License plate data lets cops spy on US drivers at record rates, and more for Tuesday, January 27, 2015

License plate data lets cops spy on US drivers at record rates Jeff John Roberts Jan 27 2015, 6:03am PDT A new investigation shows the scale of surveillance on U.S. highways is more extensive than many previously imagined, thanks to a license plate database that allows federal and local law enforcement to watch cars and even drivers in real time. According to documents reviewed by the Wall Street Journal, the […] Read More » Sponsored post: Thought leadership webinar: The death of traditional data integration SnapLogic Jan 27 2015, 5:55am PDT The Death of Traditional Data Integration How the Changing Nature of IT Mandates New Approaches and Technologies Live Webinar 1/28/15 10AM PST / 1:00PM EST Join two industry thought leaders and pioneers, Dave Linthicum, SVP, Cloud Technology Partners and Gaurav Dhillon , Co-founder and CEO, SnapLogic in this upcoming webinar about the state […] Read More » Patent grant suggests Apple considered own gamepad for iPhones Kevin C. Tofel Jan 27 2015, 5:44am PDT Although there are several third-party gamepads for iOS devices, Apple could yet build its own. This week, the company was granted a patent for a gaming accessory that it first filed back in 2008, according to Patently Apple. The patent describes a type of shell for […] Read More » Cloudbees rakes in $23.5M to fund mo’ marketing Barb Darrow Jan 27 2015, 5:40am PDT Cloudbees, the PaaS company that’s transitioned into a continuous integration company, now has $23.5 million in Series D money to fund expanded sales and marketing in more geographies. “We want to scale up and scale out,” Cloudbees CEO Sacha Labourey said in an interview. “To scale up we’ll […] Read More » Internet of things needs global privacy push, says UK regulator David Meyer Jan 27 2015, 5:34am PDT The U.K. telecommunications regulator Ofcom has called for international industry standards on privacy in the internet of things. On Tuesday the regulator published an outline of its approach to the developing internet of things, largely based on responses to a call for input that it made […] Read More » Dutch and Slovenian regulators nail carriers over net neutrality David Meyer Jan 27 2015, 3:04am PDT While the European Union dithers over EU-wide net neutrality, some European countries are marching on regardless. On Friday Slovenia’s regulators nailed carriers Telekom Slovenije and Si.mobil for violating net neutrality principles, and on Tuesday Dutch regulators fined KPN and Vodafone for similar violations. The latest ruling, […] Read More » Facebook: Downtime was caused by an internal boo-boo, not a hack David Meyer Jan 27 2015, 1:32am PDT Facebook’s outage early on Tuesday, which also took out linked services such as Instagram and Tinder, was down to a technical issue caused by the company itself rather than external factors. The outage affected users around the world. According to a technical note, the outage lasted […] Read More » Opera founder unveils feature-rich Vivaldi power browser David Meyer Jan 27 2015, 1:00am PDT Almost two years ago, the Norwegian browser firm Opera ripped out the guts of its product and adopted the more standard WebKit and Chromium technologies, essentially making it more like rivals Chrome and Safari. But it wasn’t just Opera’s innards that changed; the browser also became […] Read More » Silent night: Facebook, Instagram go down for Snowmadgeddon Tom Krazit Jan 26 2015, 10:36pm PDT All those carefully crafted images of snowscapes will have to stay locked up for a bit, East Coasters, because Facebook and Instagram are down. (Update 11:12pm: Our brief Facebook-related national nightmare appears to be over, at least for me and Janko Roettgers on the West Coast.) […] Read More » Forget TV, let’s put the Supreme Court on YouTube Jeff John Roberts Jan 26 2015, 2:55pm PDT The Supreme Court is now on YouTube — sort of. A clandestine video from the court has turned up on the popular video-sharing platform, showing moments of last week’s outbursts in which protestors harangued the Justices about a controversial decision about corporate free speech. The protestors were hauled away and charged […] Read More » Microsoft cites key cloud and mobile segments for good Q2 Barb Darrow Jan 26 2015, 1:23pm PDT Microsoft is claiming strong cloud-and-mobile growth in its second-quarter earnings release. The company which is playing catchup in cloud now claims a $5.5 billion run rate there, up from the $4.4 billion it claimed last quarter. On Monday the company reported diluted earnings per share (EPS) of […] Read More » Got a low-cost laptop? Windows 10 upgrade may take some effort Kevin C. Tofel Jan 26 2015, 11:23am PDT Now that Microsoft has opened up the floodgates to try the Windows 10 Technical Preview, you’re itching to give it a go, right? So am I, so I attempted to get the latest software through the Windows Insider program. These days, I’m using the $229 HP Stream […] Read More » An increasingly rare type of solar farm goes online in California Katie Fehrenbacher Jan 26 2015, 11:19am PDT When the huge solar farm just outside of Las Vegas called Ivanpah opened up in early 2014, many lamented that this type of solar plant, called solar thermal, could soon become a dinosaur. Late last week another of these large solar thermal farms was officially turned […] Read More » IBM bristles at report of massive layoffs to come Barb Darrow Jan 26 2015, 10:12am PDT Oy. what a week IBM has had. And it’s only Monday. Last week, a report surfaced that the IT giant would soon cut a whopping 26 percent of its workforce — or about 118,000 employees — as part of a “Reorg from Hell.”  The story was later picked up […] Read More » Gigaom Research webinar: Big data application development: why it matters Gigaom Jan 26 2015, 8:55am PDT Big Data is still in its early stages of life; to get to the next stage, its integration with core enterprise technologies needs to get better. Chief among the enterprise environments with which Big Data must integrate is the developer ecosystem. There are a number of […] Read More » AT&T to buy Nextel Mexico, continuing continental expansion Kevin Fitchard Jan 26 2015, 7:48am PDT AT&T’s plans to tackle the Mexico market aren’t just limited to buying a single mobile operator Iusacell. It announced Monday it is buying Iusacell’s competitor Nextel Mexico for $1.875 billion from NII Holdings and will merge its operations into its growing pan-American network. closed its $2.5B […] Read More » Facebook’s new Android app goes light on the data Kif Leswing Jan 26 2015, 7:41am PDT Facebook is serious about spreading its service to people in countries without fast cellular networks or cutting-edge smartphones. Its new Android app, Facebook Lite, which isn’t available in the United States or Europe, is targeted at people with poor internet service or who are limited to 2G […] Read More » Drone on White House lawn leads to lockdown Jeff John Roberts Jan 26 2015, 7:15am PDT A small drone landed on White House grounds late Sunday night, leading to emergency vehicles swarming the area, and the perimeter being placed on lockdown until 5:00 a.m., according to the AP. A White House spokesperson told the New York Times he did not have details about […] Read More » Apple is the reason the Nexus 6 doesn’t have a fingerprint scanner Kif Leswing Jan 26 2015, 6:50am PDT Since the Nexus 6 was released, it’s been evident that Google’s developer flagship came very close to having a fingerprint scanner. Thanks to ex-Motorola CEO and current Dropbox COO Dennis Woodside, we know why it was eventually axed: The available fingerprint scanners simply weren’t good enough. In […] Read More » As Uber, Lyft, and Sidecar count patents, warning signs ahead Jeff John Roberts Jan 26 2015, 6:00am PDT Government regulators and the taxi industry can’t stop Uber — but maybe a patent can. At least that’s the hope of Sidecar, a small rival of Uber whose founder obtained a patent related to mobile ride hailing way in 2002, and who claims he thought up today’s version of […] Read More »