Geekly Update - 07 Jun 2017

The AskBobRankin Geekly Update

T-Mobile is offering to pay off the balance owed on Verizon phones when Verizon customers switch to T-Mobile. To qualify, you must have an iPhone or Google Pixel phone, and you must add T-Mobile’s Premium Device Protection Plus insurance plan, which costs $15 per month.

Cloud-based password manager OneLogin suffered its second data breach in less than a year. Customer names, email addresses, and in some cases, passwords were exposed.

Kmart also reports a data breach in which malware invaded its point-of-sale system and stole the credit card data of an unspecified number of in-store customers. A Kmart spokesman said the malware was "undetectable by current anti-virus systems" but somehow, they "quickly removed it and contained the event." Hmmm.

Victims of hackers would be legally free to hack back if the Active Cyber Defense Certainty Act (AC/DC for short) becomes law. Alarmingly, the Act would also “allow victims to penetrate the computers of other hacking victims for ‘reconnaissance’ purposes while tracing an attack to its source.”

Need some summer reading material? Here is a collection of free ebooks compatible with Kindle readers and apps.

Researchers have discovered a way to triple screen resolution without making the screen any bigger. By controlling "sub-pixels," displays could be brighter and clearer. And presumably, fonts could be even tinier.

A new device tells you if the "person" speaking to you is a human or a robot. Here is a novel use of artificial intelligence to detect artificial intelligence. It’s an idea that’s ahead of its time, but not by much.

A cardiologist set out to discover how accurate fitness trackers are in comparison to hospital measurements. He found trackers are quite good at counting heartbeats and terrible at estimating calories burned during exercise.

A smartphone case that doubles as an espresso machine guarantees that you’ll never be without caffeine again.

North Korea has created its own tablet and named it the “iPad,” even though it runs Android. Wouldn't "Kim Jong's Un-Pad" have been a more clever name?

JetBlue is the first airline to let passengers use selfies as boarding passes. Sort of. Passengers must gaze into a camera at the gate (not their smartphone) which uses facial recognition technology to verify their identity.

"Explain yourself!" As artificial intelligences take on important tasks such as screening job and loan applicants, and even recommending sentences for convicted criminals, questions arise as to how humans can make AIs explain their algorithmic reasoning.

You can love your laptop, but... the Utah Supreme Court has ruled that there is no constitutional right to marry your laptop.

"Show some love." Facebook has changed its newsfeed algorithm again. Now, you’ll see more posts similar to the ones that you took the extra time to “react” to (love, haha, wow, sad, mad) compared to posts you merely “like.” So don’t just sit there, react!

A defendant in a Florida child abuse case got 180 days in jail for contempt after failing to divulge the password to his iPhone. Other courts have ruled that phone passwords are protected by the Fifth Amendment.

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