Author: Staff Writer

Lightning strikes, major power outage wipes out data in Google ‘s European Computer Engine datacentre

Staff Writer
Google
Share this

Google has told Cloud Engine customers to build in redundancy to their cloud apps after a major power outage hit its European datacentre. Google said the outage at its European Google Compute Engine (GCE) datacentre was caused by four consecutive lightning strikes that hit the grid powering it last Thursday. While the company has taken full responsibility for the outage, it has also told customers who suffered downtime they shouldn’t be relying on a single compute zone. The incident also caused the permanent loss of some data from ‘persistent disks’…

Share this
Read More

Twitter removes the 140-character limit from Direct Messages

Staff Writer
Share this

Twitter has today removed the 140-character limit on direct messages (DMs) for all users. The move was first flagged in June, hours after CEO Dick Costolo announced he’d be standing down as CEO of the social platform. From today, the change becomes reality, as the update is rolled out to users across the world. The changes referred to here being the removal of restrictions on who can DM whom – previously you could only DM those following you, now users have the choice to receive direct messages from anyone –…

Share this
Read More

Enter ABC.xyz: Google will now be part of Alphabet

Staff Writer
Alphabet abc.xyz
Share this

Google announced a new holding company called Alphabet today, and it’s using the domain name ABC.xyz. This is a huge win for Daniel Negari’s .xyz, and new top level domains in general. Reports Domainamewire “For Sergey and me this is a very exciting new chapter in the life of Google — the birth of Alphabet,” Larry Page, the chief executive of Google, wrote in a blog post on Monday. “We liked the name Alphabet because it means a collection of letters that represent language, one of humanity’s most important innovations,…

Share this
Read More

ICANN Hacked! Resets encrypted passwords after user profile database breach

Staff Writer
ICANN Was Hacked
Share this

The overseer of the Internet’s addressing system said Wednesday that someone obtained information related to user accounts for its public website, although no financial information was divulged. ICANN, short for the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, said user names, email addresses, encrypted passwords and other data, such as bios, interests and newsletter subscriptions, were contained in the accounts. Despite the breach, the accounts as well as internal ICANN systems do not appear to have been accessed, the organization said in a post on its website. Although an investigation…

Share this
Read More

U.S. Senators introduce DHS Cybersecurity Bill to Protect ‘Dot-Gov’ Domain after breach

Staff Writer
Liquid Telecom
Share this

A bipartisan group of U.S. senators introduced legislation on Wednesday to give the Department of Homeland Security more authority to protect government Internet addresses in Cybersecurity bid. The goal is to prevent more cyberattacks like recent massive breaches at the government’s hiring office. Hacks targeting the Office of Personnel Management put the personal data of some 22 million Americans at risk and prompted the resignation of OPM chief Katherine Archuleta earlier this month. The cyberattacks prompted calls in Congress for huge improvements in monitoring and protection of government systems. Reports…

Share this
Read More

Google Maps has new update to let you visualize all of the places visited

Staff Writer
Share this

Google on Tuesday announced a new update to its Google Maps program which will allow people to visualize all of the places they’ve visited, so long as they were carrying smartphones at the time. It’s called “Your Timeline,” and it’s currently rolling out for Android devices and desktop browsers, meaning users should be able to access it over the next couple of days if they can’t already. A spokeswoman for Google told The Huffington Post that there are “no specific plans” for iOS. Read more Both the location history and Your…

Share this
Read More

Twitter Shares Rise After Faked Bloomberg Report

Staff Writer
Share this

Takeover rumors about Twitter surface with seeming regularity every couple of months. But one on Tuesday showed a new level of sophistication in an effort to pump up the company’s stock. Shares of Twitter, the social network, briefly spiked after an article that appeared to come from the Bloomberg News website contended that the company had received a takeover offer worth $31 billion. Analysts and Twitter users quickly started poking holes in the online piece and deemed it a fake. (No such report ran on the Bloomberg terminal, where its…

Share this
Read More

Women Entrepreneurs Are Key to Accelerating Growth

Staff Writer
Share this

Latest Kauffman Policy Digest explores barriers to women entrepreneurs and offers five policy recommendations to address the gender gap (KANSAS CITY, Mo.) July 20, 2015 – While the number of women entering the workforce has significantly increased over several decades, they are still half as likely as men to start a business. According to the most recent Entrepreneurship Policy Digest released today by the Kauffman Foundation, the lack of women entrepreneurs is not just a gender issue, it’s an economic issue. The Policy Digest highlights the skillsets of women that…

Share this
Read More

Ethiopian Entrepreneur Sophia Bekele spoke on #GES Panel in San Francisco

Staff Writer
DotConnectAfrica speaks at #GES-Global Entrepreneurship Summit #AfricanEntrepreneurs #SiliconValley
Share this

Sophia Bekele, Founder/ CEO DotConnectAfrica, Yes2dotAfrica was invited to speak on Global Entrepreneurship Summit (GES) forum, hosted by the White House and USAID on “African Entrepreneurs & Silicon Valley Forum: Bridging Gaps and Making Connections” The forum held at the Silicon Valley Bank’s WeWork Golden Gate location, San Francisco, California, and hosted over 100 delegates comprised of VCs, impact investors, African diaspora entrepreneurs, tech leaders, policymakers and U.S. government members from Washington DC and San Francisco, focused on spurring and supporting innovation ecosystems and investment in Africa. Various high-level panel…

Share this
Read More

WhatsApp could be BANNED in the UK if ‘Snooper’s Charter’ legislation passes

Staff Writer
Share this

The popular messaging service WhatsApp could be BANNED in the United Kingdom if the controversial ‘Snooper’s Charter’ legislation is passed. The online messaging services like WhatsApp, iMessage and Snapchat encrypt the communication between users, they fall under the cross hairs of the bill. Prime Minister David Cameron is pressing ahead with new legislation that plans to stop people from sending any form of encrypted messages. “In our country, do we want to allow a means of communication between people which we cannot read?” said Prime Minister Cameron earlier this year. “My answer to…

Share this
Read More