Apple in row over HealthKit name

5 June 2014 Last updated at 15:04

An Australian start-up has taken Apple to task for using the name HealthKit for its new fitness platform, announced at its developer conference this week.

Apple's version will allow users to run health and fitness apps and share data on upcoming operating system iOS 8.

But an Australian start-up of the same name said it has already laid claim to the title.

It has begun a Twitter campaign urging users to contact Apple about the "naming fiasco".

On the firm's blog, co-founder Alison Hardacre said that she had found out about the name clash when, at 04:30 "someone emailed me to ask whether Apple stomped all over your name or did we do a secret deal with them".

"HealthKit is already in use, by us! As an Apple fan, I feel let down. They didn't feel that they had to do a quick domain search - it would have taken five seconds to type www.healthkit.com into their browser and discover us," she added.

The service it offers is very similar to the one Apple plans to launch, a health platform connecting doctors and patients.

The firm bought the HealthKit domain name in 2012. It also uses the Twitter name @HealthKit.

It is unclear yet whether the start-up will sue Apple over the name clash or indeed whether it has a case to answer as some commentators have pointed out that Apple's Healthkit is the name of the application programming interface (API) rather than a product name.

Apple did not immediately respond to the BBC about the issue. According to Healthkit, Apple has also not yet contacted it.

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China criticises Windows 8 security

5 June 2014 Last updated at 11:58

Microsoft's Windows 8 has been branded a threat to China's cybersecurity in a state-backed news report.

China's CCTV broadcast a strongly critical story in which experts suggested it was being used to grab data about Chinese citizens.

The report comes only days after China banned the use of Windows 8 on many government computers.

Separately, other Chinese media firms called for tech firms that aided US spying to face "severe punishment".

US monitoring

In the story Prof Yang Min of Fudan University was quoted as saying that Windows 8 posed a "big challenge" to the nation's cybersecurity efforts,

"Microsoft would no longer open its Windows 8 source code to the Chinese government," he said. "However the security scheme of the Windows 8 operating system is designed to provide better access for Microsoft to users' database."

The report also suggested that Windows 8 was one of the methods the NSA was using to spirit data out of the country. China has been a consistent critic of the wide-ranging surveillance programme carried out by the NSA.

"Your identity, account, contact book, phone numbers, all this data can be put together for big data analysis," said Ni Guangnan, a member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering.

"The data might be a good way for the US to monitor other countries," he added.

In late May, China issued a notice which stopped Windows 8 machines being procured for government departments. The ban was apparently imposed because of a decree about energy-saving devices. However, many media reports said it was brought in because of fears over the security of the operating system.

Microsoft told CCTV that it was "actively co-operating" with the Chinese government on a review of its products to allay fears about what was being done with user data.

Many US tech companies were also criticised in the Chinese media for the help they have given to the NSA surveillance programme.

Yahoo, Cisco, Facebook, Apple, Google and others were described as "pawns" of the US government that had aided attempts to spy on Chinese citizens and steal secrets. All should be punished for their co-operation, said editorials in state-backed media.

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Apology over crashed anti-hack site

4 June 2014 Last updated at 14:27 By Dave Lee Technology reporter, BBC News

The head of a government-funded cyber-security advice website has apologised and said he was "not sleeping" after the site collapsed under heavy traffic.

Get Safe Online was publicised as being the place to go for advice to protect computers against a high-profile hack.

But within moments of an announcement on Monday, the website collapsed under a deluge of visitors.

Despite extra capacity being added, problems continued well into Wednesday morning.

The incident has called into question the UK's ability to handle a more serious cyber-security crisis.

"It's important for people to realise that this has been a learning curve for us," said Tony Neate, Get Safe Online's chief executive.

Stay protected

How to stop the 'two-week' attack

"We're looking at what we can do to make sure this won't happen again. We're sorry. I've had no sleep for two days."

Security expert Graham Cluley said the incident "should have been much better handled".

He told the BBC: "Get Safe Online massively dropped the ball.

"If the government is going to rely upon Get Safe Online to distribute internet security advice, the site needs to invest in the infrastructure required to remain accessible at all times, every day of the year, because you never know when the next big security issue will crop up - and when the public will need advice urgently."

'Quadrupled' capacity

Mr Neate said he did not believe the site was itself the victim of a hack attack, as some had speculated.

"There is no reason to say this is a DDoS [distributed denial of service] attack. I'd love to say it was an attack - but it's just the total amount of traffic that's coming in."

He said the site had "quadrupled" its capacity, but access was intermittent on Wednesday, although at the time of writing appeared to have stabilised.

The announcement warning of the Gameover Zeus threat was made by the UK's National Crime Agency (NCA) just before 1400 BST on Monday.

A spokesman for the NCA said Get Safe Online's down time was "disappointing", but noted that the safety information was eventually also copied to the UK's newly established Cyber Emergency Readiness Team (Cert) website.

Get Safe Online is funded by the government as well as the private sector. Its website lists an extensive number of partners and supporters, including PayPal, Barclays and Microsoft.

"The site is backed by the government and industry players," said Mr Cluley.

"The resources should be available to keep the site running even in times of high activity.

"I hope they've learnt their lesson, and that it won't happen again."

Follow Dave Lee on Twitter @DaveLeeBBC

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Android ransomware encrypts files

4 June 2014 Last updated at 17:57 By Leo Kelion Technology desk editor

A security firm says it has found the first confirmed case of ransomware that encrypts files held by Android devices.

Eset reports that the Trojan - called Simplelocker - targets SD cards slotted into tablets and handsets, electronically scrambling certain types of files on them before demanding cash to decrypt the data.

The message is in Russian, and payment is requested in Ukrainian currency.

One expert said the threat was noteworthy, but limited at this stage.

"File-encrypting malware has proved to be a lucrative criminal enterprise so it is unsurprising that Android has become a new target," said Dr Steven Murdoch, of the University of Cambridge's Computer Laboratory.

"Smartphone users should be very cautious of installing software from sources other than the operating system-provided application store, and should pressure their phone supplier to promptly provide security updates to defend against known vulnerabilities."

He noted that networks often lagged or failed altogether to provide Google's security patches for older Android handsets.

Porn alert

Slovakia-based Eset said affected device owners were presented with a message saying that their phone was locked because they had viewed and distributed "child pornography , zoophilia and other perversions".

It goes on to instruct the victims to pay 260 hryvnias ($22, £13) via the Ukrainian MoneXy cash transfer system.

"After payment your device will be unlocked within 24 hours. In case of no PAYMENT YOU WILL LOSE ALL DATA ON your device!" it added.

The security firm said that the types of files that could be encrypted included jpeg and gif images, dox and txt text files, and mkv, avi and mp4 media.

It added that information about the infected device would also be uploaded to the server computer used by the cyber-thieves, potentially to help them ensure the right data was decrypted when a payment was received.

This server was hosted on a hidden part of the internet called Tor, Eset added, making the scam hard to trace.

"Our analysis... revealed that we are most likely dealing with a proof-of-concept or a work in progress - for example, the implementation of the encryption doesn't come close to 'the infamous Cryptolocker' on Windows," wrote security researcher Robert Lipovsky.

"Nevertheless, the malware is fully capable of encrypting the user's files, which may be lost if the encryption key is not retrieved.

"While the malware does contain functionality to decrypt the files, we strongly recommend against paying up - not only because that will only motivate other malware authors to continue these kinds of filthy operations, but also because there is no guarantee that the crook will keep their part of the deal and actually decrypt them."

Although this is the first reported instance of Android ransomware encrypting files, there have been other types.

Last month a security researcher known as Kafeine reported about a variant that prevented Android apps from launching, effectively making infected devices useless, unless a $300 payment was made.

Before that, the security firm Symantec reported about an app that caused pop-up warnings to repeatedly appear, which could not easily be closed unless a fee was paid.

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Inmarsat plans new plane wi-fi service

5 June 2014 Last updated at 07:15 By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News

UK satellite telecommunications company Inmarsat has announced a nine-figure investment to boost broadband connectivity in aeroplanes over Europe.

The London-based firm will link aircraft to the internet via cellphone towers on the ground that have been modified to point skywards.

A new spacecraft will augment the system, ensuring passengers experience an unbroken onboard wi-fi service.

Inmarsat says its hybrid network will also support a range of other services.

These are likely to include high-resilience communications that can be used by government agencies in security situations or in disaster response.

For the in-flight application, British Airways is in advanced discussions to be a launch customer.

It will be hoping that the ability to drive connections through a ground tower-infrastructure, rather than just through a traditional satellite network, can increase dramatically the capacity of those connections while at the same time substantially reducing the cost of the wi-fi tariffs offered to passengers.

Major projects

Inmarsat, whose role in the search for the lost Malaysian jet MH370 has brought it international prominence, is Britain's biggest space company.

It is currently in the process of rolling out its £1bn ($1.6bn) next-generation mobile satellite communications network called Global Xpress.

This is series of big spacecraft that are being placed around the planet to provide connectivity to customers in remote locations.

These will include ships at sea, oil and gas installations, deployed armed-forces, aid agencies in disaster areas, and TV news crews reporting from trouble zones.

It will also include aeroplanes, but the project announced on Thursday will be a very different proposition - geographically, because it is restricted to Europe; and technically, because of its use of cell towers.

This so-called "air-to-ground" architecture mirrors the approach taken by GoGo in the US, which has been providing in-flight broadband internet to commercial jet liners since 2008. AT&T is now developing a rival system in North America.

Inmarsat is expecting first-mover advantage as it seeks to bring a hybrid, satellite/air-to-ground system to Europe.

It is able to do this because it has access to the necessary tranche of radio frequencies.

These are in the S-band. The European Commission granted Inmarsat a licence to operate in this part of the spectrum in 2009, and it has been looking for the right business opportunity ever since.

"The ability to deploy terrestrial technology to serve aeroplanes gives you dramatic capacity and cost-per-bit advantages [over traditional satellite only services]," explained Rupert Pearce, the CEO of Inmarsat.

"We can deliver over 40 gigabits per second across an air-to-ground network in Europe. That translates to incredible capacity, so the whole plane can get out their device and start furiously using the internet. We've seen American consumers taking to the GoGo experience in droves - they love being connected on aircraft, and they get a really rich experience at a decent cost," he told BBC News.

National challenge

The new satellite that forms part of the integrated network will be called Europasat. Its construction cost will be shared by another, but non-competing operator, Hellas-Sat, who will use the platform to deliver TV to homes. The manufacturer will be Thales Alenia Space and it should be ready for launch in 2016.

Inmarsat says that planes using the S-band satellite/ground-to-air network will be switched to Global Xpress seamlessly when they leave European airspace.

Of all Inmarsat's revenue streams, aero services are currently growing fastest - in double digits. Market-watchers expect that trend to continue.

Inmarsat's total outlay for the new network, it told investors, is likely to be near £450m.

Its confidence will be seen as further proof of the health of the UK space sector.

Government ministers have identified satellites as one of the "eight great technologies" that can help rebalance and grow the economy.

They have committed to put in place the absolute best conditions to enable large, medium and small-sized space companies to flourish.

Government and industry have challenged themselves to build a sector that is exporting products and services that are valued at £25bn per year by 2030.

Science and space minister David Willetts said: "I am delighted that UK-based Inmarsat is leading the creation of a network to provide airline passengers with in-flight wi-fi.

"Today's announcement is an important investment in new infrastructure that will promote productivity and growth in the UK and across Europe. I welcome the fact that this service has been enabled by the EU's approach to harmonising the necessary spectrum across EU member states.

"This approach enables companies to build business cases that can deliver Pan-European benefits".

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk and follow me on Twitter: @BBCAmos

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'Emotional robot' launches in Japan

5 June 2014 Last updated at 09:25

Japanese firm Softbank has unveiled a robot called Pepper, which it says can read human emotions.

It uses an "emotional engine" and a cloud-based artificial intelligence system that allows it to analyse gestures, expressions and voice tones.

The firm said people could communicate with it "just like they would with friends and family" and it could perform various tasks.

It will go on sale to the public next year for 198,000 yen ($1,930; £1,150).

"People describe others as being robots because they have no emotions, no heart," Masayoshi Son, chief executive of Softbank, said at a press conference.

"For the first time in human history, we're giving a robot a heart, emotions."

The firm will deploy prototypes of the robot at two of its stores from Friday, allowing customers to interact with them.

Continue reading the main story

It could go long way in helping improve elderly care"

End Quote Rhenu Bhuller Frost & Sullivan

Softbank said it planned to subsequently station Pepper at more of its stores nationwide.

Growing market

Japan is one of the world's biggest robot markets.

According to some estimates, its overall robotics market was worth about 860bn ($8.4bn; £5bn) yen in 2012.

And with a rapidly ageing population, coupled with a falling birth rate, the demand for robots is expected to increase further.

The growth is expected to come not only from businesses looking to offset labour shortages and rising wage costs, but also from households seeking an alternative to paying for care workers for elderly relatives.

Japanese carmaker Honda has also been developing a household robot, Asimo. US President Barack Obama played football with it during his recent visit to Japan.

ActiveLink, a robotics research subsidiary of electronics firm Panasonic has also developed technology to help people carry out manual tasks.

Analysts said that development of household robots was likely to pick up, especially in countries like Japan that have an ageing population.

"Even if one can pre-programme such robots to carry out specific tasks based on certain commands or gestures, it could go long way in helping improve elderly care," said Rhenu Bhuller, senior vice president healthcare at consulting firm Frost & Sullivan.

"And with the technology improving fast - you could see big improvements in managing labour requirement in the the sector."

Softbank developed Pepper in collaboration with French company Aldebaran Robotics, in which it took a majority stake in 2012.

Bruno Maisonnier, founder and chief executive of Aldebaran said: "The emotional robot will create a new dimension in our lives and new ways of interacting with technology."

"It's just the beginning, but already a promising reality."

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US seeks Twitter sarcasm detector

5 June 2014 Last updated at 10:46

The US Secret Service is seeking a Twitter sarcasm detector.

The agency has put out a work tender looking for a software system to analyse social media data.

The software should have, among other things, the "ability to detect sarcasm and false positives".

A spokesman for the service said it currently used the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Twitter analytics and needed its own, adding: "We aren't looking solely to detect sarcasm."

The Washington Post quoted Ed Donovan as saying: "Our objective is to automate our social media monitoring process. Twitter is what we analyse.

"This is real-time stream analysis. The ability to detect sarcasm and false positives is just one of 16 or 18 things we are looking at."

Prism controversy

The tender was put out earlier this week on the US government's Federal Business Opportunities website.

It sets out the objectives of automating social media monitoring and "synthesising large sets of social media data".

Specific requirements include "audience and geographic segmentation" and analysing "sentiment and trend".

The software also has to have "compatibility with Internet Explorer 8". The browser was released more than five years ago.

The agency does not detail the purpose of the analysis but does set out its mission, which includes "preserving the integrity of the economy and protecting national leaders and visiting heads of state and government".

The US has been under intense pressure on surveillance in the wake of revelations by Ed Snowden, the fugitive former technical worker for the CIA.

Last year he leaked details of the US National Security Agency's Prism scheme, which could access detailed records of individual smartphone and internet activity.

His documents alleged the NSA had access on a massive scale to individual chat logs, stored data, voice traffic, file transfers and social networking data of individuals.

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BBC to stream World Cup matches in 4K

5 June 2014 Last updated at 11:14 By Jane Wakefield Technology reporter

Three World Cup football matches being played in Brazil this summer will be streamed in ultra high-definition (UHD), the BBC has announced.

The format, also known as 4K, offers four times the resolution of 1080p high definition video.

The matches - including the quarter final and the final - mark one of the first times a live event has been streamed over the air in UHD in the UK.

They will only be made available to a limited number of TVs at BBC sites.

But it could pave the way for more widespread use of the technology.

One of the biggest challenges of distributing UHD TV to the home is how to make it compatible with existing broadcast and broadband capacities.

Users need speeds of around 20Mbps (megabits per second) in order to watch 4K content without glitches, experts say.

"It's a good idea for the BBC to trial these things and the results on a large screen look impressive but it also needs to be realistic about the potential to push this across current broadcast networks," said Toby Syfret, an analyst at Enders research group.

Previously the BBC has worked with Japanese broadcaster NHK on such trials. Rival broadcaster Sky has also run 4K trials.

The live streams will be sent via satellite from Brazil, and then distributed via Digital Terrestrial TV (DTT) and Internet Protocol (IP) but only to a handful of UHD TV sets in selected BBC Research and Development facilities.

Matthew Postgate, controller of BBC Research and Development said: "The trials will prove hugely valuable in furthering our understanding of UHD technology, and potential distribution models for the future."

4K is the next great hope for TV manufacturers hoping to persuade viewers to upgrade their sets but like any fledging technology it has experienced teething problems.

There is not a great deal of content available yet in the format and the costs of 4K TV sets remain high.

Netflix recently made some of its TV shows - including House of Cards and Breaking Bad - available in the new technology but the decoder required to view the content was not compatible with some early 4K televisions.

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Freeview builds connected TV service

5 June 2014 Last updated at 14:00

Freeview is launching a connected TV service, giving viewers access to catch-up services without being tied to a broadband provider.

Freeview Connect will offer ITV Player, iPlayer, 4OD and 5 OnDemand as standard on Smart TVs and set-top boxes.

Jonathan Thompson, boss of Digital UK, called the initiative "a critical step" in the evolution of Freeview.

But some commentators described it as a reaction against YouView, which has largely become a Pay TV business.

Launched in 2012, YouView was originally envisaged as a free-to-air net TV service, with internet providers BT and TalkTalk - who are among the service's backers - offering extra channels at a cost.

But the price of stand-alone YouView boxes has remained relatively high. Of the 1 million YouView set-top boxes installed in the UK, only around 30,000 were bought unsubsidised on the high street,

The rest were sold with subscription bundles or broadband contracts from BT and Talk Talk, often tying consumers into rolling contracts.

This is thought to have disillusioned YouView's other shareholders - the BBC, ITV, Channel Four, Channel 5 and transmission company Arqiva.

They are backing the new Freeview service, investing a reported £100 million over five years.

Although the broadcasters will remain partners in YouView, it is reported that they will cut their investment, leaving BT and Talk Talk to pick up the majority of the costs.

Freeview Connect, the working title of the new project, would build catch-up services directly into TVs and set-top boxes.

Viewers would still require a broadband connection to watch streaming TV, but would not be tied into a provider in order to keep the service.

The terrestrial channels will offer their own catch-up services at launch - but it is not yet certain whether the likes of Netflix, Amazon Instant, YouTube, Vimeo and other services will come on board.

Ilse Howling will leave her job as managing director of Freeview to oversee the project.

She said her goal was to create "a new, mass market service to make connected TV available free, for everyone."

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Tinder introduces photo sharing

5 June 2014 Last updated at 17:06 By Kim Gittleson BBC reporter, New York

Dating app Tinder has introduced a photo sharing feature called Moments to encourage people to use it for more than just hooking up.

The feature lets users send temporary picture messages which will expire after 24 hours.

It marks an attempt by Tinder to expand beyond its dating base into the more lucrative social messaging sector.

The 18-month-old app has not yet generated any revenue, although monetisation schemes are being planned.

"We realised making a connection is not enough," Tinder's co-founder Sean Rad told the BBC.

"We needed to help our users come up with better ways to get to know their matches."

Mr Rad said that that picture messaging - which has proven incredibly popular, as Tinder's Los Angeles neighbour Snapchat has demonstrated - would allow users to form more "meaningful relationships".

Increasing competition

The move into photo sharing comes as Tinder is facing increasing competition from established dating firms such as OkCupid as well as newer entrants such as Hinge.

It has also suffered from a series of security issues involving fake accounts and spambots.

Nonetheless, its simple interface - which allows users to link their Facebook pictures to their profiles, and then look at other users' pictures - has proved winning. Users swipe left to decline a match, or right to begin messaging someone.

Although the firm declined to provide specific user numbers, analytics firm Comscore has said that as of April 2014, there were 2.7 million smartphones using the app - a huge increase even from last July.

"The growth chart for Tinder looks pretty incredible," said Andrew Lipsman, vice-president of marketing and insights at Comscore.

Making money

Tinder's biggest investor is the media conglomerate InterActiveCorp (IAC).

Research firm IBIS World has estimated that the dating services industry should bring in $2.2bn (£1.3bn) in revenue in the US this year, with IAC, which also owns traditional dating sites Match.com and OKCupid, holding an estimated 27% share.

New York-based IAC has said that it was "just a matter of time" before Tinder started generating revenue.

"Given the unique nature of Tinder, we think it presents sort of its own unique monetisation opportunities," former chief executive Gregory Blatt briefed analysts in April.

IAC's chairman Barry Diller added that this could involve subscription fees, advertising or charging for add-on services.

Continue reading the main story

We envision a world in which everyone is extracting value on Tinder"

End Quote Sean Rad Tinder co-founder

Mr Rad, however, declined to provide more details on these plans beyond saying that he was considering charging users to undo a swipe.

He also turned down the opportunity to elaborate on reports that Tinder could be worth several hundred million dollars.

"We don't even think about the valuation," he said.

Expanding brief

Analysts have noted that while Tinder seems to be more popular than its competitors, it has been lumped in the less-lucrative category of dating sites, which tend to have valuations in the low millions.

"Just to give some perspective, the whole mobile dating category had nine million users in April," said Mr Lipsman.

"That's almost double what it was last year - but it's still a much smaller than social as a whole.

"WhatsApp alone is bigger than the entire dating category, with 15 million users."

That is perhaps one reason why Tinder's founders have insisted that the app is about making "connections". They describe it as being in the social messaging sphere, alongside firms such as WhatsApp and Snapchat, which have significantly higher valuations.

"We envision a world in which everyone is extracting value on Tinder," said Mr Rad, who insisted the app was never meant to be just about dating.

He also emphasised that it was not just used by young twenty-somethings in cities looking for a quick match.

"The oldest user whose identity we've been able to confirm and know of is 65 - and they've already met somebody," he said.

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