Category: Tech

Are you switching to Signal?

On By mehranmuslimiblogIn Tech, Tips, UncategorizedLeave a comment

For some years now almost the entire world has been using WhatsApp thanks to it being the leading secure messaging platform. However, that is all changing  due to a slowness on the part of its owner Facebook to introduce multi-device access.

Zak Doffman comments that this has been made worse by “the fast-moving convergence of messaging and calls—and with WhatsApp calls still tied to a phone, rather than an easier-to-use large screen device, it’s becoming a major stumbling block.”

Facebook tried to rectify this by launching the cross-platform Messenger Rooms, but these don’t offer end-to-end encryption. So, as Doffman says, it isn’t an ideal way to communicate if your information is sensitive or confidential.

Admittedly, WhatsApp does do a good job of securing voice and video calls from its iPhone and Android apps, and you can now have up to eight people on a call. It also has a desktop app in the pipeline, but it’s all a bit too late.

The super secure Signal platform is beating WhatsApp. It has already started beta testing one-to-one video and voice calls from its desktop app. Group calls are not available yet, but they won’t be far away, as Signal’s recent announcement would seem to indicate: “We think that calls need to zoom out of the past and into the future, and your feedback will help us get there.” Obviously this was aimed at Zoom, which dominated work and personal conversations during lockdown.

“This release is one of the first steps towards our goal of enabling secure voice and video calls that are available on all of your devices,” Signal says, adding, “in addition to being end-to-end encrypted and free for everyone to use.”

However, Doffman points out that Signal isn’t really that concerned about Zoom,  it is WhatsApp that is the real target. And it is picking up traction with those who don’t really trust Facebook for messaging. The only downsides of Signal at the moment are first, the number of users is relatively small at the moment, and second, there are no backups yet, so if you lose your device, you lose your messages.

The recent protests in the USA and Hong Kong have highlighted the need for a more secure messaging by anyone concerned about interception, metadata or tracking. What’s more Signal is chasing WhatsApps users and is ahead of the game. If WhatsApp wants to retain its No.1 position, it needs to implement end-to-end encrypted back-ups and linked devices. Not used Signal yet? Why not install it on your phone and try it now.

The Ugly Exploitation of 5G Fears

On By mehranmuslimiblogIn Digital Innovation, TechLeave a comment

The COVID-19 pandemic has proved to be a fertile breeding ground that has brought together disparate groups, including anti-vaxxers and the anti-5G movement, on any platform they can find to share their conspiracy-based views. One of the most prominent claims is that 5G technology spread the coronavirus, even though 5G is not available ‘everywhere’.

Before that became a widely shared theory, we already knew that those who don’t want to see 5G launched had been pushing out information about the alleged dangers of 5G. We were all about to be ‘wi-fried’ by it, and children would be particularly vulnerable. I’m not here to debate the claims of the anti-5G movement, but I would like to alert people to one of the dangers that this kind of scaremongering can produce: the opportunity to be scared into buying into a health scam.

A Forbes story by John Koetsier illustrates it perfectly. It concerns a ‘5G Bioshield’ that is being sold for $350 per unit. The USB stick boasts features such as “quantum oscillation” and “restoring coherence of atoms” as well as “emitting life force frequencies.”

This is what the company selling it claims on its the website:

“Through a process of quantum oscillation the 5G BioShield USB Key balances and reharmonizes the disturbing frequencies arising from the electric fog induced by devices, such as laptops, cordless phones, wi-fi, tablets, etc., The 5G BioShield USB Key restores the coherence of the geometry of the atoms, which allows a perfect induction for life forces, by (re-)creating a cardiac coherence, via plasmic support and interactivity.”

It sounds like the answer to all those fears about the health damage that 5G is purported to inflict. It must be a very special USB stick to do all the above, must it not? You’d like to think so for $350.

The expert analysis

But when Pen Test Partners reviewed the stick’s properties, it “revealed nothing more than what you’d expect from a regular 128MB USB key,” states its blog. And they went on to say: “Usually with USB devices, one can look at the properties and it will list the manufacturer and extra information about the device. However, we found that all the default values remained. This is often an indication of cheap, unbranded devices.”

So, basically it is a $6 USB stick being sold for $350. Furthermore, the founders of the 5G Bioshield don’t appear to exist. Koetsier says, “A search for “Dr. Ilija Lakicevic,” listed on the website as one of the founders of the company, turns up nothing on LinkedIn. A search for him on the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics, where the 5G BioShield website says he worked, also turns up no results.”

Have they sold any? Yes. To the city of Glastonbury in the UK, which issued a statement saying, “We use this device and find it helpful.” It is also worth mentioning that other health protection used in Glastonbury include Shungite, a mineral which is said to have healing powers that one “healing crystal” company says “span the board from purity to protection.”

Whether you agree with the theory that 5G is a health danger or not, I expect you can agree that paying $350 for a $6 product is quite simply — exploitation!

How Google’s 5G strategy could give it market dominance

On By mehranmuslimiblogIn TechLeave a comment

Google has shared its vision for enabling telecommunication providers to deliver business services through 5G networks using a Global Mobile Edge Cloud (GMEC) strategy. This will allow both Google and telecoms companies to use 5G networks to deliver “unique applications and services running at the edge,” as Janikaram MSV writes at Forbes.

What is 5G/Edge for business?

A 5G network will be able to deliver speed and bandwidth unlike anything we have experienced before, and the entire system is more geared up for business services than consumers. Furthermore, since telco networks provide access to the Cloud, it means they can “introduce an edge computing layer that offers unique advantages to businesses,” Janikaram says.

Google foresees the advantages of this for its own business, because it will enable it to provide some of the best Google Cloud Platform capabilities to the businesses, and this in turn will enable the telecom companies to monetise their 5G networks.

Google has already partnered with AT&T to build a portfolio of 5G edge computing solutions ​for industries like retail, manufacturing and transportation​, and will maximise the use of Google’s AI capabilities to help AT&T to expand its reach in the USA.

Consumers will also have their experience radically offered when through the use of 5G. It will deliver all manner of immersive experiences using augmented and virtual reality, and we can expect the retail sector to be altered beyond recognition with services similar to an Amazon Go shopping experience, and we’ll have ‘smart’ everything: cities, healthcare, buildings.

All of this depends heavily on using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and data. Google is well positioned for this as a leader in analytics, as well as AI, and its strategy will help telecom providers to offer a “technology stack to developers and businesses building the next-generation consumer experiences.”

For example, here are some of Google’s assets that will help it to make the most of the edge computing opportunity: Anthos is a Google modular hybrid cloud platform based on containers and Kubernetes for enterprise data that can be revamped for the telecom edge.

And there is TensorFlow, the most popular open source machine learning framework used by researchers, AI engineers and ML developers.

Google has also built custom hardware to accelerate the training and inference of machine learning models, and its Edge TPU is the counterpart of Cloud TPU that can speed up inferencing TensorFlow models running at the edge.

Let’s not forget that Google has 21 cloud regions and 134+ Content Delivery Network (CDN) locations across the globe, and that through its Point of Presence (PoP) and edge locations, Google delivers some of its services such as Search, Gmail, YouTube and more. It is going to capitalise on this global footprint, and as Janikaram says, “If Google manages to deliver on its vision of edge computing, it will become a formidable player in the 5G-based mobile edge computing market.”

6 Tech Predictions for 2020

On By mehranmuslimiblogIn TechLeave a comment

The tech world is constantly changing, and as we enter 2020 and a new decade, we will see even greater differences than we have seen over the previous ten years. Tech experts, who have their finger on the pulse, and are astute when it comes to making predictions about the coming decade in technology, have been discussing the key changes at various conference events worldwide, and I’ve selected six that I think are the most interesting, and significant for those working in tech.

We want more privacy

Privacy has been a major issue over the last two years, highlighted by the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica scandal. Consumers are going to pay more attention to how their data is collected, and how it is stored. As a consequence, more businesses will be looking for cloud-based solutions with privacy features that fully comply with the law and fair consumer practices.

Biometrics will produces more wearables

People are already wearing FitBits, but in the next few years we will probably see more interactive data tracking using heart rate and brainwaves for example, and using them to power personal experiences. One suggestion is that when you lower your heart rate, you’ll see a scene on your screen change colour and sharpness. Positive thoughts may do the same. In other words, we will be using more augmented or virtual reality. Sarah Hill, CEO at HEALium, sees it as a new form of meditation. She says, “These new kinds of meditation are harnessing the power of your body’s own electricity via your wearables to allow the user to feel content in ways that have never been done before.”

Recession-proofed credit

Few people will ever forget the last recession, so as rumours of another one filter through, more people are trying to prevent slipping into a bad credit rating situation by using credit-building fintech tools to bolster their credit scores in advance.”

More AI in publishing

Monetising content has always been an issue for online publishers, and this decade should present them with new solutions, such using machine learning and AI to predict readers’ specific interests and how likely they are to subscribe.

The advance of 5G

Many are agreed that this is going to be a 5G decade. It will probably evolve rapidly and we will see more enterprise applications, plus investment in 5G technology will rise significantly.

The assistant in your car

Niko Vuori, CEO of Drivetime, says, “It is estimated that there will be eight billion digital voice assistants in use by 2023. As voice assistants continue to dominate the home, the in-vehicle usage has remained relatively limited to navigation, despite being one of the only environments that truly requires a hands-free experience.” Expect to have much more voice-assistant technology in your car.

There are many more tech changes to come. What prediction have you seen that appeals to you the most?