Tag: Security

10 Tech News Roundup #10

Here are 10 tech news that I found interesting.

Southeast Asia’s Sea, formerly Garena, to raise upwards of $884M in US IPO – Sea, the Singapore-based digital entertainment firm formerly known as Garena, is set to raise upwards of $884 million when it lists on the New York Stock Exchange Friday under ‘SE’. Techcrunch

Atlassian is on one heck of a run – When Atlassian went public at the end of 2015, it was a bit of an anomaly: a tech IPO whose numbers looked quite good with some profitability.

Microsoft quietly added an anti-cheat game feature to Windows 10 – Microsoft started rolling out the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update to PCs earlier this week, complete with features like Windows Mixed Reality and people integration for the taskbar. While most of the new additions are obvious, Microsoft quietly added an anti-cheat feature for games. The Verge

Tim Cook promises a new Mac mini will come some day – You thought that just because Apple hasn’t updated it in over three years, the Mac mini is dead? We don’t blame you, but according to Apple CEO Tim Cook, there’s still hope for Apple’s tiny desktop computer. Mashable

Google could update Chrome to address pesky in-browser cryptocurrency miners – In-browser cryptocurrency mining is becoming a serious issue. While some sites like The Pirate Bay are open about the behavior, others (knowingly or otherwise) attempt to use your CPU cycles without your permission. Techspot

Watchdog warns of dangerous security vulnerabilities in children’s smartwatches – Safety concerns over children’s connected toys are nothing new. Wi-Fi enabled dolls such as My Friend Cayla and Barbie were found to be vulnerable to hackers, while smart Fisher-Price toys and HereO watches also featured dangerous security holes, all of which have since been patched. Now, a watchdog has warned that more smartwatches aimed at kids could be easily compromised. Techspot

Apple is slipping after reports of iPhone 8 production cuts – Shares of Apple are down 1.65% to $157.12 in early trading on Thursday on reports that the company has cut orders linked to its new iPhone 8. Business Insider

Malaysian authorities probing report that personal data of millions of consumers up for sale – PUTRAJAYA: Police and the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) said on Friday (Oct 20) they are investigating claims that the private data of millions of Malaysians are being advertised for sale online. Channel NewsAsia

Where Security Meets High Performance Computing – As its power increases and its cost declines, High Performance Computing (HPC) is making an impact on the security field. The ability to use parallel processing to run at speeds of a teraflop or higher is now contributing to improved security in airports, online and elsewhere. At the same time, HPC itself creates a number of new security risks for organizations that employ it. This article looks at HPC’s impact on security. It also explores HPC’s own vulnerabilities and discusses how new solutions from Dell EMC and Intel help address them. HPCWire

Netflix: the content war – Netflix will spend US$7 billion to US$8 billion on content in 2018 as the streaming wars escalate, it said this week. That cash goes toward a mix of licensed and original programming. “Our future largely lies in exclusive original content,” said Netflix in its latest earnings report. Stranger Things is among the recent hits for Netflix’s studio. Tech in Asia

10 Tech News Roundup #9

Here are 10 tech news that I found interesting.

Microsoft’s Windows 10 breaches privacy law, says Dutch DPA – The Dutch data protection authority has concluded that Microsoft’s Windows 10 operating system breaches local privacy law on account of its collection of telemetry metadata. The OS has been available since the end of July 2015. Techcrunch

Amazon finally makes a waterproof Kindle, after 10 years of Kindles – Amazon has been selling Kindles for 10 years now, but “waterproof” hasn’t appear on its list of incremental technological advancements until now. The company just announced a new version of its popular e-reader that builds on last year’s Kindle design and now has an IPX8 waterproof rating. The Verge

Hyatt breach exposed customer payment data at 41 hotels – Hyatt announced today that its payment systems were breached, exposing credit card data from 41 hotels in 11 countries. The hack was discovered in July and the investigation only just recently concluded. Techcrunch

AWS and Microsoft double down on deep learning with Gluon, a simplified ML model builder – AWS and Microsoft may be arch rivals when it comes to competing for business in cloud storage and services, but when it comes to breaking ground in newer areas where volumes of data make a difference to how well the services work and creating systems that are easier to use, collaboration is key. Today, the two companies announced a new deep learning interface called Gluon, designed for developers of all abilities (not just AI specialists) to build and run machine learning models for their apps and other services. Techcrunch

Fake Adobe Flash malware locks your Android phone’s data unless you pay up – Consider this yet another PSA on why you should never ever download Adobe Flash Player, or anything resembling it if you’re using an Android phone. Security researchers at ESET have discovered a new kind of ransomware infecting Android phones on a level nobody’s ever seen before. Called DoubleLocker, the exploit encrypts the data on the infected device and then changes its PIN number so victims are locked out of their device unless they pay the ransom demanded by hackers. Mashable

Intel Delivers 17-Qubit Quantum Chip to European Research Partner – On Tuesday (Oct. 10), Intel delivered a 17-qubit superconducting test chip to research partner QuTech, the quantum research institute of Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) in the Netherlands. The announcement marks a major milestone in the 10-year, $50-million collaborative relationship with TU Delft and TNO, the Dutch Organization for Applied Research, to accelerate advancements in quantum computing. HPCWire

Fujitsu Tapped to Build 37-Petaflops ABCI System for AIST – Fujitsu announced today it will build the long-planned AI Bridging Cloud Infrastructure (ABCI) which is set to become the fastest supercomputer system in Japan and will begin operation in fiscal 2018 (starts in April). ABCI will use Intel’s Xeon Gold processors and Nvidia V100 GPUs and deliver 550 petaflops theoretical peak performance in half-precision floating point and 37 petaflops of double-precision peak floating point performance. The award is from Japan’s National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST). HPCWire

Qualcomm fires another shot at Apple with a new lawsuit in China – Qualcomm has filed a lawsuit against Apple in its continuing legal battle over patents, this time looking to block the manufacturing and sale of iPhones in China, according to a report by Bloomberg this morning. Techcrunch

WD shows off market-ready MAMR tech for monster hard drives – Western Digital showed off a a prototype hard drive with a potentially revolutionary new energy-assisted magnetic recording technology called microwave-assist magnetic recording (MAMR). The company says the new tech could potentially be ready for market by the end of 2019, and it could allow the manufacture of 40 TB hard drives by 2025. For context, WD is now currently offering 14 TB drives to datacenter customers and 12 TB drives are just entering the general market. The company performed the reveal at its “Innovating to Fuel the Next Decade of Big Data” event at its headquarters in Silicon Valley yesterday. Techreport

Chaos and hackers stalk investors on cryptocurrency exchanges – LONDON, SHANGHAI, NEW YORK: Dan Wasyluk discovered the hard way that trading cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin happens in an online Wild West where sheriffs are largely absent. Channel Newsasia