Show Notes: linuxactionnews.com/254

The post Linux Action News 254 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

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• Wine 3.0 Released — This includes in particular Direct3D 12 and Vulkan support, as well as OpenGL ES support to enable Direct3D on Android.
• Oneplus pwned — One of our systems was attacked, and a malicious script was injected into the payment page code to sniff out credit card info while it was being entered.
• ​Google moves to Debian for in-house Linux desktop — Google has officially confirmed the company is shifting its in-house Linux desktop from the Ubuntu-based Goobuntu to a new Linux distro, the DebianTesting-based gLinux.
• Meltdown and Spectre Linux kernel status — Some “enterprise” distributions did not backport the changes for this reporting, so if you are running one of those types of kernels, go bug the vendor to fix that, you really want a unified way of knowing the state of your system.
• Red Hat pulls microcode update — Which, er, sounds like Red Hat has given up and, to avoid any blame, has told its customers to just get whatever firmware your CPU maker is offering. And if it works, it works, and if it makes your box fall over, uh, don’t look at Red Hat.
• Red Hat: We Didn’t Pull CPU Microcode Update — “It’s actually an encrypted, signed binary image, so we don’t have the capability, even if we wanted to produce microcode. It’s a binary blob that we cannot generate. The only people who can actually generate that are the CPU vendors.”
• Ubuntu almost ready to patch against Spectre — This week we published candidate Ubuntu kernels providing mitigation for CVE-2017-5715 and CVE-2017-5753 (ie, Spectre / Variants 1 & 2) to their respective -proposed pockets for Ubuntu 17.10 (Artful), 16.04 LTS (Xenial), and 14.04 LTS (Trusty).  
• Skyfall and Solace: Meltdown and Spectre are just the beginning — Skyfall and Solace are two speculative attacks based on the work highlighted by Meltdown and Spectre.
  Full details are still under embargo and will be published soon when chip manufacturers and Operating System vendors have prepared patches.
• NHoS shut down — The small team behind an ambitious NHoS Linux project are calling it a day, citing receipt of a trademark infringement warning from the UK Department of Health’s (DoH) “brand police” as the “final straw.”

The post Linux Action News 37 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

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• Fedora 27 released — The Workstation edition of Fedora 27 features GNOME 3.26. In the new release, both the Display and Network configuration panels have been updated, along with the overall Settings panel appearance improvement.
• Firefox 57 arrives — It’s by far the biggest update we’ve had since we launched Firefox 1.0 in 2004
• There’s an option for people who don’t like change — a fork of the Mozilla code-base pre-Servo/Rust… Basically for those not liking the direction of Firefox with v57 rolling out the Quantum changes, etc.
• Ubuntu Unity 7 flavour might be on the horizon — A proposal to create a new community Ubuntu flavor which uses the Unity 7 desktop by default is gathering support within the Ubuntu community.
• LTS kernel 4.14 released — Anyway, go out and test the new 4.14 release, that is slated to be the
  next LTS kernel – and start sending me pull request for the 4.15 merge
  window.
• RISC-V support may be coming to 4.15 — RISC-V is hoping to see mainline with Linux 4.15. We’ve known for a while now about their mainline ambitions for 4.15 and a pull request was sent today, but it remains to be seen yet if Linus Torvalds will pull it for this merge window.
• Red Hat announces ARM version of RHEL — Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.4 for ARM, the first commercial release for this architecture.
• Oneplus backdoor — OnePlus accidentally left in place a diagnostic testing application made by Qualcomm. After decompiling this application, he discovered that it can be exploited to grant root access—effectively acting as a backdoor.

The post Linux Action News 28 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

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• Solus pushing forward Steam with Snaps — That snap, as some people have already guessed as much, will be the linux-steam-integration project, using a strict-mode LSI intercept module. We can also make various tweaks on top of that runtime to enforce ABI compatibility where it might be missing.
• AAC will be supported in Fedora Workstation 27 — What we will be shipping in Fedora is a modified version of the AAC implementation released by Google, which was originally written by Frauenhoffer. On top of that we will of course be providing GStreamer plugins to enable full support for playing and creating AAC files for GStreamer applications.
• Plasma 5.11 released — Plasma 5.11 brings a redesigned settings app, improved notifications, a more powerful task manager. Plasma 5.11 is the first release to contain the new “Vault”, a system to allow the user to encrypt and open sets of documents in a secure and user-friendly way, making Plasma an excellent choice for people dealing with private and confidential information.
• 5.12 aims for Wayland improvements — If we all just use Wayland and report and fix the bugs we run into I’m sure that 5.12 will be an awesome release on Wayland. So please help to make it happen!
• KDE turns 21 — t was on 14 October 1996 that the “Kool Desktop Environment” was founded by Matthias Ettrich. At the time he wanted KDE to be a “consistent, nice looking free desktop-environment.”
• Fwupd 1.0 Released — fwupd now supports 72 different kinds of hardware, support for another ~12 devices is currently being worked on, many vendors continue using or exploring fwupd, and around 165,000 devices each month get updated firmware using fwupd with LVFS.
• Oneplus collecting data in Oxygen OS — Moore discovered that some of the data being sent to OnePlus’ servers included the phone’s IMEI number, the phone number, MAC addresses, mobile network names and IMSI prefixes, Wi-Fi connection info, and the phone’s serial number.
• Say they’ll stop — By the end of October, “all OnePlus phones running OxygenOS will have a prompt in the setup wizard that asks users if they want to join our user experience program.” Not only that, but he also stated that OnePlus “will no longer be collecting telephone numbers, MAC Addresses and WiFi information.
• Librem 5 funded — 14 days early, we have crossed a historic milestone.
• Purism Collaborates with Cryptocurrency Monero — The Monero Project is a grassroots, community-driven initiative that advocates for privacy on a global scale by producing several free libre open source software projects, with the flagship offering being Monero, a fungible and decentralized cryptocurrency.

The post Linux Action News 23 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

The new OnePlus 2 specs, price, availability & everything else you should know are out. Motorola doubles down on Moto X with Style, Play & updates Moto G. Microsoft’s Arrow Launcher for Android, Razer acquires OUYA & Scientists confirm ‘impossible’ EM Drive propulsion.

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Show Notes:

• OnePlus 2 specs, price, availability and everything else you should know
• Motorola doubles down on Moto X with Style and Play, and updates Moto G – CNET
• This is Microsoft’s Arrow Launcher for Android (download APK)
• Some Steam Accounts Hijacked Following Security Lapse
• Razer Acquires OUYA Software Assets | techPowerUp
• Scientists Confirm ‘Impossible’ EM Drive Propulsion | Hacked
• Smoking Gun: MPAA Emails Reveal Plan To Run Anti-Google Smear Campaign Via Today Show And WSJ | Techdirt

The post EMerging Science | TTT 197 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

WireLurker is attacking iOS and Macs in China & researches say it could be the future of attacks for the platform. Google fires back at Dropbox & Microsoft by owning your “Open With” menu.

Plus what Office going free means for open source projects like LibreOffice.

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Google Drive now lets you open files in compatible Mac & PC apps w/ new Chrome extension | 9to5Google

Google announced today that it’s releasing a new Chrome extension called Application Launcher for Drive that allows users to open files directly from its Google Drive service in compatible apps on a Mac or PC. The extension adds an “Open With” option that will let users launch files in apps like, for example, Mac OS X’s Preview app or third-party editing apps like those from Adobe and Microsoft.

Users can enable the feature by installing the new Chrome extension from the Chrome Web Store and making sure files are synced using the latest version of the Drive app for Mac or PC. You’ll then be able to see compatible apps by right-clicking files and selecting “Open With” in Drive (as pictured above).

Researchers Discover New ‘WireLurker’ Malware Affecting Macs and iOS Devices in China – Mac Rumors

Researchers from Palo Alto Networks (via The New York Times) have published a research paper on WireLurker, a malware new family that’s been infecting both Mac OS and iOS systems over the course of the past six months. The researchers say that WireLurker, which is targeting users in China, “heralds a new era in malware attacking Apple’s desktop and mobile platforms.”

The WireLurker malware is the “biggest in scale” in the trojanized malware family, and it is able to attack iOS devices through OS X using USB. It’s said to be able to infect iOS applications similar to a traditional virus, and it is the first malware capable of installing third-party applications on non-jailbroken iOS devices “through enterprise provisioning.”

Thus far, WireLurker has been used in 467 OS X apps in the Maiyadi App Store, which is a third-party Mac app store in China. The apps have been downloaded 356,104 times, infecting hundreds of thousands of users.

According to the researchers, WireLurker looks for iOS devices connected via USB to an infected Mac, installing malicious third-party applications onto the device even without a jailbreak.

Once installed, WireLurker can collect information from iOS devices like contacts and iMessages, and it’s able to request updates from attackers. It’s said to be under “active development” with an unclear “ultimate goal.”

Former NSA lawyer: the cyberwar is between tech firms and the US government | Technology | The Guardian

Former NSA general counsel Stewart Baker said on Tuesday.

Speaking at Web Summit in Dublin, Baker claimed that moves by Google and Apple and others to encrypt user data was more hostile to western intelligence gathering than to surveillance by China or Russia.

“The state department has funded some of these tools, such as Tor, which has been used in Arab Spring revolutions or to get past the Chinese firewall, but these crypto wars are mainly being fought between the American government and American companies,” he said, in conversation with Guardian special projects editor James Ball.

Baker said encrypting user data had been a bad business model for Blackberry, which has had to dramatically downsize its business and refocus on business customers. “Blackberry pioneered the same business model that Google and Apple are doing now – that has not ended well for Blackberry,” said Baker.

OnePlus One sales numbers: 500,000 smartphones sold to date, stretch goal of 1 million by year’s end | 9to5Google

OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei confirmed to Forbes that OnePlus One smartphone sales have eclipsed the 500,000 mark to date, adding that the Chinese company has a lofty goal of selling 1 million units by the end of the year.

Forbes claims that OnePlus has achieved half a million sales of its flagship One device, which has been available on an invite-only basis since April, with an advertising budget of just $300. That small figure was allocated towards OnePlus experimenting with Facebook advertising.

Models go for $299 and $349.

OnePlus has been able to sell its flagship One smartphone for so cheap because it is only barely profiting off each handset sold. “We’re making a single-figure dollar amount on each phone,” Pei told Forbes. “That’s not the way we’re going to make money in the future, it’s just to keep the operation going.”

Microsoft Changes Tack, Making Office Suite Free on Mobile

“We’d like to dramatically increase the number of people trying Office,” John Case, corporate vice president of Office marketing at Microsoft, said about the new offering. “This is about widening the funnel.”

Microsoft says it has more than 7 million consumers subscribing to Office 365. It says there have been more than 40 million downloads of its Office apps for the iPad. In its most recent quarter, which ended Sept. 30, Microsoft said its consumer Office revenue grew 7 percent.

By making an unabridged version of Office available for free on mobile, Microsoft is betting it can get even more people to start using the software, without stealing sales from the PC and Mac versions of the product, where it still makes truckloads of money.

The post Macs Do Get Viruses | Tech Talk Today 87 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

OnePlus steps in it again by asking men to vote on pictures of women in their community, a new USB connector is near, and its amazing. Data shows women are often more serious about gaming then men and the ultimate telemarketer burn.

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OnePlus asks women to participate in degrading contest to get a smartphone

The startup OnePlus recently launched its first smartphone, the One, and to deal with production issues it’s been letting people buy them by invitation only, slowly offering them to more people as more are produced. It’s a weird system, and today OnePlus began supplementing it with a horribly conceived and deeply sexist contest that allows women to jump the line if they’re willing to have a bunch of internet dudes vote on their appearance. The contest asks women to draw the OnePlus logo on their body (or on a sheet of paper that they’re holding) and then take a photo of themselves and post it in OnePlus’ forums. From there, the 50 “most well liked” will get a free T-shirt and have the option of buying the phone.

OnePlus is calling it the “Ladies First” contest, and it’s basically as awful as it sounds. To say nothing of the fact that the prize is merely the opportunity to buy a phone at full price, the entire conceit is that the male fans of OnePlus are honoring women by voting on them. “In true gentlemen fashion and because chivalry is not dead, we are giving the lovely ladies of OnePlus a chance to skip the invite line,” OnePlus staffer Jerry writes. Jerry introduces the contest by writing that “OnePlus wants to give a shout out to the few but beautiful female fans in our community.”

OnePlus launches, then deletes ‘Ladies First’ promo contest – CNET

After letting the contest continue for a few hours, it looks like OnePlus finally made the right decision to take the forum offline. In a blog post on its contest page, the company acknowledged the contest was in poor taste, and called on the community for ideas on how to better get women involved in tech.

Reversible USB Type-C connector finalized: Devices, cables, and adapters coming soon

The USB Promoter Group has announced that the greatest invention in the known universe — the reversible Type-C USB connector — is finally ready for mass production.

The USB Implementers Forum will now take the Type-C spec and start building devices, cables, and adapters that support the new reversible connector. We could begin seeing Type-C USB devices over the next few months, but considering the lack of backwards compatibility (an adapter is required) and the mass proliferation of Micro-USB chargers, it may take a little while for Type-C to reach critical mass.

It’s essentially two USB 3.1 SuperSpeed connectors (which have the standard four pins, plus five more to enable 10Gbps connections). If you plug the connector in one way, the top set of pins are used; if you plug it in the other way, the bottom set of pins are used. It’s pretty simple.

The Type-C connector also supports the new USB Power Delivery spec (also finalized today), which allows for up to 100 watts to be carried over a USB cable (enough to charge a laptop or power most peripherals, including a monitor).

Report: Women Spend More On Mobile Games Than Men

• Supportive evidence for the report
• Additional Supportive evidence for the report

The mobile ad firm found that Flurry based on a sample of games that reach a total of 1.1 million devices on the Flurry platform, women actually make 31 percent more in-app purchases than men. Other than that, it found that women also spend 35 percent more time in gaming apps, and have 42 percent more retention over seven days on average compared to men.

Flurry notes that the data is measured on a worldwide basis, but “there is very little difference in the numbers when we looked at the US audience only.”

The new report comes as a Kim Kardashian mobile game has taken the world by storm. The New York Times reporting that game developer Glu Mobile said it generated $1.6 million in revenue during the first five days of the game’s release — and since the game is free, this money is streaming in from in-app purchases. An analyst even told the newspaper that the game could generate $200 million worth of revenue on an annual basis.

Males, however, are passionate about certain kinds of mobile games. Flurry also measured the amount of time that gamers spend in 19 categories of iOS games and found that men still spend more time in card/battle games, strategy, tower defense, sports and action/RPG. This shows that in general, hardcore mobile gaming still appeals mostly to men.

And now for a moment in Faux

Today is a good day…

Chris Blasko originally shared:

Today is a good day. I just had a call from a telemarketer. Did I yell and scream at them, you ask? Certainly not. Like a good IT administrator I put my skills to use for their benefit. Here’s how the conversation went:

Computer: “Press 9 to not be contacted in the future. Press 4 to speak to someone about your mortgage issues”

TM: “Hello, are you having problems paying your mortgage?”
Me: “Hi, this is the IT department. We intercepted your call as we detected a problem with you phone and need to fix it.”
TM: “Oh… ok, well what do we need to do?”
Me: “We’re going to need to fix the settings by pressing 4-6-8 and * at the same time”
TM: “Ok, nothing happened.”
<alright, so he’s not using a Polycom>
Me: “Are you using the new Polycom phones that we deployed?”
TM: “No, it’s a Yealink”
Me: “Ok, I see. You haven’t had the new Polycom phone deployed to your desk yet. Let me check our technical documentations for the Yealink.”

Me: “Alright, do you see an “OK” button on your phone?”
TM: “Yes I do”
Me: “Alright, you’re going to press and hold that button for 10 seconds.”
TM: “OK, pressing it now”
Me: “Perfect, let me know if you get a password request”
TM: “OK, nothing has popped up ye—-“
<click>

That’s right. I made a telemarketer unwittingly factory reset his phone which means he will be unable to make anymore calls until someone is able to reconfigure his phone and that will take at least an hour or longer if they can’t do it right away!

The post Women and Their Games | Tech Talk Today 43 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.