We may soon see a true Google phone. Yes, there’s the Nexus line, which are phones that Google sells in close partnership with a rotating cast of hardware makers. But according to a Telegraph report, Google is going to build its own smartphone from scratch, just as it’s done with the Pixel Chromebooks and tablet. The thinking is that this would allow Google to more directly compete with Apple for the high end of the smartphone market, which is still dominated by the iPhone in many Western markets. The Telegraph claims that “a senior source” tells it to expect the phone by the end of the year.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
For companies looking to reduce the cost and complexity of Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI), the attraction of Desktop-as-a-Service (DaaS) is that you can greatly reduce up-front investment. “It’s pay as you go and you only pay for what you need,” says Mark Lockwood, research director at Gartner.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
A new ransomware program making the rounds uses a simple, yet effective technique to make user files inaccessible: locking them in password-protected ZIP archives.The new threat is called Bart and shares some similarities -- in the ransom note in particular -- with Locky, a much more widespread ransomware program. It is distributed through spam emails that masquerade as photos.The emails have ZIP attachments that contain JavaScript files. These files can be run directly on Windows without the need of additional software and are an increasingly common way to distribute malware.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Attackers are packaging the newest and most sophisticated attack tools in long out-of-date malware wrappers, targeting medical devices running legacy operating systems, to breach hospital networks for advanced persistent attacks.Last year, TrapX Security revealed how attackers were infecting medical devices with malware, then moving laterally through hospital networks to steal confidential data. They called it MEDJACK for medical device hijack. Attackers have evolved, so today the firm released a MEDJACK 2 report, “Anatomy of an Attack - Medical Device Hijack 2."To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Fast, faster, fastest might be an accurate description of the type of propulsion system researchers from DARPA are looking to build in the next few years.The radical research agency will next month detail what it calls the Advanced Full Range Engine which, in a nutshell, is a dual personality propulsion system that combines a turbine engine for low speed operations with a ramjet/scramjet for high speed, supersonic operations.+More on Network World: DARPA moves “aircraft-like” spacecraft technology to next phase+To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
If you're looking for alternatives to Windows laptops, there's a new incentive to consider Chromebooks: some of them can run Android apps.And if you're looking for such a device under $200, HP just announced its Chromebook 11 G5. The entry-level laptop starts at $189 and offers 12.5 hours of battery life.The laptop is available with or without a touchscreen. Just as touchscreens are used for smartphone and tablet apps, touch capabilities are important in running many Android apps, and more Chromebooks could have touchscreens going forward.You could, however, still use Android productivity apps and software like Skype on the non-touch version of the Chromebook 11 G5, which will have access to the Google Play store, HP said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
By now we all know that IPv6 is a powerful solution to a pressing problem. The world has run out of new IPv4 addressing space, and the internet needs IPv6 to grow. What’s less widely discussed—but potentially more exciting—is how the modern version of the internet protocol won’t just make the internet bigger, but it will make it smarter.For years, IPv6 was a tough sell. Few organizations were eager to invest in something that just made the addressing space bigger, particularly if IPv4 was already meeting their needs. Now that the pool of IPv4 addresses has run dry, the pace of transition has increased significantly. And it will only accelerate as we start to explore the full potential for network innovation that IPv6 brings to the table.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
In the future, personal assistant-like smartphones will capture images of what users see, all day and every day, researchers say. And if devices can see what their owners can see, they’ll remember it and help organize their owners' lives. Add artificial intelligence (AI) to the users' camera, and the days of forgetting things are over.But there’s a problem and that’s battery life. It’s one of the reasons devices aren’t attempting this organizational feat now, the scientists from Rice University say.+ Also on Network World: 5 business uses for wearable technology +To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The Nest learning thermostat learns from you and programs itself, so it is cooling and heating more efficiently and saving you money. Plus, it can be controlled from anywhere on earth through your mobile device. So coming home from vacation no longer means coming back to a blisteringly hot house. Nest claims that on average people save 10% to 15% on heating and cooling bills, so this is one of those products that aims to pay for itself. Nest also works with "Alexa". It averages 4.5 out of 5 stars on Amazon from over 4,600 people (84% rate it 5 stars -- read reviews). It typically lists for $249, but through July 4th it's being discounted 20%, down to $199. Learn more or purchase the discounted Nest (3rd generation - current model) at Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Facebook and Google have a deepening duopoly of apps adult U.S. smartphone owners use, according to the most recent monthly "Mobile Metrix" report from web metrics company comScore. The two giants own and operate every one of the eight most popular apps, based on the number of adults who used them in May 2016. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Bold leadership is essential for companies to achieve breakthrough performance, but according to the 2016 Deloitte Business Confidence Report, 90 percent of the 600 C-suite executives (CXOs) and C-suite executives-in-waiting (CXOWs) admit to not regularly demonstrating bold leadership.Deloitte uses six characteristics to assess bold leadership: someone who sets ambitious goals; invites feedback from colleagues at all levels of seniority; innovates and looks for new ways of doing things; proposes ideas their company might consider controversial; takes risks; and builds strong teams and empowers them to succeed. Further, 52 percent of CXOWs and 60 percent of CXOs doubt that there are enough bold leaders at the highest ranks in their company.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Corporate mobile infrastructures continue to grow, with both company-issued and employee-owned devices playing a key role in supporting business processes. Enterprise mobility management (EMM) suites are often the way enterprises manage these increasingly complex environments.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Enterprise mobility management (EMM) helps companies secure their mobile infrastructure, as well as control device policies and manage mobile apps, content, networks and services. The platforms have been around for a while; some might know them as mobile device management (MDM) suites. But those suites have matured and adopted new features.Editor's note: This chart was originally posted in May 2013 and was updated in March 2015 and again on June 27, 2016. We chose the vendors and products listed here based on conversations with independent analysts about which have significant market share or are important to include for other reasons such as features and functions. All information in the chart about the products and services comes from the respective vendors.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Tech companies have a reputation of being high pressure and fast-paced -- especially startups. That culture can quickly erode morale as employees begin to feel the strain of the long hours and rapid, and sometimes confusing, change.A 2015 study from VitalSmarts, a leadership training company, interviewed 827 tech employees, to look at how culture affects performance in tech companies. The study identified some key ideas around culture and how it can positively or negatively affect the overall performance of the company.David Maxfield, New York Times bestselling author and vice president of research at VitalSmarts, has been conducting social science research around Fortune 500 companies for the past 30 years. Based on his research, he offer these suggestions on what needs to change in the tech world, and how to change it. But if you think improving work-place culture in tech is about building a cutting edge office or offering the best benefits, you're probably wrong.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Security teams handling Identity and access management (IAM) are hampered by dirty data and need management help from a chief data officer, according to a new report by TechVision Research.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Ask what department is responsible for data security in an organization and the most likely answer is, “IT.” But some experts are saying it shouldn’t be IT alone – that better security requires a closer collaboration with Human Resources (HR).One example, they say, is a breach this past Feb. 26 at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), when a departing employee inadvertently downloaded 44,000 customer records, including personally identifiable information (PII), to a USB thumb drive.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
If you’re in my age bracket, you might remember this clip of Yosemite Sam yelling at his camel to slow down. He kept yelling, “Whoa, Camel,” but the headstrong camel wouldn’t stop until Yosemite Sam jumped off and hit him on the head. (For you millennials, it used to be OK for kids to watch this stuff.)A similar trend is happening in IT today. The cloud, specifically public cloud has become all the rage. We’re moving everything to the cloud—storage, apps, compute cycles, communications tools. You name it, there’s a cloud service for it. But are we moving too fast? Should CIOs be yelling, “Whoa cloud, whoa!” And then hitting their IT architects in the head with something?To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
If you’ve ever sent bulk email such as newsletters, updates, sales pitches, etc., then you’ll be aware that this isn’t as simple as it used to be. Many moons ago, you could slap some text into a page along with a few links and that was good enough. Then came HTML mail and the ante was upped but you still didn’t have to break a sweat to ensure that the user could read your content. But now …To be competitive these days you have to deliver slick, styled, typographically sophisticated content with color, responsiveness, animation … you name it. And you’ve got to take into account not only how email renders on desktop clients (just consider the horrors of Microsoft Outlook’s eccentric rendering of otherwise valid HTML and CSS content) but also what happens to content in various Webmail services and, most importantly these days, on mobile devices. And just to make it all that little bit harder, many mobile platforms have specific version-dependent quirks that break the best-laid plans o' mice and designers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Much of this past week in iPhone 7 rumorville was occupied with rehashing and debunking a lot of the most popular scuttlebutt (dual cameras, no more 3.5mm headphone jack, etc.) about Apple’s next flagship smartphone, which is expected to debut in September. Plenty continues to be said as well about how boring the new iPhones promise to be (though Apple will need to try really hard to make it duller than its recent Worldwide Developers Conference bounty). Macworld’s Macalope column rips into those who don’t have faith in Apple to do the right thing, including a writer for The Verge who urges Apple shoppers to have “Have some dignity” over buying what Apple is reportedly selling this time around.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
When cars leave the starting line at Sonoma Raceway in California on Sunday for the start of the Toyota/Save Mart 350, they'll be taking part in the launch of a product designed to help NASCAR officials monitor and manage the 110-lap race.New race management software that NASCAR is launching on Sunday is designed to give officials a single screen to watch where cars are on the racetrack, manage penalties and share information with racing teams about what's going on.It arose from a partnership between NASCAR and Microsoft that started in 2014. It began with a mobile inspection app that let race officials see whether cars were in compliance with all the rules about how they have to be constructed.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here