Month: April 2020

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  The Pixel 4 XL. [credit: Ron Amadeo ]

Google is shipping Android's April security patch this week, and with it comes a fix for a long-standing issue with the Pixel 4's face unlock feature. The Pixel 4's face unlock system is finally getting an alertness check, almost a whopping six months after launch.

Google went all-in on a face unlock system for the Pixel 4, removing the fingerprint reader that had been on previous models and using and IR-backed, 3D face scanner as the only biometric system. The Pixel 4 sported a big, lopsided top bezel with all the requisite hardware to build a FaceID-like system, but Google's software left a bit to be desired. The face-scanning system worked even when the user's eyes were closed, so it would be possible to point the phone at the sleeping owner and unlock the phone without their consent. With the new eyes-open check, there's more of a consent factor built into the biometrics.

The fact that the Pixel 4 didn't launch with this feature is kind of baffling. The system is, after all, a copy of Apple's Face ID system that debuted on the iPhone X and that has an eyes-open check was built into the original release. Even Google's previous version of face unlock—a camera-based system that was built into Android 4.1 Jelly Bean back in 2012—could ask the user to blink to verify that they were a living, breathing, alert person.

Enlarge (credit: Yuri Samoilov Follow / Flickr)

Richard Blumenthal, the US senator sponsoring a bill that critics say will limit the use of encryption, is calling for an investigation of video-conference provider Zoom, in part over its false claim it offered... end-to-end encryption.

The Connecticut Democrat is a sponsor of the EARN IT (Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies) Act bill that would create incentives for companies to make changes to their platforms. In return, the companies would receive liability protections for any violations of laws related to online child sexual abuse material. Critics of the proposed law, who include the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), say it's a Trojan horse designed to allow the government to weaken end-to-end encryption.

A pattern of privacy infringements

Citing a "pattern of security failures & privacy infringements," Sen. Blumenthal on Tuesday called for the FTC to investigate Zoom. Chief among cited privacy infringements is the claim on the Zoom website that meetings were end-to-end encrypted, meaning video, audio, and text was encrypted at all times in transit, and couldn't be decrypted by Zoom or anyone else, other than conference participants. A post published last week by The Intercept reported that Zoom meetings, in fact, used what's usually called transport encryption, which allows Zoom to decrypt meeting data.

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  Cargo Dragon is shown on Tuesday, about to be released by the International Space Station's robotic arm. [credit: NASA ]

The date August 18, 2006, forever altered the trajectory of SpaceX.

On that day, NASA awarded SpaceX a contract to develop a service for delivering cargo to the International Space Station. This "Commercial Orbital Transportation Services" agreement would pay SpaceX $278 million to design and develop a spacecraft and rocket for this purpose—what became known as Cargo Dragon and the Falcon 9.

At the time, SpaceX was just 4 years old. The company had attempted a single launch, of its Falcon 1 rocket, from an atoll in the Pacific Ocean a few months earlier. This small rocket, capable of putting a few hundred kilograms into orbit, had flown for about half a minute before falling back to Earth and crashing into a reef just offshore. The rocket failed because, even before it cleared the launch pad, a fuel leak caused the engine to catch fire.