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hitechno1mobile · 2 months

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Warp Speed for Your Pocket: The Race for Ultra-Fast 5G and 6G

The world of mobile technology is constantly evolving, pushing the boundaries of speed and connectivity. We've witnessed the incredible leap from 3G to 4G, enabling activities like streaming high-definition videos and real-time video calls. Now, we stand at the precipice of another revolution – the era of 5G and, on the horizon, 6G.

Considering a Career in Mobile Technology? (Are You Interested in a Career in Mobile Technology?)

The rapid advancements in mobile technology create a surge in demand for skilled professionals who can understand, maintain, and repair these complex devices. If you're fascinated by technology and enjoy problem-solving, consider enrolling in a mobile repairing course in New Delhi offered by institutes like Hitech No1. With over 20 years of experience, Hitech No1 has trained more than 3 lakh students, empowering them to contribute to the ever-evolving mobile technology landscape. It's important to note that Hitech No1 focuses on education and doesn't provide mobile repair services.

Now, let's delve into the exciting world of 5G and 6G and explore what they hold for the future:

1. 5G: The Dawn of Ultra-Fast Connectivity:

5G promises a significant leap from 4G, offering mind-blowing download and upload speeds. Imagine downloading a full-length movie in seconds or experiencing lag-free virtual reality experiences – that's the power of 5G. This ultra-fast connectivity will revolutionize various sectors, including:

Enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB): Experience blazing-fast internet speeds on your smartphone, enabling seamless streaming of high-resolution content and ultra-fast downloads.

Ultra-Reliable Low-Latency Communication (uRLLC): This technology promises near-instantaneous response times, critical for applications like remote surgery and autonomous vehicles.

Massive Machine-Type Communication (mMTC): 5G will connect a vast number of devices simultaneously, paving the way for the Internet of Things (IoT) to flourish.

2. 6G: The Next Frontier in Mobile Connectivity:

While 5G is still under development in many regions, researchers are already looking ahead to 6G. This next-generation technology promises even faster speeds (potentially exceeding 1 terabit per second) and even lower latency. Here's a glimpse into what 6G might offer:

Ubiquitous Connectivity: Imagine a world where seamless connectivity is available everywhere, from bustling city centers to remote rural areas. 6G aims to bridge the digital divide and provide universal internet access.

AI-Powered Networks: 6G networks might be integrated with artificial intelligence, allowing for intelligent resource allocation and self-optimizing performance.

The Tactile Internet: 6G's ultra-low latency could enable the development of the "tactile internet," where users can experience remote sensations in real-time, opening doors for advancements in telemedicine, virtual reality, and robotics.

3. Challenges of 5G and 6G Deployment:

Despite the immense potential of 5G and 6G, there are challenges to overcome:

Infrastructure Development: Deploying the necessary infrastructure for widespread 5G and 6G coverage requires significant investment and time.

Device Compatibility: Not all current devices are compatible with 5G. As 5G becomes more widespread, we can expect a similar transition for 6G-compatible devices.

Health Concerns: There are ongoing discussions about the potential health risks associated with radiofrequency waves emitted by mobile networks. More research is needed to address these concerns.

4. The Race for Technological Supremacy:

The race to develop and deploy 5G and 6G has become a battleground for technological supremacy between nations. Countries like China, the United States, and South Korea are heavily invested in this race, understanding the economic and strategic advantages associated with leading the way in mobile technology.

5. Impact on Mobile Repair Industry:

The advancements in 5G and 6G technology will undoubtedly impact the mobile repair industry. As these networks become more complex, technicians will require specialized skills and knowledge to diagnose and repair 5G and 6G-enabled devices. This highlights the growing importance of qualified mobile repair professionals.

6. The Importance of Skilled Professionals:

The increasing complexity of mobile devices, coupled with the rapid advancements in technology, creates a surge in demand for skilled mobile repair technicians. These professionals play a crucial role in ensuring the smooth functioning of mobile networks and devices.

7. How Hitech No1 Can Help:

Hitech No1's comprehensive mobile repairing courses equip students with the theoretical knowledge and practical skills necessary to excel in the mobile repair industry. Their curriculum is constantly updated to reflect the latest advancements in mobile technology, ensuring students are prepared to address the challenges posed by 5G and 6G devices.

Here's what sets Hitech No1 apart:

Experienced and Certified Trainers: You'll be guided by experienced and certified instructors who not only share theoretical knowledge but also provide invaluable hands-on training.

Industry-Relevant Curriculum: The curriculum is regularly updated to cover the latest technologies, including 5G functionalities and potential repair considerations for 6G devices in the future.

Advanced Lab Facilities: Hitech No1 provides access to state-of-the-art labs equipped with the latest tools and equipment used in mobile repair, ensuring students receive practical training on industry-standard technology.

Career Assistance: Hitech No1 goes beyond academics and offers career assistance to its students. They help with resume building, interview preparation, and connecting students with potential employers in the mobile repair industry.

8. The Future of Mobile Technology:

The future of mobile technology is brimming with possibilities. 5G and 6G will usher in an era of hyper-connectivity, transforming the way we live, work, and interact with the world around us. As technology advances, the demand for skilled mobile repair technicians will only grow. By enrolling at a reputable mobile repairing institute in Delhi like Hitech No1, you can position yourself for a successful career in this exciting and ever-evolving field.

The race for ultra-fast 5G and 6G connectivity is well underway. While challenges exist, the potential benefits of these next-generation technologies are undeniable. As mobile technology continues to evolve, the need for skilled professionals to maintain and repair these complex devices will become even more critical. Consider taking a mobile repairing course and becoming a part of the future of mobile technology!

#5g #6g #5G and 6G connectivity #Mobile Technology

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ophirgottlieb · 7 years

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This Stock is the Pick-axe to the Cloud Gold Rush

Date Published: 2017-06-05 Written by Ophir Gottlieb * This is a snippet from a CML Pro dossier originally published on 6-3-2017. LEDE Arista Networks Inc (NYSE:ANET) is one of our all-time favorite Top Picks in the cloud theme, and is rising to all time highs. Here is the stock chart:

We do believe, as the Top Pick dossier refers to it, that Arista Networks is the Pick-axe to Cloud Gold Rush. Arista Networks Inc was added to Top Picks on 22-Nov-16 for $94.50. As of today it is trading at $152.26, up 61.1% in six-months.

Ticker Date Added Price Added Return ANET 11-22-2016 $94.50 61.12%

Further, on 4-5-107 we penned Arista Networks: The Opportunity is Here. The stock price was $134 at the time of that dossier, so Arista Inc stock is up more than 13% in just the two-months since we published that highlight. STORY & UPDATE Quickly, the story behind Arista Inc: Of all the revolutionary trends that are coming our way that we look to, from artificial intelligence, machine learning, genomics, self-driving cars, the Internet of Things (IoT), streaming video on Demand (SVOD), and the rest — the enterprise cloud realm may be the largest of them all. WHY THE CLOUD? Of all the revolutionary trends that are coming our way that we look to, from artificial intelligence, machine learning, genomics, self-driving cars, the Internet of Things (IoT), streaming video on Demand (SVOD), and the rest — the enterprise cloud realm may be the largest of them all. The cloud is, generally speaking, just a cluster of computers and hardware sharing resources to power the Internet, apps, video, IoT and anything else that is connected and has data. I always search for the best way to demonstrate the explosion that is coming in data. I like charts, and I like stats, but it’s hard to really convey the astounding growth in data we are about to see. So here’s a chart, and then I’ll try my best with a specific example:

So that’s just mobile and it shows the growth in traffic increasing 1,000% in six years. But here’s how that translates into data. In 2012 the Library of Congress estimated that all printed, audio, and video material came in at 3 to 20 petabytes. That means that one exabyte could hold a hundred thousand times the printed, audio and video material, or 500 to 3000 times all content of the Library of Congress. By 2021, global traffic alone will generate 49 exabytes… per month. That means that data that is the size of 14,700,000% of all the printed, audio and video material of all-time will be generated in a month on just mobile devices. Yeah, that’s just mobile and every month. And if we take that even further out, to say, 2025, the numbers reach billions of percent a day. The cloud is going to be a huge deal. Here is a chart of that growth:

ARISTA The old world where Cisco Systems built a wonderful empire was based on dedicated network systems — a fancy way of saying that Cisco provided all of the hardware and guts to the switches (and routers). But, Cisco has secularly lost market share in switching, today at 53%, versus 70% in 2010. The lost business has gone mainly in the Data Center switching side, where Arista Networks inc and do-it-yourself (DIY) white-label solutions have become more prevalent. First, the image we always reference of market share trends:

But the trend — that is, moving to white-label solutions, has been under reported by the media. Facebook has created a gigantic cloud and has focused on something called the Open Compute Project. Microsoft and Google have joined the Project. These companies are looking to free themselves from the shackles and expenses of the “old way.” Arista Networks Inc is aware of the change — in fact, it has been a part of the change — even the catalyst to the change. Arista’s strategy, which has been to take a more software-centric approach of networking, called SDN, is working. The company’s hardware is strong, it has exposure to the cloud platforms and generally appears to be more agile than Cisco. The Arista Inc story is wonderful, full of opportunity and risk, and we highly encourage a read of the Top Pick dossier: Arista Networks is the Pick-axe to Cloud Gold Rush. But now, onto a critical update that pushed the stock price to fresh all-time highs on Friday. LEGAL FIGHT Arista Inc and Cisco Systems Inc (NASDAQ:CSCO) have been embroiled in one of the most contentious intellectual property battles technology has ever seen. While Uber and Alphabet Inc's Waymo have gotten the juicy headlines, the guts of the cloud world have had their own heavyweight bout. We wrote extensively about the risks in our dossier Arista Risk Must Be Examined. Here's a quick primer before we get to the update: Cisco has filed a lawsuit claiming that Arista has infringed upon its patents and the accusation is big one. Arista was founded by ex-Cisco employees and the lawsuit claims that essentially all of Arista’s success is a patent rip-off. To restate clearly, this is not a small off on the side lawsuit, this is a lawsuit of enormous proportions with respect to the accusations. In fact, for a moment, the International Trade Commission placed an import ban and cease and desist order covering all Arista (ANET) products. The ITC determined that Arista willfully and intentionally infringed three Cisco patents covering core, Cisco-proprietary network functionality. For Arista’s customers and partners, the cease and desist order blocks the marketing, sale or distribution of all inventory of imported infringing products. It also means that Arista is unable to honor the service and warranty contracts for any infringing products sold after the ITC’s ruling date [of] June 23. For Arista’s suppliers, the ITC orders mean that Arista cannot import parts or components to manufacture infringing products in the United States. Now, all that ended recently when Arista Networks [] got a vote of approval from U.S. customs authorities with its newest versions of its products. But, the risk isn’t gone. While some will say Cisco is throwing up a last ditch effort to protect its technology which, as we saw in the chart at the top, is in full blown competitive free fall, others will say this is a legitimate case of intellectual property theft. UPDATE It appears that Arista Inc has yet again won the battle of old versus new. Here it is, straight from one of our favorite all-time journalists, Barron's Tiernan Ray:

[T]he U.S Patent and Trademark Office’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board yesterday issued a decision finding for Arista’s claims that another of Cisco Systems (CSCO) patents over which Cisco was suing Arista is "unpatentable." It is the second time in a week the company received a favorable judgment from the Patent board, the prior one having been from the same case. Source: BARRON'S

The Patent board wrote: "We determine that Petitioner (Arista) has met its burden of showing, by a preponderance of the evidence, that all of the claims for which trial was instituted are unpatentable." We'll save the technical details and get to the conclusion, which is that, for now, the patent fight is finally over and Arista Inc will not have to turn on its manufacturing plant in the United States, which would have taken a bite out of gross margins. We do note that it is quite possible that Cisco Systems Inc is not done yet, the company has been relentless in trying to defend itself and has used aggravated language declaring that Arista has blatantly infringed on its copyrighted command-line interface terms, noting direct copy-and-paste scenarios in which the firm neglected to fix Cisco’s typos. Of course, Arista has argued that the commands aren’t protected by copyright, suggesting Cisco is simply trying to thwart growth of the upcoming firm. It looks like Arista Inc was right. WHAT NOW We like Arista Inc long-term, but the price is high and we don't believe any extra emphasis should be given to the company just because of this ruling. As always, in this toppy market we do see the potential for a correction, but when we look out 3-7 years, we see Arista Inc continuing to take down Cisco Systems Inc moat and growing rapidly into the cloud. OPTION TRADERS For you option traders we offer this read: Options and the Cloud Revolution A classic example demonstrates that four weekly options does not equal one monthly option. The author has no position in Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) at the time of this writing. WHY THIS MATTERS It's finding the technology gems, like Arista, that can turn into the 'next Google,' or 'next Apple,' where we have to get ahead of the curve. This is what CML Pro does. Each company in our 'Top Picks' has been selected as a future crown jewel of technology. Market correction or not, recession or not, the growth in these areas is a near certainty. The precious few thematic top picks for 2017, research dossiers, and alerts are available for a limited time at an 80% discount for $19/mo. Join Us: Discover the undiscovered companies that will power technology's future. Thanks for reading, friends. Legal The information contained on this site is provided for general informational purposes, as a convenience to the readers. The materials are not a substitute for obtaining professional advice from a qualified person, firm or corporation. Consult the appropriate professional advisor for more complete and current information. Capital Market Laboratories (“The Company”) does not engage in rendering any legal or professional services by placing these general informational materials on this website. The Company specifically disclaims any liability, whether based in contract, tort, strict liability or otherwise, for any direct, indirect, incidental, consequential, or special damages arising out of or in any way connected with access to or use of the site, even if we have been advised of the possibility of such damages, including liability in connection with mistakes or omissions in, or delays in transmission of, information to or from the user, interruptions in telecommunications connections to the site or viruses. The Company makes no representations or warranties about the accuracy or completeness of the information contained on this website. Any links provided to other server sites are offered as a matter of convenience and in no way are meant to imply that The Company endorses, sponsors, promotes or is affiliated with the owners of or participants in those sites, or endorse any information contained on those sites, unless expressly stated.

#$anet

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fact2know-com · 4 years

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Top10 latest Technology to learn In 2020

The speed with which technology is progressing is faster than ever. We are now in the midst of the fourth industrial revolution, and companies and individuals have to be prepared to remain relevant.

Technology is changing day by day, and this change is affecting our lifestyle in equal measure. All aspects of our daily lives have been affected, including sports, health, food, and education. Online transactions are becoming the norm with digital currencies such as cryptocurrency slowly making its way into our lives. The health department has also been mostly affected by diagnosis and treatment, to become more accurate.

Without an understanding of the major trends in technology, individuals and companies will not be able to properly prepare and seize opportunities.

change is the only constant. This also applies to your professional life. Up-skilling is a necessity in itself nowadays, the reason is very simple, technology is developing very fast. I have listed the top 10 trending technologies, which are expected to gain a large market in 2020.

So, let’s take a New Year’s resolution to master any of the techniques below:

Artificial Intelligence

Blockchain

Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality

Cognitive Cloud Computing

Angular and React

DevOps

Internet of Things (IoT)

Intelligent Apps (I – Apps)

Big Data

RPA (Robotic Process Automation)

1) Artificial Intelligence (AI)

One of the most transformational technological advances of our time is Artificial Intelligence (AI). Companies around the world are harnessing the power of AI to enhance their customer experience and restructure their business processes.

In 2020, most people will get used to working together with AI. Designing and deploying your AI-based systems will remain expensive; Therefore, companies will rely on providers of AI-as-a-service platforms.

Artificial Intelligence Training – Explore the curriculum of master air and deep learning.

AI existed before the birth of the Internet, but now data processing and compute power backbones have become very strong, so that an entire technology can be created automatically.

Artificial Intelligence is everywhere today, from your mobile to your driving car to your house to your financial establishment.

This is the new normal, nothing the world can do without.

2 ) Blockchain technology

Blockchain is a digital ledger that is used to record transactions that are very secure due to their encrypted and decentralized nature. Despite receiving criticism, investment in technology is likely to bear fruit in 2020.

More companies are willing to join the fold, and it will make you excited about how this technology unfolds.

Blockchain Training – Explore courses in Master Blockchain.

This is the technology that powers bitcoins, a whole new parallel currency that has taken over the world.

Blockchain as a technology is reaching everywhere possibilities in everything from the health department to elections to law enforcement.

Understand how blockchain works and how secure your career is because it is technology-based!

3) Augmented reality and virtual reality

Augmented Reality (AR), on the other hand, super limits digital objects on the real world through a smartphone screen. On the other hand, mixed reality (MR) is an extension of AR. Here anyone can connect with digital gadgets placed in the real world.

Virtual reality (VR) provides a fully digitally immersive experience, where you use those headsets in a computer-generated world that blend the real world.

Virtual is real! VR and AR, twin technologies that let you experience things in the virtual that are very close to the real, are being used today by businesses of all shapes and sizes. But the underlying technology may be quite hard to understand.

In the Medical field doctors use AR technology to practice surgery in a controlled method.

VR, on the other word, make a new system for gaming and marketing.

If you want to ride the virtual wave, whatever interests you, AR and VR skills must be there!

4) Cognitive Cloud Computing

Cognitive computing is closely related to artificial intelligence and its many prevalent techniques (image recognition, pattern recognition, machine learning, natural language processing, and so on). It differs from traditional data analytics, due to its agile, interactive, and contextual properties.

AWS Solution Architect Training – Explore the curriculum of Master AWS.

The cognitive cloud is an expanded ecosystem of traditional cloud and cognitive computing.

Because of this, you can build cognitive computing applications and reach people through cloud deployment. Cognitive computing is considered the next major development in the IT industry.

It interacts in human language and helps experts make better decisions by understanding the complexities of Big Data. Its market area is generated revenue of $ 13.8 billion by 2020 and is one of the top 10 trending technologies in this year.

Big brands like Google, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Wipro have started upgrading this next-generation technology to speed up for the upcoming market.

5) Angular and Reaction

AngularJS is a structural framework for developing dynamic web apps, while React is a JavaScript library that allows you to create UI components. Angular JS is based on MVC (Model View Controller) while React is based on Virtual DOM.

Angular and Feedback Training – Explore master angular and feedback courses.

Okay, now we are coming to Core Tech.

Angular and React are JavaScript-based frameworks for building modern web applications.

Using React and Angular can create a highly modular web app. Therefore, you do not have to go through many changes in your codebase to add a new feature.

Angular and React allows you to create a native mobile application with the same JS, CSS, and HTML knowledge.

The best part – an open-source library with highly active community support.

6) DevOps

According to Wikipedia, DevOps is a model of practices that help to combine software development (Dev) and information-technology operations (OPS) which aim to short the system development life cycle and give continuous delivery with best software quality.

DevOps Training – Explore the curriculum for the master DevOps tool.

It is odd in the list. It is a methodology, not a technique.

DevOps is a methodology which ensures that development and operations both go hand-to-hand. The DevOps cycle is depicted as an infinite loop representing the integration of developers and operation teams:

.Automatic structure,

workflow and

continuously measuring application performance

7) Internet of Things (IoT)

The Internet of Things is the system of interconnected devices like mechanical and digital machines which provide unique identifiers and which able to transfer data to over a network without human-to-human-to-computer interaction.

Another discussion that is no longer a discussion, but has become a complete technology ecosystem in itself.

IoT is essentially connecting multiple devices and creating a virtual network, where everything works radically through a single monitoring center.

IoT is a vast network of connected devices – all of which collect data and share data about how they are used and the environment in which they operate.

It includes everything you have:

mobile phone,

fridge,

The washing machine is a good example you can think of.

With IoT, we can customize smart cities:

Traffic system,

efficient waste management and

Energy use

So in addition to traffic, start thinking of some new excuses for coming late for office.

8) Intelligent Apps (I – Apps)

Intelligent apps are applications that derive real-time and historical data from user interactions and other sources to make suggestions and predictions. It provides a personalized and adaptive user experience; Data analytics and machine learning are core components of intelligent apps. The i-apps are listing the software which written for mobile devices depend on artificial intelligence and machine learning technology, which are aimed at making everyday tasks easier.

This includes tasks like organizing and prioritizing email, holding meetings, talking, talking, content and more. Some familiar examples of i-apps are chatbot and virtual assistant.

In today these applications getting more popularity, they will come with promises of various jobs and better salaries.

9) Big Data

Big data is a term that describes large amounts of data – both structured and unstructured – that connect business on a day-to-day basis. But this does not amount to significant data. This is what organizations do with data that matters.

Big Data and Hadoop Training – Explore the curriculum for Master Big Data and Hadoop.

Big data refers to problems that are associated with the processing and storage of different types of data. Today most companies rely on big data analytics to get big information about themselves:

customers,

Product research,

Marketing initiatives and many more.

To your surprise, big data-inspired Germany to win the World Cup.

Hadoop and Spark are the best well-known frameworks for solving big data problems.

If you already have basic knowledge of Big Data, it’s great! If not, this is the right time to start.

10) RPA (Robotic Process Automation)

Robots handle is the repetitive business processes using RPA task robots, parse, , perform tasks , and trigger error-free which responses 24/7

RPA Training – Explore the curriculum of Master RPA.

Typically, any desk job in any industry includes tasks that are repetitive in nature and can be automated.

RPA allows you to automate every routine which you need and repetitive tasks.

You must write any code to automate repetitive tasks.

In 2020, the practice of bots and machine learning is only skyrocketing, which means RPA will become an invaluable skill.

Choose one or all, either of them to make a happy career in 2020!

With this we come to the end of the article “Top 10 Trending Technologies”. I hope this was informative enough to get you started in 2020.

from WordPress https://www.fact2know.com/top10-latest-technology-to-learn-in-2020/

#Tech #current Technology #latest Technology #latest Technology 2020 #latest Technology trends #tech

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theinvinciblenoob · 5 years

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Libertarian on lockdown? Privacy minded or paranoid?

Security is more front of mind today than ever before. If it’s not a company vacuuming up your data or nation states trying to hack your email, it’s your own “opsec” that needs a refresh.

For this holiday season, we have more than a dozen gift ideas — from practical gadgets that will make it harder for spies to listen in, to data-saving tips that will keep your information safe — without breaking the bank.

Passphrase dice

Coming up with passwords that are easy to remember is difficult. The better way is to use a longer and more memorable passphrase instead. It’s as easy as rolling a handful of dice and using word lists! You can pick up a five-pack of dice to generate random passphrases for just a few bucks. Or, if you want mail-order dice-generated passphrases, you can always rely on teenage security prodigy Mira Modi to generate them for you for a small fee.

Price: $8.00 — $15.00 Available from: EFF | Diceware

A password manager subscription

Where are you going to store all those passphrases? A password manager, of course! Although most password managers are free, many come with premium features that let you securely synchronize your passwords across your many devices. Our favorite password manager is 1Password — which offers gift certificates. But, everyone will have their preference, and there are plenty of password managers out there to choose from.

Price: from $4.99/month Available from: 1Password | LastPass | Dashlane

Yubikey

You might be done with beefing up your passwords, but now you need to lock down your accounts to the max. Done right, two-factor authentication is a major barrier for hackers to beat. The strongest protection comes in the form of a Yubikey, a physical, NFC-enabled USB stick that tells Google, Facebook, Twitter and any other supported service that it’s you and nobody else. Yuibikeys are the gold standard of two-factor keys.

Price: from $45.00 Available from: Yubikey

A burner phone

Ever needed to make a one-time phone call to a source, an ally — or even an enemy — without being easily tracked? A burner phone is your friend. Though they’re not perfect, burner phones make it more difficult for the powers that be to track you from place to place, or identify you in a vast sea of metadata and call records. Finding a good burner phone also isn’t easy — it depends on the kinds of threats that you face. A cheap, available phone like the ZTE Z233 is available at many department stores and inner-city pharmacies. You should pay in cash to avoid any financial paper trail. Just, don’t get too attached; the point of a burner phone is that you ditch it after its one and only use. You could always use an app like Burner that generates a temporary phone number, if you don’t want to shell out money.

Price: around $19.99 Available from: Target | Sears

Counter-surveillance infrared eyewear

Nothing beats surveillance cameras like invisible infrared light — and clothing and accessory makers know that more than anyone. Pick up a pair of infrared-emitting spectacles that mask your face in CCTV-heavy cities. You can also buy “stealthwear” clothing that can help you blend into a crowd by deflecting heat.

Price: $95.00 — $125.00 Available from: Reflectacles

Privacy screens

These thin, sticky screens don’t look like much, but they are vital in preventing visual hacking efforts — that’s when someone looks over your shoulder and spies on your private information. Privacy screens block anyone looking at your display from outside your 60-degree viewing angle, so anyone next to you will see nothing but a darkened screen.

Price: $18.83 — $42.85 Available from: Amazon (phone) | Amazon (laptop)

An encrypted USB storage drive

Encrypted removable storage is hard to come by. Nobody should rely entirely on hardware-based encryption because many drives use proprietary cryptography that are full of bugs. One encryption-supported flash drive stands above the rest — an IronKey D300. The key uses signed firmware to prevent tampering, enforces strong passwords and comes in several storage sizes.

Price: $65.00 — $86.20 Available from: Kingston | Amazon

Chromebook

Chromebooks are lightweight and practical, yet range from low-end disposable (almost burner) devices to the high-end and powerful. These Chrome OS-powered behemoths are highly secure — and capable — even if they’re the underdog in the operating system space. With the right tools and guides, Chromebooks can be considerably locked down and a determined defender against even the most powerful adversary. There is an entire spectrum of devices to choose from — including entry-level laptops, mid-range devices and high-end performance giants — a Chromebook for every need, with uncompromising security.

Price: $179 — $499 — $999 Available from: Google

A webcam cover

Almost everyone knows that hackers can target your webcam and remotely spy on you. So get a webcam cover! There are so many to choose from, you can be as inventive as you want — from sliding covers and customizable covers — even boutique homemade webcam covers from Etsy. Or, if you’re on a budget, you can never go wrong with a good old fashioned Post-it note.

Price: from $4.99 Available from: Amazon | Etsy

A microphone blocker

Don’t forget about your microphone! Microphone blockers work on most devices with a 3.5mm headphone jack by tricking a laptop or a phone into thinking that an external microphone is installed. Instead, the blocker picks up nothing more than sweet, sweet silence. Most microphone blockers will fit on a keyring and can be taken on the go, but anyone wanting to use a blocker on a newer iPhone or iPad will need a headphone adapter.

Price: $5.99 — $15.99 Available from: Amazon | StackSocial

A USB condom

You might think this is a joke, but USB condoms are real! These pocket-sized plugs are great for isolating your devices from alien or untrusted ports, allowing users to power up without transmitting (or receiving) malicious data. Most are USB-A, so any USB-C powered devices — like MacBooks and newer iPads — will also need an adapter.

Price: $11.99 Available from: Amazon

Raspberry Pi mini-computer

These mini-computers might not seem like much, but the Raspberry Pi revolution has taken the developer and hobbyist world by storm. They are ideal for beginners for learning basic coding, they’re highly adaptable and expandable, allowing even the more advanced users to build fully fledged systems — from lightweight gaming machines to media centers, and security systems to virtual private network routers, and more! Nothing speaks to the security-minded geek than an open-source platform to play with.

Price: from $35.00 Available from: Raspberry Pi

An RFID blocking wallet

RFID hacking is where someone swipes your personal data or information from an NFC-enabled credit card and makes fraudulent purchases. RFID attacks aren’t a widespread issue but the threat from card skimming exists. The EFF has a decent RFID blocking wallet for a low price, while other, more upscale wallets cost far more.

Price: from $22.00 — 72.00 Available from: EFF | Ridge Wallet

Amazon Cloud Cam

You might think, why would I need a wireless camera if I’m trying to prevent surveillance? You’d be surprised at how useful a camera can be. Take Amazon’s Cloud Cam — it’s the most secure internet-connected camera available for its price. Think of it as your eyes and ears when you’re away from home — keeping your house and your things safe. Or, even take it with you, and use in your hotel room to prevent “evil maid” attacks. The camera works in the dark, can be easily hooked up to a Wi-Fi network, and its feed is remotely accessible using your Amazon account — which, like other camera makers, can be secured with two-factor authentication. You could even put your Yubikey to good use!

Price: $119.99 Available from: Amazon

pfSense router

You might not have heard of a pfSense router before, but these security gateways are ideal for protecting your Internet of Things applications. Many IoT devices are insecure or buggy, and can lead to a wider compromise of your home or corporate network. A pfSense router helps segment network traffic to isolate your potentially buggy devices from your production devices. pfSense routers are easy to set up and manage — so you’ll never really have to think about it again.

Price: $249.99 Available from: Netgate

A lock-pick training kit

For the fidgety types: a lock-pick training kit is a great gift for anyone who wants to learn the fundamentals of lock picking. Transparent padlocks work best, as you can easily understand how the innards work — and how to defeat them. There are many available, but you shouldn’t break the bank on a basic kit — especially for beginners.

Price: $30.00 — $59.95 Available from: Cool Material | Amazon

via TechCrunch

#IFTTT #TechCrunch

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fmservers · 5 years

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Gift Guide: The best security and privacy tech to keep your friends safe

Libertarian on lockdown? Privacy minded or paranoid?

Security is more front of mind today than ever befroe. If it’s not a company vacuuming up your data or nation states trying to hack your email, it’s your own “opsec” that needs a refresh.

For this holiday season, we have over a dozen gift ideas — from practical gadgets that will make it harder for spies to listen in, and data-saving tips that will keep your information safe — without breaking the bank.

Passphrase dice

Coming up with passwords that are easy to remember is difficult. The better way is to use a longer and more memorable passphrase instead. It’s as easy as rolling a handful of dice and using wordlists! You can pick up a five-pack of dice to generate random passphrases for just a few bucks. Or, if you want mail-order dice-generated passphrases, you can always rely on teenage security prodigy Mira Modi to generate them for you for a small fee.

Price: $8.00 — $15.00 Available from: EFF | Diceware

A password manager subscription

Price: from $4.99/month Available from: 1Password | LastPass | Dashlane

Yubikey

You might be done with your passwords, but now need to lock down your accounts to the max. Done right, two-factor authentication is a major barrier for hackers to beat. The strongest protection comes in form of a Yubikey, a physical, NFC-enabled USB stick that tells Google, Facebook, Twitter and any other supported service that it’s you and nobody else. Yuibikeys are the gold standard of two-factor keys.

Price: from $45.00 Available from: Yubikey

A burner phone

Price: around $19.99 Available from: Target | Sears

Counter-surveillance infrared eyewear

Nothing beats surveillance cameras like invisible infrared light — andlothing and accessory makers know that more than anyone. Pick up a pair of infrared-emitting spectacles that mask your face in CCTV-heavy cities. You can also buy “stealthwear” clothing that can help you blend into a crowd by deflecting heat.

Price: $95.00 — $125.00 Available from: Reflectacles

Privacy screens

These thin, sticky screens don’t look like much, but they are vital in preventing visual hacking efforts — that’s when someone looks over your shoulder and spies on your private information. Privacy screens block anyone looking at your display from outside your 60-degree viewing angle, so anyone sat next to you will see nothing but a darkened screen.

Price: $18.83 — $42.85 Available from: Amazon (phone) | Amazon (laptop)

An encrypted USB storage drive

Encrypted removable storage is hard to come by. Nobody should rely entire on hardware-based encryption because many drives use proprietary cryptography that are full of bugs. One encryption-supported flash drive stands above the rest — an IronKey D300. The key uses signed firmware to prevent tampering, enforces strong passwords and comes in several storages sizes.

Price: $65.00 — $86.20 Available from: Kingston | Amazon

Chromebook

Price: $179 — $499 — $999 Available from: Google

A webcam cover

Price: from $4.99 Available from: Amazon | Etsy

A microphone blocker

Price: $5.99 — $15.99 Available from: Amazon | StackSocial

A USB condom

Price: $11.99 Available from: Amazon

Raspberry Pi mini-computer

These mini-computers might not seem like much, but the Raspberry Pi revolution has taken the developer and hobbyist world by storm. They are ideal for beginners for learning basic coding, they’re highly adaptable and expandable, allowing even the more advanced users to build fully-fledged — from gaming machines to media centers, and security systems and virtual private network routers — and more. Nothing speaks to the security-minded geek than an open source platform to play with.

Price: from $35.00 Available from: Raspberry Pi

An RFID blocking wallet

RFID hacking is where someone swipes your personal data or information from an NFC-enabled credit card and make fraudulent purchases. RFID attacks aren’t a widespread issue but the threat from card skimming exists. The EFF has a decent RFID blocking wallet for a low price, while other, more upscale wallets cost far more.

Price: from $22.00 — 72.00 Available from: EFF | Ridge Wallet

Amazon Cloud Cam

Price: $119.99 Available from: Amazon

pfSense router

Price: $249.99 Available from: Netgate

A lock-pick training kit

Price: $30.00 — $59.95 Available from: Cool Material | Amazon

Via Zack Whittaker https://techcrunch.com

#TechCrunch

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cryptnus-blog · 6 years

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5 Industries That Blockchain Will Revolutionize

New Post has been published on https://cryptnus.com/2018/05/5-industries-that-blockchain-will-revolutionize/

5 Industries That Blockchain Will Revolutionize

Image credit: BeeBright/Shutterstock

Blockchain is poised to disrupt major industries in the coming years, making many of our everyday activities more convenient and secure. Here are five industries on track to experience the blockchain revolution in 2018.

The media hype about Bitcoin and cryptocurrency in recent months has made it easy to lose sight of what’s truly exciting about blockchain technology. Underneath all the investment fervor lies blockchain’s true potential for disrupting industries, streamlining services, decentralizing databases and connecting users in a way never done before.

The most obvious area to apply a blockchain shake-up is the financial industry, and there are many companies out there doing just that. However, countless other projects are taking innovative approaches to disrupting industries from digital identities to city management, building their business models on the blockchain.

Here are five industries that are primed to experience the blockchain revolution in 2018.

1. Digital identity management

Our digital identities and personal data are some of our most valuable assets. With more and more horror stories about data breaches and the harvesting of our personal information without our knowledge (case in point: Cambridge Analytica), it’s clear that a radically different platform for cybersecurity is needed.

Here is where blockchain could make for a vastly improved system. As a decentralized public ledger, it shakes up the traditional method of data storage – you don’t have to worry about a centralized power abusing your data without your knowledge, because there is no centralized power. All personal information entered into the blockchain remains firmly in your possession, with no incentive or even capability for outside data harvesting.

Blockchain can assure security for your data, but also accessibility. With at-your-fingertips storage, you’ll be able to draw up personal documents and onboarding information instantaneously. This will allow for one-click applications to help you save time and maneuver red tape, secure in the knowledge that your data is secure, private and local.

Blockchain projects that focus specifically on organizing your digital identity make managing your information easy and reliable. For example, SelfKey, built on the Ethereum blockchain, aims to make identity data breaches and theft a problem of the past using a self-sovereign identity approach: You can control your identity documents and attributes at all times and also verify and notarize them through its free and open-source identity wallet.

While the world of blockchain-based digital management is constantly evolving, projects like SelfKey are already secure and private by design, allowing you to own and control your personal data, painlessly undergo KYC processes of financial and immigration services, and so much more. The technology has been built with the help of Standard Chartered Bank, which collaborated with KYC-Chain, the founder of the SelfKey Foundation.

2. Property rental

Anyone looking to rent a home in an in-demand area will understand how severely broken the rental industry is. Apartment hunting, signing a lease, and scraping together the money for your first month’s rent plus deposit can be a momentous task. With many tenants offering landlords higher rental prices behind the scenes, people who are rejected for an apartment can feel like they’re expected to bid against rivals in the dark.

Of course, there is also the trust issue – how can a landlord trust that the tenants they’ve met for five minutes at a viewing are a good fit for their property? And vice versa: how can renters be confident they’re not signing the next year of their life away to a less-than-reputable organization?

Then there’s the deposit. Not only can this be prohibitively expensive for renters who are living paycheck to paycheck, but it’s damaging for the economy as a whole. When you think of how much money is lying stagnant, locked away in rental deposits, it really is amazing that we’ve kept to our current rental model for so long without updating it for the modern world.

One blockchain project trying to disrupt the rental industry that has gained traction is Rentberry, a San Francisco-based startup that’s already garnered a lot of media exposure. Rentberry aims to address the common pitfalls and headaches of the traditional rental model. One of its functions is to allow prospective tenants to bid on the landlord’s offered price, bringing transparency to the rent auctioning process. The security deposit crowdfunding capability, in which a new tenant can take out microloans from the Rentberry community to be paid back with interest, removes the barrier of saving up a lump sum of money before moving in.

The use of e-signatures and smart contracts to cover all monetary transactions, including rent and bills, allows payments to occur in a reliable, trustless system. The rating system for both landlords and tenants means people have a reliable, network-approved way of assessing each other before they enter into a legally binding contract.

3. Blockchain as a service

When it comes to the industry of blockchain itself (blockchain as a service, or BaaS), Ethereum rules the roost as the platform most projects are built on. However, Ethereum is far from perfect, its one notable flaw being its poor scalability.

The beauty of blockchain is that it’s a permanent, immutable ledger. In Ethereum’s case, it’s also its biggest drawback. The fact that every transaction ever performed on the blockchain is there forever is highly detrimental to Ethereum’s scalability, and it slows down the system considerably; currently, Ethereum can only process 15 transactions per second.

Many blockchain projects have tried different methods to fix Ethereum’s scalability issue, including Ardor, the new BaaS that offers data cloud storage, customizable monetary tokens, decentralized trade, encrypted voting and messaging, and a local marketplace. Where Ardor is notable is in its unique method of tackling blockchain bloat.

Ardor actually consists of two blockchains: a parent and a child. The parent chain, Ardor, takes on the brunt of the processing functions, while the child chains pay a fee to have their transactions processed. Older transactions can then be pruned, with certain nodes opting to act as archives for obsolete transactions.

Ardor has already launched its first child chain, Ignis, with more to come, promising a cost-effective and secure solution for companies to piggyback on a full-fledged blockchain as opposed to building their own from scratch.

4. Digital advertising

Digital advertising is another example of a deeply flawed industry that wastes time and money on all sides. Ads and banners that harvest our attention are a necessary evil that we as internet users have resigned ourselves to as the cost for using Facebook or YouTube. However, those seconds and minutes build up, aggregating into a colossal chunk of time and data that would be better spent elsewhere. This is frustrating and invasive on the consumers’ side and – given the prevalence of ad blockers – a waste of money on the advertisers’ side.

Given that online ads are a must to fund the free services we enjoy, if there was an option to make viewing targeted ads less onerous, wouldn’t you take it? What if you could choose what types of ads to view, instead of being forced to sit through superfluous or irrelevant commercials What if, instead of paying third parties like Facebook to ply you with ads, advertisers paid the very people they were trying to attract in the first place – you, the viewer? What if you were given a choice as to whether and what type of ads show up on your devices?

There are many startups taking a crack at solving the attention economy problem, but perhaps none are quite as on the nose as the blockchain project, Basic Attention Token. Not only does BAT provide an internet browser that blocks ads and trackers, but its business model works on the revolutionary concept of directly paying consumers for viewing ads. This incentivizes users to view ads they’d normally block or tune out, and it achieves more precise targeting for advertisers with lower rates of fraud.

5. Internet of things

IoT is an increasingly relevant concept in our daily lives. Essentially, it is the interconnectivity of all our devices – watches, cars, phones, etc. – that haven’t traditionally been computers. The thought of all our gadgets syncing up and communicating without any human input may sound exciting, but there are enormous security and functional considerations to account for.

Forbes predicts that by 2020, annual revenues for all aspects of IoT – hardware, software and solutions development – will be upward of $470 billion. Clearly, this is an incredibly robust market with an enormous need for someone to manage regulation and infrastructure.

In an industry that, like blockchain, is still relatively new and chaotic, there are plenty of companies stepping up with management solutions. One making waves is Waltonchain, an award-winning Chinese project that seeks to integrate IoT and blockchain technology on an unprecedented scale. Using smart contracts, radio frequency identification tags (to be implemented in 2019), and mother and child chains similar to those used by Ardor, Waltonchain is disrupting a wide array of industries, including retail, supply chain management, marketing and sales.

Its most ambitious goal involves something that seems straight out of science fiction: building smart cities. And it’s well on its way to making it happen, with a few key partnerships in the works with companies that provide the payment network and infrastructure to match Waltonchain’s vision and technology.

While smart cities may still be a few years down the line, IoT remains a tremendously powerful ecosystem that is already embedded in every aspect of our lives. As we have seen in a series of scandals, breaches and data abuses over the past few years, nothing so fundamental to human functioning should be controlled by a centralized authority.

2018: The year of blockchain?

With the cryptocurrency markets still struggling to recover after a gruesome three months, Q2 2018 may be the opportune time to step back from crypto as an asset and instead focus on the fundamentals of the blockchain industry.

These projects are only a handful of many ingenious startups working to transform the industry they’re operating in. Blockchain is poised and ready to disrupt every aspect of life we ever took for granted.

Even if you aren’t investing in cryptocurrencies, these projects are worth following for anyone with an interest in cutting-edge technology that provides solutions to everyday problems. Whether it’s to streamline our digital identity management, help us find an apartment, monetize our ad viewing or integrate all aspects of our lives via IoT, blockchain technology will likely be at the forefront.

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iota-news · 6 years

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The sensors have fully taken action in business and in Norwegian households. But how can you capitalize on the main data that sensors and “things” capture every single day? The technology behind IOTA can be the beginning of the golden age of the sensors.

Do you think about cryptovaluta when you hear the name IOTA? Then you are not alone. But the revolutionary technology behind can completely transform how data is shared in real time in a world full of sensors and “things” connected to things online.

The technology can create huge business opportunities for businesses across industries and sectors.

That possibility has now taken the companies TINE and inFuture.

Through the pilot project ‘TINE Smart Farm’ they look at the potential of IOTA’s technology. To get more knowledge about the health of the cows, they started a collaboration in the autumn of 2017, among other things, to install motion sensors in a farm on Kalnes.

The IOTA Foundation is built around the Internet of Things (IoT), and was founded by the Norwegian David Sønstebø.

The technology behind IOTA, called Tangle technology, enables real-time encrypted data sharing, and is considered the beginning of the “machine-to-machine” economy.

IOTA is perhaps best known for its crypto currency, but this is only one possible application of the company’s technology.

The “Tangle” technology enables businesses to explore brand new business models on the B2B (Business-to-business) business. It makes the technology by making any technological resource a potential service that can be traded in an open market in real time without fees.

TINE is one of several organizations that explores what opportunities this technology creates. At the same time, there are several organizations looking at solutions in sectors such as energy, mobility, commerce, industry 4.0 and smart cities, says Director of Global Business Development at IOTA, Wilfried Pimenta de Miranda, adding:

“In Norway, digitalization is in record speed, and there is already much digitized. At the same time, Norway has sky-high investment capacity.

Now the whole world is in the midst of a gigantic digitization process. By 2017, only 2,32 billion smartphone users were estimated worldwide. By 2020, statista.com predicts that there will be almost three billion smartphone users, and within the same year, experts predict that a total of 50 billion sensors and “stuffs” will be connected to the network.

It’s just in the world of internet of things (IoT) that IOTA’s technology hits a nerve. IOTA wishes to exceed the limits of standard block technology with its own distributed distributed ledger technology (DLT) – with open source.

Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) technology is a digital system for storing either value and / or data through transaction history of resources.

Here, the information data associated with the transactions is stored in several different locations at the same time. However, in traditional payment systems, the information is stored on one or more centralized databases.

By using DLT, all users in the network will process and verify each transaction, which will create a consensus to avoid, among other things, fake transactions.

We will explain the technology more thoroughly, and what opportunities are we coming back to, further down the article.

“This technology opens up new opportunities for Internet of Things (IoT) and data driven business models,” said Pimenta de Miranda.

Many of those who are now exploring the possibilities with IOTA have joined a test project launched by IOTA last November: Data Marketplace.

“Here we have brought together a number of international players like Bosch, Accenture, Samsung and Norwegian TINE. The project is designed as an open and innovative ecosystem – powered by workshops for business models and pilots.

But how can we understand the technology behind IOTA even better?

Let’s rewind back to 2008. The financial crisis was at its darkest and the American bank Lehman Brothers went bankrupt. Obama was elected as American president, and the first block chain (blockchain) was conceptualized as part of the bitcoin.

Since then, block technology has undergone major improvements.

Despite several iterations and an overwhelming upheaval, blockblocks are still relatively unmodified technology that has not found their way into industry.

One of the reasons for this is the lack of scalability. The “blocks” in public blocks are bottlenecks. It provides slower transaction validation and high transaction fees. It prevents many economic business models from emerging, “says Pimenta de Miranda.

When it comes to innovation, specifically within IoT, the requirement for energy consumption and storage capacity is strict, so that each node in the block network will be incompatible with sensors and connected devices.

Just in recent years, IOTA has entered the market with a completely unique further development of this technology. IOTA is built around the Internet of Things (IoT). They have launched next-generation “distributed ledger” technology using a new invention called “Tangle” at the core. «Tangle» is a new data structure that causes the network to have no blocks, no chain, nor is it necessary for “miners”, as it would be for traditional block technology.

Tangle technology is not built up by blocks, but can also be viewed as a spider web where participants in the network participate with automatic validation of the information forwarded. Each transaction sent will not be completed until the sender has validated two previous transactions.

This validation process enables a significantly higher processing speed for the transactions. The technology is theoretically infinitely scalable.

When all network participants contribute in the validation process with each connected device, whether it’s a sensor or a larger computer, the integrity and security of the network are maintained. This happens without the need for dedicated “Blockchain miners” who work around the clock and consume huge amounts of power.

Due to system architecture, IOTA works quite differently from other blockbeds.

“The result is a decentralized and self-regulating” peer-to-peer “network with unique features. There are customized requirements many businesses have for IoT today. The “Tangle” technology is scalable, simple and has no fees on transactions. In addition, data transfer is secure and encrypted, “says Pimenta de Miranda.

It makes the technology unique and able to solve the problems that traditional blockbags have in an elegant way.

BLOKKJEDE TECHNOLOGY:

Tangle TECHNOLOGY:

The missing puzzle piece of the “Smart” Revolution

It’s almost three years since IOTA’s adventure started. Since that time, the organization, which is not profit-driven, has grown at record speed.

The Norwegian founder of IOTA, David Sønstebø, has previously explained about the IOTA project: “Data wants to be free, but not for free”.

– Today, huge amounts of data are stored in so-called datasets. These are data companies could make profits on, but instead they are saved. This is because there is no easy way to sell the valuable information today, “says Pimenta de Miranda, adding:

“Norway’s smart revolution and increasing ambition to make data for” the new oil “relies on the ability to open and share data across silos, secure data transfers and earn money on data streams in the new IoT world.

Pimenta de Miranda explains that the digital revolution is about opening the silos. IOTA is already addressing two major technical challenges:

1. Data flows must be trusted: Data integrity and data stream security must be maintained in IoT.

2. You must be able to capitalize on data and value transfer without fees must be achieved in order to have real-time machine-to-machine communication.

Pimenta de Miranda explains that the IOTA technology, with the open source code, will revolutionize the internet and create a “Web 3.0” where any connected device can safely flow data through the peer to peer system and where machines can trade with each other.

– IOTA develops and distributes the “backbone” behind the Internet for any thing that will create a true machine-to-machine economy. We believe this is the next wave of value creation.

This is how the machine-to-machine technology works in practice

To understand machine-to-machine technology even better, Pimenta de Miranda draws a concrete example of mobility:

Now IOTA is working closely with the Dutch network company Enexis to enable connected vehicles to seamlessly pay for electricity for smart chargers. It is possible through a stream of fee-free microtransactions.

– This gives full interoperability. It even removes the need for any kind of contract. In the future, autonomous vehicles will of course be able to pay for electricity on the go along the journey. Not only for electricity but also for parking and other fees.

Now this technology is on its way to a test facility in the Nordic region, and Pimenta de Miranda encourages you to follow.

The role of data marketplace revitalizes machine-to-machine technology

In order to facilitate machine-to-machine technology in the best possible way, IOTA is dependent on a data marketplace for purchase and sale of sensor data.

“With our concept,” Data Marketplace “, or the data market in good Norwegian, we want the protocol to be used as the basis for the exchange, purchase and sale of data and data streams,” says Pimenta de Miranda.

The technology is complex. Through the computer marketplace, you remove the barrier for understanding the technology by inviting actors to test it with their own devices. All you need is to be connected to the internet and have connected devices that retrieve data.

According to Pimenta de Miranda, the cooperation appears to be a catalyst for co-creation by organizing open innovation workshops, while at the same time creating more cooperation between the companies based on the pilot projects.

“IOTA creates completely new opportunities for real-time data sharing, as you have not seen before,” says Pimenta de Miranda.

In connection with the data marketplace launched in November 2017, the IOTA Foundation has collaborated with several Norwegian players, including TINE, DNV GL, Crayon Group, Multiconsult, Oslo Cancer Cluster, NTNU and UiO.

Smart Cities need to learn to leverage available technologies to their benefit. We’re excited for IOTA and their potential for contributing to a green smart city, and to support them further with the ambition to put Oslo in the forefront in this area» Silje Bareksten, Head of Smart City i Oslo Business Region

Back to TINE and inFuture – how do they really innovate with IOTA?

However, the sensors TINE and inFuture install on Kalnes are of the more comprehensive type. They have a hypothesis about how these data in the future, and looking into how this technology can be exploited for different uses in the agricultural sector.

– First, we must test and secure the data. TINE and InFuture look at IOTA as a candidate to help them with a new business area in the future, says Pimenta de Miranda.

– Someone has the same interest and the same challenges as TINE. Common to all collaborators is that through testing the platform, they can express what they themselves want to get out of technology in the long term, says Pimenta de Miranda.

The data marketplace is a low-yielding fruit. The sensors that capture data in Kalnes’s barn will be able to sell encrypted real-time data on IOTA’s marketplace. Here other companies can also buy data or subscribe to data streams.

“TINE is a very important player for us. In the near future, the goal is to carry out some pilot projects together. The development in our ecosystems is fast, and there is still much we will find out over time.

With the network, the IOTA Foundation also has several other international agricultural organizations, where they work with IOTA in other parts of agriculture.

Pimenta de Miranda explains that as soon as you have a clear picture of what data you are on, you can even sell them – even smaller farmers. As long as the data comes from a source you can trust, you can, among other things, tag the data as sustainable and sell them in the marketplace.

“The smart agriculture is an emerging market with enormous potential. It will be very valuable in the future, he says, adding:

“The technology is going to change much of the world

This is IOTA’s next step in Norway

There are already several who have started exploring the technology behind IOTA in Norway. More partnerships have been put in place, and dialogue has been started between several companies in everything from energy, mobility, supply chain, smart cities and e-health.

“We recently had a business model workshop in Oslo with several participants from business and we are approaching more cooperation,” says Pimenta de Miranda.

He explains that they will now bring IOTA’s ecosystem to a smart pilot testing facility in Sweden where they recently signed an agreement in the field of energy and e-mobility.

“We are looking at the launch of similar projects in Norway, and have recently become part of Kongsberg TestArena in order to test smart mobility.

In terms of health, we are very pleased to set up an e-health and MyData / GDPR conference on April 12, 2018 in collaboration with the Oslo Cancer Cluster, says Pimenta de Miranda.

Pimenta de Miranda explains that they scale the innovation community’s efforts and sharing knowledge with proactive companies such as universities and the public sector – but also the private sector

“We want to invest resources in short-term” Multiplier “initiatives and Minimal Viable Ecosystems to help our strategic partners in their ambition to become a leader in IoT and smart innovation in Norway.

Denne teknologien kan forandre verden was originally published on premium.obforum.no. It was translated by the IOTA-News Community. The Community curates, examines, and summarizes news from external services while producing its own original material. Copyrights from external sources will be credited as they pertain to their corresponding owners. IOTA-News.com´s purpose is to make use of partial 3rd party content or pictures as either allusion or promotional endorsement of mentioned sites.

The post This technology can change the world! appeared first on IOTA News.

via IOTA News

#IFTTT #IOTA News

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finside-ru · 6 years

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Финтех-тусовка заподозрила Humaniq в мошенничестве

С сайта проекта Humaniq, который провёл ICO на $5 млн весной 2017 года, пропала информация о людях, имеющих отношение к проекту, а финтех-тусовка заподозрила Humaniq в мошенничестве.

Обсуждение:

Игорь Костылев (Futurebanking): Гайз, а что с Алексом Форком и его Humaniq?

Кирилл Горыня: С такой фамилией фаундера у блокчейн проекта может быть много неожиданных поворотов)))

Александр Лупачев (Russia Partners): Если не отвечает в соц сетях, то можно отправить телеграмму с уведомлением Васильеву Алексею Викторовичу, 170042, Тверь, Артиллерийский пер.7, кв.237.

Константин Плавник: Гы гы гы. Без устали днём и ночью пытаются спасти Африку. Альтруисты! Визионеры!

Юрий Новиков Трубецкой: С большой вероятностью, никакого Хуманика не будет. Осталось ли что-то от собранных денег, тоже большой вопрос. Не так уж и много было тех денег.

Виктор Насочевский: Один из первых скам проектов. Собрали сколько смогли и исчезли с горизонта.

Отсюда.

Одновременно с сайта Humaniq пропала информация из раздела about. Адрес https://humaniq.com/about выдаёт ошибку 404. Копия этой информации сохранена здесь: http://finside.ru/1253.

Там информация о людях, имеющих отношение к проекту, в частности, об Алексе Форке (на фо��о слева; предпочитает пользоваться псевдонимом, а не реальным именем) и «молдавском олигархе» и «визионере» Дмитрии Каминском (на фото справа; ранее покупал Интерактивный банк и обещал вложить в ibank 1 миллиард долларов. На деле банк был лишён лицензии ЦБ в апреле 2016 года, вкладчики получали выплаты из АСВ).

Сохранённая информация:

About Humaniq

A little snapshot about the people that live Humaniq and run Humaniq.

Our Mission

Today, two billion people around the world do not have access to banking. Humaniq aims to increase financial inclusion worldwide by providing new financial services to the unbanked based on Blockchain technology and biometric identification systems. With this new mobile digital economy, we will help people who are excluded from the financial system break free from poverty and improve their lives, and emerging economies shift into the cryptoeconomy.

Humaniq Team

Alex Fork Head of Humaniq Humaniq founder and Fintech entrepreneur Alex is one of the most important members of the international Blockchain community, who has worked with the UN to lead the deployment of Blockchain technology to improve the efficiency of UN resources and remittances. He has also spearheaded the harnessing of blockchains in Russia, organising a conference for 500 participants on the Ethereum Blockchain; authoring Bitcoin. More than Just Money; and founding the Fintech accelerator for startups in Russia, Future Fintech. He started Humaniq to help lift the global banked out of poverty.

Serafima Semkina CAO Bringing experience of management and economics, Serafima’s passions include art, music and Russian literature and the crypto-economy. She cannot stand inequality and is happy to have the opportunity to tackle it with Humaniq.

Javed Khattak CFO Javed has a background as an actuary and of finance, consulting and startups. He loves technology, especially gadgets, AI and virtual reality, and believes in Blockchain for Good. He is working with Humaniq to bring greater opportunities and fairness to the world.

Anton Mozgovoy Product Manager Anton was motivated to work with Humaniq to use his experience in both computer science and finance to help to bring happiness for all across the world. He is passionate about freedriving and wakeboarding, and, of course, staying late to finish work.

Georgii Oleinikov Developer Bringing experience of mathematics and computer science, Georgii loves things that have an impact and people that make these things happen. He believes there is big room for improvement in the financial sector, with many not served.

Kherel Kechil Lead Frontend Developer Kherel is a digital nomad. He joined Humaniq to experience and participate in the financial evolution, and observe changes to the better in the country where he currently resides — China.

Peyman Irani SMM, CSS Peyman’s background is in sales and marketing, entrepreneurship, and social media and he is passionate about his family, innovation and humanitarian capitalism. Fairness means a lot to him and he believes we can do something great for humanity at Humaniq.

Segrey Blinov SMM, CSS Bringing experience of social media and customer service support, Segrey is passionate about Blockchain technology and his family.

Danny Kass SMM, CSS Danny’s background is in social media, B2B sales and customer service support. He loves cryptoeconomy and technology and at Humaniq is motivated to disrupt the financial industry with an ecosystem for entrepreneurs to make changes from the bottom up.

Andriy Schechenko Forum Administrator Andriy has experience in computer science, security research, online community building and entrepreneurship and is passionate about both improving the world and space exploration. At Humaniq he wants to contribute to something good for humanity and boost financial independence.

Lee Baker Writer Lee has a background in both communications and community organising and loves story-telling to inspire positive action and to connect with others to change things for the better. He wants to unleash the power of the collaborative economy and help everyone to put their destinies into their own hands.

Olga Derbio Graphic Designer Olga has a background in architecture, interior design and graphic design, and is passionate about inspiring others, building sites, spontaneity, and the universe. She is at Humaniq so she can be creative for social good — and to become a crypto geek!

Humaniq Advisers

Dinis Guarda

Digital age influencer Dinis is the founder of digital communications consultancy Ztudium and manager of websites intelligenthq.com, openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, and hedgethink.com. Dinis also co-founded BlockchainAge, a blockchain research and tech influencer, platform, book and film; led the digital strategy for invstr.com; authored books including The Next Tsunami: Blockchain plus AI and IOT and led a digital master course in London for Group INSEEC. He has been ranked as in the top 100 Blockchain and Fintech influencers.

Dmitry Kaminskiy

An innovative entrepreneur and investor active in Biotech, Fintech, Blockchain and artificial intelligence, Dmitry is co-founder of the Deep Knowledge Ventures investment fund, focused on investments in AI and Deeptech. He adheres to the principle of impact investment in all his business activities, believing that business should make a social impact, and he supports the deployment of Blockchain for Good, which led to his decision to support Humaniq from its inception.

David Applefield

Is an American writer and media specialist living in Paris. He has as spent his career developing creative and innovative solutions for business leaders, heads of state, ministries, NGOs, and other not-for- profit foundations. He is the Financial Times representative for Africa, the Middle East and emerging markets.

Iggy Bassi

Is the co-founder and serves as a Director of GADCO, a venture focused on sustainable agriculture and livelihood development in West Africa with LATAM technologies. He has a long track record in building companies in the technology, finance, and impact markets – in both emerged and emerging markets. Over the past 20 years he has advised many global companies (inc. Fortune 500), sovereigns, and entrepreneurs on solving problems in competitiveness, sustainability, scenario planning, and structuring complex transactions. He works at the intersection of technology, sustainability, food security, global security, and innovative thinking around the collaborative economy.

Matt McKibbin

Is a business development guru and a decentralization evangelist. He became interested in Bitcoin and the blockchain technology in 2012. Technologically savvy, he is an extroverted connector driven by a desire to see transformative and decentralized technologies positively affect the 7 billion people on the planet. He is based in the Washington DC metro area.

Alex Bausch

Is an entrepreneur with broad experience in all aspects of international business development and the creation of global technology companies. He strongly believes in partner ecosystems which aim to inspire and spawn new innovations. His specialties include: SaaS services, mobile identity security, the IoT, enterprise managed mobility, decentralised ledger technology, marketing, and product development.

Nick Ayton

Is a writer, speaker and educator of all things Blockchain and Cryptocurrency. He is a Fintech 100 Influencer and Number 21 Rise Blockchain Top 100. He has had eight startups and held many senior roles in major IT and tech companies. He now chairs various Blockchain events and advises a range of clients on Blockchain technology, bitcoin and Ethereum. One of his latest projects is to raise funds using cryptoeconomics and create a new film finance model to make a mini- series for TV about the Bitcoin Revolution, an asset backed Token, and a new Media and Film Production business on Ethereum. Ron Morris

Has been designing and delivering educational programs in multiple countries for over a decade. After several years working for Groupe INSEEC, France’s largest higher education group, he went on to direct their London campus, bringing in top-tier thought leaders, practitioners, and companies to contribute to programs and events. He has now opened a new campus for Groupe INSEEC in San Francisco, delivering immersive, challenge-based programs focused on innovation and entrepreneurship, bringing together a wide range of startups, accelerators, institutes, and thought leaders.

Tim Campbell

In previous roles Tim has been a key government advisor on Diversity, Small Business Social Enterprise and Entrepreneurship. Tim was also Boris Johnson’s Training and Enterprise ambassador for the City of London whilst Mr Johnson was Mayor of London. In February 2012 Tim was awarded the MBE for his efforts supporting enterprise and he currently sits on the City of London’s Education Board. Tim is a keen runner and martial arts enthusiast and is happily married with two children. Michael Terpin

Michael Terpin co-founded BitAngels (www.bitangels.co), the world’s first angel network for digital currency startups, in May 2013, and now serves as its chairman. The distributed angel network currently has more than 600 members, and it has made more than 25 investments in bitcoin and cryptocurrency companies with two exits and several follow-on rounds. Terpin is also co-founder and managing partner of bCommerce Labs (www.bcommercelabs.com), the first technology incubator fund focused on e-commerce companies for bitcoin and the blockchain, and a partner at Flight VC.

Chami Akmeemana

Paolo Tasca

Paolo Tasca is a FinTech economist specialising in P2P Financial System. An advisor for different international organisations including the EU Parliament on blockchain technologies, Paolo recently joined the University College London as Director of the Centre for Blockchain Technologies (UCL CBT). Prior to that, he has been a senior research economist at Deutsche Bundesbank working on digital currencies and P2P lending. Paolo is the co-author of the bestseller «FINTECH Book» and the co-editor of the book «Banking Beyond Banks and Money. A quick walk through our history as a company:

2016

April

Inception of the Humaniq idea by Alex Fork.

November

Humaniq Whitebook is written and the original project team is formed.

December

Humaniq.co website is launched and pre-ICO is announced

2017

February

Smart contracts are being developed, due diligence and marketing campaign take place.

February

Humaniq team meets with project partners in India. Alex Fork conducts the first performance tests of the project in unbanked regions of India.

February

Humaniq announces first online hackathon

February

Pre-ICO (crowdsale) is launched

March

Alpha version of the app is available for testing on IOS and Android.

April

Humaniq collects $1.5 mln in the first hour of their ICO.

May

App with new enchanced biometrics is being released.

Now

Humaniq is 43 people now, working from 14 countries.

product Open source Humaniq Wiki HMQ Explorer company About Blog Forum Use Cases Partners Ambassadors legal Privacy Security Policies resources White Paper Contact us Humaniq Humaniq is a simple and secure mobile app, delivering financial inclusion solutions to the 2.5 billion unbanked / 1 billion underbanked globally.

http://finside.ru/1253 Источник Финсайд

#финсайд #банки #деньги #Россия #Москва

0 notes

viralhottopics · 7 years

Text

How Samsung’s new voice assistant, Bixby, is different from Siri

Image: ILLUSTRATION by Ambar Del Moral/Mashable

Samsung has a new voice. And it has world-changing ambitions.

In the upcoming Galaxy S8, users will find an extra button on the left side of the phone, just below the volume controls. Pressing it will activate Bixby, Samsung’s new voice assistant. Once activated, Bixby will help you navigate what’s arguably the most sophisticated piece of technology you own the smartphone in your hand.

If Samsung gets its wish, though, Bixby will eventually do much more than just help you order Lyfts or set up complex calendar appointments. The long-term vision is for Bixby to act as a kind of uber-interface for all of Samsung’s products: TVs, wearables, washing machines, even remote controls.

SEE ALSO: Samsung Galaxy S8: all the leaks in one place

Samsung designed Bixby with a specific goal in mind, one that veers away from its fellow voice assistants Apple’s Siri, Amazon’s Alexa, Microsoft’s Cortana and the Google Assistant. Those platforms were generally built to help users quickly perform common tasks (“Remind me to buy milk”) and perform search queries (“What’s the capital of Brazil?”). Bixby, on the other hand, is all about making the phone itself easier to use, replicating the functions of many apps with voice commands.

Yes, Siri et al. already do that to a certain extent you can easily set a reminder with your voice, for example but the voice integration typically only handles the basics. The goal of Bixby is to voice-enable every single action in an app that you’d normally do via touch, starting with Samsung’s apps. So, not just “set a reminder to buy pickles at 6 p.m., but “Set a reminder on my Shopping List to buy pickles at 6 p.m. and make it repeat every week, then share the list with my wife.”

Bixby speaks

Injong Rhee, CTO of Samsung Mobile and the architect behind Bixby, says the voice assistant is nothing short of an “interface revolution,” freeing users from hunting down hidden functionality within menus and hard-to-find screens.

“Bixby is an intelligent user interface, emphasis… on ‘interface,'” Rhee says. “A lot of agents are looking at being knowledgeable, meaning that you can ask questions like, ‘Who’s president of the U.S.?’ A lot of these are glorified extensions of search. What we are doing with Bixby, and what Bixby is capable of doing, is developing a new interface to our devices.”

Bixby architect Injong Rhee, CTO of Samsung Mobile.

Image: Pete Pachal/Mashable

Although it makes its debut on the Galaxy S8, it will soon spread. Rhee sees the Bixby button eventually spreading to all kinds of smart-home devices, from TVs to refrigerators to air conditioners.

“Anywhere there is an internet connection and a microphone, Bixby can be used,” he says. “There is some technology in the device, but a lot of it lives in the cloud. That’s why the range of devices goes beyond just a smartphone. It means it can be in any device we produce.”

“Anywhere there is an internet connection and a microphone, Bixby can be used.”

Samsung began work on Bixby about 18 months ago, Rhee says. It grew out of the company’s S Voice tool, which has been on Samsung phones since 2012. (The timing might explain why Samsung’s smart fridge announced right around then failed to deliver on its planned integration with Alexa.) S Voice hadn’t progressed much over the years, but then last year Samsung acquired the much-hyped Viv Labs and its sophisticated assistant, a strong indicator of the company’s renewed interest in voice control. However, Rhee says Viv’s technology is planned for future updates to Bixby and doesn’t have a role in the initial release.

The name Bixby came out of Samsung’s focus groups, but it was actually their third choice overall. It was the top pick among millennials a demographic the company is specifically targeting with the Galaxy S8 so it won out. (Rhee declined to say what the other names were.) It’s also distinctive enough, with hard consonants, for it to work well as an activation word. Bixby, which will initially speak just English and Korean, is intended to be a user’s “bright sidekick,” helping them navigate their devices in a more natural way.

“[What came before], it’s been people trying to learn how the machine interacts with the world, but… it should be the machine learns how the human interacts with the world,” Rhee says. “The learning curve shouldn’t be steep.”

All talk, all action

For an app to be considered Bixby-supported, every possible touch action needs to be mapped to a voice command. Rhee explains that, for a typical app, there are about 300 different actions the user can perform. That doesn’t sound too bad until you consider there are around 15,000 different ways to perform them. And the ways to verbalize those actions number in the millions. That’s a lot of stuff to map out.

Still, Samsung says it’s up for the challenge, at least as far as its built-in apps are concerned. But what about third-party apps? Considering the amount of development work, will Snapchat or Facebook ever work as well with Bixby as Samsung’s apps?

Bixby will take you as far as it can rather than just hitting you with a, “Sorry, I didn’t catch that.”

Rhee says Samsung has a plan to get third-party apps talking to Bixby, and an SDK to be released at a later date will introduce tools that make the mapping much easier. He also suggests Viv’s technology can help here, too.

“Viv Labs is coming in by way expanding our vision into third-party ecosystems. It doesn’t necessarily have to be all of the touch commands that they can perform. At a minimum, [Bixby will perform] the basic functionalities: like the settings, or changing the language from English to French.”

On the Galaxy S8, a total of 10 apps will be Bixby-supported, Rhee says, with a second “wave” coming a few weeks later. Out of the gate, users will be able to use Bixby with Contacts, Gallery, Settings, Camera, Reminders and a few others.

Another way Bixby is different from its peers: it will be aware of what you’re doing on the phone and suggest different actions depending on what’s on screen. So if you press the button while, say, looking at a single photo in the Gallery, editing and sharing controls are probably more relevant to you than searching. And if Bixby doesn’t understand every aspect of a complex command, it will take you as far as it can rather than just hitting you with a “Sorry, I didn’t catch that.”

All this “awareness” brings up an important question: How much data is Samsung collecting about you? Rhee says most user-specific data is kept on the device, but, as a cloud service, Bixby needs to store some information in the cloud. It’s not yet clear what the exact breakdown is.

The button

Having a dedicated button for Bixby brings a number of advantages. For starters, it means Samsung won’t have any need for Clippy-style pop-ups directing users to the assistant people will inevitably find it on their own. It also ensures there will be far fewer accidental activations than if Bixby were mixed into a home button something users of Siri are all too familiar with.

“We actually have done a lot of research to have the Bixby button as part of the home button like our friends in Cupertino,” Rhee says. “A lot of people find it a little awkward to use it in public. The home button is a very overloaded place there’s a lot of functionality into it. Having a dedicated button really removes a lot of friction.”

It’s the dedicated button that really epitomizes Samsung’s approach.

And since the idea is to press and hold, lifting your finger when you’re done, Bixby will know definitively when you’re done speaking. Still, there will also be a wake-up phrase you can just say “Hi Bixby,” to activate the assistant at any time.

It’s the dedicated button that really epitomizes Samsung’s approach, and if it indeed ends up on all Samsung products, Bixby will become much more than just a smartphone assistant it’ll become the gateway for Samsung to finally, truly become a major player in the internet of things.

Sure, Samsung has had its “Smart” devices for a long time, and its low-power Tizen OS is ideal for powering the many products with connections to the internet. It also acquired SmartThings in 2014 to strengthen its IoT brand.

But until now, Samsung has lacked a gateway for its customers to really take advantage of that interconnectivity. For most, it’s hard work hunting down the right settings on your phone to connect a smart TV to an air conditioner, but what if you could just tell Bixby to do it? And if you can talk to it from all those devices asking any question or even making phone calls then you’re really onto something.

“It’s actually omnipresent in a sense,” Rhee says. “Even if I speak to Bixby in, say, a washing machine, you can still do a lot of things that you do on your phone. For instance, you can say, ‘Bixby, send a text to my friend Michael,’ or ‘Make a phone call.’ That’s the vision.”

The more capable assistant

Amazon and Google already know this, and the success of Alexa and buzz around Home are a testament to the unquestionable efficiency of adding voice control to devices. But Samsung, with its high standard of controlling all functions of a device via Bixby, might end up with the advantage. Alexa, for all of its “skills,” often falls short of full control (you can turn on or dim LED lights, for example, but might not be able to select specific colors), so the market has room for a more capable competitor. Of course, how and when Bixby will mix with third-party products and services remains an open question.

“Philosophically, what we are looking at is revolutionizing phone interfaces,” Rhee says. “We understand our applications better than anybody else out there that’s why we started with our own technology, but going forward we have plans to work with our partners.”

Bixby may be the best thing to happen to Samsung software in a long time.

Eventually, Rhee says a Bixby app might come to non-Samsung Android phones and even iOS, possibly partnering with Google Assistant for search-related queries (though he cautions Google and Samsung haven’t “gotten to the specifics” on how that would work).

At the same time, Bixby control could extend to all kinds of smart products, not just Samsung ones. That would probably take a level of cooperation with competitors that Samsung hasn’t really shown before, but if Bixby becomes ubiquitous in the long term, whatever OS this or that device is running will become less relevant.

That’s a future Samsung is clearly hoping for, since software has traditionally been its weakness. Samsung may be a chief Android partner, but it’s struggled to differentiate its many services from Google’s, and the company lacks an OS of its own (Tizen notwithstanding). Samsung’s browser, Samsung Pay, S Health they’re all duplicates of Google products, and are widely regarded as inferior.

That’s why Bixby may be the best thing to happen to Samsung software in a long time. If customers respond, Bixby could, in the long term, finally get Samsung users to think of its phones as Samsung phones rather than just the best-performing Android phones on the market. All Android vendors try to differentiate to some extent, but Bixby’s app-simplifying skills and potential IoT capabilities are a compelling sell.

Bixby represents an important step for Samsung when it comes to services: finally a good answer to “Why should I use your software?” Effortless voice control of everything not just your phone is a tantalizing promise, and if Samsung can pull it off in the long term, its “bright sidekick” might end up being the only assistant we actually want to talk to.

WATCH: Samsung’s wireless earbuds double as a fitness-tracker

Read more: http://ift.tt/2ndLCYb

from How Samsung’s new voice assistant, Bixby, is different from Siri

#How Samsung’s new voice assistant #Bixby #is different from Siri

0 notes

grabey · 7 years

Link

Samsung has a new voice. And it has world-changing ambitions.

Pressing it will activate Bixby, Samsung's new voice assistant. Once activated, Bixby will help you navigate what's arguably the most sophisticated piece of technology you own — the smartphone in your hand.

If Samsung gets its wish, though, Bixby will eventually do much more than just help you order Lyfts or set up complex calendar appointments. The long-term vision is for Bixby to act as a kind of uber-interface for all of Samsung's products: TVs, wearables, washing machines, even remote controls.

Samsung designed Bixby with a specific goal in mind, one that veers away from its fellow voice assistants — Apple's Siri, Amazon's Alexa, Microsoft's Cortana and the Google Assistant. Those platforms were generally built to help users quickly perform common tasks ("Remind me to buy milk") and perform search queries ("What's the capital of Brazil?"). Bixby, on the other hand, is all about making the phone itself easier to use, replicating the functions of many apps with voice commands.

Yes, Siri et al. already do that to a certain extent — you can easily set a reminder with your voice, for example — but the voice integration typically only handles the basics. The goal of Bixby is to voice-enable every single action in an app that you'd normally do via touch, starting with Samsung's apps. So, not just "set a reminder to buy pickles at 6 p.m., but "Set a reminder on my Shopping List to buy pickles at 6 p.m. and make it repeat every week, then share the list with my wife."

Bixby speaks

Injong Rhee, CTO of Samsung Mobile and the architect behind Bixby, says the voice assistant is nothing short of an "interface revolution," freeing users from hunting down hidden functionality within menus and hard-to-find screens.

"Bixby is an intelligent user interface, emphasis... on 'interface,'" Rhee says. "A lot of agents are looking at being knowledgeable, meaning that you can ask questions like, 'Who's president of the U.S.?' A lot of these are glorified extensions of search. What we are doing with Bixby, and what Bixby is capable of doing, is developing a new interface to our devices."Although it makes its debut on the Galaxy S8, it will soon spread. Rhee sees the Bixby button eventually spreading to all kinds of smart-home devices, from TVs to refrigerators to air conditioners.

"Anywhere there is an internet connection and a microphone, Bixby can be used," he says. "There is some technology in the device, but a lot of it lives in the cloud. That's why the range of devices goes beyond just a smartphone. It means it can be in any device we produce."

Samsung began work on Bixby about 18 months ago, Rhee says. It grew out of the company's S Voice tool, which has been on Samsung phones since 2012. (The timing might explain why Samsung's smart fridge — announced right around then — failed to deliver on its planned integration with Alexa.) S Voice hadn't progressed much over the years, but then last year Samsung acquired the much-hyped Viv Labs and its sophisticated assistant, a strong indicator of the company's renewed interest in voice control. However, Rhee says Viv's technology is planned for future updates to Bixby and doesn't have a role in the initial release.

The name Bixby came out of Samsung's focus groups, but it was actually their third choice overall. It was the top pick among millennials — a demographic the company is specifically targeting with the Galaxy S8 — so it won out. (Rhee declined to say what the other names were.) It's also distinctive enough, with hard consonants, for it to work well as an activation word. Bixby, which will initially speak just English and Korean, is intended to be a user's "bright sidekick," helping them navigate their devices in a more natural way.

"[What came before], it's been people trying to learn how the machine interacts with the world, but... it should be the machine learns how the human interacts with the world," Rhee says. "The learning curve shouldn't be steep."

All talk, all action

For an app to be considered Bixby-supported, every possible touch action needs to be mapped to a voice command. Rhee explains that, for a typical app, there are about 300 different actions the user can perform. That doesn't sound too bad until you consider there are around 15,000 different ways to perform them. And the ways to verbalize those actions number in the millions. That's a lot of stuff to map out.

Still, Samsung says it's up for the challenge, at least as far as its built-in apps are concerned. But what about third-party apps? Considering the amount of development work, will Snapchat or Facebook ever work as well with Bixby as Samsung's apps?

"Viv Labs is coming in by way expanding our vision into third-party ecosystems. It doesn't necessarily have to be all of the touch commands that they can perform. At a minimum, [Bixby will perform] the basic functionalities: like the settings, or changing the language from English to French."

On the Galaxy S8, a total of 10 apps will be Bixby-supported, Rhee says, with a second "wave" coming a few weeks later. Out of the gate, users will be able to use Bixby with Contacts, Gallery, Settings, Camera, Reminders and a few others.

Another way Bixby is different from its peers: it will be aware of what you're doing on the phone and suggest different actions depending on what's on screen. So if you press the button while, say, looking at a single photo in the Gallery, editing and sharing controls are probably more relevant to you than searching. And if Bixby doesn't understand every aspect of a complex command, it will take you as far as it can rather than just hitting you with a "Sorry, I didn't catch that."

All this "awareness" brings up an important question: How much data is Samsung collecting about you? Rhee says most user-specific data is kept on the device, but, as a cloud service, Bixby needs to store some information in the cloud. It's not yet clear what the exact breakdown is.

The button

Having a dedicated button for Bixby brings a number of advantages. For starters, it means Samsung won't have any need for Clippy-style pop-ups directing users to the assistant — people will inevitably find it on their own. It also ensures there will be far fewer accidental activations than if Bixby were mixed into a home button — something users of Siri are all too familiar with.

"We actually have done a lot of research to have the Bixby button as part of the home button like our friends in Cupertino," Rhee says. "A lot of people find it a little awkward to use it in public. The home button is a very overloaded place — there's a lot of functionality into it. Having a dedicated button really removes a lot of friction."

And since the idea is to press and hold, lifting your finger when you're done, Bixby will know definitively when you're done speaking. Still, there will also be a wake-up phrase — you can just say "Hi Bixby," to activate the assistant at any time.

It's the dedicated button that really epitomizes Samsung's approach, and if it indeed ends up on all Samsung products, Bixby will become much more than just a smartphone assistant — it'll become the gateway for Samsung to finally, truly become a major player in the internet of things.

Sure, Samsung has had its "Smart" devices for a long time, and its low-power Tizen OS is ideal for powering the many products with connections to the internet. It also acquired SmartThings in 2014 to strengthen its IoT brand.

But until now, Samsung has lacked a gateway for its customers to really take advantage of that interconnectivity. For most, it's hard work hunting down the right settings on your phone to connect a smart TV to an air conditioner, but what if you could just tell Bixby to do it? And if you can talk to it from all those devices — asking any question or even making phone calls — then you're really onto something.

"It's actually omnipresent in a sense," Rhee says. "Even if I speak to Bixby in, say, a washing machine, you can still do a lot of things that you do on your phone. For instance, you can say, 'Bixby, send a text to my friend Michael,' or 'Make a phone call.' That's the vision."

The more capable assistant

Amazon and Google already know this, and the success of Alexa and buzz around Home are a testament to the unquestionable efficiency of adding voice control to devices. But Samsung, with its high standard of controlling all functions of a device via Bixby, might end up with the advantage. Alexa, for all of its "skills," often falls short of full control (you can turn on or dim LED lights, for example, but might not be able to select specific colors), so the market has room for a more capable competitor. Of course, how and when Bixby will mix with third-party products and services remains an open question.

"Philosophically, what we are looking at is revolutionizing phone interfaces," Rhee says. "We understand our applications better than anybody else out there — that's why we started with our own technology, but going forward we have plans to work with our partners."

Eventually, Rhee says a Bixby app might come to non-Samsung Android phones and even iOS, possibly partnering with Google Assistant for search-related queries (though he cautions Google and Samsung haven't "gotten to the specifics" on how that would work).

At the same time, Bixby control could extend to all kinds of smart products, not just Samsung ones. That would probably take a level of cooperation with competitors that Samsung hasn't really shown before, but if Bixby becomes ubiquitous in the long term, whatever OS this or that device is running will become less relevant.

That's a future Samsung is clearly hoping for, since software has traditionally been its weakness. Samsung may be a chief Android partner, but it's struggled to differentiate its many services from Google's, and the company lacks an OS of its own (Tizen notwithstanding). Samsung's browser, Samsung Pay, S Health — they're all duplicates of Google products, and are widely regarded as inferior.

That's why Bixby may be the best thing to happen to Samsung software in a long time. If customers respond, Bixby could, in the long term, finally get Samsung users to think of its phones as Samsung phones rather than just the best-performing Android phones on the market. All Android vendors try to differentiate to some extent, but Bixby's app-simplifying skills and potential IoT capabilities are a compelling sell.

Bixby represents an important step for Samsung when it comes to services: finally a good answer to "Why should I use your software?" Effortless voice control of everything — not just your phone — is a tantalizing promise, and if Samsung can pull it off in the long term, its "bright sidekick" might end up being the only assistant we actually want to talk to.

Writer: PETE PACHAL

from Blogger Why Bixby will be the star of the Samsung Galaxy S8

#Tech

0 notes

markalbueba · 7 years

Link

Samsung has a new voice. And it has world-changing ambitions.

If Samsung gets its wish, though, Bixby will eventually do much more than just help you order Lyfts or set up complex calendar appointments. The long-term vision is for Bixby to act as a kind of uber-interface for all of Samsung's products: TVs, wearables, washing machines, even remote controls.

Bixby speaks

All talk, all action

For an app to be considered Bixby-supported, every possible touch action needs to be mapped to a voice command. Rhee explains that, for a typical app, there are about 300 different actions the user can perform. That doesn't sound too bad until you consider there are around 15,000 different ways to perform them. And the ways to verbalize those actions number in the millions. That's a lot of stuff to map out.

The button

The more capable assistant

Amazon and Google already know this, and the success of Alexa and buzz around Home are a testament to the unquestionable efficiency of adding voice control to devices. But Samsung, with its high standard of controlling all functions of a device via Bixby, might end up with the advantage. Alexa, for all of its "skills," often falls short of full control (you can turn on or dim LED lights, for example, but might not be able to select specific colors), so the market has room for a more capable competitor. Of course, how and when Bixby will mix with third-party products and services remains an open question.

Eventually, Rhee says a Bixby app might come to non-Samsung Android phones and even iOS, possibly partnering with Google Assistant for search-related queries (though he cautions Google and Samsung haven't "gotten to the specifics" on how that would work).

At the same time, Bixby control could extend to all kinds of smart products, not just Samsung ones. That would probably take a level of cooperation with competitors that Samsung hasn't really shown before, but if Bixby becomes ubiquitous in the long term, whatever OS this or that device is running will become less relevant.

Writer: PETE PACHAL

#Tech

0 notes

justinharst · 7 years

Link

Samsung has a new voice. And it has world-changing ambitions.

If Samsung gets its wish, though, Bixby will eventually do much more than just help you order Lyfts or set up complex calendar appointments. The long-term vision is for Bixby to act as a kind of uber-interface for all of Samsung's products: TVs, wearables, washing machines, even remote controls.

Bixby speaks

All talk, all action

For an app to be considered Bixby-supported, every possible touch action needs to be mapped to a voice command. Rhee explains that, for a typical app, there are about 300 different actions the user can perform. That doesn't sound too bad until you consider there are around 15,000 different ways to perform them. And the ways to verbalize those actions number in the millions. That's a lot of stuff to map out.

The button

The more capable assistant

Amazon and Google already know this, and the success of Alexa and buzz around Home are a testament to the unquestionable efficiency of adding voice control to devices. But Samsung, with its high standard of controlling all functions of a device via Bixby, might end up with the advantage. Alexa, for all of its "skills," often falls short of full control (you can turn on or dim LED lights, for example, but might not be able to select specific colors), so the market has room for a more capable competitor. Of course, how and when Bixby will mix with third-party products and services remains an open question.

Eventually, Rhee says a Bixby app might come to non-Samsung Android phones and even iOS, possibly partnering with Google Assistant for search-related queries (though he cautions Google and Samsung haven't "gotten to the specifics" on how that would work).

At the same time, Bixby control could extend to all kinds of smart products, not just Samsung ones. That would probably take a level of cooperation with competitors that Samsung hasn't really shown before, but if Bixby becomes ubiquitous in the long term, whatever OS this or that device is running will become less relevant.

Writer: PETE PACHAL

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itmanco · 7 years

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Say hi to Samsung Bixby, the new voice assistant in the Galaxy S8 Samsung has a new voice. And it has world-changing ambitions. In the upcoming Galaxy S8, users will find an extra button on the left side of the phone, just below the volume controls. Pressing it will activate Bixby, Samsung's new voice assistant. Once activated, Bixby will help you navigate what's arguably the most sophisticated piece of technology you own — the smartphone in your hand. If Samsung gets its wish, though, Bixby will eventually do much more than just help you order Lyfts or set up complex calendar appointments. The long-term vision is for Bixby to act as a kind of uber-interface for all of Samsung's products: TVs, wearables, washing machines, even remote controls. SEE ALSO: Samsung Galaxy S8: all the leaks in one place Samsung designed Bixby with a specific goal in mind, one that veers away from its fellow voice assistants — Apple's Siri, Amazon's Alexa, Microsoft's Cortana and the Google Assistant. Those platforms were generally built to help users quickly perform common tasks ("Remind me to buy milk") and perform search queries ("What's the capital of Brazil?"). Bixby, on the other hand, is all about making the phone itself easier to use, replicating the functions of many apps with voice commands. Yes, Siri et al. already do that to a certain extent — you can easily set a reminder with your voice, for example — but the voice integration typically only handles the basics. The goal of Bixby is to voice-enable every single action in an app that you'd normally do via touch, starting with Samsung's apps. So, not just "set a reminder to buy pickles at 6 p.m., but "Set a reminder on my Shopping List to buy pickles at 6 p.m. and make it repeat every week, then share the list with my wife." Bixby speaks Injong Rhee, CTO of Samsung Mobile and the architect behind Bixby, says the voice assistant is nothing short of an "interface revolution," freeing users from hunting down hidden functionality within menus and hard-to-find screens. "Bixby is an intelligent user interface, emphasis... on 'interface,'" Rhee says. "A lot of agents are looking at being knowledgeable, meaning that you can ask questions like, 'Who's president of the U.S.?' A lot of these are glorified extensions of search. What we are doing with Bixby, and what Bixby is capable of doing, is developing a new interface to our devices." Bixby architect Injong Rhee, CTO of Samsung Mobile. Image: Pete Pachal/Mashable Although it makes its debut on the Galaxy S8, it will soon spread. Rhee sees the Bixby button eventually spreading to all kinds of smart-home devices, from TVs to refrigerators to air conditioners. "Anywhere there is an internet connection and a microphone, Bixby can be used," he says. "There is some technology in the device, but a lot of it lives in the cloud. That's why the range of devices goes beyond just a smartphone. It means it can be in any device we produce." Samsung began work on Bixby about 18 months ago, Rhee says. It grew out of the company's S Voice tool, which has been on Samsung phones since 2012. (The timing might explain why Samsung's smart fridge — announced right around then — failed to deliver on its planned integration with Alexa.) S Voice hadn't progressed much over the years, but then last year Samsung acquired the much-hyped Viv Labs and its sophisticated assistant, a strong indicator of the company's renewed interest in voice control. However, Rhee says Viv's technology is planned for future updates to Bixby and doesn't have a role in the initial release. The name Bixby came out of Samsung's focus groups, but it was actually their third choice overall. It was the top pick among millennials — a demographic the company is specifically targeting with the Galaxy S8 — so it won out. (Rhee declined to say what the other names were.) It's also distinctive enough, with hard consonants, for it to work well as an activation word. Bixby, which will initially speak just English and Korean, is intended to be a user's "bright sidekick," helping them navigate their devices in a more natural way. "[What came before], it's been people trying to learn how the machine interacts with the world, but... it should be the machine learns how the human interacts with the world," Rhee says. "The learning curve shouldn't be steep." All talk, all action For an app to be considered Bixby-supported, every possible touch action needs to be mapped to a voice command. Rhee explains that, for a typical app, there are about 300 different actions the user can perform. That doesn't sound too bad until you consider there are around 15,000 different ways to perform them. And the ways to verbalize those actions number in the millions. That's a lot of stuff to map out. Still, Samsung says it's up for the challenge, at least as far as its built-in apps are concerned. But what about third-party apps? Considering the amount of development work, will Snapchat or Facebook ever work as well with Bixby as Samsung's apps? Rhee says Samsung has a plan to get third-party apps talking to Bixby, and an SDK to be released at a later date will introduce tools that make the mapping much easier. He also suggests Viv's technology can help here, too. "Viv Labs is coming in by way expanding our vision into third-party ecosystems. It doesn't necessarily have to be all of the touch commands that they can perform. At a minimum, [Bixby will perform] the basic functionalities: like the settings, or changing the language from English to French." On the Galaxy S8, a total of 10 apps will be Bixby-supported, Rhee says, with a second "wave" coming a few weeks later. Out of the gate, users will be able to use Bixby with Contacts, Gallery, Settings, Camera, Reminders and a few others. Another way Bixby is different from its peers: it will be aware of what you're doing on the phone and suggest different actions depending on what's on screen. So if you press the button while, say, looking at a single photo in the Gallery, editing and sharing controls are probably more relevant to you than searching. And if Bixby doesn't understand every aspect of a complex command, it will take you as far as it can rather than just hitting you with a "Sorry, I didn't catch that." All this "awareness" brings up an important question: How much data is Samsung collecting about you? Rhee says most user-specific data is kept on the device, but, as a cloud service, Bixby needs to store some information in the cloud. It's not yet clear what the exact breakdown is. The button Having a dedicated button for Bixby brings a number of advantages. For starters, it means Samsung won't have any need for Clippy-style pop-ups directing users to the assistant — people will inevitably find it on their own. It also ensures there will be far fewer accidental activations than if Bixby were mixed into a home button — something users of Siri are all too familiar with. "We actually have done a lot of research to have the Bixby button as part of the home button like our friends in Cupertino," Rhee says. "A lot of people find it a little awkward to use it in public. The home button is a very overloaded place — there's a lot of functionality into it. Having a dedicated button really removes a lot of friction." And since the idea is to press and hold, lifting your finger when you're done, Bixby will know definitively when you're done speaking. Still, there will also be a wake-up phrase — you can just say "Hi Bixby," to activate the assistant at any time. It's the dedicated button that really epitomizes Samsung's approach, and if it indeed ends up on all Samsung products, Bixby will become much more than just a smartphone assistant — it'll become the gateway for Samsung to finally, truly become a major player in the internet of things. Sure, Samsung has had its "Smart" devices for a long time, and its low-power Tizen OS is ideal for powering the many products with connections to the internet. It also acquired SmartThings in 2014 to strengthen its IoT brand. But until now, Samsung has lacked a gateway for its customers to really take advantage of that interconnectivity. For most, it's hard work hunting down the right settings on your phone to connect a smart TV to an air conditioner, but what if you could just tell Bixby to do it? And if you can talk to it from all those devices — asking any question or even making phone calls — then you're really onto something. "It's actually omnipresent in a sense," Rhee says. "Even if I speak to Bixby in, say, a washing machine, you can still do a lot of things that you do on your phone. For instance, you can say, 'Bixby, send a text to my friend Michael,' or 'Make a phone call.' That's the vision." The more capable assistant Amazon and Google already know this, and the success of Alexa and buzz around Home are a testament to the unquestionable efficiency of adding voice control to devices. But Samsung, with its high standard of controlling all functions of a device via Bixby, might end up with the advantage. Alexa, for all of its "skills," often falls short of full control (you can turn on or dim LED lights, for example, but might not be able to select specific colors), so the market has room for a more capable competitor. Of course, how and when Bixby will mix with third-party products and services remains an open question. "Philosophically, what we are looking at is revolutionizing phone interfaces," Rhee says. "We understand our applications better than anybody else out there — that's why we started with our own technology, but going forward we have plans to work with our partners." Eventually, Rhee says a Bixby app might come to non-Samsung Android phones and even iOS, possibly partnering with Google Assistant for search-related queries (though he cautions Google and Samsung haven't "gotten to the specifics" on how that would work). At the same time, Bixby control could extend to all kinds of smart products, not just Samsung ones. That would probably take a level of cooperation with competitors that Samsung hasn't really shown before, but if Bixby becomes ubiquitous in the long term, whatever OS this or that device is running will become less relevant. That's a future Samsung is clearly hoping for, since software has traditionally been its weakness. Samsung may be a chief Android partner, but it's struggled to differentiate its many services from Google's, and the company lacks an OS of its own (Tizen notwithstanding). Samsung's browser, Samsung Pay, S Health — they're all duplicates of Google products, and are widely regarded as inferior. That's why Bixby may be the best thing to happen to Samsung software in a long time. If customers respond, Bixby could, in the long term, finally get Samsung users to think of its phones as Samsung phones rather than just the best-performing Android phones on the market. All Android vendors try to differentiate to some extent, but Bixby's app-simplifying skills and potential IoT capabilities are a compelling sell. Bixby represents an important step for Samsung when it comes to services: finally a good answer to "Why should I use your software?" Effortless voice control of everything — not just your phone — is a tantalizing promise, and if Samsung can pull it off in the long term, its "bright sidekick" might end up being the only assistant we actually want to talk to. WATCH: Samsung's wireless earbuds double as a fitness-tracker http://ift.tt/2ml5hpQ By Samy Morsy

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