Researchers use the human body to transfer wireless secure passwords

A Princeton report back in January revealed that some smart home devices unwittingly broadcast location information while others didn't encrypt their data streams at all. Sending a password or secret code over airborne radio waves like WiFi or Bluetooth means anyone can eavesdrop, making those transmissions vulnerable to hackers who can attempt to break the encrypted code. To get around the uncertainty of pushing information over the air, some scientists have posited using the body as a conduit. Instead of using its magnetic field, as previous researchers have, engineers from the University of Washington have pioneered a way to send wireless signals from a touchpad or screen held in one hand to a smart device in physical contact with the other.

As described in their research paper, the method operates simply, like conducting static electricity. Data is still wireless but confined to the human body, riding the low-frequency electromagnetic transmissions generated by a device's fingerprint sensor or touchpad, traveling through the body to whatever smart device the user touches. While this has obvious applications for smart home or car door locks, it could also send information securely to wearables or even coordinate networks of body sensors.

Their process employs a sequence of finger scans to encode and transmit data. Performing a finger scan correlates to a 1-bit of digital data and not performing the scan correlates to a 0-bit.

The technology could also be useful for secure key transmissions to medical devices such as glucose monitors or insulin pumps, which seek to confirm someone’s identity before sending or sharing data.

While the scientists were able to repurpose touch interfaces to send data at bit rates of 50 bits per second on laptop touchpads and 25 bits per second with fingerprint sensors, that's just fast enough to send a simple password or numerical code from body to receiver in a few seconds. They could achieve much higher speeds, and thus transmit more complex data, if the input manufacturers gave them more access to their software. 

This represents only a first step, the researchers say. Data can be transmitted through the body even faster if fingerprint sensor manufacturers provide more access to their software.

The research was funded by the Intel Science and Technology Center for Pervasive Computing, a Google faculty award and the National Science Foundation.

For more information, contact the research team at onbody@cs.washington.edu.


source: University of Washington

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Nokia D1C Spotted on Geekbench browser powered by Android Nougat with 3GB RAM

An unannounced Nokia smartphone running Android 7.0 Nougat dubbed Nokia D1C has made multiple appearances on the Geekbench browser.

According to the benchmark site, Nokia D1C uses Snapdragon 430 chip featuring an octa-core processor with each core running at clock speeds up to 1.4GHz. The Snapdragon processor is paired with 3GB RAM.

The phone ran through Geekbench several times with scores ranging from 656 to 667 in single-core, whereas scores for multi-core performance ranged from 3,120 to 3,229.

Qualcomm's mid-tier Snapdragon 430 processor featuring high-end performance was launched in September last year with its commercial availability slated for 2016 second quarter. Xiaomi's Redmi 3S, which is a variant of Redmi 3, launched in June uses the Snapdragon 430. The processor is paired with Adreno 505 graphics unit.

Reports about Nokia's Android smartphone first emerged a few months ago, stating the company was planning to re-enter the global smartphone market with two new smartphones running the Android Nougat operating system. The handsets are expected towards the end of 2016 or might be pushed to a later date sometime in the first quarter of next year, depending on testing and development.

Two more Nokia mid-range phones codenamed Nokia 5320 and RM-1490 were spotted at Geekbench. These two models were running the slightly older version of Android 4.4 KitKat.

source: Geekbench browser  

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Save your Money and Data on iPhone

Attention all my lovely friends who have iPhones and have done the new awesome latest iOS update. Important news for you!! Keep reading.....
Remember in the terms and conditions of the latest update. Apple put a new feature in our phones with this update which we agreed to that we weren't even aware of. Go into your settings...Click on cellular data ..scroll all the way to the bottom and you'll see "Wifi Assist". Turn it off!! . It "assists" your wifi speed by using your data simultaneously when your wifi has a weak connection. The point of having wifi on is to obviously NOT use your data. This is just their sneaky way to over charge people! Check your phone ASAP and share this post with everyone you know so they don't get taken advantage of either!!!!

On Android M there is a option called Turbo Download which combine your mobile data and wifi but this is off by default.

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How Camera Evolve

Digital cameras today tend to fall under one of two categories: SLR or mirrorless.

To find out, let s take a quick trip through the history of the medium.

It turns out that many of the changes to how cameras work have been attempts to solve a simple problem: How do you show what s in front of the lens to both the user and whatever s recording that image?

From glass plates to mirrors
Originally, photographs weren t on film; instead, you d coat a metal or glass plate with a photosensitive liquid.

To speed up the process, a second lens was added near the first, through which framing and focus could be adjusted without fiddling with the primary one

Mirrors were added around the turn of the century (the last one, to be clear), allowing for two new camera types. One was a “twin-lens” setup where the mirror bounced the image from the extra lens upwards onto a small translucent screen; a second, similar lens just below opened onto the shutter and the film itself, and focusing the first would also focus the second.

In the other design, the mirror went directly between the lens and the film, reflecting the image through a prism that, in turn, refracted it into your eye. But when you hit the shutter button, the mirror flipped up out of the way and the shutter opened on the film. This was known as the single lens reflex, or SLR. The design was not only more compact, but since the user looked through the primary lens, you could switch that lens out and still see exactly what the film would see.

It was the most popular type of camera for decades, even until film was replaced by a digital sensor (whence the D in DSLR). But then the mirrorless camera was born.

From mirrors to LCDs

In a way, mirrorless cameras are very much like the familiar point-and-shoot cameras, in which the lens sits directly in front of the shutter and film or sensor. This solves the problem of how to get the view from the lens to both the user’s eye and the image capture mechanism: the image hits the sensor, which then relays that image to the LCD facing the user.

The main way to frame a shot on point-and-shoots is via the display on the back, but because of poor quality screens, lenses and sensors (everything, really), the cameras were never taken seriously. For serious photography an SLR was still mandatory. However, as sensor and image processing technology matured and shrank, it became possible for these cheaper cameras to do the job which had traditionally been filled by larger, more sophisticated pieces of equipment.

So while the early digital point-and-shoots we had in the late 90s and early 2000s were mirrorless after a fashion, the term is now usually used to refer to cameras with interchangeable lenses, manual controls, and often an electronic viewfinder — a small eyepiece in which a tiny display is put, so the user can frame and shoot just like in the old days. In fact, an early term for mirrorless cameras was EVIL – “electronic viewfinder interchangeable lens.” But some didn’t have EVFs, some didn’t really have interchangeable lenses, and so on. What they all had in common was — you guessed it — no mirror.

The primary advantage of mirrorless camera systems is their compact size. Because they require few or no moving parts inside (some retain a mechanical shutter, for instance), they can be thinner and lighter, or add other functions, like in-camera image stabilization. There’s also a motivation to use high-quality displays and intuitive touch controls, since they will be relied upon more than in SLRs.

Smaller cameras, however, tend to have smaller image sensors — which can, but doesn’t necessarily, adversely affect image quality. This differs from camera to camera and often depends more on the quality of the lens.

Another drawback is that electronic viewfinders and LCDs aren’t necessarily preferable to an optical viewfinder. After all, when you are seeing the light as it comes through the lens itself, there is no lag or color bias. On the other hand, since you’re getting info direct from the sensor, what you see is what you get, minimizing guesswork in exposure and focus.

Lastly, smaller bodies also mean less room for the switches, dials, and other old-school physical controls prized by many photographers. It’s largely a matter of taste, but it’s also hard to deny the utility of controls you can handle without looking at them.

Mirrorless cameras have helped invigorate a flagging photography market long long divided into “cheap” and “serious.” Compact, powerful, and intuitive, the mirrorless camera is in many ways the best of both worlds.

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Facebook launches Messenger Lite designed for older Android devices with limited storage

Facebook announcing today a new standalone version of its Messenger app, Messenger Lite, specifically designed for older Android devices with limited storage and for slower, data-constrained Internet connections.

Idea being that not everyone in the world has the premium hardware and superfast data connectivity that its full-fat messaging product assumes.

“With Messenger Lite, people are able to quickly and easily send text, photos and links to anyone using Messenger or Messenger Lite,” writes Facebook introducing the new app.

Or of course they could just use SMS.

The move follows Facebook launching a stripped down version of its main Android app for users in emerging markets last year. That app, called Facebook Lite, eschews data-intensive content like video and location-powered features like Nearby Friends to offer a more basic feature set and low res imagery in an app that’s less than 1MB in size.

Earlier this year Facebook revealed usage of this no-frills Facebook app had ballooned to 100 million monthly actives just nine months after launch, confirming it as it’s fastest growing app at that point — a growth trick it’s clearly hoping to repeat now with Messenger Lite.

Albeit Messenger Lite is not so modest in size: Facebook says the new stripped down Messenger is around 10MB. Although Android hardware continues to improve, even at the affordability focused end of the pipe.

In terms of features, Messenger Lite supports what Facebook dubs “core experiences” — namely: “messaging, sending and receiving photos and links, and receiving stickers”. Yes, stickers aren’t a nice-to-have in the hyper competitive world of mobile messaging.

Facebook says Messenger Lite for Android is starting to roll out, initially to Kenya, Tunisia, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Venezuela — with other countries slated to be added in the “coming months”.


source: newsroom.fb.com

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Exploit vendor Zerodium Offers $1.5 Million Bounty For iOS Zero-Day Exploits

Exploit vendor Zerodium has tripled its bug bounty for an Apple's iOS 10 zero-day exploit, offering a maximum payout of $1,500,000.00 Reward.

That's more than seven times what Apple is offering (up to $200,000) for iOS zero-days via its private, invite-only bug bounty program.

Zerodium, a startup by the infamous French-based company Vupen that buys and sells zero-day exploits to government agencies around the world, previously offered US$500,000 for remote iOS 9 jailbreaks, which was temporarily increased to $1 Million for a competition help by the company last year.

The company paid out $1 million contest reward for the first three iOS 9 zero-days in November to an unnamed hacker group, then lowered the price again to $500,000.

With the recent release of iOS 10, Zerodium has agreed to pay $1.5 Million to anyone who can pull off a remote jailbreak of the Apple's latest mobile operating system, allowing a full third-party control over the device.

The company has also doubled its bug bounty for Android 7.x (Nougat) remote jailbreaks to $200,000 as well as boosted rewards for exploits in other software, including Adobe Flash, Microsoft Internet Explorer and Edge, Windows Reader, Microsoft Word and Excel, Safari, and OpenSSL or PHP.



The hike in the price is in line with demand and the tougher security of the latest iOS and Android operating systems, and to attract more researchers, hackers and bug hunters to seek complex exploit chains in iOS 10.

To claim the prize money, Zerodium is asking for a previously unknown security vulnerabilities that must allow an attacker to compromise a non-jailbroken iOS device remotely.

Zerodium CEO Chaouki Bekrar notes on Twitter that the company is prepared to buy multiple iOS zero-day hacks at that price, saying "We can afford to buy multiple iOS exploit chains for $1.5M each."

Hackers will get the payout within a week of submitting the zero-day vulnerabilities along with a valid working proof-of-concept. 

ZERODIUM evaluates and verifies all submitted research within one week or less. Payments are made by wire transfer within one week or less. For more information,  visit FAQ


source: zerodium

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Solar Roadways tiles get their first public test in an Idaho town

After years of work (and some last-minute delays), Solar Roadways has installed its first public energy tiles in Sandpoint, Idaho as part of a test. On top of producing a light show, the panels will generate power for the fountain and restrooms in a public square. They have heating elements, too, so they should keep running even in the heart of winter. And if you're not sure how well they'll work in practice, you can check on them yourself -- Sandpoint has a live webcam pointed at the tiles.

World’s first ever public installation of Solar Roadways!

• Solar Roadways Installation
• 150 square feet
• 30 Solar Roadways SR3 panels
• Walkable/bike-able surface
• Heating technology built into the panels creates a virtually maintenance-free surface
• Intended to be a dynamic installation that will be updated with the latest product developments and panels
• Future interactive capability to allow site visitors to change the LED programming  

It's a modest dry run with just 30 panels, and it'll be a long while before you see them on the streets they were designed for. However, it shows that they're more than just theoretical exercises. And if a small number of tiles can power a town square by themselves, it's easy to imagine full-fledged solar roads shouldering a significant amount of the energy demand for whole cities.

source: Sandpoint, Solar Roadways 

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Watch Stranger Things as 8-bit cinema

What better way to celebrate Stranger Things, a show that's heavily-influenced by classic films from the early-'80s, is there than to depict it in 8-Bit format, the third generation of gaming started in 1983?

The last installment of CineFix's "8 Bit Cinema" (directed by David Dutton) reimagines the popular Netflix series as a classic video game. Each level depicts a major scene from the show, including Will Byers encountering and running away from the Demogorgon; Dustin, Mike, and Lucas discovering Eleven; Mike feeding and clothing the psychokinetic girl; Barb's blood-dropping moment at Steve's swimming pool; and the Eleven-Demogorgon showdown in the school classroom.

A love letter to the supernatural classics of the 80's, Stranger Things is the story of a young boy who vanishes into thin air. As friends, family and local police search for answers, they are drawn into an extraordinary mystery involving top-secret government experiments, terrifying supernatural forces and one very strange little girl.

Stranger Things stars Winona Ryder, David Harbour, Finn Wolfhard, Millie Brown, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Noah Schnapp, Natalia Dyer, Cara Buono, Charlie Heaton, and Matthew Modine.

Matt Duffer and Ross Duffer (Wayward Pines, Hidden) serve as writer, directors and co-showrunners of the series, and are executive producers along with Shawn Levy and Dan Cohen via their 21 Laps entertainment banner (The Spectacular Now, Night At The Museum, Real Steel, Date Night). Shawn Levy also serves as director.

Season 2 of Netflix's original series Stranger Things will debut in 2017 and consist of 9 episodes.

Watch Here :

8-bit Cinema "gamifies" your favorite Hollywood Blockbusters into 80's arcade and NES inspired action! 

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IEEE 802.3bz: New Ethernet Standard Brings 5X the speed without disruptive cable changes

The IEEE has released a standard for the copper wire cables, 802.3bz. The new standard 2.5GBASE-T and 5GBASE-T Ethernet. The NBASE-T Alliance released a specification in November 2014 that’s compatible with the 802.3bz standard.

The Ethernet Alliance wrote that the IEEE 802.3bz Standard for Ethernet Amendment sets Media Access Control Parameters, Physical Layers and Management Parameters for 2.5G and 5Gbps Operation lets access layer bandwidth evolve incrementally beyond 1Gbps, it will help address emerging needs in a variety of settings and applications, including enterprise, wireless networks.

The wireless component may be the most significant implication of the standard as 2.5G and 5G Ethernet will allow connectivity to 802.11ac Wave 2 Access Points, considered by many to be the real driving force behind bringing up the speed of traditional NBase-T products.

Up until now, our wired networks have been confined to 1Gbps speed cap as per the widely implemented 1000BASE-T (IEEE 802.3ab). Now, the theoretical speeds are going to make a significant leap.

The 802.3bz standard has boosted the speeds to 2.5Gbps and 5Gbps up to 100m length on the same Cat5e and Cat6 copper wires currently used. The perks are only in case of the wires. Large organizations having thousands of meters of copper cabling inside their offices could take a breath of relief because they won’t have to reinstall them. Although, device hardware will have to be upgraded to support the new IEEE 802.3bz standard.

“Going beyond 1 Gb/s with existing Cat5e and Cat6 cables was little more than a talking point two years ago. But now with NBASE-T, we have the ability to extend the life of an enormous asset —your wired network. The Cat5e and Cat6 installed in just the last 15 years now exceeds an estimated 70 billion meters of cabling, which is more than 10 trips to Pluto,” said Sachin Gupta who is the VP of Product Management at IEEE.

We have already achieved 10Gbps theoretical bandwidth but its high equipment cost is a downside and contributes to its low adoption rate. The new 802.3bz standard might come up with cost effective network products which can benefit both home and office users.

It won’t improve the speed of your internet as it depends on the speed provided by your ISP (PLDT, Globe, Smart) which currently maxes out at 1Gbps. Maybe in future ISPs offer higher speeds. You will see the effect during multiplayer gaming session and file sharing over your home network. The 802.3bz standard has been approved recently but many compatible products are already available in the market.

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USB group posted a standard new audio spec for USB-C's could rid of your headphone jack

It look like Apple has a good move for its iPhone 7 removing headphone jack- It's an instructive lesson to any company with less than a billion users of its products or services: no matter how good you may already be, there's always the potential to do better, and if you're not willing to change and do the scary new thing, someone else will. Adapt or die. So let’s take a look at the good, the bad and the future of what USB Type-C audio is going to mean for smartphone and music enthusiasts.
 
The USB Implementers Forum has published its long-expected Audio Device Class 3.0 specification, giving device makers the standard they need to pipe sound through USB-C ports on everything from phones to PCs. And the organization isn't shy about its goals, either -- this is mainly about letting companies removing the ages-old 3.5mm port, according to the Forum. In theory, that means slimmer devices, better water resistance and opening the "door to innovation" through room for other features.

We're not sure everyone will buy that last argument, but there are some advantages to the spec that are worthwhile even if the headphone jack is here to stay. Aside from offering better digital audio support (such as headphones with custom audio processing), the USB-C sound spec improves on earlier USB approaches with power-saving measures and keyword detection. In other words: a company could take advantage of USB audio without hurting your battery life as much as before, and it should be easier to implement voice recognition.

This doesn't mean that every company will embrace 3.5mm-free hardware with the same enthusiasm as Apple or Motorola. After all, Samsung used its Galaxy Note 7 introduction to make a not-so-subtle dig at Apple's then-rumored decision to drop the headphone jack on the iPhone 7. However, the USB-C spec may nudge vendors who were thinking about ditching the conventional audio socket and were just waiting for official support to make their move.

Right now, it’s unclear whether or not USB will fully be able to replace the 3.5mm jack in the smartphone market. It’s also unclear as to whether or not this is just a phase, or if the two will remain active side by side going forward. Companies like Intel are still looking to develop a USB Type-C audio standard to ensure a similar feature set and compatibility across these type of headphones.
 
I know that it wasn’t that long ago that Samsung, Nokia, and other early smartphone manufacturers all had their own proprietary headphone connectors. However, customers may not be so willing to give up the recently won convenience of the 3.5mm jack.

The alternative to both the 3.5mm and USB audio connections is to make the move over to wireless. Bluetooth headphones are reasonably priced these days and sidestep some of the compatibility issues that will likely face USB Type-C headphones. A further drive towards USB Type-C headphones might makes these products more popular. However, the lossy compression formats used to transmit wireless Bluetooth audio won’t appeal the pickiest audiophiles out there.

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After 47 years United States set to Hand Over Control of the Internet to ICANN Today

Washington (AFP) - The US government on Saturday ended its formal oversight role over the internet, handing over management of the online address system to a global non-profit entity.

Founded in 1998, non-profit organization ICANN (The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) oversees the Internet's "address book" (or root zone) — the process of assigning domain names and the underlying IP addresses to keep the Internet running smoothly.

But according to the contract, ICANN and its IANA department (the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority) was set to work under the supervision of National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce.

That contract is ending today, and the US Commerce Department is scheduled to hand over its role to ICANN, which will now become an autonomous body, accountable to an international multi-stakeholder community which includes members from the technical community, businesses, telecommunications experts, civil society and governments.

The Internet itself was designed to function without a central authority and has become a critical part of everyone's life, as well as for the global economic infrastructures.


The US Commerce Department announced that its contract had expired with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, which manages the internet's so-called "root zone."

That leaves ICANN as a self-regulating organization that will be operated by the internet's "stakeholders" -- engineers, academics, businesses, non-government and government groups.

The move is part of a decades-old plan by the US to "privatize" the internet, and backers have said it would help maintain its integrity around the world.

US and ICANN officials have said the contract had given Washington a symbolic role as overseer or the internet's "root zone" where new online domains and addresses are created.

But critics, including some US lawmakers, argued that this was a "giveaway" by Washington that could allow authoritarian regimes to seize control.

A last-ditch effort by critics to block the plan -- a lawsuit filed by four US states -- failed when a Texas federal judge refused to issue an injunction to stop the transition.

Lawrence Strickling, who heads the Commerce Department unit which has managed these functions, issued a brief statement early Saturday confirming the transition of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA).

"As of October 1, 2016, the IANA functions contract has expired," he said.

Stephen Crocker, ICANN's board chairman and one of the engineers who developed the early internet protocols, welcomed the end of the contract.

"This transition was envisioned 18 years ago, yet it was the tireless work of the global Internet community, which drafted the final proposal, that made this a reality," he said in a statement.

"This community validated the multi-stakeholder model of Internet governance. It has shown that a governance model defined by the inclusion of all voices, including business, academics, technical experts, civil society, governments and many others is the best way to assure that the Internet of tomorrow remains as free, open and accessible as the Internet of today."

The Internet Society, a group formed by internet founders aimed at keeping the system open, said the transition was a positive step.

"The IANA transition is a powerful illustration of the multi-stakeholder model and an affirmation of the principle that the best approach to address challenges is through bottom-up, transparent, and consensus-driven processes," the group said in a statement.


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For the people who asked, ICANN is the Internet Corporation for Names and Numbers.

They're the entity that manages all domain names and the IP address (url) associated with them... Think of it as a corporation that gives out and manages phone numbers and makes sure nobody shares the same phone number, except in this case it's for ip and internet addresses for the whole internet. (Each internet address has an signed IP address)

And it make people remember a address in word than numbers  sample blogmytuts.net than 216.239.32.21, Yes People can remember a website address in word than number but computers are good in number..

Try Whois http://whois.uanic.name/eng/blogmytuts.net/

ICANN is the internet equivalent of a building code agency.

Here's the idea. Computers online have addresses. These addresses are numbers. They used to look like "38.166.3.98" but now they tend to look like "ab24:ccs45:hs783:fhua7" these addresses are hard for humans to remember. So a clever engineer figured out an idea. Let server operators assign human readable names to their addresses. Such as facebook.com or usa.gov. And created a system that maintains a great big table of all addresses and their associated names.

So "facebook.com" translates to "182.284.367.7" , because humans are good at reading words but computers work better with numbers. All ICANN does is write that standard. Sort of like a building code for the internet.

The servers that do this work are spread out, owned by ISP companies, Universities, businesses, and governments. ICANN just codifies the standards so they're the same worldwide. They couldn't do anything untoward even if they wanted to. 

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