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Chip-based credit cards are a decade old; why doesn’t the US rely on them yet?

Ciaran McGuiggan Earlier this week, mobile payments company Square announced that it had developed a credit card reader that will verify purchases from an embedded chip on the card. Currently, US consumers primarily rely on swipe-and-sign credit cards, which give card details to a merchant through the magnetic stripe on the back. But because the swipe-and-sign system became overburdened with instances of fraud, MasterCard, Visa, and other financial groups decided in 2012 that they would transition their systems to a chip-based setup called EMV (eponymous for EuroPay, MasterCard, and Visa, the three primary developers of the standard) by October 2015. Square is hoping to capitalize on this transition by being one of the first companies out of the gate in the US to offer small and medium-sized business owners a smaller, less-expensive alternative to buying a whole new set of credit card terminals. The EMV standard works using a chip that’s embedded in a credit card, which effectively acts as a mini-computer. Instead of swiping quickly and having your card give its details to a merchant’s point of sale (POS) system, an EMV card creates a unique code for each transaction and (ideally) requires the consumer to enter a PIN associated with the card instead of relying on a signature. Because of this, EMV is often called chip-and-PIN. Making a purchase with an EMV card also requires the card to be present in the card reader throughout the transaction. Read 15 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Chip-based credit cards are a decade old; why doesn’t the US rely on them yet?

Updated Qi 1.2 standard makes wireless charging more wireless

The Qi-compatible Nexus 5 on the Nexus Wireless Charger. New chargers will be able to increase the space between the device and the pad. Andrew Cunningham The Wireless Power Consortium’s Qi wireless charging standard is wireless in that the phone is not physically plugged into anything, but it still requires your device and the wireless charging pad to be touching each other to work. Today, the WPC announced ( PDF ) that version 1.2 of the Qi standard will add support for resonant charging, making it possible for your phone to be charged when near a Qi pad rather than directly on top of it. A small image showing Qi 1.2 in action. WPC It’s a minor enough change that current Qi 1.1 receivers will be able to take advantage of it with no extra hardware, but it opens up a few different possibilities for companies that want to build Qi support into their products. The WPC says that Qi chargers can now be embedded within tables and desks rather than placed on the surface, making them less obtrusive. “New low power transmitter designs” will make it easier to build Qi chargers into cars, and a single Qi 1.2 transmitter will be able to charge multiple Qi devices simultaneously. Qi can also now supply up to 2,000 watts of power to household appliances (the release specifically mentions “kitchen applications”). Current Qi devices will be able to draw power from these new transmitters at distances of up to 30 mm (around 1.2 inches), while devices with purpose-build Qi 1.2 receivers increase the distance to 45 mm (about 1.8 inches). Engadget reports that the resonant version of Qi is roughly 70 to 80 percent efficient, while the old inductive version is around 85 percent efficient, and Qi 1.1 and 1.2 transmitters and receivers will be able to interoperate, so inductive charging pads like the Nexus Wireless Charger will still be able to charge Qi 1.2 phones. Just know that resonant charging will require a Qi 1.2 transmitter. Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Updated Qi 1.2 standard makes wireless charging more wireless

Modbook’s next project is the convertible MacBook Apple won’t make

The Modbook Pro X would be an expensive entry in a crowded niche. Modbook Inc. Before the iPad, people who wanted an Apple tablet could buy something called the ” Modbook ” from a company named Axiotron. For $2,279, the company would take a regular white plastic MacBook, take it apart, and reassemble it inside a purpose-built tablet case with a Wacom digitizer and stylus installed. After some financial trouble and the launch of an actual Apple tablet , Axiotron became Modbook Inc. , and the company launched the Modbook Pro , which did for the 13-inch MacBook Pro what the Modbook did for the standard Macbook. Today the company is ready to announce the third iteration of the Modbook, kind of. The Modbook Pro X takes the 15-inch Retina MacBook Pro (including the refreshed models introduced yesterday ), makes some modifications to its specs, and puts it into a tablet case. Like past Modbooks, the Modbook Pro X is designed to appeal to artists and other creative professionals who would like to draw directly on their tablet screens without having to use a separate drawing tablet. The catch? This project currently exists only as a Kickstarter project , with no guarantee the product will see the light of day if it doesn’t hit its $150,000 funding goal. The Modbook as a tablet. Modbook Inc. The Modbook Pro X will preserve all of the original ports and the CPU, GPU, and screen specs of the 2013 Retina MacBook Pro, crammed into a black tablet of indeterminate thickness and weight. The screen will be covered by a digitizer that supports 2,048 different pressure levels, and the Modbook will come with software installed to take advantage of the digitizer hardware. Optional “keybars,” small rows of keys mounted to the back of the tablet, will provide keyboard hotkey shortcuts that users can press without interrupting whatever they’re sketching onscreen. Read 6 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Modbook’s next project is the convertible MacBook Apple won’t make

LibreOffice 4.3 upgrades spreadsheets, brings 3D models to presentations

A 3D duck in the latest version of LibreOffice Impress. Document Foundation LibreOffice’s latest release provides easier ways of working with spreadsheets and the ability to insert 3D models into presentations, along with dozens of other changes. LibreOffice was created as a fork from OpenOffice in September 2010 because of concerns over Oracle’s management of the open source project. LibreOffice has now had eight major releases and is powered by “thousands of volunteers and hundreds of developers,” the Document Foundation, which was formed to oversee its development, said in an announcement today . ( OpenOffice survived the Oracle turmoil by being transferred to the Apache Software Foundation and continues to be updated.) In LibreOffice 4.3, spreadsheet program Calc “now allows the performing of several tasks more intuitively, thanks to the smarter highlighting of formulas in cells, the display of the number of selected rows and columns in the status bar, the ability to start editing a cell with the content of the cell above it, and being able to fully select text conversion models by the user,” the Document Foundation said. Read 3 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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LibreOffice 4.3 upgrades spreadsheets, brings 3D models to presentations

Podcasting patent troll: We tried to drop lawsuit against Adam Carolla

wasim muklashy Personal Audio LLC is an East Texas shell company that gleaned national attention when it claimed it had the right to demand cash from every podcaster. The company was wielding a patent on “episodic content,” which it said included anyone doing a podcast, as well as many types of online video. Now the company is trying to walk away from its highest-profile lawsuit against comedian Adam Carolla—but Carolla won’t let the case drop. In a statement released today, Personal Audio says that Carolla, who has raised more than $450,000 from fans to fight the case, is wasting their money on an unnecessary lawsuit. The company, which is a “patent troll” with no business other than lawsuits, has said Carolla just doesn’t care since his fans are paying his lawyers’ bills. Read 12 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Podcasting patent troll: We tried to drop lawsuit against Adam Carolla

Chinese military “hacked” Israel’s Iron Dome

Iron Dome The technology behind Iron Dome, the missile defense system Israel has been using since 2011, was allegedly stolen by Chinese military hackers. That claim was made by Cyber Engineering Services to Brian Krebs of security news site Krebs On Security , and it identifies Elisra Group, Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), and Rafael Advanced Defense Systems as the three defense companies that were compromised during the cyber assault. The perpetrators, Cyber Engineering Services says, are the same ones behind a spate of attacks that have come to light in the past few years, all attributed to Unit 61398, a Shanghai-based arm of the Chinese army. The five Chinese military officers indicted by the US earlier this year for allegedly hacking energy firms in the country also belong to the same unit. The hacks took place from October 2011, some six months after Iron Dome became operational, and continued up until August 2012. Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has said that many hundreds of rockets fired from Gaza, particularly during the current military operation and a series of clashes in 2012, have been scuppered by the system, which is thought to be one of the most effective missile-defense technologies in the world. Read 7 remaining paragraphs | Comments

It’s not just Verizon: All major US carriers throttle “unlimited” data

Verizon Wireless One of the most common reactions to Verizon’s announcement that it will throttle the heaviest users of its “unlimited” 4G plans went something like this: “That’s the last straw, I’m switching to T-Mobile!” Unfortunately, switching to T-Mobile, AT&T, or Sprint won’t protect you from getting throttled, even if the carrier is claiming to sell you “unlimited” data. Let’s take a look at the relevant passages in each carrier’s terms and conditions. We’ll start with the Verizon Wireless announcement last week: Read 15 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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It’s not just Verizon: All major US carriers throttle “unlimited” data

Model drone finds elderly man, missing for three days, alive

It took just 20 minutes for a model drone to locate a missing elderly Wisconsin man, a feat that helicopters, search dogs, and volunteers couldn’t accomplish in three days. Just don’t tell that to the Federal Aviation Administration, whose regulatory wings are already flapping about model drones. This weekend’s discovery of the 82-year-old man in an area of crops and woods comes amid a legal tussle between flight regulators and model drone operators—the latest of which coincidentally involves search-and-rescue missions. Read 10 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Robotic glove gives you extra fingers for grabbing

Melanie Gonick / MIT Four fingers and a thumb on each hand is pretty useful. Humans have gone from caves to sprawling cities in part because of our dexterous digits. But researchers at MIT think we could do even better if we had an upgrade. They have developed a glove with two extra robotic fingers that respond intelligently to your movements, allowing you to perform two-handed tasks with just one robot-enhanced hand. “You do not need to command the robot, but simply move your fingers naturally. Then the robotic fingers react and assist your fingers,” said the glove’s creator Harry Asada, of MIT’s Department of Mechanical Engineering . Read 10 remaining paragraphs | Comments

DOE, commercial partners start world’s largest carbon capture project

Earlier this week, the US Department of Energy announced that work has started on what when finished will be the world’s largest carbon capture facility. Located in Thompsons, Texas, the project will capture a portion of the emissions from the coal-fired W.A. Parish Generating Station. The CO 2 will then be compressed and piped to the West Ranch oil field, where it will be injected under ground. This will help liberate oil that’s otherwise difficult to extract, but has the added benefit that the carbon dioxide typically stays underground, sequestered. The project was originally planned as a small pilot that would only extract CO 2 from the equivalent of 60 megawatts of the plant’s 3,500MW of generating capacity. When it was realized that the amount of CO 2 from 60MW of would be too little CO 2 to supply the oil field’s needs, the project scope was expanded to 240MW. At that scale, the facility would become the largest of its type in the world. The exhaust gas will have its sulfates removed before being bubbled through a solution of amines, which will bind the CO 2 . Once separated from the rest of the gasses, the carbon dioxide will be released by heating the amine solution, which can be recycled. The CO 2 is then sent under pressure via a pipeline. Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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DOE, commercial partners start world’s largest carbon capture project

Ken May

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