Dr. Bill | The Computer Curmudgeon

Can YOU think of ways to use this in a security/social engineering scenario?

This is an “ooopsie” for sure!

Whoops! Google Says Mysterious Wave of Unbootable Macs Is Their Bad

Gizmodo – By: Tom McKay – “A serious flaw in Google Keystone, which controls Chrome updates, is capable of doing major damage to macOS file systems on some computers and has been linked to data corruption that struck Hollywood video editors and others on Monday evening, Variety reported.

Initially, blame for the corrupted file systems was largely directed at Avid and its Media Composer software, which was identified as a common link by film and TV editors who said they could not reboot their Mac Pros after shutdown. But on Tuesday evening, Google told users via its support forums that it had ‘recently discovered that a Chrome update may have shipped with a bug that damages the file system on MacOS machines’ and ‘paused the release while we finalize a new update that addresses the problem.’

According to 9to5Google, what actually happened is that version 1.2.13.75 of the Keystone software shipped with an update that damages the macOS filesystem when System Integrity Protection (SIP)—a security measure that keeps unauthorized software from modifying protected data—had been disabled or is not installed (versions of OS X predating the 2015 El Capitan update). News of the real cause of the issue was first identified by the Mr. Macintosh blog.

‘If you have not taken steps to disable System Integrity Protection and your computer is on OS X 10.9 or later, this issue cannot affect you,’ Google said in its support note.

Apparently, video editors may have raised the alarm about the issue first because disabling SIP is a requirement to run third-party graphics cards. Variety reported that “dozens of machines at multiple studios” were disabled, including the entire video editing team working on ABC’s Modern Family.”

These are pirate services that re-show streams from Dish Network or DirectTV. If you subscribe to one, be aware!

Hollywood Declares War on IPTV as Multiple Services Are Shut Down

Cord Cutters News – By: Luke Bouma – “This week we saw a major network of IPTV services with over 50 million customers get shut down by a police action in Europe. Now Hollywood and the MPAA are getting into the action as they use copyright claims to take down multiple IPTV services.

According to a report from TorrentFreak, multiple IPTV service domains including BestTVStreams, OneStepTV, TVStreamsNow, and DoozerIPTV have all been seized by the MPAA, now called MPA America, for copyright infringement.

Other services like XCaliberTV have started to inform their customers that their service was also shut down due to a copyright infringement claim.

These are just a few of the IPTV services that have been quietly taken offline in the last few weeks. For years, IPTV and streaming services have promised a huge collection of TV channels for crazy low rates. Now Hollywood has taken notice and after a few early legal wins against companies like Set TV NOW and the Dragon Box have decided to go full speed ahead in their efforts to shut down what they see as pirate services.

What is strange here is ACE and the MPA America are usually very vocal when they shut down an IPTV or pirate box service. Yet both have been silent about their recent successes. Typically, ACE and MPA America try to make examples out of services.

Over the last week more than 50 million IPTV customers have lost their service. Many have been left to wonder if they will get money back because they had prepaid for a year or more. Multiple Cord Cutters News readers have said when they asked about refunds their messages have been left unreturned. Service social media accounts have also been deleted.

This is likely just the start if the reports coming out of Europe are to be believed. According to police, during their raid on Xstream-codes.com they got the names of over 5,000 resellers. Many are predicting that information will be used to go after current resellers and if companies like Dish have their way they will go after IPTV subscribers.

We have also seen the US Department of Justice go after streaming services they say are pirate services. iStreamItAll was once one of the most popular private Roku Channels before it was removed. Now iStreamItAll’s website has been seized by the FBI following a Grand Jury indictment of the owner of the service.

Dish has won several lawsuits in Puerto Rico targeting resellers of IPTV services winning $412,500 and $305,000 in damages not from the people who owned the IPTV services but resellers.

What has been made clear recently is that a massive amount of resources are being spent to shut down pirate services with IPTV being a major focus of Hollywood. When you see numbers like 50 million subscribers you can see why.”

You will still be able to use YouTube on your PC, but the “lean-back” mode for some players will no longer work. You will have to use a special TV friendly app.

YouTube Is Shutting Down its Web-Based TV Interface

Cord Cutters News – By: Luke Bouma “If you had a Fire TV for the last year or so you have likely used the YouTube Web interface. This special version of YouTube’s website lets Web browsers on your TV easily use YouTube.com and have it look and act a lot like the YouTube app for TVs.

Now YouTube has started to warn users that its Web-based TV interface will soon be going away. Its now directing anyone who wants to watch YouTube on their TV to get the app version of YouTube. (Hopefully, your device has a YouTube app for your TV.)

This news comes after YouTube made changes to its back end last week that broke many third-party YouTube apps. Many of these apps quickly found workarounds, but it seems that YouTube is working on something.

The question now is are these changes an effort to force people to use the YouTube app or is YouTube trying to prepare for a roll out for a few updates that are in the works?

Recently we saw Hulu end support for several older legacy devices as it prepared to roll out its new app with a new user interface and a traditional grid guide. For now, we will have to wait to see if YouTube is doing this as the first step of something larger or just ending support for something that is only used by a small number of users.”

This article from TechCrunch says it all:

Microsoft urges Windows users to install emergency security patch

TechCrunch – By: Zack Whittaker – “Microsoft has warned Windows users to install an “emergency” out-of-band security patch.

The software giant said in an advisory that a security flaw in some versions of Internet Explorer could allow an attacker to remotely run malicious code on an affected device. A user could be stealthily infected by visiting a malicious web page or by being tricked into clicking on a link in an email.

“An attacker who successfully exploited the vulnerability could take control of an affected system,” said Microsoft.

Microsoft said the vulnerability was under active exploitation, though details of the flaw had not been made public.

More than 7% of all browser users are running affected versions of Internet Explorer 9, 10 and 11, according to recent data. All supported versions of Windows are affected, including Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and Windows 10, as well as several Windows Server versions.

Most users can install the patches using Windows Update.

Microsoft also issued a fix for its in-built malware scanner Windows Defender, which if exploited could have triggered a denial-of-service condition resulting in the app failing to work.

The company said no action was required by users to remediate the bug in Windows Defender.

It’s rare but not unheard of for Microsoft to release emergency security patches outside of its typical monthly patching cycle. The company typically releases security fixes in the second week of each month on its so-called Patch Tuesday, but also will release fixes for significant vulnerabilities under active exploitation as soon as they are made available.

Homeland Security warned in its own advisory urging affected users to install the patches.”