Boing Boing » apple

Apple can decrypt iPhones for cops; Google can remotely "reset password" for Android devices

Cory Doctorow — Sun, 12 May 2013 15:49:04 +0000

Apple apparently has the power to decrypt iPhone storage in response to law-enforcement requests, though they won't say how. Google can remotely "reset the password" for a phone for cops, too:

Last year, leaked training materials prepared by the Sacramento sheriff's office included a form that would require Apple to "assist law enforcement agents" with "bypassing the cell phone user's passcode so that the agents may search the iPhone." Google takes a more privacy-protective approach: it "resets the password and further provides the reset password to law enforcement," the materials say, which has the side effect of notifying the user that his or her cell phone has been compromised.
Ginger Colbrun, ATF's public affairs chief, told CNET that "ATF cannot discuss specifics of ongoing investigations or litigation. ATF follows federal law and DOJ/department-wide policy on access to all communication devices."
...The ATF's Maynard said in an affidavit for the Kentucky case that Apple "has the capabilities to bypass the security software" and "download the contents of the phone to an external memory device." Chang, the Apple legal specialist, told him that "once the Apple analyst bypasses the passcode, the data will be downloaded onto a USB external drive" and delivered to the ATF.
It's not clear whether that means Apple has created a backdoor for police -- which has been the topic of speculation in the past -- whether the company has custom hardware that's faster at decryption, or whether it simply is more skilled at using the same procedures available to the government. Apple declined to discuss its law enforcement policies when contacted this week by CNET.

It's not clear to me from the above whether Google "resetting the password" for Android devices merely bypasses the lock-screen or actually decrypts the mass storage on the phone if it has been encrypted.

I also wonder if the "decryption" Apple undertakes relies on people habitually using short passwords for their phones -- the alternative being a lot of screen-typing in order to place a call.

Apple deluged by police demands to decrypt iPhones [Declan McCullagh/CNet]

(via /.)

Skeuomorphism, Apple, and Ricardo Montalbán's favorite station wagon

David Pescovitz — Thu, 09 May 2013 03:43:16 +0000

Over at Apple, Jony Ive is reportedly pulling back on the skeuomorphism for iOS 7. I'm glad. I don't care for skeuomorphism except in a very few instances, like the 1982 Chrysler Town & Country seen above with Ricardo Montalbán.

Apple won't fix your computer if you smoke near it

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 21:21:10 +0000

Consumerist's Laura Northrup rounds up several years' worth of stories from Apple customers who say they were denied warranty support on their computers because they'd smoked around them. As an annoying ex-smoker, I can sympathize with a tech who doesn't want to work on a machine that smells like an old ashtray, but that's what painter's masks are for -- I've also serviced machines that reeked of BO and other less savory odors. This just feels like a way to weasel out of doing warranty service and forcing customers to pay for new machines. If the company has a policy of not fixing machines if you smoke near them, it should say so when it sells you the warranty: WARNING: IF YOU LIGHT UP NEAR YOUR LAPTOP, WE WON'T EVER FIX IT, EVEN IF IT IS MATERIALLY DEFECTIVE.

Dena set up an appointment at the same Apple store. They told me that they would take pictures of the computer – both inside and out before determining whether to proceed and that if the only problem was the optical drive, they’d probably just replace it. Dena called me earlier this week to deliver the “bad news.” She said that the computer is beyond economical repair due to tar from cigarette smoke! She said the hard drive is about to fail, the optical drive has failed and it isn’t feasible to repair the computer under the warranty. This computer is less than 2 years old! Only one person in my household smokes – one 21 year old college student. She said that I can get it repaired elsewhere at my expense. I asked why my warranty didn’t cover the repair and was told it’s an OSHA violation.

Smoking Near Apple Computers Creates Biohazard, Voids Warranty

Siri keeps data for "up to two years", but only anonymously

Rob Beschizza — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 15:24:10 +0000

Robert McMillan explains what happens to the data generated and stored with Siri queries: "Once the voice recording is six months old, Apple “disassociates” your user number from the clip, deleting the number from the voice file. But it keeps these disassociated files for up to 18 more months for testing and product improvement purposes." [Wired]

Steve Jobs Manga

Rob Beschizza — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 19:08:18 +0000

Posted online is a preview of the first installment of Manga Taishō and Mari Yamazaki's manga bio of Steve Jobs.

OS X Lion-O

Rob Beschizza — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 16:47:13 +0000

John Brownlee has a solution to the "big cat" problem now faced by OS X's marketing team, which has run out of cool ones to use as version titles

Apple loyalty test rumor debunked

Rob Beschizza — Sat, 16 Feb 2013 16:05:09 +0000

Derived from Adam Lashinsky's Inside Apple, rumors spread of "fake" engineering projects within Apple, crafted to expose leakers. Not quite, reports Jacqui Cheng: "Our own sources acknowledged that Apple may not tell an engineer what project he or she is about to work on until the time comes, which is what Lashinsky was talking about in Inside Apple. Lashinsky clarified that the "fake" projects line didn't come from him but secondhand from an audience member, who had himself heard about it from a friend."

Apple rumor watch: 100 designers developing wristwatch computer

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 18:03:38 +0000

Bloomberg reports that a team of "about 100 product designers are working on a wristwatch-like device that may perform some of the tasks now handled by the iPhone and iPad."

LEGO Macintosh model

David Pescovitz — Tue, 05 Feb 2013 17:48:52 +0000

Exquisite LEGO model of the original Apple Macintosh by Chris McVeigh, aka powerpig on Flickr.

A bizarre Steve Jobs "Groucho" photo and the story behind it

Rob Beschizza — Fri, 25 Jan 2013 15:42:19 +0000

John Brownlee tells the story of "a photograph of Steve Jobs so incredible, so deserved of being considered iconic, that you simply can’t believe that no one has ever even heard of it."

My Great Ghost, "Glass Machine"—remixing Philip Glass, with an app

Xeni Jardin — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 17:34:58 +0000

Scott Snibbe, the developer for Björk’s "Biophilia" app, has developed an iOS app for the Philip Glass remix project—the app is titled REWORK_.

Here is a video of My Great Ghost, whose remix of "Music in 12 Parts" is the first track on the record, performing an entirely new track using the app.

More about the app:

The studio has built a REWORK app that includes interactive visualizations corresponding to 11 of the remix songs with visuals that range from futuristic three-dimensional landscapes to shattered multicolored crystals and vibrating sound waves. The app also includes an interactive “Glass Machine” that allows users to create their own music inspired by Philip Glass’ early works by simply sliding two discs around side-by-side, generating polyrhythmic counterpoints between the two melodies.
“This is a way for people who don’t have the experience of manipulating music material to see what it's like,” says Glass.
The app is available via the iTunes store here and more info can be found at the Snibbe Studio website here.

And for those in the NYC area: My Great Ghost is playing at the Studio at Webster Hall on Monday 1/21.

Jony Ive introduces Apple's latest

Rob Beschizza — Mon, 17 Dec 2012 14:04:36 +0000

John Herrman is brilliant.

New Apple iTunes 11 interface revealed

Xeni Jardin — Thu, 29 Nov 2012 12:56:33 +0000

Vintage ad scanned and Flickr'd by James Vaughan.

Wouldn't it be nifty if the newest iteration of iTunes, which in my opinion is one of a great company's poorest products, looked like this? The Ping-less iTunes 11 is set to launch this month, likely today, according to hints dropped in this Wall Street Journal profile of Apple exec Eddy Cue. It's not that big a secret, anyways; the Apple.com iTunes splash page says it's "coming in November," and there aren't many days left in November.

Below, *actual* screenshots of the new interface. Come to think of it, the new UI resembles the vintage ad more than iTunes 10 does! But I don't like it. I wish iTunes were a skinnable, interpret-able service with an API, like Twitter is (for now, anyway)—imagine if you could use any third-party client you wanted to access the service, as cleanly and free of cruft as you please.

Library view

Album view

Apple's Siri vs. Japanese-accented English

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 00:36:25 +0000

In this video, an increasingly frustrated native Japanese speaker discovers that Siri is unable to parse the spoken English word "work" when voiced with a typical Japanese accent. (kenjikinukawa via Joi Ito)

Remembering the EasyKey keyboard overlay for the Apple ][

Mark Frauenfelder — Wed, 14 Nov 2012 22:12:50 +0000

Bob Knetzger is a toy and game designer and the Toy Inventor's Notebook columnist for MAKE. He says:

Saw your cool post on clunky 80's Apple ][ software interfaces -- wow, that really takes me back.

That kind of horrible interface is what inspired me to develop the EasyKey keyboard overlay for the Apple ][ and other home computers.

This EasyKey brand was created by me and my two partners at the time, fellow industrial designer Rick Gurolnick and programming and hardware whiz EE Dan Schoff. Together we started a small company called Neosoft that created some of the most highly regarded educational software of the 1908s. We created products for CBS Software, Simon and Schuster, and others, that combined the clever 6502 assembly language programming techniques (who remembers page flipping, pixel patterns to create extra pseudo colors, and sound waveform zero-crossing for A to D sound tricks?) with solid educational values together with state of the zippy bit-map art work.

The titles were award-winning, museum-level quality, and just plain FUN! Baby dinosaurs hatched out of their eggs to show your scores, human body cut-away layers dissolved to show internal organs, maps and timelines came to life...and more. And this at a time when most Apple ][ software offered space invader sprites.

With our EasyKey titles you could change programs and just swap the keyboard cover. Here, play US Presidents games without any typing or spelling--just press for your choice:

Kids around the world had fun and learned with our programs--here's an Aboriginal student in AUS tries out some looking-and-counting games with Number Farm -- as depicted in National Geographic:

Apple ordered to pay Samsung's legal fees in UK after 'false and misleading' notice

Rob Beschizza — Mon, 12 Nov 2012 17:14:51 +0000

After losing a patent lawsuit with Samsung in the UK, Apple was required to post information about the ruling on its website and in media advertising. After seeing Apple interweave the details into an amusing editorial and later tuck it out of sight with a clever web design trick, the court appears not to be amused. As quoted by Chris Foreman at Ars Technica:

"The false innuendo is that the UK court came to a different conclusion about copying, which is not true for the UK court did not form any view about copying," Sir Robin Jacob noted in the final order, which was published online on Sunday. "There is a further false innuendo that the UK court's decision is at odds with decisions in other countries whereas that is simply not true. Apple's additions to the ordered notice clearly muddied the water and the message obviously intended to be conveyed by it."

Apple: three million iPads sold since Friday's launch

Xeni Jardin — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 14:10:11 +0000

Three million iPads have been sold in the the three days since Apple launched a new iPad mini and fourth-generation iPad.

Slippery web designers at Apple hide court ordered apology perpetually below the fold

Dean Putney — Sun, 04 Nov 2012 14:23:27 +0000

Apple was recently ordered by a UK court to publicly display a notice that Samsung did not copy the iPad with their Galaxy tablet to undo the damage they've done by making that accusation. And like a scolded child, they're scuffling their feet and mumbling "sorry" to the ground.

It's no surprise that their apology is at the bottom of the page, or that you need to scroll to see it. What's sneaky about it is that the large image of the iPad on their homepage resizes automatically to force that text to always appear below the fold when you load the page. Apple's webmasters have written in code to figure out how tall your browser window is, then make the site's design just big enough to push the apology out of your view and make you scroll to see it.

apple.co.uk [via Reddit] Thanks, Majd!

Siri vs. Google Voice Search for iPhone

Xeni Jardin — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 16:56:13 +0000

The guys at Gizmodo did a side-by-side comparison of voice search on iPhone, using Siri vs. using Google Voice Search for iOS. (Thanks, Joe Sabia!)

Gruber on iPad Mini

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 31 Oct 2012 16:30:40 +0000

“Wow, it feels like a Kindle,” and “Ew, the screen is terrible,” were Mrs. Daring Fireball’s initial reactions when Gruber handed her the iPad Mini to see what she, "an avid daily user of an iPad 3," thought. "Her initial reaction matched mine exactly, and perfectly encapsulates the experience," Gruber writes. But his prediction: "This is going to play out much like the iPod and iPod Mini back in 2004: the full-size model will continue to sell strongly, but the Mini is going to become the bestselling model." [daringfireball.net]

What Apple's Game of Executive Thrones means for you

Xeni Jardin — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 21:16:45 +0000

iOS chief Scott Forstall is out, SVP Jonny Ive moves to head of Interface design—lots of changes at One Infinite Loop. Dan Moren at Macworld writes about the executive shuffle Apple announced late Monday. "It's the kind of drama we in the tech press usually only get from watching Game of Thrones," says Dan. "Consider what Monday’s maneuvers mean for the hardware, software, and services coming out of Cupertino.

Parody iPad Mini promo video

Mark Frauenfelder — Mon, 29 Oct 2012 16:40:30 +0000

This parody promo for the iPad Mini is funny and factual.

iOS Maps debacle reimagined as surrealist art project

David Pescovitz — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 17:08:44 +0000

If Apple's iOS Maps disaster was actually avant-garde art… (Thanks, Dustin Hostetler!)

Tech journalism

Cory Doctorow — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 00:06:53 +0000

Dan Gillmor sez, "This is a story about a story about a rumor of an invitation to an announcement of a product launch. Needless to say, the company involved is Apple."

Steve Jobs, Romantic

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 18:14:05 +0000

At O'Reilly Radar, Doug Hill with a worthy read on the late Apple CEO: "I’d like to talk here about a spirit that Jobs carried within himself. It’s a spirit he relied on for inspiration, although he seemed at times to have lost track of its whisper. In any event, what it says can tell us a lot about our relationship to machines. I refer to the spirit of Romanticism. I spent much of this past summer reading about the Romantics — the original Romantics, that is, of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries — and it’s remarkable how closely their most cherished beliefs correspond to principles that Jobs considered crucial to his success at Apple."

Unique issues in Japan for Apple iOS6 maps

Xeni Jardin — Tue, 25 Sep 2012 15:03:09 +0000

Inconsistencies and funny goofs with Apple's new iOS6 maps feature have been widely reported. But in Japan, a country-specific set of technical issues contribute to the feature's lack of reliability there. The biggest problem, according to a NYT article by Hiroko Tabuchi, is that "much of its data appears to be drawn from OpenStreetMap Japan, a Wikipedia-like service that contains a lot of incorrect and outdated information," and Japan "uses a system of longitude and latitude that differs slightly from the global standard." Apple may have mixed up conflicting data sources that use both systems. (NYTimes.com)

Advisory: iOS6 maps on the tube

Cory Doctorow — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 12:54:13 +0000

The London Underground workers made a funny.

(Thanks, Fipi Lele!)

(Image: source unknown -- if you know it, please leave details in the comments)

IOS6 maps fail so hard, a Tumblr is born

Xeni Jardin — Thu, 20 Sep 2012 14:29:08 +0000

You know you have an issue when someone brews up a Tumblr to mock you: theamazingios6maps.tumblr.com.

RIP, Ping

Xeni Jardin — Mon, 17 Sep 2012 19:28:39 +0000

During last week's iPhone 5 unveil, Apple CEO Tim Cook confirmed that the company's social network foray would be mothballed on September 30. That gives you, like, 2 weeks to figure out what the hell Ping is. Cook signaled this was coming earlier this year at the All Things Digital 2012 event: “We tried Ping, and I think the customer voted and said ‘This isn’t something that I want to put a lot of energy into.’”

Kirby Ferguson's TED Talk: "Embrace the Remix" - a must-see

Cory Doctorow — Mon, 13 Aug 2012 21:20:06 +0000

Kirby "Everything is a Remix" Ferguson, whose work we've blogged about a lot, gave an amazing, must-see TED Talk about the way that creativity comes about as the result of creative re-use of others' work. It's not just explicit remixes and samples -- everything from the iPhone to Bob Dylan's music are made out of other peoples' inventions and creations. Ferguson shows that our cognitive bias for "loss aversion" makes us willing to take others' ideas, but furious when others take our ideas and build on them (cue Steve Jobs saying "I've always stolen shamelessly from the best" and contrasted with his vow to "go thermonuclear on Android" because "It is a stolen product.") We rationalize that the stuff we take from others is just plumbing -- uncreative infrastructure to which we add our own special snowflakes of creativity. But everyone thinks that his or her work is a special snowflake and everyone else's is boring plumbing. The truth is, it's both. And copyright and patent laws, with their "awkward metaphor" of property, have it backwards. They make hypocrites out of all of us, forcing us to pretend that our inspiration arrived holus-bolus, as our brains were bestirred by mystical muses -- and to deny our participation in the ancient tradition of ripping off the best and making something that's ours out of what we take.

Embrace the Remix (via TechDirt)