Boeing Black Smartphone Bricks Itself When Tampered with

Boeing (yes, that same Boeing that makes airplanes) is currently working on a smartphone called “Black” that can reportedly self-destruct when it senses that it’s being tampered with.

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It’s especially made for government agencies and their agents. Boeing’s emphasis in designing Black is security, with the goal of ensuring that sensitive information and data stay private or secure, even when the phone changes hands (or is stolen.) Apparently, the phone can also be set to automatically “brick” itself in the event that it falls into the wrong hands. Adding to security, it can transmit on private satellite channels.

Boeing’s tamper-proof phone is aimed at government agencies and contractors who need to keep communication and data secure. Made in the United States, the phone runs on Google Inc’s Android operating system. The 5.2-by-2.7-inch handset, slightly larger than an iPhone, uses dual SIM cards to enable it to access multiple cell networks instead of a single network like a normal cellphone.

The device’s hardware roots of trust and trusted boot ensure the device starts in a trusted state, enabling maximum security of data. Hardware media encryption and configurable inhibit controls are embedded to protect the device, its data, and the transmission of information, significantly reducing the risk of mission compromise due to data loss.

[via Geekologie]

Don’t Take Your Sense Of Touch For Granted

Manual dexterity – the ability to open a bottle, to sign a birthday
card is something we take for granted.
When your sense of touch is impaired due to a stroke, diabetes or
otherwise, tying your laces can become impossible. Recent research has found that wearable gloves that stimulate the
nerves which communicate with the brain, can improve the tactile
discrimination (quality of the sense of touch) of patients.

Logitech Harmony Smart Keyboard Supports Typing on Set-top Boxes and Game Consoles

Logitech has announced a new member of the Harmony line of universal remote controls. Typically, when we are talking about Harmony Remotes, they look like remote controls. This time that is not the case with the Harmony Smart Keyboard being designed to allows easy typing on your set-top box or game console.

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The keyboard has a normal QWERTY arrangement and should make for each searching for your favorite content. The keyboard has dedicated buttons for changing channels, Guide, Pause, and Play on connected devices. The keyboard will support Apple TV, Roku, and the Xbox One and PS3. No mention of support for the PS4 is made, but that’s not surprising – none of Harmony’s remotes yet support Sony’s latest console.

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The keyboard ships with the Harmony Hub that works with an app available for Android or iOS devices. The hub and app combo  allows you to control components in your entertainment system and set up activities for tasks like watching movies, and even allows operation of equipment inside of closed cabinets. The Harmony Smart Keyboard can be pre-ordered for $149.99 (USD) right now.

Pizza Hut’s Touch Table Lets You Design the Perfect Pie

You have no shortage of pizza choices. In your area alone, you probably have several hundred pizza shops. Well, Pizza Hut has a plan to get you in the door and leave those others behind.
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This proof-of-concept interactive table was created in partnership with Chaotic Moon Studios. It lets you visualize your order as you are designing it. You can pick your crust, select your sauce and cheese; then add toppings like chicken, pepperoni or whatever you want. Then you can choose cheese sticks, Spicy Asian wings or Hershey’s Chocolate Dunkers. Once your order is complete, you can pay by placing an NFC compatible smartphone on the tabletop.

It is basically the same way you order from them online already, just in a more interactive form. The chain is no doubt hoping that this entices more customers and speeds up orders. Oh, and while you wait for your pizza, you can play some Angry Birds.

[via Engadget]

Beautiful Wooden Workbench Hides a PC: Maker’s Desk

Swedish artist Love Hultén continues to marry classic furniture with computers. One of his latest projects is Tempel, a modern workstation inspired by 19th century writing desks. It combines a workbench, a large drawer and a computer in one elegant piece of wooden furniture.

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The workbench’s lid has an illuminated planetarium design beneath its keyhole. Below the workbench are 26 drawers.

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When opened, the lid turns into a desk and reveals Tempel’s other components. The left side houses a soldering station…

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while the right side seems to contain the controls for the computer, as well as its USB ports.

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The computer’s 24″ monitor pops out in front of the tool rack at the center.

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Now that’s an all-in-one PC. Check out Love’s website to see more of Tempel.

[via designboom via Werd]

Ten Russian Inventions That Have Quietly Changed The World

Science and The WorldAlthough our ties with Russia sometimes walk across a political tightrope, there’s no underestimating  this nation’s  scientific and technical contributions. Across the centuries, many inventions that have changed the course of our daily lives have emanated from the briliiant minds of Russian scientists. Here are ten for your reading edification.

Samsung and LG Will Help People Be Healthier With New Smartphones and Fitness Technology

Samsung Galaxy S5 and GearSamsung and LG pair fitness technology with their new smartphones. In recent years, we have see the rise in fitness technology, like heart rate monitors and fitbands. Now smartphone companies are getting involved. The Samsung Galaxy S5 and LG G Flex will soon release their own fitness gadgets. By marketing fitness technology with smartphones, more people are being exposed to technology that facillitates an active lifestyle.

AllSee Low-power Sensor Uses Ambient Radio Signals to Detect Gestures

Many gesture detection devices, including the Kinect and the Leap Motion, use infrared cameras to sense movement. They also have dedicated chips that process the data from the cameras. These components are power-hungry, especially if they’re turned on at all times. Researchers from the University of Washington have developed a gesture detection device that uses 1,000 to 10,000 times less power than its counterparts.

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Bryce Kellogg, Vamsi Talla and their teacher Shyam Gollakota call the device AllSee. Instead of cameras and infrared light, it measures how the user’s hand affects ambient TV signals: “At a high level, we use the insight that motion at a location farther from the receiver results in smaller wireless signal changes than from a close-by location. This is because the reflections from a farther location experience higher attenuation and hence have lower energy at the receiver.”

The signal can also come from a dedicated RFID transmitter such as an RFID reader; future models may even use ambient Wi-Fi signals. The researchers even built prototypes that used TV signals both as source of data and as source of power, eliminating the need for a battery or plug.

Wave at your browser and go to the AllSee homepage for more on the device.

[via DamnGeeky]

Nissan Rear-view Mirror Can Switch to Rear Camera View: Who’s the Nearest of Them All?

Nissan just made the rear-view mirror twice as useful. Its Smart mirror neatly hides an LCD monitor, which can display live video from a camera mounted at the rear of a vehicle at the flick of a switch.

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The 4:1 monitor and 1.3mp camera should come in handy not just when your cargo or passengers are blocking your view, but also when your rear window gets dusty, wet or fogged up.

I think it’s a great idea, but as other folks have pointed out, it might be better if the switch is installed somewhere that’s closer to the driver. Nissan will offer the Smart rear-view mirror starting this Spring in Japan and in the rest of the world starting next year.

[Nissan via Wired]

Raspberry Pi Bullet Time Rig: Frozen Pi

The folks at PiFace – makers of hardware interfaces for the Raspberry Pi – wanted to make a camera rig that could create the bullet time effect popularized by The Matrix, but they didn’t want to spend thousands of dollars on cameras. Naturally their first instinct was to see if they could use the Raspberry Pi to make a cheaper alternative. To their surprise, their idea worked!

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PiFace calls its rig the Frozen Raspberry Pi or Frozen Pi. It consists of 48 Raspberry Pis each with a Raspberry Pi Camera and a PiFace Control and Display interface, all mounted on a laser-cut wood frame. The computers are networked via Ethernet so they can be simultaneously triggered remotely and so that the pictures they take can be sent to a single computer. PiFace wrote a Python script to collect the pictures and arrange them in order. Skip to around 2:17 in the video below to see the rig in action and people in inaction.

Slow down time and head to the PiFace blog to find out more about how they made the Frozen Pi.

[via MAKE]