At the recent DefCon conference in Las Vegas, researchers opened many of the top commercially available gun safes with simple tools like a straw or a paper clip, and in one case, just by shaking it a bit. The investigation began after the researchers, Toby Bluzmanis, Marc Tobias and Matt Fiddler, learned that certain Stack-On safes, issued to some law enforcement officials to secure their firearms at home, could be opened simply by jiggling the doorknob.
If anybody knows how to pick a lock, it's Schuyler Towne.
Microcontrollers like ESP8266-based boards have built-in Wi-Fi, and that's really cool, but what's even cooler is that certain pro models of the D1 Mini also have a port where you can connect a directional antenna. This can give you exceptional range, but if you were to just plug one in after opening the package, it most likely wouldn't work.
If you've been paying attention to the smartphone industry, you've certainly noticed a rise in dark mode lately. With most phones now sporting OLED panels, which use less power to display darker colors, users have been begging developers to include a dark theme in their apps. Lately, Google has been happy to oblige.
When computers have vision but people don't, why not have the former help the latter? That's the gist behind the Cognitive Augmented Reality Assistant (CARA), a new HoloLens app developed by the California Institute of Technology.
While many retailers have introduced try-before-you-buy features in their apps, Walmart has gone in another direction by bringing shoppers an augmented reality tool to help them compare products they want to buy.
Rooting. As an Android user, I'm sure you've heard the word once or twice. According to Kaspersky, 7.6% of all Android users root — but for the 92.4% who don't, we wanted to talk to you.
Computer vision company Blippar has already dabbled with outdoor AR navigation, but now it wants to make it easier for people to make their way through indoor spaces with augmented reality.
The availability of space for filming immersive content has just gotten bigger with the launch of Innovation Studios by Sony Pictures Entertainment.
China-based virtual reality headset maker ANTVR has decided to enter the augmented reality space, and to do so it's launching its headset on Kickstarter. The company claims that its new Mix AR device has a field of view that surpasses the Meta 2, the HoloLens, and others within a smaller form factor and at a fraction of the price. But there's a catch.
While you were busy browsing Instagram, composing tweets, or chasing Snapchat updates, an eight-year-old ARKit developer was hard at work on her first step toward taking over the tech world via augmented reality.
The latest cosmetics brand to launch its own augmented reality try-on tool is Cover Girl, which introduced its browser-based experience this week.
A recent TED Talk makes a strong case for the healthcare industry to adopt augmented reality as a means to expanding access to surgical care across the globe.
It looks like there is a fatal flaw in the current macOS High Sierra 10.13.1, even straight from the login menu when you first start up the computer. This severe vulnerability lets hackers — or anyone with malicious intentions — do anything they want as root users as long as they have physical access to the computer.
Considered by many (perhaps unfairly) to be a very public failure, Google Glass can add another plot point to its comeback story, this time as a tool to teach social skills to children and adults with autism.
Generally speaking, in terms of modern devices, the more simple you make an interface to navigate, the more successful the product is.
Elon Musk's SpaceX is launching the world's most powerful rocket. The Tesla founder and CEO says the company is about to go through "manufacturing hell" to make delivery schedules for its new Tesla 3. Somehow, Musk says Tesla will offer Level 5 driving (so you can take a nap while your car drives you to and from work) within two years.
Google quickly learned over five years ago electric vehicles (EVs) were the powertrain of choice for its then fledging driverless car program and the industry has since followed its lead.
Google Play Services has been near the top of every Android user's list of battery-sucking apps for years now. It's a core system app, so you'd expect some battery drain, but for many folks, it runs rampant.
With chips in four out every five PCs made since 2010, few companies are as pervasive in modern computing as Intel. That's why an advisory released Monday, May 1, confirming a remotely exploitable vulnerability in all non-server business hardware made in the last seven years has sent shockwaves through the technology world.
Asobo Studios, one of the first companies to partner with Microsoft on HoloLens development, is applying their expertise towards building applications for various business verticals through their internal HoloForge Interactive team.
3D modeling is usually a very long and complicated process. Manipulating the thousands to millions of vertices, faces, and triangles to the correct shape you want is just the first part of the process, and can take a good while depending on the level of detail needed. From there, you need to texture the model by applying the UV coordinates and placing the textures in the correct places. And all of this isn't even including the process of creating normal maps.
A custom recovery is a very powerful tool. You can flash ZIPs that modify your Android device in ways that not even root can accomplish, and of course you can use it to install custom ROMs. But when you're applying all of these cool mods, there's always a chance that something could go wrong, and you might even end up bricking your device.
There's one thing that I've always liked about iPhones, and that's their centered digital clock in the status bar at the top of the screen. On Android, it's always on the right side by default, and there's no easy setting that lets you just change it to the center position. But if you have a Google Pixel XL, there's a simple modification you can perform to get exactly that—a centered status bar clock.
As if you needed another example of Android's open-source awesomeness, before the Pixel phones were even released, a flashable ZIP that will give you almost all of Google's Pixel-exclusive features on other devices appeared.
We all got a little jealous of the iPhone 7 Plus's dual-lens camera during the Apple Keynote in September. It's okay, you can admit it. But just because your Android doesn't have two lenses doesn't mean you can't recreate the fun bokeh effect of the iPhone's now wildly popular Portrait Mode.
Out of nowhere, Google released a preview build of the upcoming Android N release back in March—a full two months early. As if that weren't enough excitement for one day, they topped themselves by following up that announcement with the debut of a new "Android Beta" program that allows users with eligible devices receive preview builds as a regular OTA update, meaning no losing data or manual installation.
A couple days back we told you about the 30-day free trial for people interested in YouTube Red, and now Google is running a concurrent promotion that really sweetens the deal, especially if you're a first-time subscriber and own or plan to buy a Chromecast.
Whether you choose the sassy face of someone like your inner Disgust from Inside Out, or you're the happy-go-lucky Joy, chances are you're well-versed in expressing your inner "ew." So for this Halloween, take pride in your judgmental self by donning a DIY Disgust mask.
It's a rare person who enjoys swallowing pills—and equally rare to find those who can toss a pill back easily and effortlessly without gulps of water and coughs. The transition from liquid medicine to pills, tablets, and capsules can be a rough one, and some of us still struggle well into our adult lives. Yet the reason your pills are getting caught in your throat may not be the medication's fault—it's all in how you swallow.
Laminate floor planks look beautiful and add elegance to a home. However, if a plank gets damaged, it detracts from the beauty of the flooring. Do you call in a professional and pay tons of money to replace the plank? Thankfully, no. There actually is an easy way to replace a damaged laminate plank if you are ready to spend some time and have a little bit of patience.
Finding the motivation to make a change can be tricky. It's difficult to resist the urge to procrastinate, or even give up when goals seem distant and difficult. If you wish you could stick to your New Year's resolutions, or maybe even just commit to pursuing smaller goals, you might want to consider making a small change to start: just create a new password.
You've probably tried just about every method of hanging your holiday decorations: nails, thumbtacks, sticky hooks, and, in desperation, even tape. Each method can leave a host of complications when removed, though, from chipping paint to visible holes.
Accessing your favorite and most recent contacts on your iPhone is now faster than ever before, thanks to the iOS 8 update. Just double-click your Home button, select your contact above the app switcher menu, then choose how you want to contact them.
Last week's tech roundup featured iPhone 6 clones, an all-in-one sleep tracker, Xbox One updates, and other cool gadgets. This week, there's a lot more to show off, and a bunch of stuff that I need to get my hands on! Everything from app updates to putting stickers on your favorite items, I can't help but squeal at how much the "future" is right now.
One of the most common complaints that people have about the Nexus 4 would have to be its intermittently poor Wi-Fi performance, a problem that for many, persists through the installation of updates and even custom ROMs.
It's been over two whole years since the Samsung Galaxy S3 was released, so let's face it—our beloved GS3, once an iconic heavyweight in the tech arena, is almost as washed up as Sylvester Stallone.
You can do many things on your Nexus 7 to make life easier, like auto-categorize photos and perform on-the-fly calculations, but one thing that you should really have is more swipe gestures. By adding custom swipe gestures, you'll be able to navigate your device better, skip music tracks, and get instant access to designated apps, all with the flick of a few fingers.
It can be a pretty exasperating ordeal to hunt for one image on your tablet when you have hundreds and hundreds of photos in your gallery. Luckily, there are ways to make this a pain-free process on your Nexus 7, as well as make sure it's never a problem in the future.
Flappy Bird is immensely popular, we already know that, but it's even more so now that the developer removed it from Google Play and the iOS App Store. Android users can still get the game fairly easy, but it's nearly impossible to install a safe version on the iPhone now, so you'll have to resort to one of the many Flappy Bird clones out there.
