Tag Archives: Charlie Sanchez

AVG

Three reasons to be excited about: Facial Recognition

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Facial recognition software has a bad reputation. Associations with surveillance state and future visions of corporate tracking and advertising like in the movie Minority Report make facial recognition seem like an intrusive and objectifying technology tearing at the last remnants of our privacy.

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Minority Report

 

While there are legitimate concerns about some uses of facial recognition technology, there are also a huge number of wonderful and innovative ways it can be applied to improve our daily lives.

 

People with disabilities

Facial recognition software and the growing accuracy with which technology can accurately discern human features is starting to become a real benefit to people with disabilities.

The recently unveiled “XploR mobility cane” uses facial recognition technology to scan approaching people and alert the user when someone they know is approaching.

Likewise, the Samsung Memory Recaller is an app designed to help Alzheimers sufferers recognize the faces of friends and loved ones.

Samsung Memory Recaller from Bbdo Proximity Thailand on Vimeo.

 

 

Search and recovery

While Google has recently shelved planned to commercially release a facial recognition search due to privacy concerns, their acquisition of PittPatt shows there is still interest in the technology. The recent earthquakes in Nepal have underlined the importance of international search and rescue efforts.  Facial recognition can be a huge help when used in conjunction with other online search and recovery tools such as Google’s Person Finder to help identify missing people and put them in touch with friends and family.

PiP My Pet

 

When most people think of facial recognition, they naturally think of people, but work is already afoot applying this technology to our furry friends. Apps such as PiP My Pet use the same facial recognition technology to identify lost pets.

 

Security and convenience

Despite what many people may think, facial recognition will almost certainly make the technology of the future more secure and easy to use. I’ve written before about the merits and shortcomings of biometric security but recent buzz around Microsoft’s How-Old.net and Facebook’s DeepFace tagging technology show that there is a lot of research going into this area.

Very soon, web enabled devices will be able to discern our identity with complete accuracy meaning that identity specific items such as keys, wallets, ticket and passports could become things of the past. Using technology will also become easier with facial recognition helping alleviate some of the headaches caused by remembering multiple passwords and login credentials.

 

Do you have a favorite use for facial recognition technology? Do you think it is a good or bad thing? Let me know on Twitter or on Facebook.

Title image courtesy of Engadget.com

AVG

Adobe release critical security patches

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Earlier this May, Adobe announced that, on Tuesday 12 May, it will release two vital updates to Adobe Reader and Acrobat that address critical security flaws.

Although Adobe has not yet announced what the issues are, all Adobe users should ensure that they install the update as soon as it becomes available to them.

Keeping your software up to date is one the simplest and most effective ways of keeping your device safe. New bugs and vulnerabilities emerge all the time and developers release updates to mitigate the threats.

For more information on how updating software helps protect your PC, watch the video below from AVG Security Awareness Director Michael McKinnon.

How updating software helps protect your PC

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How updating software helps keep you safe

 

 

AVG

Three reasons to be excited about: Augmented Reality

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Whether for personal entertainment or in the workplace, augmented reality has some exciting applications for all of us.

Entertainment

One of the most exciting applications for augmented reality is in the entertainment industry. As highlighted by the incredibly popular game Ingress, the ability to capture the world around us and add fantastical features will take entertainment to the next level.

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Ingress

Videogames and movies that emerge the world around you will give each of us an incredibly personal and interactive entertainment experience.

In fact, the allure of augmented reality in the gaming industry is so big that, by 2020, it is predicted to be worth around $120 billion. That total is three times that of virtual reality, underlining its wide range of applications.

 

Business and industry

It’s not all fun and games though. Augmented reality has a lot to offer businesses and industry too. Any industry where skilled workers such as engineers or manufacturers need to access information in real time can benefit greatly from augmented reality.

Among it’s wide number of applications, augmented reality could be used to help train staff, improve effectiveness of industrial maintenance checks and make your products easier to find and purchase.

 

Education

Augmented reality is already in use as an educational tool around the world and is a great way to make information exciting and engaging for students.

Whether studying the human body with digital 3D figures that leap out of screens to bringing old fashioned text books to life,  augmented reality could possibly be the next big step in teaching tools.

Aurasma, an augmented reality app available on tablets has been working with schools for a few years already.

Video

Aurasma in school

 

What are the uses of augmented reality that most excite you? Let us know on our Facebook page or via Twitter.

 

Image courtesy of solidworks

AVG

Google introduce new account security measure

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One of the most convenient things about having a Google account is that you can use it to log into various accounts across the web.

However, according to a Google blog, users that log in to third party sites using their Google credentials are potentially at risk of phishing attacks.

Password Alert

 

To help protect users, Google has introduced a new free to use Chrome extension called Password Alert. Here’s how it works:

“Once you’ve installed and initialized Password Alert, Chrome will remember a “scrambled” version of your Google Account password. It only remembers this information for security purposes and doesn’t share it with anyone. If you type your password into a site that isn’t a Google sign-in page, Password Alert will show you a notice like the one below. This alert will tell you that you’re at risk of being phished so you can update your password and protect yourself.”

Gmail password reset

 

While the extension is designed to provide Google users with an extra level of protection when surfing the web it is still a work in progress.

Security researchers have already discovered a number of workarounds the extension but Google is continuing to work on the vulnerabilities.

 

How to check which extensions you are running.

Checking which Chrome extensions are active is quick and easy. Within Chrome, open the menu in the top right and select More Tools. Select Extensions from the menu.

Here you can view which extensions are currently running, add and remove extensions.

Chrome extensions

AVG

Watch out for Nepal Earthquake Scams

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Unfortunately it is common for attackers and scammers to hijack news stories in an attempt such as the Nepal Earthquake to trick those trying to help.

One such website (which has since been removed) was savenepal.org

Save Nepal

 

If you wish to make a donation to the relief effort in Nepal, be sure to make it to an accredited charity. You can find a list of them here.

 

How to avoid phishing scams

Most scams take the form of a “phishing” attack, where victims are tricked into handing over their personal or payment details.

For more information on detecting and avoiding phishing scams, watch this AVG Academy video.

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How to avoid phishing scams

 

 Title image courtesy of FT.com

AVG

Three reasons to be excited about: Mobile Payments

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While paying through a mobile device, wearable or digital card may seem like a high-tech near future, the reality is that mobile payments are already soaring around the globe.

Earlier in April, GSMA Mobile Money for the Unbanked (MMU) released its 2014 State of the Industry Report on mobile financial services.  The report indicates that there are already 255 mobile money services in operation across 89 countries and in over 60% of developing markets.

The arrival of major tech and finance players such as Apple, VISA and Samsung have brought the mobile payments into the spotlight and into the mainstream.

Here we look at three of the most interesting developments in recent months:

 

Digital Credit Cards

While generally still in the beta phase, digital credit cards promise to consolidate the bulk of a wallet or purse into a single card.

The idea is to forgo multiple cards and instead have a single digital card that can be programmed with the details of all your other payment and membership cards. At the touch of a button, your American Express card can become your Starbucks loyalty card. Pretty neat!

There are several major players in this space including Coin, Plastc, Swyp and Wocket.

Coin Card

 

Mobile payments are getting full backing

There’s recently been some good news for those worried about storing money in online services such as Apple Pay, PayPal or Google Wallet.

According to Yahoo Finance, the Feder Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) now insures funds stored in Google Wallet.

This means that should anything happen to Google or one of the banks holding your money, your digitally stored funds are protected by the US federal government.

While most of us use services such as PayPal to directly make payments rather than actually store money, it’s reassuring to know that online digital balances are starting to get the same government protection offered to the traditional banking system.

 

Mobile payments are going social

One of the most interesting developments in the mobile payment space has been the land grab by several social networks to integrate payment services into their platforms. Both Facebook and Snapchat have both got involved.

The rise of dedicated social payment services is also worth noting. Payment service Venmo has already risen to prominence (although not with a few security hiccups on the way).

Venmo

 

I personally see social and banking as two diametrically opposed services. One should be private, secure and personal, the other open public and shared.

The fact of the matter is that there’s clearly a demand for a payment protocol with inbuilt social features so expect to see a whole lot more activity in this area in the coming months.

 

 

 

AVG

Unpredictability is key in password strength

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The latest report from infosec provider Praetorian suggests that when it comes to hacking a password, the sequence and consistency of the characters is just as important as the actual strength of the password itself.

Using a technique called a mask attack, attackers break a password down into their component elements such as upper case letters (u), lower case letters (l), digits (d) and symbols (s).

In their example, Praetorian used “Password1234” which when viewed in this system becomes “ullllllldddd”. This string of letters is known as a mask. Each letter in the chain denotes the character type (u= upper case).

Using this technique, Praetorian analysed nearly 35 million leaked passwords from various sources. What they found was surprising.

Password Masks

 

 

Of the 35 million analysed passwords, half of used the same 13 masks.  This means that despite the millions of variants of characters, digits and symbols, in our passwords, as many as half of us are using a very limited selection of masks.

Naturally our predisposition for these certain masks makes our passwords much easier to hack. Not to mention that many people also use dictionary words and personally identifiable information in their passwords.

 

Why do we behave like this?

Praetorian posits that our preference masks is down to the way that we are informed to create strong passwords. A simple example of this would be to use a capital letter in the password. Conventional behavior leads us to use it at the start of a password and use symbols such as ‘!’ at the end.

 

How to improve your password safety.

The most important thing to do to help make your passwords more difficult to crack is to use an unusual mask. Don’t be tempted to start your password with a capital and insert your symbols and digits somewhere other than the end.

Password managers can also help you generate strong, long and random passwords that use a wide variety of masks.

 

 

AVG

Three Exciting Things In: Connected Cars

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The motor industry is one of the most innovative spaces in business right now. From driverless technology to remote access and electronic cars, there is an abundance of exciting technology that promise to make a real difference to the way to move around our lives.

 

Augmented Reality Driving Goggles

Covered in this fascinating Wired article, these driving goggles (seen above) are being developed by the automaker Mini and have the potential to change the way we drive for good.

Mini Goggles

Headsup display: Make sure the most important information is available to you wherever you’re looking with speed and directions fed directly into the goggles.

Zero latency: Using special technology to predict how your head will move, the goggles approach to close to “zero latency” meaning that the augmented images displayed in the goggles are happening in real time.

Look through walls: By using cameras and microphones outside of the vehicle, you can look straight through the frame of the car to see potential hazards.

 

 

Remote Control Parking:

BMW recently revealed that they have developed remote control parking for the 2016 BMW 7 Series.

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2016 BMW 7 Series

 

But that’s not all, BMW are looking to change “interaction between the driver and the car” by introducing in-car gesture control to the 7 series and improved voice commands. This means no more fiddling with that radio or satnav.

BMW Gesture Control

 

 

Wireless Car Charging

Electronic cars are slowly but surely making their way into the mainstream. One of the largest obstacles to their adoption is the lack of charging stations. A research team at Qualcomm  has developed a wireless form of charging for electronic cars that could potentially make it much easier to charge vehicles.

Using inductive charging, the electronic car will charge wirelessly when parked over a magnetic plate.

Inductive charging

 

Inductive technology has only recently taken off in the consumer space with wireless smartphone charging stations so don’t expect to see these on the road any time soon.

 

The importance of privacy

As these three exciting technologies demonstrate, the Internet of Things is growing and advancing at an incredible rate. It’s important though to ensure that we are building and developing advanced functionality with privacy and security in mind.

The benefits of smart, connected vehicles are obvious for all to see but as AVG has highlighted several times already, vulnerabilities in system security can pose real risks to human safety and property damage.

AVG

How to tell if an app has in-app purchases

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News emerged recently of a California woman suing Google for the return of thousands of dollars taken without her knowledge via in-app microtransactions.

After upgrading a free app via the Google Play store, hackers got hold of Susan Harvey’s details and between March 2013 and August 2014 ran up thousands of dollars across 650 in-app purchases without any alerts and notifications being sent to the victim.

 

Checking for in-app purchases

It’s easy to see if an app allows in-app purchases, just visit the Apple App Store or the Google Play Store.

Google Play Store

Android

 

Apple App Store

iOS

 

While it is not yet determined who is to blame for this attack, one thing we can all do to help keep ourselves safe from fraud or mobile attacks is to carefully check the permissions of any apps we install on our devices.

Check out this video for tips on which permissions to look out for when installing a new app.

Video

Make Sure You Check These Permissions

 

In the video, Michael highlights these top permissions to check when installing an app:

  • Check the app store that the app contains in app purchases
  • Access to the internet
  • Access to phone and call information
  • GPS and precise location
  • Access to photos/media/files
  • Camera and microphone access

 

 

AVG

Why Netflix is spending millions on encryption

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The popular streaming service Netflix recently announced in their quarterly letter to shareholders that they plan to secure their entire service with HTTPS.

While some parts of Netflix already use encryption, such as the registration and payment services, the intention is now to encrypt the entire service for users on all platforms. This includes the data sent and received as part of the streaming service.

Significant costs

In October last year, Netflix said that they were investigating encrypting their entire service but claimed that it could cost them “$100’s of millions a year” to implement.

Netflix hasn’t explained exactly why they’ve done decided to roll out HTTPS, although sources speculate that the Snowden revelations have some part to play.

2014 was a watershed year for security with a number of high profile companies and individuals suffering cyber-attacks. The trend continued in 2015 and Netflix has followed the likes of Google to adopt HTTPS across more of their services.

Improving user privacy

As Netflix explained in their letter, the wider adoption of HTTPS “helps protect member privacy, particularly when the network is insecure, such as public wifi, and it helps protect members from eavesdropping by their ISP or employer, who may want to record our members’ viewing for other reasons.”