The Daily Nerd (March 28th, 2014)
Table of Contents
The Daily Nerd (March 28th, 2014) #
Millions of Android app downloads infected with cryptocoin-mining code
Researchers at security company Trend Micro say they have found at least two apps on the Google Play store, Songs and “Prized”, which contain code to join any phone that has them to a cryptocoin-mining “pool”. Each app has had between 1m and 5m downloads, meaning that up to 10m phones might be affected. Songs was still available at the time of publication. An email to the developer had not been answered by time of publication.
Peter Molyneux: He reveals some interesting insights from his period while working at Microsoft
I left Microsoft because I think when you have the ability to be a creative person, you have to take that seriously, and you have to push yourself. And pushing yourself is a lot easier to do if you’re in a life raft that has a big hole in the side, and that’s what I think indie development is. You’re paddling desperately to get where you want to go to, but you’re also bailing out. Whereas if you’re in a big supertanker of safety, which Microsoft was, then that safety is like an anesthetic. It’s like taking antidepressants. The world just feels too comfortable.
The conflicts between Ubuntu and its commercial counterpart Canonical on the one hand and other free software projects on the other hand are not just about Unity, the wording of the Canonical Contributors’ License Agreement, the technical differences between Mir and Wayland, or any of the half dozen other issues being so passionately discussed at any given time.
Contrary to what Ubuntu supporters sometimes claim, the conflict has little to do with jealousy. After all, Canonical has yet to turn a profit, and has had its share of failures, such as the Ubuntu Edge crowdfunding campaign.
Building PRISM-Proof Web Services
Reminders that data entrusted to online services can easily be leaked or stolen aren’t hard to find. Major companies commonly have passwords and other data taken by attackers, while governments have their own ways to get hold of user data.
Researcher Raluca Popa of MIT thinks many online services should and could be redesigned to guard against that. “Really, there’s no trusting a server,” she says. Popa has led the development of a system called Mylar for building Web services that puts that philosophy into practice. Services built using it keep data on their servers encrypted at all times and only ever decrypt it on a person’s computer.