33 Years of the Digest ... founded August 21, 1981
Copyright © 2014 E. William Horne. All Rights Reserved.

The Telecom Digest for Oct 26, 2014
Volume 33 : Issue 189 : "text" Format
Messages in this Issue:
Feds examining medical devices for fatal cybersecurity flaws (Monty Solomon)
iOS 8.1 mini-review: Testing Apple Pay, SMS forwarding, and more (Monty Solomon)
Handful of Virginia police agencies sharing seized phone data (Monty Solomon)
Re: Obama signs "BuySecure" initiative to speed EMV adoption in the US (Matt Simpson)
Re: Obama signs "BuySecure" initiative to speed EMV adoption in the US (John Levine)
In win for broadcasters, court shuts down Aereo's live TV feature (Monty Solomon)
Update: Anticipated Spectrum Auction Date Pushed Back (Neal McLain)
How a dumb software glitch kept thousands from reaching 911 (Bill Horne)

The ship of democracy, which has weathered all storms, may sink through the mutiny of those on board.  - Grover Cleveland

See the bottom of this issue for subscription and archive details.

Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2014 01:16:26 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Feds examining medical devices for fatal cybersecurity flaws Message-ID: <p06240806d06f9105a330@[172.16.42.4]> Feds examining medical devices for fatal cybersecurity flaws They could be controlled remotely, overdose patients, or thwart heart implants. by David Kravets Oct 23 2014 Ars Technica http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/10/feds-examining-medical-devices-for-fatal-cybersecurity-flaws/ ***** Moderator's Note ***** I can see it now: a salesman comes into the pre-op waiting room and says "Bill, you of all people must know how important it is to protect your heart with McAfee"! Bill Horne Moderator
Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2014 01:19:18 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: iOS 8.1 mini-review: Testing Apple Pay, SMS forwarding, and more Message-ID: <p06240808d06f91aecac4@[172.16.42.4]> iOS 8.1 mini-review: Testing Apple Pay, SMS forwarding, and more We take the new features for a test drive and evaluate the maturity of iOS 8. by Andrew Cunningham Oct 22 2014 Ars Technica http://arstechnica.com/apple/2014/10/ios-8-1-mini-review-testing-apple-pay-sms-forwarding-and-more/
Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2014 01:19:56 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Handful of Virginia police agencies sharing seized phone data Message-ID: <p06240809d06f91e1d6cc@[172.16.42.4]> Handful of Virginia police agencies sharing seized phone data Former judge says cops shouldn't be able "to just transfer information." by Cyrus Farivar Oct 22 2014 Ars Technica http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/10/handful-of-virginia-police-agencies-sharing-seized-phone-data/ ***** Moderator's Note ***** As I understand it, the rule is that evidence admitted in any court is valid in any other. Any lawyers care to comment? Bill Horne Moderator
Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2014 17:25:32 +0000 (UTC) From: Matt Simpson <usenet@news.jmatt.net> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: Obama signs "BuySecure" initiative to speed EMV adoption in the US Message-ID: <5F015A19-F470-4BB9-B849-A8DD5D46F1AA%usenet@news.jmatt.net> Telecom Digest Moderator wrote: > This seems to fly in the face of the cell-phone makers' attempts to > position "smart" phones as secure money-transfer mechanisms. Not necessarily. It could help them. EMV, or chip-and-pin, will require merchants to upgrade their POS terminals. As long as they have to upgrade anyway, many of them are likely to add NFC capability at the same time, to allow consumers a choice of chip cards or phone payments.
Date: 25 Oct 2014 15:19:00 -0000 From: "John Levine" <johnl@iecc.com> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: Obama signs "BuySecure" initiative to speed EMV adoption in the US Message-ID: <20141025151900.14157.qmail@ary.lan> In article <5F015A19-F470-4BB9-B849-A8DD5D46F1AA%usenet@news.jmatt.net> you write: >Telecom Digest Moderator wrote: > >> This seems to fly in the face of the cell-phone makers' attempts to >> position "smart" phones as secure money-transfer mechanisms. > >Not necessarily. It could help them. EMV, or chip-and-pin, will >require merchants to upgrade their POS terminals. As long as they >have to upgrade anyway, many of them are likely to add NFC capability >at the same time, to allow consumers a choice of chip cards or phone >payments. Don't forget contactless EMV, which Mastercard calls Paypass and Amex and Visa call something else. It's considerably more popular than contact chips. The few chip terminals I've seen in the US all also support contactless. Most US cards will be chip+signature rather than chip+pin, and contactless chip+signature is just as secure as the contact version. It's not as good as chip+pin since the signature isn't part of the transaction sent to the bank, but it's a lot better than the mag swipe and is impractical to clone. R's, John
Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2014 01:10:47 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: In win for broadcasters, court shuts down Aereo's live TV feature Message-ID: <p06240805d06f8fa650ff@[172.16.42.4]> In win for broadcasters, court shuts down Aereo's live TV feature Judge says startup is "doing its best to turn lemons into lemonade," but fails. by Cyrus Farivar Oct 23 2014 Ars Technica http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/10/in-win-for-broadcasters-court-shuts-down-aereos-live-tv-feature/
Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2014 15:04:38 -0700 (PDT) From: Neal McLain <nmclain.remove-this@and-this-too.annsgarden.com> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Update: Anticipated Spectrum Auction Date Pushed Back Message-ID: <bf79141c-5e73-4cde-9dd4-fd0ccbf10105@googlegroups.com> October 24, 2014, CommLawBlog, by Davina Sashkin If you picked "mid-2015" in your office pool for the date the FCC's incentive spectrum auction would be held, we've got some bad news for you. While that was probably a pretty good bet up to now (since Commission officials have tenaciously stuck with the "mid-2015" date for some time), it's not looking so good anymore. According to an item just posted on the FCC's blog, the current target date is "early 2016". http://www.commlawblog.com/articles/broadcast/ Neal McLain
Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2014 14:20:09 -0400 From: bill@horneQRM.net (Bill Horne) To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: How a dumb software glitch kept thousands from reaching 911 Message-ID: <20141025182009.GA16957@telecom.csail.mit.edu> How a dumb software glitch kept thousands from reaching 911 By Brian Fung Who ever thinks that their call to 911 would go unanswered? But in a terrifying incident this spring, thousands of Americans found themselves in need of help - and got none. For six hours, emergency services went dark for more than 11 million people across seven states. The entire state of Washington found itself disconnected from 911. The outage may have gone unnoticed by some, but for the more than 6,000 people trying to reach help, April 9 may well have been the scariest time of their lives. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/10/20/how-a-dumb-software-glitch-kept-6600-calls-from-getting-to-911/ -or- http://goo.gl/O9Hif1 -- Bill Horne (Remove QRM from my address to write to me directly)

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