Hackers can be notoriously difficult to buy gifts for, so we've curated a list of the top 20 most popular items Null Byte readers are buying during their ethical-hacking studies. Whether you're buying a gift for a friend or have been dying to share this list with someone shopp ...more
Your iPhone and Mac can speak to each other in many ways, allowing you to start work on one device and seamlessly switch to the other, share clipboards between the two, and pick up phone calls and answer text messages on both. The compatibility is incredible, but there's even ...more
After years of waiting, Microsoft has finally updated its industry-leading augmented reality device, the HoloLens. During a pre-show event at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, HoloLens inventor Alex Kipman, along with Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Julia White, ...more
The release of Avatar Chat for Magic Leap One and Spatial for HoloLens during the fourth quarter of 2018 appeared to revolutionize video calling via augmented reality. But a new startup called Mimesys, which is showing off its software at CES this week in Las Vegas, has upped ...more
Following the surprise release of Magic Leap's SDK on Monday, March 19, Unity, Unreal Engine, and Mozilla followed up by announcing official partnerships with the company. "We are proud to partner with Magic Leap to integrate the Magic Leap platform with Unity," Unity announc ...more
Perhaps in tribute to the season premiere of Game of Thrones, Google Glass is demonstrating that what is dead may never die, as Alphabet's X (formerly Googlex) has revealed that the Enterprise Edition of the smart glasses are now available to businesses. Two years ago, the te ...more
One of the coolest features that Samsung built into the Galaxy S4 is the infrared (IR) blaster and WatchON software to control your television. I've been using my GS4 for the past few weeks to control my DirecTV setup and it works great. Smartphones are truly becoming all-in-o ...more
Most of us have some sort of malware scanner or antivirus program on our computers, but what about our smartphones? A lot of people don't realize that computers aren't the only devices that are susceptible to malicious software and apps—they can follow you on your smartphone o ...more
When it comes to augmented reality wearables, it's currently an enterprise world. As such, Magic Leap's latest Lumin updates are centered on features that appeal to enterprise customers. And Epson and Spinar are joining forces with a solution for distributed workforces. Mean ...more
The year 2019 was filled with all the normal peaks and valleys of the tech business cycle, but this year was particularly important in a space as relatively young as the augmented reality industry. What once seemed like a vast fertile bed of mobile AR apps, powered by Apple's ...more
If you have a modern iPhone, you have an excellent video recorder at your disposal. Every iPhone since the 6S has the ability to shoot in 4K resolution, and each new iteration has brought new capabilities to the table. But even the best mobile shooter can use a little extra he ...more
Enterprise augmented reality software provider Upskill has raised $17.2 million in its latest round of funding, led by new investors Cisco and Accenture. Last year, the company closed a Series B round of funding led by strategic investors Boeing HorizonX and GE Ventures, who ...more
On Tuesday, original design manufacturer (ODM) Flex used the CES spotlight to help introduce a smartglasses reference design aimed at companies interested in bringing their own enterprise AR headsets to market. Flex AR is a head-mounted display with a similar form factor to H ...more
When it comes to augmented reality smartglasses, for now, it's still a mostly enterprise world, since the form and function of most are more acceptable on a job site versus your local cafe, and the still high price tags are far more palatable to major companies rather than ind ...more
Surveillance is always a useful tool in a hacker's arsenal, whether deployed offensively or defensively. Watching targets yourself isn't always practical, and traditional surveillance camera systems can be costly, lacking in capabilities, or both. Today, we will use motionEyeO ...more
Influenced by the growth of augmented and virtual reality technology as well as 3D computer vision, Ericcson Ventures invested in Matterport, whose hardware and software help companies create AR/VR experiences. In other AR market news, HoloLens supplier Himax Technologies is ...more
GE Aviation and their software partner Upskill are seeing success by giving their mechanics smart tools and smart glasses, the latter in the form of Google Glass. In a pilot program at their Cincinnati factory, GE Aviation gave a team of mechanics Google Glass Enterprise Edit ...more
Over the past several weeks, I’ve had the pleasure of test driving Samsung’s next big thing, the Galaxy S4. After putting the GS4 through its paces, I have a clear picture of what this device is capable of. I’ve covered the features of the device before, and now I’ll tell you ...more
With many office workers in the US being asked to work from home if their job allows, Magic Leap's customary updates for the Lumin OS and Lumin SDK brings some help to keep distributed workforces connected. Chief among the new features arriving with Lumin OS version 0.98.10 a ...more
Now that we've officially seen the HoloLens 2 and Microsoft has shown off the improvements and new superpowers of the augmented reality headset, what about the specs? Luckily, Microsoft has laid bare the full specifications for its next-generation headset. Let's dive in and s ...more
On the surface, AppleCare+ seems like an expensive and gimmicky option to tack onto your already pricey iPhone 11, 11 Pro, or 11 Pro Max. Upon further inspection, however, you'll see that its seemingly expensive price tag is chump change compared to the fees you'll have to pay ...more
Some of the big guns developing augmented reality technology fired shots at their competitors with announcements and leaked plans this week. Enterprise augmented reality software and hardware makers were served notice by Microsoft when the company strengthened its own offerin ...more
In a LinkedIn post published on Tuesday, Microsoft's leading advocate for the HoloLens made a prediction that the mixing of immersive technologies will define augmented reality in 2018. Alex Kipman, the Technical Fellow for new device categories for Microsoft's Windows and De ...more
When it comes to antivirus software, you don't want some fly-by-night developer having access to the sensitive data that these apps can scan. Luckily, most of the longest-tenured antivirus companies from the realm of desktop computers offer complete security suites for Android ...more
Welcome back, my hacker novitiates! As you know by now, the Metasploit Framework is one of my favorite hacking tools. It is capable of embedding code into a remote system and controlling it, scanning systems for recon, and fuzzing systems to find buffer overflows. Plus, all o ...more
The rise and fall of Meta, the Silicon Valley-based augmented reality startup that looked to challenge the likes of Microsoft's HoloLens, and others, took just six years. Now, as the story of the company draws to a close, we finally have some deeper insight into what exactly ...more
The worldwide health crisis around the coronavirus has gripped the live events industry, particularly in the tech sector, with the cancellations of Mobile World Congress, the Game Developers Conference, Facebook's F8, Google I/O and now South by Southwest. But one conference, ...more
Computer vision is a key component in enabling augmented reality experiences, but now it can help give sight to the blind as well. In this case, that assistance comes from Envision, developers of mobile apps for iOS and Android that use optical character recognition (OCR) and ...more
Last December, Google unceremoniously killed off Google Glass Explorer Edition with a final software update, leaving the Glass Enterprise Edition 2 as the only remaining AR wearable from Google. Now, Google is making it easier for enterprise customers and developers to acquir ...more
In his famous 1996 "Content is King" essay, Bill Gates predicted that content is where tech companies will make money on the Internet. The adage clearly holds true in the current phase of augmented reality experience. For example, Magic Leap, Snapchat, Facebook, Google, 8th W ...more
Aircraft manufacturer Airbus is so impressed with the boost in productivity it has gained from Microsoft's HoloLens, the company will begin offering augmented reality software to its customers. On Monday at the Paris Air Show, Airbus announced that it will begin selling off-t ...more
Public beta testers are no longer stuck on iOS 12.1.3. Apple just released the first public beta for iOS 12.2 today, Jan. 28. The company released the first developer beta for the software Thursday, Jan. 24, which includes new features for HealthKit and News, as well as a slew ...more
One day after the official release of iOS 12.1.3, Apple released the first beta for iOS 12.2 to developers. The software appears to be the first in some time to be a major update. Apple's last beta cycles included 12.1.2 and 12.1.3, incremental updates to iOS 12.1. Now, we've ...more
On Wednesday, in addition to uploading another batch of videos from its L.E.A.P. conference to its YouTube channel, Magic Leap also launched a new video series for developers called Spacebar. The new series consists of interviews with developers regarding their insights, expe ...more
Automotive augmented reality company WayRay has set its destination for a $1 billion valuation with an estimated time of arrival of 2019, and it has just passed a major milestone towards that goal. On Tuesday, the company announced that it has closed an $80 million Series C r ...more
On Tuesday, at the Unite Berlin developers conference, Unity unveiled new tools designed specifically for augmented reality that could literally raise the technology to the next level. Coming this fall, a new extension for Unity called Project MARS (short for Mixed and Augmen ...more
A Russian augmented reality startup wants the next frontier in real estate to be augmented reality estate. Arcona, a blockchain-based augmented reality platform proposed by Piligrim XXI, maps out a grid of "Digital Land" over real locations across the world where digital cont ...more
Upskill, an enterprise software developer for industrial augmented reality applications, recently received an influx of funding and a major vote of confidence from two of their top customers. The company announced today that it has secured Series B funding from Boeing, throug ...more
Yesterday, the Free Software Foundation published an article written by Paul Kocialkowski. A software developer for the the Android fork system Replicant, Paul stated that his organization discovered, and later patched, a "backdoor" vulnerability that existed in older Samsung ...more
After nearly two months of beta testing, Apple is finally pushing the iOS 15.6 software update to all iPhone users. While it's not as feature-rich as the iOS 15.5 or iOS 15.4 that came before it, there are still a few things you'll want to know about it. The iOS 15.6 update w ...more
UnrealIRCd is an open-source IRC server that has been around since 1999 and is perhaps the most widely used one today. Version 3.2.8.1 was vulnerable to remote code execution due to a backdoor in the software. Today, we will be exploiting the vulnerability with Metasploit, exa ...more
Your social security number, credit card information, and medical history can fall into the wrong hands if you're not careful about how and where you share your data online. If you really care about your data, there are tools and techniques you can utilize to protect yourself ...more
With just one line of Ruby code embedded into a fake PDF, a hacker can remotely control any Mac computer from anywhere in the world. Creating the command is the easy part, but getting the target to open the code is where a hacker will need to get creative. Ruby is just one wa ...more
The misconception that macOS is more secure than the Windows operating system is far from the truth. With just one small command, a hacker can completely take over a MacBook and control it remotely. The sheer volume of Windows computers currently in operation around the world ...more
A remote administration tool, or RAT, is a piece of software used for remotely controlling machines. They are commonly used by tech support to gain remote access for troubleshooting purposes, but RATs are also an important part of a hacker's advanced persistent threat (APT) to ...more
An invaluable button on your iPhone can do hundreds, even thousands, of amazing things, but most iPhone users don't even know it exists. You can't push it. You can't click it. You can't press it. But it's the largest button on your iPhone, more powerful than the versatile Side ...more
Roughly a year and a half after unveiling the HoloLens-like ThinkReality A6, Lenovo is back with its take on enterprise-grade smartglasses, and the results look impressive. Then again, looks can be deceiving. On Sunday, a day ahead of the opening of the virtual Consumer Elect ...more
For over three decades, Microsoft's landmark program, Excel, has helped businesses accomplish tasks and problem solve quickly and efficiently. Whether you're a budding entrepreneur or navigating a remote career, Excel can help you apply your business skills at a higher level. ...more
When Facebook launched its first hardware products last year, the Portal and Portal+ smart displays, the company mostly touted its video-calling features as it faced off against Amazon and its Echo Show. But Facebook also had an interesting feature that mostly flew under the ...more
Over the past year, Magic Leap has teased its cross-platform vision of the AR cloud, which it dubs the Magicverse. While the company shared a timeline for its debut next year, it also served up new developer tools for the present. Facebook is also looking to the future of aug ...more
Public beta testers are in for a treat today. While Apple is extremely inconsistent with the release schedules for the developer and public betas, the company has once again released both versions of iOS 12.2 beta 5 today, March 11. If you're a public tester, you now get to ex ...more
While developers received iOS 12.2 beta 3 on Feb. 19, public beta testers had to wait one extra day, following suit with previous iOS 12.2 beta releases. The third beta update includes fixes for Group FaceTime and the missing date on the lock screen, as well as a few tiny app ...more
Apple just released the third iOS 12.2 developer beta Tuesday, Feb. 19, fifteen days after the release of iOS 12.2 developer beta 2. Beta 3 fixes an issue with the lock screen, and reintroduces Group FaceTime to beta testers. Overall, iOS 12.2 hosts a wealth of new features as ...more
Augmented reality wearables maker ThirdEye Gen, Inc. has officially released what it claims are the "smallest mixed reality glasses" in the X2, which will be available for hands-on demonstrations at the company's CES 2019 booth this week. The sequel to the X1 model, the X2 pa ...more
So, you've lost your Apple TV remote. Maybe it's busted. What are you supposed to do now? You could go out and buy a new one, but they're expensive if you have a newer Apple TV with a Siri Remote, and wouldn't you rather spend that money on a movie? You might be without a work ...more
In recent years, many software publishers have tried to sell the business community on remote meetings via VR, but if social media chatter is any indication, it hasn't taken off in a big way just yet. However, for some, the notion of holding remote meetings using augmented rea ...more
If you own a Porsche, there's a good chance you're interested in two things: speed and quality. Porsche Cars North America wants to extend that experience from the driver's seat to the service center. Next year, the sports car importer will deploy Atheer AiR Enterprise AR sof ...more
If you're a regular reader of this site, there's a good chance friends and family turn to you as their volunteer technical support staff. In these instances, it can be difficult to troubleshoot purely through just verbal descriptions over the phone. While there are a plethora ...more
If competition in the augmented reality space was a spectator sport, then ARKit, ARCore, and HoloLens dominate the prime-time broadcasts on ESPN. If you're looking for the race to be the "Cardboard for AR," you might need to tune-in to ESPN2. There, you would learn that Mira ...more
In an early morning blog, Jimmy Alamparambil of the Unity team announced a major new update to their ARKit plugin. Developers now can use Unity and ARKit to create AR experiences and test directly from Unity's editor, without deploying to the device. The software development ...more