BGR has managed to score the upcoming BlackBerry Touch/Monaco. This touchscreen + optical pad smartphone is said to have ditched the “Storm” name and clicky SureType. OS 6.1 comes along for the ride (sorry to those hoping for some QNX love) along with a new BlackBerry ID system that will ultimately make swapping devices easier as contacts, apps, and other data will be stored on the cloud and pushed downward. The Touch/Monaco looks nice for sure, but we’re not going to get too excited until we see some QNX bits bantered about. RIM…?
If the above tweet by @MuscleNerd is any indicator of our wait time for an iOS 4.3.1 untethered jailbreak, we’re glad to say our wait time could be coming to an end. Since we can’t rely on SHAtter exploits anymore, we’ll have to keep our eyes peeled for the next latest and greatest hardware-based exploit while making due with mere software ones for the time being. Let’s hope the last few bugs with the 4.3.1 jailbreak get patched sooner rather than later.
Android’s openness is both it’s greatest strength and weakness. While it’s awesome that consumers can pretty much do whatever they want with Google’s hard work, it also means carriers and smartphone manufacturers can as well. And as history has shown us, those outside entities are rarely “on the mark” or have consumers’ best interests in mind when customizing Android to their liking. And as the Android vs. everyone else debate has raged on in recent times, the word “fragmentation” has continuously reappeared. That could all be ending very soon however, according to a new article by BusinessWeek.
Google is apparently tired of the constant media buzz around Android’s fragmentation and lack of consistency across multiple vendors. As such, new rules are being required. Specifically, new partnerships outside of Google’s reach and other 3rd party tweaks much be approved by Google’s head of Andorid, Andy Rubin. Of course, manufacturers and carriers don’t have to play ball. But if they don’t, they risk being alienated by Google as they will restrict access to the latest and greatest Android code to offenders of their new rules — this all according to various sources from Facebook, LG, Samsung, Toshiba, and several more. Google is getting extremely stringent.
On one hand, that’s very bad for the platform that built its incredible success on openness and no barriers. But for a platform that is constantly splintered with each new OS release, it can also be good. Either way, things have escalated to government investigation levels as it is being reported that the U.S. Justice Department and European Union aere being dispatched to determine if any anti-trust claims are indeed true.
Is Google stepping on dangerous ground?
If you’re in the market for a futuristic transparent computer monitor, Samsung has two models that may tickle your fancy. The two models come in at 22″ and share a 1680 x 1050 resolution, with the only main difference being one monitor does black & white while the other displays full color. Contrast ratio (500:1) may seem low at first until you consider ambient light is the only backlight to be had. Besides the new age lighting, the two Samsung monitors in question feature HDMI and USB output/input as well as a claimed 90% energy savings over traditional monitors.
Pricing and specific release are as of now unknown.
If you thought no one could possibly be as stupid as Sony was several years back when it was found that they purposely distributed CDs that would install rootkits on customers’ computers, think again. Samsung is in the house with a new, even further reaching action — pre-installing keylogging software on new computers.
An article by Eset highlights a 2 – part story which involves a Norwich University graduate, Mohamed Hassan, who discovered a key logger on two brand new Samsung laptops. What’s startling is that the keylogger in question (dubbed “StarLogger”) records text and takes screenshots of the screen, making it even harmful than Sony’s rootkit of the early 2000′s.
Hassan reports that he found StarLogger first on a Samsung R525, and at a later date an R540 from a completely different store. When Mr. Hassan contacted Samsung, he was at first met with several denials and shrugging shoulders. But with a little persistance, Samsung CS finally broke down; they installed the keyloggers to gain customer usage information. Concerned consumers can easily and quickly determine if their computer is infected by checking the C drive for a folder called “SL”, specifically “c:\windows\SL”.
Under no circumstances is a keylogger pre-installed by the manufacturer (or anyone for that matter) ok or necessary. Back in ’04, Sony ended up paying almost $600 million out in fines and compensation. With technology becoming even more important in an increasing number of peoples’ lives and Samsung’s own digital infection potentially more harmful to customers, we could easily see Samsung break Sony’s record. Of course that is assuming a class action lawsuit is filed against Samsung. For the safety of technology users around the world, we certainly hope such a thing happens.
The other much less disastrous scenario (for Samsung, anyway) is if this keylogger is being installed by some disgruntled employee that is directly/indirectly involved in the manufacturer and shipping of Samsung’s laptops. Either way, expect to hear more about this in the coming hours and days.
Update
Congrats to Samsung for not doing a Sony (and ignoring this for days to weeks) and tackling this claim from the get go. After a thorough and very quick investigation, Samsung has responded on their official Korean blog:
The statements that Samsung installs keylogger on R525 and R540 laptop computers are false.
Our findings indicate that the person mentioned in the article used a security program called VIPRE that mistook a folder created by Microsoft’s Live Application for a key logging software, during a virus scan.
The confusion arose because VIPRE mistook Microsoft’s Live Application multi-language support folder, “SL” folder, as StarLogger.
(Depending on the language, under C:\windows folders “SL” for Slovene, “KO” for Korean, “EN” for English are created.)
Samsung will continue to respect customer needs by providing the highest quality products and services.
**See image below: Vipre (premium) run after creating an empty “SL” folder in the C:\ folder.
Congratulations Kansas City, Kansas. You are the first group of citizens to take part in Google’s 1Gbps internet project. Residents of “Google, Kansas” (previously known as Topeka) can’t be all to happy considering (1) they weren’t chosen and (2) the winner is from the same state. Nevertheless, hope has been restored. Google says Kansas City is but the first city of many to receive their uber fast gigabit network. Looks like we can all re-cross our fingers…
A BerryReview source fresh out of a RIM internal RDX developer conference today had some pretty interesting things to share specifically relating to RIM’s next step with their mobile OS — Highlander. Highlander as it is internally called will eventually take the name OS 7 once released sometime in 2012. As far as features go, nothing too specific was mentioned. Though RIM CTO David Yach did divulge that OS 7/Highlander would incorporate the best aspects of OS 6.1 and QNX into one, beautifully functioning mobile OS.
Moving forward, Highlander will be the sole OS for both the PlayBook and BlackBerry smartphones. Our biggest hope is that RIM can really start executing and wowing us with some fresh paint on the 10-year old OS and modernization of countless aspects throughout the current BlackBerry OS. Because as it stands now, they’re not at the top of our list. Come on RIM….
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