Cyborg glasses express fake emotions

17 April 2014 Last updated at 00:00 By Leo Kelion Technology desk editor

Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play.

The prototype uses OLED displays to show two computer-generated eyes

As Google continues to stoke excitement for its Glass smart-eyewear, a Japanese researcher has developed a radical alternative.

Rather than focus on what the owner sees, Prof Hirotaka Osawa's kit shows computer-generated eye animations in place of the wearer's real ones.

Special lenses let the user see out or take a secret nap if they prefer.

The professor said the glasses could be used to simulate emotional reactions when users are distracted or busy.

He added that the idea of creating an "emotional cyborg" was inspired by the work of an American sociologist who had coined the phrase "emotional labour" to refer to the use of facial expressions and body movements to show feelings.

This, Prof Osawa noted, could be a requirement for nurses, waitresses, teachers, therapists and others working in interaction-intensive professions.

"Our developed society requires workers to behave more socially," he told the BBC.

"AgencyGlass aims to support such kinds of emotional labour by extending users' social abilities with technology, just as robots already support our physical labours and computers support our mental activity."

Software that stares

The glasses feature two OLED (organic light-emitting diode) screens, which are controlled by either a smartphone or PC via a Bluetooth wireless connection. This computer is also connected to a camera to take readings from the wider environment.

On the glasses themselves. gyrometer and accelerometer sensors are fitted to one arm to monitor the user's behaviour, while a battery sits on the other arm to power the device.

If the user nods, the glasses show a blink.

If they shake their head, the eyes blink several times.

If they incline their head, the eyes look upwards.

If the computer's facial recognition software detects someone looking straight at the wearer, the computer-generated eyes move and gaze back at them.

Although these are relatively simple expressions, the professor said they allowed others to feel they were "cared" about, while freeing the user of the need to "control their emotions".

Cyborg smiles

The professor is well aware how odd his prototype looks.

In a humorous promotional video he even shows himself using AgencyGlass to appear alert at a meeting in his Tsukuba University office when in fact he is sleeping.

But others agree that with some more work the kit could have real-world uses.

Dr Nadia Berthouze suggested the glasses could be used to tackle the problem people from Western and Eastern cultures sometimes have at recognising each other's emotional states.

"People can misinterpret expressive signals." explained University College London's reader in affective interaction and computing.

"The equipment could be developed to become a facial-display translator between two cultures where facial expressions are different.

"If you ask: 'Would someone buy the glasses the way they look now?' The answer, I'm sure, is no. The eyes are too funny.

"But the idea could be explored."

In the meantime, Prof Osawa said he intended to expand his research into emotional cyborgs by creating another display to mimic a wearer's smile.

"An earlier study suggests that the human mouth is more effective at influencing [the way people interpret] emotion than human eyes in Western culture," he explained.

He added that he hoped to unveil the smile display in October.

23.34 | 0 komentar | Read More

Kim Dotcom wins back cars and cash

17 April 2014 Last updated at 13:11

Kim Dotcom, the multimillionaire founder of closed file-sharing site Megaupload, has won back cars, cash and property seized in a January 2012 raid.

Requests from police to extend the length of time the assets could be held were declined by a court in Auckland, New Zealand, where Mr Dotcom lives.

US authorities accuse Mr Dotcom of infringing copyright on a "massive scale".

He has also been sued by several major film and music publishers.

They accuse him of using Megaupload to encourage users to upload copyrighted material illegally - and profiting from the operation.

'Falling apart'

Mr Dotcom, along with several associates, has denied the charges.

Since the raid, he has launched a new file storage site, Mega, as well as setting up his own political party.

Police raided the mansion of Mr Dotcom and his wife Mona two years ago, taking more than 15 luxury vehicles, including a pink 1959 Cadillac.

Mr Dotcom tweeted: "Breaking News: High Court ruling just now. Mona and I are getting our New Zealand assets back, unless the Crown appeals."

The authorities have 14 days to appeal against the decision.

Mr Dotcom added: "The NZ asset ruling is HUGE. We've just filed a case in Hong Kong against unlawful seizure of #Megaupload. The US case is falling apart!"

An extradition hearing is due to take place in July. If extradited and brought to trial, Mr Dotcom faces 20 years in prison.

23.34 | 0 komentar | Read More

Virgin apologises for email glitch

17 April 2014 Last updated at 15:07

Virgin Media has apologised after some of its customers received hundreds of unwanted emails because of a distribution list error.

Anyone clicking "reply all" to a recent customer services email was able to message everyone on the mailing list.

The email was sent to inform customers of changes to Google services.

The Information Commissioner's Office said it was looking into an "alleged breach" of data protection rules before deciding if action was necessary.

Virgin Media said it was "investigating exactly what has happened", and confirmed no more replies were able to be sent.

It said the problem related to a "sub set" of its virgin.net email customers, but it did not know the precise number affected.

Although customers' addresses were not themselves shared, anyone pressing "reply all" and entering into the email chain exposed their own details to thousands of others - and the company urged people not to do so.

Some people reported receiving hundreds of emails, including spam messages and light-hearted exchanges between other customers.

Bob Alexander, from Taunton, said he had suffered "a great deal of inconvenience and stress" after receiving more than 700 emails.

The 69-year-old told the BBC: "I am a quadriplegic and to delete 700 emails from my Blackberry handset has taken me all evening."

Virgin Media later said it had resolved the problem, which it said affected "a small proportion of our customers".

The initial email had been sent by one of the company's suppliers, the spokesman said.

He added: "We apologise for the inconvenience caused."

The Information Commissioner's Office said it had received a "number of calls" about a "possible data breach relating to emails sent out by Virgin Media".

"We will be making enquiries into the circumstances of the alleged breach of the Data Protection Act before deciding what action, if any, needs to be taken," it said in a statement.

23.34 | 0 komentar | Read More

Galaxy S5 fingerprint sensor hacked

16 April 2014 Last updated at 14:08

The fingerprint sensor on Samsung's Galaxy S5 handset has been hacked less than a week after the device went on sale.

Berlin-based Security Research Labs fooled the equipment using a mould it had previously created to spoof the sensor on Apple's iPhone 5S.

The researchers said they were concerned that thieves could exploit the flaw in Samsung's device to trigger money transfers via PayPal.

The payments firm played down the risk.

"While we take the findings from Security Research Labs [SRL] very seriously, we are still confident that fingerprint authentication offers an easier and more secure way to pay on mobile devices than passwords or credit cards," it said.

It added that even if users were hacked it would cover their losses.

A spokesman for Samsung was unable to comment.

Reject pile

SRL created its hack by lifting a real fingerprint from a smartphone screen and then carrying out a fairly elaborate process to create a mould out of glue and graphite spray. This was then swiped across the sensor that sits in the phone's home button.

"The fingerprint mould was actually one I made for the Apple device back in September," project manager Ben Schlabs told the BBC.

"All I had to do was take it out of the reject pile as it wasn't one of the ones that ended up working on the iPhone 5S for whatever reason.

"It was the first one I tried and it worked immediately on the S5."

Although the fake fingerprint proved easy to use, Mr Schlabs added that he was concerned that Samsung's software would not lock out thieves who had less luck, allowing them to make repeated attempts.

"Samsung could have enforced a password [lock-out] after five failed swipe attempts," he said.

"But the way it works is that if it fails five times and asks for a password, if you just turn the screen off and back on again you can have another try."

This is not true of the iPhone 5S.

Reveal transactions

While Apple currently limits its fingerprint scanner to unlocking the iPhone and verifying purchases in its own online store, Samsung has allowed its sensor to be used by third-party apps that add its Pass API (application program interface) to their code.

PayPal's mobile app is the first to take advantage of this. The software can be used to send and request money and reveal past transactions.

SRL acknowledged that the fingerprint scanner made it simpler to access, but criticised the company for not requiring a second form of authentication, such as a Pin code.

However, PayPal said Galaxy S5 users should not be deterred from using the feature.

"The scan unlocks a secure cryptographic key that serves as a password replacement for the phone," it said.

"We can simply deactivate the key from a lost or stolen device, and you can create a new one.

"PayPal also uses sophisticated fraud and risk management tools to try to prevent fraud before it happens. However, in the rare instances that it does, you are covered by our purchase protection policy."

Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play.

Rory Cellan-Jones tests out the Samsung S5

Tech blog Engadget agreed that users should not be too concerned.

"The odds are low that a street thief will get past your phone's defences, or that a talented hacker will get in before you've had a chance to remotely wipe your content," it reported.

But Mr Schlabs said that did not mean the risk of fingerprint hacks could be ignored.

"If you think into the future, once ATMs have fingerprint scanners and once heads of state start using fingerprint authentication it's going to become a lot more attractive," he said.

"Our method is pretty rudimentary and has been around for at least a decade and it worked on a phone that was only released last week.

"Once people develop better or faster methods, or once there are fingerprint databases of images that get leaked, it's definitely a concern."

23.34 | 0 komentar | Read More

First Heartbleed 'hacker' arrested

16 April 2014 Last updated at 21:56

A 19-year-old Canadian became the first person to be arrested in relation to the Heartbleed security breach.

Stephen Arthuro Solis-Reyes from London, Ontario was accused of hacking into the Canadian Revenue Agency (CRA)'s website last Friday by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

The RCMP say Mr Solis-Reyes then stole 900 social insurance numbers.

In a separate development, UK parenting site Mumsnet has provided fresh details about how it fell victim to the bug.

The site has published a post explaining how a hacker hijacked several accounts last week - including one belonging to Mumsnet's founder Justine Roberts - after exploiting the cryptology flaw to expose the owners' credentials.

"I hope the actions of hijacking Justine's account help draw attention to how big a deal this is," the hacker wrote on the social network.

"I suspect a lot of people would not have taken it seriously otherwise. Be thankful that the person who got access to the server information was kind enough to let you all know (and at least try and be funny with it) instead of simply sitting on the information."

Canada arrest

The Heartbleed bug was made public a week ago by Google and Codenomicon, a small Finnish security firm, which independently identified the problem.

The bug exploits a flaw in OpenSSL - a cryptographic software library used by services to keep data transmissions private.

Canada's tax agency was one of the first major organisations to cut services as a result the security flaw.

However, the action came too late.

"It is believed that [Mr] Solis-Reyes was able to extract private information held by CRA by exploiting the vulnerability known as the Heartbleed bug," the RCMP said in a statement.

The RCMP, which has been investigating the breach for four days, charged Mr Solis-Reyes with "unauthorized use of a computer" and "mischief in relation to data".

He is expected to appear in court on 17 July 2014.

Security experts warn that more attacks could be revealed soon, as firms and governments work to determine whether or not their systems are vulnerable.

23.34 | 0 komentar | Read More

Tencent brings Candy Crush to China

17 April 2014 Last updated at 03:21

China's internet giant Tencent will launch the popular Candy Crush game on the mainland in a partnership with the game's creator.

The tie-up will give the UK-based King Digital Entertainment exposure to China.

The Chinese version of the Candy Crush game will be available by the middle of this year to customers of Tencent's Mobile QQ and Weixin Game Centers.

Candy Crush was the most downloaded free mobile app of 2013.

Continue reading the main story

We are looking forward to bringing great moments of fun to Chinese users soon"

End Quote Steven Ma Senior Vice President, Tencent

The alliance will help Tencent, China's biggest listed internet firm, attract more users to its online and mobile services, which include social media platforms.

China has the world's largest population of internet users. According to the country's Internet Network Information Centre, CNNIC, there were 618 million internet users at the end of 2013.

Tencent is fighting for market share at home with rival Alibaba Group, which is expected to launch a share sale in the US later this year.

Steven Ma, senior vice-president at Tencent said: "We are excited that our collaboration will combine King's enjoyable mobile gaming experience and Tencent's strong game publishing and operation capabilities in China. We are looking forward to bringing great moments of fun to Chinese users soon."

Meanwhile, King's chief executive Riccardo Zacconi said in a statement: "Tencent has the largest mobile social network in China and is a great partner to work with. I look forward to working together to make Candy Crush Saga as popular in China as in the rest of the world."

Top three

The partnership with Tencent will further extend King's presence in Asia. It launched its Candy Crush game in Japan and South Korea last year.

The company's portfolio includes more than 180 games, but only a few have been popular with users.

Its top three games - Candy Crush Saga, Pet Rescue Saga and Farm Heroes Saga - accounted for 95% of its total revenue in the fourth quarter of 2013.

The company launched an initial public offering in March, listing its shares on the New York Stock Exchange. Shares fell by as much as 15% on their debut trading day.

King Digital Entertainment raised $500m (£300m) after shares were priced at the mid-point of the range it had initially indicated, valuing the company at more than $7bn.

The company is due to report its first quarter results next month on 7 May.

23.34 | 0 komentar | Read More

Google shares fall on ad concerns

17 April 2014 Last updated at 08:01

Shares in Google have dropped 5% despite the technology giant reporting a first-quarter profit rise of 3%.

Profits were $3.45bn (£2.05bn), but investors are preoccupied by Google's inability to maintain advertising prices.

A widely watched measure, the average "cost per click", was down 9% from a year earlier.

Another weak spot highlighted in the report was the firm's discounted sale of Motorola Mobility to Lenovo.

Google sold the smartphone maker to Lenovo in January for close to $3bn, after paying $12.5bn for the firm less than two years ago.

Despite investors' reaction, Google's chief executive, Larry Page, was upbeat: "We completed another great quarter," he said in a statement.

"We got lots of product improvements done, especially on mobile. I'm also excited with progress on our emerging businesses."

However, Google continues to struggle with its ability to charge advertisers higher prices for mobile ads, which are increasingly important with more and more consumers accessing Google's browser through their smartphones.

Advertisers have proven reluctant to pay as much for ads on mobile screens compared to Google's bread-and-butter desktop ads, which have been the main revenue generator at the firm.

Rates for mobile ads can be half as much as on personal computers, according to Needham & Co analyst Kerry Rice.

However, Google expects mobile ad prices to catch up with PCs eventually as it becomes easier for consumers to buy products using mobile devices, Google chief business officer Nikesh Arora said.

'A little bit dodgy'

Google has greatly diversified its portfolio of products in recent years, speculatively branching out into phones, drones, Google Glass, and even thermostats and fire alarms, CNet technology analyst Larry Magid said.

"Some of these crazy ideas need to become less crazy and more profitable," he told the BBC. "Their core business, what really brings in the money, that's beginning to get a little bit dodgy for them."

Google's results were not the only ones to disappoint investors on Wednesday.

Technology giant IBM reported its lowest quarterly revenue in five years.

IBM attributed the drop in revenue, which went down 4% to $22.5bn, to weak hardware sales.

Enterprise technology spending has shifted away from traditional computing giants as governments and corporations move towards online services, large-scale data analysis and IT security, FBR analyst Dan Ives said.

23.34 | 0 komentar | Read More

Lavabit loses contempt appeal

17 April 2014 Last updated at 11:37

A US appeals court has upheld a contempt of court ruling against Lavabit, the secure email service used by whistleblower Edward Snowden.

The company was found in contempt of court last year after refusing to comply with an FBI order to hand over encryption keys in an investigation thought to relate to Mr Snowden.

After that ruling, Lavabit's owner Ladar Levison closed down the service.

Mr Levison could appeal against this latest decision in a higher court.

"I haven't read the court's opinion, nor sought advice from lawyers on any possible legal strategy, so that is still pending," he told news website Ars Technica.

Last June, the US government obtained a court order for Lavabit's encryption keys in order to allow investigators to track the email traffic of an unnamed target, thought to be Mr Snowden, who had an email account with the service.

'Coerce innocent providers'

Just hours before a deadline to hand over the information expired, Mr Levison provided the FBI with an 11-page printout listing the keys in tiny type, in effect making them unusable.

The court found Mr Levison in contempt and the government told Lavabit to provide the keys in an acceptable industry standard electronic format within three days.

Mr Levison did provide the information to the FBI by the new deadline but appealed against the court's contempt ruling.

A judge sitting on the case at the appeals court upheld the ruling as he said Mr Levison had never challenged the court order in the lower court.

Mr Levison's lawyer said he was disappointed with the ruling but said the court's decision was to do with procedural issues and not the merits of the case.

"The court did not say the government's actions in this case were legal," said Ian Samuel.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which has been supportive of Mr Levison, said in a statement: "We believe it's clear that there are limits on the government's power to coerce innocent service providers into its surveillance activities."

In January, Mr Levison told the BBC that he was working on developing a new encrypted email protocol.

"I just feel that the ability for individual law-abiding citizens to communicate privately without a fear of government surveillance is so important, and the courts and the politicians so naive, that the only way to ensure that we retain this ability to communicate privately is to come up with a long-term technical solution," he said.

23.34 | 0 komentar | Read More

BBC and Sky experience fault on iOS

17 April 2014 Last updated at 12:32 By Leo Kelion Technology desk editor

The BBC and Sky's video-on-demand TV services are both experiencing problems on iPhones and iPads.

The fault appears to be limited to iPlayer, Sky Go and Now TV on Apple's iOS platform and began last night.

Neither organisation was able to provide a full explanation when asked.

However, the director of Now TV suggested that altering a device's date setting would act as a temporary workaround.

"It's a Sky-wide issue, so it's both our app and Sky Go," Gidon Katz told the BBC.

"It appears to be related to a date configuration. So, if you reset your iOS device to yesterday's date it would work.

This could indicate that the issue is linked to an expired digital certificate.

However, changing the date setting can cause other problems. For example the owner becomes unable to access Apple's App Store.

It also fails to fix streams in either the iPlayer app or via the service's website.

A message on the BBC's website said: "We are aware of reports from users encountering an 'Insufficient Bandwidth' error message when attempting to play programmes through the iPad app. This is currently under investigation and we will update this FAQ when we obtain further information."

A spokesman for the corporation noted that shows could still be downloaded, rather than streamed, but was unable to provide more details.

Game of Thrones

This is the second technical fault that Now TV has experienced this month.

Sky's subscription service - which targets people who do not subscribe to its satellite TV channels - crashed during the first episode of the latest Game Of Thrones season.

Mr Katz said this was caused by a separate problem created by the challenge of servicing a large audience watching the same content simultaneously.

"Last Monday was exacerbated by the fact that we had a football match on at the same time," he explained.

"The sheer demand means we have to keep on improving our processes.

"This is technically challenging.

"If you have large numbers of people watching Liverpool-Man City concurrently and Game of Thrones at the same time it's obviously going to put a much larger strain on our technical capability than people dipping in and out of [Netflix's] House of Cards, Orange is the New Black or any of those series."

The HBO Go app also crashed while showing the same Game of Thrones episode to US audiences.

23.34 | 0 komentar | Read More

German media boss criticises Google

17 April 2014 Last updated at 14:20

The boss of one of Europe's largest media companies has strongly criticised Google in an open letter printed in a German newspaper.

Mathias Dopfner, chief executive of Axel Springer, says his company is afraid of Google and its power.

He also asks in the letter, addressed to Google boss Eric Schmidt, whether Google intends to create a superstate where anti-trust and privacy laws don't apply.

Google has not commented on the letter.

Continue reading the main story

With the exception of biological viruses, there is nothing with such speed, efficiency and aggressiveness that spreads like these technology platforms"

End Quote Mathias Dopfner CEO Axel Springer

Axel Springer publishes more than 200 newspapers and magazines including German papers Die Welt and Bild. It also has a significant online presence and television and radio interests.

Mr Dopfner's letter was published in Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper - which is not published by his company - in response to a column by Google's executive chairman Eric Schmidt.

Mr Schmidt's column had referred to the advertising relationship between Axel Springer and the search company. He described how the relationship had been challenging at times but how now they had "walked down the aisle" and signed a multi-year deal.

Mr Dopfner acknowledged that he was pleased at the marketing relationship between the two companies and an admirer of Google's entrepreneurial success but went on to say that the company had little choice but to engage with Google as "we know no search engine alternative to increase our online reach".

Global monopoly

The company makes 62% of its profits from digital business, he said, and the internet is a great opportunity, but he explained that he was concerned about the role Google plays online.

He referred to a long-running dispute between Google and the European Commission, which involved accusations that the search company gave favourable treatment to its own products in search results.

Mr Dopfner said the resulting agreement between the two parties was not a compromise but instead the Commission had "sanctioned the introduction of a business model, which in less honourable circles is called extortion".

He said the agreement would still allow Google to discriminate against competitors in search results. At the time Google said its proposals to change the way search results were ranked were fair and wide-reaching.

Mr Dopfner went on to say in the letter that large technology companies like Google are far more powerful than people realise.

"With the exception of biological viruses, there is nothing with such speed, efficiency and aggressiveness that spreads like these technology platforms, and this also lends its creators, owners and users with new power."

He compared the company to the state monopolies that ran the German postal and telecoms services: "Today there is a global network monopoly. Therefore, it is of utmost importance that there are transparent and fair criteria in Google's search results."

Superstate

Mr Dopfner's comments were not just restricted to Google - the founder of social network Facebook also came under fire. He explained that he'd been at a conference when someone asked Mark Zuckerberg how Facebook stored data and protected users' privacy.

"And Zuckerberg said: 'I do not understand your question. Those who have nothing to hide, have nothing to fear.'

"Again and again I had to think about this sentence. It's terrible. I know it is certainly not meant that way. This is a mindset that was fostered in totalitarian regimes not in liberal societies. Such a sentence could also be said by the head of the Stasi or other intelligence service or a dictatorship."

Turning his attention to Google founder Larry Page, Mr Dopfner said: "He dreams of a place with no privacy laws and without democratic accountability."

Referring to comments Mr Page had made about the company wanting to develop ideas but being unable to because they were illegal, Mr Dopfner said: "Does this mean that Google is planning to operate in a legal vacuum, without the hassle of anti-trust and privacy? A kind of superstate?"

He finished the letter with a warning to Google that in the history of economics monopolies do not survive long.

23.34 | 0 komentar | Read More