Chinese state run media, which means it’s essentially the Chinese Government, has made a very interesting claim. They claim that because iOS 7 tracks your movements that this makes it a “national security concern.” Here’s what the Wall Street Journal had to say:
In its national noon broadcast, state-run China Central Television criticized the “frequent locations” function in Apple’s iOS 7 mobile operating system, which tracks and records the time and location of the owner’s movements. The report quoted researchers who said that those with access to that data could gain knowledge of the broader situation in China or “even state secrets.”
Apple didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Now I have talked about the frequent locations option previously. At the time I said that other phone makes do something similar and that I don’t think there’s anything sinister going on here. But I also mentioned that Apple should clear the air on this feature. Perhaps if they did, we wouldn’t be talking about this right now. Given that Apple really wants to make inroads into the Chinese marketplace, I think they’ll have to address this now.
This is one of those stories to keep an eye on.
Apple Forcing You To Update To The Latest Flash Version
Posted in Commentary on July 11, 2014 by itnerdIt seems that Apple has taken the step of blocking older versions of Flash which forces you to update to the latest version of Flash (which is 14.0.0.145 by the way) which protects you from this threat that I wrote about earlier this week. According to this support document, if you’re running Safari and an older version of Flash, the browser will block it and present you with the option to download the latest version. This isn’t a new behavior from Apple as OS X and Safari have the means for Apple to do this sort of thing. Plus Apple isn’t exactly fond of Flash. So Mac users shouldn’t be shocked by this.
Now if for whatever reason you have an attachment to the version of Flash that you have, To use it you need to use the web plug-in management to re-enable it for specific websites using “Run in Unsafe Mode”. Alternately you can use another browser.
Leave a comment »