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New UK PM Boris Johnson (still) thinks there’s a tech solution for the Irish border

Jul23
by on July 23, 2019 at 3:25 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, UK


Perhaps we should feel sorry for Boris Johnson. He just attained a long-held ambition of his, ascending to the office of Prime Minister following a tight competition with his Conservative rivals. And now he has to figure out Brexit, with a deadline of October 31. Thank you all for the incredible honour you have done me. The time for campaigning is over and the time for work begins to unite our country and party, deliver Brexit and defeat Corbyn. I will work flat out to repay your confidence — Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) July 23, 2019 Brexit was the poison pill…

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‘YouTubers’ author Chris Stokel-Walker on how to fix the world’s biggest video platform

Jul23
by on July 23, 2019 at 3:21 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, Google, Insights


Over the past couple of years, YouTube’s been in hot water over a myriad of issues that would give any CEO sleepless nights. The list of offenses includes failing to police problematic videos appearing on its platform, toxic comments that have pushed it to disable the feature for some content, and troubling recommendations delivered to unwitting users, including children. Naturally, the company has been lambasted over these shortcomings – rightly so, many people would argue. I’ve been on that side of the debate too, having written about the platform’s mistakes over the past few years. That said, I began to wonder if…

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Vicious malware threatens to turn search engine into crypto-mining zombie botnet

Jul23
by on July 23, 2019 at 2:54 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, blockchain, cryptocurrency, Hard Fork


Enterprise search engine Elasticsearch is under threat of being turned into a sophisticated cryptocurrency mining botnet to be used in distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. Cybersecurity firm Trend Micro describes a new malware strain that launches multi-stage attacks on publicly accessible databases and servers that run old versions of Elasticsearch software. “[…] Many of the malicious traffic or attacks that we see targeting Elasticsearch are relatively straightforward, and more often than not, profit-driven,” wrote Trend Micro. “An attacker looks for unsecure or misconfigured servers or exploit old vulnerabilities, then drop the final payloads that typically consist of cryptocurrency-mining malware or even ransomware,” added…

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Fujifilm’s new surveillance camera can read license plates from 1km away

Jul23
by on July 23, 2019 at 1:38 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, Plugged


Fujifilm has announced a new long-range surveillance camera that can spot vehicles’ licence plates from a kilometer away. To accomplish this, the so-called Fujifilm SX800 packs a built-in lens capable of 40x optical zoom, boosting the focal length from 20mm to 800mm. It also supports a 1.25x digital zoom for a maximum focal length of 1,000mm. To put this in simpler terms, the Japanese camera-maker says this equals about a kilometer in distance. And, indeed, it has included samples of the SX800’s zoom-in chops. Here’s what this looks like: Pretty impressive, right? Now imagine if someone manages to put this…

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How the hell does your phone’s in-screen fingerprint scanner work?

Jul23
by on July 23, 2019 at 1:33 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, Plugged


Welcome to TNW Basics, a collection of tips, guides, and advice on how to easily get the most out of your gadgets, apps, and other stuff. If you’ve used any modern Android devices, you’ll have come across the current unlocking trend: the in-screen fingerprint scanner. Over the past decade of smartphones, one of the clearest usability evolutions has been how we unlock our devices. We’ve moved from typing in passcodes, to fingerprint scanners, to facial recognition, but the method most seen at the moment is the aforementioned in-screen fingerprint scanner. For those not in the know, this — as the name suggests —…

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