Three fined £1.9 million for weak 999 call handling system

As Britain’s telecoms regulator, Ofcom’s responsibilities include fining providers for serious service blunders. Three is the latest company to be hit with one of Ofcom’s invoices, having been fined £1,890,000 today for failing to appropriately protect customer access to emergency services.

Last October, Three notified Ofcom of a temporary outage affecting Kent, Hampshire and parts of London, which turned out to be due to two separate fibre cable breaks. But when the regulator took a closer look at Three’s network configuration, it noticed all emergency call handling was routed through a single data centre, with no redundancy system in place should that go down.

To be clear, at no point were Three subscribers unable to contact emergency services. However, “Three’s emergency call service was vulnerable to a single point of failure,” and thus the way the network was configured was not fit for purpose as far as Ofcom is concerned — no matter how widespread or serious an outage may be, mobile operators are required to “ensure everyone can contact the emergency services at all times.”

Three has since redesigned the network, creating back-up routes that can carry emergency calls in the event of any system meltdowns. Nevertheless, Three must still cough up £1.9 million “given the potential impact on public health and safety” the single point of failure represented — and that includes a 30 percent discount for cooperating with Ofcom during the investigation.

Source: Ofcom

Apple Devices Escape Mention in WikiLeaks’ Latest ‘Vault 7’ CIA Hacking Documents

Wikileaks yesterday published its latest round of allegedly leaked CIA documents, detailing aspects of the U.S. agency’s “Cherry Blossom” firmware modification program, which uses modified versions of router firmware to turn networking devices into surveillance tools.

The document is the latest in WikiLeaks’ “Vault 7” series of publications on CIA hacking methods. Previous leaks have detailed the agency’s targeting of iOS devices and Macs, while this manual relates specifically to network routers: Once installed, the Cherry Blossom program can be used to monitor internet traffic, crawl for passwords, and redirect the target user to a particular website.

The manual also describes how CIA agents might install the modified firmware. “In typical operation, a wireless device of interest is implanted with Cherry Blossom firmware, either using the Claymore tool or via a supply chain operation.” While documents have not been made public that detail the “Claymore” tool, the latter tactic refers to the practice of intercepting the target device somewhere between the factory and the end user.

The document lists several network products as susceptible to its hacking protocol, including devices from Asus, Belkin, Buffalo, Dell, DLink, Linksys, Motorola, Netgear, Senao, and US Robotics. Apple’s AirPort networking equipment does not appear on the list, however.

The CIA has struggled to penetrate Apple’s network router hardware in the past due to a combination of the company’s robust encryption and its use of proprietary hardware. Previous Harpy Eagle documents published by Wikileaks show apparently unsuccessful efforts to “gain root access on an Apple Airport Extreme and Time Capsule via local and/or remote means to install a persistent rootkit into the flash storage of the devices”.

The Cherry Blossom document dates to 2012, so it’s likely CIA methods have moved on in an effort to keep up to date with changing networking hardware. In a response the same day that the iOS device hacking efforts came out, Apple said that many of the vulnerabilities in that leak were already patched. Apple reportedly ceased development of its AirPort networking devices last year.

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.

Tags: Apple security, CIA, WikiLeaks
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HomeKit Support for Nest Smart Products Unlikely Anytime Soon

Rumors that smart thermostat maker Nest is considering adding Apple HomeKit support to its product range appear to be premature, according to a report on Thursday. AppleInsider spoke to a Nest employee who apparently confirmed there are “no immediate plans” to support Apple’s smart home platform and “no roadmap” for such a migration.

The rumors were apparently stoked by Apple’s announcement at the Worldwide Developers Conference that it has taken steps to make it easier for third parties to integrate the smart home platform into their devices, followed by a comment recently attributed to Nest that it would “consider HomeKit”.

At the present time, HomeKit-enabled smart products require a hardware authentication chip to make them compatible with Apple’s Made-For-iPhone program. At WWDC, however, Apple said it was updating its specification so that smart products won’t have to include a hardware chip and will be able to authenticate through software instead. The news sparked suggestions that some older products could theoretically be upgraded to support HomeKit using a firmware upgrade.

HomeKit has enjoyed fairly wide support among smart gadget manufacturers, but the Google-owned Nest brand has never been on that list. Apple removed Nest products from its stores in 2015 shortly after the first HomeKit-compatible products became available for purchase.

Nest owners needn’t completely give up hope for HomeKit support, as manufacturers have occasionally added the standard to products via upgrades well after they have come to market. Add to that Apple’s looser licensing and authentication restrictions for HomeKit and it’s not impossible that Nest will come around to the platform one day.

Tags: Nest, HomeKit
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Apple HomeKit may soon support Nest smart home products

You may eventually be able to control your Nest thermostat, smoke detector or security camera through Apple HomeKit following the company’s recent comments to 9to5Mac.

• Apple HomeKit and Home app: What are they and how do they work?
• Apple HomeKit spec change likely to see river of new products flood the market

The Apple specialist news site asked Nest if it would look into updating its current products to support the new features that will be introduced with iOS 11. Nest’s reply was that it would “consider HomeKit”.

Apple quietly introduced a new feature with the announcement of iOS 11 that will make it much easier for smart-home product manufacturers to add their devices to Apple’s HomeKit platform.

Currently, HomeKit-enabled devices require a hardware chip so the products can work with the company’s Made-for-iPhone program. However, with the update, products can be added to HomeKit via software authorisation through iCloud.

HomeKit already supports smart home devices such as thermostats, lighting and smoke detectors, but Nest hasn’t been on the list. Whilst the associated costs of meeting HomeKit criteria are largely to blame, Nest is a natural rival for Apple due to its affiliation with Google. It’s encouraging to see Nest is at least considering adopting Apple’s, and if it did, it would not only give people more of a reason to adopt HomeKit, but it could expand Nest’s appeal as well.

Canada rules that all new cellphones must be unlocked

Canadians pay some of the highest wireless rates of any G7 nation, and to add insult to injury, they often have to shell out $50 or more to unlock cellphones when switching operators. However, the nation’s wireless regulator, the CRTC, has now ordered carriers to unlock devices for free and decreed that all new smartphones must be sold unlocked. The move was prompted by excoriating public criticism on unlocking fees after the CRTC requested comment on new wireless rules.

“That’s called a ‘Ransom Fee’ or ‘Hostage Fee’ in any other business,” one person wrote, as noted by the CBC. “It is unbelievable how the government allows these companies to extort money like this!” Telecoms notably made $37.7 million CAD ($28.5 million) in unlocking fees, a jump of 75 percent since 2014.

Carriers disagreed with the CRTC, saying “we think it’s a lot more appropriate that people who actually have their device unlocked bear the cost of the unlocking,” said Rogers VP Howard Slawner. He failed to mention, however, that carriers are the ones that lock devices in the first place, and anyway, the CRTC is banning that, too.

With a new federal government in place, Canada’s CRTC seems to be favoring more consumer-friendly internet laws. It recently ruled against a free music “zero-rating” scheme from carrier Videotron, which many critics believe violates the principal of net neutrality. Rather than creating hard rules, however, the regulator is laying out a “framework” and then ruling on potential violations on a case-by-case basis. By contrast, the US FCC under Ajit Pai wants to roll back consumer-friendly net neutrality rules put in place by Tom Wheeler under the Obama administration.

To give you an idea how much Canadians overpay on wireless, it’s actually cheaper for me, an ex-pat Canadian who lives in Paris, to bring my French SIM card over when I visit. France-based carrier Free Mobile charges just €20 per month (about $30 CAD) with no contract, and includes a massive 25GB of data roaming per month in Canada and the US, with free calls and texts within those countries or to (and from) France. If I was to purchase and use a local SIM card in my unlocked phone, it would cost much more and give me much less.

Via: CBC

Source: CRTC

US funds tech giants’ efforts to build next-gen supercomputers

The US government is giving six companies a total of $258 million in hopes that they can build an exascale supercomputer before China, Japan or anyone else does. A post on the Exascale Computing Project website has revealed that the Department of Energy has awarded AMD, Cray, HP, IBM, Intel and Nvidia $258 million in funding over a three-year period. The six corporations won’t depend solely on the government’s money, though — to show that they’re also fully invested in the project, they’ll cover 40 percent of the total costs that could amount to least $430 million.

An exascale supercomputer would be capable of making a billion billion calculations per second and is expected to have the same processing power as the human brain at neural level. It could change the way we do research, help us conjure up elusive treatments for illnesses and unravel the mysteries of our planet and the universe.

According to the Exascale Computing Project, DOE’s funding will help support hardware, software and application development. In HP’s case, for instance, the agency wants it to create an exascale computer based on “The Machine” — its memory-driven supercomputer that has the potential to replace data server farms with a single computer the size of a fridge.

The project aims to conjure up at least one exascale-capable system by 2021, though the companies involved might have to work faster than that to beat China, which vows to have a functional exascale machine by 2020. Seeing as it successfully built what’s currently known as the world’s fastest supercomputer, the Asian country could very well succeed.

Via: The Verge

Source: Exascale Computing Project

Free App of the Week: Infinite Jumper Game ‘Beat Stomper’

Apple has made electronic music-driven infinite jumper game Beat Stomper its Free App of the Week on the App Store. Usually $2, this trippy little game has been rated at least four stars by over 650 gamers for its frenetic jump-and-hold mechanic, combined with a rousing soundtrack which adapts to the action unfolding on the screen.

Neon-drenched graphics and rapidly strobing particle effects are par for the course in this vertical high score chaser. Gamers control a little square that jumps high into the air with a tap on the screen. Another tap forces the square to stomp down, hopefully onto the next platform. With platforms moving from side to side, timing is everything. Not only that, the movement of the platform also impacts the direction you jump in. This from the App Store editors’ notes:

Absolutely exploding with style and energy, this infinite jumper challenges you to guide little leaping block people up, up and away into musical heaven. Using taps to hurl your angular avatars from one shifting platform to the next, you’ll aim for boosts that’ll rocket them even higher – or at least keep them from plunging to their game-ending doom.

Beat Stomper requires 136MB on iPhone and iPad, and can be downloaded for free on the App Store. [Direct Link]

Tag: App of the Week
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DirecTV Now tempts potential subscribers with free Roku box

AT&T’s DirectTV Now over-the-top streaming television service came on strong last fall. Launched against heavy competition from Sling TV and PlayStation Vue, AT&T decided to sweeten the deal for subscribers by giving away a free Apple TV, a year of HBO and a temporarily reduced introductory fee. Variety reports that the telecom giant is now giving customers a free Roku Premiere set-top box when they prepay for two months of DirecTV Now.

It’s hard not to see this as another hedge against a flagging subscriber base, of course. While AT&T bragged about adding more than 200,000 video subscribers for the initial DirecTV Now launch, it hasn’t done too well since. According to Bloomberg sources, DirecTV lost around 3,000 customers in February and didn’t gain any new ones in March, either. These kinds of offers happen all the time, however, and don’t necessarily point to a floundering customer base, per se.

DirecTV Now only became available on Roku devices this past May, according to Variety, and can also be viewed with Apple TV, Amazon’s Fire TV, Google Chromecast and various iOS and Android mobile devices. The service is priced from a basic $35 per month with 60 channels to a “Gotta Have It” option with more than 120 channels for $70 per month.

Via: Variety

Source: DirecTV Now

Woman raped in India sues Uber for obtaining her medical records

The Uber passenger who was brutally raped by her driver in India in 2014 has sued the ride-hailing firm for improperly obtaining and sharing her medical records. See, while the company showed support for her plight and publicly declared that it will do “everything to help bring [the] perpetrator to justice” — the accused, pictured above, was sentenced to life in prison — its head honchos apparently doubted her story. The lawsuit is partly based on a report published by Recode and The New York Times in early June, which revealed that Uber executive Eric Alexander got her records from the doctors who examined her after the sexual assault.

It’s unclear if he obtained those records legally — either way, he shared them with company chief Travis Kalanick and fellow exec Emil Michael. Both Alexander and Michael were recently fired. Kalanick, on the other hand, is currently on a leave of absence while the company is undergoing a work culture overhaul after being accused of fostering a toxic, sexist environment. The three executives reportedly speculated that she conspired with Uber’s top rival in India, Ola, to stage the incident and sabotage the ride-hailing service.

In the documents the plaintiff’s lawyers submitted to court, they wrote:

“Kalanick, Eric Alexander, Uber’s then-Vice President for Business in Asia and Emil Michael, Uber’s then-Senior Vice President for Business, bought into the narrative of rape denialism which focuses on whether a victim had been drinking, what she was wearing, or whether she knew the alleged rapist, rather than on the very real physical, emotional and financial toll that rape takes on a victim.

By focusing on “whether she was really raped at all,” and painting Plaintiff as an opportunist and a liar, Defendants seemed to be assuring themselves that the only reason why a woman would report a sexual assault is for personal gain, rather than to prevent similar crimes from occurring again or to right an injustice.

Plaintiff is devastated by the acts of Uber and its executives, who have intruded into her very personal medical records from her sexual assault and callously disregarded her privacy by sharing their contents across the Company.”

The documents also say that the plaintiff has filed the lawsuit for intrusion into private affairs, for public disclosure of private facts and for defaming her character. As for Uber, a spokesperson said in a statement when asked for a comment about the lawsuit:

“No one should have to go through a horrific experience like this, and we’re truly sorry that she’s had to relive it over the last few weeks.”

Source: Reuters, Ars Technica

AMD’s Vega Frontier Edition cards now have prices, and they’re not cheap

Why it matters to you

You’re going to really need some serious computational power to justify the investment in AMD’s Radeon Vega Frontier Edition GPUs.

With Intel’s Core X-Series and AMD’s Ryzen, the competition in high-end desktop CPUs is starting to solidify. When it comes to GPUs, Nvidia’s GeForce GTX offerings are currently at the top of the heap, and gamers are awaiting AMD’s next generation Vega GPUs to arrive to complete the competition in graphics as well.

So far, we’re lacking details on Vega, having only seen information on the Frontier Edition cards that are intended primarily for churning through highly technical workloads like machine learning, 3D rendering, and cloud computing. The Radeon Vega Frontier Edition cards aren’t aimed at the typical gamer, which is a good thing if some recently surfaced pricing information is valid, as VideoCardz reports.

The pricing appeared at two sites, Scan UK and Sabre PC, and the Frontier Edition cards won’t be cheap. According to the sites, the air-cooled version will be priced at $1,199 while the liquid-cooled model will come in at a hefty $1,799. For that money, Vega Frontier cards promise up to 13 TFlops of power, which is a TFlop faster than Nvidia’s fastest GeForce GTX Titan Xp.

These cards won’t be snatched up by gamers, but rather will be used by organizations building out computing clusters and who need serious power for artificial applications, 3D rendering, and other demanding computational tasks. AMD provided some benchmarks during its introduction of the new cards showing them to be 70 percent faster than Nvidia’s Titan Xp card in Solidworks, a 3D computer-aided drafting (CAD) applications.

Nevertheless, AMD is claiming that its Vega GPUs for gamers will be even faster. Without any additional details, though, that claim remains unverified. These cards won’t show up until later in 2017, and so AMD has time to perfect the GPUs and bring down pricing to more affordable levels. When Vega does arrive, Nvidia will face the same kind of competitive pressure that Intel is facing from AMD’s Ryzen CPUs — and that’s good new for everyone who plans to be in the market soon for a new PC.