By BeauHD from
Slashdot's moving-on-to-bigger-and-better-things department:
The co-founder and CEO of Oculus, Brendan Iribe, is stepping down from the company he helped create with Palmer Luckey over four years ago in Irvine, California. Iribe writes in a statement to UploadVR: "We've decided to establish new PC and mobile VR groups to be more focused, strengthen development and accelerate our roadmap. Looking ahead and thinking about where I'm most passionate, I've decided to lead the PC VR group -- pushing the state of VR forward with Rift, research and computer vision. As we've grown, I really missed the deep, day-to-day involvement in building a brand new product on the leading edge of technology. You do your best work when you love what you're working on. If that's not the case, you need to make a change. With this new role, I can dive back into engineering and product development. That's what gets me up every day, inspired to run to work." UploadVR adds: When we asked Oculus PR what this meant for Max Cohen, the current Head of Mobile at Oculus, we were told that, "he's still focused on mobile and growing the mobile ecosystem on Jon's team." After publication, Oculus PR also informed us of how this affects the roles of Nate Mitchell, VP of Product, and Michael Abrash, Cheif Scientist, upon further inquiry: "Nate will be leading Rift, on Brendan's PC VR team. Michael Abrash still leads Oculus Research on Brendan's team. When asked about John Carmack, CTO, and Michael Antonov, Chief Software Architect, Oculus PR informed us that, "they are both still at Oculus and they work on the mobile team. Michael Antonov is leading the Carmel and ReactVR effort today."
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By BeauHD from
Slashdot's high-performance department:
MojoKid writes from a report via HotHardware: AMD has just officially unveiled that desktop variants of its Zen processor family will now be branded RYZEN. Zen-based processors will eventually target desktops, servers, and mobiles device, but the first wave of products will be targeted at the performance desktop market, where gamers and VR continue to spur growth. AMD is positioning RYZEN as a high-performance option and though there will be other core configurations as well, AMD has disclosed that one of the high-end options in the initial RYZEN line-up will feature 8 cores (16 threads with SMT) and at minimum a 3.4 GHz base clock, with higher turbo frequencies. That processor will also be outfitted with 20MB of cache -- 4MB of L2 and 16MB of L3 -- and it will be infused with what AMD is calling SenseMI technology. SenseMI is essentially fancy branding for the updated branch predictor, prefetcher, and power and control logic in Zen. AMD's upcoming AM4 platform for RYZEN will be outfitted with all of the features expected of a modern PC enthusiast platform. AM4 motherboards will use DDR4 memory and feature PCIe Gen 3 connectivity, and support for USB 3.1 Gen 2, NVMe, and SATA Express. Performance demos of RYZEN shown to members of the press pit a stock Intel Core i7-6900K (3.2GHz base, 3.7GHz turbo) with Turbo Boost that was enabled on the 6900K, versus RYZEN with boost disabled running at 3.4GHz flat. In the demo, the RYZEN system outpaced the Core i7-6900K by a few seconds.
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By BeauHD from
Slashdot's take-matters-into-your-own-hands department:
An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Google dropped a single National Security Letter into its most recent transparency report without much fanfare, but today the company published eight more NSLs in an attempt to shed more light on government surveillance of Google users. The eight letters published today were sent to Google from FBI offices across the country. Cumulatively, the NSLs seek broad access to content for around 20 user accounts. The names of the targets are redacted, but most of the letters seek access to Gmail accounts. The NSLs were sent to Google over a five-year period, from 2010 to 2015, with the majority coming from the Charlotte, North Carolina field office of the FBI. Others came from Florida, Arizona, New York, and California. "In our continued effort to increase transparency around government demands for user data, today we begin to make available to the public the National Security Letters (NSLs) we have received where, either through litigation or legislation, we have been freed of nondisclosure obligations," Richard Salgado, Google's director of law enforcement and information security, wrote in a blog post. Google has fought to make the letters public in part because the FBI can issue them without prior judicial oversight.
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By BeauHD from
Slashdot's constitutional-protections department:
A Florida appeals court has reversed a decision by a previous judge and ruled that a suspected voyeur can be made to reveal his iPhone passcode to police. "The defendant was arrested after a woman out shopping saw a man crouch down and aim what she believed was a smartphone under her skirt," reports BBC: Store CCTV captured footage of a man crouched down, holding an illuminated device and moving it towards the victim's skirt, according to court documents published by news site Courthouse News. Aaron Stahl was identified by law enforcement officers who reviewed the footage, according to court documents. After his arrest, Mr Stahl initially agreed to allow officers to search his iPhone 5, which he told them was at his home. However, once it had been retrieved by police - but before he had revealed his passcode - he withdrew consent to the search. The trial court had decided that Mr Stahl could be protected by the Fifth Amendment, which is designed to prevent self-incrimination. However, Judge Anthony Black's formal opinion to the court quashed the decision. Judge Black referred to a famous Supreme Court case, Doe v US 1988, in which Justice John Paul Stevens wrote that a defendant could be made to surrender a key to a strongbox containing incriminating documents but they could not "be compelled to reveal the combination to his wall safe." "We question whether identifying the key which will open the strongbox - such that the key is surrendered - is, in fact, distinct from telling an officer the combination," wrote Judge Black. "More importantly, we question the continuing viability of any distinction as technology advances."
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By msmash from
Slashdot's he-says-she-says department:
Uber is defending the scope of its privacy practices after a wide-ranging report alleged employees were tracking individual riders. From a CNBC report: "We have hundreds of security and privacy experts working around the clock to protect our data," Uber told "Reveal" in a statement. Additionally, Uber told CNBC that it is continuing to increase its security investments. The company pointed to workers that needed data for their roles, such as anti-fraud experts, or employees that validate driver insurance documents or investigate traffic incidents. "It's absolutely untrue that 'all' or 'nearly all' employees have access to customer data, with or without approval," Uber said. "We have built [an] entire system to implement technical and administrative controls to limit access to customer data to employees who require it to perform their jobs. This could include multiple steps of approval -- by managers and the legal team -- to ensure there is a legitimate business case for providing access." According to legal documents filed by ex-employee Ward Spangenberg in October and reported by The Center for Investigative Reporting on Monday, "Uber's lack of security regarding its customer data was resulting in Uber employees being able to track high profile politicians, celebrities, and even personal acquaintances of Uber employees, including ex-boyfriends/girlfriends, and ex-spouses."
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By msmash from
Slashdot's making-sense department:
If you were holding out hope that Android and Chrome would one day merge into some kind of super OS that marries the desktop and mobile worlds once and for all, Google's senior vice president for Android, Chrome, and Chromecast Hiroshi Lockheimer has some bad news for you: It's not happening. From a PCWorld report: Speaking on the All About Android podcast, the mobile chief threw a giant bucket of cold water on the idea that the two platforms would eventually converge, despite recent rumors that suggest such a project is already in development at Google. "There's no point in merging them," Lockheimer said, pointing out sales of that Chromebooks overtook Macs in the first quarter of this year. "They're both successful." He added, Google's aim is "to make sure that both sides benefit from each other. ... You'll see a lot more of that happening, where we're cross-pollinating, but not a merge."
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By msmash from
Slashdot's explain-like-I-am-5 department:
China may have been hoping to attract tech talent to its nation, but it is unlikely that people in the tech industry will move there. A columnist at Bloomberg explains why: The biggest problem is government control of the internet. For a software developer, the inconvenience goes well beyond not being able to access YouTube during coffee breaks. It means that key software libraries and tools are often inaccessible. In 2013, China blocked Github, a globally important open-source depository and collaboration tool, thereby forcing developers to seek workarounds. Using a virtual private network to "tunnel" through the blockades is one popular option. But VPNs slow uploads, downloads and collaboration. And it isn't just developers who suffer. Among the restricted sites in China is Google Scholar, a tool that indexes online peer-reviewed studies, conference proceedings, books and other research material into an easily accessible format. It's become a crucial database for academics around the world, and Chinese researchers -- even those with VPNs -- struggle to use it. The situation grew so dire this summer that several state-run news outlets published complaints from Chinese scientists, with one practically begging the nationalist Global Times newspaper: "We hope the government can relax supervision for academic purposes." The cumulative impact of these restrictions is significant. Scientists unable to keep up with what researchers in other countries are publishing are destined to be left behind, which is one reason China is having difficulty luring foreign scholars to its universities. Programmers who can't take advantage of the sites and tools that make development a global effort are destined to write software customized solely for the Chinese market. The author has raised several other reasons to make his case.
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By BeauHD from
Slashdot's cease-and-desist department:
An anonymous reader quotes a report from ZDNet: A security research firm has released details of a "critical" flaw in a security tool, despite being threatened with legal threats. The advisory said that an attacker could "manipulate accounting documents and financial results, bypass change management controls, and bypass segregation of duties restrictions," which could result in "fraud, theft or manipulation of sensitive data," as well as the "unauthorized payment transactions and transfer of money." An attacker could also add a backdoor to the affected server, the advisory said. The researchers contacted and met with PwC in August to discuss the scope of the flaw. As part of its responsible disclosure policy, the researchers gave PwC three months to fix the flaw before a public advisory would be published. Three days later, the corporate giant responded with legal threats. A portion of the cease-and-desist letter, seen by ZDNet, said that PwC demanded the researchers "not release a security advisory or similar information" relating to the buggy software. The legal threat also said that the researchers are not to "make any public statements or statements to users" of the software. The researchers told PwC that they would publicly disclose their findings once the three-month window expires, which is in line with industry standard disclosure practices. That was when PwC hit the security firm with a second cease-and-desist letter. Undeterred, the researchers released a security advisory a little over two weeks later.
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By BeauHD from
Slashdot's another-day-another-hack department:
Quest Diagnostics has said in a statement that a hack of an internet application on its network has exposed the personal health information of nearly 34,000 people. "Quest Diagnostics has notified affected individuals via mail and established a dedicated toll-free number to call with questions regarding this incident," the company said. CBS News reports: The Madison, New Jersey-based company says âoean unauthorized third partyâ on Nov. 26 gained access to customer information including names, dates of birth, lab results and in some instances, telephone numbers. The stolen data did not include Social Security numbers, credit card accounts, insurance details or any other financial information. Quest said Monday it is working with a cybersecurity firm and law enforcement to investigate the breach, while taking steps to prevent similar incidents from recurring. If you think you're affected by this hack, you can call (888) 320-9970.
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