Technology - Google News |
- Apple kills $999 MacBook Air and 12-inch MacBook - CNET
- Amazon Prime Video finally works with Chromecast and Android TV - Engadget
- Zoom Mac flaw allows webcams to be hijacked - because they wanted to save you a click - Graham Cluley Security News
| Apple kills $999 MacBook Air and 12-inch MacBook - CNET Posted: 09 Jul 2019 07:43 AM PDT  The 12-inch MacBook is no more. Sarah Tew/CNETApple upgraded its newest MacBook Air and MacBook Pro laptops on Tuesday, but it looks like two notebooks have vanished from the company's site. The smallest of the MacBooks and the cheapest MacBook Air are now gone. The $999 MacBook Air and 12-inch MacBook are no longer available on Apple's website as of Tuesday. It appears the Mac maker will have the updated $1,099 MacBook Air and 13-inch MacBook Pro as the new entry-level notebooks. That effectively raises the entry cost of buying a Mac by $100, part of a broader trend by Apple to hike up prices throughout all of its new products, from the iPad to the iPhone. The removal of the two Macs also streamlines the lineup, offering a simpler, albeit more expensive, set of options for consumers. Apple says the $999 MacBook Air will still be available via its Education Institution store. While the iPhone continues to drive a vast majority of Apple's revenue, the Mac line has grown to be the company's No. 2 hardware line, having surpassed flagging sales of the iPad. First released in 2015, the "classic" 13-inch MacBook Air was the default low-cost option and a favorite of college students and young professionals. The thin laptop received annual updates until 2017 with improvements to its Intel processor while keeping the sub-$1000 price tag. Apple's 12-inch MacBook also made its debut in 2015 and received updates for the following two years. The laptop served as a tweener, smaller and less powerful than the Pro line, but more expensive than the Air lineup. The more powerful 2018 MacBook Air effectively rendered the MacBook irrelevant. Google searches for either MacBook still show the laptops available on Apple's site. However, clicking on the search results for the discontinued notebooks will redirect you to the company's Mac landing page. Apple didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. Originally published July 9, 6:23 a.m.  $1,099  CNET may get a commission from retail offers.
Apple MacBook AirThis posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Amazon Prime Video finally works with Chromecast and Android TV - Engadget Posted: 09 Jul 2019 06:08 AM PDT Sponsored Links Here's proof that Google and Amazon have truly buried the hatchet: Prime Video is finally available on Mountain View's streaming devices. The two tech giants ended their streaming video spat in April, paving the way for their services to become available on each other's hardware products. That means you can now cast Good Omens or The Man in the High Castle from the Prime Video app to screens bigger than your phone or laptop using Chromecast devices (or Chromecast built-in) or play the shows through the application on an Android-powered smart TV. To be clear, some Android TVs already have access to Prime Video, but Google says it will roll out to more TV models, set-top boxes and streaming devices starting today. You'll be able to download the app from Google Play or by clicking the app icon on your TV's home screen. Prime Video's availability on Google's devices is just half the story, though -- the companies have also restored Fire TV's access to YouTube. Google blocked Fire TV's access to YouTube way back in 2017 when the tech giants' feud was heating up, and it remained inaccessible until now. The current agreement only applies to Fire TVs and not to Echo Show units, but now that the two formerly feuding corporations have made up, a YouTube app for the device is not out of the realm of possibility. |
| Posted: 09 Jul 2019 03:30 AM PDT
Dumb. Shameful. Downright rude. Three of the words I could use to describe the Zoom video conferencing app after a serious security issue was discovered in its Mac version. Security researcher Jonathan Leitschuh has shared details of a vulnerability that can allow any maliciously-crafted webpage to open-up a video call to a Mac which has the Zoom app installed. In short, any website can turn on your Mac's webcam without asking your permission.
Now, you might think that taking the nuclear option of uninstalling Zoom from your Mac means you're no longer at risk of having someone unexpectedly spying on you. If you thought that, you'd be mistaken though. Because, as Leitschuh describes, when you initially installed Zoom it also installed a web server on your Mac. And even after Zoom is uninstalled from your computer, the web server code continues to run on your Mac in a hidden directory – waiting for you to visit a Zoom meeting link, whereupon it will (without asking your permission) reinstall Zoom. That doesn't just suck, it's downright rude. I want to control whose apps get installed on my computer. A typical Mac user would believe that dragging the Zoom app into the trash can would uninstall the app, not leave behind code that can reinstall the app in the blink of an eye without a user's explicit permission. Zoom hasn't just installed the web server on your Mac to reinstall its app, however. It's also using it to update Zoom, and aid the launching of calls. Leitschuh expressed his nervousness about this approach:
Zoom, however, appears to think the installation of its webserver code is justifiable because it's a "legitimate solution to a poor user experience problem, enabling our users to have faster, one-click-to-join meetings." Leitschuh describes how he responsibly disclosed the vulnerability to Zoom in March, alongside details of how Macs could be hit by a denial-of-service attack by bombarding the web server with pings. The researcher gave Zoom 90 days to fix the issues before going public. After a lot of back and forth, the denial-of-service vulnerability was fixed in version 4.4.2 of the Zoom app. However, Zoom's response to the other concerns were a "quick fix" patch that only disabled "a meeting creator's ability to automatically enable a participants video by default." (Yes, by default Zoom let the host of a video call decide if participants will automatically join with their video enabled, rather than the participants make that rather important decision. How dumb is that?) According to Leitschuh, Zoom fix for this vulnerability "regressed" on June 7 2019, allowing the vulnerability to still be exploited with the video camera activated. In a blog post, Zoom has attempted to defend the way its app works, claiming that users are able to turn video off when they join a meeting. Zoom also argues that users would become aware that they had joined a meeting:
The company goes on to say that it will be making changes in its next update:
I'm not impressed by the tone of Zoom's response, which feels in places like it has been written by the PR department. And I really don't like the idea anymore of having Zoom's conferencing app on my Mac. So I've uninstalled it. But, of course, that's not enough. I also need to remove the web server that Zoom sneakily also installed on my Mac, which could reinstall Zoom without my permission at a moment's notice. If you want to do the same, be sure to read the end of Leitschuh's article where he gives technical instructions on how shut down the web server and prevent it from being installed. |
| You are subscribed to email updates from Technology - Latest - Google News. To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google, 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, United States | |
This post have 0 komentar
EmoticonEmoticon