The Register

Plus: Microsoft to dump support for Cortana on iOS, Android phones

In brief Your Google Home speaker may have been quietly recording sounds around your house without your permission or authorization, it was revealed this week.…

Start the clock on those patches – they'll be coming any day, week, month soon

DEF CON In July, the makers of millions of smartphones powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon system-on-chips received mitigation recommendations to address a bevy of security flaws in their products, all introduced by Qualcomm's technology.…

Bug-hunter details how his team slurped data… IN SPAAAAACE

DEF CON FYI, if you didn't already know: readily available satellite TV electronics can be used to sniff and inspect satellite internet traffic.…

Zuck, Google, Microsoft platforms barred from Apple's iOS software souk

Facebook, Google, and Microsoft – suspected or convicted monopolists – are being thwarted from offering their respective game services by another tech giant facing scrutiny for anti-competitive behavior: Apple.…

Heavy burden for one valiant man to carry, and it needs sharing

Credential breach website Have I Been Pwned (HIBP) will be going open source, site creator and maintainer Troy Hunt has told the world.…

This is not a matter for the San Diego court, says digital family history service

Springer of unwelcome family tree surprises and favorite of investigative genealogy hunting uncles everywhere, Ancestry.com has tried to invoke an arbitration clause to fight off a 77-page false advertising lawsuit accusing it of violating California auto-renewal laws.…

Taiwanese optics suppliers in the frame, reportedly

Apple forecaster Ming-Chi Kuo has reported some supply chain issues for the firm's upcoming entry-level iPhone 12, with camera lenses from one supplier seemingly raising quality concerns.…

Don't worry, your job's safe... we think

The UK government is setting up a dynamic purchasing system to help buy artificial intelligence services across the public sector with an estimated £200m on the table over four years.…

Those who won lost; those who lost won

Red faces abound within the British Army after an Excel spreadsheet cock-up led to a number of soldiers being wrongly promoted.…

We don't have to go... outside... to have a good time, oh no

It's a beautiful day in old Blighty, hotter even than former party capital Ibiza in the Mediterranean. Are you going to go outside?…

These are the class-action-suit-joining 'droids lawyers are looking for. (We'll get our coats)

Google "abuses Android OS to obtain a competitive advantage", according to a lawsuit filed this week alleging that the Alphabet offshoot "secretively monitored and collected users' sensitive personal data" to develop apps to compete with TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram.…

Plus: CDC still telling folks not to drink it

Though the global coronavirus pandemic rests on a knife edge in many countries, some restrictions have been eased and folks are settling into the "new normal".…

I always feel like ... somebody's watching me (and they're doing it continuously)

Log management and analytics biz Sumo Logic has tweaked its technology platform to help sift through applications and infrastructure that run on AWS as well as keep an eye on software development cycles.…

Keep up, old-timer

Microsoft has released a bunch of updates to its Visual Studio development tool on Windows and Mac, including an extension that provides full diagnostics and code completion for the Angular TypeScript/JavaScript framework.…

Doesn't matter if design was perfected at dawn of humankind, you still have to pay Cupertino tax

Apple's $699 Mac Pro Wheel Kit provoked astonishment from the general public, swiftly followed by raucous laughter. Even by Apple's standards, these were a blatant piss-take. Fortunately, there's now an alternative for thrifty punters from Mac accessory biz OWC that costs "just" $199.…

You know this, guys: 7.14 linguine. Get with the programme!

Reg Standards Bureau No less a character than John Cleese himself has mounted a challenge to the supremacy of the Register Standards Soviet after the funny walks man suggested that he himself was an appropriate measure of social distancing.…

Demirkapi shows how drivers can be misused for deep pwnage

DEF CON Writing a successful Windows rootkit is easier than you would think. All you need is do is learn assembly and C/C++ programming, plus exploit development, reverse engineering, and Windows internals, and then find and abuse a buggy driver, and inject and install your rootkit, and bam. Happy days.…

And expands its Horizons VDI into new clouds

VMware has decided revealed plans to become an application vendor of sorts, with make-your-office-safe-ware that complements its other end-user compute products.…

Stiffened sinews and floppy disks

On Call Do you remember those halcyon days when we used to enjoy a city break every now again? Relive those times with a continental Friday On Call, courtesy of The Register.…

Boffins find atmospheric oddities that make the planet blink in Spring and Autumn

Mars pulses with ultraviolet light three times a night during spring and autumn, according to boffins from the University of Colorado's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP).…