WEBVTT - TechStuff Looks Back on 2017 0:00:04.160 --> 0:00:12.200 Get text with technology with tech Stuff from dot Com. 0:00:12.200 --> 0:00:14.240 Hey there, and welcome to Tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:14.360 --> 0:00:17.760 Jonathan Strickling. I'm an executive producer here at How Stuff Works, 0:00:17.800 --> 0:00:21.279 and there are a few episodes of tech Stuff I 0:00:21.320 --> 0:00:24.520 try to do every year. It's kind of become a tradition. 0:00:25.120 --> 0:00:28.680 And this is the first of that series of episodes 0:00:28.760 --> 0:00:31.639 that happens to cap off each year as as best 0:00:31.680 --> 0:00:33.920 I can. Anyway, this is a look back on the 0:00:33.960 --> 0:00:37.640 previous twelve months in tech Stories. Now I want to 0:00:37.680 --> 0:00:39.720 take a quick look at some of the biggest stories 0:00:39.760 --> 0:00:43.559 in tech that happened in and just so I'm totally 0:00:43.600 --> 0:00:47.599 transparent and everyone at home listening can understand this, I'm 0:00:47.600 --> 0:00:53.640 actually recording this episode on December seven, which means there's 0:00:53.720 --> 0:00:57.640 like an extra month of stories and gossip and scandals 0:00:57.640 --> 0:01:00.680 that are not gonna make the cut as they ain't 0:01:00.760 --> 0:01:04.680 happen yet. What when I'm recording this, they'll happen by 0:01:04.680 --> 0:01:07.640 the time you hear this. So I apologize for that, 0:01:07.840 --> 0:01:11.720 but the predictions episodes have proven over and over again. 0:01:12.360 --> 0:01:14.840 I am not someone who can see into the future, 0:01:15.280 --> 0:01:17.880 so I might chat a little bit about some stuff 0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:20.800 that's coming up later on in December. As I record this, 0:01:20.840 --> 0:01:23.920 it'll of course be in your past and maybe we'll 0:01:23.920 --> 0:01:26.880 see how it turns out by that point. But let's 0:01:26.880 --> 0:01:31.360 start where every year starts in January, according to the 0:01:31.400 --> 0:01:34.160 calendar that I I follow. Anyway, if you've been keeping 0:01:34.240 --> 0:01:37.280 up with tech stuff, you know I recently did a 0:01:37.360 --> 0:01:42.800 full series about the company Xerox. Well, January one was 0:01:42.840 --> 0:01:46.880 when Xerox officially split into two companies. One of them 0:01:46.920 --> 0:01:49.920 continue to carry the name Xerox, and that one is 0:01:49.960 --> 0:01:53.080 all about the traditional document businesses that we tend to 0:01:53.120 --> 0:01:56.160 think about when we hear the name Xerox. The other 0:01:56.240 --> 0:01:59.960 company is now known as Conduit and is one focused 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:05.960 on business process services. So that happened, knocking January off 0:02:06.080 --> 0:02:08.960 right off the bat. Also in January, very early, I 0:02:09.000 --> 0:02:11.560 went to c e S I was formerly known as 0:02:11.600 --> 0:02:15.200 the Consumer Electronics Show. Ramsey was also there. A whole 0:02:15.240 --> 0:02:17.600 bunch of us from how Stuff Works went this past year, 0:02:18.160 --> 0:02:20.400 and some of the stuff that got a lot of 0:02:20.440 --> 0:02:26.040 attention during that year's c e S included Amazon's Alexa product. 0:02:26.280 --> 0:02:30.520 I apologize if I just activated your Alexa, but it 0:02:30.560 --> 0:02:34.040 was getting incorporated into all sorts of devices, including vehicles, 0:02:34.880 --> 0:02:38.679 There were dozens of different smart devices on display, like 0:02:38.880 --> 0:02:41.200 weird ones too, like smart pillows that could tell you 0:02:41.240 --> 0:02:44.440 when you were snoring, as if I needed that. I've 0:02:44.440 --> 0:02:46.919 got a wife who punches me whenever it happens. There 0:02:46.919 --> 0:02:51.160 were self balancing motorcycles. There were fancy concept cars like 0:02:51.200 --> 0:02:55.440 Faraday Futures vehicle. There were ultra high definition displays with 0:02:55.520 --> 0:02:59.480 amazing resolution and color representation. There were self driving vehicles. 0:02:59.560 --> 0:03:03.720 There were luetooth toasters for crying out loud. In other words, 0:03:03.800 --> 0:03:07.519 it was a mix of amazing, amusing, and befuddling technology, 0:03:07.560 --> 0:03:10.639 which is pretty much par for the course. I went 0:03:10.680 --> 0:03:13.960 with a team of several talented people here at how 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:16.639 stuff works. We explored the floor and we shot lots 0:03:16.680 --> 0:03:18.360 of videos so you can actually find those if you 0:03:18.360 --> 0:03:22.000 want to be nostalgic and look at the the cutting 0:03:22.040 --> 0:03:26.520 technology of yesteryear. Literally, this coming ce S will be 0:03:26.560 --> 0:03:30.680 the first one I will miss in ten years, And 0:03:30.720 --> 0:03:32.320 by miss, I mean I won't attend it. I'm not 0:03:32.320 --> 0:03:35.160 going to actually miss it. I'm actually okay with sitting 0:03:35.240 --> 0:03:38.720 one out for once now. One story that got Nintendo 0:03:38.800 --> 0:03:43.040 fans excited early in seventeen was the unveiling of the 0:03:43.080 --> 0:03:47.440 Switch that's Nintendo's latest gaming console. The Switch can be 0:03:47.440 --> 0:03:50.280 played as a portable gaming device, or it can be 0:03:50.360 --> 0:03:53.120 docked in a into a station and connect with a television. 0:03:53.720 --> 0:03:57.400 Controllers include detachable handheld devices that are called joy cons, 0:03:57.840 --> 0:04:01.920 and when the console went on sale later in demand 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:06.080 far exceeded supply, particularly here in the States. This is 0:04:06.120 --> 0:04:09.720 not an unusual story for Nintendo. It's pretty much their 0:04:10.000 --> 0:04:12.880 m O whenever they release a new product. In fact, 0:04:13.080 --> 0:04:16.839 as of December, it can still be challenging to find 0:04:16.960 --> 0:04:21.719 a Nintendo Switch in some markets. Games like Legend of Zelda, 0:04:21.800 --> 0:04:25.119 Breath of the Wild, and Super Mario Odyssey were able 0:04:25.120 --> 0:04:28.880 to leverage the love of iconic franchises while also incorporating 0:04:28.880 --> 0:04:31.200 new types of gameplay into the world's and they have 0:04:31.240 --> 0:04:35.839 received some good critical response. So the system appears to 0:04:35.880 --> 0:04:38.359 be a step in the right direction for a Nintendo 0:04:38.480 --> 0:04:42.600 which clearly needed to recover after the WEU came out 0:04:42.760 --> 0:04:49.039 to less than uproarious applause. We also learned more in 0:04:49.160 --> 0:04:52.960 January about the fires that were being caused by Samsung 0:04:53.040 --> 0:04:55.880 Notes seven hand sets. You might remember that story from 0:04:56.839 --> 0:05:00.919 where some hand sets were spontaneously catch fire and it 0:05:01.160 --> 0:05:05.159 led to a an industry wide ban in the airline 0:05:05.200 --> 0:05:09.440 industry for Samsung Notes sevens, who had the office officers 0:05:09.480 --> 0:05:14.360 actually confiscating Notes sevens before passengers could get onto planes. Well, 0:05:14.880 --> 0:05:17.880 the company conducted a four month long investigation, and in 0:05:18.000 --> 0:05:20.800 January seventeen they announced that the problem was due to 0:05:20.839 --> 0:05:25.400 some irregularly sized batteries which would lead to overheating and 0:05:25.520 --> 0:05:28.960 that would then lead to fires. Moving on to February, 0:05:29.400 --> 0:05:32.680 one of the troubling themes in seventeen, and this is 0:05:32.680 --> 0:05:36.920 putting it lightly, has revolved around allegations of sexual harassment 0:05:37.000 --> 0:05:39.560 and related charges. And I want to be clear here. 0:05:40.080 --> 0:05:43.159 The troubling thing for me is seeing how systemic this 0:05:43.320 --> 0:05:47.240 culture has been across multiple industries. I don't mean it's 0:05:47.279 --> 0:05:50.520 troubling that victims are coming forward. It's good that they are. 0:05:51.040 --> 0:05:54.240 It's rather troubling that there was such an enormous environment 0:05:54.279 --> 0:05:57.960 for victimization in the first place. Well, in February seen 0:05:58.000 --> 0:06:00.640 one of the earliest instances of this in the tech 0:06:00.720 --> 0:06:04.760 industry was of a former Uber employee named Susan Fowler, 0:06:05.040 --> 0:06:07.920 who claimed that the car service company, the ride hailing 0:06:08.040 --> 0:06:12.039 service company Uber, had a toxic culture filled with misogynistic 0:06:12.040 --> 0:06:17.680 executives and a permissive attitude towards unacceptable behavior. Her accusations 0:06:18.160 --> 0:06:21.720 were such that it it essentially forced Uber to launch 0:06:21.760 --> 0:06:26.320 an internal investigation on its practices and its culture. That 0:06:26.440 --> 0:06:31.720 investigation continued for months, and in early June, news broke 0:06:31.800 --> 0:06:34.760 that Uber had fired more than twenty employees as a 0:06:34.800 --> 0:06:38.400 result of this investigation at all levels within the company. 0:06:38.480 --> 0:06:41.159 And yes, there's gonna be a lot about Uber in 0:06:41.160 --> 0:06:45.880 this episode because stuff went whackadoodle crazy over there. So 0:06:46.080 --> 0:06:51.440 you could call this episode Uber what Happen because that's 0:06:51.680 --> 0:06:56.279 gonna come back multiple times. There's hardly a month that 0:06:56.320 --> 0:06:59.000 doesn't have an Uber story in it. On February eleven, 0:06:59.640 --> 0:07:03.479 North Korea test fired a ballistic missile across the Sea 0:07:03.560 --> 0:07:06.920 of Japan, and this also becomes a big story throughout 0:07:07.000 --> 0:07:10.440 the year. This set the stage for a very tense 0:07:10.560 --> 0:07:14.360 game of posturing between North Korea and other nations, particularly 0:07:14.440 --> 0:07:16.960 the United States. And this was just one of a 0:07:16.960 --> 0:07:21.040 few tests throughout seen that caught the world's attention. Another 0:07:21.080 --> 0:07:24.920 in July demonstrate that North Korea had an intercontinental ballistic missile, 0:07:25.280 --> 0:07:27.320 and it became clear that North Korea had developed or 0:07:27.360 --> 0:07:30.880 acquired some powerful missiles capable of carrying a payload a 0:07:30.880 --> 0:07:34.200 great distance as far as the United States, and that 0:07:34.320 --> 0:07:36.560 was only a matter of time before those missiles would 0:07:36.560 --> 0:07:39.840 be outfitted with nuclear warheads. And as someone who lived 0:07:39.880 --> 0:07:44.560 through the Cold War and an era of mutually assured destruction, 0:07:44.840 --> 0:07:47.160 the story did not exactly set my heart to singing. 0:07:47.760 --> 0:07:49.840 But this is a story that's still playing out today. 0:07:50.120 --> 0:07:56.040 In February, Disney's Maker Studios dropped Peautie Pie YouTube superstar 0:07:56.200 --> 0:08:00.520 from its network because of a some videos that Ptpie 0:08:00.560 --> 0:08:04.040 had had published in which he had voiced some anti 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:08.960 Semitic messages, some uh slurs against Jewish people. He included 0:08:09.000 --> 0:08:13.160 some Nazi imagery and a couple and Disney dropped him 0:08:13.200 --> 0:08:16.160 like a hot potato, and then YouTube followed suit, canceling 0:08:16.160 --> 0:08:20.520 a planned season two of pd pis series Scare Beauty Pie. 0:08:20.760 --> 0:08:25.280 The company also removed him from the Google Preferred Advertising program, 0:08:25.320 --> 0:08:29.440 and this caused a big discussion in the online world 0:08:29.520 --> 0:08:35.240 about the the rights of creators the rights of platforms. Uh. Also, 0:08:35.280 --> 0:08:39.920 it was just feeding into a generally toxic environment online 0:08:40.480 --> 0:08:46.480 about harassment and and really awful trollish behaviors, which was 0:08:46.559 --> 0:08:50.800 kind of a theme throughout March I have a happy 0:08:50.880 --> 0:08:54.000 story to start with March, and I'm thankful for it 0:08:54.000 --> 0:08:57.600 because there's so many negative ones that happened in But 0:08:57.679 --> 0:09:04.080 in March, SpaceX successfully launched a used Falcon nine first 0:09:04.240 --> 0:09:09.800 stage rocket, and that proved the usefulness of reusable launch vehicles. 0:09:09.840 --> 0:09:13.640 This brings down the costs of launching a payload into 0:09:13.640 --> 0:09:17.680 space considerably. Now it's still incredibly expensive to launch stuff 0:09:17.720 --> 0:09:22.600 into space, but it's slightly less incredibly expensive than if 0:09:22.640 --> 0:09:25.280 you had to construct a brand new launch vehicle for 0:09:25.320 --> 0:09:27.840 every single launch. And this might have the first time 0:09:27.880 --> 0:09:31.120 anyone had used a first stage rocket a second time. 0:09:31.600 --> 0:09:34.680 SpaceX designed the Falcon nine launch rocket to return to 0:09:34.720 --> 0:09:37.680 Earth and land upright and intact after a use to 0:09:37.760 --> 0:09:41.040 allow for this, and you may remember when SpaceX was 0:09:41.080 --> 0:09:44.160 able to bring back a first stage rocket and land 0:09:44.200 --> 0:09:47.760 it successfully, that first one they did, they retired. They 0:09:47.800 --> 0:09:49.959 did not plan on using it again. It was more 0:09:50.000 --> 0:09:53.440 of a proof of concept that this could actually work. 0:09:53.720 --> 0:09:56.040 And then after that they started to really work on 0:09:56.520 --> 0:09:59.559 practical ones that they would be able to use repeatedly, 0:09:59.760 --> 0:10:01.560 and this was the first case of that. So that's 0:10:01.559 --> 0:10:06.240 pretty darn cool. Also in March, Uber's contentious year continued 0:10:06.320 --> 0:10:09.000 as one of its autonomous vehicles got involved in an 0:10:09.080 --> 0:10:13.680 accident in Arizona. The company suspended all its self driving 0:10:13.760 --> 0:10:16.880 vehicle test operations, which were at that point taking place 0:10:16.920 --> 0:10:21.360 in San Francisco, Arizona, and Pittsburgh. San Francisco's cars were 0:10:21.400 --> 0:10:23.560 the first to get moving again just a few days 0:10:23.600 --> 0:10:27.199 after the accident. This was a tough time for Uber 0:10:27.280 --> 0:10:31.600 because they had just managed to to resecure permission in 0:10:31.640 --> 0:10:36.000 San Francisco to operate autonomous vehicles in they had encountered 0:10:36.000 --> 0:10:39.679 a problem where the city said, hey, you failed to 0:10:40.040 --> 0:10:42.720 fill out the proper paperwork and get the proper licenses 0:10:42.760 --> 0:10:45.240 to be able to do what you are doing, So 0:10:45.600 --> 0:10:49.319 this was the second setback for them. Police, however, stated 0:10:49.360 --> 0:10:52.440 that the Uber vehicle was not at fault in the accident, 0:10:52.520 --> 0:10:55.080 in fact, was the fault of the other driver, and 0:10:55.320 --> 0:11:00.240 also in March, the president of Uber, Jeff Joe Owns, 0:11:01.120 --> 0:11:04.920 stepped down from the company. In a statement to the press, 0:11:05.040 --> 0:11:09.040 Jones said, quote, the beliefs and approach to leadership that 0:11:09.120 --> 0:11:12.440 have guided my career are inconsistent with what I saw 0:11:12.480 --> 0:11:15.760 and experienced at Uber, and I can no longer continue 0:11:15.800 --> 0:11:19.839 as president of the ride sharing business. End quote. This 0:11:19.920 --> 0:11:24.240 was another indicator that perhaps those accusations Fowler had levied 0:11:24.280 --> 0:11:26.920 earlier had some merit to them, and that there were 0:11:26.920 --> 0:11:30.840 other problems going on over in Uber's business. For the 0:11:30.880 --> 0:11:34.160 president to actually resign and not be asked to resign, 0:11:34.200 --> 0:11:36.679 he stepped down because he felt that it was not 0:11:36.840 --> 0:11:40.560 a good fit for him. That was another big red 0:11:40.679 --> 0:11:44.640 flag for Uber. Also in March, after months of being 0:11:44.720 --> 0:11:52.400 absent from Oculus events, Palmer Lucky left Facebook and thus Oculus. Now. 0:11:52.480 --> 0:11:55.520 Lucky was the creator of the Oculus rift. He had 0:11:55.600 --> 0:11:58.800 made headlines in sixteen for his involvement in groups that 0:11:58.840 --> 0:12:02.640 supported Trump's president sidential campaign, and that group used trollish 0:12:02.679 --> 0:12:06.240 strategies to antagonize people with opposing viewpoints. That's a kind 0:12:06.280 --> 0:12:08.600 way of putting it. There was a lot of hate 0:12:09.120 --> 0:12:12.840 messaging out of this group, and Palmer Lucky had been 0:12:12.840 --> 0:12:16.400 financially supporting the group, which led to a lot of 0:12:16.440 --> 0:12:20.400 developers deciding to leave the Oculus platform out of protest. 0:12:21.080 --> 0:12:25.240 Palmer Lucky had given an apology and said that his 0:12:25.400 --> 0:12:29.800 actions in no way reflected the company, but uh Facebook, 0:12:29.840 --> 0:12:35.880 which is extremely cognizant of its public relations, decided that 0:12:35.920 --> 0:12:39.000 palmer Lucky or at least apparently decided that Palmer Lucky 0:12:39.280 --> 0:12:43.160 probably should not be at various official events. In fact, 0:12:43.240 --> 0:12:46.960 Lucky was absent at the Oculus Developers Conference, which was 0:12:47.000 --> 0:12:49.440 a notable absence considering the fact that he's the guy 0:12:49.440 --> 0:12:52.840 who made it in the first place, and so his departure, 0:12:52.880 --> 0:12:56.880 while not a big surprise, had came after months of 0:12:56.960 --> 0:13:01.240 him being essentially out of the public ie. Moving on 0:13:01.320 --> 0:13:05.080 to April, Tesla announced a new type of solar panel 0:13:05.160 --> 0:13:08.640 for house rooftops that looks like a high end roof shingle. 0:13:09.000 --> 0:13:15.000 They are very pretty. They're also very expensive. Uh Tesla says, well, 0:13:15.040 --> 0:13:18.840 they're not more expensive than other roof tiles of this type, 0:13:18.960 --> 0:13:23.440 but they are roof tiles that essentially very well off 0:13:23.480 --> 0:13:25.800 people would use to tile their houses. They're not like 0:13:25.840 --> 0:13:30.440 the shingles that you would get at your local hardware 0:13:30.480 --> 0:13:32.960 store so that you could do a d I Y 0:13:33.160 --> 0:13:36.640 shingle repair on your roof. It's definitely more expensive than that, 0:13:36.880 --> 0:13:40.720 but they are very attractive. So it's possibly a step 0:13:40.760 --> 0:13:46.000 toward more solar panels and solar power in various markets. 0:13:46.760 --> 0:13:49.480 I just feel like it's gonna be markets where people 0:13:49.520 --> 0:13:53.040 already have a ton of disposable income rather than uh, 0:13:53.080 --> 0:13:56.680 you know, a standard type of of home construction moving forward. 0:13:56.720 --> 0:14:00.320 But still every advance is a good one in a roll. 0:14:00.520 --> 0:14:04.480 Yek Yak, which is a location based anonymous messaging app, 0:14:04.760 --> 0:14:08.880 shut down now. At its height, yik Yak was worth 0:14:09.040 --> 0:14:13.080 four hundred million dollars. When it's shut down, the company 0:14:13.200 --> 0:14:16.200 sold off assets in the form of its engineering talent, 0:14:16.400 --> 0:14:19.640 for one million dollars. The service had been the target 0:14:19.720 --> 0:14:23.160 of much criticism as people argued that it encouraged cruelty 0:14:23.320 --> 0:14:26.840 and gossip among its user base, which was primarily college 0:14:26.880 --> 0:14:31.200 students that's to whom yek Yak was marketed. Many people 0:14:31.240 --> 0:14:34.480 were concerned that the app put vulnerable populations at risk 0:14:34.960 --> 0:14:38.200 and that it could lead to mob mentality in some communities. 0:14:38.880 --> 0:14:42.480 And there were also many concerns that younger people might 0:14:42.600 --> 0:14:47.440 get on the app and be exploited or otherwise harmed. Now, 0:14:47.480 --> 0:14:50.280 and just so you guys know, I once chaired a 0:14:50.320 --> 0:14:54.600 panel discussion with the apps founders at a south By Southwest. 0:14:55.080 --> 0:14:58.080 I walked away from that feeling uncertain about the experience. 0:14:58.160 --> 0:15:02.400 I wasn't entirely comfortable with how things had unfolded, and 0:15:02.560 --> 0:15:05.440 so it didn't surprise me when this happened. The app 0:15:05.560 --> 0:15:07.720 now is a thing of the past. It doesn't exist. 0:15:07.760 --> 0:15:11.000 In fact, the blog post that was the farewell doesn't 0:15:11.000 --> 0:15:12.800 exist either, because I was going to go there and 0:15:12.880 --> 0:15:16.000 quote some of it, but it's gone, and I didn't 0:15:16.080 --> 0:15:18.120 use archive dot org to look at an old one. 0:15:18.800 --> 0:15:22.480 But yep, yek yek is no more. Well. That brings 0:15:22.560 --> 0:15:26.040 us up to Mayen. But that means I've gotten through 0:15:26.080 --> 0:15:28.680 the first four months of the year. So I'm gonna 0:15:28.680 --> 0:15:38.560 take a little break and thank our sponsors. All Right, 0:15:38.600 --> 0:15:44.120 we're up to Mayen. That's when a malware known as 0:15:44.200 --> 0:15:48.960 Wanna cry begins to infect computers around the world, locking 0:15:49.480 --> 0:15:53.080 the computer contents away. Now, this type of malware falls 0:15:53.160 --> 0:15:59.320 under the category known as ransomware. Typically, ransomware will infect 0:15:59.360 --> 0:16:02.440 a computer. It will encrypt part of a computer's hard 0:16:02.520 --> 0:16:05.840 drive or the whole darn thing and lock off the 0:16:05.880 --> 0:16:09.880 contents from users. So you log into your computer and 0:16:09.920 --> 0:16:12.720 suddenly you can't access any of your data because it's 0:16:12.760 --> 0:16:16.000 all been encrypted. There's usually some sort of communication to 0:16:16.040 --> 0:16:19.280 the victim that gives instruction on how to earn back 0:16:19.400 --> 0:16:23.400 the access to your own data. Normally that includes paying 0:16:23.480 --> 0:16:27.760 some sort of ransom, usually in a cryptocurrency like Bitcoin, 0:16:28.200 --> 0:16:32.080 to an account that's associated with the hackers. The Wanna 0:16:32.120 --> 0:16:36.960 cry virus specifically targeted Microsoft Windows machines, taking advantage of 0:16:36.960 --> 0:16:40.680 a vulnerability in the operating system. As the story developed, 0:16:41.120 --> 0:16:44.680 news broke that the US National Security Agency or n 0:16:44.800 --> 0:16:48.680 s A had discovered that same vulnerability and designed its 0:16:48.680 --> 0:16:53.480 own exploit before Wanna cry appeared on the scene. In fact, 0:16:53.480 --> 0:16:56.760 there were some allegations that perhaps the authors of Wanna 0:16:56.800 --> 0:17:01.040 cry were able to create Wanna cry because some of 0:17:01.080 --> 0:17:04.280 the n s A stuff got leaked in a in 0:17:04.640 --> 0:17:07.840 a big data dump earlier in the year. This raised 0:17:07.840 --> 0:17:10.800 some questions about the n s AS ethics, which many 0:17:10.920 --> 0:17:15.520 argued the agency had a responsibility to report this vulnerability 0:17:15.560 --> 0:17:18.920 to Microsoft, but instead they chose to keep it for themselves. 0:17:19.520 --> 0:17:23.320 A security researcher named Marcus Hutchins discovered a u r 0:17:23.480 --> 0:17:26.160 L that acted as a kill switch for the malware 0:17:26.560 --> 0:17:28.840 and that helped restrict the effects of Wanna Cry. It 0:17:28.880 --> 0:17:31.480 did infect hundreds of thousands of computers, but it would 0:17:31.520 --> 0:17:33.199 have been even worse had it not been for this 0:17:33.320 --> 0:17:38.879 kill switch. This same security researcher was later arrested in 0:17:38.960 --> 0:17:43.359 August seventeen and charged with creating another type of malware 0:17:43.400 --> 0:17:48.080 called Chronos k r o o S, which was designed 0:17:48.080 --> 0:17:52.920 to steal online banking credentials. According to crebs On Security, 0:17:52.960 --> 0:17:55.440 which is an excellent blog if you've not checked it out, 0:17:55.480 --> 0:17:59.199 I recommended, Hutchens did seem to have a past in 0:17:59.320 --> 0:18:03.040 making malay just software up until around two thousand twelve 0:18:03.160 --> 0:18:06.119 or two thousand thirteen. At that point he seemed to 0:18:06.119 --> 0:18:08.879 have a change of heart and he started working diligently 0:18:09.000 --> 0:18:13.520 to uncover and counteract malware. Hutchens has pleaded not guilty 0:18:13.600 --> 0:18:16.480 to the charges against him, and his case is yet 0:18:16.480 --> 0:18:19.840 to be heard as of the recording of this podcast episode. 0:18:20.200 --> 0:18:23.400 As for Wanna Cry, experts suspect that it had its 0:18:23.400 --> 0:18:27.720 origins in North Korea, though officials from North Korea denied 0:18:27.720 --> 0:18:31.320 that the government had anything to do with the virus. However, 0:18:31.359 --> 0:18:34.960 if you're talking about North Korea and a virus and 0:18:35.040 --> 0:18:39.399 infecting the Internet, the most sort of most fingers have 0:18:39.480 --> 0:18:42.080 to point at the government because North Korea has the 0:18:42.119 --> 0:18:46.119 Internet pretty much locked down. Within the country. There's an intranet, 0:18:46.160 --> 0:18:50.119 but not very very limited access to the outside internet. Uh. 0:18:50.320 --> 0:18:53.440 North Korea does not necessarily want everyone to have access 0:18:53.520 --> 0:18:57.639 to the world's information. Now it's time to get back 0:18:57.760 --> 0:19:02.560 to Uber. Yep, we're not done with Uber yet. In May, 0:19:02.920 --> 0:19:06.560 Uber and Weymo began their court battles in earnest Now, 0:19:06.600 --> 0:19:10.879 Weymo is the self driving company. Self driving car company, 0:19:10.920 --> 0:19:13.679 I should say that spun off from Google's R and 0:19:13.760 --> 0:19:17.560 D department. An engineer who once worked at Weymo named 0:19:17.600 --> 0:19:20.520 Anthony Lewandowski. He worked there when it was still just 0:19:20.640 --> 0:19:25.399 part of Google, had left Google in UH sixteen. He 0:19:25.440 --> 0:19:29.360 founded a new company called Auto and Uber then acquired 0:19:29.440 --> 0:19:33.200 Auto O. T t O was the name of that company, 0:19:33.560 --> 0:19:38.320 and as a result, Lewandowski began to work for Uber. Now. Weymo, 0:19:38.560 --> 0:19:42.399 in its legal claim against Uber, said that Lewandowski had 0:19:42.400 --> 0:19:48.440 illegally downloaded fourteen thousand documents that belonged to Weymo, including 0:19:48.440 --> 0:19:53.000 proprietary trade secrets, and that therefore Uber was developing its 0:19:53.000 --> 0:19:57.280 own self driving car technology on trade secret information that 0:19:57.400 --> 0:20:01.200 was developed at Weymo, and Lewandowski was effectively a thief. 0:20:02.080 --> 0:20:04.520 This particular trial is still playing out as of the 0:20:04.560 --> 0:20:08.520 recording of this podcast, it has not been resolved. Uh. 0:20:08.720 --> 0:20:13.840 Uber did end up firing Lewandowski, who was still to 0:20:13.920 --> 0:20:16.000 this day as far as I know, taking the Fifth 0:20:16.040 --> 0:20:20.640 Amendment against self incrimination, so he's not really core. He's 0:20:20.680 --> 0:20:25.120 not really cooperating with investigators on this matter. But other 0:20:25.200 --> 0:20:27.960 developments have happened over the past few days, so I'm 0:20:28.000 --> 0:20:30.919 sure I will do a full story about weymo versus 0:20:31.040 --> 0:20:38.159 uber once this has concluded. Meanwhile, going into June, a 0:20:38.359 --> 0:20:42.480 different type of ransomware attack happened, this time in the Ukraine. 0:20:42.680 --> 0:20:46.199 This one was called Petya, which also takes advantage of 0:20:46.240 --> 0:20:49.240 that same exploit that the n s A identified with 0:20:49.280 --> 0:20:53.320 Microsoft Windows machines, so Petya and Wanna cry both were 0:20:53.320 --> 0:20:56.679 taking advantage of that same vulnerability. The attacks were traced 0:20:56.680 --> 0:20:59.920 back to a software update package of a Ukrainian tack 0:21:00.160 --> 0:21:03.400 preparation program that was very popular in the corporate world 0:21:03.440 --> 0:21:07.639 in the Ukraine. Suspicion fell on the company itself that 0:21:07.800 --> 0:21:11.600 made this software, but representatives of that company said no, no, no, 0:21:11.680 --> 0:21:14.040 we're victims as well, where it's not us. We didn't 0:21:14.119 --> 0:21:17.119 make this. It did infect our our software that we sold, 0:21:17.160 --> 0:21:20.800 but we didn't actually put it there. An investigation revealed 0:21:20.840 --> 0:21:24.879 that there was a compromised employee account, and suspicions pointed 0:21:24.920 --> 0:21:28.880 investigators towards Russian hackers. The same patch that was used 0:21:28.960 --> 0:21:32.800 to secure computers against Wanna cry would work against Petya, 0:21:33.200 --> 0:21:36.000 but as it turned out, many systems in the Ukraine 0:21:36.000 --> 0:21:39.680 and beyond had failed to install those patches, and so 0:21:39.760 --> 0:21:43.640 they ended up getting encrypted. In addition, the email provider 0:21:43.760 --> 0:21:46.760 post e O shut down the email addresses that were 0:21:46.760 --> 0:21:49.600 associated with the hacker demands, so there was no way 0:21:49.640 --> 0:21:52.240 to pay the ransom even if you wanted to, so 0:21:52.280 --> 0:21:54.960 some people had to completely just get rid of entire 0:21:55.040 --> 0:21:58.320 drives of information and including a hospital in West Virginia 0:21:58.400 --> 0:22:01.160 that had to just junk it's computer systems in order 0:22:01.200 --> 0:22:07.560 to rebuild. In June, Verizon completed its acquisition of Yahoo, 0:22:08.040 --> 0:22:11.840 so this has been going on since the end of sixteen. 0:22:12.320 --> 0:22:14.920 The price tag ended up being at around four point 0:22:15.000 --> 0:22:19.480 four eight billion dollars. Merissa Meyer, who had left Google 0:22:19.560 --> 0:22:22.200 to head Yahoo as CEO for about four and a 0:22:22.200 --> 0:22:25.920 half years, left the company with a reported twenty three 0:22:26.040 --> 0:22:30.879 million dollar severance package. Verizon created a new subsidiary company 0:22:30.920 --> 0:22:34.159 called Oath, under which Yahoo would join other assets like 0:22:34.240 --> 0:22:37.760 Huffington's Post. Now I've done an episode about Yahoo before, 0:22:38.119 --> 0:22:41.080 but I feel like I might need to revisit this 0:22:41.200 --> 0:22:43.560 and do a new episode and really dive into how 0:22:43.600 --> 0:22:47.120 the company meandered. Over the last several years. There were 0:22:47.160 --> 0:22:50.879 some massive data breaches which Yahoo failed to disclose for 0:22:50.960 --> 0:22:54.320 quite some time that did enormous damage to the company's 0:22:54.359 --> 0:22:58.239 reputation and affected millions of people, and Meyer, who at 0:22:58.280 --> 0:23:00.960 one time was looked at a as a possible savior 0:23:01.080 --> 0:23:03.800 of the company, became the target of a lot of 0:23:03.800 --> 0:23:07.520 criticism for her role in leading a company that seemed 0:23:07.520 --> 0:23:11.520 to fail completely in protecting its customers. Also that month, 0:23:11.600 --> 0:23:14.600 the European Union hit Google with a two point seven 0:23:14.840 --> 0:23:18.760 billion dollar fine after finding the company guilty of practicing 0:23:18.800 --> 0:23:24.520 anti competitive strategies in the world of online comparison shopping. Yikes. 0:23:24.640 --> 0:23:28.000 This was the largest fine levied for an antitrust case 0:23:28.280 --> 0:23:33.640 from a governing body, so they set a record. Amazon 0:23:33.720 --> 0:23:36.199 announced in June that it was moving to acquire the 0:23:36.320 --> 0:23:40.640 upscale grocery store chain Whole Foods. The deal was reported 0:23:40.680 --> 0:23:44.080 to be about thirteen point seven billion dollars, which is 0:23:44.480 --> 0:23:46.480 just shy of how much it costs to shop at 0:23:46.520 --> 0:23:51.320 Whole Foods for a week of groceries and hey, let's 0:23:51.359 --> 0:23:56.320 check in with Uber, shall he. So? In in June 0:23:55.440 --> 0:23:59.960 of CEO Travis Kalanik announced he would take a lead 0:24:00.040 --> 0:24:04.280 eve of absence. His departure would end up being permanent. 0:24:04.840 --> 0:24:08.320 The former CEO of Expedia, Dara kasro Shah, he became 0:24:08.359 --> 0:24:10.600 the new CEO of the company a couple of months 0:24:10.680 --> 0:24:13.919 later in August. He came into a company that was 0:24:14.040 --> 0:24:18.800 in crisis, not just from a rash of sexual harassment 0:24:18.840 --> 0:24:23.920 scandals that were still unresolved, but also there was these 0:24:24.000 --> 0:24:27.840 charges that law enforcement were levying against Uber, saying that 0:24:28.080 --> 0:24:31.520 the company had developed software specifically designed to help drivers 0:24:31.600 --> 0:24:35.199 evade law enforcement. This is something that the company is 0:24:35.240 --> 0:24:39.720 still dealing with today. Moving on into July, that's when 0:24:39.800 --> 0:24:43.000 hyper Loop one held its first full scale test of 0:24:43.000 --> 0:24:46.240 its technology. It happened on a test track in Nevada 0:24:46.480 --> 0:24:49.439 using an actual size vehicle, So there is like a 0:24:49.520 --> 0:24:54.040 full scale vehicle of what would end up being the 0:24:54.119 --> 0:24:57.000 types of transportation we would get into once the system 0:24:57.040 --> 0:25:01.000 is complete. However, no one was inside this test vehicle. 0:25:01.480 --> 0:25:04.960 The hyper loop one method relies on mag lev technology, 0:25:05.000 --> 0:25:08.480 which is different from the original hyper loop concept that 0:25:08.520 --> 0:25:12.280 Elon Musk talked about. Elon Musk's version used what he 0:25:12.359 --> 0:25:16.800 called air skis, so you would use uh, you pump 0:25:16.880 --> 0:25:20.080 air down kind of like a reverse air hockey table, 0:25:20.720 --> 0:25:23.720 and that would allow the pod to float above the 0:25:23.760 --> 0:25:27.640