Articles by John P. Mello Jr.

The Internet of Things has come under attack by pranksters in recent days. The events could signal tumultuous things to come as more and more everyday objects connect to the Internet The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has advised the customers of digital sign maker Daktronics to "take defensive measures" following a series of cyberpranks on t...

In large families, it's common to pass on an older child's clothes to a younger one. The same is true in the Apple product family. It's common to pass on features introduced in the big brother iPhone to the little brother iPad. That appears to be the case with the next-generation iPad Air -- if the latest gaggle of rumors are to be believed "Histor...

Google's acquisition of Skybox may be a small step for the search giant, but it could be a giant leap for the Internet Google on Tuesday announced its intention to buy the satellite imaging startup for US$500 million. The move not only would enhance Google's satellite imaging resources, but also provide it with some top talent for its blue-sky plan...

As if the discovery of the Heartbleed flaw weren't enough woe for OpenSSL, more than half a dozen additional defects have been discovered in the code used to protect communication on the Web Among them is one dubbed "Cupid" by its discoverers. The flaw can be used to compromise enterprise networks....

Instagram, Facebook's popular free mobile app for editing and sharing photos, has never had a reputation for subtlety. It's image-editing tools and filters have had more in common with a palette knife than a fine sable paint brush. That's changed, though, with the latest version of the app.Version 6.0 of Instagram, which has an estimated 200 milli...

If you're a spammer, big news like the recent breach of eBay's computers is like striking oil in your back yard Perpetrators of unwanted email live for headline-grabbing events that they can use to separate gullible Web wanderers from their money, so the eBay breach is a perfect vehicle for the scammers, Cloudmark reported last week....

Hachette -- whose stable of best-selling authors includes J.K. Rowling and James Patterson -- remains at loggerheads with Amazon over renewal of a book distribution deal between the two. The stalemate has slowed the flow of books from the publisher to the online retailer to a crawl Negotiations have been going on for more than a month, but it's onl...

A cyberespionage campaign with links to Iran for at least three years has been targeting U.S. military and congressional personnel, journalists and diplomats, as well as U.S. and Israeli defense contractors and members of the U.S./Israel lobby, according to a report released Thursday by iSight Partners Using more than a dozen phony identities on on...

Apple on Tuesday aimed to calm anxiety among its iCloud users with reassurances that the service hadn't been breached in a ransomware-style attack "Apple takes security very seriously and iCloud was not compromised during this incident," reads a company statement. "Impacted users should change their Apple ID password as soon as possible and avoid u...

The Department of Justice last week unsealed indictments against five members of the Chinese military who were accused of hacking into the computer systems of U.S. companies to steal everything from trade secrets to confidential corporate correspondence China's initial response was to deny any wrongdoing and charge that the United States had hacke...

Apple vowed Tuesday to fix a persistent bug in its iOS mobile operating system that punishes former iPhone users. The flaw, which has been in iMessage since the release of iOS 5, prevents former iPhone users from receiving SMS messages from current users Apple recently fixed a server-side iMessage bug that was causing an issue for some users, and i...

Many shutterbugs are familiar with this bugaboo: They shoot scads of photos of a vacation or event, but they never quite get the time to put the pics in a form where they can be shared with friends and family Google now has an app for that. It's called "Stories." Google on Tuesday added Stories to its Google+ social network. ...

The U.S. Justice Department on Monday kicked up a notch the Obama administration's efforts to curb China's economic espionage activity against American businesses A grand jury indicted five members of the Chinese army on DoJ allegations they conspired to hack into the networks of U.S. companies to steal information that would be useful to their com...

Another digital currency was brought to its knees last week when the administrators of Doge Vault had to suspend operations after they discovered their online wallet service had been attacked by hackers Following an investigation of the incident and the reconstruction of some of their damaged information from a backup, the administrators contacted ...

The FCC on Thursday approved by voice vote proposed rules governing neutrality on the Internet Following a public comment period and review of those comments by the commission, the agency will finalize the rules, possibly as soon as the end of this year....

With Sony's PlayStation 4 increasing its commanding lead over the Xbox One, Microsoft made a play Tuesday to goose sales of its computer game console The company announced it would start selling Xbox One without its Kinect controller -- which allows a US$100 price cut -- and it removed the requirement that Xbox users subscribe to Live Gold to acces...

Parrot has added a new model to its line of airborne drones -- the Bebop. Demonstrated in San Francisco over the weekend, the lightweight Bebop includes some snappy features, such as built-in image stabilization, a 14-megapixel camera with a fish-eye lens, and support for the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset Although a price hasn't been announce...

The Reveton Gang is at it again. This time, though, they're targeting users of Android phones -- typically visitors to porn sites The gang that pioneered the idea of locking up a target's computer and demanding a ransom to unlock it has turned its attention to the rapidly growing mobile market....

If you have a story to tell -- even a dull one -- Adobe Voice can improve your presentation. The free app can't make your story more compelling, but it can give you a better shot at getting it across. Adobe Voice is available for the iPad 2 and above running iOS 7.To kickstart your use of Voice, Adobe offers a welcome page with a pair of sample sl...

Small businesses have been an elusive market for sellers of online advertising. That's because the value proposition of those ads is a tough sell Facebook hopes to reduce some of the resistance in the small business community to advertising online with a series of summer boot camps, dubbed "Facebook Fit," that combine business advice with a soft se...