Hasta La Gadget!

Akamai’s annual State of the Internet report is loaded with all sorts of interesting, if not terribly surprising, tidbits about both broad and narrowband connections around the globe. The big news? The world-wide average connection speed has jumped 23-percent from last year, to 2.1Mbps. Speeds in the good ol’ US-of-A were up 15-percent for an average of 5.3Mbps, though we still languish in 14th place on the list of fastest countries. As expected, Asia continues to dominate the speed race, with 61 cities in Japan alone making the top 100 list. If you want the fastest connections the States have to offer you’ll have to head for San Jose or Riverside in CA or the home of the Wu (that’s Staten Island for those of you not in the know), which all tied with an average 7.8Mbps connection. Check out the PR after the break and click the more coverage link to download some charts.

Continue reading Akamai sees internet speeds climb, Asia still dominates broadband arms race

Akamai sees internet speeds climb, Asia still dominates broadband arms race originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Jul 2011 21:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Samsung has finally wrapped up that investigation into alleged cancer risks at its chip facilities, but it might not share the details with the rest of the world. In the study, which the company commissioned last year, researchers from US-based Environ International Corp. found that cancers affecting six semiconductor employees were unrelated to any chemicals they may have been exposed to on the job. Of those six workers, four have already died and five of the families are currently pressing charges. Last month, a South Korea court determined that two of the cases could be linked to toxic chemical exposure — a ruling that Environ’s report clearly contradicts. Samsung, however, is reluctant to disclose the results in full, for fear that doing so may reveal some proprietary information. Environ’s Paul Harper declined to say how much Samsung paid for the investigation, due to client confidentiality, while confirming that the research was carried out in consultation with a panel of independent experts. Semiconductor exec Kwon Oh-hyun, meanwhile, denied that the company commissioned the study in order to use it as evidence in the ongoing court case, in which Samsung isn’t even listed as a defendant.

Samsung study finds no link between cancer and work conditions, might not be released in full originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 15 Jul 2011 07:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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In Symantec’s bleak, dystopian world, it doesn’t matter whether you choose Android or iOS — you’ll be making yourself vulnerable to attacks regardless of the camp you’re in. The company just concluded a study pitting iOS’s security against Android’s — an undertaking intended mainly for corporate IT staffs trying to figure out which devices they can safely issue to employees. (Curiously, despite the enterprise focus, you won’t find a single comparison against BlackBerrys.) Although iOS won higher marks when it came to thwarting traditional malware and showed a more modest advantage in terms of data loss, data integrity, and service attacks, the two platforms proved equally adept at preventing web-based attacks — and equally powerless to catch socially engineered ones. And when it came to implementing certain security measures, such as permissions-based controls, Android pulled ahead.

Ultimately, Symantec (which sells mobile security software of its own, by the by) concluded that both “are still vulnerable to many existing categories of attacks,” not least because both platforms allow users to sync with third-party apps or web services that may or may not be secure themselves. Indeed, Symantec’s thesis is that Apple’s App Store approval process helps explain its lead in the malware-blocking department. Also, in shocking news, Symantec adds that people using jailbroken are especially attractive targets for attackers, and that these devices are as vulnerable as computers. Don’t say no one warned you. Head past the break for a press release with a summary of the findings or, if you’re curious, hit the source link for a PDF version of the full report.

Continue reading Symantec report on mobile security concludes iOS and Android both vulnerable to attacks

Symantec report on mobile security concludes iOS and Android both vulnerable to attacks originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 29 Jun 2011 17:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Isn’t it curious how you always crack open a beer before settling in for some GTA? Or how you tend to put an anxious hand over your wallet when logging onto PSN? No soldier, it is not curious. Not at all. But this is: Researchers at North Carolina State University claim they’ve found a way to predict your in-game behavior with “up to 80 percent accuracy.” After analyzing the decision-making of 14,000 World of Warcraft players, they noticed that different players prefer different types of achievements. These preferred achievements clump together into statistically significant groups, known as “cliques”, even if they have nothing obvious in common. So a WoW player who likes to improve their unarmed combat skills also, for some psychological reason, tends to want points for world travel. What’s more, the researchers believe that clique-spotting can be exploited outside the rather specific world of WoW, in which case their method could prove lucrative to game designers, online retailers and pretty much anyone with an interest in predicting your next move. Want to know more? Then we predict you’ll click the PR after the break.

Continue reading Shocker! Gamer behavior is actually quite predictable

Shocker! Gamer behavior is actually quite predictable originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 14 Jun 2011 16:47:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Alright, so technically all video games are digital, but what we’re talking about here is the stuff that you don’t buy on physical media — downloadable games, add-on content, mobile apps, subscriptions, and gaming on social networks. That market has grown to account for 24 percent of all video game revenues in 2010, or $3.8 billion, according to the Entertainment Software Association. The ESA is the body running the currently ongoing E3 shindig, and its data comes from the NPD Group, which likes to keep a cold robotic finger on the gaming industry’s pulse. Other findings in the latest ESA study include the average age of gamers (37!), the best-selling genres (action with 21.7 percent, followed by sports at 16.3 percent), and the highest-grossing games of 2010 (no prizes for guessing the warmongering winner of that one). Give the source link a bash to immerse yourself in even more gaming trivia from yesteryear.

Digital games distribution earned $3.8 billion in 2010, a quarter of entire video game market originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 09 Jun 2011 03:52:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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