FAA makes flying drones near sports stadiums a punishable crime
The Federal Aviation Agency (FAA) posted a warning that says drone operators that fly their aircraft near or over sports stadiums and racetracks could be punished by monetary fines and up to one year in jail. The rules will change flight patterns over 150 stadiums and racetracks with 30,000 or more people.
Drones will no longer be able to fly under 3,000 feet within three miles of a NCAA Division I college stadium, Major League Baseball (MLB) stadium, or National Football League (NFL) stadium - and the same rules apply for any Indy Car, NASCAR Sprint Cup or Champ series auto tracks.
The FAA is working to commercialize drone use, and while that has proven to be a drawn out mess, a growing number of private citizens are flying drones.
Continue reading: FAA makes flying drones near sports stadiums a punishable crime (full post)
Comcast settles overcharging lawsuit, will fork over $50 million
Comcast will pay $50 million to end an 11-year-old class-action overcharging lawsuit that was filed by angry Philadelphia customers. The lawsuit was filed on December 8, 2003, and originally wanted $875 million from the cable giant.
The payments, credits and free upgrades will be issued to subscribers in Philadelphia and four other local counties - and will help out current and former subscribers from January 1, 2003 to December 31, 2008, according to legal documents.
Plaintiffs will receive a measly $15 payout, as just $16.67 million will be paid out in cash or customer credit - including four months of free Internet service upgrades, six free pay-per-view movies two free months of The Movie Channel, or one free month upgrade to Extreme 105 service.
Continue reading: Comcast settles overcharging lawsuit, will fork over $50 million (full post)
'State sponsored' Russian hacker group is attacking geographic rivals
A likely Russian state-sponsored hacker group is being blamed for launching cyberattacks against NATO, Georgia, the Caucasus, Eastern Europe and Western European defense contractors, according to a report from FireEye. The APT28 group launches phishing attacks with links to websites that look like authentic news, with compromised information the type of data the Russian government would be interested in acquiring.
"The Sofacy group is using multiple malware families, including some that are not mentioned in the FireEye paper," said Aleks Gostev, Kaspersky Lab chief security expert of Global Research and Analysis. "They have been very active lately and have registered many domains in order to launch phishing attacks."
The FireEye report also notes APT28 sought "sensitive tactical and strategic intelligence" from governments in the region. Russia has been blamed for a number of coordinated cyberattacks against targets across Europe and in the United States, including a recent attack on the White House - and breaching point of sale (POS) machines of Home Depot.
Continue reading: 'State sponsored' Russian hacker group is attacking geographic rivals (full post)
iOS 8 now installed on more than 50 percent of Apple mobile devices
Apple iOS 8 has captured 52 percent of the company's active mobile devices, continually taking market share from iOS 7. From Oct. 13 to Oct. 27, iOS increased from 48 percent up to 52 percent, with some analysts saying software bugs and possible lack of additional features have prevented some users from upgrading.
The required 5GB of free space also likely doesn't help, as Apple hasn't been able to convince owners to clear much-needed space before updating.
Despite the release of iOS 8.0.1 - which caused serious headaches for some iPhone 6 Plus owners - the adoption rate for iOS 8 is still significantly higher than the rival Google Android mobile operating system. Android 4.4 KitKat was publicly launched before November 2013, and has captured just 25 percent after an entire year.
Continue reading: iOS 8 now installed on more than 50 percent of Apple mobile devices (full post)
White House suffered cyberattacks, but problem has been addressed
The White House, also known as the Executive Office of the President (EOP), is familiar with enduring cyberattacks on a frequent basis. However, a recent attack was found to be organized and significantly powerful, with the White House's networks enduring a few days of consistent downtime.
"In the course of assessing recent threats we identified activity of concern on the unclassified EOP network," an anonymous source recently told the media. "Any such activity is something that we take very seriously. In this case we took immediate measures to evaluate and mitigate the activity."
In addition to state-sponsored hacker groups in China and Russia, other nations have shown interest in advanced cyber espionage tactics. The computers and systems were not damaged, but suffered extended downtime that has been largely resolved by federal cybersecurity experts, according to reports.
Continue reading: White House suffered cyberattacks, but problem has been addressed (full post)
Fry's Leaks the Samsung 850 EVO - V-NAND in TLC Flavor
Samsung has teased the 850 EVO since media met in South Korea for the 850 Pro launch. The company is eager to flex its V-NAND advantage in 3bits per cell form but retail availability has been quiet, until now.
Fry's Electronics just broke the 850 EVO cover and put the 1TB model up for preorder. Priced at $499.99 until 10/30/14, 850 EVO 1TB preorders are currently scheduled to ship on November 24.
Fry's Electronics also gave us our first look at the EVO with 3D V-NAND's specifications. 550 MB/s sequential read and 520 MB/s sequential write speeds. It should be noted this drive is marketed at 1TB and not 960GB, so there shouldn't be a large amount of overprovisioning. Samsung's 3D V-NAND uses a 3Xnm process and has enterprise level endurance ratings. Samsung shouldn't have to add overprovisioning to 850 EVO to extend the life of the flash or for increased performance.
Continue reading: Fry's Leaks the Samsung 850 EVO - V-NAND in TLC Flavor (full post)
EA revenues drop 18%, increases its predictions for Q1 2015
EA has been in the news a fair bit in the last 24 hours, where we only just reported that Battlefield: Hardline has a release date of March 17, 2015 and we have a release window of Q4 2015 for DICE's Star Wars Battlefront. Now we're hearing about EA's financials for the quarter that finished on September 30.
The company reported $990 million in net revenue for the three-month period, which is an 18.5% slide from the $1.21 billion in revenue it posted from its last quarter. When comparing it to the same quarter from last year however, it shows the company has a nice 42.4% year-over-year increase. Net income for the company has improved from the same time last year, posting $3 million in income versus the $273 million loss from last year.
Digital revenues slipped 5.2% from $536 million to $508 million for the quarter, but this is still a 12.9% increase year-over-year. EA is still hoping to make a massive $1 billion in digital add-on content this year, and looks to be on track to reach that big goal. The company has adjusted its expectations for the fiscal year, something that ends on March 31, 2015, too. It has added $75 million to its projections, for a total of $4.375 billion. For the next three months, EA expects a net revenue of $1.1 billion.
Continue reading: EA revenues drop 18%, increases its predictions for Q1 2015 (full post)
DICE's Star Wars Battlefront to land sometime in Q4 2015
It was only a few hours ago that we were reporting that EA announced that Battlefield: Hardline, which is being developed by Visceral Games, will be released March 17, 2015, and now we're hearing about Star Wars Battlefront.
EA has announced that Star Wars Battlefront, DICE's take on the Star Wars universe, will reach gamers in Q4 2015. Considering Star Wars: Episode 7 is due on December 18, 2015, this makes perfect sense - ride the marketing wave of the movie. Blake Jorgensen, EA's Chief Financial Officer confirmed that Star Wars Battlefront will indeed be a first-person shooter, and it'll be EA's "major first-person shooter" for the year.
The following year, 2016, DICE's Battlefield franchise will be fresh out of the oven, with Battlefield 5 (or a rename, or whatever it arrives as), will arrive in the third quarter of EA's 2017 fiscal year, so sometime in the last quarter of 2016. This means we're waiting an entire two years for the next true Battlefield game, which is sad news.
Continue reading: DICE's Star Wars Battlefront to land sometime in Q4 2015 (full post)
Razer announces its first surround sound bar, the Leviathan
Gaming peripheral maker Razer has just announced its first surround sound bar, the Leviathan. Razer's Leviathan is a virtual 5.1 surround sound gaming and music bar, that streams your audio through Bluetooth 4.0 aptX, with a price tag of $199.99. Here's what we can expect inside of the Leviathan:
Razer's co-founder and CEO, Min-Liang Tan said: "The opportunity to produce a precision-engineered surround sound solution for high-performance gaming, movie watching and music listening, and make it versatile to use in any setting, was a very exciting proposition for us. The Razer Leviathan delivers what music aficionados, movie buffs and gamers alike are looking for to improve their entertainment setup".
Continue reading: Razer announces its first surround sound bar, the Leviathan (full post)
Dying Light axed on PS3, Xbox 360, now on Xbox One, PS4 and PC only
With the 30FPS and low-res debacle causing outrage amongst gamers, Techland has just announced it has cancelled the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions of its zombie survival game, Dying Light, which will now be exclusive to current-gen consoles, and the PC.
The developer said that the previous-gen versions were compromising the "core version of Dying Light", adding that it had spent the past three years of development on Dying Light "making sure that all the features of our game add up to create a truly next-gen experience". The developer continued: "Much of this 'next-gen feel' is tightly connected to the technological side of Dying Light. For instance, up to 200,000 objects can be displayed in the game at once. Add to this our use of realistic, physics-based lighting technology and you really start to push the next-gen systems to the limits. Features like these along with our core gameplay pillars - such as the player-empowering Natural Movement, threefold character development system, and vast open world - are all an inherent part of how Dying Light plays. However, combining all of these into one fluid experience is only possible on technologically advanced platforms".
"After thorough internal testing" the developer decided to axe the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions of the game, so that players will receive "the full and best experience regardless of the platform you play on". Dying Light was meant to be released before the end of the year, but was delayed until February 2015.
Continue reading: Dying Light axed on PS3, Xbox 360, now on Xbox One, PS4 and PC only (full post)