Geekly Update - 22 September 2021

The AskBobRankin Geekly Update

Are you tired of paying a monthly rental fee for your Internet modem or router? In most cases, you can save money by buying your own and using it instead of the boxes supplied by your ISP.

Express VPN, one of the most popular virtual private network products, has come under scrutiny due to news that the company's CIO was fined $1.6 million by the DOJ for spying on US citizens at the behest of the United Arab Emirates. Oh, and the company was just bought by Kape Technologies, which owns VPN review sites, and has historical ties to malware, ad-injection and data mining operations.

Another scammer in the slammer. Krebs on Security reports that Matthew Gatrel was found guilty of operating a powerful distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack service. Gatrel was convicted on three charges of violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, and faces a maximum of 35 years in prison.

Microsoft just announced a bunch of new hardware, including the redesigned Surface Pro 8, a new Surface Duo 2, Surface Go 3, and the Surface Laptop Studio.

On a related note, another "just here for the headline" item... Microsoft Unveils New Mouse Made From Ocean-Bound Trash, Pledges To Go Zero Waste, Water Positive By 2030. (BONUS: I'll save you the trouble of googling the definition of "water positive".)

Microsoft has also released an update to the PC Health Check app to help you determine if your PC meets the hardware requirements to upgrade to Windows 11. Unfortunately, the new PC Health Check app is available only to members of the Windows Insiders program at this time. The app checks to see if your PC has Secure Boot, TPM (Trusted Platform Module) 2.0, and has a supported CPU.

ZDNet reports that there is a loophole allowing Windows 11 to run on older computers with unsupported hardware. But it's not pretty. If you go that route, your PC won't get fixes, security patches, or driver updates via Windows Update.

Wanna try arm wrestling with a bionic hand? Psyonic's Ability Hand prosthesis has five fingers that can flex and extend. Sensors in its fingertips detect pressure so the wearer can work with even the most delicate objects.

This just in from the Take A Memo Department: In a leaked memo, Apple CEO Tim Cook says the company is doing “everything in our power" to identify those who leaked earlier memos. At the same all-hands meeting, the company announced they would not impose a vaccine mandate, and hoped to "move forward" from the Epic vs. Apple antitrust case. Both of those news items were immediately leaked to the tech press.

The Lithuanian National Cyber Security Centre tested 5G mobile phones from Chinese manufacturer Xiaomi, and found embedded software that could detect and censor terms including “Free Tibet”, "Long live Taiwan independence", "democracy movement", and 449 other terms. The agency recommends that citizens with Chinese phones get rid of them "as fast as reasonably possible."

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