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And then there are the people I’m writing this article for: the folks for whom VPN usage is a life-or-death thing. These people are citizens in nations with oppressive regimes trying to communicate with the outside world, people who are researching health or sexuality information that could cause them to be discriminated against (or worse), people who are trying to hide their location from abusive partners or stalkers, people who are dissidents (which is not a pejorative, but a word used to describe people who are fighting totalitarian regimes and oppressive government policies), and so on....

Most of those tech support calls are easy. If they’re having trouble with a task, you walk them through the steps, maybe even writing up a cheat sheet for them to print and keep handy. If they’re having hardware problems, you do basic troubleshooting (“Have you tried turning it off and back on again?”) and that usually works. But every once in a while you get one of those calls, where the problems don’t have an easy fix....

The debate saw familiar arguments used for and against the proposal: Crypto is an environmental disaster, reputational risk from being seen to approve of ecological destruction and endorsing the crypto community; against claims that proof of stake would fix the environmental concerns and fiat money isn’t completely green either, and crypto is safer for anonymous use. During the debate, the foundation said in its prior fiscal year, cryptocurrency made up only 0....

The Windows 11 2022 Update launched with system-wide live captions, which generated live captions from any audio content – but this feature only supported US English. Live captures technically arrived as an accessibility feature, alongside voice access for controlling a PC and text dictation, and natural voices for Narrator. But live captions can be a useful tool for anyone working from a noisy café. Also: More powerful than ChatGPT’: Microsoft unveils new AI-improved Bing and Edge browser The latest Windows 11 preview in the Dev Channel, build 25300, adds Chinese (Simplified and Traditional), French, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese (Brazil), Spanish, and other English dialects....

The new screen-recording function is rolling out to some Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel, but will reach more insiders before eventually hitting Windows 11 for mainstream users. The updated version of the Snipping Tool app with the screen recorder is version 11.2211.35.0. Snipping Tool is one of Microsoft’s ‘inbox’ apps – apps that generally ship with Windows 11, such as Calculator and the Mail and Calendar app. The screen-recording button with its own video camera icon sits next to the original Snip button, which has a camera icon....

The good news is that this upgrade won’t be a mandatory feature update, as it was for millions of Microsoft customers for the first several years of the Windows 10 era. Instead, the unique circumstances of the Windows 11 launch, most notably its strict minimum hardware requirements, raise a handful of new questions that anyone contemplating this upgrade needs to answer before proceeding with the update. Let’s go through them together....

Windows 10 came as a relief to PC users frustrated by the split personality of Windows 8 that, on the one hand, abandoned longtime conventions in pursuit of an experience that could straddle tablet PCs and phones and, on the other hand, all but froze the features of the desktop interface that people actually used. While Windows 10 struck a middle ground that all but killed the full-screen “Metro” experience, users have still had to deal with an interface that has tried to move forward some of the touch-friendlier elements of Windows 8 but which has left behind large swaths of the interface....

A survey by Stack Overflow found that 90% of developers believe it’s important for them to be happy at work. With as many as three-quarters of developers either actively looking for a new job or open to new opportunities, employers should take note of what keeps their software teams sweet – particularly as competition in the hiring market becomes more ferocious. The key takeaway? Money isn’t everything – but it certainly helps....

The Chinese smartphone maker trailed Samsung, which remained in the number one spot with 19% market share. Meanwhile, Apple was bumped down to third, after experiencing only 1% growth during the quarter, the Canalys report showed. Meanwhile, Oppo and Vivo each hold 10% share and grew 28% and 27%, respectively. In a letter to employees, Xiaomi founder and CEO Lei Jun described claiming the world number two title as a “major victory” to the company’s strategy....

They tell you not to eat them. Some might tell you that they’re dangerous. But these little packets of silica gel, also known as desiccant, might save the life of your tech. I was reminded of this by a post by my ZDNet tech colleague David Gewirtz, who recently had the misfortune of dunking his AirPods Pro into his morning brew. He took a few silica gel packets, threw them into an airtight box with his dunked AirPods, and left them there for a day....

Also: What is GPT-4? Here’s everything you need to know On Thursday, the tech giant announced Microsoft 365 Copilot, which integrates large language models (LLM), including Open AI’s GPT-4, into the Microsoft 365 apps. Microsoft says Copilot will be integrated into the apps in two different ways to assist both behind-the-scenes as you do your work, and also actively when requested. Microsoft 365 apps will be embedded with Copilot which will optimize the apps to work alongside you and assist you in accomplishing tasks as you go through your workflow, according to Microsoft....

Taskbar overflow was in the mainstream Windows 11 release, giving users an overflow area to place extra apps after they’ve picked which apps they want to appear in the taskbar. Microsoft says it is now “reintroducing” taskbar overflow with a new experience to give users faster and smoother app switching and app launching. It avoids the taskbar becoming cluttered. SEE: Microsoft Teams is getting all these new hybrid work features The new taskbar overflow automatically creates a set of “overflowed” apps that sit behind a button to the right of the taskbar....

Purchased for an undisclosed amount, Just Analytics will remain for the “foreseeable future” as its own brand, with Rackspace noting that the company has built “a well-known and respected brand among the leaders and customers of Microsoft Azure Data Analytics” that it aims to build on. Just Analytics employs more than 100 employees at its headquarters in Singapore, with additional employee presence in Vietnam and India. The analytics firm also has its data platform, Guzzle, listed on Microsoft Azure Marketplace....

Rackspace’s non-GAAP earnings per share in Q3 came to 25 cents on revenue of $763 million, up 12% year-over-year. Revenue growth was once again strong thanks to new customer acquisitions and growing customer spending in the company’s Multicloud Services and Apps & Cross Platform segments. Analysts were expecting earnings of 24 cents per share on revenue of $756 million. “The Cloud market continues to grow and momentum continues to accelerate,” CEO Kevin Jones said in a statement....

The project, founded by Europol, the National High Tech Crime Unit of the Netherlands’ police, Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre, Kaspersky, and McAfee, launched five years ago and has grown to involve 170 partners across law enforcement, cybersecurity companies, academia, and others. The No More Ransom portal now offers 121 free ransomware decryption tools which can decrypt 151 ransomware families. They’ve helped more than six million ransomware victims recover their encrypted files for free – all without the need to give into the demands of cyber extortionists....

The remote code execution vulnerabilities (CVE-2021-34527 and CVE-2021-1675) in Windows Print Spooler – a service enabled by default in all Windows clients and used to copy data between devices to manage printing jobs – allow attackers to run arbitrary code, enabling them to install programs, modify, change and delete data, create new accounts with full user rights and move laterally around networks. Now ransomware gangs are taking advantage of PrintNightmare to compromise networks, encrypt files and servers, and demand payment from victims for a decryption key....

The total figure of ransomware attacks seen by SonicWall in the first half of 2021 smashed the 2020 total of 304.6 million. The fact that the first six months of 2021 have already surpassed all of 2020 alarmed SonicWall researchers, who added that it represented a 151% year-on-year increase. “Even if we don’t record a single ransomware attempt in the entire second half (which is irrationally optimistic), 2021 will already go down as the worst year for ransomware SonicWall has ever recorded,” the report said....

The device originally debuted to the public back in October 2022 at Razercon, and was given a full spec sheet during Razer’s CES 2023 presentations earlier this month. We’ve known since the initial reveal that the Wi-Fi version of the Razer Edge would be a Razer.com exclusive, and would retail for $399.99. This version and the 5G model below both include the Edge itself (the tablet portion of the device) and the Razer Kishi V2 Pro mobile controller, which adds hardware buttons, analog sticks, haptic feedback, and a 3....

So, why has a mouse that seemingly made all of the right moves become something of a controversy? One big reason: its price. More specifically, a widely-held, not very nuanced belief that Razer’s asking gamers to “pay more for less” by pricing the lighter, less feature-rich Viper V2 Pro at the same $150 launch price its more broadly-equipped ancestor launched at. The reality of V2 Pro’s value proposition is far more complex Still, this brewing argument from what appears to be a vocal minority threatens to prevent buyers from clearly seeing what is almost certainly the best mouse to launch so far this year....

Of that amount, the telco will pay almost ₹19,940 crore upfront to the Indian government, with the remainder to be paid over an 18-year period. Conducted over four rounds, the auction made a total 2,251MHz of spectrum available, with Reliance Jio buying up spectrum across the frequency bands of 800MHz, 1,800MHz, and 2,300MHz. In total, Reliance Jio’s expenditure amounted to ₹60.8 crore per MHz, the telco said. Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani said the additional spectrum would help the telco expand India’s digital footprint and prepare for its 5G rollout, which he previously declared would be ready later this year....