eBay asks 145 million users to change their passwords following cyber attack

eBay asks 145 million users to change their passwords following cyber attackEarlier this week, it was confirmed that popular online marketplace eBay was hit by a cyber attack and personal information for a substantial amount of users was stolen.

Yesterday, the company urged 145 million users to change their passwords, and to change those passwords on other sites if they use the same username and password elsewhere.

The company acknowledged that emails, encrypted passwords, birth dates and full mailing addresses were stolen during the attack from late March. Financial information and PayPal details were not compromised.

EBay spokeswoman Amanda Miller said the company uses “sophisticated,” proprietary hashing and salting for passwords, but security analysts believe it is just a matter of time before they are unscrambled.

The company added that there had not been any increase in fraudulent activity on the site since the breach. Attackers managed to obtain logins for some eBay employees, giving them access to the corporate network and eventually to exploit databases.

Facebook adds music and TV identification service for posts

Facebook adds music and TV identification service for postsFacebook has unveiled a Shazam-esque TV and music identification service which will allow you to tag what you are listening to or watching in your news feed post.

Friends can then preview the songs for 30 seconds or be linked to the TV show’s Facebook page.

The social networking giant built the feature from scratch over the last year, and will rollout over the coming weeks for iOS and Android users. The service can bring up shows from 160 TV stations, and from millions of artists.

Facebook says the new feature is an extension of the “feelings and activity sharing” option unveiled last year. Over 5 billion posts have been shared with feelings or activity since last year, adds the company.

The new service will require users to opt-in, and if you do not, nothing will change with your Facebook experience.

Source:
Crunch

Sony PlayStation 4 outsells Microsoft Xbox One for fourth straight month

Sony PlayStation 4 outsells Microsoft Xbox One for fourth straight monthAccording to the latest NPD figures, the Sony PlayStation 4 was the best selling console for the fourth month in a row, easily beating out the Xbox One.

“Life to date, sales of PS4 and Xbox One hardware have more than doubled the combined sales of PS3 and 360 hardware through their first six months of sales,” NPD analyst Liam Callahan added.

Overall console sales jumped 120 percent YoY from April 2013, and hardware saw a 76 percent revenue boost from last year. Hardware grew to $192.8 million while software fell 10 percent to $227.9 million.

Microsoft confirmed it shipped 115,000 Xbox One for the month, and Sony did not reveal an exact number.

Sony has shipped over 7 million PS4 since launch, while Microsoft has shipped just over 5 million. Microsoft is looking to boost sales by dropping Kinect as a mandatory bundle with the console, and selling the device with the motion control accessory for $399, the same price as the PS4. The company has also dropped the need for an Xbox Live Gold subscription if just using entertainment apps like Netflix.

Source:
BBG

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LG G3 press shots show off an incredible design

LG G3 press shots show off an incredible designWe now have some press renders of the upcoming LG G3, the company’s latest flagship.

The design of the phone features a great looking brushed metal finish, and nice curved corners with a thin bezel display.

LG’s power house will feature a 5.5-inch display with a QHD 1440 x 2560 pixel resolution, 3GB RAM, a 13MP OIS camera and Qualcomm’s latest quad-core Snapdragon 805 processor.

The company is expected to officially announce the device on May 27th.


 

Apple looking to purchase Beats Audio for $3.2 billion as its innovation sputters

Apple looking to purchase Beats Audio for $3.2 billion as its innovation sputtersAccording to the Financial Times, and later vetted by other outlets, Apple is preparing to purchase Beats Electronics for up to $3.2 billion.

Beats is popular for their headphones and more recently their music-streaming service that competes with Spotify and other unlimited streaming companies.

Apple has long been rumored to be developing their own streaming service, but it appears they could not innovate quickly enough, which could prove to be a negative turning point in the ongoing saga of Apple, a company that has not released a truly new product since the iPad in 2010.

Through its iTunes store, Apple created the market for music digital downloads, but there are plenty in the industry that believe that model is dead. Streaming services, where subscribers pay $5 to $10 for unlimited listens of huge catalogs, continue to see strong growth, especially through mobile devices.

The company also has iTunes Radio, which is an ad-supported “radio” service similar to Pandora, meaning general music services remain a key theme for Apple.

Beats was founded by music producing legends Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine, and at $3.2 billion the acquisition would be the largest ever for Apple.

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Google unveils Docs, Sheets, Slides apps for iOS

Google unveils Docs, Sheets, Slides apps for iOSJust a month after Microsoft launched their Office suite for iPad, Google has responded by releasing Google Docs and Google Sheets for iOS.

Until now, any productivity content you may have had was restricted to Google Drive or the Web browser, which were not overall great experiences. Additionally, Google’s PowerPoint-equivalent Slides is “coming soon” but has not reached the App Store like its brothers.

Google has had dedicated apps for Android for some time.

Reads the release for Docs:

Create, edit & collaborate with others on documents from your iPod, iPhone, or iPad with the free Google Docs app.

With Google Docs you can:

-Create new documents or open and edit any that you started on the web or another device.
-Share documents and work together with others in the same document at the same time
-Get stuff done anytime–even without an internet connection
-Add and respond to comments
-Never worry about losing your work–everything is automatically saved as you type

For Google Sheets, the spreadsheet editor, here is what Google says:

Create, edit & collaborate with others on spreadsheets from your iPod, iPhone, or iPad with the free Google Sheets app.

With Google Sheets you can:

– Create new spreadsheets or open and edit any that you started on the web or another device.
– Share spreadsheets and work together with others in the same spreadsheet at the same time
– Get stuff done anytime–even without an internet connection
– Format cells, enter/sort data, perform various sheet operations, and more
– Never worry about losing your work–everything is automatically saved as you type

Office for iPad adds printing feature, more

Office for iPad adds printing feature, moreLast month, Microsoft unveiled their suite of Office applications for iPads. The popular apps saw 12 million downloads in their first week.

Today, the software giant updated the apps, adding the ability to print along with some other improvements. Microsoft says printing was the top requested feature since launch.

Says Microsoft: “Your top request is here! You can now print Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, and PowerPoint presentations to an AirPrintTM printer. In Word for iPad, you can choose to print a document with or without markup. In Excel, print a selected range, a single worksheet or an entire spreadsheet. Of course, you can select the pages or slides you want to print.”

Additionally, the company has added “SmartGuides” in PowerPoint to help align pictures, shapes, text and more within the slide. The update also fixes some bugs and improves overall performance.

The suite is free to download and will allow for free read-only of all Office documents as well as presentations. If you want to create and edit documents, you will need to pony up for an Office 365 subscription, which can be as cheap as $5 per month depending on your needs.

You can find the Word app here. You can get the Excel app here and PowerPoint here.

Heartbleed Infographic: Change your password if you are on these sites or use these services

Heartbleed Infographic: Change your password if you are on these sites or use these servicesLWG Consulting has put together an infographic helping concerned Internet users who may be susceptible to the Heartbleed bug that plagued OpenSSL traffic and only just recently began making headlines.

An estimated 65 percent of all sites on the Web are affected, and major companies have scrambled to issue patches.

Despite most major sites being patched quickly, Heartbleed has been around for at least three years, meaning your passwords and other personal data could be have stolen at some point, well before the patches. There are a number of tools for checking if a site you have been using is, or has been, vulnerable. One such tool is LastPass Heartbleed checker.

As an added protection if you use the Chrome browser, there is a new plugin that will automatically let you know if the site you are visiting is still vulnerable, and will also place a Heartbleed logo next to Google search results.

Try the plugin here and check the infographic below. Worth noting, however, is Google’s response here: