Teknovis

A friend recently made me aware of a new child locating service called num8 by a company called Lok8u. The service is delivered using a child-friendly watch that contains a GPS receiver, and it uses Google Maps to display the child’s location.

The Lok8u website claims:

Now available.. the world’s first GPS locator that locates your child…not just the device.

And…

num8 is the world’s first GPS locator device that has been specifically designed with children in mind.

I am wary of these claims… For example, I think that Wherify would dispute these claims (if it was still operating)!

Wherify Wireless Watches

I am sure that there are many others also!

Tags: Google, GPS, Lok8u, Wherify

I read an article during the week about a letter of support for Net Neutrality from some of the biggest, and most well-known, Internet based companies in the world. The article is Big names support net neutrality, and it lists the following supporters:

The letter, signed by the chief executives of Google, Ebay, Skype, Facebook, Amazon and Sony Electronics among others, says that maintaining data neutrality helps businesses to compete on the basis of content alone.

And…

Other signatories included community websites Digg, Flickr, LinkedIn and Craigslist.

This list of companies does not really surprise me, as they probably have the most to gain from Net Neutrality. Conversely, it is probably the telcos who have the most to loose!

Tags: Amazon, Craigslist, Digg, eBay, Facebook, Flickr, Google, LinkedIn, Net Neutrality, Skype, Sony

I read today that Manchester Airport has installed full body scanners to determine if users are carrying prohibited items. These scanners are developed by Rapiscan Systems, and the idea of them is that they will provide greater security for passengers, as well as improving their travelling experiences.

For more information about these scanners read Airport scanner shows ‘naked’ images or watch the video in ‘Naked’ scanner in airport trial.

Clearly such scanners will raise security concerns. Therefore, certain measures will be taken to protest users privacy:

• The operators will be in separate locations
• The operators will not be able to see the passengers’ faces
• The operators cannot use personal devices to capture images
• The images cannot be stored by the system

These measures are admirable, but I am not sure if they are really that useful.

Personally, I would not mind somebody seeing these images of my body, especially if it improves my airport experience!

However, I wonder will these scanners be used in other locations in the future, without knowledge or consent of the people being scanned. For example, such a scanner could be used at the entrance of a nightclub. Would this be a valid privacy concern?

Tags: Rapiscan Systems, UK

New Unit of Reviewed Code Quality

Very funny :D

I got my first Bank of Ireland phishing email last week, and I have got about three per day since! A typical one looks like this:

Subject: 365 Banking: You are required to confirm your email address
Date: Sun, 04 Oct 2009 20:50:23 +0200
From: Bank of Ireland <accounts@boi.ie>
To: xxx@xxx.xxx

http://www.sp-ad.com/.www.365online.ie/

The url looks really convincing, and I found it quite difficult to explain how to extract the domain name to some non-technical friends.

The page looks really convincing also! I did not visit it myself, but I used an online service to capture a screenshot of it:

Bank of Ireland Phishing Screenshot

The real page can be viewed at https://www.365online.com/.

Tags: Bank of Ireland, Phishing