HighFrequency
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Alexa and Siri are vulnerable to 'silent,' nefarious commands
Hacks are often caused by our own stupidity, but you can blame tech companies for a new vulnerability. Researchers from China's Zheijiang University found a way to attack Siri, Alexa and other voice assistants by feeding them commands in ultrasonic frequencies. Those are too high for humans to hear, but they're perfectly audible to the microphones on your devices. With the technique, researchers could get the AI assistants to open malicious websites and even your door if you had a smart lock connected.
Defective Sony stereo is a fire hazard that drives your dog nuts
The Sony CMT-SX7 HiFi was supposed to be a compact, high-end sound system with multi-room capabilities and a full suite of wireless streaming standards (including AirPlay and Google Cast). Instead, it's a recalled safety hazard that doesn't play music right, makes your dog bark and threatens to catch on fire. Sony has issued an impassioned plea to stop using the stereo immediately. You probably don't have one (it's brand-new, and only available in Japan right now), but if you do, you should listen.
Apple seeks patent to control devices with audio 'hyperlinks'
Remember when Lady Gaga pinged smartphones and presumably alarmed dogs by transmitting inaudible, high-frequency audio at a concert with Sonic Notify tech? It turns out Apple's applying for a patent to do something similar, namely "audio hyperlinking" that can be contained within an audio stream. Cupertino's application says that such sound waves could be audible or outside the normal hearing range of 20Hz to 20KHz and "cause an effect in the user interface" of a receiving device. That could be useful during a podcast, for instance, to give users links to articles relevant to a discussion via sound waves alone. The application goes on to describe how such data could be encoded into an audio stream and read by the receiving device, and leaves wiggle room for a wide range of uses. Call us cynical, but we imagine that includes a way of sneaking in more ads.
