Month: August 2024
Digital wallets allow for the use of stolen credit cards
Criminals can link stolen cards to digital wallets, and make purchases with them.
Researchers have discovered leading digital wallets such as Apple Pay, Google Pay, and PayPal could be used to carry out fraudulent purchases using stolen and cancelled payment cards.
By adding the card to a digital wallet, criminals can exploit the flaw in the ‘authentication, authorization, and access the control mechanisms of major digital wallet apps and US banks alike.
Security academics exposed the fault at the Usenix security 2024, and in a research paper outlined plausible scenarios in which victims full names (which are already printed on cards) and a victim’s address can be used to authenticate a card added to the digital wallet.
The potential scenario
The process can be carried out if the attacker choses a knowledge-based authentication (KBA) instead of a multi-factor authentication such as a one time password sent by email, text, or call (MFA). Some KBA schemes don’t even require multiple data points – many only need a zip code, billing address, date of birth, or last four digits of a social security number. Once this is acquired, the fraudster can freely make purchases with the digital card.
To make matters worse, cancelling or blocking the card does not necessarily stop this, as when a card is authenticated, the bank issues a token which authorizes purchases and is stored in the digital wallet, so criminals can reassociate the wallet with the replacement card once it is reissued.
Recurring transactions can also be used to exploit the victim, with purchases labelled ‘recurring’ processed even if the card is locked.
In the age of data breaches, most notably the recent National Public Data incident which potentially exposed the personal information of billions of people, verifying information is easier than ever to obtain.
Whilst banks have reported that the flaws have been resolved and that this type of attacks are no longer possible, staying vigilant is always important – and for anyone concerned, we’ve reviewed the best credit card fraud detection platforms available.
Via The Register
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US intelligence says Iran hacked the Trump campaign
Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo from Getty Images
Iran is behind attempts to hack into Republican and Democratic presidential campaigns and has already succeeded in compromising Donald Trump’s campaign, intelligence officials said in a statement issued Monday.
The joint statement from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) says:
We have observed increasingly aggressive Iranian activity during this election cycle, specifically involving influence operations targeting the American public and cyber operations targeting presidential campaigns.
This includes the recently reported activities to compromise former President Trump’s campaign, which the [Intelligence Community (IC)] attributes to Iran. The IC is confident that the Iranians have through social engineering and other efforts sought access to individuals with direct access to the presidential campaigns of both political parties. Such activity, including thefts and disclosures, are intended to influence the U.S. election process. It is important to note that this approach is not new. Iran and Russia have employed these tactics not only in the United States during this and prior federal election cycles but also in other countries around the world.
Protecting the integrity of our elections from foreign influence or interference is our priority. As the lead for threat response, the FBI has been tracking this activity, has been in contact with the victims, and will continue to investigate and gather information in order to pursue and disrupt the threat actors responsible.
In a statement, Iran’s Mission to the United Nations called the allegations “unsubstantiated and devoid of any standing.”
Last week, with Donald Trump already publicly pointing fingers at Iran, the New York Times reported that Trump advisor Roger Stone said he was contacted by Microsoft “a few months ago” about hackers that managed to get into his Hotmail account. He also said the FBI had informed him about unauthorized access to his Gmail that they believed had been used to get access to communications of other people in the Trump operation.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran harbors neither the intention nor the motive to interfere with the U.S. presidential election. Should the U.S. government genuinely believe in the validity of its claims, it should furnish us with the pertinent evidence—if any—to which we will respond accordingly,” the Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the United Nations said in a statement emailed to The Verge.
Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo from Getty Images
Iran is behind attempts to hack into Republican and Democratic presidential campaigns and has already succeeded in compromising Donald Trump’s campaign, intelligence officials said in a statement issued Monday.
The joint statement from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) says:
We have observed increasingly aggressive Iranian activity during this election cycle, specifically involving influence operations targeting the American public and cyber operations targeting presidential campaigns.
This includes the recently reported activities to compromise former President Trump’s campaign, which the [Intelligence Community (IC)] attributes to Iran. The IC is confident that the Iranians have through social engineering and other efforts sought access to individuals with direct access to the presidential campaigns of both political parties. Such activity, including thefts and disclosures, are intended to influence the U.S. election process. It is important to note that this approach is not new. Iran and Russia have employed these tactics not only in the United States during this and prior federal election cycles but also in other countries around the world.
Protecting the integrity of our elections from foreign influence or interference is our priority. As the lead for threat response, the FBI has been tracking this activity, has been in contact with the victims, and will continue to investigate and gather information in order to pursue and disrupt the threat actors responsible.
In a statement, Iran’s Mission to the United Nations called the allegations “unsubstantiated and devoid of any standing.”
Last week, with Donald Trump already publicly pointing fingers at Iran, the New York Times reported that Trump advisor Roger Stone said he was contacted by Microsoft “a few months ago” about hackers that managed to get into his Hotmail account. He also said the FBI had informed him about unauthorized access to his Gmail that they believed had been used to get access to communications of other people in the Trump operation.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran harbors neither the intention nor the motive to interfere with the U.S. presidential election. Should the U.S. government genuinely believe in the validity of its claims, it should furnish us with the pertinent evidence—if any—to which we will respond accordingly,” the Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the United Nations said in a statement emailed to The Verge.
Welcome Back, Pablo Sanchez. Backyard Sports Game Series Set to Return
Baseball, football, basketball and hockey appear to be on the horizon for fans of the old-school videogame series.
Baseball, football, basketball and hockey appear to be on the horizon for fans of the old-school videogame series.
Amazon’s Echo Hub is down to its best price yet
The Echo Hub is a smart home controller that’s simple to use and set up and is currently $35 off at multiple retailers. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge
If you’re looking for a simple and intuitive smart home controller even the most tech-averse family members or roommates can use, Amazon’s Echo Hub is an excellent solution. And right now, it’s down to an all-time low price of $144.99 ($35 off) at Amazon, Best Buy, and B&H Photo.
The Echo Hub lets you control a wide range of smart home devices like smart lights, security devices, thermostats, and more by simply tapping its eight-inch touchscreen. It’s also mountable, so you can hang it up in the kitchen or some other place for the whole household to access. Naturally, as an Amazon gadget, the Echo Hub integrates best with Alexa, making it a particularly great buy if your smart home runs on a bunch of Alexa-enabled devices. However, the Echo Hub also supports Matter and Thread, so you can connect it to other smart home platforms if you need to.
As a nice extra, you can also use the Echo Hub like an ad-free Echo Show to play music and stream videos. It doesn’t sound as good as the Echo Show 8 and lacks a camera, but given the Echo Hub is primarily a smart home dashboard, those tradeoffs are forgivable.
Read our Amazon Echo Hub review.
More ways to save today
You can buy the Sonos Ace for $399 ($50 off) from Amazon, Best Buy, and B&H Photo, which is the best price we’ve seen on the wireless headphones. The Ace headphones deliver top-notch noise cancellation and sound, but what makes them really stand out is how well they integrate with the Sonos home audio ecosystem. If you own a Sonos soundbar like the Arc, Beam, or Ray, you can connect them so you can listen to the TV privately via your headphones.
Amazon’s Echo Spot is on sale for $54.99 ($25 off) from Amazon, Best Buy, and Target, which is $10 shy of its all-time low price. The Alexa-enabled smart speaker and alarm clock hybrid is semispherical like the Echo Pop while delivering good sound. However, unlike the Echo Pop, it offers a small smart display for showing the time, weather, and music playback but without the camera found in larger Echo Show displays for an extra sense of privacy.
Best Buy is currently running a buy two, get one free deal on select Nintendo Switch titles. The sale includes some highly anticipated games like The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom and the first new Mario & Luigi game in nine years, Mario & Luigi: Brothership. It also includes beloved older games, ranging from Super Mario Odyssey and Mario Kart 8 to Animal Crossing: New Horizons.
The Echo Hub is a smart home controller that’s simple to use and set up and is currently $35 off at multiple retailers. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge
If you’re looking for a simple and intuitive smart home controller even the most tech-averse family members or roommates can use, Amazon’s Echo Hub is an excellent solution. And right now, it’s down to an all-time low price of $144.99 ($35 off) at Amazon, Best Buy, and B&H Photo.
The Echo Hub lets you control a wide range of smart home devices like smart lights, security devices, thermostats, and more by simply tapping its eight-inch touchscreen. It’s also mountable, so you can hang it up in the kitchen or some other place for the whole household to access. Naturally, as an Amazon gadget, the Echo Hub integrates best with Alexa, making it a particularly great buy if your smart home runs on a bunch of Alexa-enabled devices. However, the Echo Hub also supports Matter and Thread, so you can connect it to other smart home platforms if you need to.
As a nice extra, you can also use the Echo Hub like an ad-free Echo Show to play music and stream videos. It doesn’t sound as good as the Echo Show 8 and lacks a camera, but given the Echo Hub is primarily a smart home dashboard, those tradeoffs are forgivable.
Read our Amazon Echo Hub review.
More ways to save today
You can buy the Sonos Ace for $399 ($50 off) from Amazon, Best Buy, and B&H Photo, which is the best price we’ve seen on the wireless headphones. The Ace headphones deliver top-notch noise cancellation and sound, but what makes them really stand out is how well they integrate with the Sonos home audio ecosystem. If you own a Sonos soundbar like the Arc, Beam, or Ray, you can connect them so you can listen to the TV privately via your headphones.
Amazon’s Echo Spot is on sale for $54.99 ($25 off) from Amazon, Best Buy, and Target, which is $10 shy of its all-time low price. The Alexa-enabled smart speaker and alarm clock hybrid is semispherical like the Echo Pop while delivering good sound. However, unlike the Echo Pop, it offers a small smart display for showing the time, weather, and music playback but without the camera found in larger Echo Show displays for an extra sense of privacy.
Best Buy is currently running a buy two, get one free deal on select Nintendo Switch titles. The sale includes some highly anticipated games like The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom and the first new Mario & Luigi game in nine years, Mario & Luigi: Brothership. It also includes beloved older games, ranging from Super Mario Odyssey and Mario Kart 8 to Animal Crossing: New Horizons.
Nvidia’s AI NPCs will debut in a multiplayer mech battle game next year
Mecha Break lets you ask for advice from in-game characters. | Screenshot: YouTube
Nvidia ACE, the company’s AI-powered system for giving voices and conversation skills to in-game characters, is set to debut in Mecha Break, a new multiplayer mech battle game coming to PC, Xbox X / S, and PlayStation 5 in 2025.
In Mecha Break, players can choose from a variety of mechs across categories like assault, melee, and sniper for online matches where they’ll fight both on the ground and in the air. It looks similar to something like the Armored Core series, just without a single-player mode.
Nvidia writes that players will be able to “interact via natural language with game characters” and that the characters can “see” and identify you or objects around you through your webcam, using GPT-4o. It’ll also use a combination of on-device Nvidia models and cloud-based AI to generate NPCs’ voices.
In the demonstration above, the player asked an in-game character for details about their mission and mechs, then changed their mech’s paint job by talking to it. The AI NPC’s responses were flatly delivered and bland. Maybe that’s fine when NPCs are just glorified in-game wikis.
But it might not be ideal for much beyond that. When The Verge’s Sean Hollister demoed Nvidia ACE in January, he pointed out that the characters “didn’t feel like real people,” the dialog wasn’t particularly inspiring, and that there were frequent delays before NPCs replied. Mecha Break doesn’t look like it’s any better so far, but we’ll see where things stand when it releases next year.
Mecha Break lets you ask for advice from in-game characters. | Screenshot: YouTube
Nvidia ACE, the company’s AI-powered system for giving voices and conversation skills to in-game characters, is set to debut in Mecha Break, a new multiplayer mech battle game coming to PC, Xbox X / S, and PlayStation 5 in 2025.
In Mecha Break, players can choose from a variety of mechs across categories like assault, melee, and sniper for online matches where they’ll fight both on the ground and in the air. It looks similar to something like the Armored Core series, just without a single-player mode.
Nvidia writes that players will be able to “interact via natural language with game characters” and that the characters can “see” and identify you or objects around you through your webcam, using GPT-4o. It’ll also use a combination of on-device Nvidia models and cloud-based AI to generate NPCs’ voices.
In the demonstration above, the player asked an in-game character for details about their mission and mechs, then changed their mech’s paint job by talking to it. The AI NPC’s responses were flatly delivered and bland. Maybe that’s fine when NPCs are just glorified in-game wikis.
But it might not be ideal for much beyond that. When The Verge’s Sean Hollister demoed Nvidia ACE in January, he pointed out that the characters “didn’t feel like real people,” the dialog wasn’t particularly inspiring, and that there were frequent delays before NPCs replied. Mecha Break doesn’t look like it’s any better so far, but we’ll see where things stand when it releases next year.
Nvidia has a surprise GPU launch today – but is the new RTX 4070 worth buying?
Nvidia RTX 4070 graphics card with GDDR6 video RAM is real, and official support comes in with the latest graphics driver.
Nvidia’s new version of the RTX 4070 has been officially announced, and the graphics card is pretty much just as previously rumored, carrying slightly slower video memory – but the good news is that there’s seemingly no meaningful impact on performance.
Wccftech was quick to spot the release of the new variant of the 4070, which was revealed by Team Green in a lowkey manner as part of the release notes for its latest graphics driver.
That Game Ready Driver brings in support for the GeForce RTX 4070 with GDDR6 video RAM (as opposed to the GDDR6X which is the memory employed on the graphics card currently). As previously rumored, these are 20Gbps GDDR6 modules and this lowers the memory bandwidth to 480GB/s (from 504GB/s).
That sounds bad, but apparently Nvidia has tuned the memory timings and latencies in order to pep up the GDDR6 modules a touch, and the end result is that the new and old versions of the RTX 4070 effectively offer the same level of performance.
Nvidia informs us: “To improve supply and availability to meet strong demand, we’re introducing the GeForce RTX 4070 with extra fast GDDR6 memory. All of the other specs remain the same. It offers similar performance in games and applications.”
Wccftech has some benchmarks which back up this assertion and show that the performance of the new RTX 4070 equates to the existing GDDR6X model across a clutch of games and apps. The relative performance of both graphics cards is within 1% in all cases except for one app (Chaos V-Ray, where the GDDR6 model is actually 3% faster – but that can be classed as an outlier).
As expected, the new RTX 4070 is pitched at the same price, which is why Nvidia had to ensure performance was pretty much identical. Team Green notes that its card making partners will be selling the new graphics card from September, so the week after next (there won’t be a Founders Edition from Nvidia).
(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)
Analysis: Is it worth buying?
Is this new version of the RTX 4070 worth buying, then? The short answer is – yes. Or at least it’s every bit as worthwhile as the older GDDR6X-toting RTX 4070, which will still probably represent the majority of models out there on shelves for quite some time (it takes a good while for existing stock to sell through, of course).
The good news here is that PC gamers feared that the GDDR6 variant would be a bit slower, but as we can see, from both Nvidia’s claims and the purported benchmarks aired above, there’s no meaningful difference at all between the two spins on the RTX 4070.
The not-so-great news is that we were also hoping that maybe the use of GDDR6 might make the new RTX 4070 better in the power-efficiency stakes, but the TGP (power usage) of the graphics card hasn’t changed – it remains at 200W as before. Incidentally, there’s no difference in the chip used in either version (AD104-250 is in both – whereas previous speculation pointed to a slightly different AD104-251 spin).
In short, none of this will help the RTX 4070 reclaim its spot on our roundup of the best GPUs, from which it was ousted by the RTX 4070 Super. However, the vanilla RTX 4070 with GDDR6 still remains a solid buy, and one other consideration you might want to take into account here is the rumor that it’s possible we’ll see price tags for the RTX 4070 creeping up.
That price hike is purportedly bound up in the reason for the switch to GDDR6, because as a previous report claimed, the faster GDDR6X VRAM is thinner on the ground stock-wise – and that’s something Nvidia hints at when it mentions the need to “improve supply and availability” for the RTX 4070. Given this possible price increase, if you’re mulling an RTX 4070, you might want to move sooner rather than later – and the new variant is every bit as good as the current 4070.
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Discover how founders and investors are saving the planet at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024
Until recently, saving the world usually didn’t involve turning a profit. But as the world has warmed, a range of startups and investors have emerged that have squared the circle, making a clear business case for reducing humanity’s impact on the planet. We’re excited that Rebecca Hu, co-founder and CEO of Glacier; Allison Wolff, co-founder
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Until recently, saving the world usually didn’t involve turning a profit. But as the world has warmed, a range of startups and investors have emerged that have squared the circle, making a clear business case for reducing humanity’s impact on the planet. We’re excited that Rebecca Hu, co-founder and CEO of Glacier; Allison Wolff, co-founder […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Tencent-backed payments startup Airwallex reaches $500 million revenue, eyes 2026 IPO
Tencent-backed fintech startup Airwallex has reached an annual revenue run rate of $500 million, driven by strong performance in North American and European markets, the company said on Tuesday. In an interview with CNBC, CEO Jack Zhang said that the
The post Tencent-backed payments startup Airwallex reaches $500 million revenue, eyes 2026 IPO first appeared on Tech Startups.
Tencent-backed fintech startup Airwallex has reached an annual revenue run rate of $500 million, driven by strong performance in North American and European markets, the company said on Tuesday. In an interview with CNBC, CEO Jack Zhang said that the […]
The post Tencent-backed payments startup Airwallex reaches $500 million revenue, eyes 2026 IPO first appeared on Tech Startups.
Authors Sue Anthropic For Copyright Infringement Over AI Training
AI company Anthropic has been hit with a class-action lawsuit in California federal court by three authors who say it misused their books and hundreds of thousands of others to train its AI-powered chatbot Claude. From a report: The complaint, filed on Monday, by writers and journalists Andrea Bartz, Charles Graeber and Kirk Wallace Johnson, said that Anthropic used pirated versions of their works and others to teach Claude to respond to human prompts.
The lawsuit joins several other high-stakes complaints filed by copyright holders including visual artists, news outlets and record labels over the material used by tech companies to train their generative artificial intelligence systems. Separate groups of authors have sued OpenAI and Meta over the companies’ alleged misuse of their work to train the large-language models underlying their chatbots.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
AI company Anthropic has been hit with a class-action lawsuit in California federal court by three authors who say it misused their books and hundreds of thousands of others to train its AI-powered chatbot Claude. From a report: The complaint, filed on Monday, by writers and journalists Andrea Bartz, Charles Graeber and Kirk Wallace Johnson, said that Anthropic used pirated versions of their works and others to teach Claude to respond to human prompts.
The lawsuit joins several other high-stakes complaints filed by copyright holders including visual artists, news outlets and record labels over the material used by tech companies to train their generative artificial intelligence systems. Separate groups of authors have sued OpenAI and Meta over the companies’ alleged misuse of their work to train the large-language models underlying their chatbots.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.