Google’s Pixel line-up of smartphones have long been among the best Android devices on the market, and our often touted as examples of what Google thinks a smartphone running its operating system should be. And it's not just about the hardware and software, Pixel owners also get phones that offer great security, due...Read more...
Artificial intelligence has been used for some rather interesting applications, such as helping people deal with losing a loved one. While this is a unique use of the technology, there is so much more that AI can be used to improve our daily lives. This includes cybersecurity, which Google is now capitalizing on by...Read more...
The Google Play Store is the primary app repository for most Android users, and that makes it a tantalizing target for internet ne'er-do-wells. Google says it takes Play Store security seriously—so seriously, in fact, that it has whipped up a nifty little acronym to describe its approach. Google says that it leveraged...Read more...
Artificial intelligence is not perfect. It occasionally spews misinformation, like the time a Chevy AI chatbot was tricked into “selling” a Tahoe for $1, and hallucinations or mistakes in the training data can result in incorrent output. However, the march of AI integration continues, bringing with it these sorts of...Read more...
Drop everything—there's a new hardware security vulnerability in Intel's processors! Or don't, really, because this vulnerability is only rated at a "medium" severity by Intel itself, and it's even arguably a good thing for the company. That's because it only affects older processors based on the "Skylake"...Read more...
Conventional wisdom holds that adding two-factor authentication (2FA) is the best way to secure your online accounts. With this feature enabled, a threat actor would need your login credentials, as well as a one-time code to access your data. Google Authenticator is a popular way to store two-factor codes, and a...Read more...
Google wants its Play Store users to have more control over their app account data by allowing them to delete their account and/or data directly within the app or online. Chalk that up as a nice win for personal data privacy.
In an announcement yesterday, Google laid down new rules that will require Android app...Read more...
Pepsi Bottling Ventures (PBV) has suffered a major data breach, with hackers making off with a trove of sensitive information. The company has begun notifying affected individuals of this incident, but the details remain sparse. According to a sample of the security notice issued by PBV, unknown threat actors managed...Read more...
Google’s Project Zero team, which finds and analyzes zero-day security vulnerabilities, has revealed that an unnamed commercial surveillance company developed spyware that exploited three vulnerabilities specific to Samsung phones equipped with Exynos SoCs. Project Zero managed to obtain a sample of the exploit chain...Read more...
Google issues monthly security patches for its Pixel phones and to other Android devices via the Android Open Source Project. Each of these patches includes important fixes to protect end users from emerging threats or disclosed flaws. November’s security update is particularly important for Pixel owners as it...Read more...
Back in 2018, the Associated Press (AP) published a piece bringing attention to the fact that Google still collects some user location data even when Location History is disabled in Google Account settings. Two years later, the Arizona Attorney General sued Google for deceptive location tracking practices, citing this...Read more...
Among the many features and devices announced at the Google I/O event in May of this year was a new feature for the Google app giving users the option to request that their personal information be removed from Google search results. The company told users at the time of the announcement that the feature would be made...Read more...
Near the end of 2020, Apple introduced a dedicated app privacy section to the App Store, requiring developers to disclose what user information is linked to users’ identities and used to track them. Then, in May of 2021, Google announced that a similar feature was in the works for its Play Store. Almost a year later...Read more...
Chrome is the most popular browser on the planet (in terms of market share) with billions of a users, and the unwanted side effect of that immense popularity in the tech space is it attracts bad actors. Such is the reason for the latest browser update—it comes with a warning from Google that one of the security...Read more...
Managing passwords across all your platforms and logins can be a nightmare. You have an account for your bank, social media, smart devices, doctor, gaming platforms, work, and probably a lot more. Fortunately, Google has started rolling out new password manager features to make your password juggling hopefully...Read more...
Malicious software, commonly known as malware, is one of many threats to both cybersecurity and privacy. Cybercriminals can distribute malware to achieve a number of different goals, including siphoning funds from cryptocurrency wallets, stealing login credentials, or establishing botnets. However, cybercriminals...Read more...
It's a new era and there's a new bully in schools. A financial bully to the school administrations, at least. That bully is ransomware, and he's an annoying jerk.
Ransomware is an ever increasing threat that most recently has affected schools, governments, hospitals, and even individual users. This particular type...Read more...
Another day another vulnerability. Several, actually—the Stable Channel for the desktop edition of Chrome had an update on April 26, 2022 that includes no less than 30 security fixes, half a dozen of which are rated as "High" severity flaws.
The release notes for Google's Chrome v101.0.4951.41 for Windows, Mac, and...Read more...
Back in May of 2021, Google announced that privacy labels would be coming to the Google Play Store. Now, almost a year later, the company has announced that it will soon be rolling these labels out to the Play Store with requirements for application developers. The Google Play Store already features an expandable...Read more...
As we have alluded to in numerous recent posts, security and malware-related alerts are almost weekly if not more frequent. According to Google's Project Zero, a whopping 58 zero day exploits were found in 2021. That's basically about 1.12 new zero day exploits a week.
Project Zero is an initiative from Google...Read more...
When Microsoft added Windows Subsystem for Linux it was exciting for developers, but it also raised a question. "If Windows can run Linux, when will it run Android?" A logical inquiry of course, because Android is a Linux-based operating system. Unfortunately, now that Android Subsystem has been added, a bad egg has...Read more...
Google is pushing out an emergency patch for its Chrome browser on multiple platforms, including Windows, Linux, and Mac to protect against a zero-day vulnerability that is being actively exploited in the wild. Applying the patch updates the browser to version 100.0.4896.127, and more importantly it protects users...Read more...