5G Network Speed Defined As 20 Gbps By the International Telecommunication Union

An anonymous reader writes with a report at Mobipicker (linking to a Korea Times story) that a 12-member committee from the International Telecommunication Union has hashed out a formal definition of the speed requirements for 5G mobile networking; the result has been designated IMT-2020, and it specifies that 5G networks should provide data speeds of up to 20Gbps — 20 times faster than 4G. From the Korea Times story: The 5G network will also have a capacity to provide more than 100 megabits-per-second average data transmission to over one million Internet of Things devices within 1 square kilometer. Video content services, including ones that use holography technology, will also be available thanks to the expanded data transmit capacity, the ministry said. … The union also decided to target commercializing the 5G network worldwide by 2020. To do so, it will start receiving applications for technology which can be candidates to become the standard for the new network. Consequently, the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games will be the world’s first international event to showcase and demonstrate 5G technology. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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5G Network Speed Defined As 20 Gbps By the International Telecommunication Union

"Let’s Encrypt" Project To Issue First Free Digital Certificates Next Month

An anonymous reader writes: Let’s Encrypt, the project that hopes to increase the use of encryption across websites by issuing free digital certificates, is planning to issue the first ones next month. Backed by the EFF, the Mozilla Foundation, the Linux Foundation, Akamai, IdenTrust, Automattic, and Cisco, Let’s Encrypt will provide free-of-charge SSL and TSL certificates to any webmaster interested in implementing HTTPS for their products. The Stack reports: “Let’s Encrypt’s root certificate will be cross-signed by IdenTrust, a public key CA owned by smartphone government ID card provider HID Global. Website operators are generally hesitant to use SSL/TLS certificates due to their cost. An extended validation (EV) SSL certificates can cost up to $1, 000. It is also a complication for operators to set up encryption for larger web services. Let’s Encrypt aims to remove these obstacles by eliminating the related costs and automating the entire process.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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"Let’s Encrypt" Project To Issue First Free Digital Certificates Next Month

British Government Instituted 3-Month Deletion Policy, Apparently To Evade FOIA

An anonymous reader writes: In late 2004, weeks before Tony Blair’s Freedom of Information (FOI) act first came into force, Downing Street adopted a policy of automatically deleting emails more than three months old (paywalled). The IT decision has resulted in a “dysfunctional” system according to former cabinet officials, with Downing Street workers struggling to agree on the details of meetings in the absence of a correspondence chain. It is still possible to preserve an email by dragging it to local storage, but the relevance of mails may not be apparent at the time that the worker must make the decision to do so. Former special adviser to Nick Clegg Sean Kemp said: “Some people delete their emails on an almost daily basis, others just try to avoid putting anything potentially interesting in an email in the first place.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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British Government Instituted 3-Month Deletion Policy, Apparently To Evade FOIA

A QR Code on Heinz Ketchup Linked Straight to German Porn

When Daniel Korell scanned a QR code on a bottle of Heinz Ketchup, he got more than he bargained for. Rather than bring up the competition page he was expecting to see, it instead linked to a German porn site called Fundorado. Oops. Read more…

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A QR Code on Heinz Ketchup Linked Straight to German Porn

Apple De-Certifies Monster Cables After Lawsuit Against Beats

An anonymous reader writes: Since 2005, Monster cables have been licensed under Apple’s “Made For iDevice” program, which lets cable manufacturers put a logo on their product signifying they work with Apple products. Now, Apple has revoked that certification. In January of this year, Monster sued Beats, accusing its founders of fraud. Beats was acquired by Apple in 2014, and Monster is accusing Apple of bullying them by terminating the licensing deal. Monster’s general counsel said the move would “significantly disrupt Monster’s business and that the two companies had worked well for years, with Monster paying Apple more than $12 million in licensing fees since 2008.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Apple De-Certifies Monster Cables After Lawsuit Against Beats

Researchers Find Major Keychain Vulnerability in iOS and OS X

An anonymous reader notes a report from El Reg on a major cross-app resource vulnerability in iOS and Mac OS X. Researchers say it’s possible to break app sandboxes, bypass App Store security checks, and crack the Apple keychain. The researchers wrote, “specifically, we found that the inter-app interaction services, including the keychain and WebSocket on OS X and URL Scheme on OS X and iOS, can all be exploited by [malware] to steal such confidential information as the passwords for iCloud, email and bank, and the secret token of Evernote. Further, the design of the App sandbox on OS X was found to be vulnerable, exposing an app’s private directory to the sandboxed malware that hijacks its Apple Bundle ID. As a result, sensitive user data, like the notes and user contacts under Evernote and photos under WeChat, have all been disclosed. Fundamentally, these problems are caused by the lack of app-to-app and app-to-OS authentications.” Their full academic paper (PDF) is available online, as are a series of video demos. They withheld publication for six months at Apple’s request, but haven’t heard anything further about a fix. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Researchers Find Major Keychain Vulnerability in iOS and OS X

The World’s Thinnest 4 TB External Drive Doesn’t Need Extra Power

Chances are if you’ve opted for an ultra-portable laptop , you’ve made a few compromises when it comes to on-board storage. So an external hard drive for archiving your mountains of media is a must, and Samsung’s now squeezed four terabytes of storage inside a housing that matches your computer’s svelte dimensions. Read more…

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The World’s Thinnest 4 TB External Drive Doesn’t Need Extra Power

Malware Attacks Give Criminals 1,425% Return On Investment

An anonymous reader writes: Trustwave released a new report which reveals the top cybercrime, data breach and security threat trends. According to their findings, attackers receive an estimated 1, 425 percent return on investment for exploit kit and ransomware schemes ($84, 100 net revenue for each $5, 900 investment). Retail was the most compromised industry making up 43 percent of investigations followed by food and beverage (13 percent) and hospitality (12 percent). Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Malware Attacks Give Criminals 1,425% Return On Investment

Amazon Pulls Kodi Media Player From App Store Over Piracy Claims

An anonymous reader writes with news that the Kodi media player (formerly XBMC) has had its app pulled from the Amazon app store after Amazon decided that it facilitates piracy. Amazon said, “Any facilitation of piracy or illegal downloads is not allowed in our program, ” and directed the development team not to resubmit the app. The team was surprised to hear this, since Kodi itself does not download or link to any infringing content. It does support addons, and some users have created addons to support pirated content, but the Kodi developers are fighting that behavior. XBMC Foundation board member Nathan Betzen said it’s absurd that “Amazon won’t let us into their appstore, but they have no problem selling the boxes that are pushing the reason they won’t let us into their app store.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Amazon Pulls Kodi Media Player From App Store Over Piracy Claims

AMD unveils R9 Fury X, Fury, and Nano graphics cards

25 more images in gallery There’s not one, not two, but three brand new high-end graphics cards on the way from AMD. As rumoured, AMD is dropping the numerical branding and is instead grouping its top cards under the “Fury” banner. All are based on its new Fiji chip, which is a tweaked version of the company’s long-standing GCN architecture, and—as expected—all will come equipped with 4GB of stacked, on-package high bandwidth memory (HBM). The flagship is the $649 R9 Fury X, which launches on June 24. At that price, it is pitched directly against Nvidia’s GTX 980 Ti . It features 4096 stream processors—a huge jump over the 2816 stream processors found in the R9 290X—”up to” 1050MHz core clock, 256 texture units, 64 ROPs, HBM memory with 512 GB/s of bandwidth, a 67.2 GP/s pixel fill rate, and a six-phase VRM (voltage regulator module), which AMD claims is ideal for overclocking the card. We don’t yet have UK pricing, but it’ll probably be around £550. Despite using two 8-pin power connectors, the Fury X’s power consumption isn’t as high as some feared: the TDP is 275W, just a tad higher than the R9 290X’s, although it’s worth bearing in mind that in real-world usage, the R9 290X was much closer to 300W. The Fury X supports up to 375W of power for overclocking. Read 7 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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AMD unveils R9 Fury X, Fury, and Nano graphics cards