Recorded 8th March 2020
Not a great deal of Apple News, except the growing expectation Apple might not be able to do WWDC in the same way as previous years, and a free fix for owners of iPad Air 3s with troublesome screens. Meanwhile Intel reveal that there is a dangerous flaw in their chip management module that can’t be fixed, Virgin Media might be in hot water with the GDPR, Microsoft say 99.9% of hacked accounts make the same mistake, and TCL showed off an interesting “rollable extendable phone concept”. Simon and Nick consider these and wander off into a few other bits and pieces as well (as they often do).
GIVEAWAYS & OFFERS
- Get Donny Yankellow’s 2FunDads iMessage stickers for FREE
Why not come and join the Slack community? You can now just click on this Slackroom Link to sign up and join in the chatter!
Slacker @MacJim has a family friendly Flickr group for listeners to share photos because the Darkroom channel in the Slack has become so popular – if you’re interested head over to to the Essential Apple Flickr and request an invitation.
On this week’s show:
NICK RILEY
- @spligosh on Twitter very occasionally.
- Sometimes appears on Bart Busschots’ Let’s Talk Apple
APPLE
- WWDC on Verge of Being Canceled Following New #COVID19 Guidance From Santa Clara County – Mac Observer
- Apple’s new App Store policies fight spam and abuse but also allow ads in notifications — Ars Technica
- Apple offers free repair for third-generation iPad Air models facing blank screen issues — 9to5 Mac
TECHNOLOGY
- Intel ‘unable to fix’ critical hardware-encoded CPU flaw – IT Pro
- TCL reveals extending smartphone concept and tri-fold tablet – BBC News
- TCL’s rollable phone concept is wild and a wayyy better idea than screens that bend in half with ugly creases and half-baked hinges – Input Magazine
- Sonos kills its device-bricking ‘recycle mode’ – Engadget
- Electric cars may not get cuter than the Microlino 2.0 — CNET
SECURITY & PRIVACY
- Don’t be fooled, experts warn, America’s anti-child-abuse EARN IT Act could burn encryption to the ground — The Register
- Virgin Media ‘likely to face maximum GDPR fine’ following data leak – IT Pro
- 1.2 Million Microsoft Accounts Hacked, Made The “Same” Mistake — Fossbytes
- Boots halts Advantage Card payments after cyber-attack – BBC News
- Amazon’s Ring logs every doorbell press and app action – BBC News
WORTH A CHIRP / ESSENTIAL TIPS
- DuckDuckGo Open-Sources New ‘Tracker Radar’ To Fight Online Tracking — Fossbytes
- Fully Charged Show – YouTube
NEMO’S HARDWARE STORE
- Nemo will be back as soon as the trucks can get to him…
Essential Apple Recommended Services:
- Pixel Privacy – a fabulous resource full of excellent articles and advice on how to protect yourself online
- Ghostery – protect yourself from trackers, scripts and ads while browsing.
- 33mail.com – Never give out your real email address online again.
- Sudo – get up to 9 “avatars” with email addresses, phone numbers and more to mask your online identity. Free for the first year and priced from $0.99 US / £2.50 UK per month thereafter…
- ProtonMail – end to end encrypted, open source, based in Switzerland. Prices start from FREE… what more can you ask?
- ProtonVPN – a VPN to go with it perhaps? Prices also starting from nothing!
- Comparitech DNS Leak Test – simple to use and understand VPN leak test.
- Fake Name Generator – so much more than names! Create whole identities (for free) with all the information you could ever need.
- Wire – free for personal use, open source and end to end encryted messenger and VoIP.
- Pinecast – a fabulous podcast hosting service with costs that start from nothing.
Essential Apple is not affiliated with or paid to promote any of these services… We recommend services that we use ourselves and feel are either unique or outstanding in their field, or in some cases are just the best value for money in our opinion.
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