APC_Australia_Issue_442_June_2017

technotes
» NEED TO KNOW
Windows 7 and 8.1
updates blocked on
certain CPUs
LATEST HARDWARE NOW
KILLS UPDATES ON OLDER
VERSIONS OF WINDOWS
If you’ve built a lovely new Ryzen
or Kaby Lake system, and stuck with
Windows 7 or 8.1, there’s a catch.
According to a Microsoft Knowledge
Base article, Windows Update now
informs you that you have
unsupported hardware when you try
to update. The solution, naturally, is
an upgrade to Windows 10. The cited
reason is Microsoft’s ‘support policy’.
We knew this was coming — last
year, Microsoft said that Windows 10
would be the only platform to
support Kaby Lake, Qualcomm 8996
and AMD Bristol Ridge. Not many
people will be running the latest
chips alongside older versions of
Windows, so adding support would
be unprofitable. But cutting off all
updates does look mean-spirited.
Older versions of Windows run
perfectly well on new silicon; there’s
no technical problem. This move
leaves you out in the cold; you won’t
even get basic security updates.
Boo. CL
Aussie ISPs forced to
block a number of
KickassTorrents
related sites
CAN THE RIGHTS HOLDERS
SHUT THEM DOWN FASTER
THAN THEY CAN MULTIPLY?
Another cluster of domains has been
added to the ever-growing list of
piracy websites that Australian ISPs
are forced to block. The latest
additions include an array of sites
associated with the popular Kickass-
Torrents name, including proxys and
mirrors, and were this time brought
to attention by a number of music
labels. This ruling will allow rights
holders to submit an affidavit in the
future in order to get any further
domains blocked, rather than having
to go through the same legal
proceedings. HD
Microsoft announces its Chromebook
killer: the Surface Laptop
Colourful, sophisticated and velvety.
Announced at a recent event in New York, Microsoft’s newest product,
the Surface Laptop, brings yet another slick PC to the company’s
ever-growing stable. The product is said to be the tech giant’s answer
to the MacBook Air and cheap Chromebooks flooding US the market.
The Surface Laptop packs a 13.5-inch PixelSense display with a ‘flocked
Alcantara’ material — that’s the same microfiber fabric found on some Surface
keyboard covers — surrounding its keyboard and trackpad. It comes with your
choice of either an Intel Kaby Lake Core i5 or i7 processor and, in a laptop first,
has a PCIe SSD mounted directly on the motherboard (up to 512GB). Out of the box,
it’ll run a new lightweight version of Windows called Windows 10 S which can be
upgraded to Windows 10 Pro for just US$49 (about $65).
Starting at $1,499, the Surface Laptop will arrive in Australia on June 15th,
2017, and will be available in Platinum, Burgundy, Cobalt Blue and Graphite Gold.
Stephen Lambrechts
Australian Federal Police admit to illegally
accessing journalist’s call records
ALL IN THE NAME OF INVESTIGATION.
The Australian Federal Police recently admitted than an officer accessed a journalist’s
phone records without a warrant to investigate a leak from within the AFP. The
breach occurred earlier this year and an internal investigation was carried out, but
no disciplinary action was taken against the officer. Commissioner Andrew Colvin
defended the action, saying he didn’t believe there was any “ill will or bad intent”.
The matter was recently raised with the Commonwealth Ombudsman, who
promised an audit, but the journalist wasn’t informed of the breach. Commissioner
Colvin stated that only the call records were accessed, not the content of the calls
themselves, “Just the fact of the existence of the calls in the first place.”
To allay public fear on the growing concern over metadata retention,
the Commissioner said, “I believe that the public should have full confidence
in the police... and this [metadata retention] policy... I want to underscore how
important access to metadata is to police as a fundamental building block of our
investigations.” Sharmishta Sarkar
8 www.apcmag.com