Mobile marketers love these barcodes , but as consumers embrace them, unscrupulous efforts grow.
It’s difficult to open a magazine or a flyer, these days, without seeing QR codes in all of the adds, but just as their popularity grows, so does their attractiveness to unethical individuals who would take advantage of this opportunity to cause harm.
These little black and white codes may look simple enough, but they may now pose an underlying threat.
It took quite a while for consumers to start to feel the enthusiasm for QR codes that mobile marketers have felt from the start. This has meant that individuals who would seek to use them for harmful purposes have left them alone for quite some time. But as the scanning trend continues to grow, so have the hazards associated with the activity.
Malicious QR codes have started to pop up here and there now that the technology has become commonplace.
Though it is still rare for malicious QR codes to appear, they have started showing up on occasion, and their impact can be quite damaging. This is because there are far more mobile device users that have barcode scanners than there are those who have protection against the type of attack that a tainted scan could present.
QR codes are meant to make it easy to redirect a device user to an app or a website to provide information, generate a download, view a video, or even to help buy a product or make a charitable donation. However, when a permissive reader app has been used, even a seemingly harmless scan could place the user’s privacy at risk.
The most common strategy that is used in order to encourage malicious barcode scans is simply to place a sticker with the harmful code overtop of the legitimate square. Therefore, one of the best efforts that a device user can make to protect his or her security is simply to double check that the QR codes they scan are printed directly onto materials from companies that they trust, and aren’t printed onto a sticker. Downloading a scanner app with built in protection is also a highly recommended activity.
NVIDIA introduces Project Shield
Mobile gaming has become a massive market, one that is virtually impossible to ignore. The advent of mobile technology ensures that people would have access to new forms of entertainment that could be access wherever they were. Mobile gaming has quickly become one of the most popular forms of entertainment among mobile consumers. Mobile gaming often refers to games specifically designed as applications for smart phones and tablets. Video technology company NVIDIA is looking to change all of that with Project Shield.
Device will put a new spin on mobile gaming
Project Shield was recently announced by NVIDIA and refers to an ambitious new gaming device that is not meant to be an entirely standalone product. Since the rise of mobile gaming, gamers only had access to games that they could play on their mobile device. Despite the overwhelming number of mobile games available, many of these games are very similar to one another, offering limited variety to gamers. NVIDIA believes that Project Shield can help solve this problem because it is designed to provide gamers with much more variety.
Mobile device can stream PC games
Project Shield takes the form of a controller, very similar to those seen with the Xbox 360. This game controller is equipped with its own screen, which provides users with a high-definition look of the game they are playing. While the screen may lack the same fidelity that can be found with many modern tablets and smart phones, Project Shield makes up for its potential shortcomings with the fact that it can play games directly from a PC.
Project Shield may be a welcome gadget for avid gamers
Project Shield is designed to allow users to stream games from their PC to NVIDIA’s handheld device using a WiFi connection. This is one of the device’s most acclaimed features, and NVIDIA expects it to be well received by gamers of all types. Essentially, Project Shield is capable of transforming nearly any game available for the PC into a mobile game. The only problem, of course, is that gamers will need to find a way to extend their WiFi signal if they ever want to leave the house with Project Shield.
