Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Okay, hey there,
Speaker 1: and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland.
Speaker 1: I'm an executive producer with iHeart Podcast. Send How the
Speaker 1: tech are you? It's time for the tech news for
Speaker 1: the week ending on March twenty second, twenty twenty four.
Speaker 1: And last week I dedicated an entire episode to how
Speaker 1: the US House of Representatives voted in favor of a
Speaker 1: bill to force TikTok's parent company, Byte Dance to either
Speaker 1: sell TikTok off or face a national band for the app.
Speaker 1: And I've got a couple of follow ups on that story.
Speaker 1: And to be clear, that particular bill still has to
Speaker 1: pass in the US Senate, which isn't a guarantee. In fact,
Speaker 1: it's not even a guarantee that the bill will come
Speaker 1: up for a vote in the Senate before it could
Speaker 1: be signed into law, so it's not a done deal.
Speaker 1: So first up, in that episode, I heavily criticized the
Speaker 1: US government for being far too myopic and focusing just
Speaker 1: on TikTok instead of looking at the larger picture in
Speaker 1: which data brokers collect and sell information from a host
Speaker 1: of different services and devices. And platforms. I argued that
Speaker 1: TikTok doesn't need to have a parent company that merits
Speaker 1: the quote unquote foreign adversary label in order for it
Speaker 1: to be a threat or a concern. I guess some
Speaker 1: folks in the House were thinking of the same thing,
Speaker 1: because this week the House of Representatives voted to pass
Speaker 1: a bill called the Protecting Americans Data from Foreign Adversaries Act.
Speaker 1: So this bill would make it against the law for
Speaker 1: data brokers to sell American citizen data to foreign adversaries
Speaker 1: such as China, Russia, or North Korea or entities that
Speaker 1: work within those countries. So it wouldn't matter where this
Speaker 1: information came from, whether it came from TikTok or Facebook
Speaker 1: or Google or Apple or any other entity that regularly
Speaker 1: trades and the zeros and ones that relate to American
Speaker 1: citizens information. If this has passed into law, the Federal
Speaker 1: Trade Commission or FTC, will be able to penalize data
Speaker 1: brokers that are found to have violated the law. And
Speaker 1: I think this is a modest improvement. It removes that
Speaker 1: laser focus from really a single company, that being TikTok. However,
Speaker 1: all that being said, it's still a pretty modest bump. Personally,
Speaker 1: I don't think foreign adversaries are really the only entities
Speaker 1: that we should be concerned about when it comes to
Speaker 1: protecting our privacy and personal information. I think domestic companies
Speaker 1: can be just as dangerous, like Meta or Google. That
Speaker 1: being said, the Verge reports that lawmakers behind this most
Speaker 1: recent act are hopeful that the recent ground swell of
Speaker 1: support that these measures have had, at least in the
Speaker 1: House of Representatives, could build momentum to a more comprehensive
Speaker 1: privacy protection set of laws down the road here in
Speaker 1: the United States, which you know, I sure hope that
Speaker 1: that's the case, because it's long overdue. Meanwhile, over at Gizmoto,
Speaker 1: Thomas Jermaine has a piece titled politicians who voted to
Speaker 1: ban TikTok may own as much as one hundred and
Speaker 1: twenty six million dollars in tech stocks. So Germaine points
Speaker 1: out that the stock ownership could indicate a conflict of
Speaker 1: interest with regard to the TikTok. Brewjaha that the companies
Speaker 1: that some of these politicians have heavily invested in are
Speaker 1: ones that potentially could benefit if something were to you,
Speaker 1: though happened to TikTok sure would be a shame. Could
Speaker 1: be that these politicians are not even entirely motivated out
Speaker 1: of concern for protecting US citizens, as hard as that
Speaker 1: is to believe, they might not be acting in our
Speaker 1: best interests, and instead maybe they're hopeful that by slapping
Speaker 1: a Chinese owned company around, they could see their own
Speaker 1: stock portfolio flourish. I don't know if that's the case,
Speaker 1: but I will say that once again, at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, it really doesn't even matter what the
Speaker 1: truth is, because as long as there is a perception
Speaker 1: that someone is acting more out of their own self
Speaker 1: interest rather than a genuine desire to be a leader
Speaker 1: and to protect their constituents, well that's enough to undermine
Speaker 1: confidence in that person. In fact, Jermaine's piece and Gizmoto
Speaker 1: really explores that issue thoroughly. I recommend checking it out.
Speaker 1: It's a well written piece and it quotes a lot
Speaker 1: of different people who are saying I'm not saying that
Speaker 1: these politicians are trying to engage in some form of
Speaker 1: insider trading. What I'm saying is this isn't a good look,
Speaker 1: and unfortunately it does end up hurting confidence in those leaders.
Speaker 1: And why they are doing what they're doing, and they
Speaker 1: need to address that. Now, let us turn our attention
Speaker 1: to the US government targeting another big tech company, this
Speaker 1: one firmly rooted in America itself. I'm talking about Apple.
Speaker 1: The US Department of Justice has brought a lawsuit against Apple,
Speaker 1: alleging that the company has made a monopoly out of
Speaker 1: the Apple iPhone ecosystem, and that the company had leveraged
Speaker 1: its near total control over that ecosystem to drive corporate
Speaker 1: valuation at the expense of pretty much anyone who wasn't
Speaker 1: directly an Apple stakeholder, including folks like customers and developers,
Speaker 1: and from a very high level, I don't think you
Speaker 1: can really argue against that. It's pretty blatantly clear that
Speaker 1: Apple has done that. They have nearly always been a
Speaker 1: buttoned down company that practiced jealous control over all aspects
Speaker 1: of its technological ecosystem. Now I say nearly always, because
Speaker 1: there was a period of time when Steve Jobs had
Speaker 1: been banished from Apple where things were a bit different,
Speaker 1: but upon his return, they kind of came back to it.
Speaker 1: This particular lawsuit cites a myriad of Apple decisions that
Speaker 1: support the legal accusation of the company being anti competitive,
Speaker 1: including the infamous Apple Messages issue. So the difference between
Speaker 1: those green and blue bubbles and Apple Messages is one
Speaker 1: of many choices that the Department of Justice says exists
Speaker 1: solely to pressure customers into buying into and then staying within,
Speaker 1: the Apple iPhone world. But that's just the tip of
Speaker 1: the iceberg. The DOJ says that Apple has also purposefully
Speaker 1: limited interoperability with technologies from other companies like smart watches
Speaker 1: or digital wallets, which discourages iPhone owners from branching outside
Speaker 1: the Apple world and kind of corrals them into buying
Speaker 1: and using more Apple products. Now, I've said that for
Speaker 1: years that Apple's very good at building stuff that works
Speaker 1: great with other Apple stuff, but not so great with
Speaker 1: working with other technologies. The iPod is a great example.
Speaker 1: Early on, if you didn't have a Macintosh computer, there
Speaker 1: was no reason to get an iPod because it wasn't
Speaker 1: compatible with other types of computers. And even when it
Speaker 1: was compatible, say like the Windows version of iTunes, was
Speaker 1: so bloated and clunky that it would discourage you from
Speaker 1: using it like it was almost it almost felt like
Speaker 1: Apple was intentionally trying to drive people to a band
Speaker 1: and whatever other technologies they used in favor of Apple technologies,
Speaker 1: because then everything worked really well. And so what the
Speaker 1: DOJ is saying is that the company has continued to
Speaker 1: do that, and it's doing it specifically in order to
Speaker 1: decrease competition in the space. Now, there's a lot more
Speaker 1: to the lawsuit than what I've already said, and I
Speaker 1: am no legal expert, but on a surface level, it's
Speaker 1: actually really hard for me to find much fault in
Speaker 1: the argument. Now, that does not mean that it's going
Speaker 1: to stand up in court. It might not, and Apple
Speaker 1: says it vehemently disagrees with the premise of the lawsuit,
Speaker 1: that in fact, that this constitutes a monopoly in the
Speaker 1: first place, and that the company is going to fight
Speaker 1: the lawsuit. Of course, the fact that Apple recently had
Speaker 1: to comply with EU regulations that deal with similar issues
Speaker 1: could mean that Apple is already on its back foot
Speaker 1: on this matter. Now, I do have another Apple related
Speaker 1: story I wanted to mention before we move on with
Speaker 1: other news. Technica's Dan Gooden has a piece titled Unpatchable
Speaker 1: Vulnerability in Apple chip leaks secret encryption keys, and as
Speaker 1: I'm sure you can imagine, that is not a good thing.
Speaker 1: The chips in question are Apple's M series of processors.
Speaker 1: I highly recommend reading the piece if you want all
Speaker 1: the technical details that the piece does go into great
Speaker 1: technical detail, which I'm not going to do for this
Speaker 1: news episode. But the challenge of fixing this problem is
Speaker 1: that the vulnerability is actually built into the architecture of
Speaker 1: the chips themselves, as in the physical layout of the
Speaker 1: chips design. So that kind of thing is not easy
Speaker 1: to fix. You know, you can't just take the chip
Speaker 1: in to get an alteration. You would either need to
Speaker 1: swap the chip out for a different one with a
Speaker 1: completely different architecture, and that would still need to be
Speaker 1: able to work with whatever device in question you're switching
Speaker 1: out of. Right, Like, a different architecture doesn't necessarily mean
Speaker 1: that it's going to be compatible with the computer you're using.
Speaker 1: Or you know, you have to wait for a new
Speaker 1: generation of devices that have a brand new chip in
Speaker 1: them that don't does and include the flaw, Or you've
Speaker 1: got to find some way to patch the issue and
Speaker 1: try and work around it, and likely any patch you
Speaker 1: create would really impact chip performance because the chip would
Speaker 1: have to find a way to work that is counter
Speaker 1: to the way the chip had been designed to work,
Speaker 1: so there are no great solutions to this kind of
Speaker 1: a problem, and the vulnerability could mean that malicious hackers
Speaker 1: could steal cryptographic keys from Macintosh computers under the right circumstances,
Speaker 1: which is not cool. But again, you should check out
Speaker 1: the article in Ours Technica to get all the technical details. Okay,
Speaker 1: we've got more news to go through before we get
Speaker 1: to that, Let's take a quick break to thank our sponsors.
Speaker 1: We're back, so I've got more government versus tech stories
Speaker 1: to cover. A Senator Elizabeth Warren is calling on the
Speaker 1: Securities in Exchange Commission or SEC in the US to
Speaker 1: investigate Elon Musk and Tesla. This would not be the
Speaker 1: first rodeo between the SEC and Tesla if this investigation
Speaker 1: does in fact launch. There have been a few tussles
Speaker 1: between Musk and the SEC in the past, as Musk
Speaker 1: has shown quite a few times that apparently he sees
Speaker 1: rules as being something that happened to other people. Anyway,
Speaker 1: what is the reasoning behind this current push for an investigation. Well,
Speaker 1: Warren says she is concerned there could be a quote
Speaker 1: possible misappropriation of Tesla resources and conflicts of interest arising
Speaker 1: from mister Musk's dual role at Tesla and X renamed
Speaker 1: from Twitter end quote. This is something that some Tesla
Speaker 1: shareholders have been arguing for some time, so at the
Speaker 1: very least, they have said that Musk dividing his attention
Speaker 1: between his electric vehicle car company that has been down
Speaker 1: a pretty bumpy road for a couple of years now
Speaker 1: and a trash fire of a social media platform isn't
Speaker 1: really in the best interest for Tesla shareholders. I mean,
Speaker 1: this was the reason why Musk named an new CEO
Speaker 1: for X, even though Musk has not really stepped away
Speaker 1: from X all that much. So. Warren alleges that the
Speaker 1: board of directors over at Tesla is essentially stocked with Musks,
Speaker 1: buddies and cronies, that it's it's a Musk controlled board
Speaker 1: of directors, and that this is good for Elon Musk,
Speaker 1: but it's not good for shareholders or for the company itself.
Speaker 1: One might argue that Musk's compensation package serves as evidence
Speaker 1: that this accusation has some merit to it. Warren also
Speaker 1: cites Elon Musk himself, who has stated on X and
Speaker 1: elsewhere that his desire to gain twenty five percent voting
Speaker 1: power at TESLA is a very real concern of his,
Speaker 1: and that if he doesn't get what he wants, he's
Speaker 1: gonna make them sorry. Not in so many words, but
Speaker 1: you know that's the gist of it. Musk has responded
Speaker 1: in his own typical way by lobbying criticisms and accusations
Speaker 1: and insults through his ex platform. So will we see
Speaker 1: the SEC go after Musk yet again? And if so,
Speaker 1: will the SEC again slap Musk with more penalties? I
Speaker 1: would say probably, But that's largely because Musk makes it
Speaker 1: really hard to not go after him. He just seems
Speaker 1: intent on escalating situations. All right, But how about some
Speaker 1: positive news related to one of Musk's endeavors for real,
Speaker 1: I'm not being facetious here. Nolan Arba is the first
Speaker 1: human recipient of a Neurlink brain computer interface system. So
Speaker 1: Neurlink is one of Elon Musk's companies, and Arba is
Speaker 1: a quadriplegic who opted into the surgery to have a
Speaker 1: Neurlink interface implant, and he reports that he can now
Speaker 1: control a cursor on a computer screen just by imagining
Speaker 1: the cursor moving around and He's actually likened it to
Speaker 1: being akin to using the Force in a Star Wars movie.
Speaker 1: It's given him the ability to play Civilization six, which
Speaker 1: is a turn based strategy game in one of his
Speaker 1: favorite video games, and I think that's pretty awesome. So
Speaker 1: our Ba says that the technology hasn't been flawless, it's
Speaker 1: not without its issues, but that he's been given a
Speaker 1: ton more agency than he experienced in the past. And
Speaker 1: I think any technology that increases accessibility and gives folks
Speaker 1: more autonomy is something that we should really be proud of,
Speaker 1: and I think it's super cool. We also have to
Speaker 1: remember that there still are concerns about Neuralink, including ethical
Speaker 1: concerns about how the company has experimented on animals in
Speaker 1: the process of developing this technology, and that perhaps it
Speaker 1: hasn't done so responsibly, so we can't ignore that. But
Speaker 1: I do think it's important that you know, I acknowledge
Speaker 1: the stuff that is legitimately really cool, and I think
Speaker 1: giving folks the ability to have computer access even if
Speaker 1: they don't have command of their limbs, I think that's
Speaker 1: really awesome. Back to various US government agencies that are
Speaker 1: trying to hold tech companies to task. So next up,
Speaker 1: I want to talk about the Federal Communications Commission, or FCC,
Speaker 1: as well as the cable industry. So I'm largely drawing
Speaker 1: from an article written by John Broadkin for Ours Technica.
Speaker 1: It's titled FCC bans cable TV industry favorite trick for
Speaker 1: hiding full cost of service, So you might remember this
Speaker 1: has been an ongoing issue. The FCC has argued that
Speaker 1: cable companies regularly hide tons of fees in monthly bills,
Speaker 1: so that the amount you have to pay is significantly
Speaker 1: higher than the amount the cable companies advertise. So the
Speaker 1: company might say, like, this is just a hypothetical example
Speaker 1: that perhaps monthly service would cost forty nine dollars, But
Speaker 1: this is before all these odd fees start to pop up,
Speaker 1: and it balloons that figure to much higher levels every
Speaker 1: billing cycle. So now the FCC has mandated that cable
Speaker 1: companies include the all in price while they advertise services.
Speaker 1: The cable company can't cite some stripped down version only
Speaker 1: to pull the old switch ru when it's time to
Speaker 1: actually build customers. Instead, they have to say what the
Speaker 1: full cost is going to be instead of saying, oh
Speaker 1: sorry that yeah, that was without the broadcast TV fee included,
Speaker 1: you know, or whatever. Cable companies are ticked off. No
Speaker 1: big surprise there. Broadcod quotes a lobby group for the
Speaker 1: industry that says, quote, micro management of advertising in today's
Speaker 1: hyper competitive marketplace will force operators to either clutter their
Speaker 1: ads with confusing disclosures or leave pricing information out entirely
Speaker 1: end quote. And I just want to say, all right,
Speaker 1: First of all, what do you mean by hyper competitive marketplace?
Speaker 1: That is laughable? In the United States. There are tons
Speaker 1: of households in the US that have little to no
Speaker 1: choice in providers when it comes to things like terrestrial
Speaker 1: television service. So where is this competition you're talking about
Speaker 1: unless you're talking about competing with other forms like streaming services.
Speaker 1: And yes, cable TV is dying out, but it's because
Speaker 1: largely of the predatory practices and terrible service associated with
Speaker 1: cable companies. Anyway, these new rules won't take effect for
Speaker 1: several more months, and there are a lot more processes
Speaker 1: that are to follow, so you can easily imagine the
Speaker 1: cable industry is likely to contest this and the FCC's
Speaker 1: authority to even pass this in the first place. So
Speaker 1: fun times. But I recommend the article in Ours Technica
Speaker 1: if you want to know more of than details. Alexandra
Speaker 1: Alper of Reuter's reported on the United Nations adopting a
Speaker 1: global resolution that focuses on artificial intelligence and how countries
Speaker 1: must commit to protecting human rights while making sure AI doesn't,
Speaker 1: you know, go all terminator on US done those exact words,
Speaker 1: mind you. So the US is actually the country that
Speaker 1: proposed this resolution, China co sponsored it, and those are
Speaker 1: you know, the two leading superpowers advancing AI technology in
Speaker 1: the world today. And you know, we've seen numerous times
Speaker 1: in the recent past that the way AI has been
Speaker 1: advanced hasn't always been in the most peaceful or non
Speaker 1: disruptive ways. So this resolution has passed, but it's also
Speaker 1: a non binding resolution. So you could make an argument,
Speaker 1: and I certainly do that there is a lot of
Speaker 1: circumstance going on here, but nothing really of substance. It's
Speaker 1: kind of like leaders saying, yes, these are things that
Speaker 1: we should definitely be concerned about, and then that's the
Speaker 1: extent of it, and everything just keeps on going the
Speaker 1: way it's been going, which is kind of frustrating. If
Speaker 1: you ask me, I guess once we're all reduced to
Speaker 1: hiding out in bunkers as the robots rampage overhead. We
Speaker 1: can scold the various world leaders for not actually doing
Speaker 1: anything substantial about safeguarding against risks associated with AI, but
Speaker 1: just you know, saying we probably should. It's just a
Speaker 1: man politics. I get it why everyone hates when I
Speaker 1: bring it up. It's unfortunate. I don't want to either.
Speaker 1: It's just the world we live in. So John Ray,
Speaker 1: the guy who was brought in to help dismantle the
Speaker 1: bankrupted cryptocurrency company FTX, y'all remember that one, right, Jenrey
Speaker 1: was brought in in order to return as much value
Speaker 1: as he could to investors and former customers of this
Speaker 1: cryptocurrency exchange, and he has now weighed in on Sam
Speaker 1: Bankman Freed's current fate. So Freed, or SBF as he
Speaker 1: was known in the crypto community, is coming up for
Speaker 1: sentencing soon. He was found guilty on multiple charges of
Speaker 1: fraud earlier, and now he faces up to a maximum
Speaker 1: of one hundred and ten years in prison, though it
Speaker 1: could be significantly fewer than that. It could be like
Speaker 1: five years if the judge decides, and SBF essentially has
Speaker 1: previously argued for clemency. He wrote letters that stay at
Speaker 1: his crimes resulted in essentially no losses or harmed to
Speaker 1: customers and investors, et cetera. So John Ray wrote in
Speaker 1: to say, oh, contrere monfrere Yeah. He says that stakeholders
Speaker 1: have filed claims that collectively amount to twenty three point
Speaker 1: six quintillion dollars, that is beyond a princely sum. The
Speaker 1: actual estimated loss is somewhere around ten billion dollars, still
Speaker 1: an astronomical amount of money, but not in the quintillion range,
Speaker 1: So there's some discrepancy here. And Ray says that like
Speaker 1: in order to address each claim, there is a significant
Speaker 1: amount of work that goes into it. So clearly there
Speaker 1: is a real cost associated with SBF's crimes here. And
Speaker 1: Ray does not mince words in his letter. He says
Speaker 1: that while his team has worked very hard to get
Speaker 1: as much back as possible, it did so while SBF
Speaker 1: was casting aspersions on their efforts. And moreover, there are
Speaker 1: plenty of cases where there's just no way to reclaim
Speaker 1: what had been lost, including quote, the bribes to Chinese
Speaker 1: officials or the hundreds of millions of dollars he meaning
Speaker 1: SBF spent to buy access to or time with celebrities
Speaker 1: or politicians or investments for which he grossly overpaid having
Speaker 1: done zero diligence. The harm was vast, the remorse is nonexistent.
Speaker 1: End quote yaoza. That is spilling the ding dang darn tea, y'all.
Speaker 1: But beyond on that, Ray also outlined five times he
Speaker 1: says SBF lied in an effort to ask for a
Speaker 1: lighter sentence. So John Ray is essentially saying, throw the
Speaker 1: book at this guy. That the crimes that SBF committed
Speaker 1: and his continued quest to shift blame to other people
Speaker 1: show that he doesn't deserve a lighter sentence, So we'll
Speaker 1: have to see what actually gets handed down. Prosecutors are
Speaker 1: calling for a pretty hefty sentence of around like forty
Speaker 1: or fifty years, so I'm not feeling too optimistic for
Speaker 1: SBF's chances of getting out with a light one in
Speaker 1: this particular case. I think the judge might be a
Speaker 1: little more inclined to lean a bit heavier in this
Speaker 1: particular example. Okay, I've got some more news stories to
Speaker 1: get through before we get to that. Let's take another
Speaker 1: quick break, all right, Now we've got a couple of
Speaker 1: hacking stories that we should cover, So first up, some
Speaker 1: researchers at Colorado State University uncovered vulnerabilities in electronic logging
Speaker 1: devices or elds that are used by the trucking industry.
Speaker 1: So the purpose of an ELD is to keep track
Speaker 1: of stuff like the number of miles and hours driven
Speaker 1: for a run of vehicle performance and stuff like that. Right,
Speaker 1: it's to be part of fleet maintenance and oversight for
Speaker 1: things like drivers and individual vehicles. But the researchers found
Speaker 1: that at least one type of ELD and there's only
Speaker 1: a few that are used by the whole industry. These
Speaker 1: elds are components that are part of larger systems, and
Speaker 1: while there are a ton of these systems that are
Speaker 1: in use in the trucking industry, there are only, you know,
Speaker 1: a few elds that are produced. So at least one,
Speaker 1: maybe more of these elds has a severe vulnerability that
Speaker 1: can be compromised via Bluetooth or Wi Fi. And it's
Speaker 1: even possible to do a compromising attack on one of
Speaker 1: these elds if you're just driving relatively close to a
Speaker 1: truck that's in motion that has a system that has
Speaker 1: this ELD in it, and once it's compromised, the attacker
Speaker 1: can do stuff like they can send a signal that
Speaker 1: would force a truck driver to pull off the road.
Speaker 1: They can even infect the truck so that it in
Speaker 1: turn will infect other trucks if they come within driving range.
Speaker 1: And it's like turning a truck into patient zero for
Speaker 1: a pandemic, only it's a computer virus rather than a
Speaker 1: biological one. And obviously this vulnerability could lead to a
Speaker 1: situation where an entire fleet could become compromised and then manipulated.
Speaker 1: It's a huge danger to not only drivers on the road,
Speaker 1: but also supply chains in general. So, according to the researchers,
Speaker 1: the manufacturer behind the particular ELD they have tested, they
Speaker 1: didn't reveal which one it was. They said that company
Speaker 1: is working on a firmware update that could address this problem.
Speaker 1: But the researchers say other elds might have similar vulnerabilities,
Speaker 1: and that all manufacturers should be investigating this so that
Speaker 1: they can avoid, say a series of attacks that could
Speaker 1: have a severe impact on the shipping industry in the
Speaker 1: United States. Next up are some research hackers who disclose
Speaker 1: that electronic locks from Dormacaba have a massive security flaw
Speaker 1: in them, so these locks use RFID technology. Lots of
Speaker 1: hotels use this particular brand for their door locks, and
Speaker 1: the hacker showed that using an NFC capable device like
Speaker 1: even an Android phone with NFC it's near field communication abilities,
Speaker 1: you can clone hotel key cards and use the cloned
Speaker 1: card to then access a room like you can make
Speaker 1: a master key this way. All you really need is
Speaker 1: an actual key card that was compatible with these systems
Speaker 1: and an NFC enabled device to send a signal to
Speaker 1: overwrite the information on that key card. You know, these
Speaker 1: cards are meant to be wiped and then re used, right,
Speaker 1: so if you can do that and you overwrite the
Speaker 1: info onto the key card, then you can create essentially
Speaker 1: a skeleton key that'll work on these locks. That includes
Speaker 1: being able to open dead bolts, because while you can't
Speaker 1: close a dead bolt on your hotel room door, typically
Speaker 1: these dead bolts are also connected to electronic systems, so
Speaker 1: that housekeeping, for example, can open the door even if
Speaker 1: you've closed the dead bolts. So really the only thing
Speaker 1: you're left with that can keep your door locked would
Speaker 1: be something like if it has a chain on it,
Speaker 1: or something similar along those lines. You know, something that
Speaker 1: you manually use to secure the door, and even then
Speaker 1: you know it's just another level of protection. It's not
Speaker 1: meant to keep everyone out forever. So researchers had already
Speaker 1: worked with Dormacaba and told them about this vulnerability, and
Speaker 1: the company has done an impressive amount of work to
Speaker 1: replace more than a third of the locks that were
Speaker 1: out there in the world that are vulnerable to this.
Speaker 1: But that means you still have around two thirds of
Speaker 1: the locks that are still vulnerable, and it could take
Speaker 1: years to replace most of those because apparently it's not
Speaker 1: just replacing the locks, it's updating the entire system so
Speaker 1: that that includes key cards and the encoders and everything
Speaker 1: like that. The researchers say that as far as they
Speaker 1: can tell, the exploit is not currently active in the wild,
Speaker 1: so that's something at least. But yeah, if you're going
Speaker 1: to be staying in a hotel, just you know, keep
Speaker 1: that in mind. You might want to make use of
Speaker 1: that safe in that hotel room if you can. Now,
Speaker 1: let's end with some fun news. There's a rumor circulating
Speaker 1: that Sony is preparing an upgraded PS five to launch
Speaker 1: in time for this year's holiday season. So this comes
Speaker 1: as Sony has said that the PS five is kind
Speaker 1: of entering the latter half of its life cycle, which
Speaker 1: is pretty wild to me. I still don't own a
Speaker 1: PS five or an Xbox Series X for that matter.
Speaker 1: The rumored PS five Pro should be able to deliver
Speaker 1: upscaled graphics and provide better performance and frame rates, but
Speaker 1: there's no confirmation on this story yet, so there's also
Speaker 1: no firm details to give about this console's stats or
Speaker 1: how much it's gonna cost. My guess is it'll be
Speaker 1: fairly expensive because Sony has stated that it plans to
Speaker 1: focus on profit for the last half of the PS
Speaker 1: five's life cycle. So it sounds to me like Sony's
Speaker 1: goal is not just to entice folks like me who
Speaker 1: never adopted the current generation of consoles, but to also
Speaker 1: convince people who already own a PS five to upgrade
Speaker 1: to the new model now. I think to do that,
Speaker 1: they're gonna have to really firmly demonstrate why this new
Speaker 1: PS five is going to be desirable. I don't think
Speaker 1: a boost in graphics or performance is going to be enough,
Speaker 1: like to say, like existing titles will run better and
Speaker 1: look better on this. I don't think that's gonna be
Speaker 1: quite enough to convince a lot of folks to upgrade.
Speaker 1: They're gonna need to have a decent library of launch
Speaker 1: title games that really demonstrate the value of the PS
Speaker 1: five pro if in fact this is their plan, because
Speaker 1: without those titles, there's not much of a sales pitch
Speaker 1: there unless it's for someone like me who just never
Speaker 1: got on one of the PS fives in the first place.
Speaker 1: And if I'm going to buy one, I'm more likely
Speaker 1: to go for, you know, the best version that's out there,
Speaker 1: rather than buy something that's been said to be on
Speaker 1: the end of its life cycle. And Sony is not
Speaker 1: the only company that's planning new hardware launches. Microsoft had
Speaker 1: a leak, a document leak that showed that a code
Speaker 1: name device called Brooklyn is a future Xbox hardware. It's
Speaker 1: like cylindrical in shape, which is interesting. And Nintendo reportedly
Speaker 1: is preparing to launch a follow up to the highly
Speaker 1: successful Switch handheld consoles, so should be looking at some
Speaker 1: new video game hardware in the not too distant future. Finally,
Speaker 1: I have a recommended article for y'all. It's from Time
Speaker 1: dot Com. It's by Will Henshall and it's titled Nobody
Speaker 1: Knows How to safety test AI, which you know, it's
Speaker 1: a bit of a problem. We all we recognize that
Speaker 1: AI can pose potential threats. That's clear that those threats
Speaker 1: range in severity from worrying about something that could cost
Speaker 1: a company millions of dollars or potentially replace people so
Speaker 1: that folks are out of a job, or all the
Speaker 1: way up to like AI powered weaponized systems that could
Speaker 1: potentially misidentify targets. I mean, there's pretty terrifying ways that
Speaker 1: AI could potentially harm us. But it's also hard to
Speaker 1: figure out how do we test for that, How do
Speaker 1: we discover how AI could potentially cause problems before we
Speaker 1: deploy that AI in the real world and just find
Speaker 1: out through experience that is an issue. So I recommend
Speaker 1: checking out that article if you're interested in learning more
Speaker 1: about that. That's it for this week's news. I hope
Speaker 1: all of you out there are well, and I will
Speaker 1: talk to you again really soon. Tech Stuff is an
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