Showing posts with label apple. Show all posts
Showing posts with label apple. Show all posts
Thursday, May 23, 2013
Apple Answers Location Recording Fears
There are ten Q&As in Apple’s statement concerning the iPhone location tracking problem, its purpose, bugs and solutions. We won’t bother you with the official statement, we’ll just cut to the chase. 10 Apple statement is:
1. Why is Apple tracking the location of my iPhone?
Apple is not tracking the location of your iPhone. Apple has never done so and has no plans to ever do so.
2. Then why is everyone so concerned about this?
Providing mobile users with fast and accurate location information while preserving their security and privacy has raised some very complex technical issues which are hard to communicate in a soundbite. Users are confused, partly because the creators of this new technology (including Apple) have not provided enough education about these issues to date.
3. Why is my iPhone logging my location?
The iPhone is not logging your location. Rather, it’s maintaining a database of Wi-Fi hotspots and cell towers around your current location, some of which may be located more than one hundred miles away from your iPhone, to help your iPhone rapidly and accurately calculate its location when requested. Calculating a phone’s location using just GPS satellite data can take up to several minutes. iPhone can reduce this time to just a few seconds by using Wi-Fi hotspot and cell tower data to quickly find GPS satellites, and even triangulate its location using just Wi-Fi hotspot and cell tower data when GPS is not available (such as indoors or in basements). These calculations are performed live on the iPhone using a crowd-sourced database of Wi-Fi hotspot and cell tower data that is generated by tens of millions of iPhones sending the geo-tagged locations of nearby Wi-Fi hotspots and cell towers in an anonymous and encrypted form to Apple.
4. Is this crowd-sourced database stored on the iPhone?
The entire crowd-sourced database is too big to store on an iPhone, so we download an appropriate subset (cache) onto each iPhone. This cache is protected but not encrypted, and is backed up in iTunes whenever you back up your iPhone. The backup is encrypted or not, depending on the user settings in iTunes. The location data that researchers are seeing on the iPhone is not the past or present location of the iPhone, but rather the locations of Wi-Fi hotspots and cell towers surrounding the iPhone’s location, which can be more than one hundred miles away from the iPhone. We plan to cease backing up this cache in a software update coming soon (see Software Update section below).
5. Can Apple locate me based on my geo-tagged Wi-Fi hotspot and cell tower data?
No. This data is sent to Apple in an anonymous and encrypted form. Apple cannot identify the source of this data.
6. People have identified up to a year’s worth of location data being stored on the iPhone. Why does my iPhone need so much data in order to assist it in finding my location today?
This data is not the iPhone’s location data—it is a subset (cache) of the crowd-sourced Wi-Fi hotspot and cell tower database which is downloaded from Apple into the iPhone to assist the iPhone in rapidly and accurately calculating location. The reason the iPhone stores so much data is a bug we uncovered and plan to fix shortly (see Software Update section below). We don’t think the iPhone needs to store more than seven days of this data.
7. When I turn off Location Services, why does my iPhone sometimes continue updating its Wi-Fi and cell tower data from Apple’s crowd-sourced database?
It shouldn’t. This is a bug, which we plan to fix shortly (see Software Update section below).
8. What other location data is Apple collecting from the iPhone besides crowd-sourced Wi-Fi hotspot and cell tower data?
Apple is now collecting anonymous traffic data to build a crowd-sourced traffic database with the goal of providing iPhone users an improved traffic service in the next couple of years.
9. Does Apple currently provide any data collected from iPhones to third parties?
We provide anonymous crash logs from users that have opted in to third-party developers to help them debug their apps. Our iAds advertising system can use location as a factor in targeting ads. Location is not shared with any third party or ad unless the user explicitly approves giving the current location to the current ad (for example, to request the ad locate the Target store nearest them).
10. Does Apple believe that personal information security and privacy are important?
Yes, we strongly do. For example, iPhone was the first to ask users to give their permission for each and every app that wanted to use location. Apple will continue to be one of the leaders in strengthening personal information security and privacy.
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
Apple Ipad Mini
The software - iOS 6 - should be very familiar to Apple users, but the hardware is new. Its not like the big iPads, which mostly varied in thickness, this one has been designed to comfortably hold in one hand and slip into a coat pocket.
The Apple iPad mini uses a 7.9" IPS LCD display of 1024 x 768 pixel resolution (4:3 aspect ratio, 162ppi pixel density). Its the same resolution as the iPad 2, but scaled down. The pixel density is way below the Retina mark (and we mean the lower threshold Apple sets for tablets), though the display is noticeably sharper than the one on the iPad 2.
Full specifications of Ipad Mini:
| General | 2G Network | N/A |
| SIM | No | |
| Announced | 2012, October | |
| Status | Available. Released 2012, November | |
| Body | Dimensions | 200 x 134.7 x 7.2 mm (7.87 x 5.30 x 0.28 in) |
| Weight | 308 g (10.86 oz) | |
| Display | Type | LED-backlit IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen, 16M colors |
| Size | 768 x 1024 pixels, 7.9 inches (~162 ppi pixel density) | |
| Multitouch | Yes | |
| Protection | Oleophobic coating | |
| Sound | Alert types | N/A |
| Loudspeaker | Yes | |
| 3.5mm jack | Yes | |
| Memory | Card slot | No |
| Internal | 16/32/64 GB storage, 512 MB RAM | |
| Data | GPRS | No |
| EDGE | No | |
| WLAN | Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, dual-band | |
| Bluetooth | Yes, v4.0 with A2DP, EDR | |
| USB | Yes, v2.0 | |
| Camera | Primary | 5 MP, 2592x1944 pixels, autofocus, check quality |
| Features | Geo-tagging, touch focus, face detection | |
| Video | Yes, 1080p@30fps, video stabilization, check quality | |
| Secondary | Yes, 1.2 MP, 720p@30fps, face detection, FaceTime over Wi-Fi | |
| Features | OS | iOS 6 |
| Chipset | Apple A5 | |
| CPU | Dual-core 1 GHz Cortex-A9 | |
| GPU | PowerVR SGX543MP2 | |
| Sensors | Accelerometer, gyro, compass | |
| Messaging | iMessage, Email, Push Email, IM | |
| Browser | HTML (Safari) | |
| Radio | No | |
| GPS | No | |
| Java | No | |
| Colors | Black/Slate, White/Silver | |
| - Siri natural language commands and dictation | ||
| - iCloud cloud service | ||
| - Twitter and Facebook integration | ||
| - Maps | ||
| - Audio/video player/editor | ||
| - Image viewer/editor | ||
| - Voice memo | ||
| - TV-out | ||
| - Document viewer | ||
| - Predictive text input | ||
| Battery | Non-removable Li-Po battery (16.3 Wh) | |
| Stand-by |
Tags: Ipad Mini, Ipad Mini Spec, Ipad Mini Price
Tuesday, May 21, 2013
Apple Releases iOS 4 3 1 For All Apple Product
All of those Apple iPhone 4 users getting todays upgrade to iOS 4.3.1, please take one step forward. Uh, not so fast you Verizon customers. Outside of Big Reds Apple iPhone 4 users (who are still using iOS 4.2.6 launched in January), those using the iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, iPod touch (3rd and 4th generation) the original iPad and iPad 2 can upgrade to the newly launched iOS 4.3.1.The upgrade includes a fix for a graphics bug on the 4th generation iPod touch, repairs a bug relating to connectivity on some cellular networks, fixes a bug that created a flickering image when using Apple Digital AV Adapter with some television sets, and fixes an issue relating to authenticating with some enterprise web services.
The release of the upgrade is somewhat of a surprise to iOS owners as it had been rumored that the 4.3.1 upgrade would not be released for another two weeks. While the software was released earlier than expected, an upgrade was expected after researcher Charles Miller discovered a flaw in mobile Safari during the Pwn2Own hacking contest. During the contest, Miller shared the flaw with Apple in an effort to have the problem repaired.
Related post:
Google holds on Android 3.0 for cell phone
2 viruses to infected Android OS
Blacberry Playbook Can Run on Android
Windows Phone 7, Copy Paste uipdate
Source
Apple following the steps of Samsung iPhone5
If it’s not the new iPad, it’s rife rumor regarding the upcoming next-gen iPhone that’s keeping Apple in the news just now. The device, which is thought to be receiving a longer screen, will also be getting a mighty quad-core processor, if a report originating from DigiTimes is to be taken as Gospel.
The blogosphere has become used to taking DigiTimes coverage with a pinch of salt – primarily because many of the big leaks stem from unspecified sources, and this latest report doesn’t break the habit of a lifetime.
The iPhone is credited with changing the face of the modern-day smartphone, but after sticking with the same ethos throughout in terms of screen size and general power (i.e. good quality, but not eye-watering), it appears the fruit company is now playing catch-up with rivals.
A quad-core processor would be quite a bump from the current dual-core A5 chip offered with the iPhone 4S, and would also boast more power than the third gen iPad which, despite offering quad-core graphics, is still only a dual-core A5X processor.
DigiTimes being DigiTimes, I can’t say I believe this one, especially since my current iPhone 4S has been running for months, with numerous games and apps, yet without so much as a second of lag. I’m more inclined to believe Tim Cook’s company will opt for the A5X once again, which would still be fast, and allow for smooth gaming on the slightly larger screen
Of course, I could be wrong, and given Apple’s apparent push towards the larger screen, a quad-core processor wouldn’t be a massive shock. Still, although the company appears to have gone with the flow in increasing the display real-estate, a new chip exceeding the A5X would seem like too much of a leap, while also not being particularly necessary.
As with most Apple products, we’ll likely only know in the days leading up to the announcement what the next iPhone – dubbed the "iPhone 5" – will include. Although LTE would seem a foregone conclusion given the iPad implementation, the only other aspect we could presume without doubt to be a feature, is iOS 6, which was announced last month at WWDC 12.
Of course, I will be keeping you updated with anything I pick up in the meanwhile, though, so stay tuned!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)