Month: December 2017

Intel started shipping 8th-gen Core processors for laptops this year, but so far we’ve only seen a handful of 15 watt quad-core chips designed for thin and light computers. Now it looks like higher-power, higher-performance chips are on the way. Images posted on Chinese service Tieba allegedly shows a computer with an Intel Core i7-8720HK […]

Intel Coffee Lake 6-core laptop CPU leaked is a post from: Liliputing

Intel started shipping 8th-gen Core processors for laptops this year, but so far we’ve only seen a handful of 15 watt quad-core chips designed for thin and light computers. Now it looks like higher-power, higher-performance chips are on the way. Images posted on Chinese service Tieba allegedly shows a computer with an Intel Core i7-8720HK […]

Intel Coffee Lake 6-core laptop CPU leaked is a post from: Liliputing

BMW

I like when car makers get experimental. By their nature, car makers are normally conservative beasts, but progress requires trying new things, even at the risk of the occasional failure. Often, these automotive experiments are carried out by racing departments—always catnip to nerds like me who begin to salivate at the mention of words like "homologation."

But recently, the cars of BMW's i brand have captivated me the most. The plug-in hybrid i8 remains my default answer when asked about my favorite car (this happens regularly in my line of work), and it surely represents the near-term future of the sports car.

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Enlarge (credit: Kaspersky Lab)

A newly discovered piece of Android malware carries out a litany of malicious activities, including showing an almost unending series of ads, participating in distributed denial-of-service attacks, sending text messages to any number, and silently subscribing to paid services. Its biggest offense: a surreptitious cryptocurrency miner that's so aggressive it can physically damage an infected phone.

Trojan.AndroidOS.Loapi is hidden inside apps distributed through third-party markets, browser ads, and SMS-based spam. Researchers from antivirus provider Kaspersky Lab have dubbed it a "jack of all trades" to emphasize the breadth of nefarious things it can do. Most notably, Loapi apps contain a module that mines Monero, a newer type of digital currency that's less resource intensive than Bitcoin and most other cryptocurrencies. The module allows the malware creators to generate new coins by leaching the electricity and hardware of infected phone owners.

But the lower demands of Monero mining by no means stop Loapi from straining infected phones. Kaspersky Lab researchers tested Loapi in a lab setting. After two days, the mining caused the battery in the phone to bulge so badly it deformed the cover. The researchers provided the pictures above as evidence.

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Enlarge / U-35 under construction at Kiel in 2013. The sub—like all the others in Germany's fleet—is currently in for repairs. (credit: Bjoertvedt )

Germany has a submarine problem. During a test dive in October, the Deutsche Marine's U-35 struck something (probably a rock) with one of its four "X-rudders," the steering planes on its rear fins. The damage required the submarine to be towed back to a shipyard in Kiel for repairs—where it joined three other German navy submarines currently drydocked. The U-35 was the Deutsche Marine's only working submarine prior to the collision. The remainder of the German submarine fleet is in port at the German naval base in Eckernförde—waiting for dry docks in Kiel to open up.

Germany has a total of six submarines, all of the Type 212 class. These "hybrid" subs—also operated by the Italian navy—are powered by a combination of a diesel engine and nine proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells. They are among the quietest, most advanced non-nuclear submarines in the world. Because their fuel cells are "air independent propulsion" (AIP), these subs can operate submerged for weeks without surfacing. And since the PEM cell "engines" have no moving parts other than the electrically powered screws, they're incredibly stealthy when submerged. They can also operate in waters as shallow as 17 meters deep (55 feet), making them ideal for patrolling the waters of the Baltic.

But because of backlogs in repairs and a series of unfortunate events, only two of the Type 212 class are not currently under repairs—and they are not ready for active service:

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Google announced in June that it was building an ad blocker into the Google Chrome web browser and the company outlined plans to use it to block ads on sites with annoying ads starting next year. Now we have a firmer start date: February 15th, 2018. That’s when Chrome will stop showing any ads on […]

Google Chrome’s ad blocker for sites with annoying ads starts working on February 15th, 2018 is a post from: Liliputing

When Microsoft unveiled the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update earlier this year, one of the features the company highlighted was a tool called Timeline that shows thumbnail icons of things you were doing in the past… either on your PC or on another device. The idea is to provide a sort of task switcher that […]

Windows 10’s new Timeline feature lets you pick up where you left off (on any device) is a post from: Liliputing

In common with most other countries, demand for movies is absolutely huge in India. According to a 2015 report, the country produces between 1,500 and 2,000 movies each year, more than any other country in the world.

But India also has a huge piracy problem. If a movie is worth watching, it’s pirated extremely quickly, mostly within a couple of days of release, often much sooner. These early copies ordinarily come from “cams” – recordings made in cinemas – which are sold on the streets for next to nothing and eagerly snapped up citizens. Who, incidentally, are served by ten times fewer cinema screens than their US counterparts.

These cam copies have to come from somewhere and according to representatives from the local Anti-Video Piracy Committee, piracy groups have begun to divert “camming” duties to outsiders, effectively decentralizing their operations.

Their targets are said to be young people with decent mobile phones, students in particular. Along with China, India now has more than a billion phone users, so there’s no shortage of candidates.

“The offer to youngsters is that they would get 10 US dollars into their bank accounts, if they videographed and sent it on the first day of release of the film,” says Raj Kumar, Telugu Film Chamber of Commerce representative and Anti-Video Piracy Committee chairman.

“The minors and youngsters are getting attracted to the money, not knowing that piracy is a crime,” he adds.

Although US$10 sounds like a meager amount, for many locals the offer is significant. According to figures from 2014, the average daily wage in India is just 272 Indian Rupees (US$4.24) so, for an hour or two’s ‘work’ sitting in a cinema with a phone, a student can, in theory, earn more than he can in two days employment.

The issue of youth “camming” came up yesterday during a meeting of film producers, Internet service providers and cybercrime officials convened by IT and Industries Secretary Jayesh Ranjan.

The meeting heard that the Telangana State government will soon have its own special police officers and cybercrime experts to tackle the growing problem of pirate sites, who will take them down if necessary.

“The State government has adopted a no-tolerance policy towards online piracy of films and will soon have a plan in place to tackle and effectively curb piracy. We need to adopt strong measures and countermeasures to weed out all kinds of piracy,” Ranjan said.

The State already has its own Intellectual Property Crimes Unit (IPCU) but local officials have complained that not enough is being done to curb huge losses faced by the industry. There have been successes, however.

Cybercrime officials previously tracked down individuals said to have been involved in the piracy of the spectacular movie Baahubali 2 – The Conclusion which became the highest grossing Indian film ever just six days after its release earlier this year. But despite the efforts and successes, the basics appear to elude Indian anti-piracy forces.

During October 2017, a 4K copy of Baahubali 2 was uploaded to YouTube and has since racked up an astonishing 54.7m views to the delight of a worldwide audience, many of them enjoying the best of Indian cinema for the first time – for free.

Still, the meeting Monday found that sites offering pirated Indian movies should be targeted and brought to their knees.

“In the meeting, the ISPs too were asked to designate a nodal officer who can keep a watch over websites which upload such data onto their websites and bring them down,” a cybercrime police officer said.

Next stop, YouTube?

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN discounts, offers and coupons

Enlarge / Microsoft's Brad Smith addresses shareholders during Microsoft Shareholders Meeting December 3, 2014 in Bellevue, Washington. (credit: Stephen Brashear/Getty Images)

This week Microsoft has altered a longstanding corporate policy, eliminating forced arbitration agreements for employees who file claims of sexual harassment—it is believed to be the largest such tech firm to make this notable change.

"The silencing of people’s voices has clearly had an impact in perpetuating sexual harassment," Brad Smith, Microsoft's president and chief legal officer, told The New York Times on Tuesday. In a blog post, Smith also said that the company would support new federal legislation to end the use of arbitration in sexual harassment cases.

Like other industries in recent months, Silicon Valley has come to reckon with abuse amongst some of its most prominent corporations and people in an entirely new way. Some individuals who have been ousted this past year for alleged sexual misconduct include Shervin Pishevar, Robert Scoble, and Steve Jurvetson, among others.

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Enlarge / Oculus Touch controllers (bottom) and HTC Vive wands (top) join in harmony... at least in Facebook Spaces. Is this an indication of VR harmony to come? (credit: Facebook)

In a major about-face for the virtual reality teams at Facebook, the company announced a surprise Tuesday update to its VR "Spaces" app. The social media service's first VR chat app, still in beta and free, now officially supports its biggest home-VR rivals in the HTC Vive and the SteamVR platform.

This may come as a shock to anyone who has tried using Facebook VR software on rival hardware. Facebook and its home-VR company Oculus have spent more than a year telling customers that many of its major VR games and apps must remain exclusive to Oculus hardware, as opposed to being opened up and used by owners of rival hardware like the HTC Vive. This, in part, inspired a homebrew community to break Oculus' hardware-locking systems and prove that cross-platform issues were never technical. (The SteamVR platform, conversely, has supported outside hardware such as Oculus and Windows Mixed Reality from the moment those headsets reached the market.)

Ars' Sam Machkovech tests Facebook Spaces in VR, with help from Kyle Orland. Edited by Jennifer Hahn. (video link)

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