Two U.S. senators are pushing proposals to extend the National Security Agency’s domestic telephone records dragnet, but a diverse coalition of civil liberties and advocacy groups have called on lawmakers to vote against those plans.Proposals by Senator Richard Burr, a North Carolina Republican, and Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat, to extend expiring parts of the counterterrorism Patriot Act, “contain flaws and omissions that are incompatible with the goal of stopping domestic bulk collection,” the coalition said in a letter to Senate leaders sent Thursday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Cisco’s most recent Visual Networking Index (VNI), the ongoing report of Internet and IP trends and statistics, finds that more than half of the world’s population will be Internet users by 2019. Also, the number of machine-to-machine (M2M) interconnections – the underpinning of the Internet of Things/Everything – will triple by then.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Google I/O brings a boatload of updates for mobile, payments, Internet of ThingsGoogle’s annual I/O conference was chock-full of developments, starting with the next update to its mobile operating system, code-named Android M. Improvements to the core user experience include an overhauled permissions system. The bottom line is that it should be easier for developers to get users to install and update their apps, because they will no longer ask users to agree to a long list of permissions up front. Instead, apps will query users when they try to use a feature that requires a permission, and let them allow or deny those at will.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Wander around the halls of Google’s I/O conference and eventually you’ll bump into a large table covered with a blue cloth. But being I/O, this is no ordinary cloth. It’s a smart fabric developed by Google’s advanced technology group that could one day control your smartphone or the lights in your home.Called Project Jaquard, it’s an experiment that involves weaving electronics into fabric to create the equivalent of a touch screen inside the material. The surface feels like a patch of corduroy, but stroking your fingers up and down or sideways controls nearby electronics.Google had set up a few demo stations on the table where people could interact with the cloth. One patch allowed you to manipulate a 3D image on a nearby display, while another changed the song on a phone, and yet another controlled the lights overhead.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Google will let users access more key functions of its Maps service, including search and navigation, without an Internet connection this year.For the first time, offline users will get search results for places and be able to use turn-by-turn voice navigation, said Jen Fitzpatrick, VP of engineering at Google, who announced the changes during Google’s I/O conference for developers in San Francisco. She didn’t say when this year the offline features will go live.Users might also see local business reviews and their operating hours.Google is also working to bring its public transit directions in Maps to more countries around the world, Fitzpatrick said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Google is moving deeper into the world of the Internet of Things (IoT), announcing a new operating system -- Brillo -- as well as a communications layer at its Google I/O developer conference today.Sundar Pichai, a senior vice president at Google, took the stage at the company's annual conference to talk about updates to the Android platform, like Android Auto and Android Wear. He then turned his attention to IoT and how Google plans to help users build their own smart homes.MORE ON NETWORK WORLD: 12 most powerful Internet of Things companies
"People are making connected devices like smart light bulbs," said Pichai. "But developers don't know how to target these experiences. And for users, it's really confusing to make it all work together."To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Google is overhauling its approach to mobile payments with Android Pay, which will let people use their smartphone to make payments in brick and mortar stores as well as in apps like Lyft and GrubHub.The changes are an effort by Google to reclaim momentum in the area of mobile payments, where Apple Pay has been fast taking hold and other rivals like Samsung’s LoopPay are emerging.Android Pay will be incorporated into the next version of Android, currently known as Android M, which was unveiled at Google’s I/O conference for developers in San Francisco Thursday. The service will also work with previous versions of Android as far back as KitKat, said Dave Burke, VP of engineering at Google.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission will consider including broadband within a controversial program that subsidizes telephone or mobile service for poor people.Recipients of the FCC’s Lifeline program, which provides a US$9.25 monthly subsidy for voice service, could use that money to purchase broadband service instead under a proposal from FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler. Eligible households would continue to receive one $9.25 monthly subsidy, and they could choose whether to apply the money to traditional telephone service, mobile service or broadband, FCC officials said Thursday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
And now for something completely different, courtesy of the country that definitely does things differently. Japan is rolling out Anicall (site is in Japanese), a social network for dogs and cats that it refers to as "The Internet of Animals."Anicall first rolled out in January at the first ever Wearable Expo in Japan, but more details were shared on the show "Great Gear" on NHK World, the English-language version of Japan's biggest broadcast network.Anicall works with your smartphone and a plastic collar for the pet. Instead of using GPS and Wi-Fi, the collar uses Bluetooth to communicate, giving it a much longer battery life.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The Internet of Things is many things to many people - we’re seeing things like Internet-connected basketballs to vending machines and other devices that connect to the cloud to provide valuable data.One thing I didn’t expect in the IoT world was a device that could measure a cow’s temperature.But that’s exactly what Brad Walters, CEO of Monnit, showed me recently at Interop 2015. Walters’ company makes more than 40 different types of sensors that fit into the world of IoT. Most of the things are dry (or wet) devices that measure temperature, water sensing or gas leaks - important things that can mean the difference between a small problem or a major disaster, whether inside your home or at your remote data center.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Lenovo’s concept smartphone lets you interact with projected imagesA Lenovo concept smartphone that’s fitted with a laser projector module can display content on a hard surface, like a table or wall, where users will be able to interact with the projected images. On Thursday, Lenovo showed off “Smart Cast,” which can also read the gestures of users interacting with the projected images: in one demo, a user was able to play a song on the image of a piano keyboard projected onto a table.Google said to be planning a do-over on mobile paymentsTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
German telecom and Internet operators could once again be forced to store customer traffic and location metadata for police investigation purposes, five years after a previous data retention law was declared unconstitutional.The draft data retention law unveiled on Wednesday would oblige providers to store call and Internet traffic metadata for a maximum of 10 weeks while location data would have to be stored for four weeks, the German government said.The measure is meant to help law enforcement agencies in their fight against terrorism and serious crime. According to the government, it strikes the right balance between freedom and security in the digital world.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
We've been hearing about speed trials over fiber for years. In 2009, researchers in Denmark were the first to beat the one-terabit mark. For comparison, today's commercial fiber usually runs at 100 gigabits per second.This year's real-world tests, by switch-maker Alcatel-Lucent over existing long-distance fiber, have obtained 400 gigabits per second, or 50 gigabytes in one second.That's especially good because it's real-world and four times better than the current, normally available pipes.Bits are used to measure rate of transfer, and bytes to measure capacity, by the way.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, newly announced Democratic candidate for president, has always seemed a grumpy sort when being interviewed on television. And that makes his campaign site’s 404 page video all the funnier.
Just scoot down to the bottom of the page. Priceless.
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We’ve been hearing about the impending depletion of IPv4 addresses for years, but that day is finally upon us -- the free supply of IPv4 numbers in North America will be completely gone within a month or two.However, as the world slowly transitions to IPv6, there’s no cause for alarm. A significant quantity of unused, previously allocated IPv4 numbers are readily available for re-distribution to IP network operators that need them. And an active private market for IPv4 addresses has emerged to allow companies with these excess IPv4 numbers to sell them to those in need.+ ALSO ON NETWORK WORLD Infographic: IPv4 vs IPv6 +To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The U.S. Senate will return early from a week-long recess in a last-ditch effort to extend provisions of the Patriot Act that the National Security Agency have used to collect millions of domestic telephone records over the past nine years.The Senate is scheduled to resume debating whether to extend or amend Section 215 of the Patriot at 4 p.m. ET Sunday, hours before that part of the counterterrorism law is due to expire. The Senate was previously scheduled to return from an extended Memorial Day break on Monday, but Section 215 of the Patriot Act expires at 12:01 a.m. that day.It’s unclear what direction the Senate debate will take. As of Wednesday morning, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell hadn’t announced what votes will be taken Sunday evening.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Hyundai is first to roll with Android AutoHyundai is the first carmaker to put Android Auto into vehicles, starting with navigation features on the 2015 Sonata, where the vehicle’s dashboard infotainment system mirrors a connected Android smartphone. Google’s automotive software competes with Apple’s CarPlay, which Hyundai has previously said would be offered as an option on the 2015 Sonata.EMC scoops up Virtustream for cloud management for $1.2 billionEMC will expand its portfolio of cloud management tools in a $1.2 billion deal to buy Virtustream. Virtustream’s xStream software is used to manage complex enterprise applications, such as SAP’s S/4HANA, so they can be run effectively on hosted infrastructure services.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here