Friday, 14 March 2014

Use WhatsApp on Android? Your chats are not so secure

3/14/2014 10:59:00 am TECHNOLOGY No comments

Use WhatsApp on Android? Your chats are not so secure

If you use WhatsApp on an Android phone, you should be careful about what you talk about or share on the instant messaging app.

NEW DELHI: If you use WhatsApp on an Android phone, you should be careful about what you talk about or share on the instant messaging app. Using a few scripts and a rogue app, anyone can peer into your chat logs and see what you talk about with your friends.

A Dutch security consultant has found that WhatsApp chat logs saved on the SD card of an Android phone can be read by other apps because of the way Android allows sharing of data between apps.

"The WhatsApp database is saved on the SD card which can be read by any Android application if the user allows it to access the SD card. And since majority of the people allows everything on their Android device, this is not much of a problem," Bas Bosschert wrote on his blog.

"What do we need to steal someone's WhatsApp database? First we need a place to store the database," Bosschert explained. "Next thing we need is an Android application which uploads the WhatsApp database to the website."

When an Android application is installed, whether from the Play store or through an APK file, which is an installer file for Android phones and can be downloaded from various sources, the app requests for permissions to use network and SD card etc.

To explain his hack, Bosschert set up a web server and then created an Android application that required several special permissions on a user's phone. But because Android OS allows applications to access various parts of the phone - this is why users can conveniently share almost everything through any app on Android phone - Bosschert's app had no difficulty gaining access to WhatsApp data.

Bosschert wrote that the code that allows his application to access WhatsApp data and then upload it to his web server can be added to a popular Android app by a rogue developer to fool users and steal WhatsApp chat logs.

The older versions of WhatsApp were so insecure that they didn't even encrypt their data stored on SD card. The data from older versions of whatsApp could be read by anyone once it was uploaded on the web server. Even the data from newer version of WhatsApp, which uses encryption, can be accessed with ease.

"The WhatsAppp database is a SQLite3 database which can be converted to Excel for easier access. Lately WhatsApp is using encryption to encrypt the database, so it can no longer be opened by SQLite. But we can simply decrypt this database using a simple python script. This script converts the crypted database to a plain SQLite3 database," wrote Bosschert. "We can conclude that every application can read the WhatsApp database and it is also possible to read the chats from the encrypted databases."

Bosschert joked, "Facebook didn't need to buy WhatsApp to read your chats."

The security issue apparently doesn't exist on iPhones or Windows Phone devices because on these smartphones, apps have limited access to storage and other phone hardware. The more flexible access to phone hardware allows Android apps to talk to each other and helps a user quickly share content between apps. This is very convenient compared to what is possible on iPhone or Windows Phone, where it is difficult to share content between apps. But it also exposes data to rogue apps.

Google says that it keeps an eye on apps inside its Play store and removes apps if they pose any security risks. But this doesn't negate the fact that theoretically it is possible for a rogue app to do more damage on Android because of the open nature of the OS compared to iOS, which uses silos. Google also advises people against installing apps that don't come through Play store. By default Android phones are set to not install apps downloaded outside the Play store
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Google opens Add-On stores for Docs and Sheets

3/13/2014 12:14:00 pm TECHNOLOGY No comments

Google opens Add-On stores for Docs and Sheets

Search outfit Google has attempted to beef up its Docs and Sheets services to give it an edge over its rival in the cloud office field, Microsoft.
According to a Google blog post, the add-ons can help people create tables of contents, embed Twitter tweets into their documents, run mail merges, connect with Google Maps and Google Analytics, and add new fonts to documents.
The new features are classified as being experimental, but since most of Google's live products are in Beta, this will come as no surprise. Google is also making its Sheets

Adding on
According to Google, it's now possible to browse add-ons for Docs and Sheets, with an option to download them, from the menu of any open document or spreadsheet. Once an add-on is installed it becomes available across all of your documents or spreadsheets and can be used right away.
One of the functions is Letter Feed Workflows, which routes a document to the right people and adds a simple "Approve" button right inside your document or spreadsheet. This means that a person can be notified as soon as it 's approved, and can publish the final version with a single click.
Our favourite is the ability to create a bibliography without leaving Docs. The EasyBib Bibliography Creator helps cite books, journals, and websites in MLA, APA, and Chicago style by entering in titles, journal article names, and websites right inside the document.

'NSA posed as Facebook for surveillance'

3/13/2014 11:34:00 am TECHNOLOGY No comments

'NSA posed as Facebook for surveillance'

The NSA has "co-opted" more than 140,000 computers since August 2007 for the purpose of injecting them with spying software.

SAN FRANCISCO: While US law enforcement agencies have long tried to stamp out networks of compromised computers used by cybercriminals, the National Security Agency has been hijacking the so-called botnets as a resource for spying.

The NSA has "co-opted" more than 140,000 computers since August 2007 for the purpose of injecting them with spying software, according to a slide leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden and published by The Intercept news website.

Botnets are typically used by criminals to steal financial information from infected machines, to relay spam messages, and to conduct "denial-of-service" attacks against websites by having all the computers try to connect simultaneously, thereby overwhelming them.

In November, Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey told the Senate that botnets had "emerged as a global cyber security threat" and that the agency had developed a "comprehensive public-private approach to eliminate the most significant botnet activity and increase the practical consequences for those who use botnets for intellectual property theft or other criminal activities."

According to the NSA slide published by The Intercept, one technique the intelligence agency used was called QUANTUMBOT, which "finds computers belonging to botnets, and hijacks the command and control channel." The program was described as "highly successful."

Reuters reported in May that US agencies had tapped botnets to harvest data from the machines' owners or to maintain the ability to issue the infected computers new commands.

The slide leaked by Snowden is the first confirmation of the practice, and underscores the complications for the NSA of balancing its major mission of providing eavesdropping capability with the less well-funded missions of protecting critical national assets and assisting law enforcement.

The Top Secret slide was marked for distribution to the "Five Eyes" intelligence alliance, which includes the United States and Britain.

The NSA declined to confirm or deny the existence of the program. It is not known if the botnets hijacked by the agency

were in other counties or in the United States, or if the botnets could have been recaptured by criminals.

Many botnet operations disable the machines' security software, leaving them vulnerable to new attacks by others.

In a written statement, an NSA spokeswoman said: "As the President affirmed on 17 January, signals intelligence shall be collected exclusively where there is a foreign intelligence or counterintelligence purpose to support national and departmental missions, and not for any other purposes.

"Moreover, Presidential Policy Directive 28 affirms that all persons - regardless of nationality - have legitimate privacy interests in the handling of their personal information, and that privacy and civil liberties shall be integral considerations in the planning of US signals intelligence activities."

The Intercept article and supporting slides showed that the NSA had sought the means to automate the deployment of its tools for capturing email, browsing history and other information in order to reach as many as millions of machines.

It did not say whether such widespread efforts, which included impersonating web pages belonging to Facebook Inc and other companies, were limited to computers overseas.

If it did pursue US computers, the NSA also could have minimized information about those users.

Infosys expects muted growth in Q4

3/13/2014 11:28:00 am TECHNOLOGY No comments

Infosys expects muted growth in Q4

Infosys expects sluggish growth in January-March quarter mainly due to muted spending by clients, especially in the retail sector.

NEW DELHI: IT major Infosys expects sluggish growth in January-March quarter mainly due to muted spending by clients, especially in the retail sector.

Infosys CEO and managing director SD Shibulal said muted growth in the fourth quarter of 2013-14 may spill over to the next financial year also.

"At the beginning of the quarter (Q4) we gave guidance for FY 2014, several factors may result our revenues to be near the lower end of guidance," he said at a Barclays investor meet.

"At the broad level some of our clients have seen slowdown in their business, these are across various verticals leading to unanticipated project ramp downs and cancellations in Q4.

"We have also seen some challenges in skill miss-matches between skills that clients need and what we have which has led to slowdown in ramp-ups. These factors are leading to decline in business momentum for us during the quarter," Shibulal added

Infosys had raised revenue growth forecast to 24.4-24.9% for the financial year ending March 31, 2014 from 21-22% estimated earlier.

"Many of the factors that have led to the recent slowdown will continue to impact client spending at least in the initial part of fiscal year 2015," he said.

Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy was brought back to head the IT major in June, following quarters of laggard performance.

"We have re-organised our sales structure and we have created several new small units that can bring better growth in areas where we find headroom for growth. We have also revamped our key performance indicators so that high performers will get better and better rewards," Murthy said
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Your 2G internet bill is likely to go up

3/13/2014 11:26:00 am TECHNOLOGY No comments

Your 2G internet bill is likely to go up

Telcos may adopt this strategy to propel first-time smartphone users to use 3G.

NEW DELHI: Tariffs for second-generation (2G) and third-generation (3G) data services are likely to converge over time as mobile phone companies could raise prices for 2G data offerings, having lowered 3G data prices in the recent past, a senior executive from Vodafone India said.

Mobile phone companies may adopt this strategy to propel first-time smartphone users to use 3G and push their existing 2G data users to experience faster speeds on 3G, say experts.

"We brought down 3G prices about four months ago and we expect that 2G and 3G prices are going to converge in the future," Vodafone India's Delhi circle head Subrat Padhi said.

However, companies may not be able to lower 3G rates further, Padhi said. He was speaking on the sidelines of an event to launch Vodafone's plans to promote 3G awareness among its own customer base and new smartphone users.

Vodafone said that only a fourth of its 160 million subscribers use smartphones, of which only half use 3G services. The company wants to increase this share of 3G users by making people aware that the technology gives better browsing experience and faster speeds. Top telcos, including Vodafone, had spent thousands of crores in buying 3G bandwidth through auctions in 2010, and had to price the services high to recoup the cost which proved unattractive to cost-sensitive subscribers in India.

Carriers thus have been forced to reduced tariffs of high-speed 3G plans significantly over the past couple of years. Leading telecom companies including Bharti Airtel, Vodafone India and Idea slashed tariffs by over 70% in 2012 in order to boost usage. Since 3G usage has doubled year-on-year for the companies.

In contrast, telcos have raised tariffs for 2G data indicating that the industry is already moving in that direction. The last increase was done four months ago when discounts were cut in various circles and the amount of free data was lowered without touching headline tariffs.

Padhi added that initial signs of convergence were evident as differences between 2G and 3G tariffs had significantly reduced
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South Africa demanded Rs 180 crore to host IPL 7

3/13/2014 11:25:00 am CRICKET No comments

South Africa demanded Rs 180 crore to host IPL 7

In comparison, BCCI will need to spend a total of around Rs 60 crore on staging the event in UAE, and if needed, Bangladesh.

NEW DELHI: BCCI would have loved to host the IPL in South Africa but the plan was shelved because of the cost factor.

According to sources, Cricket South Africa (CSA) was demanding close to Rs 180 crore to host the T20 event, though it could not be ascertained if the demand was for hosting the entire event or just a part.

The steep demand put off not only the board but also IPL team owners who did not want to spend that kind of money. Thus, South Africa lost out as a possible host as the teams did not want to go there even for a part of the event.

In comparison, BCCI will need to spend a total of around Rs 60 crore on staging the event in UAE, and if needed, Bangladesh. Of course, the board will save some more money if the government allows IPL matches in India from the first week of May itself.

"These venues work out to be cheaper. The intention is to play as many matches as possible in India. The calculations have been done but we will get correct figures only after home ministry's direction," a top BCCI official told TOI.

Franchises hope that a large population of expats in UAE will help boost revenue from gate receipts which would compensate them partly
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Samsung introduces free streaming service Milk Music

3/09/2014 10:46:00 am TECHNOLOGY No comments

Samsung introduces free streaming service Milk Music

Samsung on Friday unveiled a free music service for users of its Galaxy smartphones, entering a crowded market that includes Pandora, Spotify and Apple's iTunes.

The service dubbed "Milk Music" will offer some 200 ad-free radio stations to US customers with Samsung Galaxy devices.

"Milk introduces a fresh approach to music that reflects our innovation leadership and our focus on creating best-in-class consumer experiences," said Gregory Lee, president and chief executive ofSamsung Telecommunications America.

"We're offering consumers amazing, rich music experiences built around what matters most to them and their lifestyle."

Milk is powered by the radio service Slacker. The company suggested it may take a page from Apple by offering "unique music programming from top selling and emerging artists" available exclusively through the platform.

The South Korean Electronics giant, which is the world's biggest smartphone maker and is challengingApple in the US market, said the service will be offered with no log-in required and no need to browse for a specific artist or song.

It will have 200 genre-based and curated stations and some 13 million songs, and like other service will allow six song skips per hour per station.

Apple last year introduced its ad-supported iTunes radio service, which also allows customers to make purchases from the iTunes catalog.

SP Jain Institute of Management and Research Completes Placements With Top Salary Of Rs 29.5

3/09/2014 10:29:00 am JOBS, TECHNOLOGY No comments

SP Jain Institute of Management and Research Completes Placements With Top Salary Of Rs 29.5

SP Jain Institute of Management and Research (SPJIMR) has completed placements for the PGDM Class of 2014 with a 22.9% increase in the highest salary from Rs 24 lakh last year to Rs 29.5 lakh this time. The average salary has gone up around 6.8% to Rs 17.2 lakh even as 101 companies including 51 first-timers made 246 offers to the 228-strong batch.

The median salary for the batch was Rs 16.8 lakh. 70% of the batch has offers of Rs. 15 lakh and more, while 85% had salaries of Rs 13 lakh and more

Around 51% of the batch received pre-placement offers and pre-placement interviews through their autumn internships at top corporate houses, which included Axis Bank, Amazon, TAS, Microsoft, HUL, P&G, Asian Paints, Kraft, Colgate Palmolive, Dell, Citibank, General Electric, Flipkart, GSK, HCCB and HSBC, among others.

The 51 new companies on campus included Cipla, HSBC, Bain and Co, Samsung and Mars among others. Eight international offers were made to this batch from a consulting major.

The placements saw general management roles coming from the likes of Cipla, Mahindra & Mahindra, Ranbaxy, RIL and Tata Administrative. Consulting saw a spurt in the offers with 23.2% of the batch placed across such firms as Bain Capability, Bristlecone, Capgemini, Cognizant Business Consulting, Deloitte, Ernst & Young, IBM and KPMG, among others.

In the finance space, recruiters included Axis Bank, Avista Advisory, Franklin Templeton, Goldman Sachs, HSBC Bank, ICRA, ING Vysya Bank, Citibank, JP Morgan, JM Financials, Nielsen, Nomura, Standard Chartered, Yes Bank amongst others. Corporate finance/strategy roles were offered by Amazon, Dell, Flipkart, GE, PepsiCo and Siemens among others. 21% of the batch got offers in the financial services and banking sector.

Roles in IT/ITes were offered by the likes of Infoedge, Makemytrip while Microsoft, Google and HCL Technologies offered sales roles on campus. Corporate IT roles were offered from business giants like General Electric, Hindustan Unilever and Dr Reddy’s.

The FMCG sector made offers to 23% of students. Companies included Asian Paints, HUL, Kraft, L’Oreal, Marico, P&G, PepsiCo, Philips, Reckitt Benkiser, Mars, Nivea and Samsung. Telecom roles were offered to students by Bharti Airtel and Vodafone.

Women Make 50% Of The Entire Talent Pool In Pharma

3/09/2014 10:27:00 am JOBS, TECHNOLOGY No comments

Women Make 50% Of The Entire Talent Pool In Pharma

The ability to learn is the most important quality a leader can have… – Sheryl Sandberg

People become leaders by internalising a leadership identity and developing a sense of purpose. Internalising a sense of oneself as a leader is a repetitive process. A woman may assert leadership by taking purposeful action—such as convening a meeting to revive a dormant project. These interactions inform the woman’s sense of self as a leader and communicate how others view her fitness for the role.

As a woman’s leadership capabilities grow and opportunities expand, high-profile, challenging assignments and other organisational endorsements become more likely. Such affirmation gives a woman the fortitude to step outside a comfort zone and experiment with unfamiliar behaviors and new ways of exercising leadership. Leadership identity, which begins as a tentative, peripheral aspect of the self, eventually withers away, along with opportunities to grow through new assignments and real achievements. Over time, an aspiring leader acquires a reputation as having—or not having—high potential.

Our country has seen women leaders in various sectors over the years. Pharmaceutical sector in India, till a few years ago, was a lesser explored career option amongst Indian women. Today, we have leaders in the sector who have definitely made a mark for themselves in the Healthcare and Pharmaceutical sector in India. These women are calling the shots not only in pharma and healthcare space, but they are also setting benchmarks for leadership globally. Many Indian and MNC pharma companies position themselves as a preferable employer for women including scientists.

It is a widely known fact that the Pharma and Healthcare sector in India is ever growing and a demanding sector. Hence, pharma companies present in the country cannot afford to ignore over 50 per cent of their talent pool, which happens to be none other than women. It is only when organisations learn to tap the potential of their women employees and leaders that they can see higher revenues and also contribution to economic growth of the country. Gender equality and empowerment of women has a direct correlation with GDP growth and literacy rate.

The DNA of leadership remains the same irrespective of the gender. Courage, commitment and conviction are the core qualities of a leader. Women have long been slotted into stereotypes. Multitasking and balancing home and work have been long seen as strengths. The dialogue needs to change. Women today make choices of work and life in two separate buckets and allocate time to it. They have reached a position where they enjoy the power of making choices which allows them to allocate, negotiate and be more strategic and less transactional.

Successful women are self-reliant. This characteristic might be the most important. I never hear a smart, successful woman say, “I‘ll have to check with my husband and see what he thinks”. Any major decision that involves the family or relationship has been thought out ahead of time and smart, successful women make their own ultimate decisions. Then again, it‘s easy to make decisions when you know what you want and have wisely chosen a partner who supports that. Perhaps this trait is a culmination of all the rest!

3 Emerging IT Job Roles In 2014

3/09/2014 10:25:00 am JOBS, TECHNOLOGY No comments

3 Emerging IT Job Roles In 2014

Without a doubt, the Indian IT job space is ever-evolving and churns out newer job opportunities for candidates every season/year. TimesJobs.com finds out which are the emerging job opportunities in the IT field in 2014.

Job Role – E-Commerce Business Analyst

It involves supporting the development of e-commerce solutions. This person should possess strong analytical, organisational and communication skills and will have demonstrated the ability to collaborate within a team environment. As a member of the product management team, this critical role will require the ability to establish and build relationships across all levels and functions of the organisation.

Act as a liaison between the business units, technology teams and support teams.
Analyse and document complex business processes.
Develop and maintain technical specifications and business requirements.
Utilise business insights to drive decision making and opportunities.
Negotiate between accounting, supply chain, warehouse management, call center and marketing.

Hot Skills – Agile Methodology, Microsoft Office and Microsoft Project, Visio, Jira; Agile/Scrum working practice is a plus

Salary prospects- Rs. 3-6 lakhs at entry level and Rs 6 lakh-10 lakhs at middle level

Future Outlook: E-commerce is creating huge opportunities for Indian businesses as more and more corporates are making use of technology and innovation to increase their profitability by reaching out to millions of global customers. Hence there would be lot of opportunities which will be available in the e-commerce and payment gateway domain.

Demand Scale: 9/10

Job Role- Virtualisation Engineer/Architect

It refers to agile provisioning of converged storage, compute and network resources. It requires knowledge of how to take a cluster of physical servers and make them virtual machines, it also extends to network and storage virtualisation

Manage deployment of new applications, servers and services in the environment
Install patches and updates
Interface with other Systems Administrators (Application Admins, DBA, Network Admin, Storage Admin, Other OS Admin)
Monitor application performance across all sites
Perform technical troubleshooting and issue resolution and documentation of processes and procedures

Hot Skills – CITRIX, VMware, Microsoft Infrastructure technologies like DHCP, DNS, and WINS

Salary prospects – Rs. 3-5 lakhs at entry level and Rs 5-10 Lakhs at middle level

Future Outlook: As everything goes virtual, and as more and more companies are looking to assign work from home options with restrictive access and the industry is moving towards virtual office culture there is lot of new research and development happening in this domain. Hence, the virtualisation profile is likely to be a promising career option for post graduates in the years to come

Demand Scale: 8.5/10

Job Role: CRM Expert

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) experts need to work on complex CRM applications and their role includes programming, project management, project development, systems configuration, and development

The person should be able handle and retain customers through better experience by effectively managing CRM systems
Able to coordinate with various sales teams and business units
Ensure the company CRM team’s projects are delivered on schedule
Monitor data quality tasks and continually build and refine knowledge base of clients and contacts while ensuring data quality standards
Manage changes made to client and contact profiles

Salary prospects: Rs. 2.5-5 lakhs at entry level and Rs. 5-9 lakhs at middle level

Hot Skills: Debugging skills; e-commerce knowledge; business analytics; ability to multitask, data mapping

Future Outlook: Demand for CRM professionals is high and the CRM domain is expected to create a lot of job openings in all sectors as CRM provides a strong competitive edge to companies. There would be a lot of demand for professionals trained in different CRM platforms like SAP, Oracle etc.

Ways To Negotiate For A Higher Salary

3/09/2014 10:24:00 am TECHNOLOGY No comments

Ways To Negotiate For A Higher Salary

Overcome the fear of rejection and resentment and bring in self-confidence while asking for a higher salary.

Salary negotiation happens either when an employee explores a new job opportunity, or during the yearly performance assessment meetings in the current organsiation. Though difficult, it is necessary that employees at all levels overcome the fear of rejection while asking for a salary hike. Let’s find out the trick of doing it the right way…

Amit Das chief human resources officer (CHRO), Reliance Communications Ltd. shares six guidelines to adhere to when one decides to engage in negotiating higher salary:

Do homework on market benchmarks, compensation trends:

Thorough market research across industry verticals sets the ground work for a better understanding of the compensation trends and current realities. Some of the important research areas will be to find out the range of market salary for the position offered by the new organisation, or the role in the current organisation based on experience and qualification; and, the market trend specific to the industry/sector.

Take inputs from professionals and recruitment consultants, the state of business operations and the compensation structure of the organisation in order to assess its percentile positioning in the market compensation. One should use this data to take an informed stand prior to the salary negotiation.

What value you bring in?

Be very clear about how you are going to add value to the business objectives and deliverables. Once you have the clarity on the linkage between your own deliverables and the tangible business outcome, it becomes much easier to justify the basis for negotiation and one becomes confident of the compelling reasons to look forward to a higher salary.

Overcome fear/shyness:

Probably, the most common reason why one doesn’t ask for a higher salary is for the fear of being rejected, fear of coming across as demanding or fear of resentment from one’s boss. One has to overcome this fear and bring in self-confidence to justify the case of asking for a higher salary. This can only be possible when someone has substantial data and facts captured from research as mentioned earlier, which helps in an objective and professional discussion around salary increase.

Last drawn salary as the baseline:

Most often any new salary offer gets pegged to the last drawn salary. It is only fair that the current salary should be treated as the baseline for further increments. However, one needs to keep in mind the additional competencies required to manage the challenges and deliverables of the new role. This will help justify the indicative increase on the last drawn salary.

Comprehend and negotiate the CTC components:

In most cases, negotiation happens over CTC (Cost to company), which in most cases, is divided between fixed and variable parts. However, it is very important to comprehend and if required, negotiate on the various components of your CTC, which might help in arriving at a better take home salary.

Be realistic and reasonable:

One should be realistic about what you are asking for. The negotiation discussion should not be perceived by the organisation that the employee is demanding and greedy, something which is unreasonable and unjustified. It is always appreciated when the employee creates a platform for objective and factual discussion, which leads to a mutually agreed outcome.

"TAKE NO AS A QUESTION "

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Friday, 14 March 2014