Apple

If you’re new to the NSO Pegasus spyware controversy, here’s a post that’ll get you caught up.

With that in mind, this from The Verge’s Mitchell Clark:

Amnesty International — part of the group that helped break the news of journalists and heads of state being targeted by NSO’s government-grade spyware, Pegasus — has released a tool to check if your phone has been affected. Alongside the tool is a great set of instructions, which should help you through the somewhat technical checking process. Using the tool involves backing up your phone to a separate computer and running a check on that backup.

Here’s a link to Amnesty’s instructions. A bit techie, but not too hard to follow if you are OK using Terminal.

José Adorno, 9to5Mac:

Over the past few weeks, 9to5Mac has been covering how criminals in Brazil are stealing people’s phones and using them to drain user’s savings in just a moment. Over the weekend, my iPhone 12 was stolen, but iOS 15 and many other precautions were very helpful and ensured that the situation was not as bad as it could have been.

This SIM replacement trick is troubling. If you’ve not read about this exploit and Apple/Google’s response, take a minute to read this 9to5Mac post.

Back to José’s stolen iPhone:

One of the greatest features available on iOS 15 is the ability to make the iPhone findable even after being turned off or factory reset as long as Activation Lock is enabled. Turns out, this really works in real life, as I still have access to the iPhone’s position even though I factory reset it.

Read the article, some good preventative takes (how to protect your iPhone before being stolen) and response advice (iPhone stolen: what to do next?)

If you do nothing else, create a PIN for your SIM. Easy to do, great layer of protection.

Good look at what’s changed with Notifications by Juli Clover, MacRumors.

What struck me most about this redesign is the notification tuning made possible in the Notification Summary interface:

For Notification Summary, you can select specific times for notifications to be delivered, and decide which app notifications will be relegated to the Notification Summary. You can choose just a handful of apps or all of your apps.

This is definitely worth experimenting with if you feel a bit overwhelmed with notifications, need to rein them in a bit.

Ben Lovejoy, 9to5Mac:

If you’re finding that your iPhone doesn’t unlock your Apple Watch after updating to iOS 14.7, it’s not just you. Apple has admitted that there’s a bug in the latest public release of iOS that affects iPhones with Touch ID instead of Face ID.

Not to be confused with errors unlocking your iPhone using Apple Watch, something folks with masks are finding incredibly useful.

But no, this is an issue for folks who use their iPhones to unlock their Apple Watch:

The Apple Watch automatically locks when you remove it from your wrist, an important security measure given that you can use it to make contactless payments without authentication, as well as access personal data in your apps.

When you first put your Watch on, there are two ways to unlock it: Enter your passcode on the Watch, or unlock your iPhone. The latter is often easier, so many people choose to do this.

If you are encountering this issue, make sure you have Unlock with iPhone enabled. To do this:

• Launch the Watch app on the iPhone paired with your Apple Watch
• In the My Watch tab, scroll down to Passcode
• Make sure Unlock with iPhone is enabled

Here’s an Apple support document with all the details.

CNBC:

Taiwan electronics manufacturer Foxconn said Wednesday that its factory in Zhengzhou — known as the world’s largest iPhone assembly plant — has not been impacted by major flooding in the city.

And:

Zhengzhou in China’s central Henan province has been hit with torrential rain. Authorities said it rained more in an hour on Tuesday than it normally would in an average month.

And this from Tim Cook:

“Our thoughts are with everyone affected by the flooding across Henan province, and the first responders helping people to safety,” Cook said, adding that Apple will be donating to support the relief effort.

How secure is the MagSafe Battery Pack attachment? Will it pop off easily, say, when I’m pulling it out of my pocket?

Watch the video. My takeaway, this puppy’s not coming loose too easily. That magnetic connection is solid.

Tim Hardwick, MacRumors:

In iOS 15, Apple introduced a new Focus feature that aims to help reduce distractions and let you zone in on a single thing. Focus does this by filtering notifications based on what you’re doing.

If you don’t have access to the iOS or iPadOS 15 beta, this is worth a look. Tim Hardwick does a nice job walking through the new Focus interface, exploring the full tree of options.

A short read, but it’ll give you a sense of how to set up and enable a Focus once you do have access.

Reddit:

I’m generally prone to losing things, but I actually hadn’t lost my wallet in a couple of years. I was overdue. I was on my way back from my first concert since the pandemic started, it ended in Bushwick around 4am and then I had to walk 30 minutes to the Metropolitan G (there weren’t any Ubers out at that time). By then, I was barely alive, and my wallet must have slipped out of my pocket into the train sometime between 4:30-5:30am. Most of the time if you lose your wallet on the subway, your chances of getting it back are so slim you don’t even try, but I had luck, a kind stranger, and airtags on my side.

Good story, and a real-world use case showing AirTags living up to their potential.

Salman’s blog:

USB-C was supposed to be the answer to the chaos that is charge and data cable compatibility. And to an extent it was. It unified ports and reduced the amount of cables and chargers I need to travel with. The cables themselves, however, turned out to be a mess. They come in many varieties with obtuse names, confusing markers, and unclear compatibility rules. Yet they all look exactly the same.

I couldn’t agree more.

What are the 8 different USB-C to USB-C cable assemblies? From Benson Leung’s post, we have:

1. USB 2.0 rated at 3A
2. USB 2.0 rated at 5A
3. USB 3.2 Gen 1 rated at 3A
4. USB 3.2 Gen 1 rated at 5A
5. USB 3.2 Gen 2 rated at 3A
6. USB 3.2 Gen 2 rated at 5A
7. USB4 Gen 3 rated at 3A
8. USB4 Gen 3 rated at 5A

Salman took Benson Leung’s post and used some nail polish to create easily identifiable cables. To see the result, follow the headline link, scroll to the bottom for a picture. One stripe for a 3A cable, two stripes for 5A.

This is a brilliant idea. I hope it gets some traction. As is, USB-C cables are a bit of a guessing game.

Washington Post:

The text delivered last month to the iPhone 11 of Claude Mangin, the French wife of a political activist jailed in Morocco, made no sound. It produced no image. It offered no warning of any kind as an iMessage from somebody she didn’t know delivered malware directly onto her phone — and past Apple’s security systems.

Once inside, the spyware, produced by Israel’s NSO Group and licensed to one of its government clients, went to work, according to a forensic examination of her device by Amnesty International’s Security Lab. It found that between October and June, her phone was hacked multiple times with Pegasus, NSO’s signature surveillance tool, during a time when she was in France.

And:

Pegasus can collect emails, call records, social media posts, user passwords, contact lists, pictures, videos, sound recordings and browsing histories, according to security researchers and NSO marketing materials. The spyware can activate cameras or microphones to capture fresh images and recordings. It can listen to calls and voice mails. It can collect location logs of where a user has been and also determine where that user is now, along with data indicating whether the person is stationary or, if moving, in which direction.

And all of this can happen without a user even touching her phone or knowing she has received a mysterious message from an unfamiliar person — in Mangin’s case, a Gmail user going by the name “linakeller2203.”

The instance described above is the tip of the iceberg, one story among many, a small part of a massive story that broke over the weekend. A few reads to get a sense of this:

• Here’s Amnesty International’s original report, filled with detail, the source of much of this information.

• This post from The Guardian dives into details on the hack, with a map (about halfway down) that shows in what parts of the world these hacks were concentrated.

From that Guardian post:

NSO has always maintained it “does not operate the systems that it sells to vetted government customers, and does not have access to the data of its customers’ targets”.

In statements issued through its lawyers, NSO denied “false claims” made about the activities of its clients, but said it would “continue to investigate all credible claims of misuse and take appropriate action”. It said the list could not be a list of numbers “targeted by governments using Pegasus”, and described the 50,000 figure as “exaggerated”.

And:

The Guardian and its media partners will be revealing the identities of people whose number appeared on the list in the coming days. They include hundreds of business executives, religious figures, academics, NGO employees, union officials and government officials, including cabinet ministers, presidents and prime ministers.

And, regarding iPhone specific attacks:

Guarnieri has identified evidence NSO has been exploiting vulnerabilities associated with iMessage, which comes installed on all iPhones, and has been able to penetrate even the most up-to-date iPhone running the latest version of iOS. His team’s forensic analysis discovered successful and attempted Pegasus infections of phones as recently as this month.

Looking forward to official Apple comment on this situation.

Joe Rossignol, MacRumors:

According to The Information’s Wayne Ma, roughly 360,000 counterfeit wireless headphones with a retail value of $62.2 million were confiscated in the first nine months of the U.S. government’s fiscal year.

And:

The Information examined counterfeit AirPods Pro sold in Hong Kong in December, noting that they had a genuine Apple serial number and were physically indistinguishable from legitimate AirPods Pro, and even had functional active noise cancellation and Transparency mode features. The report claims one of the only ways to determine that the AirPods were fake was by looking up their firmware version, which was incorrect.

If I was going to buy AirPods Pro, I’d buy them from Apple. Period.

But if you do buy from a third party, like Amazon or Best Buy (because price), I would check the firmware as soon as they arrive, make sure you’re getting the real McCoy.

Reddit:

I purchased AirPods Pro in late 2019 and recently began encountering issues with crackling sounds and poor noise cancellation performance. I made an appointment at a local Apple Store from Apple’s AirPods Pro Service Program page and got both AirPods replaced for free later the same day. They gave me a new pack of ear tips and returned my existing wireless charging case. It was a very short appointment; they took the AirPods into the back, ran a test, and told me that they both failed the volume and noise cancellation tests.

If you own AirPods Pro and are hearing a crackling sound and/or notice poor noise cancellation performance, hop over to the AirPods Pro Service Program page.

Jim and I discussed this on this week’s podcast (drops tomorrow afternoon). Jim has the crackling sound and my noise cancellation has started to fail. We’re both taking trips to the Apple Store to see what’s what.

Note that the program is good for two years from “the first retail sale of the unit”, which means we are closing in on the end of coverage. The AirPods Pro were released October 30, 2019. Still time to get them fixed, if you qualify.

Market cap is the total value of a company’s outstanding shares. $2.5 trillion is a lot.

To see this for yourself, type AAPL in your browser search bar, then scan the detail page that appears for mkt cap or market cap.

Seems like just yesterday when Apple hit $1 trillion (August 2018) and then $2 trillion (August 2020).

Doomed.

From the product page:

Attaching the MagSafe Battery Pack is a snap. Its compact, intuitive design makes on-the-go charging easy. The perfectly aligned magnets keep it attached to your iPhone 12 or iPhone 12 Pro — providing safe and reliable wireless charging. And it automatically charges, so there’s no need to turn it on or off. There’s no interference with your credit cards or key fobs either.

And:

At your desk and need a charge? Just plug a Lightning cable into the MagSafe Battery Pack for up to 15W of wireless charging. Short on time? With a higher than 20W power adapter, you can charge both the MagSafe Battery Pack and your iPhone even faster. And you can track the status of your charge on the Lock Screen.

The pack is $99. A premium price, but an elegant solution if you own an iPhone 12 series and find yourself running out of charge towards the end of the day.

The battery pack has two 1,460mAh cells (according to this tweet).

The total of 2,920mAh is right around the capacity of the iPhone 12/12 Pro, more than the mini, less than the max, but nowhere near the $20 battery packs, like this model from INIU, which sports extra ports and 10,000mAh of charge.

That said, the MagSafe Battery Pack is slim, very tightly integrated (charge shows up in the battery Home Screen widget), uses the same Lightning cable as the iPhone, and, of course, has the convenience of MagSafe. The battery will also pass-through charge (charge when you plug in your phone).

If you own an iPhone 12 series, this will give you a constant trickle charge, topping off your phone, getting you through the day if that’s ever been an issue.

From Apple’s official MagSafe Battery Pack Support Page:

Attach your MagSafe Battery Pack to your iPhone and then plug the MagSafe Battery Pack into a power adapter. Using a 20W or higher power adapter, the MagSafe Battery Pack can charge your iPhone with up to 15W of charging power.

You can also charge both if you attach your MagSafe Battery Pack to your iPhone, then plug your iPhone into a power source. You might want to charge this way if you need to connect your iPhone to another device while charging, like if you’re using wired CarPlay or transferring photos to a Mac.

The benefit of a separate power pack like the INIU mentioned above is the additional power (days of charge without having to recharge the pack) and the flexibility (multiple ports, and with the right cable, you can charge all your devices). But the cost is a bit of extra weight and the need for a cable.

If you’ve ever considered changing carriers, take a read of the linked article. There’s a lot of good detail, but here’s the bottom line:

For a single line, unlimited talk and text with 500 MB of data costs $25 per month, with various tiers up to $60 per month for unlimited everything. You can have up to three lines, and with three lines, each person gets unlimited talk, text, and data for $30 per month or $90 per month total. Not too shabby. I’ve been paying $130 per month for three lines of lousy Verizon service, and that’s with a 19% state employee discount my wife gets for being a teacher.

There are a few caveats, but nothing truly problematic. If you are considering such a move, take the time to read Josh’s article.

Chaim Gartenberg, The Verge:

If you’re an iPhone user, the weather is always a particularly nice 70 degrees. Or 68 degrees. Any temperature but 69 degrees, actually, because it turns out that the built-in weather app on some versions of iOS — including the current version, iOS 14.6 — will refuse to display the internet’s favorite number, even if the actual temperature in a given location is, in fact, 69 degrees.

This silly piece of fluff has been flying around the internet. Lots of hot takes, lots of “nice”. It did make me laugh, imagining Tim Cook demanding that the number 69 be removed from the weather app!

In a nutshell, it’s a rounding issue, not censorship.

My favorite line, from Gruber’s take (with the URL ending “69_dudes”):

Sometimes a cigar is just an integer math conversion glitch.

Nice.

This is Money:

Apple’s lawyers warned it could quit the UK market if a court forces the company to pay a ‘commercially unacceptable’ fee for the technology used in its iPhones.

And:

Apple issued the warning as part of a court battle with UK patent holder Optis Cellular Technology.

And:

Optis is suing Apple for patent infringement after the iPhone maker refused to pay licence fees worth a possible $7billion for using ‘standardised’ smartphone technology in its products.

A High Court judge ruled last month that Apple had infringed two Optis patents, which help iPhones connect to the 3G and 4G networks.

The article is a hot take, but interesting nonetheless. If the follow-on court proceedings levy more in fines than Apple can make in profits in the UK, what choice would they have?