Microsoft pays hackers $120,000 for compromising the Edge browser

the Microsoft Edge browser

By tech2 News Staff /  14 Nov 2016 , 18:05

Teams from Beijing security firm, Qihoo and South Korean Hacker Lokihardt both managed to compromise the Microsoft Edge browser on Windows, and bagged bounties of $120,000 each. Each team or contenstant is given three attempts to compromise the target, with each attempt having a time limit of four minutes. Lokihardt managed to gain system level access in as little as 18 seconds.

The hacks were showcased at PwnFest, an event related to the ongoing Power of the Community information security conference in Seoul, Korea, according to a report in The Register. It was the first time that a VMware Workstation was successfully attacked with only remote code execution, and no interaction by the end user.

The PwnFest is a yearly event where major tech companies offer rewards to hackers for owning certain products. Targets for the hackers this year included Microsoft Edge, Google Pixel, Microsoft Hyper-V, Google Chrome, iOS, the Safari browser,  Adobe Flash and VMWare Workstation. The event also has a Lord of Pwn trophy given to the team with the most successful attacks, and if there is a tie, the award is decided based on technical merit of the hacks.

The prize money ranges from $80,000 for the Safari hack, to $150,000 for the VMWare and the Hyper-V attacks. The exploits are not publicly disclosed, and the companies usually take measures to plug these security holes.

Adobe reveals an app that lets you add words that were never spoken into an audio file

Image: Reuters

By tech2 News Staff /  04 Nov 2016 , 12:11

Technology has been mesmerising and slowly it is becoming incredibly unpredictable. Adobe is said to be working on software that will somewhat be like Photoshop but for audio. Codenamed Project VoCo, it will offer the ability to add words that are originally not in the audio file.

While it is still not confirmed whether or not it will release as a commercial product, an Adobe representative did confirm the existence of the project to The Verge. It was apparently , shown off as part of a sneak peak program at the MAX conference. It is said that the project is in development as part of a collaboration between members of Adobe Research and Princeton University.

Project VoCo is being touted as a high-end audio editing application where beyond standard speech editing and noise cancellation features it will have the ability generate new words using a person’s recorded voice. Basically the software will understand the makeup of a person’s voice and try to replicate it. However it does need about 20 minutes of speech recording.

An official Adobe statement says “When recording voiceovers, dialog, and narration, people would often like to change or insert a word or a few words due to either a mistake they made or simply because they would like to change part of the narrative. We have developed a technology called Project VoCo in which you can simply type in the word or words that you would like to change or insert into the voiceover. The algorithm does the rest and makes it sound like the original speaker said those words.”

If Adobe manages to pull this off, it’ll be one of the most important and crucial softwares of all times.

Adobe MAX 2016: Creators report 13% higher household incomes than non-creators, says Adobe report

  02 Nov 2016 , 16:07

Investing in creativity pays off with tangible benefits — from higher income to greater national competitiveness and productivity, a new Adobe report said on Wednesday.

The report, “State of Create: 2016”, released on the eve of Adobe MAX 2016 creativity conference, revealed that people who identify as creators globally report household income that is 13 per cent higher than non-creators.

Globally, more than two-thirds believe that being creative helps make people better workers, leaders, parents and students, the report highlighted. It incorporates responses from more than 5,000 adults across five countries.

“Creativity and productivity go hand in hand, but investing in creativity isn’t on the agenda for enough of today’s leaders,” Mala Sharma, vice president and general manager of Creative Cloud at Adobe, said in a statement.

“This survey provides a big wake-up call to businesses that they need to think differently and give employees the tools and freedom to be creative,” she added.

According to the report, US respondents said that being creative is valuable to the economy (77 per cent) and society (82 per cent).

Only five in 10 respondents (55 per cent) describe themselves as creative and 44 per cent say they are living up to their creative potential, showed the survey that found US creators earning 17 per cent more than non-creators.

“Businesses benefit from prioritising creativity and good design. Nearly 88 per cent believe that businesses that invest in creativity are more likely to foster innovation and 89 per cent believe that those who have adopted creativity have satisfied customers,” the report found.

The report pointed out that governments that invest in creativity are viewed more positively but agrees that there is a clear disconnect between the high value society places on creativity and the lack of investment in creative education.

Seventy-one per cent of respondents believe that creativity is being stifled by the educational system, and only 41 per cent feel that the government encourages schools to teach students to be creative.

The report also found that Japan is the most creative country and Tokyo the most creative city followed by the US and New York respectively.

IANS

Google discloses critical security vulnerability in Windows

Representational Image: Reuters

By tech2 News Staff /  01 Nov 2016 , 14:08

Two Google employees working for the Threat Analysis Group have publicly disclosed a critical Microsoft Windows vulnerability. The privilege escalation bug can allow malicious attackers to bypass security sandboxes and gain control of a system. Google has information that the vulnerability is being actively used by miscreants, and have announced the vulnerability so that users can take measures to protect themselves.

The vulnerability was reported to Adobe and Microsoft engineers on 21 October. On 26 October, Adobe released a security update after working closely with the Google Threat Analysis Group. Adobe Flash Player was affected by the vulnerability, and the security patchprevents attackers from gaining control of the system. However, Microsoft has neither released a security patch, nor issued an advisory to its users.

This is a class of exploits known as zero day exploits. These are previously unknown vulnerabilities, that have not been identified yet as an issue, and which the company is not currently patching. Google allows itself and other companies seven days to either patch or notify users of a critically vulnerable zero day exploits. These are vulnerabilities which leaves a large number of users exposed, with the chances of exploitation increasing on a daily basis. Google is publicly announcing the vulnerability, according to the guidelines laid down in the critical vulnerability policy of Google.

To avoid being affected by the vulnerability, users are advised to upgrade to the latest version of Adobe Flash player, if automatic updates are not enabled. Users of Microsoft Windows have to wait till Microsoft itself releases a security patch. Users are advised to install the Windows update and the Microsoft update when they come available.

Dropbox boosts productivity tools for iOS

Dropbox has launched a new iOS app with the goal to provide users with the same type of functionality and speed they would typically get on desktop machines.

By Tas Bindi | October 11, 2016, 9:33 PM PST



Dropbox has added new productivity features to its iOS application, as it attempts to make working on mobile devices as productive and efficient as working on desktop computers.

Among its new features is the ability to sign PDFs and share Dropbox files in iMessage while conversing with teammates on the go.

The company has also introduced a new lock screen widget that allows users to start workflows — such as create, scan, view, and upload images and documents — without having to unlock their mobile devices.

Users can also get real-time file updates — a notification is sent to users as soon as someone saves a new version of a file they're viewing. A "refresh" button appears that users can tap to see what changes have been made to the file.

"The goal was to [contain] these workflows that involve multiple steps within the Dropbox app experience," said Matt Pan, Group Product Manager for Dropbox's File Collaboration Product Group, in an interview with TechRepublic.

"We are constantly building on top of the latest functionality iOS and different operating systems provide to create integrated experiences for our users."

Other new features include the iPad Picture-in-Picture, which allows users to watch a video on Dropbox while using another app on their iPad — for example, an annotation app. In the coming weeks, Dropbox will also launch split-screen capabilities to allow users to work across multiple apps without having to toggle back and forth.

"The last two features are all about multitasking. We have a meaningful contingent of iPad users who are using Dropbox extensively for work productivity; and increasingly, they want the same multitasking [capabilities] that they get on desktop machines, on their iPad," Pan told TechRepublic.


Pan said there is

Mozilla is testing outside plugins with Firefox to keep costs down

By Shawn Knight on October 3, 2016, 3:30 PM




In an effort to keep costs down, the Mozilla Foundation recently launched a new project that it hopes will reduce the amount of time its developers spend working on non-core components of Firefox. As a non-profit, it’s important for the Mozilla Foundation to keep costs at a minimum.

As Mozilla Senior Director of Engineering Johnny Stenback explains, Project Mortar will allow Mozilla to have a stronger focus on advancing the web and reduce the complexity and long-term maintenance cost of Firefox by replacing non-core pieces of its platform with existing alternatives like those from other browser vendors.

Initially, Project Mortar will investigate how Firefox handles PDF rendering and look for lower cost approaches to providing Flash support as its use continues to decline. Right now, the project is determining the feasibility of using the minimum set of Pepper APIs to support the PDFium library for rendering PDF documents as well as the Pepper Flash plugin.

As The Register highlights, PDFium is Chrome’s open-source native PDF viewer. The Adobe / Google-built Pepper Flash player, for those not familiar, runs inside a sandbox in an effort to limit the amount of damage that malicious code could do when exploiting a vulnerability in the plugin.

Stenback notes that if these experiments are successful, it will allow them to completely remove NPAPI support from Firefox once NPAPI is disabled for general plugin use.