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Show of 02-06-2021

Tech Talk February 6, 2021

Email and Forum Questions

  • Email from Bob in Maryland: Dear Doc, Jim, and the basso profundo Mr. BigVoice. I stumbled across this tool that lets people monitor some of these AI training sets used for facial recognition. Exposing.AI finds can find out if your images were used in AI surveillance research. What do you think, Doc? Here is another computing pioneer, sort of in the Charles Babbage vein, that might be a Profiles In IT candidate: Percy Ludgate. He was an Irish amateur scientist who designed the second analytical engine (general-purpose Turing-complete computer) in history. All the best, Your faithful listener, Bob in Maryland
  • Tech Talk Responds: Great suggestion for Profiles in IT. Exposing.AI seems to be a great tool, if you have lots of Flickr photos posted. This tool Exposing.AI find out if your photos are being uses. The system uses information from publicly available image datasets to determine if your Flickr photos were used in AI surveillance research. Just enter your Flickr username, photo URL, or hashtag in the website’s search bar and the tool will scan through over 3.5 million photos for your pics. The search engine checks whether your photos were included in the datasets by referencing Flickr identifiers such as username and photo ID. It doesn’t use any facial recognition to detect the images.
  • Flickr is a logical target for the tool’s launch. The photo-sharing service is regularly used in AI research. In 2019, IBM released a dataset of almost a million pictures scraped from Flickr without the uploaders’ consent. It is not possible to remove your face from image datasets that have already been distributed, although some allow you to request removal from future releases.
  • Email from Susan in Alexandria: Good morning Dr. Shurtz. In your show on January 23, 2021, you explained how to share your WiFi password easily from your iPhone to another iPhone or from your Android phone to another Android phone. So, do you know of any easy way to accomplish this from iPhone to Android phone or vice versa? Thanks, Susan in Alexandria
  • Tech Talk Responds: That is an excellent question, Susan. Fortunately, it is easily done. To share the WiFi password with an Android phone, you will need to create a QR Code. Install the Visual Codes QR code generator application to your iPhone. Find the network’s Wi-Fi settings. Start the Visual Codes app. Tap Add Codes. At the bottom of the screen, tap Connect to WiFi. Type the network’s SSID in the Name field and the password. Press Create Code to create and save the new QR code. Simply bring up the code using the app for anyone with an Android phone to scan.
  • Starting with Android 10, phones running Google’s mobile OS can share Wi-Fi passwords between handsets using a QR code. All the recipient has to do is open the default camera app on their iPhone or Android device to scan the code and instantly connect to the Wi-Fi network. When you are ready to grant access to your Wi-Fi network, navigating to your handset’s Settings menu. The easiest way to do this is by swiping down from the top of the device’s screen to show the Quick Settings menu. From there, tap on the Gear icon to open the Settings menu. Next, tap the Connections or Network & Internet Now, tap on the Wi-Fi listing from the top of the menu. Select the Wi-Fi network you want to share. Tap the Network’s Advanced Settings Menu Icon. Tap on the QR Code or Share button.
  • Email from Jeannie in Pittsburgh: Dear Tech Talk. I recently heard you talking about Powerline Networking. My sister lives in the house right next door to mine and I’d like to share my Internet connection with her to save her some money. The only thing she’ll be using the Internet with is her computer because she doesn’t have a cell phone. My question is can we use a pair of powerline networking adapters to share the same Internet connection? Thanks for your help. Jeannie in Pittsburgh, PA
  • Tech Talk Responds: It will not work. Powerline networking adapters only work when connected to outlets that are wired to the same electrical panel. That means your Internet signal won’t go out onto the main power grid to reach your sister’s house. You mentioned that your two houses are very close together, so there’s a good chance that your sister might be able to piggyback off of your WiFi network. Pay your sister a visit and check to see if it recognizes your WiFi network on your cell phone. If it does, check the strength of the signal to see if it is strong enough for your sister to use it. If so, problem solved! If your WiFi signal cannot be detected in your sister’s house (or if it’s too weak to use) you might be able to move your wireless router closer to the side of the house that is adjacent to your sister’s house. If you are unable to move the router you can always try a WiFi Range Extender. If her computer does not have Wi-Fi connectivity built-in, she can easily add it for just a few bucks by purchasing an inexpensive USB WiFi adapter. Good luck.
  • Email from Kathy in Boulder: Dear Tech Talk. I have a blog that I’ve been writing for over four years now. It runs on WordPress. About a month ago I paid a guy to make some updates to the blog to make it more attractive. With my permission he ended up changing the blog to a new theme, Divi. This guy only charged me $50 to make the changes and I really love the way the blog looks now. After he finished installing and customizing the new theme a bunch of new posts started appearing on the blog that I didn’t write nor publish. They just appear from out of the blue. I have changed the login password and enabled Two-Factor Authentication. I delete the unauthorized posts as soon I notice them but they always just come back after a few minutes. How can I stop these posts? Kathy in Boulder, Colorado
  • Tech Talk Responds: The programmer you hired to update your blog probably installed a compromised copy of the Divi theme on it. The first thing I recommend that you try is activating the current default “Twenty Twenty-One” WordPress theme. That will automatically deactivate the Divi theme to see if it’s indeed causing the problem.
    • Log into your WordPress Dashboard.
    • Click Appearance>Themes.
    • If you see the Twenty Twenty-One theme listed there go ahead and activate it.
    • If you don’t see that theme in the list click the Add New button and search for Twenty Twenty-One, then install and activate it.
  • If that works, a compromised Divi theme is the problem. You can either keep using the Twenty Twenty-One theme or install a theme of your choosing. Since you like the look of the Divi theme you can always purchase your own legitimate (i.e. uncompromised) copy of that theme from Elegant Themes if you want. If you decide to go with a fresh Divi theme make sure you delete the compromised Divi theme from your blog BEFORE you install and activate the fresh one!
  • Email from Barbie in Reston: Dear Doc and Jim. I use my iPhone for work all the time, especially for sending email. I recently discovered that all my emails have Sent from my iPhone on the bottom. How can I remove the Sent from my iPhone message from my outgoing emails? I would rather not tip off the recipient that I sent their email using my phone. Barbie in Reston
  • Tech Talk Responds: It is quite easy to do. Just follow the steps below:
    • Tap the Settings icon.
    • Tap Mail.
    • Scroll down and tap Signature.
    • Use the Delete button to remove the entire text of the “Sent from my iPhone” message.
    • Type in a short “signature” message that you’d like to appear at the bottom of every email you send from your iPhone. This is optional.
    • Exit the Settings app.
  • From now on, every email you send will contain either your custom signature message or no signature message at all.


 

Profiles in IT: Andrew R. Jassy

  • Andrew R. Jassy is an American businessman and the CEO of Amazon Web Services (AWS). He will replace Jeff Bezos as CEO of Amazon in Q3 2021.
  • Jassy was born January 13, 1968, in NY. He is Jewish with Hungarian ancestry.
  • Andrew Jassy grew up in Scarsdale, NY, and attended Scarsdale High School.
  • Jassy graduated with honors from Harvard College, where he was advertising manager of The Harvard Crimson.
  • After receiving his Bachelors, he worked as a project manager for a collectibles company, MBI. He and an MBI colleague started a company and closed it down.
  • Five years after his getting his Bachelors, he returned to Harvard for an MBA..
  • He joined Amazon in 1997, with several other Harvard MBA colleagues. His early roles included marketing manager.
  • In the first five years at Amazon, Jassy ran a number of different business functions, including founding and running its customer relationship management team, serving as director of marketing, and writing the business plan for Amazon’s music business and leading the unit as general manager.
  • Jassy had been in what’s known at Amazon as a “Technical Assistant” role, working with Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos.
  • In the early 2000s when Amazon started providing ecommerce technology to Target and other third-party retailers, the company realized it had to decouple many components of its platform through application programming interfaces (APIs).
  • Amazon required business teams to communicate with each other exclusively through well-documented APIs, which accelerated its own product development.
  • Amazon realized that projects were taking longer than they should because teams were spending too much time setting up storage, computer and databases.
  • In 2003, he and Jeff Bezos came up with the idea to create the cloud-computing platform, known as Amazon Web Services (AWS), which launched in 2006.
  • Jassy headed AWS and its team of 57 people. He was obsessed with the customer experience. His focus was to deliver more for less. He forced the team to innovate at a very fast pace for the industry.
  • When AWS started out, instead of going head-to-head with enterprise vendors on their own turf, it decided to focus on developers and startups. While this strategy might have seemed counterintuitive at the time, it has enabled AWS to build a large base of satisfied customers.
  • AWS, for about the past four years, has has focused on enterprises. It has convinced some notables to move. Netflix, Coca-Cola, Condé Nast, Major League Baseball, Intuit and Splunk have all move some, or all, of their computing to AWS.
  • Amazon has a process it calls “working backwards,” which requires product teams to write a press release and an FAQ document before writing any code. This form of communication requires thoughtful, concise communication and ensures that all team members have a clear understanding of what they are building.
  • One interesting recent addition, called API Gateway, is a tool for creating, publishing, scaling and securing APIs. The idea is to let enterprises get the same advantages from using APIs as Amazon does, allowing faster development and innovation.
  • API Gateway is a prime example of how AWS, under Jassy’s leadership, isn’t just selling technology, but a whole new way for businesses to consume technology.
  • Every Wednesday, Jassy holds a meeting with AWS management that involves spending about two hours going through the operational performance data of AWS.
  • This is followed immediately by a 90-minute business review. The Wednesday meetings are no picnic for AWS leaders whose businesses are not performing.
  • To take the edge off, the Wednesday meetings also feature a competition to see who can show up wearing the ugliest shirt. The winner even gets a trophy.
  • In April 2016, Jassy was promoted from senior vice president to CEO of AWS.
  • Amazon Web Services closed out 2020 with more than $13.5B in annual operating profits, responsible for more than 63% of Amazon’s profits for the year.
  • On February 2, 2021, it was announced that Jassy will succeed Jeff Bezos as the CEO of Amazon Q3 of 2021, with Bezos transitioning to executive chairman.
  • In 1997, Jassy married Elana Rochelle Caplan, a fashion designer for Eddie Bauer and graduate of the Philadelphia College of Textiles and Science.
  • They live in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle. As of November 2020, Jassy’s estimated net worth is $377 million.

Observations from the Bunker

  • Management style of Andrew Jassy
  • Amazon has a process it calls “working backwards,” which requires product teams to write a press release and an FAQ document before writing any code.
  • The press release is intended to help us make sure that when we’re done developing a product, we’ve actually built something that we believe is going to matter to customers. The FAQ is intended to flesh out up front all the ways you’re going to build the product—all the hard decisions.
  • It often takes three to five iterations of the press release and FAQ before AWS starts building a product. This groundwork eliminates the need to monitor projects afterward to ensure they’re staying on course.
  • According to Jassy, the key to AWS’ success is that its services are basic. They are intended to be “flexible building blocks” that developers can stitch together.
  • Jassy is the perfect blend of business acumen and tech understanding. He has never written a line of code, but neither had Steve Jobs.
  • Technology people tend to make things more complex than they need to be. One of the great things about Andy and AWS is that the services are actually very simple.
  • Andy is not a micromanager, but he does inject himself into the review process to see if the product is there yet, and provides useful feedback on issues a team is seeing.
  • It’s about empowering the team to get things done, using a clearly articulated vision.

Tip of the Week: Check of your Router has been Hacked

  • Hackers are busy attacking routers all around the world.
  • Your router could be one of the unlucky devices that have been hacked already. The good news is you can find out right now if that’s indeed the case.
  • Vulnerabilities in some routers’ firmware code allow hackers to change some of the router’s critical settings. For example, altering the Domain Name Server (DNS) settings enables them to instruct your router to send your Internet requests to malware-infested servers and fake websites. If that happens it could result in malware being downloaded onto your computer or mobile device and/or having your identity and online accounts compromised.
  • F-Secure has created a handy tool for checking your router to make sure it hasn’t been hacked. Here’s all you have to do:
  • After you click the button the tool will check your router’s settings to make sure they haven’t been changed to values that are known to be incorrect or malicious. The entire test takes mere seconds and the results will be displayed right on your screen.
  • If the test detects an issue, you’ll need to check with your Internet Service Provider to determine what the real settings should be. Your router’s manual should tell you how to change the settings back to their correct values.

Starlink Launching High Speed satellite Internet.

  • SpaceX has become a major player in the world of space exploration with their successful collaboration on several projects with NASA.
  • They are also preparing to make super-high-speed Internet available to the masses, regardless of where they might happen to live?
  • SpaceX’s Starlink network of thousands of Internet-relaying satellites will be capable of supplying super-fast, low-latency broadband Internet to virtually any point on the Earth’s surface.
  • According to this SpaceX document that was recently provided to the FCC, they are promising download speeds of up to 1 Gigabit per second (1Gbps).
  • Their tests are already seeing latency (the delay between a click or other user interaction and the response received from the remote server) that rivals anything most ground-based Internet providers currently offer.
  • To put that 1Gbps speed into perspective, that’s five times faster than the 200Mbps that I’m currently receiving Verizon and roughly equal to the fastest speeds currently enjoyed by most folks who have access to a fiber Internet connection!
  • SpaceX has launched over 650 Starlink satellites into space and they’re currently building 120 new satellites each month. When the entire constellation of Starlink satellites are in place, SpaceX will be able to beam their super-fast broadband signal to virtually every point on the earth’s surface.
  • Your current Internet provider will probably have to drastically lower your monthly Internet bill AND increase the download speeds you’re getting in order to compete with the Starlink service.
  • If you’re being forced to use one of the slow, expensive and bandwidth-limited satellite Internet options that are the only choices currently available to those who live out in the boonies, you’ll be able to upgrade to true Internet broadband service via Starlink!

Update: Main Street vs Wall Street

  • Robinhood has lifted all the buying curbs imposed at the height of the battle between amateur investors and Wall Street hedge funds.
  • The change comes one week after the online broker limited clients to only buying a single share of GameStop and expanded its list of restricted stocks from 13 to 50. Reuters reports:
  • The videogame retailer, the initial trigger for the market slugfest, was up 8.4% in U.S. pre-market trading although the wild gyrations seen in the past two weeks appeared to have fizzled out.
  • Robinhood, among the fee-free online brokers that are credited with fueling the trades, said late on Thursday it had removed all buying restrictions imposed due to a surge in clearing house deposit requirements last week.
  • With many of the stocks involved in the so-called “Reddit rally” slumping this week, hedge funds with bearish positions on GameStop made $3.6 billion in profits compared to losses of $12.5 billion in January.
  • GameStop’s stock has crashed to about $53 after scaling as high as $483 last week, but is still up about 177% from the levels at the start of the rally.
  • Shares of cinema operator AMC Entertainment have more than halved from a peak of $19.90. They were up 5.2% on Friday.
  • Meanwhile, on WallStreetBets on Reddit, participants were still urging investors to stick with GameStop.

Former ADT Employee Spied on Customers

  • A former employee of the home security company ADT has admitted that he hacked into the surveillance feeds of dozens of customer homes, doing so primarily to spy on women or to view unsuspecting couples.
  • Telesforo Aviles, 35, pleaded guilty to a count of computer fraud in federal court this week, confessing that he inappropriately accessed the accounts of customers some 9,600 times over the course of several years.
  • He is alleged to have done this to over 200 customers.
  • Authorities say that the IT technician took note of which homes had attractive women, then repeatedly logged into these customers’ accounts in order to view them.
  • Aviles, who now faces up to five years in prison, sometimes claimed he needed to add himself temporarily in order to ‘test’ the system; in other instances, he added himself without their knowledge.
  • The scandal has inspired multiple lawsuits — three of which are ongoing. ADT tried using confidentiality agreements to keep some customers silent.

Apple Launching Big Privacy Change in Early Spring

  • The next beta version of its iPhone and iPad operating systems will force app developers to ask permission to access the phone’s unique identifier.
  • Companies that depend on online advertising are afraid that the change will reduce the effectiveness of targeted ads, and Facebook has been a particularly vocal critic.
  • To target mobile ads and measure how effective they are, app developers and other industry players currently often use Apple’s (IDFA), or a string of letters and numbers that’s different on every Apple device.
  • Once this update rolls out, app makers will be forced to ask permission to access a user’s IDFA through a prompt.
  • Apple first announced the change last summer, giving advertisers and app makers ample time to prepare.
  • Facebook in particular argues that the change will hurt the availability of free content on the open web and the ability of small business to place personalized ads.
  • Mark Zuckerberg slammed the change, calling Apple one of its biggest competitors and claiming that the change “threatens the personalized ads that millions of small businesses rely on to find and reach customers.”
  • According to Tim Cook, “If a business is built on misleading users, on data exploitation, on choices that are no choices at all, then it does not deserve our praise. It deserves reform.”