Internet & Websites - Page 22

Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht was the mastermind of a billion-dollar online drug ring, according to the US federal government. He was convicted earlier in the year and could face life in prison for his crimes, with prosecutors still quiet on what type of prison term they are seeking at the May 29 sentencing.

Joshua Dratel, Ulbricht's lead defense attorney, has issued a statement saying Silk Road made it safer to purchase and sell drugs. Using the Dark Web, customers could sell or purchase everything from marijuana and hash to cocaine, heroin or LSD - and despite reported overdose deaths - this is an argument that is rather unique.

"In contrast to the government's portrayal of the Silk Road website as a more dangerous version of a traditional drug marketplace, in fact the Silk Road website was in many respects the most responsible such marketplace in history, and consciously and deliberately included recognized harm reduction measures, including access to physician counseling," Dratel said in a recent court filing.

Update #2: And it's back up! Your day can go on like usual, we can breathe normally again now that Reddit is back!

Update: According to @redditstatus on Twitter, there was some scheduled maintenance for four hours ago, with a tweet that said: "We'll be performing some database maintenance that will require the site to be in read only mode for May 11, 22:00 - 22:30 PDT". The next tweet which was from around 52 minutes ago read: "Investigating: We're investigating a database master that's gone unavailable". Then, just 38 minutes ago, @redditstatus tweeted: "Identified: Turns out it was good we were preparing to replace a database tonight -- it's the one that just fai...".

Breaking: Reddit, otherwise known as "the front page of the Internet" is down. Visiting the website will result in a nice little blue page that says "Reddit is down for emergency maintenance".

HBO CEO Richard Plepler isn't a "reflexive proponent of binge-watching," so don't expect Game of Thrones or True Detective to be dumped onto HBO Go or HBO Now. However, subscribers are able to watch entire seasons of older content on HBO, but newer shows will not be available for binge watching.

"I don't think it would have been a great thing for HBO or our brand if that had been gobbled up in the first week," Plepler recently said during a Washington Post event. "I think it was very exciting for the viewer to have that mystery held out for an extended period of time."

Plepler explained to journalist Cecelia Kang the importance of making viewers wait for new episodes:

If you've been seeing some hate leveled at Microsoft on social media today, odds are it's due to a new online tool released by the company which attempts to gauge your age from an uploaded photo.

According to the Machine Learning Blog, The 'How Old Do I look?' website is based on the "APIs available in the Azure Machine Learning Gallery. The gallery contains many finished intelligent services such as Face, Speech, and Vision which are part of a new suite called Project Oxford from Bing and Microsoft Research." and took only a day to put together.

For the record, the site guesstimated that I was 36. I'm 29. But they were nice enough to apologise in advance with "Sorry if we didn't quite get the age and gender right - we are still improving this feature."

During Facebook's Q1 2015 earnings report, the social network has said that there are now over 1.44 billion people using Facebook each month, which is up 13% year-over-year. From those 1.44 billion users, 1.25 billion of them were on mobile, which is a bigger increase of 24% year-over-year.

Facebook has 936 million daily active users, and 798 million mobile daily active users (an increase of 17% and 31% year-over-year, respectively). This is something worth noting: around 65% of Facebook's users are using the social network daily, with 64% of those on mobile using it every single day. The numbers are continuing to grow, where if we compare the mobile-only monthly active users from Q1 2013 (just two years ago now) where it was at 189 million, compared to 581 million in Q1 2015.

Other noteworthy numbers: there are 800 million people on WhatsApp per month, 700 million on Groups per month, 600 million people using Messenger each month, and 300 million people using Instagram per month. Insane numbers, which are joined by 45 billion messages sent daily, 4 billion videos viewed per day, 650 million people connected to sports Page of some kind, and there are now over two million advertisers using Facebook.

For the first time since launching in 2009, the Microsoft Bing search engine now has over 20 percent market share of the US desktop search market, according to comScore.

Google still leads the way with 64.4 percent of the increasingly competitive market, while Bing has 20.1 percent - Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, and other companies are trying to adapt to a growing mobile market.

Bing has been a major effort for Microsoft, which has continually dumped money and development time into Bing. The search engine is now integrated into Xbox, Office, Windows and the Windows Phone, as Microsoft wants to try to lure users away from Google.

If you're on a contract with Optus or iiNet there's a possibility that you've been enjoying watching quota-free Netflix content in recent times, thanks to the online streaming giant signing deals with these ISP's in order to secure unlimited viewership for their customers down under.

In a recent statement, Netflix reflected on these past signing and have commented that "we should have avoided that and will avoid it going forward."

According to an interview with Gizmodo, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings is a strong believer in data cap abolishment worldwide. Claiming "there's no reason for data caps. We want to make the internet unmetered. Period. The capped model is antiquated: we want to make it about speed."

According to an e-mail sent out to Google partners today, the Mountain View-based search giant will soon be offering a monthly subscription service to YouTube, which would offer an ad-free experience.

The e-mail says: "Your fans want choices. Not only do they want to watch what they want, whenever they want, anywhere, and on any device they choose, they want YouTube features built specifically with their needs in mind. Over the past several months, we've taken bold new steps to bring these experiences to life. Since inviting hundreds of thousands of fans into our YouTube Music Key Beta, we've seen tremendous engagement. And we've seen an equally enthusiastic response for our new YouTube Kids app, designed to give families a simpler and safer video-viewing experience- it's already crossed 2 million installations in less than one month.

We're excited to build on this momentum by taking another big step in favor of choice: offering fans an ads-free version of YouTube for a monthly fee. By creating a new paid offering, we'll generate a new source of revenue that will supplement your fast growing advertising revenue".

With Netflix making a very big splash Down Under, launching in Australia and New Zealand recently, it shouldn't come as a big surprise that the streaming content giant has updated its Terms of Use, adding that the use of a VPN could have your account terminated.

Redder user 'CrypticCraig' posted to /r/technology with Article 6C of Netflix's new Terms of Use, which states: "You may view a movie or TV show through the Netflix service primarily within the country in which you have established your account and only in geographic locations where we offer our service and have licensed such movie or TV show. The content that may be available to watch will vary by geographic location. Netflix will use technologies to verify your geographic location".

It continues, with Article 6H, stating: "We may terminate or restrict your use of our service, without compensation or notice if you are, or if we suspect that you are (i) in violation of any of these Terms of Use or (ii) engaged in illegal or improper use of the service". So there you have it in black and white, Netflix can and will terminate your account if you are in violation of these Terms of Use (using a VPN in short).

The words 'revenge porn' have been plastered across many online and local media outlets in recent months and the website ugotposted.com was in the center of it all.

Kevin Bollaert was this websites former operator and his business was all about hosting thousands of sexually explicit images of various women without their consent - mostly submitted by disgruntled ex-boyfriends and ex-husbands. The real cash flow for Bollaert came through the form of 'take down fees' - charging the victims hundreds of dollars to have their photos removed from the archives.

This court case conviction is the first of its kind and has seen Bollaert handed 18 years in prison (eligible for parole in 10 years) alongside a $10,000 fine for his troubles. This case also sends a clear message to any 'would-be' revenge porn participants that these types of actions are unacceptable.

Liberal politician, Federal Member for Mayo and Assistant Minister for Infrastructure and Regional Development Jamie Briggs made a joke about the wrong subject when engaging in a Twitter conversation with political journalist Bernard Keane recently, stating that he will search through Keane's private metadata in order to 'dig up some dirt'.

This incident comes soon after news that the Government will have the unwarranted right to search phone and internet records for all Australian citizens from the past two years.

Although Briggs may see this as a lighthearted joke towards a critic, many users online are furious that this joke has even taken place, further labeling it as the 'harsh reality' that our future generations will have to face.

Google has kicked off April with quite a bang, announcing that it has removed almost 200 ad-injecting Chrome extensions, which were exposing users to malware, and all sorts of other nasties.

More than a third of these Chrome extensions were injecting ads that were recently classified as malware, with researchers finding 192 deceptive Chrome extensions that had affected a huge 14 million people. Google officials have removed those extensions, and pushed in new techniques that will catch any new, or updated extensions that try to abuse users.

The study also found that there is widespread use of ad injectors for other browsers, not just Chrome, on both Windows and OS X. Over 5% of people visiting Google sites have at least one ad injector installed, and within that group, half of those half two injectors installed. Scarily, nearly one-third have at least four installed.

In something that feels like the perfect evolution of Internet video, YouTube has started experimenting with 4K 60FPS video playback. But, there's only a few clips that are capable of this insane amount of bandwidth.

Most of the videos on YouTube are nowhere near this resolution and framerate, with most cameras not capable of shooting 4K 60FPS video to begin with. In order to watch the 4K 60FPS videos on YouTube you're going to of course require a 4K 60Hz capable panel, which aren't too hard to find now.

There are just six hand-picked 4K 60FPS videos on YouTube right now, with the 4K 60FPS playlist on YouTube available here.

During Facebook's F8 developer conference, CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg announced that 360-degree spherical videos will soon be on users' News Feeds.

Zuckerberg showed the audience a demonstration of the new 360-degree video, which was filmed at its Menlo Park-based HQ. The in-house footage was captured with an array of 24 camera working together, which allows a user to look freely within a virtual environment - perfect for that $2 billion acquisition of Oculus VR last year.

The best bit about the new 360-degree videos is that they don't require a VR headset like the Oculus Rift to be played back, as they'll work on normal computers, smartphones and tablets. Facebook does want to see Oculus Rift owners putting their Rift headsets on and watching the content that way, but we don't even know when the CV1 of the Rift will be made available yet. Facebook has, however, been on a .huge hiring spree leading up to the launch of the Oculus Rift CV1

Facebook Messenger surpassed 500 million monthly active users four months ago, and now has more than 600 million monthly active users, CNBC reported.

Even though some users weren't happy when Facebook broke off Messenger on mobile devices, forcing users to download the Messenger app separately, it helped boost usage figures. More social networking users are migrating from PCs to smartphones and tablets, opening the door to expansive Messenger adoption.

Facebook doesn't want Messenger just to be a text and voice communication tool for users - it could embrace the Internet of Things (IoT) and be used as a platform for additional services. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is expected to speak more about Messenger during the F8 Developer Conference.

The Islamic State Hacking Division recently created waves when it posted personal information of military personnel online - and called for attacks on the soldiers and Marines.

The ISIS group posted names, photos and addresses of US military personnel, with the list reportedly collected using public databases and social media. The hacker group didn't breach any sensitive networks, according to military sources - leading officers to be careful of social media activities.

"I am sending this message as a reminder regarding vigilance while using social media," said Army Major. General Michael Garrett. "A couple months ago, we reached out to remind you of the reality that we are operating in a 'new norm' in which cyber threats are real and constant; any Centcom teammate or family member could be targeted. To that end, we all should maintain a heightened sense of vigilance whether dealing with work or home computer usage, specifically as it relates to social media."

Apple is currently talking with content producers to launch a streaming TV service in the fall, according to a report published in the Wall Street Journal. If everything goes according to plan, consumers can expect the new streaming offering in September.

After the service launches, around 25 channels will be included, with ABC, CBS and Fox reportedly signing on - and the service can be used by all iOS devices, such as iPhones, Apple TV set-top boxes, and iPads. The new Internet streaming platform will cost about $30 per month.

"I think when Apple TV launches it will get lots of attention," said Jeff Kagan, industry analyst. "Some will love it and others will not. I think Apple TV will start small, [and] then grow quickly. Sort of on the same track as the original iPhone seven years ago. If we look out another five or ten years I Think Apple could have a powerful position in the television marketplace if for no other reason than they already have a gazillion customers always wanting the next, big thing."

We've seen this plenty of times before - excited people looking to cash in on a quick buck through social media promotions and ending up participating in a large scale scam.

Navigating through the Facebook link as seen above will see you fill out an information form in what you think is an exchange for a $2,000 AU Bunnings hardware store voucher - but what you're actually doing is giving away your precious personal information, your IP address and quite possibly your computers' virus-free integrity.

There is no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow and after you've already shared the event to your friends you come out empty handed and confused.

In the latest of unexpected news, TPG Telecom has today announced that they will be purchasing 100 percent of iiNet, "Australia's second largest DSL Internet Service Provider" - as quoted by the company themselves.

The $1.4 billion AU buyout means iiNet's shares will be acquired for $8.60 AU each, seeing $1.80 AU per share paid more than they are listed right now. As according to Gizmodo, $8.60 AU is also higher than iiNet's shares have ever been seen - their peak being $8.36 AU last December.

iiNet's Chairman Michael Smith is happy with this move, stating "The board views this as a significant reward for shareholders who have shown their faith in iiNet. The price of $1.4 billion is a very tangible measure of the value that the extraordinary people of iiNet have created through their innovation, brilliant service and capacity to add value."

US investigators are monitoring a resident in Michigan suspected of using social media to recruit - and inspire - Islamic extremism. Ahmad Musa Jibril, encouraging followers to "spread Islam by the sword," is a Palestinian-American living in Dearborn, Michigan. He is on probation after being released in 2012 for an insurance fraud conviction.

A federal judge restricted Jibril's Internet usage in 2014, but his following on social media has continued to grow. Investigators are searching through his Twitter followers and those who have "liked" his Facebook page, looking for digital fingerprints into possible extremist activity.

"There is nothing to suggest he has changed his views," said Peter Neumann, a British researcher, in a statement published by CBS News. "He has toned them down because he realizes that if he doesn't tone them down they will come after him."