Monday, June 07, 2010
Monday on abc
FEDERAL police have launched an investigation into Google and some of its employees for collecting private information while taking photographs for the Street View service.
It was revealed last month the web giant's Street View cars had collected data from personal Wi-Fi networks while taking photographs in countries including Australia. Google last month admitted it had "mistakenly" collected fragments of data from unsecured Wi-Fi networks as its Street View cars drove past houses.
Federal Attorney-General Robert McClelland today revealed he had referred the matter to the Australian Federal Police.
"I note there has been some complaints voiced, and understandably voiced, by the public in respect to practices that have been reported involving allegations that some information may have been obtained by staff of Google travelling around streets," Mr McClelland said.
"On Friday the Attorney-General's Department did refer those allegations and those reports to the Australian Federal Police."
My View Point
Ok, firstly, if you leave your network unsecured your asking for trouble as far as I am concerned its like leaving your front door open with your valuables in full view. Its been common practice for street tags (graffiti) to show up pointing out where someone has tracked an unsecured network. The issue is that google could have legitimately been looking for public hotspots and this data would have been useful for business people to know where they can get access to wifi. OK sure if you believe that, there is this nice coat hanger shaped bridge with fantastic views of Sydney harbor I can sell you!!
So what was google up to, basically it had wfifi sniffers out whilst it was looking and again this is legitimate if your marking public hotspots but once you move past the entry point of the network and then have access to the internal network thats when you have access to the data, remember data is intellectual property and money is derived from such so it pays to keep it secure!!!
IPAD working wonders already in hospitality
I recently had the pleasure of a trip to sydney learn about a new software product we are supporting at work. Its a point of sale system designed and developed by a company in Sydney who's founding programmer now lives in Long Flat NSW.
I raised an idea that perhaps developing the software to work on the ipod touch and the ipad would be a good idea so that waiters could use the ipods or the ipads for taking orders. We see something similar at the Scottish restaurant with the golden arches, there becomes a line up and the staff head out and take orders using a PDA worth over 1300 dollars running windows mobile and Newpos HOT. The IPOD retails in the 8gb format wifi only at about 300 dollars that means its 1000 dollars less. The ipad is around 600 dollars less.
A Sydney restaurant has decided to according to AFP An Australian restaurant has ditched printed menus and now hands diners the latest tech-craze, Apple's touchscreen iPad computer, from which to choose and order their meals.
Risking damaging wine spills and customers taking an iPad 'to go', the Global Mundo Tapas eatery at the Rydges Hotel in North Sydney introduced its new menus three days ago -- within a week of the iPad's Australian release.
And as I thought someone has set up the menus and pos software for the ipad with an application developed ahead of the tactile device's launch allows diners at the 50-seat restaurant to browse the menu -- complete with photographs and tasting notes -- with a flick of a finger.
Order a steak and the application asks how you would like the meat cooked, and placing your order can be done with the press of a button. Planned features include pop-up boxes that will suggest wines to match meals, and stock-control mechanisms to delete sold-out items from the menu.
But this is technology that future tech enthusiastic fast foodies were going to see in a couple of years build into their tables
BILL SHOCK – New tech New BILLs to scare and financially destroy you
A warning is out for people to be careful about data packs on mobile phones and the new IPADS make sure you get data packs that don't continue to bill you were mb after you go over your cap, whilst prepaid tends to be an expensive option in someways as its often higher priced that post paid usages but I've already seen people get massive bills from data packs.
It was revealed last month the web giant's Street View cars had collected data from personal Wi-Fi networks while taking photographs in countries including Australia. Google last month admitted it had "mistakenly" collected fragments of data from unsecured Wi-Fi networks as its Street View cars drove past houses.
Federal Attorney-General Robert McClelland today revealed he had referred the matter to the Australian Federal Police.
"I note there has been some complaints voiced, and understandably voiced, by the public in respect to practices that have been reported involving allegations that some information may have been obtained by staff of Google travelling around streets," Mr McClelland said.
"On Friday the Attorney-General's Department did refer those allegations and those reports to the Australian Federal Police."
My View Point
Ok, firstly, if you leave your network unsecured your asking for trouble as far as I am concerned its like leaving your front door open with your valuables in full view. Its been common practice for street tags (graffiti) to show up pointing out where someone has tracked an unsecured network. The issue is that google could have legitimately been looking for public hotspots and this data would have been useful for business people to know where they can get access to wifi. OK sure if you believe that, there is this nice coat hanger shaped bridge with fantastic views of Sydney harbor I can sell you!!
So what was google up to, basically it had wfifi sniffers out whilst it was looking and again this is legitimate if your marking public hotspots but once you move past the entry point of the network and then have access to the internal network thats when you have access to the data, remember data is intellectual property and money is derived from such so it pays to keep it secure!!!
IPAD working wonders already in hospitality
I recently had the pleasure of a trip to sydney learn about a new software product we are supporting at work. Its a point of sale system designed and developed by a company in Sydney who's founding programmer now lives in Long Flat NSW.
I raised an idea that perhaps developing the software to work on the ipod touch and the ipad would be a good idea so that waiters could use the ipods or the ipads for taking orders. We see something similar at the Scottish restaurant with the golden arches, there becomes a line up and the staff head out and take orders using a PDA worth over 1300 dollars running windows mobile and Newpos HOT. The IPOD retails in the 8gb format wifi only at about 300 dollars that means its 1000 dollars less. The ipad is around 600 dollars less.
A Sydney restaurant has decided to according to AFP An Australian restaurant has ditched printed menus and now hands diners the latest tech-craze, Apple's touchscreen iPad computer, from which to choose and order their meals.
Risking damaging wine spills and customers taking an iPad 'to go', the Global Mundo Tapas eatery at the Rydges Hotel in North Sydney introduced its new menus three days ago -- within a week of the iPad's Australian release.
And as I thought someone has set up the menus and pos software for the ipad with an application developed ahead of the tactile device's launch allows diners at the 50-seat restaurant to browse the menu -- complete with photographs and tasting notes -- with a flick of a finger.
Order a steak and the application asks how you would like the meat cooked, and placing your order can be done with the press of a button. Planned features include pop-up boxes that will suggest wines to match meals, and stock-control mechanisms to delete sold-out items from the menu.
But this is technology that future tech enthusiastic fast foodies were going to see in a couple of years build into their tables
BILL SHOCK – New tech New BILLs to scare and financially destroy you
A warning is out for people to be careful about data packs on mobile phones and the new IPADS make sure you get data packs that don't continue to bill you were mb after you go over your cap, whilst prepaid tends to be an expensive option in someways as its often higher priced that post paid usages but I've already seen people get massive bills from data packs.
