By the time you read this a new law in Russia will have banned the use or provision of virtual private networks (VPNs). ISPs will be required to block websites that offer VPNs and similar proxy services, currently used by millions of Russians to bypass state-imposed internet censorship. President Putin justified this draconian step as a measure to prevent the spread of extremism online. Its real purpose is to restrict the population to information approved by Russian regulator Roskomnadzor, being the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media, or more simply censorship.
After all the Russian election hacking claims, the US Senate has introduced a new bill to protect future electronic elections. The Securing America's Voting Equipment (SAVE) Act would designate elections systems as part of the US national critical infrastructure, task the comptroller general of the United States with checking the integrity of voting machines, and sponsor a "Hack The election" competition to find flaws in voting machines. I particularly like the last one because it encourages groups like Anonymous to stress test any system, hopefully making it a lot safer. Other technologically advanced countries could follow this example.
The UK has opened a can of worms for driverless cars with the suggestion that insurers would have to pay any speeding fines incurred by the cars. This shifts the insurance burden from the driver to the car itself and has interesting ramifications for schemes like demerit points on licences. The scenario of roadworks changing speed limits also becomes relevant if the car did not react quickly enough to the changed speed limits, like the ones you see on electronic signs on motorways. It would also mean that updates would need to be processed more rigorously or even in real time. I'm not sure we will see the mass adoption of driverless cars in my lifetime.
Reviewers of the latest Apple X face-recognition technology have given mixed results. If there are a lot of fluorescent lights around at night, it is dark and if you don't hold it at the Apple-recommended distance of 25-50cm, or 10-20 inches, you can have problems. When questioned, one Apple response was "you're looking at it wrong". This triggered a memory of the previous antenna issue when we were told that "you're holding it wrong". The Apple X does not support fingerprint unlocking so that isn't a fall back. They'd better get it right by release or the X could stand for "do not buy".
Apple has fallen to third behind Huawei in some reports of phone sales worldwide. Samsung at number one doesn't seem to have suffered with the recent shake up at the top posting record third-quarter profits of US$12.81bn on revenue of $60bn.
The term Wi-Fi Calling with your mobile phone may sound counterintuitive, but it is something people have been talking about since 2015. Wi-Fi Calling allows you to make and receive "phone" calls and send MMS and SMS messages over a Wi-Fi network. To do this you will need to have a compatible Wi-Fi Calling device, be connected to a supported Wi-Fi network and not have sufficient mobile network coverage to make a regular call. So, this is a substitute for other Voice over IP (VoIP) services such as those provided by Skype, Line and other applications.
To try, the first thing to do is check you have the right phone, being say anything from the Samsung Note 5 and up or Apples SE (5c) and up. Your service provider e.g. DTAC, AIS, AT&T, Vodophone etc. must support this technology. You must be connected to a Wi-Fi network and have the correct options turned on in your phone, VoLTE and Wi-Fi Calling. If these conditions are met, then you can call, including in some cases while roaming, using your phone without installing any software. For a Samsung this is Apps > Settings > Connections > Mobile Networks and select VoLTE. Then from Connections > Wi-Fi Calling and make sure its turned on. While using Wi-Fi calling there is a different icon at the top of the display. This varies by phone and OS. Now you know.
If you have used internet online services, you will have run into a reCaptcha process where you type in some words displayed as a picture or perhaps used the associated audio option if the picture is unreadable. The purpose of such a process is to filter out automated or so-called robot services that troll websites for information and access. Recently the start-up Vicarious found a way to defeat the picture based approach. Not to be outdone, a week later the University of Maryland cracked the audio based approach. Between them they have effectively negated the robot blockers. In the latter case, they used several online speech-to-text services found in the cloud to help them. Remember James' first law of data: if it is on the public internet then it is hackable, crackable or simply wide open.
James Hein is an IT professional of over 30 years' standing. You can contact him at jclhein@gmail.com.
