Category: Current and Future Trends

Articles

Wirelessly transferring data between two devices in the same space – now for Android

Google Officially Launches Nearby Sharing | DroidLife

Android’s ‘Nearby Share’ file sharing feature is finally launching | The Verge

From the horse’s mouth

Google

Instantly share files with people around you with Nearby Share (Blog Post)

Support Page

Video – Tap or click to play on YouTube

My Comments

Google has been doing work on its own across-the-room data-transfer technology, now known as Nearby Share. It is the Android platform’s answer to Apple’s AirDrop feature that many iOS users are using to “beam” photos to other users.

There have been previous attempts on the Android platform to offer this feature like Bluetooth Object Push Profile and NFC-based technologies like Android Beam.

But this will work in a true-wireless approach with support for Bluetooth, WebRTC and peer-to-peer Wi-Fi technologies. That means it isn’t dependent on a functioning Internet connection for it to run.

Your Android phone or tablet will need to have Android 6.0 or newer and the functionality will be delivered as part of the Google Play Services update. This means that it is updated independently of the operating system codebase, thus answering the problem associated with a lot of Android devices where manufacturers and carriers won’t support the device two years after it is launched.

This feature will have privacy-focused options like anonymous transfer and the ability for users to limit their discovery to only their contacts or only to selected contacts. As well, recipients don’t see the actual material about to be transferred so they don’t get shocked by someone pushing out unwanted material.

A good approach to handling AirDrop, Google Nearby Share and similar across-the-room data-transfer setups in a safe manner is to keep your devices undiscoverable to others. Then, when you have confirmed face-to-face that you are intending to use this function, then you make your device discoverable in order to receive the content.

It is available for ChromeOS but will be arriving as part of other platform primarily through software that Google develops for that platform. But there needs to be further work on having true federation for these across-the-room data-transfer protocols in a manner that doesn’t necessitate the installation of extra application software.

For Android users, Google Nearby Share is a step in the right direction to having across-the-room data transfer happening on that platform.

Article – German Language / Deutsche Sprache

AVM to launch the Wi-Fi 6 version of the FritzBox 7530 modem router in Germany as the FritzBox 7530 AX – an affordable Wi-Fi 6 option

AVM Fritz!Box 7530 AX kann vorbestellt werden | Caschy’s Blog

Das ist die neue AVM Fritz!Box 7530 AX | Caschy’s Blog

My Comments

This year is being the year where some home-network hardware manufacturers are offering Wi-Fi routers equipped with Wi-Fi 6 to the mainstream user segment. This includes some of these devices being offered either at an affordable price or as carrier-supplied equipment when you sign up to Internet service. As well some of the devices being offered are infact modem routers that have an integrated modem for the broadband service.

Now AVM has joined the party by offering the FritzBox 7530 AX home Internet gateway router initially to the German market. This unit, which will retail there from 1 September for approximately EUR€169 is based on the FritzBox 7530 modem-router family.

But its Wi-Fi access point is compliant to Wi-Fi 6 (IEEE 802.11ax) wireless-networking standards and uses a 2-stream approach for each waveband. This means it will offer 1200Mb/s data transfer speed on the 5GHz waveband and 600Mb/s on the legacy 2.4GHz waveband. It has a VDSL modem along with the ability to have one of the four Gigabit Ethernet LAN ports as a WAN (Internet service) port for fibre-optic connectivity.

There is VoIP capability with a built-in analogue telephony adaptor for legacy handsets along with a DECT base station for DECT cordless handsets. It supports DECT-ULE-based home automation with a primary intention to work with AVM’s DECT-ULE home-automation devices, namely their smart plugs and thermostatic radiator valves.

Of course, there will be the secure reliable home-network expectations that AVM is know for. This includes keeping these devices automatically updated with the latest firmware, something that was considered out of the ordinary for this class of device.

What is being highlighted is the idea of more companies providing Wi-Fi 6 as part of a commodity-priced home-network router, which will lead to this wireless-network technology becoming more ubiquitous.

Lenovo Flex 5G / Yoga 5G convertible notebook which runs Windows on Qualcomm ARM silicon – the first laptop computer to have 5G mobile broadband on board

Increasingly, regular computers are moving towards the idea of having processor power based around either classic Intel (i86/i64) or ARM RISC microarchitectures. This is being driven by the idea of portable computers heading towards the latter microarchitecture as a power-efficiency measure with this concept driven by its success with smartphones and tablets.

It is undertaking a different approach to designing silicon, especially RISC-based silicon, where different entities are involved in design and manufacturing. Previously, Motorola was taking the same approach as Intel and other silicon vendors to designing and manufacturing their desktop-computing CPUs and graphics infrastructure. Now ARM have taken the approach of designing the microarchitecture themselves and other entities like Samsung and Qualcomm designing and fabricating the exact silicon for their devices.

Apple to move the Macintosh platform to their own ARM RISC silicon

A key driver of this is Microsoft with their Always Connected PC initiative which uses Qualcomm ARM silicon similar to what is used in a smartphone or tablet. This is to have the computer able to work on basic productivity tasks for a whole day without needing to be on AC power. Then Apple intended to pull away from Intel and use their own ARM-based silicon for their Macintosh regular computers, a symptom of them going back to the platform’s RISC roots but not in a monolithic manner.

As well, the Linux community have established Linux-based operating systems on ARM microarchitectore. This has led to Google running Android on ARM-based mobile and set-top devices and offering a Chromebook that uses ARM silicon; along with Apple implementing it in their operating systems. Not to mention the many NAS devices and other home-network hardware that implement ARM silicon.

Initially the RISC-based computing approach was about more sophisticated use cases like multimedia or “workstation-class” computing compared to basic word-processing and allied computing tasks. Think of the early Apple Macintosh computers, the Commodore Amiga with its many “demos” and games, or the RISC/UNIX workstations like the Sun SPARCStation that existed in the late 80s and early 90s. Now it is about power and thermal efficiency for a wide range of computing tasks, especially where portable or low-profile devices are concerned.

Software development

Already mobile and set-top devices use ARM silicon

I will see an expectation for computer operating systems and application software to be written and compiled for both classic Intel i86 and ARM RISC microarchitectures.  This will require software development tools to support compiling and debugging on both platforms and, perhaps, microarchitecture-agnostic application-programming approaches.  It is also driven by the use of ARM RISC microarchitecture on mobile and set-top/connected-TV computing environments with a desire to allow software developers to have software that is useable across all computing environments.

.. as do a significant number of NAS units like this WD MyCloud EX4100 NAS

Some software developers, usually small-time or bespoke-solution developers, will end up using “managed” software development environments like Microsoft’s .NET Framework or Java. These will allow the programmer to turn out a machine-executable file that is dependent on pre-installed run-time elements for it to run. These run-time elements will be installed in a manner that is specific to the host computer’s microarchitecture and make use of the host computer’s needs and capabilities. These environments may allow the software developer to “write once run anywhere” without knowing if the computer  the software is to run on uses an i86 or ARM microarchitecture.

There may also be an approach towards “one-machine two instruction-sets” software development environments to facilitate this kind of development where the goal is to simply turn out a fully-compiled executable file for both instruction sets.

It could be in an accepted form like run-time emulation or machine-code translation as what is used to allow MacOS or Windows to run extant software written for different microarchitectures. Or one may have to look at what went on with some early computer platforms like the Apple II where the use of a user-installable co-processor card with the required CPU would allow the computer to run software for another microarchitecture and platform.

Computer Hardware Vendors

For computer hardware vendors, there will be an expectation towards positioning ARM-based silicon towards high-performance power-efficient computing. This may be about highly-capable laptops that can do a wide range of computing tasks without running out of battery power too soon. Or “all-in-one” and low-profile desktop computers will gain increased legitimacy when it comes to high-performance computing while maintaining the svelte looks.

Personally, if ARM-based computing was to gain significant traction, it may have to be about Microsoft encouraging silicon vendors other than Qualcomm to offer ARM-based CPUs and graphics processors fit for “regular” computers. As well, Microsoft and the Linux community may have to look towards legitimising “performance-class” computing tasks like “core” gaming and workstation-class computing on that microarchitecture.

There may be the idea of using 64-bit i86 microarchitecture as a solution for focused high-performance work. This may be due to a large amount of high-performance software code written to run with the classic Intel and AMD silicon. It will most likely exist until a significant amount of high-performance software is written to run natively with ARM silicon.

Conclusion

Thanks to Apple and Microsoft heading towards ARM RISC microarchitecture, the computer hardware and software community will have to look at working with two different microarchitectures especially when it comes to regular computers.

Articles

The news services that appear on the “screen of respect” that is main TV screen like the ABC are often seen as being “of respect” and all the screen text is part of their identity

TNI steps up fight against disinformation  | Advanced Television

News outlets will digitally watermark content to limit misinformation | Engadget

News Organizations Will Start Using Digital Watermarks To Combat Fake News |Ubergizmo

My Comments

The Trusted New Initiative are a recently formed group of global news and tech organisations, mostly household names in these fields, who are working together to stop the spread of disinformation where it poses a risk of real-world harm. It also includes flagging misinformation that undermines trust the the TNI’s partner news providers like the BBC. Here, the online platforms can review the content that comes in, perhaps red-flagging questionable content, and newsrooms avoid blindly republishing it.

.. as well as their online presence – they will benefit from having their imagery authenticated by a TNI watermark

One of their efforts is to agree on and establish an early-warning system to combat the spread of fake news and disinformation. It is being established in the months leading up to the polling day for the US Presidential Election 2020 and is flagging disinformation were there is an immediate threat to life or election integrity.

It is based on efforts to tackle disinformation associated with the 2019 UK general election, the Taiwan 2020 general election, and the COVID-19 coronavirus plague.

Another tactic is Project Origin, which this article is primarily about.

An issue often associated with fake news and disinformation is the use of imagery and graphics to make the news look credible and from a trusted source.

Typically this involves altered or synthesised images and vision that is overlaid with the logos and other trade dress associated with BBC, CNN or another newsroom of respect. This conveys to people who view this online or on TV that the news is for real and is from a respected source.

Project Origin is about creating a watermark for imagery and vision that comes from a particular authentic content creator. This will degrade whenever the content is manipulated. It will be based around open standards overseen by TNI that relate to authenticating visual content thus avoiding the need to reinvent the wheel when it comes to developing any software for this to work.

One question I would have is whether it is only readable by computer equipment or if there is a human-visible element like the so-called logo “bug” that appears in the corner of video content you see on TV. If this is machine-readable only, will there be the ability for a news publisher or broadcaster to overlay a graphic or message that states the authenticity at the point of publication. Similarly, would a Web browser or native client for an online service have extra logic to indicate the authenticity of an image or video footage.

I would also like to see the ability to indicate the date of the actual image or footage being part of the watermark. This is because some fake news tends to be corroborated with older lookalike imagery like crowd footage from a similar but prior event to convince the viewer. Some of us may also look at the idea of embedding the actual or approximate location of the image or footage in the watermark.

There is also the issue of newsrooms importing images and footage from other sources whose equipment they don’t have control over. For example, an increasing amount of amateur and videosurveillance imagery is used in the news usually because the amateur photographer or the videosurveillance setup has the “first images” of the news event. Then there is reliance on stock-image libraries and image archives for extra or historical footage; along with newsrooms and news / PR agencies sharing imagery with each other. Let’s not forget media companies who engage “stringers” (freelance photographers and videographers) who supply images and vision taken with their own equipment.

The question with all this, especially with amateur / videosurveillance / stringer footage taken with equipment that media organisations don’t have control over is how such imagery can be authenticated by a newsroom. This is more so where the image just came off a source like someone’s smartphone or the DVR equipment within a premises’ security room. There is also the factor that one source could tender the same imagery to multiple media outlets, whether through a media-relations team or simply offering it around.

At least Project Origin will be useful as a method to allow the audience to know the authenticity and provenance of imagery that is purported to corroborate a newsworthy event.

Article

Apple advises against using camera covers on their recent MacBooks.

Apple: Closing MacBooks with camera covers leads to display damage | Bleeping Computer

Previous coverage on HomeNetworking01.info

Keeping hackers away from your Webcam and microphone

My Comments

Apple has lately advised its MacBook owners to avoid buying and using accessory Webcam covers on their computers.

These Webcam shields are being seen as a security asset thanks to malware being used to activate the Webcam and microphone to surveil the computer’s user. But Apple advises against them due to the MacBook having the Webcam integrated with the circuitry for the screen and built in a very fragile manner. They also mention that the Webcam is used by macOS as an ambient light sensor and for advanced camera functionality.

with similar advice that could apply to other low-profile thin-bezel laptops like the Dell XPS 13

They recommend that if you use a device to obfuscate your Webcam, you use something as thin as a piece of ordinary printing paper and isn’t adhesive. This is because the adhesive can ruin your camera’s picture quality when you want to use it. As well, they recommend that you remove the camera-cover device before you close up your MacBook at the end of your computing session.

I also see this as a key trend that will affect other low-profile laptop computers like Ultrabooks and 2-in-1s that have very thin screen bezels like recent Dell XPS 13s. This is due to manufacturers designing the in-lid electronics in a more integrated manner so as to reduce the lid’s profile. Let’s not forget that with an increasing number of computers, the Webcam is part of facial-recognition-based device-level authentication if its operating system supports this function.

But you still need to protect your privacy when dealing with your laptop’s, all-in-one’s or monitor’s integrated Webcam and microphone.

Primarily, this is about proper computer housekeeping advice like making sure the computer’s operating system, applications, security software and any other software is up-to-date and with the latest security patches. As well, make sure that you know what is installed on your computer and that you don’t install software or click on links that you aren’t sure of.

You may find that your computer or monitor with the integrated Webcam will have some hardware security measures for that camera. This will be in the form of a shutter as used with some Lenovo equipment or a hardware switch that disables the camera as used with some HP equipment. Or the camera will have a tally light that glows when it is in use which is part of the camera’s hardware design. Here, make use of these features to protect your privacy. But you may find that these features may not affect what happens with your computer’s built-in microphone.

As well, you may find that your computer’s operating system or desktop security software has the ability to monitor or control which software has access to your Webcam, microphone or other sensors your computer is equipped with. Here, they may come with this functionality as part of a continual software update cycle. Let’s not forget that some Web browsers may bake camera-use detection in to their functionality as part of a major feature upgrade.

MacOS users should look at Apple’s support page for what they can do while Windows 10 users can look at Microsoft’s support page on this topic. Here, this kind of control is part of the fact that today’s desktop and mobile operating systems are being designed for security.

If your operating system or desktop security software doesn’t have this functionality, you may find third-party software for your computing platform that has oversight of your Webcam and microphone. One example for MacOS is Oversight which notifies you if the camera or microphone are being used, with the ability to detect software that “piggybacks” on to legitimate video-conferencing software to record your conversations. But you need to do some research about these apps before you consider downloading them.

Even if you are dealing with a recent MacBook or low-profile laptop computer, you can make sure your computer’s Webcam and integrated microphone isn’t being turned into a listening device.

Article

Facebook, AMD, Nvidia Join Confidential Computing Consortium | SDx Central

AMD, Facebook et Nvidia rejoignent une initiative qui veut protéger la mémoire vive de nos équipements  (AMD, NVIDIA and Facebook join an initiatiative to protect the live memory of our equipment) | O1Net.com (France – French language / Langue française)

From the horse’s mouth

Confidential Computing Consortium

Web site

My Comments

Some of online life’s household names are becoming part of the Confidential Computing Consortium. Here, AMD, Facebook, NVIDIA are part of this consortium which is a driver towards secure computing which is becoming more of a requirement these days.

What is the Confidential Computing Consortium

This is an industry consortium driven by the Linux Foundation to provide open standards for secure computing in all use cases.

It is about creating a standard software-development kits that are about secure software execution. This is to allow software to run in a hardware-based Trusted Execution Environment that is completely secure. It is also about writing this code to work independent of the system’s silicon manufacturer and to work across the common microarchitectures like ARM, RISC-V and x86.

This is becoming of importance nowadays with malware being written to take advantage of data being held within a computing device’s volatile random-access memory. One example of this include RAM-scraping malware targeted at point-of-sale / property-management systems that steal customers’ payment-card data while a transaction is in progress. Another example are the recent discoveries by Apple that a significant number of familiar iOS apps are snooping on the user’s iPhone or iPad Clipboard with their iPhones without the knowledge and consent of the user.

As well, in this day and age, most software implements various forms of “memory-to-memory” data transfer for many common activities like cutting and pasting. There is also the fact that an increasing number of apps are implementing context-sensitive functionality like conversion or translation for content that a user selects or even for something a user has loaded in to their device.

In most secure-computing setups, data is encrypted “in-transit” while it moves between computer systems and “at rest” while it exists on non-volatile secondary storage like mechanical hard disks or solid-state storage. But it isn’t encrypted while it is in use by a piece of computer software to fulfil that program’s purposes. This is leading to these kind of exploits like RAM-scraping malware.

The Confidential Computing Consortium is about encrypting the data that is held within RAM and allowing the user to grant software that they trust access to that encrypted data. Primarily it will be about consent-driven relevance-focused secure data use for the end-users.

But the idea is to assure not just the security and privacy of a user’s data but allow multiple applications on a server-class computer to run in a secure manner. This is increasingly important with the use of online services and cloud computing where data belonging to multiple users is being processed concurrently on the same physical computer.

This is even relevant to home and personal computing, including the use of online services and the Internet of Things. It is highly relevant with authenticating with online services or facilitating online transactions; as well as assuring end-users and consumers of data privacy. As well, most of us are heading towards telehealth and at-home care which involves the handling of more personally-sensitive information relating to our health through the use of common personal-computing devices.

The fact that Facebook is on board is due to the fact the social network’s users make use of social sign-on by that platform to sign up with or log in to various online services. In this case, it would be about protecting user-authentication tokens that move between Facebook and the online service during the sign-up or log-in phase.

As well,  Facebook has two fingers in the consumer online messaging space in the form of Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp products and both these services feature end-to-end encryption with WhatsApp having this feature enabled by default. Here, they want users to be sure that the messages during, say, a WhatsApp session stay encrypted even in the device’s RAM rather than just between devices and within the device’s non-volatile storage.

I see the Confidential Computing Consortium as underscoring a new vector within the data security concept with this vector representing the data that is in the computer’s memory while it is being processed. Here, it could be about establishing secure consent-driven access to data worked on during a computing session, including increased protection of highly-sensitive business and personal data.

Articles

Google to add fact checking to images in its search user interfaces

Google adds a fact check feature for images | CNet

From the horse’s mouth

Google

Bringing fact check information to Google Images (Blog Post)

My Comments

Increasingly, images and video are being seen as integral to news coverage with most of us seeing them, especially photographs, of importance when corroborating a fact or news story.

But these are becoming weaponised to tell a different truth compared to what is actually captured by the camera. One way is to use the same or a similar image to corroborate a different fact, with this including the use of image-editing tools to doctor the image so it tells a different story.

I have covered this previously when talking about the use of reverse-image-search tools like Tineye or Google Image Search to verify the authenticity of an image and . It will be the same kind of feature that Google has enabled in its search interface when you “google” for something, or in its news-aggregation platforms.

Google is taking this further for people who search for images using their search tools. Here, they are adding images to their fact-check processes so it is easy to see whether an image has been used to corroborate questionable information. You will see a “fact-check” indicator near the image thumbnail and when you click or tap on the image for a larger view or more details, you will see some details about whether the image is true or not.

A similar feature appears on the YouTube platform for exhibiting details about the veracity of video content posted there. But this feature currently is available to users based in Brazil, India and the USA and I am not sure whether it will be available across all YouTube user interfaces, especially native clients for mobile and set-top platforms.

It is in addition to Alphabet, their parent company, offering a free tool to check whether an image has been doctored. This is because meddling with an image to constitute something else using something like Adobe Photoshop or GIMP is being seen as a way to convey a message that isn’t true. The tool, called Assembler, uses artificial intelligence and algorithms that detect particular forms of image manipulation to indicate the veracity of an image.

But I would also see the rise of tools that analyse audio and video material to identify deepfake activity, or video sites, podcast directories and the like using a range of tools to identify the authenticity of content made available through them. This may include “fact-check” labels with facts being verified by multiple newsrooms and universities; or the content checked for out-of-the-ordinary editing techniques. It can also include these sites and directories implementing a feedback loop so that users can have questionable content verified.