Google has been court ordered to unveil identity of person that left negative review about a Melbourne dentist
US DoJ slaps racketeering charges on Huawei alongside industrial espionage & stealing trade secrets
Xiaomi announces new flagship Mi 10 & Mi 10 Pro smartphones
Lockdown is new way to block ads & tracking on your iOS devices
Cheap Fitbit Charge 3 & Orico rugged portable SSD
The Federal Court is forcing Google to reveal the identity of "CBsm 23", who left a bad review on Google Maps about a Melbourne dental practice. The post tells people to "STAY AWAY" from dental surgeon Mathew Kabbabe and that a teeth whitening procedure "was not done properly", a "complete waste of time" and that it seemed like the dentist “had never done this before". While a business owner being salty over a bad online review is nothing new, the fact a court is forcing Google to hand over any info they have about the person that wrote the review is very unique. Keyboard warriors across Australia, watch out.
The US Department of Justice has indicted Huawei with 16 crimes including racketeering and stealing trade secrets. According to the DoJ's press release, Huawei and its subsidiaries would enter agreements with US companies and just take their intellectual property relating to "internet router source code, cellular antenna technology and robotics", giving Huawei an unfair advantage. The full indictment has examples like Huawei reps opening and taking photos of competitor gear at trade shows after hours and bonus programs for employees that stole competitor. There's a bunch of stuff about Huawei dealing with US trade sanctioned countries like Iran and North Korea too.
Xiaomi was gonna announce the Mi 10 and Mi 10 Pro at MWC in a few weeks, but seeing as that isn't happening they just announced it online today instead. These are Xiaomi's flagship phones and are very similar to what Samsung announced with the Galaxy S20 a few days ago. Snapdragon 865 SoC, up to 12GB of RAM, a 90Hz OLED, 50W USB-C charging and a triple camera setup ("12MP f/2.0 lens for portraits, 8MP f/2.0 telephoto lens with 10x hybrid zoom, 20MP ultra-wide with f/2.2 lens and 117-degree FOV") - Dxomark has a review of the camera already. It's China only at first, but Xiaomi have a legit presence in Australia now (JB Hi-Fi sell em) so it'll be interesting to see if they sell the Mi 10 Pro here. It's CNY4,999 for the Mi 10 Pro (roughly A$1100) and goes on sale Feb 18th.
Wish there was something like Pi-Hole on your iOS device so all the naughty apps that track you can't send data back to their master? Lockdown is about as close as you'll get. Other smartphone privacy apps are simply VPNs that funnel data between the VPN and the internet (e.g: Guardian), which can slow things down and also introduces a new 3rd party (the VPN provider) you need to trust. Lockdown works as a VPN, but the blocking seems to take place on your device, not on Lockdown's servers. It's open source, but there's not much info out there about how it works. I wish Apple would let users change the DNS servers used over LTE as well as wi-fi, then I could just run NextDNS.
Orico shockproof 256GB external NVMe PCIe SSD - $105 from WISP
Fitbit Charge 3 - $98 at Officeworks
Heaps of stuff off eBay in the email I sent out this afternoon.
🎶 Monsters in the Parasol - Queens of the Stone Age
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The Sizzle is created on Wathaurong land and acknowledges the traditional owners of country throughout Australia, recognising their continuing connection to land, water and community. I pay my respect to them and their cultures and to elders both past and present.