Mobile security firm Pradeo has discovered an app in the Google Play Store that was supposed to be used to help Android users feel safer online. Instead, the app turned out to be a "trojandropper" used by hackers to disseminate malware on consumers' mobile devices. The app, called 2FA Authenticator, was installed by over 10,000 users. This app drops malware into your device that steals your banking information and grabs your money The irony is clear. 2FA, also known as two-factor authentication, is used to validate your identity. Let's say your bank wants to make sure that the person trying to speak to them about your account is you. So they send a text with a code number to your phone. Once you punch in the correct code number from the text, you have verified your identity as far as the bank sees it. However, the 2FA Authenticator app was used to install dangerous malware called Vultur on your handset. Vultur is designed to target financial services apps so that it...

  Google Chrome tips & tricks Omnibox That funky little box at the top is called the Omnibox and it isn't just for website addresses; this guy is also a calculator, currency converter, and more. You don't even need to hit enter to see results, the Omnibox will immediately provide you with a result. Simple math problems Convert currency Convert units Bookmark commands Plenty of Chrome's features are run by typing "Chrome://..." into your browser bar. However, you can also bookmark these commands for ease of use later. Open up Bookmark manager by pressing  Ctrl + Shift + O . Click the bottommost  three-button-menu  in the top right  ( . Click  Add bookmark. Type in the name for the bookmark under  Name. Type in the command under  URL. Click  Save. Custom search engine Using the Omnibox to search isn't limited to Google. It's simple to add any website you want instead. For example, this is a great way to quickly search your emails without op...

  Well, this is a weird one. Apparently a new ad for Destiny 2’s Witch Queen expansion has been making the rounds, not on social media, but as a Google Adsense insert, as in, one of those little autoplaying videos that spools up when you visit a website. And somehow, it manages to reveal more new things than anything we’ve seen from the most recent  official  Destiny 2 Witch Queen adds, including two significant new weapons.  I suppose you  could  consider this  spoilers , even though this is very much an ad made by Bungie? The first weapon is seen above, and while I’m not sure if it’s an exotic or a legendary (pretty sure it would be exotic), it appears to be some sort of arc railgun/machine gun hybrid. The second weapon is uh, something else entirely. In what  definitely  has to be an exotic, a grenade launcher that appears to shoot exploding Hive larva. The ad also shows off the exotic SMG that we’ve seen used in promotional materials...

  Tweet Post Share Save Print “ They’re Watching You at Work .” “ AI Here, There, Everywhere .” “ What People Hate About Being Managed by Algorithms .” We are no stranger to headlines conjuring up science fiction images of a future in which human judgment, ingenuity, and initiative are increasingly undermined by machine-based management. The dominant narrative regarding technology at work is that the machines are replacing human judgment and as a result making work more technocratic and controlled. But there’s another story that’s important to tell here: That of organizations which are using technology to  enhance  the autonomy of their workers, enabling their leaders to exercise  greater  strategic judgment. As scholars of organizational structure, we see evidence that technology in fact lies at the heart of efforts by companies to organize around employees rather than management. Companies that have successfully re-designed their structure, routines, and pract...

  1. Upstart Holdings According to Upstart, 80% of Americans have never defaulted on a loan, yet only 48% qualify for the lowest interest rates banks offer. Management believes that discrepancy stems from a lack of data. Specifically, many of the most sophisticated credit models incorporate just 30 variables, so lenders determine loan eligibility and set interest rates based on very little information. In turn, some applicants are mistakenly approved, and others are mistakenly rejected, which means the creditworthy borrowers end up subsidizing those who default. To solve that problem, Upstart leans on big data and AI. Its platform captures over 1,600 data points per applicant then measures those variables against past repayment events to quantify risk. To that end, internal studies have shown that Upstart's AI can cut loss rates by 75% while keeping approval rates constant, or it can boost approval rates by 173% while keeping loss rates constant. Either way you measure it, tha...

  In recent years, computer-generated animations of animals and humans have become increasingly detailed and realistic. Nonetheless, producing convincing animations of a character's face as it's talking remains a key challenge, as it typically entails the successful combination of a series of different audio and video elements. A team of computer scientists at TCS Research in India has recently created a new model that can produce highly realistic talking face animations that integrate audio recordings with a character's head motions. This model, introduced in a paper presented at ICVGIP 2021, the twelfth Indian Conference on Computer Vision, Graphics and Image Processing, could be used to create more convincing virtual avatars, digital assistants, and animated movies. A team of computer scientists at TCS Research in India has recently created a new model that can produce highly realistic talking face animations that integrate audio recordings with a character's head mo...

  Threat analysts have observed a new campaign named ‘OiVaVoii’, targeting company executives and general managers with malicious OAuth apps and custom phishing lures sent from hijacked Office 365 accounts. According to a report from Proofpoint, the campaign is still ongoing, though Microsoft is monitoring the activity and has already blocked most of the apps. The impact of executive account takeovers ranges from lateral movement on the network and insider phishing to deploying  ransomware and business email compromise incidents. OAuth is a standard for token-based authentication and authorization, removing the need to enter account passwords. Apps that use OAuth require specific permissions such as file read and write permissions, access to calendar and email, and email send authorization. The purpose of this system is to offer increased usability and convenience while maintaining a high security level within trustworthy environments by reducing credential exposure. With...

  Despite the ensuing slowdown due to the pandemic, Samsung managed to keep its smartphone shipments at respectable levels, according to new data obtained by  market research firm IDC . It is even more impressive, given that Q4, 2021 witnessed a decline in the overall number of smartphones sold, likely due to a paucity of major launches. Samsung managed to ship a total of 272 million smartphones in all of 2021, representing a rise of 6.0% over last year’s figure. It is a tad lower than the 300 million estimates from earlier, but it is quite common for different studies to reach different conclusions. Apple came in a close second at 235 million shipments. Arch-rival Xiaomi fell surprisingly short with only 191 million units, followed by Oppo and Vivo at 133.5 million and 12.3 million units shipped, respectively. We have to bear in mind that the numbers for Chinese OEMs could be a lot higher if we take into account domestic sales in their home market of China, the data for ...