As usual every Thursday, Wikileaks today released a new installment of the series #Vault7, the leaks related to the alleged hacking tools of the CIA. On this occasion, the portal founded by Julian Assange has brought to light documents related to Highrise, the application of the US Central Intelligence Agency to spy on SMS from Android phones. The well known popular leakster, Wikileaks has released the user guide for version 2....

Things have gotten a lot better in recent months, but at one point, almost all of the major tech companies closed their manufacturing factories and retail stores across the globe. These delays and closures caused uncertainty over when parts could be safely manufactured again and whether the anticipated new tech releases would happen as slated in 2020. Tap or click here to find out why the biggest privacy feature coming to your iPhone is delayed....

Take, for example, Microsoft, which is always rolling out new updates for Windows. A recent update — Microsoft’s fall update for Windows — added many new tools and features. If you haven’t found them all yet, here are new Windows features to try right now. Unfortunately, Windows updates don’t always go as planned. There are reports of serious issues occurring for some Windows users after another recent update. Here’s what’s happening and what you can do to fix the issue....

Programming language As we’ve discussed, lower-level languages are more efficient on their own, but as you’re calculating programming language efficiency, make sure to include energy consumption from the compiler, linker, and byte code generator. Problem-solving and algorithms It’s hard to find an optimized solution to a problem and code through an inefficient algorithm: I can add 1 + 1 to get 2, or I can first add 4, then subtract 7, then add 3 … and also get 2....

Remote workers are on the rise, and there’s a good reason for it. Advances in technology make it easier to connect. Recently, the Komando team had a call with a vendor who had team members in Arizona, Florida and other parts of the country. It’s the new normal! To pull off telecommuting, you need the right technology, which we’ll get to in a minute. First, let’s take a look at the trends in remote working and the advantages and disadvantages of each....

Collect them all? This loophole isn’t anything new, by the way. In fact, many mass-produced items like toys, games and electronics are often marked with a “collectible” label as an extra way for a shady third-party seller to squeeze some extra dollars out of hapless buyers. And the worst part: They can easily get away with it as long as the box is perfect and unopened. On the other hand, while a slim argument can be made for games, toys and electronics (which tend to have short shelf lives, and could be collectible at some point in the future), it’s inexcusable to apply it to consumer goods that people are depending on during the COVID-19 pandemic....

For a considerable amount of people (including Nokia’s investors and shareholders), Nokia Lumia 920 was a disappointment. Usually, after an iPhone announcement, Apple’s share climb (they also climb quite a lot before the announcement itself). Nokia’s shares fell by 13% right after Nokia Lumia 920 and 820 were introduced. The same happened when Apple introduced the iPhone 4S, Apple’s share decreased by 5 percent, but then they quickly picked up and one year later, Apple’s shares value has doubled!...

Why Simplenote? Simplenote is everything note-taking apps are supposed to be – they should digitally resemble the experience of a notepad in the most sophisticated way possible. There are no superfluous animations, coloring, or features I don’t necessarily require to feed the information. It’s merely a list of your notes, comes with tagging abilities so that you can categorize them, has a recovery option in case you would like to restore a deleted file, even has a dark theme, and most importantly, manages multiple platform sync ideally....

Or, for many people, as long as their laptop or tablet will connect to Facebook while they’re lounging around the house, they’re good to go. But if you’re paying attention, perhaps you’ve noticed that wireless internet in some locations isn’t as good as it could be. That’s part of the reason it’s getting a massive update in the form of Wi-Fi 6. What, exactly, is Wi-Fi 6? You probably had no idea there were five iterations before this one....

The Wileyfox Swift 2 is priced at £159 and it does improve on most of the quarters as opposed to its predecessor. For instance, the Swift 2 comes now comes dressed in a metal body alongside chamfered edges and prominent Wileyfox branding. Moving on, the main difference between the Swift 2 and the Swift 2 Plus is the bumped up 16-Megapixel primary sensor in the Swift 2 Plus as opposed to the 13-Megapixel one in the Swift 2....

Whether you’re in the dry heat of the Southwest, where it’s sizzling, or the muggy heat almost everywhere else, you’re sweating. Heck, your dogs and cats feel it. They’re panting right now. But did you know your electronics feel the heat, too? Well, maybe they don’t feel the heat, but they’re adversely affected by it. All those circuits working inside your smartphone, for example, heat up. When you have it plugged in to charge, it’s heating up....

The security flaw was dubbed KRACK and it allows an attacker to intercept data from a nearby Wi-Fi network, including passwords, photos, credit card information, private messages, emails and web activity. Basically, anything that’s normally protected and encrypted by the WPA2 standard. Click here to read more about KRACK and how to protect yourself from the threat. Since the KRACK attack put the security WPA2 of the standard itself in question, is the replacement for it in the works?...

This is an unfortunate scenario, but it should happen less now that American Express is accepted at 99% of places where credit cards can be used in the US. But for those few spots where you still can’t use your favorite card, here’s why. What’s the deal with American Express merchant fees? Before we talk about alternative payment options, let’s talk about why many retailers don’t take Amex in the first place....

As with previous security updates, the new version is now available and waiting for users to install it. Every second Tuesday of every month the tech giant Microsoft releases the monthly updates for its products, of course, the most used and well-known desktop operating system, Windows 10. This month was no different and Tuesday Patch brought the expected improvements to the tech giant well-known desktop operating system, of course, Windows 10....

As we have seen, the old boarding pass may contain a lot of personal information that could be used by ill-intentioned against us, so don’t throw away your old boarding pass! After a trip the boarding pass becomes useless, but does that mean that we should throw it in the garbage? Taking a look to a boarding pass, you will notice the presence of a barcode, so let try to understand what information it contains and how a hacker could use it for illegal activities....

A string of these little icons can tell entire stories. Or you could use just one to say what you mean. The possibilities for emojis are endless, especially when you come up with your own. Tap or click here for five ways to create custom emojis. While it can be fun to convey a mood or tell a joke using emojis, you must consider your audience. Certain emoji combinations may produce more than you bargained for....

Furthermore, tablets and Chromebooks have gotten substantially better over the last year, and customers have actually begun to consider them while looking for their next computer. These underestimated categories of computing devices have been aggressively snatching Windows’ share under Microsoft’s nose. Everything put together, it’s not difficult to understand why PC sales have been plummeting for five straight years. So, is there any way for Microsoft to come out of this deadlock?...

Should you break up with Facebook this year? We’ve got 10 reasons you might want to consider it, followed by a list of things you can do to protect your information if you’re forced to keep or reluctant to give up Facebook. Before you write to us and tell us that we’re not practicing what we preach because there’s still a Kim Komando Show Facebook page, let us say this: Kim took down her personal Facebook page a while back....

Don’t fall too deep down the rabbit hole of conspiracy theories. There’s never been hard evidence, and Facebook has long denied that practice. Frankly, it would be difficult for any entity to record and analyze hundreds of millions of random chats. It all comes down to connected apps Companies like Facebook don’t need to listen in because they already know you, inside and out. It all comes down to what you do in their apps and websites....

Managing cybersecurity was already a challenge for many organisations and their boardrooms: adding the cloud just widens the potential threat surface and increases the complexity for many. That’s especially the case for firms that might not even be aware of their cybersecurity responsibilities when it comes to cloud services. “Sometimes we still have a perception by organisations that it’s a set-and-forget-it mentality,” says Jason Nurse, associate professor in cybersecurity at the University of Kent....