The FCC’s Orwellian Internet policy

President Obama’s secret plan to protect the “open Internet” is locked inside the Federal Communications Commission. We don’t know what’s in the 322 pages, but we are told it includes a transparency rule.  We think it also includes a no-blocking rule, which is crucial because the commission's own website has been blocking access to the press releases of its minority commissioners.  The FCC, consisting of five appointed members, is celebrating the democratic process used in formulating the 332-page plan. In a campaign coordinated with the White House, commission staff solicited several million form letters from activists cheering the ever-popular “Title II reclassification.” Nearly 1 million voters responded furiously with comments of their own, advocating the exact opposite policy, one of Internet freedom. Many senators and congressmen are skeptical an “independent, expert” agency is supposed to work this way. Commission staff, however, are warning Congress, and its 535 elected representatives, to buzz off, lest it intrude on democracy. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Uber offers free rides to Koreans, hopes they won’t report its illegal drivers to police

Uber Technologies is offering free rides on its uberX ride-sharing service in the South Korean capital of Seoul, after city authorities intensified their crackdown on illegal drivers by offering a reward to residents who report Uber drivers to police.Last December, the city of Seoul offered rewards of 1 million won (about US$910) to people who report Uber drivers, and called all services by Uber “blatantly illegal.” In the last three months of operating the service for sale, about 100 reports have been made although no rewards were provided by the city yet, according to Uber Korea’s spokeswoman. Seoul city was not available for immediate response.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Uber offers free rides to Koreans, hopes they won’t report its illegal drivers to police

Uber Technologies is offering free rides on its uberX ride-sharing service in the South Korean capital of Seoul, after city authorities intensified their crackdown on illegal drivers by offering a reward to residents who report Uber drivers to police.Last December, the city of Seoul offered rewards of 1 million won (about US$910) to people who report Uber drivers, and called all services by Uber “blatantly illegal.” In the last three months of operating the service for sale, about 100 reports have been made although no rewards were provided by the city yet, according to Uber Korea’s spokeswoman. Seoul city was not available for immediate response.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Motorola’s new Moto E is a more powerful LTE smartphone

Motorola Mobility’s new Moto E has LTE and a more powerful processor than its predecessor, but users will also have to make do with a low-resolution front camera that doesn’t measure up to ones offered on competing products.The upgraded Moto E’s arrival less than a year after the first version went on sale highlights the growing competition for unlocked smartphones costing US$200 or less. It will start shipping on Thursday in 40 countries and cost about $150.The new Moto E has a 4.5-inch, 540 x 960-pixel screen and a 1.2GHz Snapdragon 410 quad-core processor from Qualcomm. The original model has a 1.2GHz dual-core Snapdragon 200 processor and a 4.3-inch screen with the same resolution.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

TCAM and CAM memory usage inside networking devices

How does Internet work - We know what is networking

As this is networking blog I will focus mostly on the usage of CAM and TCAM memory in routers and switches. I will explain TCAM role in router prefix lookup process and switch mac address table lookup. However, when we talk about this specific topic, most of you will ask: how is this memory made from architectural aspect? How it is made in order to have the capability of making lookups faster than any other hardware or software solution? That is the reason for the second part of the article where I will try to explain in short how are the most usual

TCAM and CAM memory usage inside networking devices

Flaw in popular Web analytics plug-in exposes WordPress sites to hacking

WordPress site owners using the WP-Slimstat plug-in installed should upgrade it to the latest version immediately in order to fix a critical vulnerability, security researchers warn.WP-Slimstat, a Web analytics plug-in for WordPress, has been downloaded over 1.3 million times and is highly rated by users. The plug-in allows site owners to track returning visitors and registered users, monitor JavaScript events, detect intrusions, analyze email campaigns and more.Researchers from Web security firm Sucuri found a vulnerability that stems from weak cryptographic key generation in WP-Slimstat versions 3.9.5 and lower. If attackers can determine the secret key used by the plug-in, they can launch blind SQL injection attacks that enable them to read sensitive information from the site’s database.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

What’s in my toolbag – Update 1 – Fluke LinkSprinter 200

A few years back some of us wrote on a common theme around our tools and tool-bags.  These posts turned out to be quite popular and informative to many in the community, including ourselves.  Since the original post back in 2011, I have added a few new toys tools to my tool-bag and figured it was […]

The post What’s in my toolbag – Update 1 – Fluke LinkSprinter 200 appeared first on Fryguy's Blog.

With no Google, Chinese app stores soar on high downloads

Chinese demand for smartphones is leading to a surge in app downloads from the country—so much so that five of the leading app stores in the world are now from China.Apple and Google still run two of the biggest app stores on the planet, but in China local app stores are pulling in billions of downloads, just by targeting the home market, according to Juniper Research.China itself accounted for 59 percent of all app downloads made last year, which in total reached close to 185 billion. In contrast, the U.S. market only accounted for 8 percent of all app downloads.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Greenland

Emerging enterprise techs to watch

New technologies affecting enterprise IT continue to be invented, commercialized and adopted. The latest batch of techs looming on the horizon, examined in greater detail below, include quantum computing, gamification, reactive programming, augmented reality, transient computing electronics and Named Data Networking.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

Desktop virtualization review: VMware Workstation vs. Oracle VirtualBox

Few technologies have had a greater impact on business efficiency and IT productivity than virtualization. While most of the impact has been felt in the data center and in the cloud, virtualization has also transformed IT work on the desktop, where it retains an important role. Here I compare the two leading products in this category: VMware Workstation and Oracle VirtualBox.In executing tests on Workstation 11, I ran into almost no headaches, and in the few cases an item surprised me, I found useful information in the ample VMware documentation. Good documentation has for years been one of the hallmarks of VMware products. This continues to be true.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

iOS vs. Android reaches stalemate and 7 other mobile development trends

Image by Roland TanglaoProgrammers seem to impact just about everything these days and mobile developers, in particular, are playing an ever-growing role in the world. The ubiquity of smartphones and tablets and the rise of the Internet of Things (IoT) make the people who are creating the apps and tools for all the smart devices in our lives all the more important. A new global survey helps to shed light on the trends among mobile developers and the mobile economy, in general.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The Upload: Your tech news briefing for Wednesday, February 25

Hewlett-Packard lowers outlook as its struggles continueHewlett-Packard reported another quarter of declining sales and profit on Tuesday, and blamed a strong dollar as it lowered its outlook for the current quarter and the year. Revenue was $26.8 billion, down 5 percent from a year earlier, while net profit was down 4 percent to $1.4 billion. Sales in the personal systems group were flat, but declined in both the printing and enterprise services divisions.Is Visa priming Europe for Apple Pay?To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

5 Chromebook tips and tricks to fine-tune your productivity

While Chrome OS started life as a simple, stripped-down browser and little else, Google's operating system now has tons of tools, tweaks, and customizations that let you tailor your Chromebook to your specific workflow needs.Just like Windows or OS X, Google's built additional functionality into Chrome OS's app launcher, the taskbar-like shelf, window sizing, and other functions to help you stay productive. These tips will show you how to make the most of those tools and start getting stuff done on your Chromebook.Let's dig in!Arrange your shelf The shelf has many of the features you may know from the Windows taskbar. You can even relocate it to the left or right side of the screen, though not the top. Just right-click it and choose your desired location.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

AMD will skip Chromebooks until prices, features match better, CTO says

AMD microprocessors are relatively cheap and powerful, and they consume little power. So why aren’t they featured in the latest generation of low-cost computers, Chromebooks?The answer, according to AMD chief technical officer Mark Papermaster, is that they just aren’t worth it—yet.“You have to really look at the Chromebook, and what Google’s objective with it is,” Papermaster said, speaking with a small group of reporters on Monday evening during the ISSCC conference. “For us, it's just a business decision, when you need our type of CPU and graphics technology that can make a difference.” AMD Mark Papermaster, the chief technology officer at AMDTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Gemalto says spies probably didn’t steal mobile phone encryption keys from it after all

SIM card maker Gemalto has dismissed recent reports that U.K. and U.S. spies obtained encryption keys protecting millions of mobile phones by hacking its network.Secret documents revealed last week suggested that spies from the U.S. National Security Agency and the U.K. Government Communications Headquarters had stolen SIM card encryption keys from Gemalto, allowing them to intercept the conversations of millions of mobile phone users. The GCHQ documents, dating from 2010, were among those leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Gemalto says spies probably didn’t steal mobile phone encryption keys from it after all

SIM card maker Gemalto has dismissed recent reports that U.K. and U.S. spies obtained encryption keys protecting millions of mobile phones by hacking its network.Secret documents revealed last week suggested that spies from the U.S. National Security Agency and the U.K. Government Communications Headquarters had stolen SIM card encryption keys from Gemalto, allowing them to intercept the conversations of millions of mobile phone users. The GCHQ documents, dating from 2010, were among those leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Analysis: Example of WAN Orchestration

I wanted to draw attention to this WAN Orchestration demonstration video from Nuage Networks to highlight that you don't need to become a programmer to bring orchestration to your network.

The post Analysis: Example of WAN Orchestration appeared first on EtherealMind.

Response: We Dislike People Quoting Gartner

John Herbert wrote a wonderful post explaining why he (and a lot of other people including myself) hates seeing Gartner quotes in vendor presentations. Let me elaborate a bit on this apparent anti-Gartner sentiment.

Lisa Caywood from Brocade is an exception – watch the video of her Network Field Day 9 presentation to see how a vendor Gartner slide should look like.

Uber’s loyalty deal with Starwood Hotels could boost global growth

Uber likes to promote its service as an easy way to get from point A to point B with a smartphone. Now the company wants to reward you for making one of those points a hotel.The ride-hailing service is teaming up with Starwood Hotels & Resorts to boost the use of its app among the well-traveled crowd. Through the partnership, members of Starwood’s guest loyalty program can link their accounts with Uber accounts and earn Starwood credits whenever they take an Uber ride. They’ll earn more credits if they take the ride while staying in one of the hotel company’s 1,200 properties in 100 countries.The arrangement goes into effect Wednesday, marking Uber’s first partnership of this sort with a hotel operator.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here