Sunday, October 27, 2013

Windows Store recommendations could one day reflect your usage patterns

Windows Store recommendations could one day reflect your usage patterns data = {blogUrl: "www.engadget.com",v: 320};when = {jquery: lab.scriptBs("jquery"),plugins: lab.scriptBs("plugins"),eng: lab.scriptBs("eng")}; var s265prop9 = ('20641613' !== '') ? 'bsd:20641613' : ''; var postID = '20641613'; var modalMNo = '93325862', modalVideoMNo = '93320648', modalGalleryMNo = '93304207'; when.eng("eng.omni.init", {pfxID:"weg",pageName:document.title,server:"acp-ld39.websys.aol.com",channel:"us.engadget", s_account: "aolwbengadget,aolsvc", short_url: "",pageType:"",linkInternalFilters:"javascript:,",prop1:"article",prop2:"software",prop9:s265prop9,prop12:document.location,prop17:"",prop18:"",prop19:"",prop20:"", prop22:"dana-wollman", prop54:"blogsmith",mmxgo: true }); adSendTerms('1')adSetMOAT('1');adSetAdURL('/_uac/adpagem.html');lab._script("http://o.aolcdn.com/os/ads/adhesion/js/adhads-min.js").wait(function(){var floatingAd = new AdhesiveAd("348-14-15-14c",{hideOnSwipe:true});}); onBreak({980: function () { adSetType("F");htmlAdWH("93325862", "LB", "LB"); adSetType("");}}); EngadgetMenu NewsReviews Features Galleries VideosEventsPodcasts Engadget ShowTopics Buyers Guides Sagas Store Hands On More Betterer HD Mobile Alt Announcements Cameras Cellphones Desktops Displays Gaming GPS Handhelds Home Entertainment Household Internet Laptops Meta Misc Networking Peripherals Podcasts Robots Portable Audio/Video Science Software Storage Tablets Transportation Wearables Wireless Acer Amazon AMD Apple ASUS AT&T Blackberry Canon Dell Facebook Google HP HTC Intel Lenovo LG Microsoft Nikon Nintendo Nokia NVIDIA Samsung Sony Sprint T-Mobile Verizon About UsSubscribeLike Engadget@engadgettip uswhen.eng("eng.nav.init")when.eng("eng.tips.init") onBreak({980: function () {htmlAdWH("93325870", "215", "35",'AJAX','ajaxsponsor');}});Windows Store recommendations could one day reflect your usage patternsBypostedJun 27th, 2013 at 7:06 PM 0

Windows Store recommendations could one day reflect your usage patterns

Yesterday was the day Microsoft made Windows 8.1 available as a public download; today's the day we ask "what's next?" Here at the company's annual Build developer conference, we sat down with Ted Dworkin, the man who oversees the Windows Store, to do a deeper dive on the store's latest redesign. In particular, we were curious about that new Bing-powered recommendation engine, and how it might become smarter over time. What ensued was a Pandora's box of a brainstorming session. Naturally, Dworkin wouldn't make any promises about what we'll see in future updates, but he did offer some compelling ideas about how Microsoft could take people's usage patterns into account when recommending apps. For instance, while Windows already knows which applications you've downloaded, a future version of the store might also be aware of which apps you use most frequently, which ones you've uninstalled, which ones you've shared, which ones you've pinned, which ones you've unpinned, et cetera. On a privacy note, the recommendation engine is already optional, so there's no reason why you couldn't disable this kind of data collection too.

For starters, this an interesting idea for the developers attending Build this week -- there are definitely people out there who download apps because they're testing them (or reviewing them) and not because they plan on using them every day. Even more broadly, though, who among us hasn't gone on a downloading spree, just to see what they liked? With usage patterns taken into account, you might get more useful picks, ones that ignore that random Twitter client or Angry Birds game you installed. Again, Dworkin wouldn't say for sure if Microsoft plans on implementing any of this, but our vote would be "yes" if it leads to more recommendations we'd actually use.

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Posted by Chris Holman at 8:09 PM 0 comments
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FCC demands carriers protect customer privacy in declaratory ruling

FCC ACTS TO PROTECT PRIVATE CONSUMER INFORMATION ON WIRELESS DEVICES

Washington, D.C. – The Commission today took action to protect the privacy of consumers of wireless services by clarifying its customer proprietary network information (CPNI) policies in response to changes in technology and market practices in recent years. Today's Declaratory Ruling rests on a simple and fundamentally fair principle: when a telecommunications carrier collects CPNI using its control of its customers' mobile devices, and the carrier or its designee has access to or control over the information, the carrier is responsible for safeguarding that information.

Specifically, the Declaratory Ruling makes clear that when mobile carriers use their control of customers' devices to collect information about customers' use of the network, including using preinstalled apps, and the carrier or its designee has access to or control over the information, carriers are required to protect that information in the same way they are required to protect CPNI on the network. This sensitive information can include phone numbers that a customer has called and received calls from, the durations of calls, and the phone's location at the beginning and end of each call.

Carriers are allowed to collect this information and to use it to improve their networks and for customer support. Carriers' collection of this information can benefit consumers by enabling a carrier to detect a weak signal, a dropped call, or trouble with particular phone models. But if carriers collect CPNI in this manner, today's ruling makes clear that they must protect it.

The Declaratory Ruling does not impose any requirements on non-carrier, third-party developers of applications that consumers may install on their own. The ruling also does not adopt or propose any new rules regarding how carriers may use CPNI or how they must protect it.

The Commission can take enforcement action in the event that a failure to take reasonable precautions causes a compromise of CPNI on a device. This clarification avoids what would otherwise be an important gap in privacy protections for consumers.

Today's action is the latest by the FCC to protect consumer privacy as part of the agency's mission to serve the public interest. By taking action in this area, the Commission reaffirms that it is looking out for consumers in the telecommunications market.

Action by the Commission June 27, 2013, by Declaratory Ruling (FCC 13-89). Acting Chairwoman Clyburn and Commissioner Rosenworcel with Commissioner Pai approving in part/concurring in part. Acting Chairwoman Clyburn, Commissioners Rosenworcel and Pai issuing statements.


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Posted by Chris Holman at 3:10 PM 0 comments
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Claire McCaskill Will Not Be Trolled by James Taranto

Many liberals have given up on getting angry about the Wall Street Journal columns of troll virtuoso James Taranto, but he's found a young, angry army of hate-readers in the feminist blogosphere whom he now provokes on a regular basis. A recent column thanking Princeton Mom Susan Patton for teaching women to take advantage of their "peak nubility" was memorable, but it was nothing compared to his more recent op-ed, slamming Congress's efforts to reform the military's dangerously dysfunctional system for prosecuting sexual assault. In it, Taranto accused Senator Claire McCaskill of declaring a "war on men": "a political campaign against sexual assault in the military that shows signs of becoming an effort to criminalize male sexuality." And that, you don't get away with. McCaskill, a former courtroom prosecutor of sex crimes, takes to the Daily Beast today to explain calmly, and in the plainest language possible, that Taranto has no idea what he's talking about. 

McCaskill "had reservations about responding to the multiple columns ... in which he makes a lengthy and spirited defense of a convicted sex offender," but she chose to go in on Taranto's re-litigation of a sexual assault case he did not see (in such a way that equates sexual assault with "hanky panky" and having a drink as "sexual recklessness"), she writes, because this stuff happens all the time.

I don't recommend following James Taranto, long-term, on Twitter, but today might be an entertaining day to drop by. 


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Posted by Chris Holman at 11:26 AM 0 comments
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US military will spend $23 billion on cyber defense, create its own secure 4G network

US military will spend $23 billion on cyber defense, create its own secure 4G network data = {blogUrl: "www.engadget.com",v: 320};when = {jquery: lab.scriptBs("jquery"),plugins: lab.scriptBs("plugins"),eng: lab.scriptBs("eng")}; var s265prop9 = ('20641773' !== '') ? 'bsd:20641773' : ''; var postID = '20641773'; var modalMNo = '93319229', modalVideoMNo = '93320648', modalGalleryMNo = '93304207'; when.eng("eng.omni.init", {pfxID:"weg",pageName:document.title,server:"acp-ld39.websys.aol.com",channel:"us.engadget", s_account: "aolwbengadget,aolsvc", short_url: "",pageType:"",linkInternalFilters:"javascript:,",prop1:"article",prop2:"wireless",prop9:s265prop9,prop12:document.location,prop17:"",prop18:"",prop19:"",prop20:"", prop22:"steve-dent", prop54:"blogsmith",mmxgo: true }); adSendTerms('1')adSetMOAT('1');adSetAdURL('/_uac/adpagem.html');lab._script("http://o.aolcdn.com/os/ads/adhesion/js/adhads-min.js").wait(function(){var floatingAd = new AdhesiveAd("348-14-15-14d",{hideOnSwipe:true});}); onBreak({980: function () { adSetType("F");htmlAdWH("93319229", "LB", "LB"); adSetType("");}}); EngadgetMenu NewsReviews Features Galleries VideosEventsPodcasts Engadget ShowTopics Buyers Guides Sagas Store Hands On More Betterer HD Mobile Alt Announcements Cameras Cellphones Desktops Displays Gaming GPS Handhelds Home Entertainment Household Internet Laptops Meta Misc Networking Peripherals Podcasts Robots Portable Audio/Video Science Software Storage Tablets Transportation Wearables Wireless Acer Amazon AMD Apple ASUS AT&T Blackberry Canon Dell Facebook Google HP HTC Intel Lenovo LG Microsoft Nikon Nintendo Nokia NVIDIA Samsung Sony Sprint T-Mobile Verizon About UsSubscribeLike Engadget@engadgettip uswhen.eng("eng.nav.init")when.eng("eng.tips.init") onBreak({980: function () {htmlAdWH("93308280", "215", "35",'AJAX','ajaxsponsor');}});US military will spend $23 billion on cyber defense, create its own secure 4G networkBypostedJun 28th, 2013 at 5:03 AM 0

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The US Department of Defense told a Washington thinktank yesterday that it would spend $23 billion in the next four years to kick its cyber defenses up a gear. That'll include building out a "secure 4G wireless network that will get iPads, iPhones and Android devices online by mid-2014," according to Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Martin Dempsey. The DoD recently approved Blackberry 10, iOS and Samsung Galaxy devices with Knox, and General Dempsey himself was packing a smartphone he said would "make Batman and James Bond jealous." While there were no details about how such a mobile network would be locked down, he did say that all 15,000 of the Department's computer networks would be consolidated into an enterprise cloud system to increase security. All that is to combat a "17-fold" cyber warfare increase in just over two years -- no doubt including recent Chinese hacking that the White House took the rare step of recently highlighting.

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Posted by Chris Holman at 7:36 AM 0 comments
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Miley Cyrus Displayed a Tame(r) Look

Yesterday, the former Disney princess was snapped en route to SiriusXM Studios to promote her latest song, "We Can't Stop." While Cyrus has recently displayed a seemingly unquenchable thirst to parade around town in a combo of ab-baring crop tops, granny-panty hot pants, thigh-high boots, and a severe bleached coif, her trip to a radio show brought out a more relaxed side to her. She displayed a sleeker do, combing her hair down, and wore an intricate royal-blue outfit from Emilio Pucci's spring 2013 collection consisting of a tiger-embroidered bomber crop and a skirt. She polished off her look with white Céline heels. No undies, stiletto heels, or crimson lips in sight.


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Posted by Chris Holman at 3:11 AM 0 comments
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