Tech Brew Ride Home - Mon. 03/23 - The Pros And Cons Of Surveilling Against Covid19

Starting point is 00:00:00 On April 4th, 2023, around 2 in the morning, a man was found stabbed multiple times on a sidewalk in downtown San Francisco. Hey, who did this to you? What happened next turned the story into a political firestorm. Reports have identified the victim as Bob Lee, the founder of Cash App. From Bloomberg Podcasts, this is Foundering, the Killing of Bob Lee, beginning April 16. Welcome to the Tech Memer Right Home for Monday, March 23rd, 2020. I'm Brian McCullough. Today, the pros and cons of using big data, cell phones, and the surveillance economy to combat the coronavirus.

Starting point is 00:00:45 More iPhone rumors from Ming Chi Quo is the Oculus Quest bringing VR into the mainstream and how to block your messy background when you're on a Zoom conference call for work. Here's what you miss today in the world of tech. We live in a world where data is ubiquitous, data is king, perhaps is. It is inevitable that governments around the world would turn to the trove of personal data that is abundant in the world right now to help combat COVID-19. Reuters is reporting that mobile operators in Italy, Germany, and Austria are now sharing anonymized aggregated data with health authorities to map people's concentrations and movements. That is less invasive than the approach taken by countries in China, Taiwan, and South Korea,

Starting point is 00:01:33 which use smartphone location readings to trace the context of individuals who have test positive or to enforce quarantine orders. In Germany, where schools and restaurants are closing and people have been told to work from home, if they can, the data donated by Deutsche Telecom offer insights into whether people are complying. Health Tsar Lotar Wiler said, quote, if people remain as mobile as they were until a week ago, it will be difficult to contain the virus. Wyler, president of the Robert Koch Institute, said on Wednesday, Germany is entering the epidemic's exponential phase, Wiler added, warning that without progress and reducing person-to-person contacts,

Starting point is 00:02:10 as many as 10 million people could be infected in two or three months. However, privacy advocates are skeptical about whether sharing customer data is useful or proportionate even in a time of crisis. One said that if people knew their phones are being tracked, they will just leave them at home, end quote. But speaking of those more invasive measures, Reuters is also reporting that in Taiwan, they have rolled out a mobile phone-based electronic fence that uses location tracking to ensure people who are quarantined do stay in their homes. The system monitors phone signals to alert police and local officials if those in home quarantine move away from their address or turn off their phones. Authorities will contact or visit those who trigger an alert within 15 minutes.

Starting point is 00:02:53 Officials also call twice a day to ensure people don't avoid tracking by leaving their phones at home. privacy concerns have limited the use of location data for anti-coronavirus efforts in countries such as the U.S. But the system has drawn few complaints in Taiwan, which has only reported 108 cases of the virus, compared with more than 80,000 in neighboring China. Many Asian countries are on a war footing to prevent further spread after a surge of infections among people traveling from other countries, especially Europe. In Hong Kong, location tracking risk bans are given to those put under quarantine. In Singapore, the government uses textmen. messages to contact people who must click on a link to prove they are at home. Thailand has rolled out a mobile app that anyone arriving at an airport must download to help

Starting point is 00:03:38 monitor where they have been in the event that they test positive for the virus. Vietnam's capital, Hanoi, this week, also launched a mobile app to help track cases and it could be used to enforce quarantines. Other countries, including South Korea and Israel, are using satellite-based phone tracking for so-called contact tracing to see where infected individuals might have passed COVID-19 to others. China has used a wide range of methods to monitor the health and whereabouts of people and enforce restrictions on movement, end quote. And Wired has another look at how big data is providing insights about the contours of the virus in real time. Quote, for instance, Angus says that

Starting point is 00:04:16 monitoring China's internet throughout the pandemic showed how industrial plants in the worst affected regions, which operate servers and computers, shut down during the outbreak. In the last few weeks, as the emergency abated, things have started crawling back to normalcy, even if we are still far from pre-COVID-19 levels, and the evidence might be polluted by plants being restarted just to hit government-imposed power consumption targets. Quote, China is not normal yet, Angus says. The country's internet latency suggests that, quote, recovery is happening in China, but there are still a lot of people who must be facing at-home life for their activities, end quote.

Starting point is 00:04:51 Scanning cyberspace is not the only way of getting the pulse of the COVID-19 age. Samir Medani is the co-founder of Tanker Trackers, a company that leverages open source information to provide insights on the global crude oil industry to small traders. As the coronavirus pandemic unfolded, he has turned to an eclectic suite of sources to navigate the mayhem. Combining data from vessel transponders with satellite images, he has periodically checked how many oil tankers are in Anchorage in China, unable to deliver their cargo. An intimation both of how well China's ports are functioning amid the pandemic and of how high. how well industrial production is keeping up. Medani also relies on TomTom's road traffic data for various Chinese and Italian cities to understand how they are affected by quarantines and movement restrictions.

Starting point is 00:05:37 Quote, what we've seen over the past two weeks is a big revival in congestion, he says. There's more traffic going on now in China in the big cities apart from Wuhan, end quote. But of course, tracking entire populations to combat COVID-19 could only open the door to future abuses by governments, as happened after 9-11, according to civil liberties experts, quoting the New York Times. We could so easily end up in a situation where we empower local, state, or federal government to take measures in response to this pandemic that fundamentally changed the scope of American civil rights, said Albert Foxcon, the executive director of the surveillance technology oversight project, a non-profit organization in Manhattan, end quote.

Starting point is 00:06:22 Google's coronavirus website, which we discussed last week, has officially launched. It focuses on locally relevant info in the U.S., as well as enhanced search results for terms related to the disease. The website can be accessed now at google.com forward slash COVID-19, quoting the verge. It's only available in English right now, but a Google spokesperson tells the verge that Spanish language support is soon to follow. The site was also designed with accessibility in mind, including with the larger fonts that Google usually uses.

Starting point is 00:07:00 The website has videos in American Sign Language, a global map showing confirmed cases by country, and plenty of information about Google's other relief efforts, plus some feel-good YouTube videos. Alongside the website, and potentially more importantly, Google will start providing more enhanced information cards for people who search for terms related to the coronavirus. There will be information tabs for symptoms, prevention,

Starting point is 00:07:24 global statistics, and locally relevant information. quote. And in case you miss the news over the weekend, Google I.O. 2020 is officially canceled in its entirety, quoting 9 to 5 Google. On March 3rd, the company said it would cancel the physical Google IEO event at Shoreline Amphitheater and explore other ways to evolve Google I.O. to best connect with our developer community. At the time, many assumed I.O. would take place online instead, just like what the Cloud Next Enterprise Conference committed to. However, Google. Google Cloud this week delayed its Digital Summit replacement event set for early April. While all sessions for both conferences were already going to be live streamed,

Starting point is 00:08:06 presenters and production staff still need to meet up to record everything. At the start of this week, the San Francisco Bay Area, and now the entire state of California, issued a shelter-in-place order to prevent unnecessary congregation for the foreseeable future, end quote. So no I-O in any forum this year, although Google does say it will continue Android developer updates via forums and blogs. Apple analyst Ming Chi Kuo is almost single-handedly keeping us in non-coronavirus news by issuing a steady stream of iPhone rumors. Quo's latest analysis says Apple is planning a high-end 6.7-inch iPhone to launch this year with sensor shift image stabilization. And next year we could see that same stabilization technology coming to

Starting point is 00:08:59 two to three other iPhone models, quoting Mac rumors. While details are slim, sensor shift technology could bring image stabilization to the ultra-wide lens on future iPhones, starting with the 6.7-inch model. iPhone 11 Pro models feature optical image stabilization for both photo and video, but only when using the wide or telephoto lenses. Sensor shift technology would provide a solution for this, as the stabilization would apply to the camera sensor itself and not be dependent on any specific lens. Sensor shifting image stabilization could also result in better shots with attachable lens accessories like the OloClip. Taiwanese industry publication Digitimes also claim that sensor shift image stabilization technology is coming to the 6.7-inch iPhone this year. So there

Starting point is 00:09:47 are now multiple sources backing this rumor. The report claimed the technology would also be available on a high-end model of 2 6.1-inch iPhones that are rumored for 2020, but as mentioned above, Quo expects the feature to be limited to the 6.7-inch iPhone until next year. The rumored 6.7-inch iPhone would have the largest display of any iPhone ever. The device is rumored to be slightly taller than the iPhone 11 Pro Max. Quo Today also predicted that at least one, 2020 iPhone model will feature a periscope lens, which could allow for 5x optical zoom like Huawei's P30 Pro,

Starting point is 00:10:23 or even 10x optical zoom, as is rumored for the device's P40 Pro, successor. iPhones currently max out at 2x optical zoom and 10x digital zoom. Optical zoom preserves the quality of a shot when zooming in while digital zoom results in some blurriness, end quote. I've mentioned a couple of times before that if AR and VR are really going to become the next big thing, they're going to need to make mainstream inroads at some point. And for whatever reason, that really hasn't happened yet. VR especially still seems to be very much a hobbyist pursuit. But small signs that that might be changing, however tentatively. The director of content ecosystem at Oculus, Chris Pruitt, recently said during a Facebook game developers showcase that

Starting point is 00:11:15 90% of users who got an Oculus quest this past holiday season were first-time users. They had never owned an Oculus headset before, quoting Upload VR. We already knew that Oculus as a whole and the Quest by itself had a big Christmas. Previously, Facebook revealed that over $5 million of content had been sold on the Oculus Store on Christmas Day alone, and just today they revealed that 20 different Oculus Quest titles have received over $1 million in revenue. Those are big numbers that speak toward not only the popularity and apparent success of the Oculus Quest, but also the growing popularity of VR as a whole. For example, Sony just recently announced that PSVR sales have surpassed 5 million.

Starting point is 00:11:59 units total. This is still the only major VR headset on the market with concrete sales figures. This latest statistic is one of many that continue to indicate that many developers are generally finding success on the Oculus Quest platform. The developers of Apex Construct, for example, recently revealed that the Oculus Quest version of the game has sold more units than any other platform combined. Likewise, the Quest version of Red Matter surpassed the Rift version in sales in just one week, end quote. Let's end today with a couple of news items relating to working from home. First up, if you've been experiencing problems using your iOS device as a personal hotspot, you're not alone, quoting slash gear. The problems range from connectivity to data performance.

Starting point is 00:12:51 Some are unable to connect to a personal hotspot or have trouble staying connected. Others, on the other hand, are reporting degraded quality even when they are able to connect. Mac Rumors reports that Apple has distributed an internal document to authorized service providers telling them to expect customers complaining about the problem. This is the first time the company has reportedly acknowledged that such an issue exists or that, at the very least, there are more and more people complaining about it. Apple's recommended fix is amusing and temporary, turning personal hotspot off and on again. There have been no notes in betas indicating it will be fixed in iOS13.4, but hopefully Apple is now

Starting point is 00:13:28 on top of it. iOS 13.4 is expected to be released on March 24th. provided everything goes according to schedule, end quote. And maybe you've been using Zoom video conferencing to keep in touch with work. You might have seen some of your coworkers on the Zoom chats have a different background than you would expect. There's a Zoom setting that replaces your normal background with kind of anything you want, like say with a picture of the beach or maybe the bridge of the Starship Enterprise. This would obviously be especially useful if you don't want your colleagues seeing the mess that you're house has become in the few days you've been socially isolating or perhaps you don't want kids jumping

Starting point is 00:14:08 into the frame behind you. Well, here's how you two can replace your background on Zoom with an image of your choosing while still keeping your smiling face front and center in the video. Quoting CNET, to change your Zoom background on the desktop app in the Zoom app, click your profile in the top right corner and click on settings. On the menu to the left, click virtual background. You'll see a few default background options provided by Zoom, including an outer space scene or blades of grass. You can choose one of those by clicking on it, and it will automatically change your screen as well. There's also an option for you if you have a green screen and want to use that. If you want to upload a photo to use as your background, on the same virtual background page,

Starting point is 00:14:49 click the plus icon next to where it says choose virtual background. A box will pop up, allowing you to upload a photo from your computer. Click on the one you want, and it will appear alongside the other pictures as an option for you to choose from. To get rid of any photos you upload, tap the X in their top left corner. Now, to change your Zoom background on your mobile app, when you log into your account and join a meeting, tap the three dots at the bottom right of the screen to open the more menu. Then tap virtual background, select a background from the default options, or upload your own, end quote. Link for those instructions in the show notes, of course. and this word of warning, setting up your own background works best if you stay still.

Starting point is 00:15:32 No rocking back and forth in your chair or gesturing too much. And also, this only covers things in the background. You're still going to be front and center in your video, so you know, probably still a good idea to have clothes on. Yeah, so hopefully you can hear that I have most of my studio set up replicated in the front room of my house now. I'm using the front room, even though there will be. be some road noise that might creep in now and again, but because that's also more room than the closet that I had upstairs that I was considering. I also managed to scoot into my office

Starting point is 00:16:10 over the weekend and lug back an external monitor, so I have a full monitor set up again. Anyway, this is all to say. Hopefully, this sounds back to normal. And by the way, our good friend Glenn Fleischman has a new book out called Take Control of Working from Home Temporarily. It's completely free, and it'll do what it says on the tin. It'll help you figure out the optimal setup to work from home, like I've just done. I've got a link to Glenn's book in the show notes, but also just go to take controlbooks.com and search for take control of working from home temporarily. Talk to you tomorrow.

Tech Brew Ride Home - Mon. 03/23 - The Pros And Cons Of Surveilling Against Covid19

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