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mobile
March 19, 2012
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AT&T pays disgruntled iPhone user in throttling case

By on March 19, 2012 at 3:40 PM.

AT&T pays disgruntled iPhone user in throttling case

A judge in Southern California last month awarded $850 to an iPhone user who was throttled on AT&T’s network. The plaintiff, Matt Spaccarelli, filed a small claims case against AT&T, arguing that the carrier unfairly slowed speeds on his iPhone 4 despite his unlimited data plan. Spaccarelli on Thursday took to Twitter to announce that the carrier will not appeal the decision and instead paid him $850 plus $85 for court fees. In an interview with Mashable, Spaccarelli revealed that AT&T was still throttling his phone, which had an average download speed of 0.31Mbps. He said he plans to use the money to cancel his service with the network before his contract is up and will also travel to an AT&T stockholders meeting in April in Salt Lake City. “To me the check means AT&T didn’t stand a chance in the appeal,” Spaccarelli said. “If they did, they wouldn’t have paid me.” Read on for more. More →

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Legal
July 14, 2011
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How much did ‘Locationgate’ cost Apple? Less than $1,000

By on July 14, 2011 at 10:00 AM.

How much did ‘Locationgate’ cost Apple? Less than $1,000

Following the “Antennagate” scandal that cost Apple zero sales last year, a new “Locationgate” scandal took the media by storm earlier this year that ultimately cost Apple zero sales. It was discovered in late April that the iPhone and 3G-equipped iPads were secretly tracking and storing users’ locations. Apple issued a statement seven days later, claiming the culprit was a bug that would be addressed as soon as possible. Apple also said that it does not track its users or their locations. Some people tend to take things more personally than others — or perhaps they’re out for a quick buck — so lawsuits were inevitable. Thus far, just one single complaint related to Locationgate has resulted in a payout from Apple, and it was awarded to South Korean man Kim Hyung-suk this past May, Reuters reports. What was the damage? 1 million won, which translates to a whopping $945. Kim, a lawyer, said Apple sent the payment last month. More →

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Business
June 20, 2011
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Skype said to be firing execs to reduce payouts

By on June 20, 2011 at 6:46 PM.

Skype said to be firing execs to reduce payouts

Skype has started to fire several of its executives in an effort to reduce payouts from its Microsoft purchase, Bloomberg reported on Monday. Among the execs being let go are vice presidents Christopher Dean, David Gurle, don Albert, and Russ Shaw, as well as chief marketing officer Doug Bewsher, and the head of human resources, Anne Gillespi. Two other execs from Skype’s Qik acquisition earlier this year — Ramu Sunkara and Allyson Campa — were also fired according to the report. This could possibly mean that the executives will lose any stock options that were not yet vested. Microsoft announced on May 10th that it was acquiring Skype for $8.5 billion, and the deal is still pending FCC approval. More →

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Security
July 21, 2010
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Google says "me too," offering $3,000+ bounty for Chrome bugs

By on July 21, 2010 at 7:45 PM.

Google says "me too," offering $3,000+ bounty for Chrome bugs

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Several days ago, Mozilla announced that it would pay developers and hackers $3,000 for every reproducible, critical security flaw found in its FireFox web browser. Yesterday, Google has announced that it will pay $3,133.70 for critical security bugs found in its Chrome web browser. Bravo to Google for their ability to sneak 31337 (eleet) into their bug bounty payout. Google’s pay-per-bug program looks like this:

  1. The maximum reward for a single bug has been increased to $3,133.7. We will most likely use this amount for SecSeverity-Critical bugs in Chromium. The increased reward reflects the fact that the sandbox makes it harder to find bugs of this severity.
  2. Whilst the base reward for less serious bugs remains at $500, the panel will consider rewarding more for high-quality bug reports. Factors indicating a high-quality bug report might include a careful test case reduction, an accurate analysis of root cause, or productive discussion towards resolution.

We’ve got the full article all linked up for you. More →

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