iPhone

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Researchers Test Phones to See if They're Secretly Listening

Andrew Orr ·

Researchers put an iPhone and a Samsung phone into a room, playing cat and dog food advertising for 30 minutes.

The security specialists kept apps open for Facebook, Instagram, Chrome, SnapChat, YouTube, and Amazon with full permissions granted to each platform…They repeated the experiment at the same time for three days, and noted no relevant pet food adverts on the “audio room” phones and no significant spike in data or battery usage.

The results won’t surprise those in the information security industry who’ve known for years that the truth is that tech giants know so much about us that they don’t actually need to listen to our conversations to serve us targeted adverts.

For some people, maybe the belief that phones secretly spy on us is less terrifying than learning how much data these corporations actually have on us.

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Prepare Your iPhone for Hurricane Conditions

John Martellaro ·

USA Today has a list of excellent tips on how to prepare your smartphone for disaster conditions.

If you’re preparing for a hurricane, your survival plan should include your smartphone. But you’ll want to do a few things in advance to make sure it will work, and actually be helpful in an emergency. And it’s a good time to remember: you won’t be able to rely on your mobile device for everything.

The author’s checklist is impeccable.

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That Apple iPhone 11 Document is Probably Fake

Andrew Orr ·

A document that Twitter account AppleBeta2019 claims is an internal Apple document provides iPhone 11 data like new names, build numbers, and launch dates. Inconsistent information within the document suggests that it’s fake, but we’ll share the link in the interest of our readers.

It seems very unlikely that anyone creating such a document would be aware of marketing names and include said branding in the document, whose only purpose is to mention the software rollout plans. Moreover, files intended for the eyes of retail stores often include watermarking and fingerprinting techniques to help Apple detect leaks. This PDF seemingly lacks any such identifying markers.

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If There Really is an iPhone 'Pro' Coming, Just How Will it be so?

John Martellaro ·

Once you name a product “Pro,” you have a lot of explaining to do. At 9to5Mac, Ben Lovejoy explains, referring to a previous post.

Just the idea of a ‘Pro’ iPhone is a little annoying.

Don’t misunderstand me. Modern iPhones are amazing devices. There was a time when such a powerful and flexible pocket computer would have stretched the credibility of science fiction stories, yet we now take them totally for granted.

And they are sometimes used for professional purposes. There are, for example, all those ‘Shot on iPhone’ movies and ads. But let’s not kid ourselves about those. The reasons for shooting on iPhone have little to do with it being a ‘pro’ device.

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Using Two-Factor Authentication on Old Apple Devices

Andrew Orr ·

Glenn Fleishman has a good tip on how to use Apple’s two-factor authentication on older devices that don’t support it.

But 2FA and outdated versions of Apple TV, iOS, and macOS don’t mix. You try to log in on those devices with your Apple ID and popups with codes may appear on other devices, but there’s no way to enter it on the piece of equipment from which you’re trying to log in. Fortunately, there’s a simple workaround.

I always forget about the manual method.

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This Company Will Pay You to Review the iPhone 11

Andrew Orr ·

WhistleOut is looking for someone to review the iPhone 11 for them. You’ll get paid US$1,000 plus you can keep the phone when you’re done.

You’ll be putting the new iPhone through its paces—testing the camera, getting into the nitty gritty of the interface, seeing what kind of battery life you’re able to squeeze out of it—and writing a comprehensive review based on your findings. We’ll need your written review within a week of you receiving the phone. We’ll give you a review form for this.

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Apple Locks New iPhone Batteries to Each Model

Andrew Orr ·

With a special chip on the battery, Apple is locking down new iPhone batteries to prevent third-party repairs. Instead, you’ll have to go to an Apple store or an authorized repair center.

iFixit reports that replacing a battery in the iPhone XR, XS, or XS Max generates a “service” message saying the phone is “unable to verify this iPhone has a genuine Apple battery.” The phone will also not display any battery health readings.

The change is due to the chip on the battery itself. In addition to being able to relay information about battery cycles and temperature to the phone, the chips on the newer iPhone models also have an authentication feature for pairing with a specific phone.

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News+: Should Apple Leak the iPhone 11 Design?

Andrew Orr ·

In the latest issue of Macworld, Michael Simon says that Apple should leak the iPhone 11 design like Google did for the Pixel 4.

We already know it’s coming in September. And we kind of know what it will look like too. There have already been bountiful leaks that have revealed a giant square camera bump—which incidentally looks a whole lot like the Pixel 4—and it’s expected that all three models will be pretty much identical from the front. So what’s the harm in confirming what we already know?

If we accept two conditions: 1) Many Android phones tend to mimic iPhones; and 2) iPhone 11 mockups are close to or exactly the real design; Then I think the Pixel 4 was also the iPhone 11 leak.

This is part of Andrew’s News+ series, where he shares a magazine every Friday to help people discover good content in Apple News+.

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The 2020 iPhone Should Include a USB-C Port

Andrew Orr ·

Dieter Bohn writes that the 2020 iPhone should have a USB-C port, instead of a port coming to the 2019 iPhone.

I think it’s easier to get people to accept port changes when they go along with some other kind of dramatic change to a product line. And not to put too fine a point on it: if the rumors are correct, this year’s iPhone 11 doesn’t look like a very dramatic change.

The main reason I want a USB-C iPhone is flash drives. I’d love a USB-C flash drive that I could plug into both my iPad Pro and my iPhone. I have a wireless one that works with both, but it requires a separate app to use. One that “just works” natively with the Files app is ideal to me.

Podcast

We Love Dongle World – Mac Geek Gab Podcast 772

John F. Braun & Dave Hamilton · · Add Comment

Live from MacStock Conference and Expo 2019, John and Dave play Stump the Geek and take listener questions live, with a little help from impromptu co-host Kelly Guimont! Learn about APFS and Fusion Drives, iPhones making sounds when they’re not supposed to, and why we love Dongle World as much as we do. Press play and learn at least five new things!

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Here's Why That BankMyCell iPhone Survey is Flawed

Andrew Orr ·

An iPhone Survey from BankMyCell has bounced around the Apple blogosphere. It claims that iPhone retention is down 15.2% this year compared to last year. But The Macalope tells us why it’s flawed.

You can’t compare results for different demographies and declare them meaningful. You’re not controlling for anything…The only constant here is the gullibility (or culpability) of the technology press.

If BankMyCell were interested in meaningful results, it would have compared its own results over two years if it couldn’t get CIRP’s demographic breakdown. But it’s clearly not…If the methodology is crap, then you can’t trust the numbers.

That last line is the lesson we can learn from this: If the methodology is flawed, so are the results. You can’t p-hack your way around this one.