It’s another Thursday, and here’s another week of tech talk with Mark Starling and the First News 570 crew. Fasten your seat belts, we are in for a bumpy ride. This week, Microsoft took down a hacker group launching TrickBots, Apple announced the new iPhone 12, and Jeff Bezos launched a rocket. You can listen to Mark and I point and laugh while talking about the wild and crazy technology world every Thursday morning, LIVE at 6:43am Eastern.

MICROSOFT TAKES DOWN TRICKBOT NETWORK BEFORE ELECTION

We’re less than 20 days away from the 2020 US Presidential Election, and we should be prepared for the shenanigans. This week, Microsoft obtained a federal court order to disable the IP addresses of servers used by a global hacking ring. The hacking ring was selling services to other hackers as well as launching Trickbot malware attacks against companies that make products adjacent to election systems. Trickbot has been used in attacks against Universal Health Services, and Tyler Technologies a software vendor for public institutions. Tyler has reportedly paid the ransomware attackers for a decryption key that will help them regain access to their systems. Tyler has put up a public notice about the attack against them.

APPLE ANNOUNCES IPHONE 12

The world’s most valuable fruit company announced their latest edition iPhone earlier this week. The iPhone 12 harkens back to the iPhone 4 of yore with squared off corners, and comes in multiple corners. The i12 will also get rid of the LCD display in favor of a brighter OLED screen, and features a camera with a whopping f/1.6 aperture. The phone also features a ceramic heat shield that will protect it from re-entry, and 5G. The big innovation for this iPhone is MagSafe. The tech is prevalent across Macs and is used for attaching power cables to the computer. This tech could potentially remove the need for any cables, as MagSafe can be used for contact charging and data transmission. I’ve had my current iPhone since December of 2017. I think I’m due for an upgrade. Pre-orders start this Friday, and the phone will be available on October 23rd.

BEZOS’ BLUE ORIGIN SUCCESSFULLY PROVES EXTRA-PLANETARY LANDINGS

Earlier this week, Jeff Bezos’ rocket company, Blue Origin, successfully launched the New Shepard booster which is designed to land astronauts on the Moon and Mars. NASA wanted to test the technology before it is sent to the Moon. New Shepard was carrying sensors and running software for sub-orbital space tourism trips. The booster will be shuttling a crew capsule that features the largest windows of any craft flown in space. I want to go.