August, 2017 - itbusinessdirect

Nigerian Start up innovates Recycling; Q&A with Bilikiss Abiola, Founder WeCyclers

August 31, 2017September 1, 2017 Dianne Jacobs

Bilikiss Adebiyi Abiola , Founder and CEO of Wecyclers The Nigerian tech startup space is developing at speed, and stands a good chance of being the Africa’s leader. ITBusinessDirect spoke with Bilikiss Adebiyi Abiola , Founder and CEO of Wecyclers, a company that offers household recycling service using a fleet of low-cost cargo bikes. They are powering social change using the environment by allowing people in low-income communities in Nigeria to capture value from their waste. Question: How can you define the technology sector in Nigeria? Bilikiss: I believe it’s…

New malware masquerades as a ride-sharing app

August 29, 2017September 1, 2017

An update to the venerable Faketoken.q Android malware has made it easier for the program to steal your credit card information from ride-sharing apps. Faketoken attacks Russian ride-sharing apps by overlaying text boxes on the credit card information pages that can capture your credit number and other important information. Kaspersky writes: After getting onto a smartphone (judging by the malware icon, Faketoken infiltrates smartphones through bulk SMS messages with a prompt to download some picture) and installing the necessary modules, the Trojan hides its shortcut icon and starts background monitoring…

Internet providers could easily snoop on your smart home

August 29, 2017September 1, 2017

IoT devices often identify themselves voluntarily, usually by connecting to specific domains or URLs. Even if they didn’t, there are simple ways of profiling them based on observation and some known data. It’s certainly true that encryption is on the rise online. Data from Mozilla, the company behind the popular Firefox browser, shows that more than half of web pages use HTTPS, the standard way of encrypting web traffic. When sites like The Atlantic use HTTPS, a lock icon appears in users’ web browsers, indicating that the information being sent…

Microsoft will no longer force updates on Users

August 25, 2017September 1, 2017

Windows 10 will no longer automatically take control of your computer, and flip the reset switch, at the worst moments imaginable. Mind you, Microsoft will still push updates, and it won’t necessarily be easy to completely turn them off. Shortly after Windows 10 rolled out, Windows users began noticing that their computers were automatically downloading the huge Windows 10 update file without even asking. The issue was compounded by vague and confusing update alerts that led many users to initiate the upgrade to Windows 10 without realizing it. Microsoft has…

With iPod discontinuation, what are the alternatives?

August 24, 2017September 1, 2017 Staff Writer

Smartphones have largely replaced portable media players for most people. It’s been a few years since Apple bothered to update its iPod touch, and it’s been even longer since any other company try to offer a good Android-powered alternative to Apple’s touchscreen media player. Apple is now abandoning its traditional iPod because most people with smartphones now use them for everything. However, many current smartphones – including Apple’s – don’t have FM, and none has a DAB radio. Worse, smartphones need regular app updates and sometimes annual operating system upgrades. You…

Riding the digital storm

August 24, 2017 Dianne Jacobs

The digital disruption storm is past the horizon and in the business backyard. Business leaders are now sensing the digital heat and are hurriedly getting equiped to survive the ‘storm-winds of digital disruption’. Across all industries, digital disruption is no longer a hypothetical—it’s reality. Digitization is changing the way products are made, marketed, and delivered, altering consumers’ behavior and expectations in turn. These changes are unlike anything the world has seen since the Industrial Revolution. Those who don’t adapt will be left behind. Organisations are under immense pressure to keep…

Robots in Japan are now Buddhist priests

August 24, 2017September 1, 2017 Editor

It seems there is literally no job that is safe from the rising tide of automation, including those who guide us into the afterlife. In Japan robots can serve as companions, helpers for the elderly, entertainment bots but now SoftBank’s humanoid robot Pepper has put itself up for hire as a Buddhist priest for funerals. Taking the German blessing bot’s idea and running with it, Pepper’s new code will let it chant sutras in a computerised voice while tapping a drum, providing a cheaper alternative to a human priest to…

Google secretly recording users through mobile devices

August 23, 2017 Dianne Jacobs

Did you know that Google has been recording you without your knowledge? Some of your most intimate conversations might be sitting in a Google data centre somewhere. Just talking is enough to activate the recordings – but thankfully there’s an easy way of hearing and deleting them. The technology giant has effectively turned millions of its users’ smartphones into listening devices that can capture intimate conversations — even when they aren’t in the room. The company quietly records many of the conversations that people have around its products. The feature…

Globaldata: Artificial Intelligence (AI) more crucial for IoT than Big Data insights

August 23, 2017September 1, 2017

Artificial intelligence won’t solve every problem, but its current applications are already fundamentally reshaping the way we do business and collect data. While the development of the internet of things has revolutionized heavy industry, online shopping, localized data collection and virtually every other aspect of modern life and business, innovators are still struggling over the future of the IoT, and how they’ll get there. While many see big data as the driving engine behind the IoT, savvy investors and entrepreneurs have shown that the real power behind the interconnectivity phenomenon…