Tag: apple technology news

Apple has now released its latest gadgets, which have been met with the mixed responses.

After having built up the traditional hype over the latest Apple event, the latest tablet commerce releases from the company have drawn a great deal of attention as well as many furrowed brows.

The iPad Air – the top of the line model – will begin shipping in select countries as of November 1.

Tim Cook took the stage at this mobile and tablet commerce event to release the latest technology news from the company, which primarily involved the unveiling of the iPad Air and the iPad Mini 2, but also involved several other announcements from the company. For instance, he reiterated the latest sales data for the opening weekend of the iPhones 5S and 5C, last month and pointed out that in September there had been 200 million downloads of the latest iOS 7 release.

It was by far the tablet commerce announcements that were most sought by the investors in attendance.

Nearly an hour into the event, tablet commerce and the newest iPad releases finally made their way to the topic. According to Cook, the 170 millionth iPad was sold earlier in October and “this is an incredible number and I can’t think of another product that’s come so far, so fast. Now everyone seems to be making a tablet, even some of the doubters.” He also expressed that the device line leads the market in customer satisfaction saying that “iPad combines into an incredible experience hardware and amazing software and intuitive services into an experience no one else can match.”

Just over an hour into the presentation, at 11:03am, a video if the iPads are shown and Phil Schiller, the vice president of worldwide marketing for Apple, unveiled the iPad Air. It features a 9.7 inch Retina display and is 43 percent thinner than the previous model. It weighs 0.4 pounds less than the previous iPad, as well, at only 1 pound, making it “the lightest full-size tablet in the world”, while being powered by the same A7 chip that can be found in the iPhone 5S and a 10 hour battery life.

The tablet commerce discussions continued with the unveiling of the iPad Mini 2 at about 11:15, local time. As was predicted by many, it is now a 7.9 inch Retina display, also powered by the A7 chip and featuring 10 hours of battery life. By the end of the event, investors seemed nonplussed overall and stocks had dropped by 1.41 percent ($7.36 to $514.00). Now only time will tell what consumers think.

Hackers are saying that the technology is “broken” and that it is possible to bypass.

Although Apple is saying that its Touch ID fingerprint recognition system is providing consumers with the iPhone 5S with a “very high level” of mobile security, hackers are claiming that they have been able to break into that system as of a day after the initial launch of the device.

These claims have been made by the Chaos Computer Club in Germany, among other hackers.

The Chaos Computer Club released a statement that claimed that it “successfully bypassed the biometric security of Apple’s Touch ID using easy everyday means.” This could have serious mobile security implications for the device manufacture which has been heavily hyping this particular feature for the safety that it provides its users.

The hackers have claimed that it was easy enough to bypass the fingerprint based mobile security barrier.

They accomplished this by taking a photograph of a fingerprint that was left behind by a user on a glass surface. They were then able to create an artificial “finger” that featured the user’s fingerprint so that they would be able to unlock the phone’s mobile security device. Even after these claims, Apple continues to maintain that the Touch ID system is a secure one.

On Apple’s own official website, it has explained that there is a one in 50,000 chance that two individual fingerprints will be adequately similar for the technology to think that they are the same. It feels that this mobile security level remains very high.

According to the SRLabs chief scientist, Karsten Nohl “It would have been incredible if Apple had managed to do something the rest of the biometrics industry has failed to achieve after decades of trying, so I’m not surprised it was hacked after just one day.” The head scientist at the think tank also stated, while speaking to the BBC, that “Claiming this system offers a high level of security is just ridiculous.”

At the same time, Apple has not been claiming that the Touch ID is a complete replacement for the more traditional mobile security technique that uses a password. Instead, it is designed to allow users to unlock their devices more conveniently.