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John C. Morley: (00:09)
Hi everyone, I'm John C. Morley, the host of the JMOR Tech Talk Show and inspirations for your life.
John C. Morley: (01:01)
You Hey guys, it is John C. Morley here. Welcome to the JMOR Tech Talk Show. I am so glad that you guys have decided to pop in today. It is another great show that I know you guys are going to love. And so we'll get right into that in just a second. But if you're new here, just take your phone and you can actually launch your camera app point over the QR code like so touch the ellipse, and you'll get lots of great information that I produce, not just the JMOR tech talk show but so much of the great stuff. Alright, let's get right into what's going on. All right car manufacturers, Ferrari ransomware attack what's going on with this? Well, recently, the Italian supercar manufacturer Ferrari confirmed it was hit by ransomware and exposed customers to potential problems by exposing their personal information. I want to make a quote, we regret to inform you of a cyber-incident at Ferrari, where a threat actor was able to access a limited number of systems in our IT environment, per Ferrari CEO Benedetto Viga in a letter that he had addressed. So the carmaker had said that hackers access customer’s names addresses, email addresses and telephone numbers. And this is all based on an investigation. Ferrari said no payment information or details of Ferrari cars owned or ordered had been stolen, though it's not 100% clear if the carmaker has the technical abilities such as logs to detect data extraction like this. In another quote they made, we can also confirm that the breach has not impacted the operational functions of our company, close quote. Ferrari had said in a separate statement. So Ferrari is not seeing much on how many customers basically were affected by the breach or how or when the company was compromised. The carmaker hasn't really responded much to any journalists that were asking questions. So it is unclear if the breach is linked to the October incident that we know about when ransomware group known as ransom EXX claimed to have breached the carmaker, which Ferrari at the time denied a listing of the ransom EXX website seen by TechCrunch and many other people list seven gigabytes of data allegedly stolen from Ferrari, including internal documents, data sheets, and also repair manuals. Ferrari CEO said and I quote, the company has not paid the named hackers ransom demand saying that doing so does not fundamentally change the data exposure, close quote. Ferrari also said that after receiving the ransom demand, the amount of which remains unknown. It has started an investigation with a third party cybersecurity company, close quote. So you have to ask yourself a question, right? I mean, we do it every day. You've got major car companies, and you know, they have a few dollars. Why is it that they don't have proper infrastructure? And I've said this to you guys before. It's not a question of if you're going to get attacked, but when you will be attacked. Okay. If you're not properly protected, I mean, that's just the name of the game. So if you don't have protection, you're gonna get hacked. I mean, there's just no two ways about that. My only concern is do We know Ferrari is being transparent with people. I can't say yes, I can't say no. But it's interesting that it's taken them a while to respond. And they're not really talking much to the media. So this is definitely caused some issues. So, oh, we'll keep our heads looking around for what Ferrari is doing as well as other car manufacturers. And this could potentially exploit you as a car owner. So definitely. Let's keep you abreast of that. Cybercriminals are AI voice cloning tools to duet victims? What the heck is this? So if you answer a phone call from an unknown number, let the caller speak first. Whoever's on the other end of the line could be recording snippets of your voice, and later using it to impersonate you in a very interesting matter with voice prints for bank access, and a lot of other places that require a voice validation. And this is according to the FTC, the Federal Trade Commission, which is warning consumers to beware of scam artists who are secretly recording people's voices in order to later pose as them and ask victim's relatives for money. The FTC describes this scenario amongst a lot of different things in the rise of AI power tools like chat GPT, and Microsoft's vol E. A tool the software company demonstrate in January that converts text to speech. Vol E is not available to the public, but other companies like Resemble AI and 11 Labs make similar tools that are and using a short sample of anyone's voice. Well, this technology can accurately convert written sentences into convincing sounding audio. So that means you call a bank, and they're like, Oh, thank you so much for validating your voice. I do see the voice print. I got a problem with that. Okay, I think it's great that they're doing it but there should be another level on top of that, to validate that you are who you say you are. So you get a call. There's that panicked voice on the other line, could be your mom, your father, your significant other. And they say, they're in deep trouble. They possibly got a car accident, or they got arrested at no fault of their own. And you can't help but getting a knee jerk reaction to send the money. You take a deep breath and think you've heard of scams before. But this sounds so real. FTC consumer education specialists wrote, This is exactly the kind of thing that is going on. All you need is three seconds, criminals are employing wildly and widely available voice calling tools to do victims into believing their loved ones are in trouble and need cash fast. All it requires is a short clip of someone's voice, which is sometimes available on the internet. Or if it isn't, can be collected by recording a spam call plus a voice calling app such as the 11 Labs AI speech software voice lab. So perhaps you made a Tiktok video with your voice on it. That's enough. So does that mean we should stop producing content? Absolutely not. I think people that are looking to validate who we are need to go further than just our voice. There have been companies out now that are doing facial recognition and all kinds of things but you know, they're not really doing the full facial recognition. They're just taking points of it. So I think people are rushing to this too quick. And really the message comes down to don't be surprised. Okay. Spam calls email phishing. Let's say spear phishing whaling. This is becoming a new norm. Don't Trust the Voice. According to the FCC, you can no longer trust voices that sound identical to those of your friends and family members. They might have been sent the size to get you to give up your cash. Don't trust the voice as quoted by the FTC. If you suspect that this is really one of your friends or loved ones in need, hang up and call a person directly. Hey, Joe. Hey, Mike. Hey, Mom. Hey, Dad. Are you Okay, yeah, I'm fine. I'm playing golf. Oh, because I just got a call saying that you were in an accident, I'm fine. Use a phone number you know is theirs, if you can't reach your loved one, try to get in touch with some other family member, it still may be a scam. So I think this is gonna get much worse. And with bad actors using voice cloning software to mimic voices and commit crimes and validate your identity to banks and other types of entities, even by saying just the word hello? Or who is this? They could use that audio sample to regenerate a voice sounding just like yours? So when you get a phone call, don't say anything. If it's from a number, you don't know.
John C. Morley: (11:00)
Wait till the person talks. And when you receive the call from a suppose it family member, that seems a little off. Ask them for a code word that you've agreed on. Hi, Mom. What's our code word? You might think she This is crazy. But this is the kind of protection we need, right? Maybe someone mispronounces their name, that can be a red flag. So the FTC warns consumers not to trust the voice and not to trust incoming calls from unknown parties, and advises people to verify calls claiming to be from friends or family members in another way. Like the secret passcode or, like we said, a passphrase or code word. It's sad that these bad actors are doing this. And whenever someone asks for payment, via money, wire, gift card, or cryptocurrency, these are red flags. Scammers will ask you to pay or send money in ways that make it hard to get your money back, such as non-sequential gift cards from certain store. So again, we just need to be a little careful. And if we could do that, I think our lives will be a lot safer. So remember, when you get a phone call, you don't know who it's from? Don't say hello or anything first. Let the other person talk.
All right, ladies and gentlemen. So our world is changing, and so is security. And it's definitely morphing. And it's getting more complicated. Here's an interesting one, Ladies and gentlemen, journalists targeted by USB drives that explode when insert into PCs. What is this all about? Ladies and gentlemen, a bomb laden USB Drive was sent to at least five media outlets in Ecuador. And these drives that were USB were loaded with malware. But someone in Ecuador has reported to creating flash drives designed to explode once they connect to a computer. So you're probably wondering how this happens. Well, the USB devices I'm not gonna tell you how to build one but the USB device has a certain type of circuit in it. And that circuit is basically connected to a payload that can explode once it gets a voltage from your computer, which happens when you plug it in. This is terrible. It turns out that the explosion that came from a USB drive was mailed to a journalist at the station. Once it was inserted into a laptop. The Flash Drive blew up, although no one was seriously injured. While the Ecuadorian authorities released photos and videos which show the explosion seeming to cause no visible damage inside the newsroom. However, a report says the USB drive contained a common military explosive substance known as RDX. So no RDX is not your smaller version of an accurate the MBX nope. RDX is a synthetic chemical used primarily as a military explosive. And RDX accounts for a large part of explosives contamination at active and former military US installations. This is pretty seriously gentleman RTX I don't want to scare you, but it's actually something that you need to be concerned about. CTNT does contain any unstable nitrogen bonds. RDX packs are more powerful, but are often mixed with other chemicals to produce different effects, such as making it less sensitive, and less likely to explode unexpectedly. This is like crazy, this is insane that people would even do this. The military uses RDX as an ingredient in plastic bonded explosives or plastic explosives, which have been used as explosive fill. And as the military explosive RDX can be used alone as a base charge for detonators are mixed with another explosive, such as TNT to form cyclotrons. This is just terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible, are we going to have to start having a machine that literally scans our USB drives before we can safely put them into the computer. Wow. But this is kind of scary where this is going.
Alright ladies and gentlemen, if you have an iPhone, okay? Change the iPhone setting if your case holds your credit card. So this is really easy to do. Ladies and gentlemen, all you need to do is basically go to your settings screen on your iPhone, I'm going to do it right now. And once you've gone to your Settings app is basically what they call it on the top, you can actually type face and you'll see face ID, space and percent passcode touch that enter your passcode in. And then if you scroll down, you're going to see allow access when locked. Okay, so there's today view and search Notification Center Control Center lock screen widgets, live activities, Siri, etc. The one I want you to turn off is reply with message and wallet. You also may choose to turn off the one return miss calls, it's totally up to you. But the reason I say this is, let's say a bad actor gets your phone and it's locked. And they send a code from a website because the bad actor is wanting to log in. That validation or one time passcode right OTP the two factor he'll be able to see and use when your phone is unlocked if you don't disable this feature. So really important. And again, I want to go over how to do this because this is really paramount. Just go to your settings screen on your iPhone. And then what I want you to do is I just want you to type in face, you'll see face ID and passcode, enter in your passcode. By the way, I'm also going to recommend ladies and gentleman that you don't have a four digit passcode. So to change your passcode you can simply go to Password and Security. And you're going to see where it says password and security. Okay, you're going to see it says Change Password, okay. And you're going to have the option to basically change what your passcode length is. So if you get into there, you're going to see something that says two factor on but make sure ladies and gentlemen under the face ID and passcode that you turn off respond to messages and you turn off your card. Because if you don't do that, ladies and gentlemen, a bad actor could actually get at the information and pretend to be you. That's scary. I don't know, you would think that Apple would just leave these features off. So in order to change the length of your passcode, which is where I was, you can basically go into your passcode screen. Okay, password and security. And once you go in there, you're going to enter your passcode and you will see the option right there. So again, it actually says passcode so it's really easy to just type in passcode and you're gonna see it's not password but Passcode Settings you type passcode. And Passcode Settings has the ability to allow you to change what things have access to so on devices without Touch ID Oh, you can go right to Settings, passcode and tap, turn on passcode. So let me explain that one more time. Passcode Settings. Okay, you'll you could turn on Guided Access. And then you'll see it says Passcode Settings. Right over here. I can set Guided Access passcode. Okay, you set the passcode use When access is enabled, I could turn on face ID yes or no, I can set up time limits in here, play a sound and have remaining guide access if I'm using Guided Access. But I think the biggest thing for most people is they don't understand the fact that a lot of these options are enabled on your phone when you get them. See that is that's the problem.
John C. Morley: (20:55)
And so Apple did this to make it easy for you. But it's not going to help you. Right? And so you're probably saying to me, Hey, John, why would they do this? Well, it's not hard for people to pretend to be used. So these options were turned on for basic convenience. So again, to change the length, you're just going to go to settings, and you're going to tap password and security. Okay, so password, and security. And when you get into password insecurity, a message says account details, okay? And you're going to go right into your account details. And then you can basically change your passcode. So where it says change passcode, I can basically enter my passcode in there. And then I can enter in my new passcode. So by default, I guess that you, I have mine set for eight. But people are still messaging me and saying, Hey, John, this is a little confusing. I know it is. So how do you change your iPhone passcode to eight digits. It seems really confusing if you've never done it before. Again, I'm just going to going to help you understand this, you're going to go into your device, go to Settings, go to passcode and tap turn passcode on, enter a 6-digit passcode or tap passcode options. Okay, passcode options, and under passcode options. Okay, it's actually a passcode setting. So going into Passcode Settings, I literally can set the passcode used when guide is enabled, I can double click the side button to enable that. And basically, once I do this, I'm able to get into this option. Okay. But if you're still wondering, you know, how does this work? It's not hard, but you have to go through and do it correctly. So if you're trying to change the passcode, again, you can reset your phone and want to change the passcode digits to eight because that's what happened, we'll go back to four when you reset it, you use the choose a custom numeric or custom alphanumeric option. Okay. So you'll go to settings, and you'll go to touch ID and passcode. So you understand that. So you're gonna go to settings, and you're going to touch ID, and passcode. Okay, so Touch ID and passcode. And once you go to touch ID, you will see that you have the option. And then from there, you're going to be able to change basically the type of passwords you use the Choose a ccustom numeric or custom alphanumeric option. And it's much better to have you know, let's say a longer passcode. So, typically, most phones when you turn them on and you lock them, you can actually unlock your phone by the six digit passcode you can have a four digit passcode but now you can have an eight digit passcode. So six is good, four is no good, right? So people say me, John, how do you change your iPhone to four digits? Okay. So on the iPhones, you'll go into Settings from the top left tabs menu, then tap security and PIN code. You'll need your old passcode in order to change it followed by a new passcode. And then you'll re-enter to confirm it. So pretty easy and pretty straightforward, but security is very vital and I can't stress that enough.
Alright, let's move on to another interesting topic. So we've been hearing a lot about technology we've been healing or hearing about the fact that technology is starting to morph more with healthcare, right? We already saw years ago where we had the IV pumps and then they got exploited. Well is another company jumping on the bandwagon. NVidia and Medtronic are building an AI enhanced endoscopy tool. And this is interesting. They are developing this tool in the hopes to fight cancer using AI Artificial Intelligence. So this company is teaming with Medtronic, you guys all know the company in a video that makes GPUs and so they're doing this to build the AI into the GI genius endoscopy tool. And the tool uses the videos IG x hardware and holo skin medical platform to help detect polyps that can lead to colorectal cancer, doctors will get AI enhance diagnostic imaging, and they say it should be something interesting. The first GI Genius system built within the NVidia tech are expected to arrive soon. And that's probably by the end of 2023. Hopefully, this device can use a range of AI tools. Medtronic is betting that using the videos Clara platform could help develop algorithms for real time medical procedures. That's interesting. So it's going to learn on patterns in history from people. So what I gather is the data from what someone has is going to go and be what we call personal health information. But I do believe that they're potentially going to use the data without identifying everyone to help build the AI process. As long as that says, unanimous, I think it's okay. But I still think people should consent to that. So the new offering will help train AI models and also handle interference used to develop new therapeutic proteins and otherwise advanced fields like biology, and of course, chemistry. So we're gonna see a lot happening, you know, in this world, and I think people are going to wonder where are things going. And the news comes at the same time that the video is expanding its bio Nemo cloud services to help spring generative AI to drug discovery. So this is very interesting, ladies and gentlemen, that they are starting to use their technology to help health industry. And if you're curious about seeing that NVidia for an action, it will be available to preview on the Google Cloud G2 machines very soon. And Google NVidia have also announced that the generative AI video tool descript, as well as the RT app WinBot are both already using the L four over the Google Cloud. My only concern ladies and gentlemen, is the information being gathered, is it truly going to stay anonymous? Or will there be some glitches in it? I don't know. I just feel that there's got to be some way to secure the platform and make sure that the data is not going to potentially put people's personal information out on the internet. They're saying it won't. But I never believed any of these people. Because it's using cloud and supposedly, it's going to use a random number. But as a record number, but you know, that record number is probably going to get associated somewhere back in the health management system. Right. It'll be interesting. But I still think it probably needs a few steps of security. So we'll keep you abreast on what's going on there. All right.
So how about this ladies, gentlemen, you go out to dinner. You're with your boyfriend, girlfriend, or siblings and other and you get a phone call. Maybe it's a family member, or maybe you're out to dinner with your family, and you actually get a phone call. But you decide because you're with your friends or you're in a personal meeting, or even a business meeting, that you don't want to answer the phone. So you're gonna allow the Android which will now maybe answering your phone with text, will how the heck does this work? So Samsung's voice assistant can now answer your calls. So the way it works, it's called Samsung's Bixby text call. It's a feature that lets you blend traditional phone calls with texting. Pretty cool. So what typically will happen is when this is enabled on your Samsung device and it's available with the UI 5.1 which as you guys know released in February. So it's already to go and you should be all set. So getting started with the Bixby text call feature, it's really easy. You just open the phone app, tap the three dots in the right corner of the screen, choose the setting option, and from there you'll see the menu item called Bixby Text Call. Tapping this choice will bring you to a page that explains what the tool does and allows you to switch it on or off. Once the feature's activated, you'll see a button that says Bixby Text Call on your incoming call screen. Just tap the button and swipe up on the green phone icon when answering a call to use Bixby text call.
John C. Morley: (31:45)
But what does it actually do? So this gets pretty interesting. Instead of seeing traditional texts going back and forth from someone, you have a traditional phone in your face and hearing that caller's voice, you're only gonna see a text message thread on your screen. Meanwhile, the caller hears Bixby, okay, is automated voice instead of yours. And it says the following, hi, I'm using Bixby text call to convert your voice into text and respond to you. If you want to continue, say who you are and why you're calling, then the Bixby transcribes whatever the caller says into text or call and also recites the recipients text on the other end. The idea is that the caller speaks on the phone as if it's a normal phone call and the recipient types responses. So you can switch to a regular phone call anytime by tapping the green button labeled voice, and that sits above the text thread when announcing the Bixby text call Samsung said the feature works on device, meaning it doesn't send data to the cloud for processing. The company also says audio is the deleted after the recognition process is completed. Do I believe that? No. I don't. So Bixby might be a little bit, I don't know, socially awkward, but they claim it'll be helpful. Imagine somebody calls you and you decide that you're busy and now you're responding to someone via text. Hi John. Just wondering if we're grabbing dinner later and I'm in a meeting, text back “dinner sounds great. What time and where are we meeting?” Hi, I'm Bixby. Dinner sounds great. What time and where are we meeting? It's a little weird, it almost reminds me of eFax and Fax, where if you are used to faxing, you can fax if you're used to eFax and you can eFax. However, if you are in office that switched to eFax, people from many years ago don't have to know how you receive your faxes electronically, they simply go to their fax machine, enter the number, goes through the network, the fax server delivers it to you electronically. When you send a fax out to them it goes from your network and actually goes out through your phone network and sends the fax to their fax. So what eFax does is it takes a phone number and that phone number generally sends it to a fax server or to your email, but the recipient doesn't have to worry about how you receive access. You can keep interacting the way you do, very similar to the way the Bixby system works. So you might be asking me is Apple going to have a Bixby? Interesting. So apple has copied Samsung with the iPhone 13, but is that the whole story? So Apple launched the iPhone 13 series along with the iOS 15 a while back, and the event was all with different marketing and buzzwords, et cetera. But the question is, are you able to do the same thing? So Bixby Vision can perform some tasks, but anyone who has used it will let you know that it's not perfect. It's kind of like you know when you do dictation and the computer has to go back and edit, right? So I know even when you use the SIRI and I'm spelling it cuz I don't want her to talk when you do that, she doesn't always get it correct. She doesn't. I don't know. So in order to get the app for the iPhone, you can simply go to the I store your, your Apple store all call the I Store or Apple Store, same thing, and you can search for Bixby and it's called app for Bixby for Family Hub. Okay? Now there's a Samsung Bixby command and help and there's the Samsung Family Hub. So when you click on it basically you can download it. So the question everyone's asking is, does this really work? Does the Bixby app work on Apple? It got bugs, okay? And the question you might be asking is, will Siri answer calls like Bixby? Will they?
If you can't pick up the phone yourself, you can still say, hey, and then the SIRI name answer the phone and the call will be connected. If you're not able to hold the phone up to your ear, just say Siri answer the call on speaker, I bet you didn't know that. So you can do a lot of things with your iPhone, including asking Siri to answer the phone and even to answer it on speaker. I bet you to know that. But that is pretty cool. So now you're probably saying, why won't Siri answer my phone calls? Well to begin with, if you say the Hey and then Siri and it's not working in your iPhone or iPad the issue might be specific to answering calls. You'll want to go to settings Siri and search announce calls and see if the headphones only is enabled and this will ensure you can answer calls with your headphones. So I think that's pretty cool. So again all you have to do ladies and gentlemen, is you just basically go to settings and if you already have a headphone and that two system is working, chances are you are all set and ready to go. You can put your phone in airplane mode and so many other things. But I think this is great where we're going, my concern is where is the data going, right? Does Samsung Bixby send your voice to the cloud?
John C. Morley: (39:13)
They said that it achieved an 18 times speed boost a while back, and is Bixby cloud-based? Yes. So it's cloud-based. All you need is the internet, a Mike and Bixby, and you're set. So how can they say that your voice isn't going through the internet? They're a bunch of liars because we all know that in order for it to process it, it has to go to the internet, it has to, the data has to go there. That's the only way it'll know what to do with it. And now you might be saying to me, Hey John, does Bixby share your information? So personal information is shared for third party marketing. Traditional or contextual advertisements are displayed and the personalized advertising displayed. So data is definitely collected and shared with third parties. Bixby records all the questions you ask along with all the answers that it has delivered and responses.
So this gets back to a concern that I had in the very beginning of the show. We talked about the fact that cyber criminals are AI voice calling tools to do victims. I see Bixby as a potential security loophole that bad actors could get into and grab your data before it's potentially deleted. Wow, there's so much going on. You know, technology is gonna keep evolving, we all know that. And it's our job to use technology in the most efficient, smart, and effective manner for the greater good of all concern. Hey guys, and ladies, if you would like to be a guest on JMOR Tech talk, reach out to us by going to www.jmor.com , clicking on the reach out button and applying to become a guest. You know, we don't take everyone, we're looking for guests that have value, that want to bring something to my great audience. It's not about selling a product or service. So if you are winding me on the show and you're saying, Hey, I'd be a great guest, ask yourself these three questions. One, am I providing value to the host and to the host's audience? Two, am I selling a product or service either directly or indirectly? Three, when I'm online, am I trying to convince people of something that is potentially gonna put money into my pocket? If the answer is yes to any of these, okay, the question's two and three, that's a problem. If the answer is yes to number one, am I providing value, that's good. But if your answer is yes to two and three, you're probably not gonna be a great guest for the show. Hey guys, I am John C. Morley, serial entrepreneur. It has been a fantastic, amazing time to be with you guys on the JMOR Tech Talk show. I can't wait, ladies and gentlemen, to be with you guys next Friday for another great show. You can always catch the replays on YouTube or on our website www.jmor.com Within 24 hours we transcribe them. They get up there and you can just read the entire show if you'd like. Have yourself a wonderful rest of your weekend and I'm gonna see you guys yeah, next week. Can you believe that? Stay right here for more technology that you need to know about to live happy, healthy, safe, and productive life. I will see you guys next week, but for now, have yourself a wonderful rest of your weekend. Take care everyone.