| Major Flaw in Wi-Fi Protected Setup Discovered Posted: 28 Dec 2011 03:05 PM PST  The now widely used Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) standard is apparently not as protected as router makers had hoped. According to a new study, the PIN codes used to lock down the system can be brute forced on many devices by inputting incorrect PIN codes. Millions of routers and access points could be affected.
When a remote client attempts to access the device with a PIN, incorrect entries are met with a EAP-NACK message. This snippet of code can actually reveal the first half of the PIN, and the last digit is always the checksum of the PIN, so the number of possible PINs drops from 10^8 to just 11,000. With an automated system, it's not impossible to try all the possible permutations in order to gain access. Also troubling is the fact that many routers do not implement any sort of lockout policy for repeated incorrect PINs. That would allow an attacker to hit the device with a new PIN every second or two until it was cracked. Expect updated firmware on your router to at least patch this last problem. |
| HP Wanted $1.2 Billion for Palm Assets Posted: 28 Dec 2011 02:42 PM PST  A new report from VentureBeat sheds some light on the HP decision making process that ended with webOS being open sourced a few weeks ago. Sources within HP say that the company was asking for a whopping $1.2 billion for its Palm and webOS assets. For those of you keeping score, that is exactly what HP paid for Palm back in April of 2010.
HP wanted desperately not to take a direct financial hit on Palm as negations were on-going in late 2011. Multiple potential suitors were rumored including Amazon, Facebook, and HTC. Perhaps the laughable price is the reason none of those deals got very far. HP seemed oblivious to the fact that Palm lost value since it was purchased, and in the wake of the aborted TouchPad launch. Unable to find a company willing to pay the obscene asking price, HP now hopes to use webOS, while investing fewer resources in the newly open project. What do you think would have been a fair price for HP's Palm assets? |
| Verizon Experiencing Third Nationwide Outage This Month Posted: 28 Dec 2011 02:24 PM PST  Verizon Wireless has made a name for itself by being rock-solid and having a huge 3G network. Things have been a bit more rocky since its 4G LTE network started taking off. Today, Big Red is having its third nationwide data outage in the month of December. Customers across the U.S. are reporting no 4G, and often no 3G data either.
It took Verizon a little bit to respond to the avalanche of customer complaints, but it has now started handing out a standard bit of PR. "We are investigating reports of some customers experiencing trouble accessing the 4GLTE network. The network itself continues to operate and all customers continue to be able to make calls, send text messages and utilize data services. 3G devices are operating normally," the statement reads. We can personally dispute that data services remain accessible. Verizon has been working on a big push to get users to upgrade to the 4G network, but perhaps the carrier has over-estimated its back-end capacity. Some users have speculated that the issue is with authentication of devices. In the meantime, sound off in the comments and let us know how your 4G is working. |
| The Top 50 Tech Stories of 2011 Posted: 28 Dec 2011 10:53 AM PST If we built a time machine, we wouldn't have to travel back a great distance to find a far different tech world than the one we live in today. Why would we even want to? To retire richer than Bill Gates and Warren Buffett combined, of course! Think about it. If you could go back to 2010, imagine the money you could make by placing seemingly absurd bets on the near future. There's not a single person in 2010 who thinks Duke Nukem Forever will ever see the light of day, let alone actually ship in 2011. And who in 2010 would believe Hewlett-Packard, the world's largest PC maker, would seriously consider severing its PC arm, own the best selling tablet (for a period of time) and open source webOS barely more than a year after acquiring Palm for $1.2 billion? That's a parlay even a priest would take. Alas, our get rich quick scheme is wishful thinking, because plutonium is both expensive and hard to come by. And even if we did get our hands on some, we'd still need a DeLorean. Bummer. The bigger point here is that 2011 has been a crazy year with plenty of wild headlines and plot twists (or par for course, as it were). As we all get ready to kick off a new year, we've gone and assembled a gallery of the top 50 news stories of 2011. Flip through them and be sure to let us know in the comments section which tech events stand out to you the most, including ones we might have missed. |
| Soft Drink Vending Machines Offering Free Unlimited Wi-Fi Coming To Japan Posted: 28 Dec 2011 10:30 AM PST  If Japan ever decides to ditch the "Rising Sun" bit, "Land of the Awesome Vending Machines" would be an apt second slogan. A multitude of useful, weird and wacky vending machines litter the landscapes of the country's major cities, offering up goodies ranging from exotic drinks to delicious noodles and heck, even space gold and hotel rooms (as shown by Tom Edwards in his 24 hour vending machine survival stint in the heart of Tokyo). Now, those ubiquitous Japanese vending machines are getting even more useful, as one company plans on rolling out units that double as free Wi-Fi hotspots in 2012.
TechCrunch pointed us towards a recent press release by Asahi Soft Drinks, the maker of the Wi-Fi vending machines. Anyone with roughly 160 ft. will be able to tap into the Wi-Fi hotspot – no purchase necessary, no registration needed. Can't top that! Users will get 30 minutes of free browsing before they get das boot, but they can reconnect immediately if they so desire. Dozens of users can be connected at once. Once logged in, a welcome screen will display the contents of the Wi-Fi-sharing vending machine, along with the names and locations of local stores and interesting places. You also get that free high-speed Internet connection, though we'd recommend not doing any online banking or sensitive browsing through the open connection. Asahi expects to have 1,000 of this nifty vending machines deployed across five major Japanese cities by the end of 2012. They want to expand that number to 10,000 installed units within five years. Hopefully they decide to bring some of those Stateside! |
| comScore: U.S. Online Holiday Spending Tops $35 Billion Posted: 28 Dec 2011 10:05 AM PST  A strong Christmas push helped propel U.S. online holiday spending to $35.3 billion this year, up 15 percent versus 2010, according to market research firm comScore. U.S. consumers hopped online and spent $2.8 billion in the week leading up to Christmas day, marking a 16 percent increase over the same week one year ago.
"Holiday e-commerce spending has remained strong throughout the season, and we have now reached a record $35 billion in U.S. online sales for the season-to-date," said comScore chairman Gian Fulgoni. "We can now say with certainty that the $1.25 billion spent on Cyber Monday will rank it as the heaviest online spending day of the season for the second consecutive year, but we should also note that it was accompanied by nine other billion dollar spending days this year." Numbers were up across the board, culminating in a 26 percent increase in online spending on Black Friday, in which U.S. shoppers placed Web orders totaling $816 million, up from $648 million on the same day in 2010. |
| Rumor: Ivy Bridge On April 8 Posted: 28 Dec 2011 10:03 AM PST  Jonesing for some performance improved, energy-efficient Ivy Bridge action? You're going to be waiting for a bit. Just how long is up in the air. Intel's been mum on release date details for the upcoming line of CPUs, but for the most part, sources have been saying that we'll see the 22nm chips in May. DigiTimes claims that date may a bit off, however; it points to April 8th as the launch date, and even names the names of models we can expect to see on that date.
Citing "PC makers in Taiwan," the publication says that the Core i7-3770 (with S,T, and K variants) and the Core i5-3570, Core i5-3550 and Core i5-3450 should all be available at launch. All sport four cores and are reportedly priced between $184 and $332. Laptop fans can look forward to the unveiling of the Core i7-3920QM ($1,096), Core i7-3820QM ($568) and Core i7-3720QM ($378) mobile processors at the same time, according to the report. More chips – both desktop and mobile, and including Ultrabook-specific models – are expected to still launch in May. So, can the report be trusted? Only time will tell. But the prospect of overclocked Core i7 Ivy Bridge chips as early as the beginning of Spring has our mouths watering. |
| Hard Drive Vendors Pushing for Long Term Contracts with PC Makers Posted: 28 Dec 2011 08:48 AM PST  Hard drive makers put most of their eggs in a single basket by building the bulk of their manufacturing facilities in a flood prone section of Thailand, and that strategy came back to bite them on the backside when severe floods earlier this year dismantled their operations. As hard drive makers look to get back on track, they're coming up with various strategies to ensure no more monetary losses.
One of those strategies is having PC makers sign long term HDD supply contracts, DigiTimes reports. HDD vendors want PC OEMs to agree to one-year buying contracts that would lock them into specific prices and volumes for the next 12 months. PC makers are understandably hesitant and fear that once operations are fully restored, hard drive prices will take a nose dive. This isn't the only tactic HDD vendors have been toying with. Both Seagate and Western Digital recently reduced their hard drive warranties, in some cases down to just one year (Seagate Barracuda, Barracuda Green, and Momentus hard drives). |
| AMD Radeon HD 7990 Shipping in March 2012, Start Saving Your Pennies Posted: 28 Dec 2011 08:32 AM PST  On hindsight, one of the wisest decisions AMD ever made was acquiring ATI Technologies, a costly and controversial move at the time, but one in which the Santa Clara chip designer has been kicking ass with ever since. This point is underscored with AMD's Radeon HD 7000 series (see our Radeon HD 7970 preview here), a killer GPU family that will culminate with the Radeon HD 7990, a monster of a card with two 7970 GPUs and 6GB of total graphics memory.
Unless something terribly unexpected happens, like a manufacturing defect of epic proportions, we have every reason to expect this dual-GPU card will tear it up in benchmarks. We won't know for sure until we get our hands on one, of course, nor will you be able to see for yourself until it ships. According to news and rumor site Fudzilla, the HD 7990 is slated for retail in March 2012. If plan to purchase this card, start saving now. Fudzilla says it will cost $849, not exactly chump change, but not egregious considering it's two Radeon 7970 cards, which sell for $549 each. There's also power considerations to contend with, and towards that end, an intriguing feature in the 7990 is AMD's ZeroCore Power Technology, which powers down the GPU to virtually a zero state when the monitor is idle. |
| U.S. Consumers Losing Interest in 3D TV; Western Europe, China Totally Enamored Posted: 28 Dec 2011 08:11 AM PST  It's tough to get a grasp on where the market stands for 3D viewing because different parts of the world have different attitudes towards 3D. According to market research firm DisplaySearch, Western Europe and China are the most enthusiastic regions for 3D consumption, whereas interest in the United States appears to be waning.
"We were surprised to find that 3D appears to be a far more popular feature in China than North America, and the penetration rate was two times higher in the last quarter," said Paul Gray, Director of TV Electronics Research, NPD DisplaySearch. "Our report also indicates that North American and Japanese 3D penetration is lower than the Middle East." Here in the States, 3D TV penetration spiked at a little over 10 percent in the second quarter of 2011, up from less than 5 percent in the fourth quarter of 2010, but has dropped to around 7.5 percent in Q3 of this year. Western Europe, meanwhile, is far and away the most popular market for 3D TVs with a penetration rate of around 18 percent in the most recent quarter. What's also interesting to note is that of all the regions examined, including worldwide statistics, North America is the only one to show a decline in 3D TV penetration from Q2 2011 to Q3 2011. Image Credit: Philips |
