Technology - Google News

Fisher-Price’s Chatter phone has a simple but problematic Bluetooth bug - TechCrunch
AMD Teases CES 2022: We are not letting the foot off the gas pedal, We’re full speed ahead - Wccftech
Realme's latest flagship phone apparently feels like paper - Engadget

Fisher-Price’s Chatter phone has a simple but problematic Bluetooth bug - TechCrunch

Posted: 22 Dec 2021 10:00 AM PST

As nostalgia goes, the Fisher-Price Chatter phone doesn't disappoint. The classic retro kids toy was given a modern revamp for the holiday season with the new release for adults which, unlike the original toy designed for kids, can make and receive calls over Bluetooth using a nearby smartphone.

The Chatter — despite a working rotary dial and its trademark wobbly eyes that bob up and down when the wheels turn — is less a phone and more like a novelty Bluetooth speaker with a microphone, which activates when the handset is lifted.

The Chatter didn't spend long on sale; the phone sold out quickly as the waitlists piled up. But security researchers in the U.K. immediately spotted a potential problem. With just the online instruction manual to go on, the researchers feared that a design flaw could allow someone to use the Chatter to eavesdrop.

Ken Munro, founder of the cybersecurity company Pen Test Partners, told TechCrunch that chief among the concerns are that the Chatter does not have a secure pairing process to stop unauthorized phones in Bluetooth range from connecting to it.

Munro outlined a series of tests that would confirm or allay his concerns. Since the Chatter is only available in the U.S. and was persistently sold out, TechCrunch set a page monitor to tell us when it was back in stock, bought one, and started testing.

First, we switched on the Chatter phone, which activates its Bluetooth connection, paired a phone over Bluetooth, then switched off Bluetooth to simulate someone walking the phone out of range. We then paired another phone with the Chatter without hindrance, allowing us to remotely control the Chatter's audio.

Mattel, which makes the Chatter phone, said the phone "will time out if no connection is made or once the pairing occurs — it is only discoverable within a narrow window of time and requires physical access to the device." We left the Chatter on and found the Bluetooth pairing process did not time out after more than an hour.

Then, Munro asked what would happen if we called the phone connected to the Chatter. Sure enough, the Chatter rang — loudly — as expected. Then we called the Chatter again, this time without properly replacing its receiver. With the handset off the hook, the Chatter automatically answered the call, immediately activating the handset's microphone and allowing us to hear ambient background audio.

Several years ago, Pen Test Partners found a similar Bluetooth vulnerability in a child's toy doll called My Friend Cayla, which the researchers found could be paired with another person's phone if the parent's phone goes out of range. The toy was eventually pulled from shelves after it was found the doll, when connected to its app, was recording what children were saying.

The Chatter doesn't have an app, and Mattel said the Chatter phone was released as "a limited promotional item and a playful spin on a classic toy for adults." But Munro said he's concerned the Chatter's lack of secure pairing could be exploited by a nearby neighbor or a determined attacker, or that the Chatter could be handed down to kids, who could then unknowingly trigger the bug.

"It doesn't need kids to interact with it in order for it to become an audio bug. Just leaving the handset off is enough," said Munro.

When reached about the findings, Mattel spokesperson Kelly Powers said the company is "committed to security and we will be investigating these claims."

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AMD Teases CES 2022: We are not letting the foot off the gas pedal, We’re full speed ahead - Wccftech

Posted: 22 Dec 2021 06:48 AM PST

In an interview with Forbes, AMD's CTO, Mark Papermaster, revealed that for CES 2022, they are not letting the foot off the gas peddle but instead going full speed ahead. This confirms that team red is going to have a ton of announcements geared for its consumer base which would include the main focus on high-performance computing.

AMD Going Full Speed Ahead With Its CES 2022 Announcements, Expect Some Major Reveals

While AMD has its keynote planned for 4th January at 07:00 PST (15:00 GMT), there's already some incredible hype around it. The reason is that the company has been teasing the announcements on Twitter and other social networks. Along with that, there's also speculation on what's next to come!

[embedded content]

The following quote from Mark should make us even more excited for the upcoming event which is just a few weeks ahead.

Mark: When you think about what we were trying to achieve with each generation – it was to bring a better experience. With the PC market – it was being under-served. With notebooks, the battery life wasn't improving, the graphics technology wasn't being exploited that fast and we set out to change that, better CPU and GPU performance, better performance per watt and it turns out it also helped desktop, especially gamers – they benefit from having a great CPU and a great GPU and how they communicate between each other. That's what gives PC users a great experience and that's what we focussed on.

We're so excited about the coming CES in January – it will be quieter than usual with a big virtual presence, but we could not be more thrilled than with the next generation of products. We can't reveal too much now, but Antony, stay tuned. We are not letting the foot off the preverbial gas peddle. We're full speed ahead.

via Forbes

Additionally, while AMD is expected to have a major CPU announcement in the form of Vermeer-X Ryzen 3D V-Cache chips, they would also be unveiled further details for the next-generation Zen 4 core architecture which will be the most major architectural and performance uplift in years after Zen 3.

Antony:Looking to 2022 and we've obviously very excited about the launch of Zen 4, what are you hopes for the new architecture, what do you think PC enthusiasts like me will be most impressed with and has it presented any specific challenges?

Mark: I can't go into too many details but it will be a completely enhanced experience. At the start we had to get back to the forefront of consumers' minds and if you want get value, go AMD. Well we wanted to go well beyond value. We wanted to offer the best performance and the best experience, so once we'd done that, we got a seat at the table with our gaming partners, our PC partners and all the way up to our server partners thanks to our leadership. We can deeply optimize for the end experience, so what customers can expect soon is ever increasing battery life, quality of service, enhanced application performance. We expect our customers to have a high bar of expectation for AMD's next launch and we're working hard to meet that with Zen 4.

Antony, with regards to the upcoming generation – I point to CES in January. We're excited to be revealing some additional details on our new product launches that will deliver phenomenal experiences and as we've said, later in the year as it progresses we'll share more detail on Zen 4 with some mentioned at CES and more announcements on it over the course of 2022. It will be a very exciting year for AMD.

via Forbes

AMD CES 2022 - What To Expect

The AMD CES 2022 keynote is likely to host a range of products, especially the next-generation Ryzen CPU/APU lineup for mainstream and high-performance notebooks. The new lineup will be known as Rembrandt and will power the Ryzen 6000H and Ryzen 6000U powered notebooks and coupled with both Zen 3 and RDNA 2 architectures. Aside from that, AMD might also provide us with more details regarding its upcoming Zen 3D V-Cache 'Vermeer-X' CPUs that are expected to launch in Q1 2022.

Moving over to GPUs, AMD is likely to showcase more entry-level RDNA 2 designs based on the Navi 24 architecture and to kick start 2022, they might even give us an updated roadmap so we could understand where's Navi and AMD's GPU division heading next.

AMD Mainstream Desktop CPU Generations Comparison:

AMD CPU Family	Codename	Processor Process	Processors Cores/Threads (Max)	TDPs	Platform	Platform Chipset	Memory Support	PCIe Support	Launch
Ryzen 1000	Summit Ridge	14nm (Zen 1)	8/16	95W	AM4	300-Series	DDR4-2677	Gen 3.0	2017
Ryzen 2000	Pinnacle Ridge	12nm (Zen +)	8/16	105W	AM4	400-Series	DDR4-2933	Gen 3.0	2018
Ryzen 3000	Matisse	7nm (Zen 2)	16/32	105W	AM4	500-Series	DDR4-3200	Gen 4.0	2019
Ryzen 5000	Vermeer	7nm (Zen 3)	16/32	105W	AM4	500-Series	DDR4-3200	Gen 4.0	2020
Ryzen 6000	Warhol?	7nm (Zen 3D)	16/32	105W	AM4	500-Series	DDR4-3200	Gen 4.0	2022
Ryzen 7000	Raphael	5nm (Zen 4)	16/32?	105-170W	AM5	600-Series	DDR5-4800	Gen 5.0	2022
Ryzen 8000	Granite Ridge	3nm (Zen 5)?	TBA	TBA	AM5	700-Series?	DDR5-5000?	Gen 5.0	2023

Which CES 2022 announcement are you looking forward to the most from AMD?

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Realme's latest flagship phone apparently feels like paper - Engadget

Posted: 22 Dec 2021 05:57 AM PST

It was only a matter of time before someone other than Fairphone delivered a sustainability-themed smartphone (which is a good thing, of course). Realme, the sister brand of Oppo and OnePlus, announced that its upcoming flagship GT 2 Pro features an eco-friendly bio-polymer material on its back cover — apparently a first in the mobile industry. Better yet, Realme has once again collaborated with Muji and Infobar series design icon Naoto Fukasawa, who finished the GT 2 Pro's design with a textured paper feel on the body. They call this "Paper Tech Master Design."

This bio-polymer material, supplied by Saudi Arabia's SABIC, is based on paper pulp, and it has obtained International Sustainability and Carbon Certification (or ISCC in short) to prove its environmental friendliness. The Realme GT 2 Pro's packaging also uses much less plastic than its predecessor — from an overall plastic ratio of 21.7 percent down to a mere 0.3 percent.

The phone itself packs some surprises, too. For one, it's one of the first devices to be powered by Qualcomm's latest Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset, following the Moto Edge X30. The GT 2 Pro is also the world's first smartphone with a 150-degree ultra-wide camera (most are at around 120 degrees), which offers a unique fisheye camera mode for some fun photography.

There are also some noteworthy features on the radio side. In Realme's "Antenna Array Matrix System" here, there's the "world's first" ultra-wide-band antenna switching technology, which lets the phone switch to whichever of the 12 antennas has the best signal strength. In addition, this system consists of a symmetrical Wi-Fi antenna which apparently boosts signal stability by up to 20 percent.

But the most interesting feature here is perhaps the "360-degree NFC," which is achieved by hooking up the NFC module to the top two cellular antennas as well as its own, thus forming an "NFC 3 antenna array." This allows the upper part of the GT 2 Pro to read NFC on either side, which should make the likes of contactless payment and Bluetooth pairing easier.

For now, the Realme GT 2 Pro is only slated for a China launch at 7:30PM local time (6:30AM ET) on January 4th, 2022, but a company spokesperson confirmed that it will eventually go overseas. Given the brand's track record, this device will likely be competitively priced, but we're just eager to check out Fukasawa's latest mobile design in person — especially the supposedly paper-like texture. Stay tuned for more technical specs, prices and our hands-on.

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