security stories

Android malware volume tripled last quarter

Friday, August 17, 2012 - 11:19am

As Android zips past iOS as the mobile platform of the masses, it has mirrored Windows' role in the PC-Mac wars in two ways: 1) its open strategy has allowed it to become far more widespread and 2) due to its ubiquity, it has become the target of choice for hackers, criminals, and other assorted nefarious codemonkeys.

Microsoft to install crime-detecting hive mind in New York City

Eileen Marable

Thursday, August 9, 2012 - 12:46pm

New York City's police department is partnering with Microsoft to develop what's being called the Domain Awareness System (DAS), a law enforcement tool with the goal of not only preventing crime by monitoring public safety data streams, but to also help respond to and follow up on crimes quickly and more efficiently.

App stops creepy stalkers from stealing your Facebook pictures

Michael Trei

Thursday, August 9, 2012 - 3:25am

Facebook is a great way to share pictures of your life with all of your friends, but how many of those 'friends' are actually kind of creepy? A new app from McAfee lets you control who can see each picture you upload individually, and stops everyone from saving the ones they can see.

iPhone case doubles as a battery and a stun gun

Adario Strange

Thursday, July 19, 2012 - 4:51am

We all know the fictional story of Batman, a man who suffered a family assault and responded by going vigilante and creating crime fighting gadgets to protect the city. But how would you feel if such a story were real? That's the question the iPhone stun gun case presents.

Master Lock says sayonara to analog, new locks get electronic UI

Raymond Wong

Monday, July 16, 2012 - 9:43am

The padlock design has remained virtually unchanged for centuries. Master Lock thinks its time for a 21st century facelift, that's why it's replaced the combination wheel on its signature lock with an electronic one and shoved a battery into its caboose.

Bike pedals that double as locks will stymie thieves

Eileen Marable

Thursday, July 12, 2012 - 6:45am

U-locks are ok, and monster chains are a bit better but we all know thieves can be crafty when picking a lock, no matter what the size. What if there was an easy way to prevent your bike from being usable should someone tinker with your lock? That's exactly the idea behind bike pedals that also serve as your bike lock.

Special '451' Web code proposed to honor Ray Bradbury

Evan Ackerman

Friday, June 22, 2012 - 1:54pm

You see HTTP status codes all over: "404 Not Found" for mistyped URLs, "403 Forbidden" for authorization failures and traffic problems read as "503 Service Unavailable". We may now need a new one for legal restrictions, and what could be more fitting than "451" in honor of Ray Bradbury?

Keeping you safe, citizen: fingerprint scanner works from 20 feet

Evan Ackerman

Thursday, June 21, 2012 - 4:29pm

Fingerprinting used to be a complicated affair, involving ink and paper and making actual prints. Well, okay, so it wasn't that complicated, but now there's a new camera that can take pictures of your fingerprints from 20 feet away whether you want it to or not.

Classical technique may outperform quantum cryptography

Evan Ackerman

Friday, June 15, 2012 - 10:24am

Quantum cryptography may be theoretically secure, but in practice, there are certain limitations that allow clever attackers to read encrypted messages. A new system that ditches quantum mechanics for classical mechanics may prove to be even more secure, backed up by the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

The future of BitTorrent is decentralized, anonymous, free

Evan Ackerman

Monday, June 4, 2012 - 9:40pm

BitTorrent has a reputation for only being useful for stealing media from impoverished conglomerates, but at its heart, the file sharing protocol is about the free exchange of information. Researchers at Delft University of Technology are getting ready to release a BitTorrent client called Tribler that adds decentralized anonymity into the mix, for free.

DVICE

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security stories

Android malware volume tripled last quarter

Microsoft to install crime-detecting hive mind in New York City

App stops creepy stalkers from stealing your Facebook pictures

iPhone case doubles as a battery and a stun gun

Master Lock says sayonara to analog, new locks get electronic UI

Bike pedals that double as locks will stymie thieves

Special '451' Web code proposed to honor Ray Bradbury

Keeping you safe, citizen: fingerprint scanner works from 20 feet

Classical technique may outperform quantum cryptography

The future of BitTorrent is decentralized, anonymous, free

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