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Category Archives for "Networking"

Vizio to pay $2.2 million for spying on what customers watch without consent

Whether or not Vizio is “sorry” for spying on more than 11 million people while they watch TV in the privacy of their homes is debatable – the company was proud of its ability to capture “highly specific viewing behavior data on a massive scale with great accuracy” in its Oct. 2015 IPO – but Vizio has agreed to pay $2.2 million to settle charges by the FTC. The data collection about what people were watching was occurring without users’ consent and Vizio was then sharing the data with advertisers and other companies.In the FTC’s words, “The data generated when you watch television can reveal a lot about you and your household. So, before a company pulls up a chair next to you and starts taking careful notes on everything you watch (and then shares it with its partners), it should ask if that’s O.K. with you. VIZIO wasn’t doing that, and the FTC stepped in.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

They are young and passionate. They will rule the future Internet.

Beyond the Net Journal: Youth Observatory #1 Episode

 “The voices of young people are not heard when it comes to Internet policy” said Carlos Guerrero, project manager of the Youth Observatory. “We are the generation that has been using the Internet since we were children, and we are the ones who will be using it for the next 50 years. Our voice matters.”

Nicoletta Metri

IDG Contributor Network: How a rebirth at the edge will change the cloud

For enterprise IT, the cloud has finally reached the tipping point. It is no longer a question of whether cloud is part of the strategic plan for most organizations, but simply when and how they will realize the move to cloud.If you’re an IT leader, however, you may not want to get too comfortable with your cloud strategy.Despite having just fully arrived in the cloud era, we are about to move on—at least according to Peter Levine of Andreessen Horowitz.As 2016 wrapped up, Levine gave a talk in which he made his provocative prediction: Cloud computing is coming to an end.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Tech stance against immigration ban aims to protect employees

The 97 tech firms who have joined forces to oppose President Donald Trump's executive order on immigration say they are looking to protect their employees as well as their business interests."The order makes it more difficult and expensive for U.S. companies to recruit, hire, and retain some of the world's best employees," the court brief reads. "It disrupts ongoing business operations. And it threatens companies' ability to attract talent, business, and investment to the United States."INSIDER 12 habits of successful tech CEO The list of firms who signed onto the friend-of-the-court brief includes Airbnb, Apple, Facebook, GitHub, Google, Intel, Microsoft, Netflix, Twitter and Yelp. The move comes in response to the executive order signed on Jan. 27 that temporarily bars citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries, as well as all refugees, from entering the United States.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Trump’s ban becomes an H-1B fight

The U.S. technology industry warned President Donald Trump that his immigration order will hurt the U.S. economy by making it more difficult for businesses to attract overseas workers. The administration's seven-country ban is, for the tech industry, a blinking caution sign to the world's highly skilled population delivering this message: Come here at your own risk.Tech firms see the market for highly skilled workers as being "globally competitive," and any changes to immigration rules may inhibit their ability to recruit overseas. Most of these companies hire Indian nationals, who account for as many 70 percent of the H-1B visa holders.[ To comment on this story, visit Computerworld's H-1B & IT Outsourcing Facebook group. ] Two hundred and fifty-one H-1B visa applications for people born in the seven banned countries were approved in fiscal year 2015 for computer-related jobs, according to a Computerworld analysis of government immigration data for that year. If new and renewed H-1B visas are counted for multiple years, the number will rise. The seven countries where the immigration ban would apply are Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

5G starts with chips like IBM and Ericsson’s silicon antenna

A piece of silicon less than three inches across may speed up the arrival of 5G mobile networks in the next few years.IBM Research and Ericsson have developed a compact antenna array that can aim high-frequency radio signals at mobile devices and shoot them farther than they otherwise could reach, the companies said. Silicon integration makes it thin and energy efficient so it’s more commercially viable.Carriers expect 5G networks to deliver cellular data speeds in the gigabits per second, far faster than what today’s LTE services offer. They also expect benefits like less power consumption, lower latency and the ability to serve a lot more devices at the same time.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

60% off YOCOU 5-Channel Cable Management System, 6-piece – Deal Alert

Twisted, tangled cords and wires are an eyesore. Organize your space with this simple 6-piece cable management system that works for power cords, charging cables, USB cords, phone chargers, audio cables, headphones, or any other wire up to 1/4-inch diameter. The cord organizers are made of a soft, flexibile material, will not damage your desk and cables, also you can remove it easily without damage or residue. The bundle includes four 5-channel clips (two black and two white), one single-slot clip and one double-slot clip as well. Its list price of $20 is discounted to $8. See it on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Millennials can thrive by adding mainframe skills

As older IT workers retire, the industry is in danger of losing critical mainframe technology skills. But tapping millennials to fill these critical roles is helping to keep innovation alive."Credit cards, insurance companies, banks, government systems -- for any kind of large batch systems that use transactions like that, the mainframe is still the best at what it does from a processing speed and security perspective. That's why it lives on. And it sustains within large enterprises because there's no comparable cloud derivative, for one, and there's often millions of lines of proprietary, unique code that would be unreasonable to rework for another type of platform," says Chris O'Malley, president and CEO, Compuware.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

14 Python libraries too good to overlook

Hidden gems: 14 Python libraries too good to overlookImage by InfoWorldWant a good reason for Python's smashing success as a language? Look no further than its massive collection of libraries, both native and third party. With so many libraries out there, though, it's no surprise some get crowded out and don't quite grab the attention they deserve. Plus, programmers who work exclusively in one domain don't always know about the goodies that may be available to them through libraries created for other kinds of work.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

7 musts for any successful BYOD program

A mobile workforceImage by PexelsToday, employee mobility and office BYOD programs are critical for enterprise productivity. Mobile devices add new security challenges, bypassing many of the security controls you have in place. Mobile devices, mobile apps and the networks they use are now essential to satisfy customers, collaborate more effectively with suppliers, and keep employees productive anytime and anywhere.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

7 musts for any successful BYOD program

A mobile workforceImage by PexelsToday, employee mobility and office BYOD programs are critical for enterprise productivity. Mobile devices add new security challenges, bypassing many of the security controls you have in place. Mobile devices, mobile apps and the networks they use are now essential to satisfy customers, collaborate more effectively with suppliers, and keep employees productive anytime and anywhere.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

How to protect your privacy with a VPN on Android

Using a VPN on Android can help you access content that’s blocked in your region and help maintain your anonymity around the web. There are plenty of apps that offer VPN services for free and as a paid service, but which of them are worth your time?I tested six of the most popular VPN all-in-one apps (with Speedtest and the speedof.me HTML5 test) on Android to see how they stack up. You can also go your own way and use Android’s built-in VPN tool. With a few tweaks, you can make it a little easier to use, too.Why use a VPN? A VPN (Virtual Private Network) is basically a way to funnel all your web traffic through a remote server. This makes it look like you’re in a different location and obscures your real IP address. VPNs encrypt the traffic passing through them, making it harder for anyone else to listen in on your connection, even if you connect to an unsecured Wi-Fi network.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

How to protect your privacy with a VPN on Android

Using a VPN on Android can help you access content that’s blocked in your region and help maintain your anonymity around the web. There are plenty of apps that offer VPN services for free and as a paid service, but which of them are worth your time?I tested six of the most popular VPN all-in-one apps (with Speedtest and the speedof.me HTML5 test) on Android to see how they stack up. You can also go your own way and use Android’s built-in VPN tool. With a few tweaks, you can make it a little easier to use, too.Why use a VPN? A VPN (Virtual Private Network) is basically a way to funnel all your web traffic through a remote server. This makes it look like you’re in a different location and obscures your real IP address. VPNs encrypt the traffic passing through them, making it harder for anyone else to listen in on your connection, even if you connect to an unsecured Wi-Fi network.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Criminals release fewer new types of malware last year, double down on ransomware

Cybercriminals have been producing fewer new kinds of malware last year -- but that's because they're so busy raking in the money from their ransomware attacks.The number of unique malware samples discovered last year was 60 million, down 6.25 percent from last year's 64 million, according to a report released this morning by SonicWall."This is the first time I've seen that the number of unique malware samples actually decreased," said Dmitriy Ayrapetov, director of product management at SonicWall, which produced the report, based on data collections from more than a million sensors.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Criminals release fewer new types of malware last year, double down on ransomware

Cybercriminals have been producing fewer new kinds of malware last year -- but that's because they're so busy raking in the money from their ransomware attacks.The number of unique malware samples discovered last year was 60 million, down 6.25 percent from last year's 64 million, according to a report released this morning by SonicWall."This is the first time I've seen that the number of unique malware samples actually decreased," said Dmitriy Ayrapetov, director of product management at SonicWall, which produced the report, based on data collections from more than a million sensors.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here