Gross negligence is accurate enough when a company allows data on 500 million customers to be hacked and then fails to notify those customers for 2 years. Choosing to keep this from customers achieves little more than proving the company cannot be trusted. This should have been handled better.
Fixing the problems, then disclosing the breach and taking immediate action to protect customers would be the action of a responsible and trustworthy company.
This is going to cost them customers and reduce the value of the company. Not an ideal situation for anyone about to buy it...
It would make it difficult for those of us without a facebook, twitter, instagram, linkedin or google+ account... Not having these social media account means you cannot provide them which could be interpreted as a refusal to supply account information... Maybe not by a sane person but the people that make and enforce these rules are another story. That could complicate entry to the US by appearing suspicious and have the typical effect of harming the innocent while doing nothing to improve safety and security.
I generally avoid social media because of privacy and security considerations. I do have memberships of many forums and discussion groups because they offer an acceptable level of privacy.
Unfortunately for sites that rely on advertising to survive, malware delivery through ads is nothing new and this forces many people to block ads as part of their online security. This is not because the sites they visit are not trustworthy. It is simply due to the fact that not every advertiser can be trusted and the companies serving ads have failed to effectively prevent malware getting on to their networks. Criminals distributing their malware through ads are able to reach legitimate web sites that they would be unable to compromise, expanding their reach to a larger audience and making it an attractive option.
Many of us would be happy to view ads to support our favourite sites but are unwilling to take the risk. Antivirus software can only protect against known threats so, when new malware is constantly being discovered, their success rate of detection can never be 100%. Antivirus software forms part of a sensible online security plan but it does not replace ad blocking or blocking third party scripts.
Several years ago, I was a heavy MS Office user that used Outlook for email, wrote 20-60 page reports in Word, produced a couple of Excel spreadsheets daily with scientific and financial data, and created many presentations in PowerPoint. A large part of every working day was spent in MS Office.
A few issues had me looking for an alternative;
1) My Word documents would often become corrupted, growing from a couple of megabyte to tens of megabytes for no reason. Most of the time copy and pasting the whole document into a new document fixed this. 2) MS Office applications would crash regularly, particularly Word, destroying my productivity and making for a miserable working day. 3) When the stupid ribbon interface appeared in MS Office, is took longer to do making basic tasks that were efficiently achieved with traditional menus. 4) I wanted a cross platform office suite so that working Linux was easier.
OpenOffice, then LibreOffice, became that alternative and Office application crashes were a thing of the past. In early versions, MS Office documents were not always accurately rendered by my alternative so I would have to open some documents in MS Office. There were missing features that had me using MS Office for certain tasks, particularly with spreadsheets that Excel did better. Collaborating with colleagues that used MS Office exclusively could be a bit of a pain.
Today, I have no issues opening MS Office documents or saving in an MS Office format for colleagues to use. The issue of missing features is almost entirely gone and it is only my stubbornness for doing things a certain way that ever means that Excel is used. Many people have seen me using LibreOffice and have been converted from MS Office, although subscription models and other MS policies has helped with this. LibreOffice is the only office suite I really use, with MS Office on hanging around as a backup.
LibreOffice just gets better with every release, while MS Office tries to screw their customers more with every release...
Back in the late 1990's I was dual booting Windows and Linux. A PC magazine had included a CD with an early version Red Hat Linux and ran a series of articles on the strange OS. Linux had no problems dealing with the Windows partitions.
Move forward a bit to Windows XP and more dual booting.Commercial and free partition managers support Linux partitions. Windows would still screw with Linux partition, particularly when installing Windows, so having keeping each OS on a separate physical HDD became critical. That way you could unplug the Linux drive to protect it from MS incompetence. Amusingly, Linux could mount Windows partitions to transfer files over and I was able to install a driver on Windows that allowed Windows to mount Linux partitions, however, Windows XP had no native support for non-windows partitions. Linux proves to be more capable in key area than Windows but I'm still using WInXP as my main OS.
Jump forward to Windows 7 and Linux dual booting. The situation has improved a bit because you could technically let Win7 manage booting mulitple OS but it still screws with Linux partitions and has no native support for Linux partition types. Linux still does a better job and I can go months without booting into Windows anyway. More commercial software supports Linux, including games, and the open source applications available have greatly improved to the point of being better than MS products. I really hated the ribbon interface nonsense in MS Office because it reduced my productivity, it was nearly a stupid as having some animated paperclip jumping around on your screen while you're trying to work...
Windows 8 appears and I decided than if I'm ever forced to replace Win7 I'll just give up on dual booting and just stick with Linux full time. Windows 10 brings spyware and adware built into the OS, setting a new low for MS and having some very surprising side effects; friends, family and people barely know are wanting to know about Linux and how they can get away from Windows 10. There has never been a version of Windows that happily coexists with another OS, why would anyone be surprised that Win10 is breaking Linux dual boots? It is either intentionally evil or supreme incompetence; MS has a history of both.
Not even the tactics that MS used to push Windows 10 as an updates to earlier versions allowed them to beat Windows 7. Giving Windows 10 away was not enough to convince Windows 7 users to upgrade. This shows the OS is already a failure.
Many Windows users really did not like the user interface choices that MS made in Windows 8 and stuck with their preferred interface. Although Windows 10 rolled back some of those mistakes, it created many more to replace them and annoyed users by being sneaky about upgrades. MS has annoyed their customers with recent versions of Windows by no giving customers what they want or trying to turn customers into the product.
I am one of those that is sticking with Windows 7 and we never install the spyware/adware version of Windows that 10 has proven to be. I have already largely to moved to Linux so it will not be any great loss.
I can't see any reason to want this under Linux. It seems to be entirely MS specific and serves no useful purpose on Linux. Of my five computers, there is only one that runs Windows exclusively and one other that dual boots to Windows maybe once a month. Windows is becoming increasingly irrelevant, as more high quality commercial software is available on other platforms.
Most of the people that I know, use their smart phones or tablets, both Apple or Android, for tasks that were once done on Windows. While many of them have Windows laptops, they rarely use them. Mobile platforms are replacing traditional computing and MS has failed miserably to provide a useful mobile platform of their own. This applies to both business and personal tasks.
Their aggressive tactics to get Windows 10 upgrades installed is a sign of a desperation and one more reason not to trust them.
The article is light on details and seems to be the work of a confused reporter. Software alone is not going to achieve what is described. This is on the same level of stupidity as claiming that an Internet kill switch would be a simple software implementation or that police could deploy software to stop target cars to avoid the need to chase...
Geofencing is built into the firmware of several the flight controllers used in "drones" and has been in use for several years. It can be either user settable or automatically set, based on airspace restrictions, to limit flight to within a specific area or to define areas where the controller should not fly. While a government could setup a database or restricted areas to be used by the flight controllers, there is no way to update them on the fly to warn a drone in flight away from a specific area. The "drones" in use today simple lack any connectivity that would allow this.
The "drones" do not transmits anything to identify themselves or their "pilot" and they lack the hardware and software necessary to receiver any warnings. No ID means they couldn't just call up the pilot and warn them off.
To implement the suggested system, there would first need to be upgrades in hardware and software to every drone in use which would simply not be possible for millions of them. There are a lot of incompatible technologies and few industry standards. There has been some technologies developed to allow drones to identify themselves, like a manned aircraft might, but they are prohibitively expensive to the hobbyist which accounts for almost every drone in use. The next generation could start adopting this in the more advanced drones but that could still leave the toy level out.
I've been building and flying drones for four years. I entirely support prosecution of those that break the rules or in any way interfere with manned aircraft operations. It tends to be a specific group of people that cause most of the problems, those with no radio control experience that buy a ready to fly package which simply requires they the batteries to get flying. They are not educated in the proper safety or rules that should be followed. Those in the hobby know not to fly around people, airports or build up areas and are sensitive to the rights of other to privacy and to enjoy their lives without some drone buzzing around.
I'd agree that this is a funny story but one conspiracy theorist does not seem like news. It looks more like viral marketing for a game... There are crazies everywhere, with irrational views on many things but ignoring them is generally the best option.
Anyway, Google is just trying to make is easier for Chinese soldiers to find their way back to the secret bases with Maps.
The Russian government already has a plan to isolate the Russian internet by 2020, modeled roughly after China's internet. At that point, foreign services may be reachable inside Russia only if they agree to establish assets and personnel in Russia, and they might agree to laws like this as the cost of doing business.
Any instant messaging company that installs backdoors to operate in Russia will lose the trust of their users everywhere. People are demanding secure and private communications which rules out using software from a company known to install backdoors Those companies will need to decide if there are enough profitable users in Russia to make up for loses in other markets. Complying with Russian laws is not the only cost to businesses.
If Russia wants to isolate their internet, maybe the rest of the world should support this move and isolate Russia. It would cut down on cybercrime and put Russia at a competitive disadvantage.
This is only relevant to companies that have assets or personnel in Russia. Everyone else can safely ignore them. The US and Europe are not going to extradite anyone to Russia over this or cooperate with a Russian investigation. Putin have been pushing too hard at returning to cold war nonsense for any government to take this seriously.
The quality of news reporting from traditional sources has been in decline for many years. So called journalists will publish press releases as news, with no fact checks or any other basic journalism. The traditional players will present advertisements as news which is intentionally deceptive and a breach of trust with their readers or viewers. The less dishonest will at least note in the heading that it is a sponsored article. Political bias is another problem with factual reporting of news.
If you can't trust the traditional news organisations, you might as well get the news from whatever some random person posts on the internet. There are some good blogs, youtube channels and forums for technical news that the mainstream media has never been good with.
This the new and improved version; "Guilty until proven innocent.". Maybe they learned something from the media companies claiming that everyone is stealing their stuff through downloads and sending out invoices to those evil people. Or, the police and security agencies that are above any constitutional protections and assume that everyone is a terrorist.
Rights, freedoms and privacy are being eroded rapidly in the name of hunting terrorists and paedophiles. By the time the people wake up to what is happening they will find themselves in an inescapable police state, where the presumption of guilt has become the new standard.
There are just too many ad supported apps that are complete junk and too many apps trying to do the same thing. It is only getting more difficult to find the good apps in the mess. A good app can go bad quickly, through a buy out or a developer becoming evil in search of a bit of few dollars. I've been stung by devs turning an app I paid for upfront into a ad supported piece of shit and adding privacy invading features (spyware). Get burned a few times and it becomes difficult to trust developers enough to try or buy new apps.
There are only a few apps that I regularly use so there is no need to install more, unless I come across an app that does something I need and has a developer that appears trustworthy.
A Microsoft product vulnerable to exploits? That just can't true... Putting aside the sarcasm for a moment, this really should not come as a surprised to anyone. MS products are constantly targeted because MS makes them easy targets and their latest OS version has spyware and adware built in.
Anyone foolish enough to trust MS to fight against malware, when MS are pushing their own spyware/adware in Windows 10, is crazy and deserves whatever they get.
Linux distros manage to upgrade thousands of packages easily on a wide range of hardware. There is no reason that Android device manufacturers could not implement a similar approach to updates which would still allow device customisation but utilise a common base for many devices. Offering some apps in an Android store is a step in the right direction but it is not enough to address the core problem.
Individual packages (or apps) could easily be updated on Android, if manufacturers gave up the stupid idea of upgrading the entire firmware as a whole. Mobile devices have more in common with computers than dumb phones that might have been only sensibly upgraded through whole firmwares. Manufacturers are just making life difficult for themselves.
As more unpatched and exploited holes cause harm to users there will be more of a push for change. Expecting users to pay for the continued use of a broken and stupid system is not the answer.
What a smart watch offers is only of interest to few people and device limitations put many potential customers off. Short battery life is the most annoying problem. My digital watch never needs to be connected to a charger, thanks to built in solar charging, and the battery lasts for several years. If I need a "smart" device, I take my smart phone out of my pocket.
I love tech toys but I would quickly be frustrated enough with one of today's smart watches to introduce it to a very large hammer...
MS has created a huge incentive for more people to try Linux. Increasing the number of desktop Linux users will attract more commercial software which will eliminate the vendor lock-in that MS has enjoyed.
Friends and family were disgusted by Windows 8. Mostly, they just moved to Android tablets and stopped using their laptop/desktop Windows for all but that rare times it is needed. It is a little odd to see my mother using her Android tablet for just about everything but it works for her. They will even do things on the Android smart phones that used to require getting out their laptops. As someone that grew up when many people did not have a PC at home, and long before Android came along, it is amazing just how much general computing is being done without the need for a laptop or desktop computer.
I've been using Linux as my main OS for around 15 years, with Windows dual boot for some games. There has been a lot more interest from friends and family in Linux, particularly when they see me using KDE and how familiar it is to the good old Windows that MS ruined. For those used to older Windows versions there is a learning curve and putting that effort into learning Linux requires no more effort.
MS seems to be doing everything possible to kill Windows and they have my support in their mission.
This is a low cost device that is being offered to the world and it not aimed at medical professionals in developed countries. Being one for personal use in your home would not require any certifications, although this wouldn't be a substitute for seeing a cardiologist. There are many parts of the world were basic medical equipment as simply unavailable due to the high cost. What we take for granted in a visit to our doctors or hospital simply isn't there. This would never be allowed to be used by medical professionals in my country but that isn't the target market.
I have to get an ECG done shortly, as part of a regular check up with a range of other tests, and that will be using a certified device under the control of a medical professional.
The Australian Government also isn't trying to ban strong encryption or mandate backdoors. They simply don't care and this has no impact on Australians. We still use strong encryption freely and without government interference.
A minor part, the Greens, put up a motion that is rejected, as practically everything they offer up is... This isn't news. It is not unusual for a government to only support their own legislation, unless it is part of a side deal for minor party support. It gives the issue a bit of publicity which is all the Greens were really after and might force government politicians to take a position on strong encryption, if the media take the bait.
As a long term Linux user, I love what MS is doing with Windows 10. It is making it much easier to move friends and family over to Linux. A bit of background on the crap that Windows 10 does and a demo of KDE is all it takes to convert them. It doesn't hurt that I also point our that they are running Linux already on the Android phones and tablets.
I don't care if the rest of the world continues to use Windows, my only interest is in a specific group of people. My mother hated windows 8 on her new laptop and things were only marginally better with Windows 10 which I put on there to see if she could live with it. Can't see I didn't give MS a fighting chance...
Good advice. I've been doing that for many years. Things have changed a bit though...
I get my games through Steam and there are plenty that support Linux so I buy them and on rarely have to boot into Windows. Ten years ago it was a struggle to get games on Linux and it is now very easy, often easier than Windows. There are still a lot of Windows only games released and that will probably not change for a while.
The relationship between advertisers an consumers has been abused by advertisers that spy on us and compromise our security. Advertisers made themselves something that any sensible person needs to protect themselves against.
Ads allowing drive by infections with malware became common over the last decade. The big advertisers did little to protect consumers and continued to accept these ads without the necessary safeguards. Ads that interfere with our ability to view a page are more common, whether that is flashing images, auto playing video or audio, or ads that cover content. This ruins the experience for the consumer visiting those sites and ad blocking solves that problem.
Ad companies are collecting private data and tracking our online activities, ignoring our right to privacy. If they abuse our rights then it is only fair that we block them and deny them any right to dump their garbage on us.
If ad companies were not evil, fewer people would decide it is necessary to block them but there is no indication that they are prepared to improve their behaviour.
Slashdot Mirror
Gross negligence is accurate enough when a company allows data on 500 million customers to be hacked and then fails to notify those customers for 2 years. Choosing to keep this from customers achieves little more than proving the company cannot be trusted. This should have been handled better.
Fixing the problems, then disclosing the breach and taking immediate action to protect customers would be the action of a responsible and trustworthy company.
This is going to cost them customers and reduce the value of the company. Not an ideal situation for anyone about to buy it...
It would make it difficult for those of us without a facebook, twitter, instagram, linkedin or google+ account... Not having these social media account means you cannot provide them which could be interpreted as a refusal to supply account information... Maybe not by a sane person but the people that make and enforce these rules are another story. That could complicate entry to the US by appearing suspicious and have the typical effect of harming the innocent while doing nothing to improve safety and security.
I generally avoid social media because of privacy and security considerations. I do have memberships of many forums and discussion groups because they offer an acceptable level of privacy.
Unfortunately for sites that rely on advertising to survive, malware delivery through ads is nothing new and this forces many people to block ads as part of their online security. This is not because the sites they visit are not trustworthy. It is simply due to the fact that not every advertiser can be trusted and the companies serving ads have failed to effectively prevent malware getting on to their networks. Criminals distributing their malware through ads are able to reach legitimate web sites that they would be unable to compromise, expanding their reach to a larger audience and making it an attractive option.
Many of us would be happy to view ads to support our favourite sites but are unwilling to take the risk. Antivirus software can only protect against known threats so, when new malware is constantly being discovered, their success rate of detection can never be 100%. Antivirus software forms part of a sensible online security plan but it does not replace ad blocking or blocking third party scripts.
Several years ago, I was a heavy MS Office user that used Outlook for email, wrote 20-60 page reports in Word, produced a couple of Excel spreadsheets daily with scientific and financial data, and created many presentations in PowerPoint. A large part of every working day was spent in MS Office.
A few issues had me looking for an alternative;
1) My Word documents would often become corrupted, growing from a couple of megabyte to tens of megabytes for no reason. Most of the time copy and pasting the whole document into a new document fixed this.
2) MS Office applications would crash regularly, particularly Word, destroying my productivity and making for a miserable working day.
3) When the stupid ribbon interface appeared in MS Office, is took longer to do making basic tasks that were efficiently achieved with traditional menus.
4) I wanted a cross platform office suite so that working Linux was easier.
OpenOffice, then LibreOffice, became that alternative and Office application crashes were a thing of the past. In early versions, MS Office documents were not always accurately rendered by my alternative so I would have to open some documents in MS Office. There were missing features that had me using MS Office for certain tasks, particularly with spreadsheets that Excel did better. Collaborating with colleagues that used MS Office exclusively could be a bit of a pain.
Today, I have no issues opening MS Office documents or saving in an MS Office format for colleagues to use. The issue of missing features is almost entirely gone and it is only my stubbornness for doing things a certain way that ever means that Excel is used. Many people have seen me using LibreOffice and have been converted from MS Office, although subscription models and other MS policies has helped with this. LibreOffice is the only office suite I really use, with MS Office on hanging around as a backup.
LibreOffice just gets better with every release, while MS Office tries to screw their customers more with every release...
Back in the late 1990's I was dual booting Windows and Linux. A PC magazine had included a CD with an early version Red Hat Linux and ran a series of articles on the strange OS. Linux had no problems dealing with the Windows partitions.
Move forward a bit to Windows XP and more dual booting.Commercial and free partition managers support Linux partitions. Windows would still screw with Linux partition, particularly when installing Windows, so having keeping each OS on a separate physical HDD became critical. That way you could unplug the Linux drive to protect it from MS incompetence. Amusingly, Linux could mount Windows partitions to transfer files over and I was able to install a driver on Windows that allowed Windows to mount Linux partitions, however, Windows XP had no native support for non-windows partitions. Linux proves to be more capable in key area than Windows but I'm still using WInXP as my main OS.
Jump forward to Windows 7 and Linux dual booting. The situation has improved a bit because you could technically let Win7 manage booting mulitple OS but it still screws with Linux partitions and has no native support for Linux partition types. Linux still does a better job and I can go months without booting into Windows anyway. More commercial software supports Linux, including games, and the open source applications available have greatly improved to the point of being better than MS products. I really hated the ribbon interface nonsense in MS Office because it reduced my productivity, it was nearly a stupid as having some animated paperclip jumping around on your screen while you're trying to work...
Windows 8 appears and I decided than if I'm ever forced to replace Win7 I'll just give up on dual booting and just stick with Linux full time. Windows 10 brings spyware and adware built into the OS, setting a new low for MS and having some very surprising side effects; friends, family and people barely know are wanting to know about Linux and how they can get away from Windows 10. There has never been a version of Windows that happily coexists with another OS, why would anyone be surprised that Win10 is breaking Linux dual boots? It is either intentionally evil or supreme incompetence; MS has a history of both.
Not even the tactics that MS used to push Windows 10 as an updates to earlier versions allowed them to beat Windows 7. Giving Windows 10 away was not enough to convince Windows 7 users to upgrade. This shows the OS is already a failure.
Many Windows users really did not like the user interface choices that MS made in Windows 8 and stuck with their preferred interface. Although Windows 10 rolled back some of those mistakes, it created many more to replace them and annoyed users by being sneaky about upgrades. MS has annoyed their customers with recent versions of Windows by no giving customers what they want or trying to turn customers into the product.
I am one of those that is sticking with Windows 7 and we never install the spyware/adware version of Windows that 10 has proven to be. I have already largely to moved to Linux so it will not be any great loss.
I can't see any reason to want this under Linux. It seems to be entirely MS specific and serves no useful purpose on Linux. Of my five computers, there is only one that runs Windows exclusively and one other that dual boots to Windows maybe once a month. Windows is becoming increasingly irrelevant, as more high quality commercial software is available on other platforms.
Most of the people that I know, use their smart phones or tablets, both Apple or Android, for tasks that were once done on Windows. While many of them have Windows laptops, they rarely use them. Mobile platforms are replacing traditional computing and MS has failed miserably to provide a useful mobile platform of their own. This applies to both business and personal tasks.
Their aggressive tactics to get Windows 10 upgrades installed is a sign of a desperation and one more reason not to trust them.
The article is light on details and seems to be the work of a confused reporter. Software alone is not going to achieve what is described. This is on the same level of stupidity as claiming that an Internet kill switch would be a simple software implementation or that police could deploy software to stop target cars to avoid the need to chase...
Geofencing is built into the firmware of several the flight controllers used in "drones" and has been in use for several years. It can be either user settable or automatically set, based on airspace restrictions, to limit flight to within a specific area or to define areas where the controller should not fly. While a government could setup a database or restricted areas to be used by the flight controllers, there is no way to update them on the fly to warn a drone in flight away from a specific area. The "drones" in use today simple lack any connectivity that would allow this.
The "drones" do not transmits anything to identify themselves or their "pilot" and they lack the hardware and software necessary to receiver any warnings. No ID means they couldn't just call up the pilot and warn them off.
To implement the suggested system, there would first need to be upgrades in hardware and software to every drone in use which would simply not be possible for millions of them. There are a lot of incompatible technologies and few industry standards. There has been some technologies developed to allow drones to identify themselves, like a manned aircraft might, but they are prohibitively expensive to the hobbyist which accounts for almost every drone in use. The next generation could start adopting this in the more advanced drones but that could still leave the toy level out.
I've been building and flying drones for four years. I entirely support prosecution of those that break the rules or in any way interfere with manned aircraft operations. It tends to be a specific group of people that cause most of the problems, those with no radio control experience that buy a ready to fly package which simply requires they the batteries to get flying. They are not educated in the proper safety or rules that should be followed. Those in the hobby know not to fly around people, airports or build up areas and are sensitive to the rights of other to privacy and to enjoy their lives without some drone buzzing around.
I'd agree that this is a funny story but one conspiracy theorist does not seem like news. It looks more like viral marketing for a game... There are crazies everywhere, with irrational views on many things but ignoring them is generally the best option.
Anyway, Google is just trying to make is easier for Chinese soldiers to find their way back to the secret bases with Maps.
The Russian government already has a plan to isolate the Russian internet by 2020, modeled roughly after China's internet. At that point, foreign services may be reachable inside Russia only if they agree to establish assets and personnel in Russia, and they might agree to laws like this as the cost of doing business.
Any instant messaging company that installs backdoors to operate in Russia will lose the trust of their users everywhere. People are demanding secure and private communications which rules out using software from a company known to install backdoors Those companies will need to decide if there are enough profitable users in Russia to make up for loses in other markets. Complying with Russian laws is not the only cost to businesses.
If Russia wants to isolate their internet, maybe the rest of the world should support this move and isolate Russia. It would cut down on cybercrime and put Russia at a competitive disadvantage.
This is only relevant to companies that have assets or personnel in Russia. Everyone else can safely ignore them. The US and Europe are not going to extradite anyone to Russia over this or cooperate with a Russian investigation. Putin have been pushing too hard at returning to cold war nonsense for any government to take this seriously.
You could install flashblock and only allow flash content that you actually need. It cuts down on security threats and ads.
The quality of news reporting from traditional sources has been in decline for many years. So called journalists will publish press releases as news, with no fact checks or any other basic journalism. The traditional players will present advertisements as news which is intentionally deceptive and a breach of trust with their readers or viewers. The less dishonest will at least note in the heading that it is a sponsored article. Political bias is another problem with factual reporting of news.
If you can't trust the traditional news organisations, you might as well get the news from whatever some random person posts on the internet. There are some good blogs, youtube channels and forums for technical news that the mainstream media has never been good with.
This the new and improved version; "Guilty until proven innocent.". Maybe they learned something from the media companies claiming that everyone is stealing their stuff through downloads and sending out invoices to those evil people. Or, the police and security agencies that are above any constitutional protections and assume that everyone is a terrorist.
Rights, freedoms and privacy are being eroded rapidly in the name of hunting terrorists and paedophiles. By the time the people wake up to what is happening they will find themselves in an inescapable police state, where the presumption of guilt has become the new standard.
Your points are great. Well said.
There are just too many ad supported apps that are complete junk and too many apps trying to do the same thing. It is only getting more difficult to find the good apps in the mess. A good app can go bad quickly, through a buy out or a developer becoming evil in search of a bit of few dollars. I've been stung by devs turning an app I paid for upfront into a ad supported piece of shit and adding privacy invading features (spyware). Get burned a few times and it becomes difficult to trust developers enough to try or buy new apps.
There are only a few apps that I regularly use so there is no need to install more, unless I come across an app that does something I need and has a developer that appears trustworthy.
A Microsoft product vulnerable to exploits? That just can't true... Putting aside the sarcasm for a moment, this really should not come as a surprised to anyone. MS products are constantly targeted because MS makes them easy targets and their latest OS version has spyware and adware built in.
Anyone foolish enough to trust MS to fight against malware, when MS are pushing their own spyware/adware in Windows 10, is crazy and deserves whatever they get.
Linux distros manage to upgrade thousands of packages easily on a wide range of hardware. There is no reason that Android device manufacturers could not implement a similar approach to updates which would still allow device customisation but utilise a common base for many devices. Offering some apps in an Android store is a step in the right direction but it is not enough to address the core problem.
Individual packages (or apps) could easily be updated on Android, if manufacturers gave up the stupid idea of upgrading the entire firmware as a whole. Mobile devices have more in common with computers than dumb phones that might have been only sensibly upgraded through whole firmwares. Manufacturers are just making life difficult for themselves.
As more unpatched and exploited holes cause harm to users there will be more of a push for change. Expecting users to pay for the continued use of a broken and stupid system is not the answer.
What a smart watch offers is only of interest to few people and device limitations put many potential customers off. Short battery life is the most annoying problem. My digital watch never needs to be connected to a charger, thanks to built in solar charging, and the battery lasts for several years. If I need a "smart" device, I take my smart phone out of my pocket.
I love tech toys but I would quickly be frustrated enough with one of today's smart watches to introduce it to a very large hammer...
MS has created a huge incentive for more people to try Linux. Increasing the number of desktop Linux users will attract more commercial software which will eliminate the vendor lock-in that MS has enjoyed.
Friends and family were disgusted by Windows 8. Mostly, they just moved to Android tablets and stopped using their laptop/desktop Windows for all but that rare times it is needed. It is a little odd to see my mother using her Android tablet for just about everything but it works for her. They will even do things on the Android smart phones that used to require getting out their laptops. As someone that grew up when many people did not have a PC at home, and long before Android came along, it is amazing just how much general computing is being done without the need for a laptop or desktop computer.
I've been using Linux as my main OS for around 15 years, with Windows dual boot for some games. There has been a lot more interest from friends and family in Linux, particularly when they see me using KDE and how familiar it is to the good old Windows that MS ruined. For those used to older Windows versions there is a learning curve and putting that effort into learning Linux requires no more effort.
MS seems to be doing everything possible to kill Windows and they have my support in their mission.
This is a low cost device that is being offered to the world and it not aimed at medical professionals in developed countries. Being one for personal use in your home would not require any certifications, although this wouldn't be a substitute for seeing a cardiologist. There are many parts of the world were basic medical equipment as simply unavailable due to the high cost. What we take for granted in a visit to our doctors or hospital simply isn't there. This would never be allowed to be used by medical professionals in my country but that isn't the target market.
I have to get an ECG done shortly, as part of a regular check up with a range of other tests, and that will be using a certified device under the control of a medical professional.
The Australian Government also isn't trying to ban strong encryption or mandate backdoors. They simply don't care and this has no impact on Australians. We still use strong encryption freely and without government interference.
A minor part, the Greens, put up a motion that is rejected, as practically everything they offer up is... This isn't news. It is not unusual for a government to only support their own legislation, unless it is part of a side deal for minor party support. It gives the issue a bit of publicity which is all the Greens were really after and might force government politicians to take a position on strong encryption, if the media take the bait.
As a long term Linux user, I love what MS is doing with Windows 10. It is making it much easier to move friends and family over to Linux. A bit of background on the crap that Windows 10 does and a demo of KDE is all it takes to convert them. It doesn't hurt that I also point our that they are running Linux already on the Android phones and tablets.
I don't care if the rest of the world continues to use Windows, my only interest is in a specific group of people. My mother hated windows 8 on her new laptop and things were only marginally better with Windows 10 which I put on there to see if she could live with it. Can't see I didn't give MS a fighting chance...
Good advice. I've been doing that for many years. Things have changed a bit though...
I get my games through Steam and there are plenty that support Linux so I buy them and on rarely have to boot into Windows. Ten years ago it was a struggle to get games on Linux and it is now very easy, often easier than Windows. There are still a lot of Windows only games released and that will probably not change for a while.
Windows 10 = adware = malware... Now we are starting to see why MS was trying to force windows 10 upgrades on us.
Time to start complaining to local regulators, at least in those countries with consumer protection laws.
The relationship between advertisers an consumers has been abused by advertisers that spy on us and compromise our security. Advertisers made themselves something that any sensible person needs to protect themselves against.
Ads allowing drive by infections with malware became common over the last decade. The big advertisers did little to protect consumers and continued to accept these ads without the necessary safeguards. Ads that interfere with our ability to view a page are more common, whether that is flashing images, auto playing video or audio, or ads that cover content. This ruins the experience for the consumer visiting those sites and ad blocking solves that problem.
Ad companies are collecting private data and tracking our online activities, ignoring our right to privacy. If they abuse our rights then it is only fair that we block them and deny them any right to dump their garbage on us.
If ad companies were not evil, fewer people would decide it is necessary to block them but there is no indication that they are prepared to improve their behaviour.