IDG Contributor Network: How IoT faded when net neutrality became ‘pay to play’

It’s 2020, and the Internet of Things (IoT) is in decline. What happened? People whisper that it started in 2017 when net neutrality was killed.In the spirit of George Orwell’s Animal Farm, here’s what may unfold if net neutrality becomes "pay to play."Loss of net neutrality: The beginning The regulations were changed with the promise of providing "better" internet access. Internet carriers were given free rein to charge what they liked for traffic on their networks. “Free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty carriers are free to rule at last,” exclaimed Bill Paider, a fictional carrier executive paraphrasing Martin Luther King Jr. "We've even published a Carrier Code of Conduct to guide our improved public service!"To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: Smart buildings start with awareness

I want to work in an energy-efficient smart building. It would have advanced energy systems that would ensure no watt gets wasted. It would have lighting, like my fridge, that would magically turn off when unneeded, and doors that would reliably swish open Star Trek-style when and only when appropriate.Unfortunately, most buildings aren’t like that today. The majority of commercial buildings are relatively barbaric with primitive infrastructure oblivious to its purpose or costs. Far too often, building managers lack basic visibility into the infrastructure they are responsible for.+ Also on Network World: How IoT with bio-mimicry reduces indoor air pollution + However, times have changed, and today it’s appropriate to be green, although the interpretation of “green” ranges from environmental to financial motivations. Of course, a building with smart infrastructure might not always be viable. Renters wouldn’t want to pay for the upgrades. And, as long as infrastructure is otherwise working, it might not be green at all to replace it. A better option could be to focus on visibility.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Ansible for Networking: A Primer

7 things Microsoft left out of Windows 10

As usual in the tech industry, not everything that’s previewed by a vendor shows up in the final product. That’s what happened with the latest update to Windows 10, the Creators Update, which was released last month. Microsoft showed off some big changes and some smaller tweaks in its Insider Previews that are nowhere to be found in the Creators Update.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

Qualcomm’s Quick Charge 4 is coming in phones midyear

If you hate waiting for your smartphone to charge, relief is coming soon.After some hiccups, Qualcomm's superfast charging technology, called Quick Charge 4, will be in smartphones around the middle of this year.Qualcomm says Quick Charge 4 is one of the fastest smartphone battery technologies. It can charge a smartphone up to 50 percent in less than 15 minutes, or give enough juice for five hours of talk time in five minutes, the chip maker claims.The new charging technology is about 20 percent faster than its predecessor, Quick Charge 3, which is in many smartphones from Sony, LG, HTC and Motorola.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

12 top tech fields of the future

Top jobsImage by ThinkstockTech jobs of the future will include programmers, analysts, application and system developers, database and network administrators, engineers, designers, architects, scientists, researchers, statisticians, specialists, project and system managers, system and data integrators, technicians and tech support, quality controllers, trainers, and consultants in each of the following 12 areas. (Read the full story: Hot jobs of the future.)To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Hot jobs of the future

"Roughly 50 percent of all the jobs on the planet will disappear by the year 2025," predicts futurist Thomas Frey, founder of the DaVinci Institute think tank.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

12 top tech fields of the future

Top jobsImage by ThinkstockTech jobs of the future will include programmers, analysts, application and system developers, database and network administrators, engineers, designers, architects, scientists, researchers, statisticians, specialists, project and system managers, system and data integrators, technicians and tech support, quality controllers, trainers, and consultants in each of the following 12 areas. (Read the full story: Hot jobs of the future.)To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Follow-up: Nexus-OS Dropping Configuration Commands

Not long after I published the let’s drop some configuration commands rant I got a very nice email from Nicolas Delecroix, Technical Marketing Engineer in Cisco INSBU, effectively saying “Would you have time for a short WebEx call to discuss the root cause of the problem and what we did to fix it?”

Of course I agreed and here’s what they told me:

Echo Discounted 17% With This Rare Deal From Amazon – Deal Alert

You can pick up Amazon Echo for $30 below list price right now with this rare deal from Amazon. Amazon Echo is a hands-free speaker you control with your voice. Echo connects to the Alexa Voice Service to play music, provide information, news, sports scores, weather, and more—instantly. All you have to do is ask. Echo has seven microphones and beam forming technology so it can hear you from across the room—even while music is playing. Echo is also an expertly tuned speaker that can fill any room with 360° immersive sound. When you want to use Echo, just say the wake word “Alexa” and Echo responds instantly. If you have more than one Echo or Echo Dot, Alexa responds intelligently from the Echo you're closest to with ESP (Echo Spatial Perception). Echo's typical list price is $179.99, but it's been reduced $30, at least for now, to $149.99.  See the Amazon Echo on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

iPhone 8 Rumor Rollup: Tim Cook cites rumors; LTE shortfall; envisioning a function area

If you think you’re sick of the iPhone 8 rumors, pity Apple CEO Tim Cook, who acknowledged during a Q&A following the company’s earnings results announcement this past week that “earlier and much more frequent reports about future iPhones” did in fact “pause” purchases of current models.451 Research, issuing smartphone demand survey findings this week, concurred with Cook's assessment, noting that while Apple remains the preferred manufacturer among planned smartphone buyers surveyed, much fewer of them are planning purchases in the next 90 days as they anticipate iPhone 7s, iPhone 7s Plus and possibly a 10th-anniversary premium phone. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

iPhone 8 Rumor Rollup: Tim Cook cites rumors; LTE shortfall; envisioning a function area

If you think you’re sick of the iPhone 8 rumors, pity Apple CEO Tim Cook, who acknowledged during a Q&A following the company’s earnings results announcement this past week that “earlier and much more frequent reports about future iPhones” did in fact “pause” purchases of current models.451 Research, issuing smartphone demand survey findings this week, concurred with Cook's assessment, noting that while Apple remains the preferred manufacturer among planned smartphone buyers surveyed, much fewer of them are planning purchases in the next 90 days as they anticipate iPhone 7s, iPhone 7s Plus and possibly a 10th-anniversary premium phone. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Anonymity and Abuse Reports

Last Thursday, ProPublica published an article critiquing our handling of some abuse reports that we receive. Feedback from the article caused us to reevaluate how we handle abuse reports. As a result, we've decided to update our abuse reporting system to allow individuals reporting threats and child sexual abuse material to do so anonymously. We are rolling this change out and expect it to be available by the end of the week.

I appreciate the feedback we received. How we handle abuse reports has evolved over the last six and a half years of Cloudflare's history. I wanted to take this opportunity to walk through some of the rationale that got us to this point and caused us to have a blindspot to the case that was highlighted in the article.

What Is Cloudflare?

Cloudflare is not a hosting provider. We do not store the definitive copy of any of the content that someone may want to file an abuse claim about. If we terminate a customer it doesn’t make the content go away. Instead, we are more akin to a specialized network. One of the functions of the network that we provide is to add security to the content Continue reading

HandBrake mirror server hacked to serve up Proton RAT for Macs

If you recently downloaded the HandBrake app for Mac, then there’s a good chance your system is infected with a nasty Remote Access Trojan (RAT).On Saturday, the HandBrake team posted a security alert after learning one of the mirror download servers was hacked. The attacker replaced the Mac version of the HandBrake client with a malicious version.In case you don’t know, HandBrake is an open source video transcoder app which allows users to convert video to other formats.The HandBrake team said an attacker compromised the download mirror server at download.handbrake.fr and replaced the HandBrake-1.0.7.dmg installer file with a version infected with a new variant of the Proton RAT.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

HandBrake mirror server hacked to serve up Proton RAT for Macs

If you recently downloaded the HandBrake app for Mac, then there’s a good chance your system is infected with a nasty Remote Access Trojan (RAT).On Saturday, the HandBrake team posted a security alert after learning one of the mirror download servers was hacked. The attacker replaced the Mac version of the HandBrake client with a malicious version.In case you don’t know, HandBrake is an open source video transcoder app which allows users to convert video to other formats.The HandBrake team said an attacker compromised the download mirror server at download.handbrake.fr and replaced the HandBrake-1.0.7.dmg installer file with a version infected with a new variant of the Proton RAT.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Email dump hits French candidate Macron ahead of election

Another political campaign has been hit by an email dump. This time, the target is French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron.On Friday, his campaign said a massive and coordinated hack had breached the email inboxes of several staffers. This came after a mysterious user named “EMLEAKS” apparently dumped the stolen data through torrent files on text storage site Pastebin.It’s unclear if the information in the dump is genuine. Allegedly, the dump contains a 9GB trove of emails and photos. The torrent files, which were hosted on Archive.org, are no longer available there.But Macron’s campaign said the leaked files have been spreading over social media as the country prepares to vote for a new president on Sunday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Email dump hits French candidate Macron ahead of election

Another political campaign has been hit by an email dump. This time, the target is French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron.On Friday, his campaign said a massive and coordinated hack had breached the email inboxes of several staffers. This came after a mysterious user named “EMLEAKS” apparently dumped the stolen data through torrent files on text storage site Pastebin.It’s unclear if the information in the dump is genuine. Allegedly, the dump contains a 9GB trove of emails and photos. The torrent files, which were hosted on Archive.org, are no longer available there.But Macron’s campaign said the leaked files have been spreading over social media as the country prepares to vote for a new president on Sunday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Q&A with Sean Boulter, Technical Solution Architect at Big Switch

Patch to fix Intel-based PCs with enterprise bug rolls out next week

Next week, PC vendors will start rolling out patches that fix a severe vulnerability found in certain Intel-based business systems, including laptops, making them easier to hack.   Intel on Friday released a new notice urging clients to take steps to secure their systems.The chipmaker has also released a downloadable tool that can help IT administrators and users discover whether a machine they own has the vulnerability.In addition, vendors including Fujitsu, HP, and Lenovo have released lists showing which products are affected and when the patches will roll out. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Patch to fix Intel-based PCs with enterprise bug rolls out next week

Next week, PC vendors will start rolling out patches that fix a severe vulnerability found in certain Intel-based business systems, including laptops, making them easier to hack.   Intel on Friday released a new notice urging clients to take steps to secure their systems.The chipmaker has also released a downloadable tool that can help IT administrators and users discover whether a machine they own has the vulnerability.In addition, vendors including Fujitsu, HP, and Lenovo have released lists showing which products are affected and when the patches will roll out. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here