Wednesday Newsbytes – News for You – 030222
Every day we scan the tech world for news that affects all of us who use Windows computers. Today, we’re featuring three news articles that grabbed our attention over the past week. We hope you find this week’s “Wednesday Newsbytes” informative and interesting!
Version 100 of Chrome, Edge, and Firefox may break some websites
Developers have been preparing for this moment for monthsIn brief: Reaching version 100 should be a milestone for a web browser, but it’s actually an event that could break some websites for people who use Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, or Mozilla’s Firefox. Developers have been preparing for this moment for a while now, but they still need help.
Chrome, Microsoft Edge, and Firefox are all inching closer to the release of their 100th version. While this may look like a nice round number to a user, it also has the potential to introduce bugs or create compatibility issues for certain websites.
For some people it may even bring back memories of the infamous Y2K bug and Microsoft skipping Windows 9, but this time around the issue is related to how websites read user-agent (UA) strings to identify your web browser and its capabilities.
When you visit a webpage on a site like TechSpot, your device sends a request for that page that includes a user agent string that looks something like this: “Firefox: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.15; rv:96.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/96.0.”
Different web browsers have different formats for this, and due to the way some user-agent parsing libraries work they may cause issues when reading three-digit major version numbers. For an in-depth read on what implementations cause this, look here.
Note from TC & Darcy: As of today, 02 March 2022, the current version of Edge is 98.0.1108.56; the current version of Chrome is 98.0.4758.102; the current version of Firefox is 97.0.1.
FBI Warns of a Growing Scam That Hijacks Your Phone
Losses tied to this crime topped $68 million in 2021.
Cellphones are an essential part of our day-to-day lives. Now, the FBI is warning the public about a scam that could compromise your phone.
The federal law enforcement agency says crooks are using so-called “SIM swapping” to rob people of millions of dollars by stealing money from fiat and virtual currency accounts.
In this scam, fraudsters use various methods to target mobile carriers and, ultimately, gain access to sensitive information on your phone:
- Social engineering. A crook impersonates you and fools your mobile carrier into switching your phone number to a SIM card owned by the criminal.
- Insider threat. The fraudster pays off someone at your mobile provider to switch your phone number to the crook’s SIM card.
- Phishing techniques. Criminals deceive mobile carrier employees into downloading malware that allows the thieves to hack mobile carrier systems and perform SIM swaps.
When fraudsters succeed in these SIM swaps…
MICROSOFT issued a warning regarding a new Windows 10 and 11 issue that fails to delete files even after a factory reset.
The software giant cautioned users in a new post that their data might not actually be gone after they reset their device using the “Remove everything” tool.
Microsoft attributes the error to its cloud storage service OneDrive, saying that files that have been downloaded or synced locally might linger even after the reset option has been employed.
‘This issue might be encountered when attempting a manual reset initiated within Windows or a remote reset,’ the company wrote in their post.
Remote resets include those initiated from Mobile Device Management (MDM) or other management applications (i.e. Microsoft Intune or third-party tools).
However, OneDrive files that are “cloud-only” or have not been downloaded or opened on the device are not affected and will remain unaffected, even after a reset.
Russian cyber attacks against US banks increasing: Sources
Russia appears to have officially declared cyberwar on the US, taking what’s been described as preliminary steps at crippling its banking system and possibly other major industries, the Post has learned.
The Biden Administration has been working with bank executives for months about preparing for cyberattacks in as retaliation over US sanctions.
The big US banks — JP Morgan, Citigroup, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs — are under constant attacks by cyber criminals looking to disrupt operations and steal client information. The usual suspects are most often located in Iran, China and of course Russia.
Bank executives tell the Post they’ve spent billions of dollars annually to protect against cyber criminals, but they say the recent wave of attacks is different. Sources describe them as a subtle but intensified assault on banks’ technological infrastructure that began after the sanctions over Ukraine were announced.
What used to be an exciting pleasurable experience has grown into a heavy eyeball rolling one. Technology has grown to be quite the pain in the behind.
The Yesterdays of years ago were fun. Quite the opposite now…
Hi, Yvonne, it can still remain a pleasurable experience, as long as you are not tempted to succumb to malware, etc.
You are right, technology has gone a long way, but remember how useful the present technogy provides the medical world with features not even thought of a year ago to their patients and produce far more results.
The media would be at at a loss without the use of IT presently available.
Airports, aeroplanes, rely heavily on IT and has made travelling so much safer.
The many advantages IT offers today should certainly not be dismissed lighty.
I’m not dismissing it lightly. I’m complaining because it’s “another” thing we must be defensive about today. The carefree days have disappeared for everyone (at least in my age bracket). You always have to be looking over your shoulder today. I can do without the tension, and so can a lot of others.