Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio
Speaker 1: and I love all things tech, and it is time
Speaker 1: for the tech news for Tuesday, July six, twenty one.
Speaker 1: Let's get to it. An infosec researcher who goes by
Speaker 1: the handle dr web Anti Virus. I love that handle,
Speaker 1: posted a list of ten apps that are were found
Speaker 1: in the Google Play Store that are host to a
Speaker 1: trojan horse type of malware. This is a kind of
Speaker 1: malware that acts as a carrier for some sort of
Speaker 1: malicious payload. So you can think of it as kind
Speaker 1: of the gel cap that contains something really nasty inside
Speaker 1: it and just slips into a system. What specifically goes
Speaker 1: into a trojan can vary, but in this case, the
Speaker 1: malware's purpose is to scrape Facebook log and credentials off
Speaker 1: of phones. So lots of apps have options that allow
Speaker 1: users to link that app to a Facebook account, often
Speaker 1: with dubious benefits to the user for doing so. It's
Speaker 1: a pretty common practice and some users don't even think
Speaker 1: twice about it. They just click right through. In this case,
Speaker 1: doing that opens up the chance for someone to gain
Speaker 1: your login and password to Facebook, which is also why
Speaker 1: it's always a good idea to enable two factor authentication
Speaker 1: on any services that offer it. It's a bit of
Speaker 1: a hassle, but it can save you some real heartache
Speaker 1: in the long run. The ten apps include p I
Speaker 1: P Photo or PIP Photo Processing, Photo, Rubbish Cleaner, Horoscope,
Speaker 1: Daily In, Well Fitness, app Lock, Keep block It, Mass Sir,
Speaker 1: Horoscope Pie, and app lock Manager. Google has removed all
Speaker 1: ten apps from the app store, but people have downloaded
Speaker 1: these apps at least six million times collectively. Across all
Speaker 1: the apps, the apps gave no indication that they were malicious.
Speaker 1: All of them actually did what it was they claimed
Speaker 1: to do. They just went above and beyond and harvested
Speaker 1: Facebook data to on top of that, so if you
Speaker 1: use Android devices, it's a good idea to check to
Speaker 1: make sure you didn't download and install any of those apps.
Speaker 1: It's also a good idea to change your Facebook password
Speaker 1: and to activate two factor authentication. It's time for another
Speaker 1: cryptocurrency story. This time the King of Bitcoin is in
Speaker 1: legal trouble. I should add this is a self proclaimed
Speaker 1: King of Bitcoin, Bitcoin is not now, nor has it
Speaker 1: ever been, an actual monarchy. This guy's name is Claudio Livera,
Speaker 1: and allegedly he embezzled a lot of money from investor
Speaker 1: ers who are looking to get into cryptocurrency and buy
Speaker 1: a lot of money. I'm talking somewhere in the neighborhood
Speaker 1: of three hundred million dollars. Yelza. Olivera is the president
Speaker 1: of a company called the Bitcoin Banko Group, and a
Speaker 1: few years ago, in twenty nineteen, the group was in
Speaker 1: financial trouble. The company reported that after balancing its books,
Speaker 1: it came up with a shortfall of seven thousand bitcoins
Speaker 1: or so. So, in other words, seven thousand bitcoins just
Speaker 1: seemed to up and vanish. Now that could actually happen,
Speaker 1: of course. I mean if the company were to store
Speaker 1: the bitcoins in a digital wallet that in turn was
Speaker 1: on you know, some specific device, and then the company
Speaker 1: lost access to that device, like maybe they sold it
Speaker 1: or threw it out or something, well, that money would
Speaker 1: also be lost. It would be on that physical hardware.
Speaker 1: At least the record of it that allows you to
Speaker 1: use that money would be on that physical hardware. This
Speaker 1: is equivalent to stuffing a physic sical like combination lock
Speaker 1: safe full of cash and then throwing that safe into
Speaker 1: the ocean at any rate. The company then applied for
Speaker 1: permission from the Brazilian government to go through a process
Speaker 1: that would allow the company to reorganize its finances in
Speaker 1: order to you know, payoff creditors and and to not
Speaker 1: go bankrupt, and the government agreed to this. But then
Speaker 1: the Brazilian government noted that a year on into this process,
Speaker 1: the company didn't seem to actually be following the court
Speaker 1: prescribed process of reorganization. It wasn't doing what it was
Speaker 1: supposed to do by court mandate. And that's when the
Speaker 1: Brazilian government formed an investigation into Olivera, which ultimately concluded
Speaker 1: that he had been skimming money from investors for himself,
Speaker 1: and furthermore that he appeared to have had a history
Speaker 1: of doing this in other places, including the United States.
Speaker 1: Olivera is now in police custody in Brazil. Last Friday,
Speaker 1: we learned that a networking company called Kause, which makes
Speaker 1: products designed to help I T professionals maintain a minister
Speaker 1: network systems and I T infrastructure, got hit with a
Speaker 1: ransomware attack. Lots of companies rely on cause A products,
Speaker 1: and according to the company, anywhere from eight hundred to
Speaker 1: fifteen hundred customers may be affected by this UH and
Speaker 1: it's actually kind of a cascading effects. So because A
Speaker 1: gets targeted, right, they are the company that provides the
Speaker 1: services overall. But in that process of targeting the company,
Speaker 1: the hackers were able to breach data on about fifty
Speaker 1: of cause As direct customers. But those fifty customers in
Speaker 1: turn provide services to smaller companies, so we start to
Speaker 1: see the effects ripple outward. That's where we get to
Speaker 1: that range of eight d to fifteen hundred affected companies.
Speaker 1: The affected companies are essentially locked out of their cloud
Speaker 1: based systems. Hacker group called REvil m R e v
Speaker 1: I L has claimed response ability and has demanded a
Speaker 1: ransom of seventy million dollars in Bitcoin in order to
Speaker 1: release the hold they have on that system to decrypt it. Essentially,
Speaker 1: that's the most that any hacker group has ever demanded
Speaker 1: as a ransom so far. The previous record holder was
Speaker 1: um let's see here, oh you know what, still Rebuild.
Speaker 1: They demanded fifty million dollars from Aser earlier this year.
Speaker 1: A spokesperson for CAZA has declined to comment on paying
Speaker 1: ransoms to terrorists, And just as a reminder, you know,
Speaker 1: paying ransomware is not a great idea. It does not
Speaker 1: guarantee that you're actually going to regain control of your systems,
Speaker 1: and paying off the ransom sends the message that this
Speaker 1: is an effective and profitable type of crime, and that
Speaker 1: guarantees that you'll have more attacks in the future. Some
Speaker 1: companies likely make the choice to pay off the ransom
Speaker 1: because they happen to have some form of cyber insurance
Speaker 1: against that kind of thing, and I guess that makes
Speaker 1: sense from the company's perspective. I mean, if you can
Speaker 1: pay off a ransom and get control of your systems
Speaker 1: back and you get reimbursed for the money you spent
Speaker 1: because you're insured, you kind of made it all someone
Speaker 1: else's problem, right. Insurance companies are starting to see that
Speaker 1: problem manifest now, which I imagine means we're going to
Speaker 1: see some big changes in that kind of insurance moving forward. Anyway,
Speaker 1: INFOSEC researchers believe that revel is based out of Russia
Speaker 1: or possibly Eastern Europe, and we're seeing this a lot
Speaker 1: with a lot of criminal groups in Russia in particular
Speaker 1: picking up the pace. There's a general belief that the
Speaker 1: Russian government allows these criminal groups to operate. Maybe they
Speaker 1: even subcontract with these criminal organizations in order to target
Speaker 1: specific political enemies. That's an allegation that the Russian government
Speaker 1: itself denies. But generally speaking, if you're developing software and
Speaker 1: you're in Russia, you're pretty much confined to the Russian market,
Speaker 1: and hacking becomes a more viable means of making money.
Speaker 1: So um, yeah, I can't say for certain that the
Speaker 1: Russian government condones or actively supports these hacking uh activities,
Speaker 1: but the government does seem to be reticent in pursuing
Speaker 1: legal action against these hacker organizations. Let's put it that way.
Speaker 1: At best, it appears they're looking the other way, and
Speaker 1: at worst they're in cahoots. In addition to that, I
Speaker 1: also want to mention that the company because has said
Speaker 1: it is working to get the services restored today July six.
Speaker 1: By the time you listen to this, that may have
Speaker 1: already happened. Moving on, in India, Twitter is facing a
Speaker 1: very tough situation. The Indian government has ruled that Twitter
Speaker 1: has not been compliant with content regulation within the country,
Speaker 1: and as a result, will not enjoy liability protection against
Speaker 1: stuff that people post on Twitter. While in India, the
Speaker 1: law states that Twitter is to remove posts quickly in
Speaker 1: response to legal requests from you know, law enforcement, and
Speaker 1: that the company is also supposed to share details about
Speaker 1: the owner of accounts that post offending messages. So, in
Speaker 1: other words, if someone posts something that is in violation
Speaker 1: of these rules in India, then Twitter is supposed to
Speaker 1: give up information about that person to Indian law enforcement.
Speaker 1: Twitter was also to hire a compliance officer to ensure
Speaker 1: that the company would follow India's national policies. Also supposed
Speaker 1: to hire a grievance officer in charge of reviewing allegations
Speaker 1: and a contact person who would respond to law enforcement
Speaker 1: messages as soon as possible. And according to the government,
Speaker 1: law enforcement received a complaint from an unknown or unnamed
Speaker 1: Twitter user that said that they were the victims of
Speaker 1: malicious messages that were posted on Twitter that violated these
Speaker 1: rules that I've mentioned, and that the company had not
Speaker 1: yet hired the officers that I mentioned earlier. This follows
Speaker 1: on the heels of some really big stories in India
Speaker 1: involving social media, including the government's attempts to suppress a
Speaker 1: farmers protest within India, and also Twitter had labeled some
Speaker 1: messages from Indian officials as being manipulated media, which caused
Speaker 1: a big mess in India. Here in the United States,
Speaker 1: social networking sites enjoy legal protection thanks to Section to thirty,
Speaker 1: which says that platforms are not accountable for the stuff
Speaker 1: that their users post to those platforms. But officials in
Speaker 1: India point out that it is unreasonable for a company
Speaker 1: to expect American laws and American legal protection while they're
Speaker 1: operating in a totally different country. It is too early
Speaker 1: to say how all this is going to play out
Speaker 1: and whether or not Twitter executives will eventually have to
Speaker 1: stand charge for content posted on Twitter in India, content
Speaker 1: posted by you know, other people. But I expect we're
Speaker 1: gonna see some pretty big stories come out of all this,
Speaker 1: and not just with Twitter, but with any social networking
Speaker 1: site that is operating within India, an enormous market. It's
Speaker 1: not like these companies want to just pull out of India. However,
Speaker 1: there is a place where they are threatening to do
Speaker 1: just that, just not in India. So, speaking of American
Speaker 1: social networks facing big decisions and overseas markets, let's talk
Speaker 1: about Hong Kong. The local government there plans to enact
Speaker 1: some new rules that would change data protection laws within
Speaker 1: the city of Hong Kong, and the goal is to
Speaker 1: fight doxing. Now, that's the practice of a person sharing
Speaker 1: some other person's personal information without their consent, UH, typically
Speaker 1: for malicious purposes, like to either encourage harassment or worse. So,
Speaker 1: for example, if I were to share Ben Boland's home
Speaker 1: address on this program, that would be doxing, and I
Speaker 1: suspect that's why Ben always forces me to wear a
Speaker 1: blindfold and sit in a card that then randomly drives
Speaker 1: around the city for two hours before I can never
Speaker 1: visit him anyway, Hong Kong's rules would set finds of
Speaker 1: nearly dollars per incident plus up to five years imprisonment.
Speaker 1: And apparently, as the rules are written, they could apply
Speaker 1: to platforms that includes companies like Facebook, Twitter, and Google,
Speaker 1: so not just the people posting to them, but the
Speaker 1: platforms that carry the messages as well. The company's sent
Speaker 1: a letter back in June that just became public this week,
Speaker 1: and that letter warns Hong Kong officials that if the
Speaker 1: rules are going to go into practice, these companies will
Speaker 1: have no choice but to stop providing services within Hong Kong.
Speaker 1: So it's kind of an ultimatum. Dots ng is a
Speaker 1: truly abhorrent practice. But just to be clear and to
Speaker 1: get the full context of this, these rules seem to
Speaker 1: stem not from the way that private citizens have been
Speaker 1: affected in Hong Kong, but that rather, during the anti
Speaker 1: government protests in Hong Kong back in twenty nineteen, some
Speaker 1: people were sharing private information about several police officers that
Speaker 1: ended up making the rounds online. Now, again, this is
Speaker 1: a terrible practice, like you know, it's it's it's not
Speaker 1: good no matter which side is using this, and many
Speaker 1: of those police officers ended up facing targeted harassment and worse,
Speaker 1: including you know, their families. But I just wanted to
Speaker 1: give context that the rules don't seem to be in
Speaker 1: response to, you know, citizen concerns. It seems to be
Speaker 1: more of a response to try and clamp down on
Speaker 1: citizens and as a response to civilian challenges to the
Speaker 1: government's activities. So in other words, I guess the the
Speaker 1: short way of saying all that is people are way
Speaker 1: more complicated than technology ever will be. We have a
Speaker 1: couple more stories to get through. But before I do that,
Speaker 1: let's take a quick break. Okay, we're back so over
Speaker 1: in the United Kingdom, there is a semiconductor company called
Speaker 1: Newport Wafer Fab or n WF, and it has a
Speaker 1: new owner. That owner is next spire A That is
Speaker 1: a company that is based in the Netherlands. However, that
Speaker 1: company has its own parent company, because things always get
Speaker 1: more complicated, and that parent company is a Chinese firm
Speaker 1: called Wingtech Group. NWF is the UK's largest silicon chip
Speaker 1: manufacturing company. The UK government might actually look into these
Speaker 1: things a little more closely because the UK passed a
Speaker 1: law that's called the National Security and Investment Act specifically
Speaker 1: to review all acquisitions that could affect national security. In general,
Speaker 1: the UK government views the practice of a foreign company
Speaker 1: coming in to purchase big UK companies as being a
Speaker 1: bit risky. But so far there's been no official resistance
Speaker 1: to this acquisition. Resistance. That's an electricity pun about silicon chips,
Speaker 1: and I didn't even mean to make that. So we'll
Speaker 1: have to see if the UK government allows this to
Speaker 1: move forward with no further comment. It is a little weird.
Speaker 1: I mean, I find the way the UK government handles
Speaker 1: things to be odd anyway. Now, I look at things
Speaker 1: like Brexit, which seems to indicate that England or Britain,
Speaker 1: rather the United Kingdom wants to stand on its own
Speaker 1: and not be part of a larger collective. And yet
Speaker 1: isn't necessarily blinking an eye when large foreign companies come
Speaker 1: in and acquire major companies within the UK. Just seems
Speaker 1: to be a disconnect, is all I'm saying, Just trying
Speaker 1: to understand it. Also in acquisition news, we've got some
Speaker 1: about Bugatti, which is a company that's known for its
Speaker 1: outrageously expensive supercars that very wealthy folks drive at very
Speaker 1: fast speeds. The company of Bugatti started more than a
Speaker 1: century ago, and I covered a bit about it in
Speaker 1: my episodes about the history of Volkswagen. The original run
Speaker 1: of Bugatti ended around the nineteen fifties nineteen sixties. It
Speaker 1: followed the death of its founder, A Torre Bugatti. His
Speaker 1: son had passed away a few years earlier before he died,
Speaker 1: and it essentially kind of faded from memory. And in
Speaker 1: nineteen seven a an investor, a man named Roman rt Oli,
Speaker 1: purchased the rights to the brand name Bugatti, so he
Speaker 1: was able to bring Bugatti back from you know, like
Speaker 1: the Junkyard of history. Volkswagen would then later purchase those
Speaker 1: rights and launched Bugatti Automobiles in ninet So while the
Speaker 1: name Bugatti has been in the automotive world since you know,
Speaker 1: nine nine, you could argue that the Bugatti automobile line
Speaker 1: has had sort of three distinct phases. Had the original
Speaker 1: run with the founder, the run under Artioli when he
Speaker 1: bought the branding, and then the Volkswagen run. Now an
Speaker 1: electric vehicle startup called Ramack has acquired a majority stake
Speaker 1: in Bugatti from Volkswagen Mate Ramak or perhaps Mate Ramak
Speaker 1: I honestly don't know how to say his name anyway.
Speaker 1: The founder of Ramak will lead the new organization, which
Speaker 1: will fittingly be called Bugatti Ramak. The deal was an
Speaker 1: all stock deal, and according to Raemak, the Bugotti and
Speaker 1: Rhemack departments will still operate separately as distinct brands. They're
Speaker 1: not going to be merged together. The Bugatti Raemack company
Speaker 1: will guide both brands. Essentially, it will make the decisions
Speaker 1: for each brand, but each brand will remain its own thing.
Speaker 1: The plan is to introduce an electric vehicle version of
Speaker 1: Bugatti by the end of the decade, along with some
Speaker 1: hybrid models. Users of Audacity have noticed some changes since
Speaker 1: the company mus Group acquired the open source app earlier
Speaker 1: this year. Audacity is a free to download and free
Speaker 1: to use audio recording and editing app. Uh And in fact,
Speaker 1: it's what I used to record tech stuff when I'm
Speaker 1: working from home, like today, I'm using Audacity. At work,
Speaker 1: we use Adobe Audition in case you're curious. Audacity is
Speaker 1: popular because one it's free and to it has a
Speaker 1: fairly extensive set of features, features that I hardly use
Speaker 1: because there are a lot of them, but understanding what
Speaker 1: each one does takes a little bit of digging, so
Speaker 1: I've only kind of dipped my toe in like maybe
Speaker 1: two percent of the features that are available on Audacity.
Speaker 1: The latest version of Audacity, however, includes changes to the
Speaker 1: apps privacy policy, and those changes mentioned that the app
Speaker 1: will collect quote data necessary for law enforcement, IT, litigation
Speaker 1: and authorities requests if any end quote, which huh, yikes.
Speaker 1: This is a piece of software that you use to
Speaker 1: record audio and then edit that audio. You probably wouldn't
Speaker 1: think of it as also passing information on to some
Speaker 1: other entity, right, but apparently that's the case. These changes
Speaker 1: prompted some folks to refer to Audacity as spyware, and
Speaker 1: there's some indication that we might see a fork in
Speaker 1: Audacity as open source developers go back to earlier versions,
Speaker 1: pre muse group acquisition of Audacity and continue developing the
Speaker 1: software through the open source approach. And in case you're
Speaker 1: not familiar with open source, the idea is that you
Speaker 1: make code readily available so that people can see exactly
Speaker 1: how something is coded, and they can then take that
Speaker 1: and depending upon the licensing agreement you set up, they
Speaker 1: can take that code and build it in to something
Speaker 1: of their own. Maybe they make their own version of
Speaker 1: the thing that code stands for, and they can then,
Speaker 1: depending on the license agreement, market that themselves. This all
Speaker 1: depends on how the open code licensing is approached. There
Speaker 1: are a lot of different ways of doing that. I've
Speaker 1: covered that on previous episodes. But the big benefit of
Speaker 1: open source is that you have it open to the
Speaker 1: entire world of developers, as opposed to say, an internal
Speaker 1: group working on a project. And when you open it
Speaker 1: up to everyone, well, by nature, you end up getting
Speaker 1: the best ideas. It may take some time for them
Speaker 1: to all kind of rise to the top. But you're
Speaker 1: going to benefit from the experience of the collective. So
Speaker 1: it's a very effective way of creating powerful applications, but
Speaker 1: it does come with this sort of limitation on how
Speaker 1: you monetize it, or at least there are other factors
Speaker 1: you have to take into consideration. Moving on, Atari, a
Speaker 1: company that lays claim to an historic name in video
Speaker 1: game culture is making a change. Now, before I get
Speaker 1: into this, I should mention that the Atari of today
Speaker 1: is not the same company as the Atari that was
Speaker 1: part of the initial video game console boom of the
Speaker 1: late seventies and early eighties. That version of Atari pretty
Speaker 1: much doesn't exist anymore. Some of its intellectual property exists,
Speaker 1: but but you could think of the current Atari as being,
Speaker 1: you know, a reincarnation maybe. So the Attari of today
Speaker 1: is trying to really establish itself in the modern gaming
Speaker 1: sphere and announced that it's going to transition away from
Speaker 1: developing free to play mobile games, which is an incredibly
Speaker 1: competitive field, to focus more on making games for consoles
Speaker 1: and the PC. These plans would potentially include developing new
Speaker 1: games for the Atari VCS console, which was finally released
Speaker 1: after multiple delays. This is a console that has a
Speaker 1: throwback retro look to it. It plays classic Atari twenty
Speaker 1: six games, among other things like it technically can play
Speaker 1: lots of other stuff, but it was designed to kind
Speaker 1: of dip into that nostalgia for gamers who are, you know,
Speaker 1: my age or older. No word yet on how the
Speaker 1: company is handling the planned opening of its string of
Speaker 1: Attari hotels that we heard about a couple of years ago.
Speaker 1: I actually wonder if that project is still on track
Speaker 1: or not. The first of those hotels is supposed to
Speaker 1: open in Las Vegas next year, and I know that
Speaker 1: if I ever do return to c e S, I'm
Speaker 1: going to have to try and book a room in
Speaker 1: that hotel, assuming you know that it exists. And finally,
Speaker 1: has this ever happened to you? You find yourself in
Speaker 1: a tedious situation, so you reach over and pick up
Speaker 1: your phone for a distraction. Maybe you're standing in a
Speaker 1: line and you just want something to take your mind
Speaker 1: off the fact that you're five people back from being
Speaker 1: able to order your coffee. Maybe you're watching a TV
Speaker 1: show and it's just gone to commercial. Maybe you're listening
Speaker 1: to a podcast and the bald guy is just droning
Speaker 1: on about stuff, or maybe you're part of a government
Speaker 1: body hosting a debate about matters that could potentially affect
Speaker 1: thousands of people's lives. That last one is a kicker, right, Like,
Speaker 1: I mean, there's this general feeling that if you're at
Speaker 1: an important debate, for example, let's say you are a
Speaker 1: US politician in Congress, maybe you should be paying attention
Speaker 1: to the proceedings, as at least theoretically, the outcome of
Speaker 1: them stands to impact countless people, many of whom you
Speaker 1: might actually represent. And yet politicians, like everyone else, you
Speaker 1: can get a bit bored and occasionally they will look
Speaker 1: to their phones for distractions. But the question how occasionally,
Speaker 1: like how much or how little attention are the politicians
Speaker 1: actually paying when it comes to, you know, running a government.
Speaker 1: So an AI that's being called Drees Deporter is scrying
Speaker 1: through video of televised political debates in Belgium. It's doing
Speaker 1: that to see how frequently people are looking at their phones.
Speaker 1: So the AI is looking at signs that politicians are
Speaker 1: looking down at their phones, are actively typing on their
Speaker 1: phones rather than paying attention to the proceedings at hand.
Speaker 1: Then the AI takes screenshots of moments that determines count
Speaker 1: as you know, politicians being distracted. Uh, and it even
Speaker 1: highlights the region showing the phone in the hands of
Speaker 1: that politician then posts those images to Twitter. So it's
Speaker 1: it's essentially public shaming. It's it's saying, hey, you are
Speaker 1: elected to do a job. That job might be boring,
Speaker 1: but it's still important and you are entrusted to do
Speaker 1: that job, so get off you gosh darn phone. Now.
Speaker 1: I'm the first to say this does not sound entirely
Speaker 1: fair to me, because we don't actually know why the
Speaker 1: politicians are looking at their phones at any given time.
Speaker 1: There could be cases where there is a legitimate reason
Speaker 1: that isn't related to just you know, checking out from
Speaker 1: whatever political discussion is going on at the moment. Still,
Speaker 1: I thought it was a fairly funny story to end
Speaker 1: our episode on today. And that is it. That's the
Speaker 1: news for Tuesday, July six one. We'll have more coming
Speaker 1: up on Thursday. If you have any suggestions for topics
Speaker 1: I should cover in future episodes of Tech Stuff, reach
Speaker 1: out to me and let me know what those are.
Speaker 1: The best way to do that is over on Twitter,
Speaker 1: the handle we use on Twitter is at text Stuff
Speaker 1: hs W Now I will talk to you again really soon.
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