Hello, hello, hello and it’s another Thursday! Guys, I have to thank you so much for your support of this weekly blog and for your ears. The Cloud has consistently provided an uptick in listens across these first three months, and has caught the attention of a major blog platform. Thanks! We’ll see what happens next.

Tune into me,  Mark Starling, John, and the First News 570 crew. This week’s hot and fresh tech news: TikTok rival: Triller fails to pay up for Verzuz purchase, Chinese tech companies hand over algo info, and VPNs safe unless you’re on iOS. You can listen to me and Mark Starling point and laugh at all things tech every Thursday at 643 am ET live on the radio or the iHeartRadio app.

And just because you know you can’t get enough of him, Elon Musk has now claimed he wants to buy Manchester United. Yes, that Manchester United. If he was joking about buying Twitter, he may be joking about buying ManU.

TRILLER FAILS TO PAY HIP-HOP DUO FOR VERZUZ SERIES

COVID-19 provided a huge source of innovation for online content. From prolific DJs hosting nightly, online (and quarantined) remix parties, to a news anchor and his tech analyst hosting weekly happy hour segments, to Timbaland and Swizz Beats pitting R&B, rap, and soul legends against each other, online streaming acts were a big hit. Producers Timbaland and Swizz Beats created the Verzuz series pitting musical acts one-on-one in a hit-song-by-hit-song competition. Triller, a TikTok competitor, purchased the series from the producers for a reported $50 million deal in cash and stock but hasn’t paid the full amount. The producers sued for a remaining $28 million due, but Triller disputes this. This particular deal isn’t the only one Triller has been accused of welching on. For their part, Timbaland and Swizz Beats allocated 46 percent of Verzuz’s equity for the artists participating in the series.

CHINESE TECHNOLOGY COMPANIES HAND ALGO INFO TO CHINESE GOVERNMENT

Everyone has an algorithm story. Usually the kind where an ad is sent to someone that doesn’t make sense. When have I ever been interested in corn cob holders? Yesterday, the Cyberspace Administration of China has published over 30 algorithms used by some of the Chinese technology sector’s companies. Alibaba, Tencent (Chinese Facebook), and ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok, have published information relating to algorithms that recommend, suggest, and influence user behavior. Alibaba and TikTok (ByteDance) are heavily used in the United States. We all know our data is being given to someone, but usually it’s to a commercial company only caring about profit, versus a government. Here, companies like Google, Facebook, and others have successfully argued that these details are trade secrets. In China, it’s not so. Browse carefully.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: IOS VPNS HAVE BEEN LEAKING DATA FOR AT LEAST 2 YEARS

Security researcher, Michael Horowitz has reported iOS users who are using a virtual private network (VPN) to privately route their traffic may have been inadvertently leaking their data for at least 2 years. VPNs are used to create encrypted, secure, private communications on the Internet. A phone or computer connects to a VPN using a special piece of software called a VPN client. Government agencies and companies require some remote workers to use a VPN to securely connect to company information. Others use VPNs for private communications or watching Netflix in a foreign country. Horowitz discovered that iOS keeps already existing connections open while a phone is connected via VPN and can even sniff device traffic using special router logging. This hole was found on iOS 13 and above. This report is coming just before Apple’s annual September event where we’re expecting new updates to iOS and macOS from the fruit company. Again, browse carefully, and don’t simply assume your nefarious communiques are guarded.

Thanks for another week of reading Top Tech News. Please look to the right and use the subscribe option to get these stories and more in your inbox. And check out The Cloud. My monthly podcast that explores into the depths of high tech and figures out if something is hype or the real deal. This month’s episode is about cryptocurrencies.

I’m worn out again, good people! I spent the earlier part of this week at NAMPI, a Medicare Program Integrity conference, talking about data, AI, and algorithms. It’s good to be back serving up this week’s tech news.

Tune into me,  Mark Starling, John, and the First News 570 crew. This week’s top tech news: a Michigan man brings in his own broadband service, fraudsters launder half a billion over crypto, and Musk sells a chunk more Tesla for big Twitter. You can listen to me and Mark Starling point and laugh at all things tech every Thursday at 643 am ET live on the radio or the iHeartRadio app.

FRAUDSTERS LAUNDER HALF A BILLION DOLLARS VIA CRYPTO

One reason crypto promoters hype up cryptocurrencies and blockchain is its way of delivering some transactional anonymity. The blockchain analysis group Elliptic has estimated criminals and fraudsters have laundered over $540 million using a “mixing service” called RenBridge. RenBridge is a cryptocurrency service that gives holders of one cryptocurrency the ability to covert their crypto into another. Bitcoin holders can convert their holdings into Ethereum or some other currency. RenBridge has been used to launder money for Russian and North Korean based bad guys. The US Treasury has sanctioned mixers Tornado Cash and Blender.io for providing the same services to criminals using blockchain. Here’s the think. If you really wanted to convert your currencies you could handle the trades yourself like everyone else using your Coinbase account or other. People who are deep into mixing services are operating in those areas with the idea of keeping their transactions secret to the point they are hard to track even across blockchains.

MUSK SELLS 7 BILLION TESLA SHARES IN CASE TWITTER DEAL HAPPENS

To also be filled in the, we told you so column. After claiming her wouldn’t need sell Tesla stock to finance the Twitter deal, Elon Musk sold $6.59 billion of Tesla stock. He explicitly said he needed to raise the money in case the deal actually goes through and his equity partners bail out. Now, when this whole saga started, Musk said he wouldn’t need to sell stock to purchase the company. This week, he doesn’t want to force and emergency sell off to finance the deal. The sale comes after last week’s shareholders meeting, and after Tesla unloaded $2 billion of Bitcoin it had invested in. Musk said they purchased a basket of traditional companies after unloading the crypto. I guess he wanted something more real.

Yes.

In the (hopefully unlikely) event that Twitter forces this deal to close *and* some equity partners don’t come through, it is important to avoid an emergency sale of Tesla stock.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 10, 2022

MICHIGAN MAN EXTENDS HIS SMALL BROADBAND EMPIRE

There’s absolutely one thing I love, American ingenuity. Akamai network architect, Jared Mauch had a simple problem. He needed broadband access delivered to his Washtenaw County home. AT&T would only supply 1.5 megabit access, and Comcast wanted $50k to bring broadband to his house. He would have given Comcast the money if they asked for 10 thousand. Instead, Jared brought his own fiber and began providing service to his neighbors. Later, he expanded his customer base to 70 households. Now, with a $2.6 million grant from the American Rescue Plan, and a contract with the country he will be providing fiber access to more than 417 rural homes. Jared fills a legitimate gap the larger companies had no interest in. Furthermore, he’s charging decent rates! $55 per month for 100 Mbps, and $79.99 per month for 1 gigabit Internet. That’s what I’m paying Verizon in a so-called competitive market. Hats off Noah. He’s a man from my own heart. Solving problems for his community.

Hi everyone, thanks for reading this week’s top tech stories. This month’s episode of The Cloud is about crypto. I hope you enjoy it. If you haven’t checked out The Cloud it’s available at all of your local podcast outlets. Please make sure you sign up for the newsletter.

Thanks for reading and have an awesome weekend.

I’m worn out y’all! I’m prepping for a big conference in Baltimore, and I’ve already hit 40. So, I’m running late on production for The Cloud. But the show must go on, because the tech world can’t stop, won’t stop.

Another week with  Mark Starling, John, and the First News 570 crew. This week’s top tech news: AT&T runs up customer bills with fake $1.99 charge, a new semiconductor shortage looms on the horizon, and surgeons separate conjoined twins using virtual reality. You can listen to me and Mark Starling point and laugh at all things tech every Thursday at 643 am ET live on the radio or the iHeartRadio app.

ATT GETS AWAY WITH HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS IN FAKE CHARGES

AT&T has been charging customers with a $1.99 administrative charge to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. In 2018, a California class action lawsuit was filed against ATT on behalf of AT&T post paid customers. According to ATT’s own records, it was bilking customers an average for $180 since 2015. In May, lawyers for California and ATT reached a settlement agreement to pay a paltry $14 million to customers who have been billed. That’s between $15 and $29 per customer. And get this, they can still bill the ridiculous fee based upon the settlement. Furthermore, subscribers won’t get a check. It’ll appear as a credit on their AT&T bill only to have AT&T take it right back. This is one of the most ridiculous settlements ever made.

SURGEONS SEPERATE CONJOINED TWINS USING VR

On Monday, Brazilian surgeons separated twins, Bernard and Arthur Lima, apart using virtual reality technology. The surgeons spent months simulating the surgery using virtual projections based on CT and MRI scans. The surgeries took place in Rio de Janeiro with direction from Great Ormond Street Hospital in London. Think about it, two sets of surgical teams, communicated using Internet technologies, all the while wearing their own VR headsets. The twins underwent 7 surgeries, with over 27 hours of operating time, and 100 medical staff between two countries. These are the real potentials of technology. Not just bilking people for dollars. This is why I got into this stuff.

ANALYSIS: AFTER LEAVING MICROCHIP SHORTAGE ANOTHER LOOMS

This time because of trade policy. A day after President Biden signed The Chip Act, legislation designed to increase US microchip and semiconductor manufacturing capabilities, a short term threat to microchip shortages is a possibility. New export restrictions that will block companies based in US and allied countries from exporting semiconductor manufacturing equipment may lead to short term delays. At issue, is that everything in the Chip Act will take time. US companies such as Intel, AMD, Motorola, Qualcomm, and others have focused their design operations in the US and relied on other countries in Taiwan and…China to manufacture their designs. Right now, Taiwan is the world’s largest chip exporter, and many US companies have invested billions of dollars in China to make chips there. If export restrictions take effect, the cost and supply of chips will be impacted while US manufacturing ramps up.

My take on this, is that it’s flighty and foolish to over rely on external countries for critical items. Cheap prices, low environmental regulations, and rely lax import restrictions have led us to a point where the US can only design but can’t make.

It’s a matter of national economic security to retain industries stateside. I get economics, scale, and optimum effort, but geopolitical winds shift in a heart beat. It only makes to retain expertise for all parts of vertical integration in your own country.

I have to issue an apology. The Cloud was late going up this month. We had a last minute guest and it takes time to produce a show. The Cloud will be up and online for your listening pleasure before the weekend is out.

Thanks for listening to The Cloud and reading the blog.

🙂

We’re back! Mark was out last Friday, and we’re back in the saddle with hot news. Since, the hiatus the court is going to force Elon Musk to trial in his will-I-won’t-I takeover of Twitter. Either way, it’s Thursday and I’m on with  Mark Starling, John, and the First News 570 crew. This week’s non-Elon stories: an EU Justice commissioner gets his iPhone hacked, Manchester City spies on its fans using scarves, and scientists say, “play all the video games you want.” You can listen to me and Mark Starling point and laugh at all things tech every Thursday at 643 am ET live on the radio or the iHeartRadio app.

BREAKING: Google has joined Amazon and will provide home security camera footage to law enforcement without a warrant. Google and Amazon claim that they’ll only provide video if LEO state the seizure is for an emergency. Google says they haven’t done this, yet. Amazon has handed over video to law enforcement a dozen times this year. Read on for full details.

EU STAFF REPORTS IPHONE HACK

Yesterday, Reuters reported EU Justice Commissioner, Didier Reyders, and some of his staff had their phones infiltrated with Pegasus. You may remember us reporting on the Israeli spyware program being used to track down a Dubai princess. The commissioner sent a memo to EU leadership after Apple had notified him that his phone was hacked. Pegasus left behind a telltale sign of evidence indicating that it was installed on his device. Pegasus is used by nation states and government entities to spy on individuals. The program can left contact lists, call logs, messages, and browsing history. No word on who the perpetrator is. It may be impossible to track who made the hack.

Here’s how to protect yourself from spyware programs like Pegasus:

1. Reboot often. Spyware programs typically load themselves and need to stay “resident” in the background after being activated. These program are rarely in the startup sequence of your device.
2. Disable iMessage. Many spyware programs activate by so-called zero-click methods. iPhones can render some webpages automatically and this is a way spyware programs can be installed. I know, this is painful. iMessage is probably the most powerful and convenient messaging tool with bots and other programs built in. That means there are more ways of getting on to your device.
3. Disable FaceTime. Yeah, this also painful. I’ve gotten used to actually using FaceTime, but again its another way spyware program can get in.
4. Don’t click on links from unknown texters. The real answer is never click on links, but my wife and friends are always sending me links.
5. Use a paid for VPN for your online communications. Most people wouldn’t resort to this, but it is a significant step in protecting yourself and masking your traffic online.

These tips and more are available from…the Russians.

WHO NEEDS A POLICE STATE WHEN YOUR FAVORITE TEAM SPIES ON YOU

We live in the era of the smart everything. Yesterday, Manchester City Football Club announced the development of a new smart scarf featuring a biometric sensor and the Club’s colors. The biometric sensor is an EmotiBit used to measure the attitude, emotional state, and stress levels of Manchester City fans during a match. The Club wants to understand their fans’ state during a match. I’d think it would be pretty easily to tell a fan’s state by looking at the score, their faces, and alcohol consumption. Manchester City has given a select few fans the device now, with places to distribute the scarves globally next year. They’ll also be giving scarves to select New York City FC (Manchester City’s sister club) this year as well. No details on how much these scarves will cost. The technology is being developed in partnership with Cisco systems.

SCIENTISTS: PLAY ALL THE VIDEO GAMES YOU WANT

This is a story that hits close to home and which I think doesn’t match anecdotal observation. So, yes, I’m dubious about it. An Oxford Internet Institute study on 39,000 gamers concludes that the amount of time gamers spend playing has no impact on their well-being. This year’s new study contradicts their own 2020 study on the topic. The report states that if players choose to spend their time playing games versus being compelled to, the player’s wellbeing is better off. I disagree on this after witnessing the amount of Minecraft my oldest plays and some of the shifts in her behavior. An excessive amount of time in the environment can impact anxiousness and social surrounding behaviors. Also, therapists are beginning to anecdotally agree on the impact Minecraft has on certain behaviors. I think a study is needed on that. Minecraft wasn’t in this study, but these titles were:

• Animal Crossing: New Horizons
• Apex Legends
• Eve Online
• Forza Horizon 4
• Gran Turismo Sport
• The Crew 2

Make sure you listen to our next episode of The Cloud on August 1st, Crypto: Is It the Future of Money? We’ll be having a blockchain expert on to talk about cryptocurrencies and the hype behind them.

Happy Thursday! Last Friday, as me and my friends were basking in the glow of Blerdcon, someone looking down at their phone blurted out, “yo! Elon Musk is backing out of the Twitter deal. Like everyone didn’t see that coming.” It’s true. Either way, it’s Thursday and I’m on with  Mark Starling, John, and the First News 570 crew. This week’s top tech stories: Elon, Elon, Elon, the head of Tesla’s AI is out, and the James Webb Space Telescope delivers its first pictures. You can listen to me and Mark Starling point and laugh at all things tech every Thursday at 643 am ET live on the radio or the iHeartRadio app.

MUSK BACKS OUT OF TWITTER DEAL, SURPRISES NO ONE

We’ve covered Elon Musk’s shenanigans a lot on First News 570 and this week’s top tech news is par for the course. Last Friday, Elon Musk announced he’s backing out of his alleged purchase of Twitter. The $44 billion deal collapsed with Musk saying he wasn’t satisfied with Twitter’s method for reporting bots and him complaining management hasn’t kept running the company at an optimum level. Twitter shares closed at $36 per share yesterday, down from the $54 per share take over price. Elon Musk was teasing the idea of him backing out of the Twitter deal shortly after announcing his takeover plans. He took the same product he was going to purchase and complained about how crappy management was, their lack of feature innovation, and proving how many bots operate the platform. My friends in the room all agreed it was simply a, “d*ck move by Elon, to show how big his b*lls are.” And here we are.

TESLA HEAD OF AI LEAVING

One of the key developers of Tesla’s Autopilot feature is leaving the company. Andrej Karpathy has decided to leave the company after taking a sabbatical this Spring. He was set to come back to Tesla this month, and is instead heading out. This news happens just after Tesla laid off 200 employees working on the Autopilot project. He wants to move on to new horizons combining AI and education.

JWST DELIVERS STUNNING PICTURES OF THE COSMOS

After 10 years of development and delays, the James Webb Space Telescope delivered its first set of images this past Monday. The JWST is the world’s largest orbiting observatory and sports a light focusing mirror that’s 3 times the size of the Hubble Space Telescope. The first image from the JWST featured an updated image of the same cluster of galaxy first shot by the Hubble Space Telescope. The image blows your mind away, and makes you question, “what is all of this for?” The marquee shot features an innumerable count of galaxies in the distance. The JWST uses upgraded infrared sensors that allows the telescope to see further in the past than ever before. Amazing.

Hi guys! It’s another unofficial start of the weekend and I want to thank you for being a part of this journey. I’ve been Mark Starling’s Thursday technology analyst since 2015 and it’s been fun. Since then, First News 570 listeners and others have been steady readers of this Thursday post, and have warmly consumed the other content. I’m grateful for your readership and listenership. I’m looking forward to continuing this ride as long as you have me.

Take care of yourself, and watch your health. Live your life now, and be around those people who are important to you and who find you important.

Have a great weekend.