Archive for June 15, 2018

#Fail: Apple Maps Routing And Navigation Is DOWN World Wide [UPDATE: Resolved]

Posted in Commentary with tags on June 15, 2018 by itnerd

It appears that navigation and routing functions of Apple Maps are down at the moment. If you try to search for an address, this is what you see:apple2

What’s worse is that Apple either doesn’t want to acknowledge that they have an issue, or they are asleep at the switch. I posted this Tweet when I first noticed the issue:

Apple Support responded with this a few minutes later:

This was my reply:

You’d think a company that is approaching 1 Trillion dollars in market cap would be able to search Twitter and find Tweets like these:

https://twitter.com/chrobie/status/1007638406585724928

And apparently this has been going on for hours which doesn’t look good if you’re Apple. Seeing as Apple isn’t admitting that there’s a problem, nobody knows how long before there is a fix for it. Thus Apple is going to have a long day fixing whatever is going on with Apple Maps and dealing with the PR fallout.

UPDATE:

UPDATE #2: This is now resolved.

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Review: KeySmart Nano Torch

Posted in Products with tags on June 15, 2018 by itnerd

I came across something the other day on Amazon that really caught my attention. It was the KeySmart Nano Torch which promises to be the “most powerful tiny flashlight.” And it is tiny.

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It fits on my key chain and hardly takes up any real estate. It’s made of stainless steel so it should survive being in your pocket as well as looking cool in the process. It has a single LED bulb and is powered by a tiny LR521 179 battery. It shows up pre-assembled and all you do to activate it is twist the housing to the left until the light comes on.

So, the central question is, how bright is it? Well, I tested it in this dark room:

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All you can see is the night light in this picture. So it’s pretty dark. But thanks to the Nano Torch, it lit it up pretty easily:

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KeySmart says it’s good for 25 Lumens. given the results here, I believe it.

Gripes? I was trying hard to find something negative to say about this product and I can’t. I think that says something about the Nano Torch.

Thus if you want a bright flashlight that you’re always going to have at hand, this is the one to get. I got my Nano Torch (actually two of them as I got one for my wife) for $20.99 CDN on Amazon. The company sells them direct as well for $19.99 US.

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Microsoft Says Windows 10 April 2018 Update Is Ready For Prime Time…. I Say Perhaps Not

Posted in Commentary with tags on June 15, 2018 by itnerd

The fine folks at Microsoft put out a blog post which trumpeted it’s use of AI to deliver a smooth roll out of the Windows 10 April 2018 update. Near the end of it, they say this:

Based on the update quality and reliability we are seeing through our AI approach, we are now expanding the release broadly to make the April 2018 Update (version 1803) fully available for all compatible devices running Windows 10 worldwide. Full availability is the final phase of our rollout process. You don’t have to do anything to get the update; it will rollout automatically to you through Windows Update.

Quality and reliability? Seriously? Tell that to the people who have been hit by issues related to this update. Most notably this one where your computer is basically unbootable after the update. Now I do have a fix for it but this issue should never have made it out of Microsoft’s QA labs. Then there’s this issue which to Microsoft’s credit they have fixed. And let’s not forget this issue which has been fixed as well. I could go on but I think you see my point here. Which is that this issue has been insanely problematic and Windows 10 users have suffered as a result. And that should never ever happen.

So Microsoft may say this update is ready for prime time. But I say that you should take that with a grain of salt. But if you fell like rolling the dice on this, make sure you have a backup of your computer in case things go south. Which is entirely possible given what has gone on to date.

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GrayShift Claims USB Restricted Mode In iOS 12 Is Already “Defeated”

Posted in Commentary with tags on June 15, 2018 by itnerd

And so the arms race has begun.

Hot on the heels of Apple admitting that it was looking to stop brute force password exploits via USB by the addition of USB Restricted Mode, GrayShift who makes the GrayKey devices which are popular among law enforcement for cracking into iPhones claims they’ve already “defeated” this feature:

“Grayshift has gone to great lengths to future proof their technology and stated that they have already defeated this security feature in the beta build. Additionally, the GrayKey has built in future capabilities that will begin to be leveraged as time goes on,” a June email from a forensic expert who planned to meet with Grayshift, and seen by Motherboard, reads, although it is unclear from the email itself how much of this may be marketing bluff. “They seem very confident in their staying power for the future right now,” the email adds.

That implies that GrayShift have a beta copy of iOS 12 and they’ve tested it against their devices to come to this conclusion. Assuming they’re telling the truth of course. Which means that as the beta process for iOS 12 continues, Apple will likely try to figure out what they’ve done and close those attack vectors. Then GrayShift will most likely try to find new attack vectors. Thus, the arms race has begun between the two companies. The question is, will either side come out on top?

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