Miscellaneous Tech News
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Co-op facial recognition trial raises privacy concerns
A trial of facial recognition technology within 18 Co-op food stores has sparked outrage from privacy advocates.
The system, from start-up Facewatch, alerts workers if someone enters the store who had a past record of "theft or anti-social behaviour". The supermarket said the pilot was done to protect workers from assaults by shoplifters. Privacy groups say they are "deeply concerned" by the trial. The initiative was organised by the Southern Co-operative, which is independent of the larger Co-op chain but runs more than 200 stores in the south of England using the same brand. The trial was first reported by Wired's news site, which picked up on a blog posted on Facewatch's website by Southern Co-op's loss prevention officer Gareth Lewis. -
Tech Tent: Breaking up Facebook
In a landmark lawsuit, US regulators have accused Facebook of buying up rivals in order to stifle competition.
They have made it clear they will seek a drastic remedy - the sale of Instagram and WhatsApp. On this week's Tech Tent we ask whether it is really likely that the social media giant's empire will be dismantled. New York Attorney General Letitia James could hardly have been clearer in her denunciation as she outlined the case she and more than 45 other state and federal regulators are bringing against Facebook. "For nearly a decade, Facebook has used its dominance and monopoly power to crush smaller rivals, and snuff out competition, all at the expense of everyday users," she said. -
Neverware is now part of Google
https://cloudreadykb.neverware.com/s/article/Neverware-is-now-part-of-Google-FAQ
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@warren-stanley well that sucks. I see another CentOS disaster heading our way.
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SolarWinds: Why the Sunburst hack is so serious
We've all seen the pop-ups on our laptops or phones: "Update is available, click here to download."
We're constantly urged to do as we're told because these software updates improve our apps by boosting cyber-security and removing glitches. So when, in the spring, a pop-up message hit the screens of IT staff using a popular piece of software called SolarWinds, around 18,000 workers in companies and governments diligently downloaded the update for their offices. What they couldn't have known was that the download was booby-trapped. SolarWinds itself didn't know either. The US company had been the victim of a cyber-attack weeks previously that had seen hackers inject a tiny piece of secret code into the company's next software update. -
@scottalanmiller Definitely. This is / was pretty nice. I guess there's more *nix installs in my future....
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Facebook pours fuel on Apple privacy row
Facebook has launched a public offensive against Apple, dragging a long-simmering row between the two tech giants into the public sphere.
Earlier this year, Apple announced it planned to ask users if they want their data to be shared for targeted, personalised advertising. The move is likely to hurt Facebook, which has warned it could cut the money earned through its ad network by half. But Facebook is portraying itself as "speaking up for small businesses". A blog post from Dan Levy, vice-president of ads, suggested that Facebook needs it to be possible to track users' activities across other apps and websites, in order to help its advertisers target their posts at those people who would most likely be responsive. -
@scottalanmiller yep just found this out was piloting it on some of our oldie but goodie Latitude's that never die
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A new hyperconverged software platform has come to the ranks to give Nutanix and vSphere a run for it's money, Rancher Harvester - Github Page is completely open source, and comes with an optional support.
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@DustinB3403 said in Miscellaneous Tech News:
A new hyperconverged software platform has come to the ranks to give Nutanix and vSphere a run for it's money, Rancher Harvester - Github Page is completely open source, and comes with an optional support.
Saw this yesterday.
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Red Hat’s crime against CentOS
In the beginning, no one expected to get Red Hat Enterprise Linux for free. The end of CentOS as a free drop-in replacement is no cause for outrage.
In tech, we tend to get angriest when companies take free things away from us. For example, we shake our fist at Google for removing services they once offered for free. And in open source land, we cry out for justice when our free, drop-in replacement for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (namely CentOS) becomes less useful as a way to avoid paying for RHEL.
I don’t know why Red Hat chose to pull the plug on the traditional fixed-point CentOS release, leaving only the CentOS Stream rolling release in its wake. Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols walks through a few possible reasons, and Red Hat CTO Chris Wright gives the company’s rationale. But many CentOS users are furious (just ask Hacker News).
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@JaredBusch said in Miscellaneous Tech News:
Red Hat’s crime against CentOS
In the beginning, no one expected to get Red Hat Enterprise Linux for free. The end of CentOS as a free drop-in replacement is no cause for outrage.
In tech, we tend to get angriest when companies take free things away from us. For example, we shake our fist at Google for removing services they once offered for free. And in open source land, we cry out for justice when our free, drop-in replacement for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (namely CentOS) becomes less useful as a way to avoid paying for RHEL.
I don’t know why Red Hat chose to pull the plug on the traditional fixed-point CentOS release, leaving only the CentOS Stream rolling release in its wake. Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols walks through a few possible reasons, and Red Hat CTO Chris Wright gives the company’s rationale. But many CentOS users are furious (just ask Hacker News).
Because if your software company still hasn't adopted Agile framework and DevOps practices, it's time to start. Hopefully this is the start of shitty software / SW companies either disappearing or getting better. Having to rely on a stale OS version isn't good for anyone.
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@scottalanmiller said in Miscellaneous Tech News:
I wonder what kind of blow back this will have.
At least they didn’t try to cover it up.
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Microsoft's December update for Windows 10 is causing performance woes on some PCs
Complaints include unusually high CPU and RAM usage, and even blue screen errors.
Unfortunately for some Windows 10 users, this month's cumulative update is causing headaches, and it does not appear as though a fix is in sight. Those affected by whatever is going on report a range of performance symptoms, such as long load times for certain programs, and jumps in resource usage.
Otherwise known as a Patch Tuesday update, these kinds of cumulative patches are doled out to Windows PCs on the second Tuesday of every month. In this case, December 8. Users started complaining of issues almost right away. -
How tech can just about save Christmas Day
Christmas 2020 is not what any of us would have planned. Covid-19 restrictions and travel bans suddenly imposed on the UK have left millions of Brits cut off from one another and facing a potentially depressing Christmas Day.
These may be hard times, but technology can help. It has its flaws. It’s not accessible to everybody. But the BBC Tech team has pulled together some ideas for digital solutions to aid us in this bleak, midwinter moment. Zoom, Facetime, Google Meet and others might seem an obvious alternative when meeting in-person isn’t possible, but not everyone finds these virtual gatherings rejuvenating. Thanks to the pandemic, many of us have spent long hours on work-based video conferences during the year, notes Sascha Miller, who is involved in the Germ Defence project, which provides information about Covid-19. “It’s actually quite intense,” she notes. Christmas Day video calls might be best kept short and sweet but scattered throughout the day, she suggests. -
Signal: Cellebrite claimed to have cracked chat app's encryption
Israeli security firm Cellebrite has claimed that it can decrypt messages from Signal's highly secure chat and voice-call app, boasting that it could disrupt communications from "gang members, drug dealers and even protesters".
A blog on its website detailing how it did it has since been altered. According to one cyber-security expert, the claims sounded "believable". But others, including Signal's founder, have dismissed them as being risible. The BBC has contacted Cellebrite and Signal for comment. Highly encrypted apps such as Signal and Telegram have become popular among people keen to keep their messages private. The adoption rates have worried law enforcement agencies, who feel they are hampering their ability to investigate crimes. "Apps like these make parsing data for forensic analysis extremely difficult," writes Cellebrite.
