Tag Archive for Apple

| December 11, 2019
Comments Off on Your Smart TV is Spying On You

Your Smart TV is Spying On You

Your Smart TV is Spying On YouMany people will find a smart TV under their tree this year. Smart TVs are like regular televisions but with an internet connection. The global smart TVs market is expected to reach 249.9M units by 2024. And all those smart TVs may be spying on you. A while ago I wrote about Vizio (VZIO) getting caught invading your privacy by collecting and selling your personal data. Despite the fact that Vizo had to pay a $2.2M fine, smart TV manufacturers continue to spy on their customers.

Data leakZDNet reports that that smart TVs send user data to tech titans including Facebook (FB), Google (GOOG), and Netflix. These devices are spying on you even when they are idle. U.S. and UK researchers say smart television sets produced by popular vendors including Samsung (005930), Apple (AAPL), and LG (LGLD), alongside content and app streaming devices such as Amazon (AMZN) FireTV, and Roku, are sending out information potentially without the knowledge or consent of users.

Smart TV's sharing users' personal data

Financial Times

Your Smart TV is Spying On You

In a paper titled, “Information Exposure From Consumer IoT Devices” (PDF), the team said that 34,586 controlled experiments found that 88% of devices send information to firms other than the device manufacturer; 56% of U.S. devices and 83.8% of UK devices send your info overseas. They also report every device they studied exposed some kind of information in plain-text.

eavesdroppingThe researchers from Northeastern University and Imperial College London found that 37% could “reliably inferred” user and device behavior from eavesdropping on the user’s interactions with television sets and other household IoT products.

The study found that almost half of the tested devices contacted Amazon. That includes devices not manufactured by Amazon. David Choffnes, one of the authors of the paper warns that Amazon has a lot of information about what you are doing in your home.

According to the paper location data and IP addresses were commonly sent by our IoT devices to third parties in the cloud including Netflix, Spotify, Microsoft (MSFT), Akamai (AKAM), and Google.

Netflix logoWhen it came to smart TVs, however, almost all of the devices included in the study would contact Netflix — whether or not a TV was configured with an account for the content streaming service. “This, at the very least, exposes information to Netflix about the model of [a] TV at a given location,” the paper reads.

Some of the tech titans collecting your data responded to the researchers.

  • Facebook said that it was “common” for services with Facebook integrated into them to send data to third-party services.
  • Netflix said that data transfers were “confined to how Netflix performs and appears on screen,” and
  • Google said user preferences and consent levels dictate how publishers “may share data with Google’s that’s similar to data used for ads in apps or on the web.”

Internet-connected smart TVs combined with streaming services like Netflix and Hulu seem to be a cord-cutter’s dream. But like anything else that connects to the internet, it opens up smart TVs to security vulnerabilities and hackers. But as is the case with most other internet-connected devices, manufacturers often don’t put security as a priority. Not only that, many smart TVs come with a camera and a microphone that attackers can access.

FBI warning

FBI issued a warning about smart TVsBecause manufacturers don’t put security as a priority, the FBI issued a warning about the risks that smart TVs pose. The FBI warned that hackers can take control of your unsecured smart TV and in worst cases, take control of the camera and microphone to watch and listen in.

… TV manufacturers and app developers may be listening and watching you, that television can also be a gateway for hackers to come into your home … your unsecured TV can give him or her an easy way in the backdoor through your router.

TechCrunch notes that some of the biggest attacks targeting smart TVs were developed by the CIA, but were stolen. The files were later published online by WikiLeaks.

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If you are interested in inspecting the IoT network traffic in your smart home, Princeton University has developed and released an open source tool called IoT Inspector. The software uses ARP spoofing to analyze what IoT devices are connected to the Internet, how much data is exchanged, and how often information is traded.

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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| August 1, 2019
Comments Off on The Secret to F-Keying at Work

The Secret to F-Keying at Work

The Secret to F Keys at WorkWe use keyboards at home, work and the car. The first keyboard to feature function keys was the 1965 Singer/Friden 2201 Flexowriter Programmatic as a standalone word processing system. Each of the function keys was programmable. The familiar 12 F-Keys were introduced in 1984 with the second generation Model M keyboard for the original IBM PC. It had 12 function keys in 3 blocks of 4 at the top of the keyboard. Over the years, various operating systems and applications have made use of function keys in different ways.

After you learn this list of F-Key secrets, you can improve your fun at work by F-Keying around in your cube as you work on your project.

F1• F1 – Universal – Opens a help or support menu in most programs.
• F1 – Apple macOS X – Reduces the screen’s brightness.
• F1 – Some computers  – Used it to enter BIOS setup during startup.
• F1+WIN – Microsoft Windows –  Opens the Microsoft Windows help and support center.

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F2

• F2 – Microsoft Windows – Renames a highlighted icon, file, or folder.
• F2 – Microsoft Excel – Edits the active cell.
• F2 – Apple macOS X – Increases the screen’s brightness.
• F2 – Some computers  – Used it to enter BIOS setup during startup (Acer, Asus, Dell, eMachines, Gateway, Lenovo, Sony).
• F2+CRTL – Microsoft Word –  Displays the print preview window.
• F2+ALT+CTRL – Microsoft Office – Opens the Documents Library.

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F3

• F3 – Microsoft Windows – Opens desktop search feature.
• F3 – MS-DOS or Windows command line – Repeats the last command entered.
• F3 – Browsers (Firefox, Chrome and IE) – Launches the Find bar.
• F3 – Apple macOS X – Opens Mission Control.
• F3 – Other programs – Will find the next search value after an initial search is performed.
• F3+CTRL – Microsoft Word – will lowercase any highlighted text.
• F3+SHIFT – Microsoft Word – Toggles between capitalizing each word, lower case and upper case for the selected text.
• F3+WIN – Microsoft Outlook – Opens the Advanced find window.

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F4

• F4 – Microsoft Windows 95 to XP – Open find window in Windows Explorer and Internet Explorer.
• F4 – Apple macOS X – Accesses dashboard.
• F4+ALT – Boss key – Microsoft Windows – Immediately closes the current program without saving. It can be used in an emergency to close browser windows you don’t want others to see.
• F4+ALT – Microsoft Windows – When no program is running it launches the Shutdown dialog box.
• F4+CTRL – Microsoft Word – Repeat the last action performed.
• F4+WIN  –  Closes the open window or tab in the active window.

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F5

• F5 – Microsoft Windows – Reload the page, document, or contents list in a folder.
• F5 – Microsoft Office – Open the find, replace, and go to window.
• F5 – Microsoft PowerPoint – Starts a slideshow in PowerPoint.
• F5 – Browsers (Firefox, Chrome, and IE) – Refreshes a web page from the cache.
• F5 – Apple macOS X – Increases the keyboard backlight.
• F5+CTRL – Browsers (Firefox, Chrome, and IE) – Forces a hard refresh of the web page from the server instead of the browser cache.
• F5+CTRL+SHIFT – Microsoft Word – inserts a bookmark in Word doc.

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F6

• F6 – Microsoft Windows desktop – Tabs from desktop files to the taskbar and the system tray icons.
• F6 – Browsers (Firefox, Chrome, and IE) – Move the cursor to the address bar.
• F6 – Apple macOS X – Decreases the keyboard backlight.
• F6 – Reduce laptop volume (on some laptops).
• F6+CTRL+SHIFT – Microsoft Office – Opens to another document.

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F7

• F7 – Microsoft Office Suite – Spell and grammar check a document.
• F7 – Mozilla Firefox – Places a moveable cursor in web pages, allowing you to select text with the keyboard (Caret browsing).
• F7 – Apple macOS X – Can be used to rewind media content.
• F7 – Increase speaker volume (on some laptops).
• F7+SHIFT – Microsoft Office Suite –  Runs a Thesaurus check on the word highlighted.

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F8

• F8 – Microsoft Windows – Enter the Windows Start Menu, to access Windows Safe Mode (if pressed during the boot process).
• F8 – Apple macOS X – Can be used to pause media content.
• F8 – Used by some computers to access the Windows recovery system, but may require a Windows installation CD.

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F9

• F9 – Microsoft Word – Refresh document.
• F9 – Microsoft Outlook – “Send and Receive All folders” email.
• F9 – Reduce laptop screen brightness (on some laptops).
• F9 – Apple macOS X – Can be used to fast forward media content.

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F10

• F10 – Microsoft Windows – Activates the menu bar of an open application.
• F10 – Browsers (Firefox and IE) – Shows the Menu bar.
• F10 – Apple macOS X – Can be used to mute the speaker.
• F10 – Some computers – Increase laptop screen brightness.
• F10 – Some computers – Used it to enter BIOS setup during startup (Compaq, HP).
• F10+SHIFT – Microsoft Windows – The same as right-clicking on a highlighted icon, file, or Internet link pops out the context menu.

—

F11

• F11 – Microsoft Windows Explorer – Enter and exit full-screen mode.
• F11 – Microsoft Excel – Adds a graph of highlighted cells.
• F11 – Browsers (Firefox, Chrome, and IE) – Enter and exit full-screen mode.
• F11 – Apple macOS X – Can be used to decrease the speaker volume.
• F11+CTRL – Microsoft Excel – Adds a new macro to the workbook.
• F11 –  Used to access the hidden recovery partition when pressed during boot (Compaq, HP, Dell, eMachines, Gateway, and Lenovo).
• F11+SHIFT – Microsoft Excel – Adds a new sheet to the workbook.

—

F12

• F12 – Microsoft Office –  Open the Save as window.
• F12 – Browsers (Firefox, Chrome, and IE) – Opens browser debug tool.
• F12 – • F11 – Apple macOS X – Can be used to increase the speaker volume.
• F12 – Used to access the list of bootable devices on a computer when pressed during boot, allowing you to select a different device to boot from (e.g., hard drive, CD or DVD drive, floppy drive, USB drive, and network).
• F12+CTRL – Microsoft Word – opens a document.
• F12+SHIFT – Microsoft Word – Saves the Microsoft Word document (like Ctrl+S).
• F12+CTRL+SHIFT – Microsoft Office – Prints a document (Like Ctrl+P).

—

Newer Apple keyboards have F13, F14, and F15 keys for even more F-Keying around – in place of the Print Screen, Lock key, and the Pause key. They also have F16 – F19 keys above the number pad. Early IBM keyboards had F13 through F24 keys, but these keyboards are no longer used.

To access all the fun of F-Keying you may need to access Fn Lock key or the “Fn key”+“Fn Lock” key to strike F-Keying gold.

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Even Superman uses a keyboardThere’s nothing like F-Keying at  work to make you more efficient. It may feel somewhat strange the first time you try to control your computer from the keyboard since we’re so used to navigating with the mouse. But, you can’t beat the ability to keep your hands on the keyboard.

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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| June 9, 2018
Comments Off on PC’s Meh

PC’s Meh

PC's MehWe are almost midway through 2018 Q2 and the 2018 Q1 PC sales numbers were meh. The good news is that IDC called the PC market flat. That’s good news because they had predicted a 1.5% decrease for the quarter. IDC reports worldwide 60.4 million PC’s sold in the January-to-March period driven mostly by businesses moving to Windows 10. 

PC market experienced a 14th consecutive quarter of declineGartner (IT) is less meh and more blah. Gartner saw slightly more PC’s shipped in 2018 Q1 at 61.7 million units for a 1.4% decline. The PC market experienced a 14th consecutive quarter of decline, dating back to the second quarter of 2012.

Gartner Principal Analyst Ms. Mikako Kitagawa affixed the blame primarily to the Chinese market. “The major contributor to the decline came from China, where unit shipments declined 5.7 percent year over year.” Ms.Kitagawa continued, “This was driven by China’s business market, where some state-owned and large enterprises postponed new purchases or upgrades, awaiting new policies and officials’ reassignments after the session of the National People’s Congress in early March.”

Dell logoThe top three Gartner vendors — Dell, HP, and Lenovo — accounted for 56.9% of global PC shipments in Q1 of 2018. Up slightly compared with 54.5% of shipments in Q1 of 2017. Dell experienced the strongest growth rate among the top six vendors worldwide, as its shipments increased 6.5%.

HP‘s (HPQ) worldwide PC shipments increased 2.8% in the first quarter of 2018 versus the same period last year. In EMEA, HP Inc. recorded double-digit growth in both desktop and mobile PCs. Gartner says HP Inc. was adversely affected by declining demand in the U.S., which generally accounts for one-third of its total shipments.  

Lenovo’s (LNVGY) global PC shipments remained flat in the first quarter of 2018. Lenovo achieved 6 percent growth in EMEA and double-digit shipment growth in Latin America. However, in Asia/Pacific (its largest market), PC shipments declined 4 percent.

After record holiday sales for consumer and gaming products in the fourth quarter of 2017, Dell continued to do well in the first quarter of 2018. With double-digit shipment increases in EMEA, North America, and Latin America, Dell grew in all regions except Asia/Pacific. Desktop and mobile PCs grew in equal measures, showing Dell’s strength in the business segment according to Gartner.

HP logoIn the U.S., PC shipments totaled 11.8 million units in the first quarter of 2018, a 2.9% decrease from the first quarter of 2017 according to Gartner. Dell moved into the No. 1 position in the U.S. based on shipments, as its market share increased to 29.1%. HP Inc. moved into second place as its shipments declined 4.8%, and its market share totaled 28.4%in the first quarter of 2018.

2018 Q1 - Gartner Global PC Shipments

Company2018 Q1 Shipments2018 Q1 Market Share (%)
Dell3,44029.1
HP Inc.3,36328.4
Lenovo1,63213.8
Apple1,49112.6
Acer Group3212.7
Others1,58613.4
Total11,833100.0
Notes: Data includes desk-based PCs, notebook PCs and ultramobile premiums (such as Microsoft Surface), but not Chromebooks or iPads. All data is estimated based on a preliminary study. Final estimates will be subject to change. The statistics are based on shipments selling into channels. Numbers may not add up to totals shown due to rounding.. Thousands of Units.Source: Gartner (April 2018)

PC shipments in EMEA totaled 18.6 million units in the first quarter of 2018, a 1.7% increase. driven by Enterprise shipments increased as many Windows 10 projects and the fast approach of the compliance deadline for the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in Europe.

PC shipments in Asia/Pacific totaled 21.9 million units in the first quarter of 2018, a 3.9% decline from the first quarter of 2017. As previously mentioned, the PC market in China drove the decline in Asia/Pacific.

IDC says the U.S. market saw a promising opening quarter for the year with almost all major vendors reporting increases in notebook sales. Overall, total PC shipments for 2018 Q1 stood at 13.5 million units.

IDC reports that HP Inc. maintained a comfortable lead over all others in the market with its eighth consecutive quarter of overall growth (up 4.3% year on year) and growth in all regions except Latin America.

Lenovo saw a flat quarter in 2018 Q1, the third consecutive quarter in which the company saw year-on-year volume stabilize with flat global growth and a slower pace of decline in the U.S. Dell Inc. posted the strongest year-on-year growth out of all the major companies, growing 6.4% and buoyed by strong performances in nearly every region.

Acer (TPE:2353) held onto fourth place. Its ongoing expansion into gaming and continued investments in Chromebooks have paid dividends for the company but also caused some tough going in other areas. Apple (AAPL) finished the quarter in fifth place with a year-on-year decline in shipments of 4.8%.

2018 Q1 - IDC Global PC Shipments

Company2018 Q1 Shipments2018 Q1 Market Share (%)
HP Inc.13,67622.6
Lenovo12,30520.4
Dell Inc.10,19016.9
Acer Group4,0856.8
Apple4,0006.6
Others16,12826.7
Total60,383100.0
Preliminary results. Shipments are in thousands of units. Source: IDC Quarterly Personal Computing Device Tracker, April 11, 2018

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PC’s used to be a leading indicator of the health of the tech sector. That is not the case anymore. Economic stress has lengthened the life span of PCs from 3 years to nearly 5 years in many firms and even longer in the home market. Increased smartphones capability and cloud-based applications and storage have taken another bite out of the PC market.

But looking into the tea leaves, many think PCs are on the rebound. Driving the PC market is a demand for premium notebooks in the mainstream and commercial markets. Gaming systems are also part of the equation. IDC expects overall smartphone shipments to decline by 0.2% in 2018 after falling 0.3% last year, the thought is that those dollars would be used to upgrade their PCs.

Mmmm – we’ll see. I say not likely. Can you say “new normal?”

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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| December 6, 2017
Comments Off on OMG Texting b 25 !

OMG Texting b 25 !

OMG Texting b 25 !This week marks the 25th birthday of text messages. Texting is more properly known as SMS. On Dec. 3, 1992, 22-year-old Sema Group software architect Neil Papworth typed the first SMS (Short Message Service) message, “Merry Christmas” on a computer and sent it over a  GSM network in the UK, to an Orbitel 901 handset owned by then-Vodafone director Richard Jarvis.

SMS serviceIn 1993, a year after the first text message was sent, Nokia (NOK) set up the first commercial SMS service in Finland. Nokia was the first handset manufacturer whose total GSM phone line supported users sending SMS text messages. In 1997, Nokia became the first manufacturer to produce a mobile phone with a full keyboard: the Nokia 9000i Communicator.

Texting adoption

SMS adoption was slow at first, with only 0.4 text messages sent per month in 1995. The fact that UK users could only send SMS messages to those on the same network was a big problem until the restriction was lifted in 1999.  However, as smartphone technology developed and text messages became easier to use, SMS popularity ballooned. As mobile phones became more popular, texting skyrocketed. By 2007, the Brits were sending 66 billion SMS messages a year and in 2012, they sent 151 billion texts.

Nokia 9000i CommunicatorIn the U.S. SMS was slower to catch on, mainly because mobile operators charged more for texts and less for voice calls, and because of the popularity and availability of PC-to-PC instant messaging or IM. However, in the United States, 45 billion text messages were sent per month in 2007, a figure that became 167 billion per month in 2011. In June 2017, 781 billion text messages were being sent in the United States per month according to the experts.

U.S. Texts Sent

MonthNumber of Text Messages Sent Each MonthIncreased Number of Text Messages Sent YoY% Increased Number of Text Messages Sent YoY
June 2017
781.000,000,000147,000,000,000431.3%
June 2016634,000,000,00073,000,000,000768.5%
June 2014561,000,000,00063,000,000,000790.5%
June 2013498,000,000,00075,000,000,000564.0%
June 2012423,000,000,00056,000,000,000655.4%
June 2011367,000,000,000126,000,000,000205.8%
June 2010247,000,000,00086,000,000,000187.2%
June 2009161,000,000,00086,000,000,00087.2%
June 200878,000,000,00030,000,000,000150.0%
June 200745,000,000,00032,500,000,00038.5%
June 200612,500,000,0005,250,000,000138.1%
June 2005
7,250,000,0004,390,000,00065.1%
June 20042,860,000,0001,660,000,00072.3%
June 20031,200,000,0002270,000,000344.4%
June 200133,000,00021,000,00057.1%
June 200012,000,000
Text Message Statistics – United States from Statistic Brain (www.statisticbrain.com)
With 25 years under its belt, many people wonder if the end of the line is near for SMS. This is because apps such as Apple‘s (AAPL) iMessage, Google‘s (GOOG) Hangouts, Facebook‘s (FB) Messenger, WhatsApp, and SnapChat have become very popular.

Closed systems

Chat applicationThese new chat applications also marked a more fundamental shift away from an open standard that anyone could use (even if your operator charged you) to closed messaging systems controlled by technology giants. Text messages, however, might not be going away soon. SMS is a very practical and easy-to-use communication method, especially for areas and countries that do not have reliable internet connections.

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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| October 9, 2017
Comments Off on Is Toshiba Screwed?

Is Toshiba Screwed?

Is Toshiba Screwed?The tortuous auction of  the covted Toshiba NAND chip fab has finally wrapped. You would think that after over nine months of bidding and 2 trillion yen ($17.7 billion) the victors would like to gloat. A win of that size would be celebrated, but nooo….

The winning partners lead by venture capitalist Bain Capital and Apple can’t even agree on when to hold a presser to announce their purchase. The consortium had planned a presser for 09-28-2017, which was abruptly canceled just minutes before it was due to begin according to reports. Reuters reports that “…the consortium could not form a consensus on whether to brief media.”

PangeaOne wrinkle may be that Apple (AAPL) has demanded new terms on its chip supply for the new iPhones. In addition to Apple, Bain’s consortium “Pangea” includes Japan’s Hoya Corporation, South Korea’s SK Hynix, and U.S. investors Kingston Technology, Seagate Technology (STX), and Dell Technologies Capital.- all of which want access to NAND technology.

Under the deal, Toshiba will have 40.2 percent of voting rights in the chip unit and Hoya will own 9.9 percent. The four U.S. tech firms will not have voting rights.

Besides internal strife, the sale also faces legal challenges from Western Digital (WDC), Toshiba’s chip venture partner, and rejected suitor, which is seeking an injunction to block any deal that does not have its consent.

Western Digital logoWestern Digital, one of the world’s leading makers of hard disk drives, paid some $16 billion last year to acquire SanDisk, Toshiba’s chip joint venture partner since 2000. It sees chips as a key pillar of growth and is desperate to keep the business out of the hands of rival chipmakers.

Bain has also announced that it plans to take Pangea public by 2020.

 

Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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