Proprietary Software and Security Issues

• cPanel, Plesk or DirectAdmin: Analysis and Comparison

  Every OS differs in user interface, security, functionality, usability and pricing, and the final decision should be based on personal needs and expectations. cPanel, Plesk and DirectAdmin all offer a number of great services, functions and tools for successful and efficient VPS management and because of their differences, individual demands can be met, and situations resolved.

• Netflix won’t ‘shy away from taking bold swings’ as streaming competition heats up

  This increase in subscriber growth this quarter came from an affluence of original content, including Stranger Things’ third season, which saw 64 million accounts watch the newest season in the first four weeks, according to the company. Netflix recently signed co-creators Matt and Ross Duffer to an overall deal with the streaming service, which will see them produce more TV shows and films for Netflix.

• House panel pushes forward election security legislation

  The panel marked up and approved the SHIELD Act, which takes aim at foreign election interference by requiring U.S. campaigns to report “illicit offers” of election assistance from foreign governments or individuals to both the FBI and the Federal Election Commission (FEC).

  The legislation also takes steps to ensure that political advertisements on social media are subject to the same stricter rules as ads on television or radio.

• New Voting Machines Will Be Used For Nov. 5 Municipal Elections

  The new system which cost the state about $52 million replaces the 15-year-old one previously used. Charleston County Board of Elections and Registration Director Joseph Debney said while the new system may not be more efficient, it offers more transparency than the previous one. Replacement provides the state with a dependable system for years to come and will greatly enhance the security of the election process. Having a paper record of each voter’s ballot will add an additional layer of security as it allows for audits of paper ballots to verify vote totals.

  The system works using a Ballot-Marking Device (BMD) that helps voters mark a paper ballot more accurately and efficiently. A voter’s choices are presented on a touch screen similar to the old voting machines. The BMD allows the voter to mark the choices on-screen and when the voter is done, prints the selections on paper ballots which then are either hand counted or counted using an optical scanner/tabulator, the second machine.

• Chhattisgarh dumps EVMs, back to ballot paper

  Chhattisgarh would perhaps be the first state in the country to do away with EVMs in favour of ballot paper in the local body polls.

• Andhra Pradesh Elections: Complaints of EVM glitches [sic] in nearly 50 booths

  Talking to reporters, the Chief Minister referred to technical glitches in EVMs and said he was demanding that ballot papers be re-introduced. "No developed country is using EVMs as they are prone to manipulation. We have hence been demanding that we revert to the ballot paper system," Naidu said.

• Chhattisgarh may return to paper ballots for local bodies polls

  In a report submitted on Tuesday, cabinet sub-committee constituted by the Baghel government has recommended the use of paper ballots instead of EVMs in the upcoming urban local body elections.

  The recommendations by the cabinet sub-committee would be referred to the state cabinet headed by CM Baghel for approval.

• Microsoft unveils two open-source projects for building cloud and edge applications [Ed: Microsoft: our 'clown computing' with NSA back doors is all proprietary software but to trap your work and your data we are openwashing the tools to put them there]

  The new projects include the Open Application Model, which is a specification for building cloud-native apps on Kubernetes, and Dapr, a portable event-driven runtime for building microservices-based apps that can run in the cloud and on edge devices.

• Top Linux antivirus software

  The last several years have seen a startling increase in malware that targets Linux. Some estimates suggest that Linux malware account for more than a third of the known attacks. In 2019, for example, new Linux-specific attacks included the Silex worm, GoLang malware, the Zombieload side-channel attack, the Hiddenwasp Trojan, the EvilGnome spyware and Lilocked ransomware. The volume and severity of attacks against Linux are clearly on the rise. While Linux has some advantages when it comes to security, the Linux kernel is certainly not devoid of security vulnerabilities nor is it immune to attack. The worst thing you can do is to sit back and assume that Linux systems are safe simply because a larger number of desktops are running Windows. Tools are available to defend Linux systems from many types of attack, and quite a few of these are free and open source. These are some of the best tools that you can get for free or at modest cost.

Calamares Plans for Debian 11

Before Debian 9 was released, I was preparing a release for a derivative of Debian that was a bit different than other Debian systems I’ve prepared for redistribution before. This was targeted at end-users, some of whom might have used Ubuntu before, but otherwise had no Debian related experience. I needed to find a way to make Debian really easy for them to install. Several options were explored, and I found that Calamares did a great job of making it easy for typical users to get up and running fast. After Debian 9 was released, I learned that other Debian derivatives were also using Calamares or planning to do so. It started to make sense to package Calamares in Debian so that we don’t do duplicate work in all these projects. On its own, Calamares isn’t very useful, if you ran the pure upstream version in Debian it would crash before it starts to install anything. This is because Calamares needs some configuration and helpers depending on the distribution. Most notably in Debian’s case, this means setting the location of the squashfs image we want to copy over, and some scripts to either install grub-pc or grub-efi depending on how we boot. Since I already did most of the work to figure all of this out, I created a package called calamares-settings-debian, which contains enough configuration to install Debian using Calamares so that derivatives can easily copy and adapt it to their own calamares-settings-* packages for use in their systems.

Android Leftovers

• Cubic and Google Pay to launch transit cards for Android phones

• Google is fleecing previous Pixel owners on trade-ins

• Google Pulls Open Source Android App For Having Donation Button

• The LG G6 and V20 Android 9.0 Pie roll-out is a mess

• Huawei Enjoy 10 mid-range Android smartphone pops up on Geekbench ahead of release

• Samsung's version of Android 10 will beef up its face unlock security

• How to Share Live Location in Telegram for Android

• How to Enable Android 10's New Gestures on Your Samsung Galaxy with One UI 2.0

• LG begins Android 10 beta program for G8 ThinQ

• Google Launches the Pixel 4 with Android 10, Astrophotography, and Motion Sense

• Pixel 4 XL vs. OnePlus 7T: Which should you buy?

• OnePlus 7T India review: The best OnePlus phone of 2019

• Volvo's First Electric Car Also Its First to Run Native Android

• YouTube Music redesigns artist profiles on Android and iOS

• After All That, Sony Unceremoniously Rolls Out PS4 Remote Play To All Android Devices

• Here's How To Keep Your Android Device Safe From The Latest Android Security Issue