FTC sets $25,000 prize for automatic IoT patching

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is scheduled to announce Wednesday a "prize competition" for a tool that can be used against security vulnerabilities in internet of things systems.The prize pot is up to $25,000, with $3,000 available for each honorable mention. The winners will be announced in July. The announcement is scheduled to be published Wednesday in the Federal Register.The tool, at a minimum, will "help protect consumers from security vulnerabilities caused by out-of-date software," said the FTC.The government's call for help cites the use of internet-enabled cameras as a platform for a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack last October. Weak default passwords were blamed.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

iPhone prototypes that never saw the light of day

What the iPhone might have been: 16 prototypes that led to the original iPhoneImage by AppleTen years ago, Apple completely and forever changed the way we interact with technology when Steve Jobs introduced the original iPhone. Though the original iPhone, by today’s standards, is far from impressive, the iPhone when launched was nothing short of groundbreaking. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Important features of PowerShell

I think it's time to talk in depth about some of the most important features of PowerShell: Providers and modules. (Snap-ins have also been important, but they are being gradually phased out.) These are really the core of the universe when it comes to all of the commands available for use within PowerShell, so I want to teach you what they are, how they work and how to use them in your daily activities. Let's dive in!Introducing modules and snap-insTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

6 must-see techie TED talks

Ideas forum TED ended its year by picking its top 10 TED Talks for the year, and we'll start 2017 off by selecting a handful of techie ones we figure might be of particular interest to Network World readers.These talks, published during 2016, touch on subjects ranging from AI to the Blockchain to Linux (as discussed by Linus Torvalds himself). One nice thing about the TED YouTube channel is that videos are now captioned, so yes, you can digest these videos even when you're not in a position to actually listen to them...MORE: 9 tantalizingly techie TED TalksTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Car makers team on platform for smartphone-vehicle interaction

Car makers Ford and Toyota have announced the SmartDeviceLink Consortium, a nonprofit to manage open source software for the interface of Android and iOS smartphone apps with their vehicle infotainment systems.Mazda Motor, PSA Group, Fuji Heavy Industries and Suzuki Motor are the first automaker members of the consortium.Elektrobit, Luxoft, and Xevo have joined as the first supplier members, while Harman, Panasonic, Pioneer and QNX have signed letters of intent to join, according to an announcement Wednesday by Ford and Toyota.BlackBerry subsidiary QNX Software Systems already powers Ford’s Sync 3 infotainment system, as the Canadian company moves its focus to software, including for automotive applications.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Uncertainty clouds debate on Russia’s suspected role in election hacks

How do you prove Russia meddled with the presidential election?That's a question the U.S. government is facing, but may never fully answer, at least not publicly. Last week, the U.S. punished Russia, claiming the country's cyberspies hacked Democratic groups and figures during the election season.However, missing from last week’s announcement was any new evidence -- or a smoking gun -- proving the Kremlin’s involvement. This isn’t sitting well with everyone in the security industry, especially since identifying the culprit of any cyberattack is no easy matter.“Maybe Russia did do it, but until we have sufficient evidence, it’s a mistake to move forward,” said Jeffrey Carr, a cybersecurity consultant.   To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Uncertainty clouds debate on Russia’s suspected role in election hacks

How do you prove Russia meddled with the presidential election?That's a question the U.S. government is facing, but may never fully answer, at least not publicly. Last week, the U.S. punished Russia, claiming the country's cyberspies hacked Democratic groups and figures during the election season.However, missing from last week’s announcement was any new evidence -- or a smoking gun -- proving the Kremlin’s involvement. This isn’t sitting well with everyone in the security industry, especially since identifying the culprit of any cyberattack is no easy matter.“Maybe Russia did do it, but until we have sufficient evidence, it’s a mistake to move forward,” said Jeffrey Carr, a cybersecurity consultant.   To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Dear Obama, From Infosec

Dear President Obama:

We are more than willing to believe Russia was responsible for the hacked emails/records that influenced our election. We believe Russian hackers were involved. Even if these hackers weren't under the direct command of Putin, we know he could put a stop to such hacking if he chose. It's like harassment of journalists and diplomats. Putin encourages a culture of thuggery that attacks opposition, without his personal direction, but with his tacit approval.

Your lame attempts to convince us of what we already agree with has irretrievably damaged your message.

Instead of communicating with the America people, you worked through your typical system of propaganda, such as stories in the New York Times quoting unnamed "senior government officials". We don't want "unnamed" officials -- we want named officials (namely you) who we can pin down and question. When you work through this system of official leaks, we believe you have something to hide, that the evidence won't stand on its own.

We still don't believe the CIA's conclusions because we don't know, precisely, what those conclusions are. Are they derived purely from companies like FireEye and CloudStrike based on digital forensics? Or do you have spies in Continue reading

Mous Limitless iPhone case: Fashionably sturdy & functional

When it comes to iPhone cases, I'm all about sturdiness. So when London-based "fashion technology company" Mous hit me up to take a look it its new Limitless iPhone case I said sure, but was expecting more style than substance.I have to admit though, this case is both good looking and a solid protector for your Apple smartphone.MORE: Bring on the iPhone 7 parody videosMous, which got its start a couple of years back making a funky and functional Musicase designed to contain your phone AND and earphones, funded its Limitless line in part through an Indiegogo campaign that raised more than $372K and that ends Jan. 8. The company pushes its use of premium materials, from marble to walnut, and dramatically shows how resilient its cases are via YouTube videos of encased phones being dropped from cranes or tossed around Apple stores.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Hot Off The Press: NSX Light Board Videos

At the start of 2016 we began a series of VMware NSX light board videos. The goal has been to highlight the use cases and capabilities driving the adoption of network virtualization today. Through the use of a light board, these NSX  experts quickly sketch out the technology and business drivers around network virtualization with NSX.

At the end of this year, the team published 20 additional light board videos across these NSX topics: Security and IT Automation as well as Features and Capabilities and OpenStack. And for 2017, more coming soon!

Here are the recently published videos:

New Features and Capabilities videos
New Security videos
New IT Automation videos

ZigBee’s Dotdot language is the latest bid for IoT harmony

As consumers watch another wave of home IoT devices emerge from CES this week, they’ll still be waiting for one technology that can make all those products work together.The ZigBee Alliance, a group of more than 400 companies that make things with the ZigBee wireless protocol, made a bid to provide that unifying technology right before the annual consumer electronics gathering kicks off.On Tuesday, ZigBee announced Dotdot, which it calls a universal language for IoT. Even though ZigBee is best known as an open wireless communications protocol used in many home IoT products, Dotdot is intended for use with any wireless technology. It defines things like how devices tell each other what they are and what they can do, which is important for making different objects around a home do things together.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

ZigBee’s Dotdot language is the latest bid for IoT harmony

As consumers watch another wave of home IoT devices emerge from CES this week, they’ll still be waiting for one technology that can make all those products work together.The ZigBee Alliance, a group of more than 400 companies that make things with the ZigBee wireless protocol, made a bid to provide that unifying technology right before the annual consumer electronics gathering kicks off.On Tuesday, ZigBee announced Dotdot, which it calls a universal language for IoT. Even though ZigBee is best known as an open wireless communications protocol used in many home IoT products, Dotdot is intended for use with any wireless technology. It defines things like how devices tell each other what they are and what they can do, which is important for making different objects around a home do things together.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

67% off Canon MG6821 Wireless All-In-One Printer, Scanner, and Copier With Airprint – Deal Alert

Canon's MG6821 all-in-one printer, scanner and copier features Airprint for convenient printing from your mobile device, and can print to Google Cloud as well. It features fast print speeds, sharp text, vivid colors, and can print 2-sided. It averages 4 out of 5 stars from over 500 customers on Amazon, where its list price has been reduced to just $49. If you're due for a new, more modern printer, see this deal on Amazon. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

ARM PCs with Windows 10 get a new start with Qualcomm Snapdragon 835

Take your pick: whether you choose an Android smartphone, Windows 10 laptop or hybrid PC device, you'll be able to run Qualcomm's Snapdragon 835. That sums up the versatility of the new chip: designed primarily for Android smartphones, it has the horsepower to run a PC. In fact, the Snapdragon 835 will  bring never-before-seen features to Windows PCs. The chip, based on ARM architecture, will first arrive in smartphones later this quarter, with a good chance of appearing in new handsets from Samsung, HTC and LG. It will also appear in PCs running Windows 10 later this year. Microsoft and Qualcomm in December announced they were collaborating to bring the Snapdragon 835 to "cellular PCs," which are thin-and-light Windows 10 laptops with smartphone-like, always-on connectivity to the internet.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

7 dazzling smartphone improvements with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 835 chip

Unparalleled improvements will come to smartphones with Qualcomm's Snapdragon 835, a tiny chip with powerhouse features. Super-thin handsets will be as fast as PCs, LTE data transfers could be faster than a wired internet connection, and virtual reality will be in the palm of your hand. Top handsets like Samsung's Galaxy S8 are likely to end up using the new eight-core Snapdragon 835 chip. Here are seven improvements coming to handsets.Smartphones will be thinnerPhones are already thin, but will get even thinner with the Snapdragon 835. The chip -- which is smaller than a U.S. penny -- is 35 percent smaller than its predecessor, the Snapdragon 820, which powers the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge. If smartphone sizes remain the same, device makers could pack in larger batteries and battery life. The chip will also occupy less circuit board space, allowing device makers to add more memory or other components.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Worth Reading: A review of technical developments in cryptography

The biggest practical development in crypto for 2016 is Transport Layer Security version 1.3. TLS is the most important and widely used cryptographic protocol and is the backbone of secure Internet communication; you’re using it right now to read this blog! After years of work by hundreds of researchers and engineers, the new TLS design is now considered final from a cryptography standpoint. —EFF

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The Rosie Pattern Language, a better way to mine your data

We’ve all been there: You’ve got tons of unstructured or semi-structured data to sift through and like any savvy nerd, you know that doing so handraulically is against all that is good and holy [queue “Mission Impossible” music]. Your problem, which you have to accept, is how to efficiently and effectively automate the extraction process. As an old hand on the digital ship you’ll probably turn to a tool you know well such as grep, that good ol’ workhorse that implements regular expressions. Say you want to find all of the IPv4 addresses in a text file. You might resort to using:To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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