Demographic Info on 80 Million US Households Found on Unsecured Server
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| Demographic Info on 80 Million US Households Found on Unsecured Server | |
| Number | 824 |
| Broadcast Date | APRIL 29, 2019 |
| Episode Length | 5:08 |
| Hosts | Rich Stroffolino |
Security researchers discover an unsecured database with demographic information on 80 million American households, Samsung launches a TV for vertical video, and E-Trade is looking into cryptocurrency trading.
Headlines
- Security researcher Noam Rotem discovered an unsecured cloud server holding a 24GB database that included demographic information on more than 80 million US households. Information in the database is for adults 40 and older including full street addresses, logitude and latitude, full names, ages, and dates of birth, with coded entries for other fields like sex, income, and maritial status. Rotem said there is no indication this database has been accessed, but that it is also still online. In a post on VPNMentor.com, he called on readers to help find the database owners.
- Samsung announced The Sero, a 43-inch quantum-dot QLED TV that can be flipped 90-degrees for watching vertical video. The TV offers 4.1 channel, 60 watt sound, Bixby control, a presumed 4K resolution, and supports NFC phone syncing to mirror vertical content to the display. 49- and 55-inch sizes will be coming later this year. The Sero will be available at the end of May in Korea for 18.9 million won, roughly $16,300.
- Amazon launched person-to-person payments in India using Amazon Pay on Android. Payments will utilize India's UPI platform for instant bank-to-bank transfers. Payments can be sent and received by selecting a contract in an address book, entering in a UPI ID, or bank account number. Users can also pay for Amazon deliveries by scanning an Amazon Pay QR code.
- Bloomberg reports that, according to sources, E*Trade is planning to let customers trade cryptocurrencies on its platform. The initial rollout would include Bitcoin and Ethereum trading, and E*Trade would reportedly consider adding more cryptocurrencies in the future.
- The New York Times reports that Apple removed or restricted 11 of the 17 most downloaded screen-time and parental-control apps over the past year. Two iOS app makers filed a complaint against Apple with the EUs competition office, claiming Apple forced changes to apps to make them less useful than its own native Screen Time app. MacRumors published an email from Apple's Phil Schiller stating the apps removed used Mobile Device Management profiles designed for enterprises to access devices and data, and that no developer should use MDM profiles on consumer devices due to privacy and security issues.
- Propublica alleges TurboTax uses deceptive design and misleading advertising to trick lower-income Americans into paying to file their taxes, even though they are eligible to do it for free. Intuit, which owns TurboTax, appears to be hiding this free option from Google Search, by adding code on its site telling search engines not to list TurboTax Free File in search results. Sen. Ron Wyden, said in a statement that Intuit's practices are outrageous and that he plans to investigate further.
- State Department Deputy Assistant Secretary Robert Strayer stated the US government wil reassess information sharing with allies who use Huawei equipment as part of the country's 5G infrastructure, specifying that the US makes no distinction between core and non-core parts of 5G networks. The UK and Dutch carrier KPN have both barred Huawei equipment from core 5G networks, but remained opened to using equipment in non-core deployments.
- The Chinese microblogging platform Weibo announced that the National Library of China will archive over 200 billion public Weibo posts as well as 210 million news stories from Sina.com. The archive is part of a non-profit project aimed at chronicling the evolution the internet area as well as “long term development of information security and digitization of the country." Other internet companies in China are being invited to participate. Archived data will be held on company servers while reviewed for policymaking and academic purposes.
- Spotify reported it lost 0.79 euros per share in Q1 on revenue of 1.51 billion euros, an increase of 33% on the year. Analysts had expected revenue of 1.47 billion euros and a loss of 0.35 euros per share. In the earnings report, Spotify announced it grew paid subscribers 32% on the year and now has 100 million Spotify Premium subscribers. Worldwide the company now has 217 million monthly active users. The company expects to have 222 to 228 million users by the end of the quarter, identifying smart speakers as a key growth area.
- The FCC approved SpaceX's request to fly some of its Starlink internet-beaming satellites at a lower orbit than intended. Originally filed in November 2018, SpaceX can now launch 1,584 of the 4,425 Starlink satellites at an orbit of 550 kilometers, with the remainder flying between 1,110 to 1,325 kilometers. SpaceX requested the change after test flights, arguing that flying some satellites in lower orbit would reduce the total number needed and decrease signal latency to 15 milliseconds. The company plans to begin launching its first operational satellites next month.
Links
| Preceded by: "Week in Review for the Week of 4/22/2019" |
Demographic Info on 80 Million US Households Found on Unsecured Server |
Followed by: "Samsung Reports A Disappointing Quarter" |