Yes and no. Even if you are using an unlocked phone, security updates can take utterly ridiculous lengths of time to arrive.
Speaking personally, my unlocked Sony Xperia Z2 running US-market firmware finally received its last patch against the Stagefright exploit on April 12th, 2016, as part of my Marshmallow update released publicly that same day. The exact same patch was provided on the exact same phone running Lollipop in other regions as early as 27th November 2015, and there were no carriers involved in the process at all. I got my patch direct from Sony.
That is an utterly shameful 138 DAYS to get the patch direct from the manufacturer, and that is 138 days from when the patch was completely done being tested and applied, and ready to release to the public. It was even longer from when the fix was made available to the manufacturers by Google.
I do not believe for one second that any additional testing was required to apply the same patch to a different firmware region; somebody at Sony simply forgot to ever release it for many markets. (The US was by no means alone in this; numerous other large markets didn't get a full Stagefright patch until Marshmallow was released, and it was basically a lottery whether you were in a lucky market or not.)
But really, the problem here lies neither at the feet of the carriers nor the manufacturers. The problem here is quite clearly with Google, who have allowed both the carriers and manufacturers to play idiotic games in the name of product differentiation.
It is high time that Google took Android back in-house, and required manufacturers to add their glossy, bloatware overlays as user-removable apps which sit on top of the OS. OS-level updates should then be sourced not from the manufacturer or the carrier, but from Google themselves. That would instantly solve the problem, while allowing manufacturers to provide the differentiation they foolishly believe us to want. (And for those of us who'd rather have a stock experience, we could get rid of all the manufacturer crapware and have a swiftly-operating phone with regular security updates.)
But sadly, there's not a chance of this happening. The lunacy will continue to prevail, because the customers are seen as utterly unimportant in all of this. Whatever the manufacturers and carriers say goes, and the rest is just ignored.
Voting software as *old* as Windows Vista? Quick, to my fainting couch!
Frankly, I'd be surprised if they were using something as *new* as Windows Vista. Windows XP seems more likely. 2000, 98 or even 95 wouldn't be surprising to me. Windows for Workgroups 3.11 wouldn't seem entirely out of the question.
Note that I'm not in any way claiming this to be a good thing, just a sad fact of life.
I've been here basically from the start, and was a religious Tucows user for a long time. I can't remember anyone having mentioned their name for 15 years.
Sometimes, getting rid of the ads you're not getting to show because you have almost zero traffic is worthwhile, if the tradeoff is that publications will write about you and raise awareness, getting your traffic back from "negligible" to "modest".
And then six months down the line, you quietly start reintroducing the ads and making your quotas.
See AC's post below. The half-baked wall "plan" is neither well-considered nor rational. I use quotes because it's not actually a plan -- Trump knows it will never be built, even if he were somehow to become president. He merely bandies it about for symbology, because he knows it appeals to the scared racists who are his core demographic.
...anything even remotely resembling this are significantly less than the chances of Donald Trump making a well-considered, rational and coherent statement on any topic and then sticking to that opinion for more than five seconds.
...what can be done with just a few off-the-shelf elements. The entire contents of the periodic table must be confiscated from the American public. It's the only way we can be protected from the turr'ists among us!!
... was just how freaking huge the Sahara Desert is, that one could fly over it in the same direction non-stop for that long at twice the speed of soundwithout reaching the end!!!
They're Republicans. Evidence isn't necessary, only hand-waving and dire predictions. The Chicken Little Party is entirely in the pockets of big business, and will do and say whatever is necessary to please their corporate overlords, even if it directly contradicts all available evidence.
In which case you hold up your iPad to the camera and play a short video. This is an idiotic idea, and there's no way on god's green earth I'd participate in something so easily circumvented. You'd need dedicated hardware incorporating more than just a regular still / video webcam for this to provide even remotely-meaningful security.
They're just trying to inflate their sense of self-importance, and calling them hackers as this article does helps accomplish that. Just like terrorists, the only way to stop these assholes is to stop giving them the spotlight (unless it is to mock them). Either call them what they are -- script kiddies -- or just don't talk about them at all. Even if they manage to DDOS your favorite game server, in the bigger picture they've accomplished nothing at all. Get up, stretch your legs, find something else to do and ignore them. It's what they deserve.
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Yes and no. Even if you are using an unlocked phone, security updates can take utterly ridiculous lengths of time to arrive.
Speaking personally, my unlocked Sony Xperia Z2 running US-market firmware finally received its last patch against the Stagefright exploit on April 12th, 2016, as part of my Marshmallow update released publicly that same day. The exact same patch was provided on the exact same phone running Lollipop in other regions as early as 27th November 2015, and there were no carriers involved in the process at all. I got my patch direct from Sony.
That is an utterly shameful 138 DAYS to get the patch direct from the manufacturer, and that is 138 days from when the patch was completely done being tested and applied, and ready to release to the public. It was even longer from when the fix was made available to the manufacturers by Google.
I do not believe for one second that any additional testing was required to apply the same patch to a different firmware region; somebody at Sony simply forgot to ever release it for many markets. (The US was by no means alone in this; numerous other large markets didn't get a full Stagefright patch until Marshmallow was released, and it was basically a lottery whether you were in a lucky market or not.)
But really, the problem here lies neither at the feet of the carriers nor the manufacturers. The problem here is quite clearly with Google, who have allowed both the carriers and manufacturers to play idiotic games in the name of product differentiation.
It is high time that Google took Android back in-house, and required manufacturers to add their glossy, bloatware overlays as user-removable apps which sit on top of the OS. OS-level updates should then be sourced not from the manufacturer or the carrier, but from Google themselves. That would instantly solve the problem, while allowing manufacturers to provide the differentiation they foolishly believe us to want. (And for those of us who'd rather have a stock experience, we could get rid of all the manufacturer crapware and have a swiftly-operating phone with regular security updates.)
But sadly, there's not a chance of this happening. The lunacy will continue to prevail, because the customers are seen as utterly unimportant in all of this. Whatever the manufacturers and carriers say goes, and the rest is just ignored.
Voting software as *old* as Windows Vista? Quick, to my fainting couch!
Frankly, I'd be surprised if they were using something as *new* as Windows Vista. Windows XP seems more likely. 2000, 98 or even 95 wouldn't be surprising to me. Windows for Workgroups 3.11 wouldn't seem entirely out of the question.
Note that I'm not in any way claiming this to be a good thing, just a sad fact of life.
I've been here basically from the start, and was a religious Tucows user for a long time. I can't remember anyone having mentioned their name for 15 years.
Sometimes, getting rid of the ads you're not getting to show because you have almost zero traffic is worthwhile, if the tradeoff is that publications will write about you and raise awareness, getting your traffic back from "negligible" to "modest".
And then six months down the line, you quietly start reintroducing the ads and making your quotas.
It is when your entire country was founded on the concept of breaking in and stealing all the land, then killing off the existing residents.
Thanks for that. Today, I learned something.
Err, sorry, I meant the well-considered bit.
See AC's post below. The half-baked wall "plan" is neither well-considered nor rational. I use quotes because it's not actually a plan -- Trump knows it will never be built, even if he were somehow to become president. He merely bandies it about for symbology, because he knows it appeals to the scared racists who are his core demographic.
And the rational bit, too.
...anything even remotely resembling this are significantly less than the chances of Donald Trump making a well-considered, rational and coherent statement on any topic and then sticking to that opinion for more than five seconds.
Not to mention that chances are they're using an emulator under the hood themselves.
The headline asked a question. He answered it truthfully. Don't like the answer? Move on.
Or were you expecting that only answers which matched your own prejudices would be allowed?
...what can be done with just a few off-the-shelf elements. The entire contents of the periodic table must be confiscated from the American public. It's the only way we can be protected from the turr'ists among us!!
Of course, that's at sea level, which ain't where Concorde flies. At altitude, 74 minutes would be more like 2,700 kilometers / 1,700 miles.
... was just how freaking huge the Sahara Desert is, that one could fly over it in the same direction non-stop for that long at twice the speed of sound without reaching the end!!!
I LOL'ed. You couldn't have been more wrong if you tried. I'm self-employed, and have been for close to two decades.
Anybody want to drop a fortune on an 8K monitor only to have it ruined by a shoddy cable? Anyone? Bueller?
They're Republicans. Evidence isn't necessary, only hand-waving and dire predictions. The Chicken Little Party is entirely in the pockets of big business, and will do and say whatever is necessary to please their corporate overlords, even if it directly contradicts all available evidence.
Nothing to see here, move along.
In which case you hold up your iPad to the camera and play a short video. This is an idiotic idea, and there's no way on god's green earth I'd participate in something so easily circumvented. You'd need dedicated hardware incorporating more than just a regular still / video webcam for this to provide even remotely-meaningful security.
What he said. This is buzzword-salad hype from EasyJet to get some free advertising from the media. Nothing more, nothing less.
I guess we've run out of the good stories. It's the end of the internet, someone. Hit the lights, please!
...and the doors to the armored car welded open.
My god, a non-native English speaker making an effort to speak English? Quick, let's dog-pile him and grind his resolve into dust!
/sometimes I despair for my fellow man
They're just trying to inflate their sense of self-importance, and calling them hackers as this article does helps accomplish that. Just like terrorists, the only way to stop these assholes is to stop giving them the spotlight (unless it is to mock them). Either call them what they are -- script kiddies -- or just don't talk about them at all. Even if they manage to DDOS your favorite game server, in the bigger picture they've accomplished nothing at all. Get up, stretch your legs, find something else to do and ignore them. It's what they deserve.
Exactly. Somebody just pulled these numbers out of thin air, and didn't even try to make them look convincing.