems aren’t ready for prime time. Instead, expect to see iterative progress as the technology matures.

But AI machines like those in the competition could also be used to plow through the code of operating systems, infrastructure and applications to find vulnerabilities for exploitation. It’s a future of AI battling AI to see who can find a flaw the quickest. DARPA insists that its research for the department of defense will be to help it thwart attempts by bad actors to infiltrate both government and private systems in the US.

In the meantime, the top robot came from security company and Carnegie Mellon subsidiary ForAllSecure, whose Mayhem AI bot bested the field and went home with a $2 million purse. Unfortunately, later in the weekend it came in last when pitted some the world’s best hackers in the professional CTF competition. David Brumley, CEO of ForAllSecure, is still happy about the bot’s performance. At one point, it was even ahead of two human teams.

The computer has speed on its side, but humans still have critical thinking and years of experience in their corner. The company spent two years working on Mayhem and 13 years researching how to automatically find vulnerabilities. Brumley thinks it’ll be 30 years before computers are as good as the best human security researchers.

But it’s more than just trying to be better than people. “I think what computers are doing is really changing the way we’re going to think about security,” Brumley said. “Right now if you want to analyze something for security vulnerabilities, you have to think long and hard about whether it’s worth the expense.”

For now, the technology is being gamified. Competition breeds innovation. The Mayhem team will go home and start applying what they learn to tackling problems in actual software. There won’t be any lights or commentary. Instead this computer and others like will work side-by-side with human counterparts to secure everything from the Pentagon to the IoT bulbs in your home.

The robot hackers are coming to make things more secure. At least that’s the hope.

We still don’t know why ‘alien megastructure’ star is dimming

Astronomers’ favorite mysterious stellar object, which may or may not be surrounded by an “alien megastructure”, remains unexplained. A reason for the flickering light emitted by the star known as KIC 8462852 continues to evade the scientific community. But scientists have taken a closer look at the star’s brightness levels, and it’s official: the amount of light coming out of it has decreased by three percent over four years. Further, it’s only happening to this one sun and none of its neighbors. The plot continues to thicken.

At first, scientists posited that the star’s intermittent shining was due to comet swarms, but that seemed far less plausible when evidence emerged that it had been irregularly dimmed for over a century. But some have claimed the historical evidence is too unreliable to support a clear decreasing trend, pointed out Gizmodo.

So earlier this year, researchers Ben Montet of CalTech and Joshua Simon of the Carnegie Institute chose to study a few years of data on KIC 8462852, nicknamed Tabby’s Star, gathered by the very precise Kepler space telescope. Ultimately, they explain in an unpublished report, the light decline is significant, not replicated by other nearby stars and is most likely not due to a comet cloud.

Back in October 2015, The Washington Post noted that scientists have mostly dismissed the theory that alien structures are blocking light from Tabby’s Star. Mostly. Aliens should always be the last hypothesis considered, a Penn State University professor told the Post, but it would explain the flickering. Sadly, no new information was revealed in the Louisiana State University researchers’ report, so the dimming remains a mystery. In their own cryptic but measured words from the paper, “No known or proposed stellar phenomena can fully explain all aspects of the observed light curve.”

Source: Gizmodo

How to find your lost Android phone

How do I track my Android phone? There are quite a few tools at your disposal.

Worried about misplacing your phone or (worse yet) having it stolen? Ease your fears and set up a tracking system before your worst case scenario strikes. For best locating results, your phone should be connected to a Wi-Fi signal, but GPS and mobile networks will still manage to pinpoint a fairly accurate location. You must also have a Google account for virtually all of the tracking services available, whether they are built in or downloaded.

• How to enable Android Device Manager on your phone
• How to locate your phone using Google
• Family Locator
• Cerberus anti theft
• Prey Anti Theft
• Lost Android
• Where’s My Droid
• The bottom line

How to enable Android Device Manager on your phone

In newer Android phones, the Device Manager is already located conveniently in your Settings app, so there’s no need for any extra downloads. This locating service has essentially amalgamated with Google to make finding your phone easier. There are just a couple of things you’ll need to activate.

Launch Settings.
Tap Security.

Tap Device Administration.

Tap Android Device Manager so that a checkmark appears in the checkbox.
Tap the back button in the top left corner of your screen.

Tap the back button again in the top left corner to return to the main Settings menu.

Tap Location in the main Settings menu.
Tap the switch beside Location at the top of the screen so that it turns on.

Tap Mode.

Tap High accuracy so the circle is filled in.
Tap the back button in the top left corner.

Tap Google Location History.

Tap the switch beneath Location History so that it turns on.

Tap the switch beside your device so that it turns on.

How to locate your phone using Google

Should you happen to lose your phone, you can locate its whereabouts by logging into your Google account from any computer or even from another phone.

Launch a web browser from a phone, tablet, or computer.
Navigate to Google if it is not your default search engine or home page.

Type find my phone android in the Google search bar.

Tap on Android Device Manager (usually the first option in the search).

Enter your email address and password just as though you were checking your email.

When your phone is located, you have three options to choose from:

• You can Ring your phone so that it makes noise (even if you had it on silent). This feature is helpful if the map indicates that the phone is within earshot and you simply can’t see it.
• You can Lock your phone so that the finder can’t access your home screen. This feature is most helpful if your phone wasn’t previously secured with a passcode or a fingerprint sensor.

• You can Erase your phone. This is the best option if you know for certain that you aren’t likely to retrieve your phone.

  

If you are trying to locate your phone with Android Device Manager and it doesn’t seem to be working, the most likely cause is that your phone is not currently connected to Wi-Fi or an available network. In this case, it’s important to keep trying; the moment your phone does make that connection, it will appear on the map.

If you want to download a tracking app for fear of a missing phone crisis, there are a number of options to choose from, and we’re highlighting some choice picks for you.

Family Locator

The Family Locator app by Life360 is essentially a GPS tracker for phones but is especially useful for families with multiple phones in use. Your family members become a “Circle”, the app’s name for a closed group of people who consent to having their phones tracked in real time. Your family members will appear on live maps within the app as little icons so that you can see where everyone is at any given moment.

The app also allows you to chat with people in your Circle or broadcast a meeting time and location. And, of course, if a phone from within your Circle is ever lost or stolen, the app will track it on the map.

Download: Family Locator (Free with in-app purchases)

Cerberus anti theft

This locator app from Cerberus offers an impressive array of remote control features if you find your phone has been lost or stolen. You’ll still be able to lock, ring, or erase your phone, but you’ll also be able to remotely access your camera or sound a loud alarm from your phone, even if it was on silent mode when you lost it.

The advanced features allow you to hide Cerberus in your app drawer so that it can’t be detected if and when your phone is found or stolen. Your missing phone will transmit data to you via the Cerberus website or via SMS text from another phone with the Cerberus app installed.

Download: Cerberus anti theft (Free with in-app purchases)

Prey Anti Theft

The Prey Anti Theft app is impressive in that three different devices can be protected through one download. You’ll have the ability to sound an alarm from your missing phone, take screenshots if it’s in use, and lock down the device the moment you realize it’s missing.

Once you’ve downloaded the app, it will walk you through a series of tutorials to show you how to use your Prey Account to track your phone. The app itself is free and doesn’t require additional purchases in order to access the high-end features.

Download: Prey Anti Theft (Free)

Lost Android

Lost Android will allow you to have remote access to your missing phone via their website. Here, you’ll be able to erase sensitive information if you fear that your phone may never be returned, or send messages to your phone in the hopes of someone finding and returning it.

Additionally, you can choose to remotely forward any calls you may be missing to another number and record a running list of any calls or messages made or photos taken with your phone.

Download: Lost Android (Free with in-app purchases)

Where’s My Droid

The basic features of the Where’s My Droid app allow you to ring your phone if you misplace it, locate it via GPS on Google Maps, and use a passcode to prevent unauthorized changes to apps on your Android phone. Stealth Mode also prevents anyone who finds your phone from seeing your incoming text messages; instead they’ll see a customizable attention word that alerts them of the phone’s lost or stolen status.

The Pro version of the app, which you pay to use, lets you remotely wipe data from your phone, use a landline to access your phone, and remotely lock the device.

Download: Where’s My Droid (Free with in-app purchases)

The bottom line

If your phone is stolen or found and it’s then factory reset, you will not be able to rely on any apps or services to find your it; a factory reset will wipe out any of the original data, accounts, or passwords that are needed to remotely find your Android phone.

As always, exercise caution when retrieving a lost or stolen phone. If you have any concerns about it being lost or stolen, it’s best to set up and test your preferred tracking system as soon as you buy it, and contact the police. It can be a bit of extra front-end work to register some apps, but it will be more work trying to locate a missing phone if no safety nets are in place at all.

How do you track?

What app do you use to track your Android phone, if any at all? Let us know in the comments section below!

QuadRooter: 5 things to know about the latest Android security scare

New Qualcomm-targeted Android security bug is reported to put ‘900 million’ devices at risk. Here’s what you need to know.

Once again, it’s Android security scare season. This morning news broke of the latest collection of vulnerabilities, discovered by security firm Check Point and grouped together under the catchy monicker “QuadRooter.” As usual, most of the reporting has focused on worst-case scenarios and a shockingly huge number of potentially vulnerable devices — in this case, an estimated 900 million.

We’re going to break down exactly what’s going on, and just how vulnerable you’re likely to be. Read on.

1. It’s a Qualcomm thing

Check Point specifically targeted Qualcomm due to its dominant position in the Android ecosystem. Because so many Android phones use Qualcomm hardware, the drivers Qualcomm contributes to the software on these phones make for an attractive target — a single set of vulnerabilities affecting a large proportion of the Android user base. (Specifically, the bugs affect networking, graphics and memory allocation code.)

Qualcomm’s drivers are a big, attractive target.

All four of the exploits that make up QuadRooter affect Qualcomm drivers, so if you have a phone that uses no Qualcomm hardware at all — for example, a Galaxy S6 or Note 5 (which uses Samsung’s own Exynos processor and Shannon modem), you’re not affected by this.

2. It’s serious, but there’s no evidence of it being used in the wild

As the name suggests, QuadRoot is a collection of four exploits in Qualcomm’s code which could allow a malicious app to gain root privileges — i.e. access to do basically anything on your phone. From there, you can dream up any number of nightmare scenarios: attackers listening in on phone calls, spying through your camera, pilfering financial details or locking down your data with ransomware.

No-one’s talking about these exploits being used in the wild yet, which is a good thing. However given the challenges involved in updating the software on the billion-plus Android devices out there, the bad guys will have plenty of time to figure out a practical application.

But…

3. Chances are you’re not actually “vulnerable”

QuadRooter is one of the many Android security issues that requires you to manually install an app. That means manually going into Security settings and toggling the “Unknown Sources” checkbox.

Any vuln which requires you to manually install an app runs into two major roadblocks: The Play Store, and Android’s built-in “Verify Apps” feature.

At the time of writing Google has yet to confirm that the Play Store is blocking apps which use these exploits (we’ve got emails out, and will update this post when we hear). But given that Check Point first disclosed the vulnerabilities back in April, it’s almost certainly doing so. That means you’ll be fine if, like most people, you only download apps from the Play Store.

And even if you don’t, Android’s “Verify Apps” feature is designed to act as an additional layer of protection, scanning apps from third-party sources for known malware before you install. This feature is enabled by default in all Android versions since 2012’s 4.2 Jelly Bean, and because it’s part of Google Play Services, it’s always updating . As of the most recent stats available, more than 90 percent of active Android devices are running version 4.2 or later.

Again, we don’t have explicit confirmation from Google that “Verify Apps” is scanning for QuadRooter, but given that Google was informed months ago, chances are it is. And if it is, Android will identify any QuadRooter-harboring app as harmful and show a big scary warning screen before letting you get anywhere near installing it.

In that case, are you still “vulnerable?” Well technically. You could conceivably go to Security settings, enable Unknown Sources, then ignore the full-screen warning that you’re about to install malware. But at that point, to a large extent, it’s on you.

4. Android security is hard, even with monthly patches

One interesting aspect of the QuadRooter saga is what it shows us about the Android security challenges that still remain, even in a world of monthly security patches. Three of the four vulnerabilities are fixed in the latest August 2016 patches, but one has apparently slipped through the cracks and won’t be fixed until the September patch. That’s cause for legitimate concern given that disclosure happened back in April.

However, a Qualcomm rep told ZDNet that the chipmaker had been issuing patches of its own to manufacturers between April and July, so it’s possible certain models may have been updated outside of the Google patching mechanism. This only underscores the confusion involved with having an explicit patch level from Google, while device manufacturers and component makers are also providing security fixes.

Most Android phone makers suck at issuing security patches. And even up-to-date devices won’t be fully patched for another month.

For now, the only way to know if your phone is theoretically vulnerable is to download Check Point’s QuadRoot scanner app from the Play Store.

Even once patches are issued, they need to go through device manufacturers and carriers before being pushed out to phones. And although some companies like Samsung, BlackBerry and (naturally) Google have been quick about making sure the latest patches are available, most of the folks making Android devices are nowhere near as timely — especially when it comes to older or lower-priced phones.

QuadRooter underscores how the ubiquity of Qualcomm-based Android devices makes them an attractive target, while the variety of hardware as a whole makes updating all of them near impossible.

5. We’ve been here before

• Catchy marketing name? Check.
• Big scary number of “vulnerable” devices? Check.
• Free detection app peddled by security company with a product to sell? Check.
• No evidence of use in the wild? Check.
• Press at large ignoring the Play Store and Verify Apps as a roadblock against app-based malware? Check.

It’s the same dance we do every year around security conference time. In 2014 it was Fake ID. In 2015, it was Stagefright. Unfortunately, understanding of Android security issues in the media at large has remained woeful, and that means figures like the “900 million” affected bounce around the echo chamber without context.

If you’re being smart about the apps you install, there’s not much reason to worry about. And even if you’re not, chances are Play Services and Verify Apps will have your back.

MORE: Android Malware — should you be worried?

The Samsung Galaxy J2 2016 is a sad, modern disappointment

Samsung should feel bad for launching the Galaxy J2 2016.

Samsung is aggressively promoting its latest budget phone in India, the Galaxy J2 2016. Launched in July for ₹9,750 (~$150), the phone sports an outdated design and internal hardware no vendor would consider acceptable in mid-2016. The highlights include a 5-inch 720p AMOLED display, a Spreadtrum SC8830 SoC with four Cortex A7 cores, 1.5GB RAM, 8GB internal storage, microSD slot, and a 2600mAh battery.

India’s largest handset maker — by a considerable margin — has deemed it reasonable to launch a phone powered by CPU cores that debuted in the first-gen Snapdragon 200 and 400 SoCs in 2013. On the GPU front, you get the Mali-400 MP2, another relic from a bygone era. Barring a few lackluster phones like the Galaxy Grand Neo Plus (which debuted in May 2015), the Spreadtrum SC8830 has been shunned by major vendors, and for good reason.

The J2 2016 fails to handle any processor-intensive tasks, and that’s if you’re able to install anything. It isn’t powerful enough to run Snapchat (which says a lot about the phone), and while Instagram works, the 8MP camera at the back isn’t great at taking detailed shots.

You get a measly 8GB of onboard storage, or just over 3.4GB for apps and games. There isn’t enough space to install a half-decent game on the limited storage, but you can utilize all that time saved by working on your documents as the full Office suite — including Word, Excel, OneDrive, OneNote, and Skype — is bundled with the phone. I managed to install a total of 21 third-party apps (and zero games) before hitting the storage limit, which is 10% of the amount of apps I currently have installed on the similarly-priced Redmi Note 3.

There really isn’t anything exciting about the Galaxy J2 2016.

The phone is also lacking when it comes to sensors. There’s no ambient light sensor, no magnetometer, no gyroscope, no fingerprint sensor, no NFC, and the notification LED is at the back (more on that later). The display is limited to 2-finger multitouch, and there’s no oleophobic coating. Fast charging? No. It takes an agonizing three hours to fully charge the phone.

The Galaxy J2 2016 is the first phone to feature Samsung’s new Smart Glow notification system, which sees an LED ring around the camera sensor at the back. The LED ring pulses every time you receive a notification, and there’s also the option to customize the notification color. You get several software-based features that leverage the LED ring, such as Selfie assist. The feature lets you use the rear camera to take a selfie, with the LED ring guiding you to the center of the frame. While it is a new approach to the standard notification light, Smart Glow’s effectiveness is fairly limited as it is at the back of the phone, rendering it useless unless you place the phone face down. And like most of the Galaxy J2, there is a fundamental flaw to Smart Glow: it only works with select Samsung apps, and is not compatible with third-party apps, unlike Light Flow.

The J2 2016 fails to handle any processor-intensive tasks — if you’re able to install anything in the first place.

The phone runs Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow out of the box, but it doesn’t come with TouchWiz. What you get instead is a stripped-down version that’s “engineered” with Turbo Speed Technology, a combination of app and memory management to prevent any slowdowns. As you can imagine, that isn’t the case. There is a noticeable stutter during everyday tasks like web browsing, checking Facebook or Twitter, and even navigating the UI. A notable difference is the app drawer, which scrolls vertically, much like the Google Now Launcher. Samsung also baked in an ultra data saving mode that works system-wide, allowing you to save on data when streaming music or videos.

Samsung is known for recycling old hardware and passing it along as new, and it has managed to do that successfully over the years in India. Last year’s Galaxy J2 went on to become the best-selling smartphone in the country, and in just a few months Samsung shipped 13 million units of the J2 2016. To put things into perspective, the J2 — which is available in select markets — outsold the standard variant of the Galaxy S7.

The Galaxy J2 2016 is the perfect illustration of Samsung’s marketing might. The company inundated the airwaves with commercials featuring Bollywood A-list celebrities and used its strong retail presence in tier 2 and tier 3 cities to aggressively promote the phone. The Indian market is saturated with plenty of phones that offer great value for money, notably the Redmi Note 3, the Moto G4 Plus, and the Lenovo K4 Note, but no vendor has Samsung’s reach or marketing budget. With the likes of Xiaomi and LeEco duking it out in the online space, Samsung is continuing to sell underwhelming hardware by the millions to customers making their way online for the first time.

Even though the J2 2016 retails for the equivalent of $150, the outdated hardware means that it costs next to nothing for Samsung to make the phone. With other vendors selling at near manufacturing cost, Samsung is able to eke out much better profits, even in the budget segment. We will likely see a shift in the coming years, as Xiaomi has announced that it will expand into the offline space. OPPO and Vivo are also aggressively expanding into tier 2 and tier 3 cities, but it will be a challenge for these vendors to offer competitively-priced hardware while dealing with the overhead associated with offline sales.

If you’re in the market for a budget phone, you should just go ahead and pick up the Redmi Note 3. For ₹9,999, the phone offers a metal chassis, and excellent hardware in the form of a 5.5-inch Full HD display, Snapdragon 650 SoC with newer Cortex A72 cores and Cortex A53 CPU cores, 2GB of RAM, 16GB storage, 16MP rear camera, 5MP front shooter, and a massive 4000mAh battery. There is a variant with a Snapdragon 652 SoC and 3GB of RAM as well as 32GB storage that is available for ₹11,999. If you can stretch your budget by a few thousand, the 32GB model is highly recommended.

See at Flipkart

Roland buys majority stake in headphone maker V-Moda

In case you hadn’t heard, today is 808 Day. To properly celebrate the occasion, audio gear maker Roland is padding its gadget lineup. Headphone company V-Moda announced today that it had sold a majority stake to Roland forming “a brand new partnership” that will “develop the next breakthrough music products.” The press release announcing the deal calls it “a strategic investment,” but Roland now owns a 70 percent stake in V-Moda and CEO Val Kolton will control the remaining 30 percent. Kolton will remain in his current role while also serving as a product design consultant for Roland’s dance, DJ and electronic music division.

“V-Moda revolutionized headphones and has pushed the envelope of personalization,” said Roland CEO Jun-ichi Miki. “Their Milano design, material research and professional DJ roots along with their loyal customers are incredible assets for Roland.” The two companies are no strangers as they collaborated on an AIRA-branded version of the M-100 headphones last year.

Speaking of the M-100s, the headphone company is perhaps best known for those Crossfade headphones that blend metal, leather and exposed hardware for its recognizable design. Last fall, V-Moda debuted a wireless version of the cans that switch off all the components housed inside when a 3.5mm cable is plugged in — an important feature for DJs and audio pros. The Crossfade cans can also be customized to fit the users personal taste. They come in black and white with silver, gold and black accents, featuring removeable “shields” on the outside of the earcups. Based on the wording of today’s news, it sounds like the ability for customers to personalize their portable audio gear is something Roland looks to continue.

Roland revived the 808 and other classic audio gear with its AIRA line in 2014 and last year a Boutique series of synths broke cover. Modern re-interpretations of iconic analog gear has been all the rage for gear makers for the last few years, so it will be interesting to see if Roland continues charting that course. It will also be interesting to see how the relationship with V-Moda affects design and what kinds of devices we’ll encounter in the future since Roland already makes its own headphones and the two sides plan to continue as separate companies. One thing’s for sure: There will be more headphones.

Source: V-Moda

Play Doodle Fruit Games: How to find and play Google’s amazingly addictive fruit Olympics

Google is going big on the Olympics. Not only is its coverage of the Olympic Games Rio 2016 hugely comprehensive and easy to navigate through Google Search, it’s also running its own competition: welcome to the Doodle Fruit Games.

This fruit fun is easy to miss, so here’s a complete guide to how you can get involved in the 2016 Doodle Fruit Games.

What are the 2016 Doodle Fruit Games?

Google likes to play. There have been a wide selection of browser games from the company in the past, but with the Doodle Fruit Games, Google is using its Google app on Android and iOS to bring some fun directly to your smartphone.

Timed to sit alongside the Rio 2016 Games, the Doodle Fruit Games provide an addictive distraction on your phone, letting you get some sports action with a range of fruit.

google

Graphically simple, there are a range of cartoon-styled games to play, each letting you compete in an event with a different fruit. There’s a brief fruity fact for each too.

How do I get Doodle Fruit Games?

This part is simple. The Doodle Fruit Games live within the Google app. This is the app that provides a deep link into Google from your phone, powering search, offering voice searching and feeding the information to Google Now.

For Android users, you almost certainly have it on your phone, accessed directly through the app itself, via the Google search bar on your home page or through Google Now. If you don’t have the app, click here to download from Google Play.

For iPhone users you’ll need to install the Google app from the App Store. This is well worth doing, not just to play these crazy games, but because it opens up a wide range of Google services on your phone. If you don’t have the app, click here to download from the Apple App Store.

It’s also worth noting that you don’t need to be online to play: the Games are part of the app, so you can play wherever you want, with or without a connection.

Google

How do I find Doodle Fruit Games?

The Fruit Games might not be immediately obvious, as you have to tap on the Google Doodle to get to them. The Google Doodle is the changing graphic that Google places above the search box on its home page, and something you’ll find when you click through on the Google app too.

This Google Doodle changes regularly, but at the time of writing, it shows a lemon, ready for the lemon swimming game.

If you’re on Android, you might find yourself just looking on the G Google logo in Google Now – tap on that G to enter the search page proper, and you’ll see the Doodle to tap to start playing.

It’s worth noting that this only works on mobile devices: if you click on the Google Doodle on your PC’s browser, you’ll be taken through to Google’s actual coverage of the Rio 2016 Games.

What Doodle Fruit Games are there?

At the time of writing, there are seven different games: coconut BMX, apple water polo, blueberry golf, lemon swimming, grape hurdles (riding a spider, natch), pineapple tennis, strawberry running.

The controls for each game is different, but basically involves tap, swipe or tilt to get through the course, aiming to survive the longest or score the most points.

Give it a go, they are quick and easy to play, a great distraction now you’re bored with Pokemon Go.

Casio EX-FR200 will capture your wide-angle selfie and 360 video world

With everyone talking about virtual reality, camera manufacturers see the opportunity to provide their own perspective, with a range of innovative capture devices appearing from all sides. 

Casio is the latest company to join the fray, with the announcement of the EX-FR200 camera, a ruggedised and flexible device to tackle your wide-angle needs. 

Now, Casio is a little limited in distribution these days, so we can’t be sure if this camera will appear outside Japan where it has been announced, according to the translation from DP Review. 

The EX-FR200 presents a fish-eye lens unit with a separate controller. The two can be connected to offer a conventional (albeit wide-angle) camera arrangement, it can be configured for selfies so you can look at the display and peer into the lens, or they can be separated, offering remote control.

Casio

Where some devices offer a camera controlled by a smartphone, Casio’s solution appears to be similar, but providing the controller with a 3-inch touch display. 

Coming back to 360 video, one of the interesting aspects of the Casio EX-FR200 is that you can combine camera modules in back-to-back fashion, just as you can with the Kodak PixPro SP360, which will let you produce video compatible with YouTube 360 Video. 

The FX200 lens itself has a 13.4mm (equiv) wide angle lens, with F/2.8 aperture and its fixed focus, good from about 40cm out to infinity. There’s a 12-megapixel CMOS sensor sitting behind the lens, with support for external microSD card storage. Casio says it gives you 185-degrees of capture.

Casio

A range of capture options are offered, with super-wide options and panorama, as well as a lot of video options, including panorama again, 4K and slow motion.

It talks to the controller using Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, with a smartphone app offering a wider range of functions, although the controller/camera body that comes with it can act as a remote control too. There are also a range of mounting options so, for example, you could have the camera module on your head, and the controller on your bike handlebars.

As we said, we’re not sure if this device will make it out of Japan, available from mid-September 2016, but it’s another interesting addition to the world of 360 capture.