You can fly over floods… but only if there’s a place to take off and a place to land. Houston’s airports, like the rest of the city, have been dealing with high water and torrential rain caused by Hurricane Harvey, and while the runways are dry, it’s going to take some time for air travel to and through the area to get anything like back to normal. [More]
Google Assistant Begins Takeover Of Home Appliances; Alexa & Cortana Make Friends
By 8.30.17
It was a big day in news for connected-home devices, with Google announcing plans to put its Home technology on a slew of new appliances, while two competing digital assistants — Amazon’s Alexa and Microsoft’s Cortana — began to make nice with each other. [More]
Education Dept. Hires Exec From Scandalized For-Profit School To Run Enforcement Division
By 8.30.17
Dedicated and effective government employees can come from many prior walks of life, it’s true; the path through any career can be winding and complex. But choosing someone with major ties to a for-profit college that engaged in questionable behaviors to head up a division tasked with investigating for-profit colleges that engage in questionable behaviors seems like a bad sign. [More]
Hundreds Of Android Apps Pulled From Google Play Store After Researchers Discover Botnet
By 8.29.17
Google pulled nearly 300 malicious apps from the Google Play Store this week, after a team of researchers from several internet companies discovered that they were all hijacking phones’ power into a massive international botnet spanning more than 100 countries. [More]
Hurricane Harvey Cancels Thousands Of Flights, Disrupts Shipping
By 8.29.17
Flooding in the Houston area continues today, as remnants of Hurricane Harvey continue to unleash unfathomable torrents of rain on the Gulf Coast. In addition to the destruction facing local homes and businesses, all travel into or out of the nation’s fourth-largest city — both for people and for things — has been hampered, and will likely continue to be for some time. [More]
Uber Finally Lets You Opt Out Of Having Your Location Tracked After Your Ride Is Over
By 8.29.17
Late last year, Uber made a change to its app that let it track customers after their rides had ended. Many troubled months later, the company is finally walking back that tweak, and will once again let customers have more control over when their locations are used. [More]
New York Times Removes Book From Bestseller List Amid Accusations It Gamed System
By 8.25.17
The New York Times bestseller list is, at this point, an institution. Reaching number one is a coveted spot that not only allows you to sell more copies of your book, but also lets you put “NYT Bestselling Author” in front of your name on your next one. The prerequisite for the list, is, of course, selling lots of copies of your book. So how did a book that barely exists and nobody ever heard of manage to become a bestseller? [More]
Spyware Found In Over 500 Android Apps, Together Downloaded More Than 100M Times
By 8.23.17
Official storefronts that sell apps — Google Play and Apple’s App Store — do their best to make sure everything they’re distributing to you isn’t going to wreck your phone or steal your data. But one vulnerability in code used in hundreds of Android apps has allowed malicious actors to change what your app does after you download and install it, and the problem has affected millions. [More]
Stealing Your Identity Can Be As Easy As Stealing Your Phone Number
By 8.22.17
You’re smart about online security, right? Sure! You use two-factor authentication on all your accounts, you don’t use dodgy WiFi, you make sure to put a passcode on your phone, and you keep it with you at all times, never out of your sight. Unfortunately, that’s not enough to protect you. Because it only takes one thing to hijack your whole digital life: Your ten-digit mobile number. [More]
Verizon Changing Up Unlimited Data Plans Again, Begins Throttling Video For All Users
By 8.22.17
Verizon hopped (back) on the unlimited data train in February, joining all of its national competition in doing so. But six months later, as the dust has settled, those plans are getting some tweaks — and every Verizon Wireless customer is getting their video throttled as a result. [More]
Report: FBI Asks Private Sector Companies To Stop Using Kaspersky Products
By 8.21.17
Obviously, it’s best practice to use antivirus and malware protection on anything you have that can connect to a network — and that goes double for businesses. But a new report says that the FBI is now asking several companies in the private sector to phase out use of products from Kaspersky Labs over concerns about the founder’s Russian background and ties. [More]
Lawmakers Seek Investigation Into Alleged Attack On FCC Commenting System
By 8.18.17
When the FCC’s new leadership officially began the process of dismantling net neutrality rules, it didn’t come as much of a surprise when an overwhelming amount of traffic crashed the Commission’s public commenting system. After all, it happened a few years ago when these rules were being written. What did surprise people was the FCC’s claim — made without providing any additional information — that the system failure was not the result of too many people trying to comment, but a malicious attack. The FCC has never fully explained how it reached that conclusion, and now some lawmakers want to know why. [More]
Court Throws Out AT&T’s Effort To Block Google Fiber In Louisville
By 8.17.17
Competition in broadband and cable is scarce at best. That’s in part because when a new player does try to build service somewhere, incumbents like AT&T will pull every legal maneuver they can to try and block it. But one court has now ruled on a contentious case in Louisville, KY, throwing out AT&T’s lawsuit and paving the way for competition to come to town. [More]
Dish Solves Pending Channel Blackout By Giving Its Customers TV Antennas
By 8.17.17
While it’s news to some consumers that they can, in fact, watch their local news without a pay-TV subscription, carriers like Dish know perfectly well that over-the-air antennas work. And the company, apparently sick of paying retransmission fees in one market, appears to be using those antennas to call a network’s bluff. [More]
Trump Manufacturing Council Disbanded After Additional CEOs Resign
By 8.16.17
The private sector fallout continues for President Trump’s widely excoriated remarks about the tragic events at a recent white nationalist rally in Virginia. Two presidential advisory groups have been disbanded following the exit of additional CEOs and labor leaders. [More]
DOJ Demands Company Turn Over Info On 1.3 Million Visitors To Anti-Trump Website
By 8.15.17
Since most of us aren’t looking at websites via a Tor connection, we’re leaving digital footprints all over the place. The sites you visit may have a surprising amount of information on you, even if you’re not logged in, and even if you went to that site inadvertently. That’s why the Justice Department is trying to compel a web-hosting company to turn over everything it knows about anyone who ever clicked on a site that is critical of President Trump. It’s also why that company is fighting against this demand. [More]
Could Comcast Engineer A Mega Merger That Would Include 55 Million Customers?
By 8.14.17
Not so long ago, Comcast failed in its effort to merge with Time Warner Cable and create a cable/internet giant with around 30 million customers. But now that the regulatory winds have shifted in a decidedly pro-merger direction, some are theorizing what it would take for Comcast to engineer a telecom Voltron nearly double that size. [More]
Here’s A Partial List Of Closed Joe’s Crab Shack & Brick House Tavern Locations
By 8.14.17 — Updated: 9.5.17
As we recently reported, employees at some Joe’s Crab Shack and Brick House Tavern restaurants found out without warning that their locations had been shut down immediately. While the corporate owners of these brands did not provide a list of shuttered locations, we’ve been able to piece together some spots that are now closed for good. [More]
