Debugged Weekly: Jul 22nd–28th
WhatsApp, Russian indictments, and free anti-virus globally. Check to see what’s been in the news this past week!
1. DOJ indicts Russian in alleged $4B bitcoin laundering operation
Summary: The Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that Russian national Alexander Vinnik was indicted for allegedly using the digital currency exchange he ran to launder billions of dollars for others and facilitate drug trafficking, identity theft and hacking.
Why this matters: This is an important case not only about cryptocurrency exchange but also US-Russian cyber-relations.
2. WhatsApp: Now one billion people send 55 billion messages per day
Summary: The eight-year old messaging app WhatsApp is now used by one billion people every day. WhatsApp reached the one billion active monthly user milestone a year ago, and now has 1.3 billion monthly active users, most of whom use it daily, according to the company.
Why this matters: WhatsApp’s progress potentially outlines a permanent global shift away from traditional SMS and towards entirely web-based mobile messaging.
3. Kaspersky Lab set to hand out free anti-virus globally
Summary: Kaspersky Lab has announced that it will be offering free anti-virus protection for everyone by rolling out the base version of its software globally at no charge. The security firm’s chief, Eugene Kaspersky, explains that an increase in the number of installations of Kaspersky Free is expected to positively affect the quality of protection of all users.
Why this matters: Kaspersky current controversy in the US could cause a mixed reception from Washington for this new product.
4. Senators to release bipartisan legislation on email privacy
Summary: Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) are expected to unveil legislation Thursday that will force the government to obtain warrants to look at Americans’ emails, according to three sources with knowledge of the bill.
Why this matters: This bill will add to the increasing amount of cyber related legislation that is being introduced to congress.
5. IBM killing off its first go at cloud object storage — 20 months after launch
Summary: We all know cloud is evolving fast, but IBM’s just given us the downside of that speed: a service it switched on in February 2015 will be switched off in August 2017. That service is the first iteration of Bluemix’s Swift-based Object Storage for Spark as a Service users.
Why this matters: This is an example of how quickly cloud-based services can transform or in some cases shut-down completely.
