Articles by John P. Mello Jr

After a glorious first week of sales following its introduction in April, sales have slid rapidly for the Apple Watch, according to data from Slice Intelligence Sales have plummeted to fewer than 20,000 units a day, down from an average of 200,000 a day during its launch week, when it sold 1.5 million units, reported Slice, which measures online pu...

With so many cybersecurity pros drowning in an ever-rising tide of hack attacks on their computer systems, an emerging approach to defending those systems may be the life preserver they've been looking for The approach doesn't involve beefing up perimeter defenses, carefully scrutinizing network traffic, or applying analytics to employee behavior -...

GoPro on Monday announced the Hero4 Session, a 1-inch cube video camera that weighs just 2.6 ounces -- less than half the heft of an iPhone. Unlike previous GoPro models, you won't need a case to protect it from getting wet. It's designed to withstand a soaking in up to 10 meters of water....

Apple rolled out its new subscription music streaming service Tuesday, and it has been getting mostly raves from reviewers "Apple has built a handsome, robust app and service that goes well beyond just offering a huge catalog of music by providing many ways to discover and group music for a very wide range of tastes and moods," wrote Walt Mossberg ...

Researchers have found a way to significantly improve the performance of fiber networks, which could lead to benefits for both consumers and Internet service providers Information in fiber optic cables degrades with the distance it travels. When you try to increase the speed at which the data is traveling by boosting the power in the network, degra...

A data breach is no picnic for any organization, but for a company that makes its potato salad by protecting other people's passwords, it's the mother of all nightmares. Yet, that has happened to LastPass twice In 2011, the service found anomalies in its network traffic that forced it to reset all its users' master passwords. To make matters worse,...

Amazon's recently released first report on government requests for information revealed that from January to May, it received 813 subpoenas and 25 search warrants The company fully responded and provided all the requested information sought for 542 of the subpoenas. It partially responded and provided only some of the requested information for 126 ...

DxO, known for its top-notch digital imaging software, on Thursday announced a new compact camera designed to allow iPhones and iPads to capture higher-quality digital images The DxO One is the first digital camera that plugs into the Lightning connector found on Apple devices and that uses their Retina display as a viewfinder....

Most consumers pay as much attention to routers as they do to doorknobs. That's not the case with Net marauders. They're finding the devices ripe targets for mischief "We've seen a big increase in malware designed for home routers," said Incapsula researcher Ofer Gayer....

Amazon is developing a mobile app that will be the cornerstone of an Uber-type service for neighborhood package delivery, The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday Under the scheme, the app would allow Amazon to compensate people to deliver packages in lieu of using a commercial carrier. People would pick up packages at brick-and-mortar stores, wher...

Apple is sending a shiver down the spine of anyone who depends on mobile advertising for a living with the inclusion of ad-blocking extensions for iOS 9 in the next version of its Safari browser The news surfaced last week, after developers discovered the provision in documentation following iOS 9's introduction at the company's Worldwide Developer...

Touchpad pioneer Synaptics has touched up an unlikely area on a keyboard: the spacebar The company last week announced the availability of its SmartBar technology, which adds gesture features to the bar. For example, text can be selected by swiping it. A double-thumb gesture can be used to zoom in and out on a document or image. What's more, the ba...

Microsoft will phase out Patch Tuesday -- its monthly potpourri of software product fixes -- when it rolls out Windows 10, which could be a mixed bag for the operating system's security Patches will be applied automatically as they're ready. That means users no longer will have to wait until the second Tuesday in the month to secure their systems f...

Other countries' concerns over U.S. government surveillance programs likely will cost American businesses more than US$35 billion, according to a report released Tuesday by the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation Originally it was thought that the fallout from Edward Snowden's revelations of U.S. mass surveillance programs would be limit...

Things could get worse before they get better as the FBI, US-CERT and Office of Personnel Management investigate a data breach that may have compromised the personal information of some 4 million current and past federal employees Additional exposures of personal identifying information could be discovered, officials have warned....

Google appears to be heeding warnings of security experts who say Android users need better control over what apps do with information from their phones At I/O, its worldwide shindig for developers held last week, the company announced that the next version of its mobile operating system, Android M, would take a more granular approach to permission...

Doppler Labs, known for making state-of-the-art ear plugs, on Tuesday launched a Kickstarter campaign for the Here Active Listening system, which takes noise-canceling technology to a new level Unlike typical noise-canceling headphones, Here's Bluetooth earbuds allow a listener to customize ambient sound, not just block it out. Paired with a smartp...

There's a new twist in the way feds are seeking to penalize bad actors for making and distributing software used in crimes, suggest recent arrests by Justice Department and FBI officials. "There's a more concerted campaign to go after go after those folks who are distributing in the underground," said Tom Kellermann, chief cybersecurity officer at...

The U.S. Senate on Tuesday voted to close debate on the USA Freedom Act, a measure that would prohibit the NSA from the indiscriminate collection Americans' phone call data. The bill already has passed in the House. However, the brawling over the bill is not quite over. The Senate has yet to address several proposed amendments to the legislation b...

Google on Thursday kicked off its I/O developers conference with the introduction of a new app for better managing, organizing and storing photos, as well as an Android spinoff for the Internet of Things, and an offline feature for Maps The new Google Photo application allows shutterbugs to back up photos automatically from any device to a personal...