Nintendo has informed consumers in its home market of Japan that production and shipments of the Switch console and accessories will experience delays due to the effect of the new coronavirus. The Animal Crossing-themed variant of the Switch, which was only announced last week, has had its preorder availability pushed back from Saturday to an unspecified date. The company apologizes for the trouble and says it’ll keep on monitoring the situation.
It’s not clear whether the delays will affect shipments elsewhere. Nintendo specifically references hardware produced in China and sold in Japan, but last year the company started diversifying its supply chain and building some units in Southeast Asia specifically for the US market to avoid US tariffs. Most Switch consoles are said to be built by Foxconn, which is keeping its Chinese factories shuttered for at least another week.
Nintendo also warns that Ring Fit Adventure will experience further delays in Japan. The popular new fitness RPG, which makes use of a pilates ring-style controller, had already been selling well domestically to the point that Nintendo’s president Shuntaro Furukawa apologized to investors for the lack of supply to East Asia last week.
There are already ways to siphon data from computers without a network connection or old-fashioned physical theft, but this might be one of the cleverer examples. Researchers have found a way to steal data from "air-gapped" computers (that is, no way to connect to other devices) using an LCD's brightness. The approach has a compromised computer relay imperceptible changes in the LCD's RGB color values that a camera-equipped device can detect. You could theoretically trick someone into loading malware on the target system through a USB drive and use nearby hijacked security cameras to transmit that information.
Don't worry about someone reading your login details through the window any time soon, though. As the methods imply, a data thief would still have to breach the victim computer and have cameras they control within line of sight. This could be helpful for intelligence agencies performing Stuxnet-style intrusions, but an attacker can't just sit outside your home and read data from your computer monitor. Still, it gives ultra-secure facilities something to think about -- they might not want to place cameras behind air-gapped computers lest a rival nation pull off some Mission Impossible-level espionage.
All products recommended by Engadget are selected by our editorial team, independent of our parent company. Some of our stories include affiliate links. If you buy something through one of these links, we may earn an affiliate commission.
YouTube channel PBKreviews has given Motorola's modern Razr the teardown treatment a day before it becomes available. And based on how many screws and cables the host had to go through to get to the flexible display, you'll probably want to go straight to a repair center instead of trying to fix the device yourself in case anything happens to it.
In fact, you'll have to heat the back of the phone to loosen up the glue and pry it open with plastic implements before you can get to any of the device's internal components. Then, once inside, you'll have to contend with dozens of screws and cables. The display, which needs more TLC than a non-foldable screen, is the very last thing you'll remove from the whole assembly. PBKreviews says the teardown was far from easy and "would probably even go as far as saying [that the phone isn't] repairable at all by most people."
Motorola released a "Caring for Razr" video in January, telling users that "bumps and lumps are normal" on the phone's display. It suggests keeping it dry, not using screen protectors and closing the phone before tossing it in your pocket or purse to prevent accidents from happening. The good news is that it'll only cost $299 to have the Razr's screen repaired "for circumstances that fall outside of the warranty." Sure, that's no pocket change, but as Phone Arena notes, that's only $20 more than a new Galaxy Note display. It's also just a tiny fraction of the $1,500 you'd have to pay for a new Razr.
Verizon owns Engadget's parent company, Verizon Media. Rest assured, Verizon has no control over our coverage. Engadget remains editorially independent.
All products recommended by Engadget are selected by our editorial team, independent of our parent company. Some of our stories include affiliate links. If you buy something through one of these links, we may earn an affiliate commission.
With Samsung’s big Galaxy S20 unveiling less than one week away, it’s really the only smartphone series anyone should be talking about right now. The new Android flagships are shaping up to be some of the sleekest and most sophisticated smartphones ever, and the Galaxy S20 Ultra in particular looks like an absolute beast. And yet a quick search over on the Google Trends site reveals that Samsung’s Galaxy S20 isn’t the only upcoming smartphone series people are talking about right now.
What’s stealing all this attention away from the sleek new S20 series? Why it’s none other than Apple’s iPhone 12. Despite the fact that the new iPhone 12, iPhone 12 Pro, and iPhone 12 Pro Max (and possibly a fourth new iPhone model) aren’t set to be released for another seven and a half months, these hotly anticipated new iPhones are already dominating the conversation. In fact, according to that Google Trends search, there’s twice as much interest right now for the iPhone 12 as there is for Samsung’s upcoming new flagship Galaxy S20 series. That doesn’t bode well at all for Samsung, but it certainly bodes well for Apple. And now, a new video has emerged that shows off Apple’s leaked iPhone 12 Pro design and I can’t stop staring at it.
Following Apple’s huge earnings win in the holiday quarter, we know that Apple’s new three-year design cycle isn’t the big problem everyone thought it was. Sure, hardcore Apple fans and bigtime tech enthusiasts would love it if Apple went back to offering refreshed iPhone designs every other year instead of every third year. They buy new iPhones every single year as soon as they’re released, and spending over $1,000 on an iPhone with the same design for three consecutive years is a tough pill to swallow.
But iPhones have consistently been getting faster and more powerful in recent years, and Apple has been supporting them for longer and longer with iOS updates. That means for the average smartphone user, there is absolutely no reason to upgrade to an expensive new iPhone any sooner than every three or four years, at the very least. Apple recognized this shift in the market long before anyone else, and that’s why the company switched to a three-year iPhone design refresh cycle beginning all the way back in 2014 with the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6s.
Now, we know all of this makes perfect sense business-wise. We also know the overwhelming majority of high-end smartphone users are waiting longer and longer to upgrade, so iPhone designs that seem old and boring to gadget fans are still fresh and new for most people when it comes time to upgrade. That’s why iPhone 11 sales were through the roof during the holiday quarter despite the fact that the iPhone 11 looks just like the iPhone XS from 2018 and the iPhone X from 2017. Even still, if you’re one of the many huge Apple fans or gadget enthusiasts out there who upgrades every year, you’re dying to get your hands on a refreshed iPhone. And thanks to the iPhone 12 series that’s set to be released this coming September, your dreams are about to come true.
Top Apple insider Ming-Chi Kuo of TF International Securities has reported on several occasions that Apple’s new iPhone 12 series will feature a significant design refresh. He has a terrific track record and he says the new iPhone 12, iPhone 12 Pro, iPhone 12 Pro Max, and maybe even a fourth new iPhone 12 model will feature a big redesign with flat metal edges around the perimeter. They’ll look like larger, modernized iPhone 5 handsets, which is music to Apple fans’ ears considering how much everyone loved the iPhone 5 design.
We’ve seen this new iPhone 12 design visualized a bunch of times. And just yesterday, we saw a leaked video that seemingly shows mockups of three new iPhone 12 models being compared to each other. Those mockups showed an overall iPhone 12 design that’s quite similar to the iPhone 11 though, especially around front where there’s still a big notch at the top of the display. But early rumors suggested Apple is also testing iPhone 12 prototypes that eliminate the notch and squeeze the TrueDepth camera sensors into the phone’s top bezel. Wondering what that stunning iPhone 12 design might look like? Well, it might look something like this:
Now, it’s looking quite unlikely at this point that Apple will manage to ditch the notch this year. For that reason and several more — like the fact that there’s no power button, and the volume buttons and mute toggle are on the wrong side of the phone — the iPhone 12 Pro design shown in this video isn’t likely to be accurate. That said, there is no way that Apple plans to keep using a display with a notch for three more years considering the current trends in the smartphone market, so we could see an exception to the company’s new three-year design cycle in the next year or two. If that’s the case, the video above could be a pretty close approximation of Apple’s iPhone 12s or iPhone 13 design. Either way, I can’t stop staring at this video and I need an iPhone like this in my life as soon as possible.
Image Source: Zach Epstein, BGR
Zach Epstein has worked in and around ICT for more than a decade, first in marketing and business development with two private telcos, then as a writer and editor covering business news, consumer electronics and telecommunications. Zach’s work has been quoted by countless top news publications. He was also recently named one of the world's top-10 “power mobile influencers” by Forbes, as well as one of Inc. Magazine's top-30 Internet of Things experts.
Similar to the 2019 Windows version of this machine, Dell is happy to tout its webcam—if for no other reason than that it no longer focuses up the nose. (This is the webcam with externals stretched out in a mock-up.)
Dell's XPS 13 Developer Edition, the company's flagship "just works" Ubuntu-based machine, was recently refreshed. These days Dell's XPS line is not the cheapest Linux option, nor is it the most configurable or user-upgradable. And if any of those factors are a big part of your criteria, this is likely not the laptop for you.
On top of that, many Linux users still have a strong DIY streak and will turn up their noses at the XPS 13. After all, in a day and age when just about every laptop I test seems to run Linux fairly well right out of the box, do you need official support? If you know what you're doing and don't mind troubleshooting your own problems, the answer is probably not.
Yet after spending a few weeks with the latest XPS 13 (the fourth refresh I've tested), it's hard to shake the feeling that this is the closest any company has come to Linux-computing nirvana. The XPS 13 Developer Edition makes an excellent choice for anyone who prefers Linux but wants hardware support from the manufacturer. All these years into its Linux odyssey, Dell continues to stand behind the operating system on these machines in a way that, in my experience, few other computer makers do.
So if you want a computer that runs smoothly and for which you can pick up the phone and get help should you need it, the Dell XPS 13 remains one of the best options out there (maybe regardless of your OS preference). It doesn't hurt, either, that the Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition is also a great-looking, solidly built piece of hardware. If you dream of a Linux rig that "just works" and comes in a powerful, minimalist package that weighs a mere 2.7lbs, the XPS 13 Developer Edition fits the bill.
But wait, which XPS 13 DE to get?
In early 2020, where the decision gets confusing is which Dell XPS 13 to consider. To judge by the number of machines and models available, Dell's Project Sputnik—the company's long-running effort to bring Ubuntu-based hardware to the masses—has been an unqualified success. Not only are there more models and configurations than ever, Dell keeps churning out hardware updates, usually on pace with the Windows models.
That's no small feat considering that this hardware has to undergo a completely different set of compatibility tests from the Windows machines. To be fair, some features have lagged behind in the Linux models; the fingerprint reader is a good example. The Windows version of the XPS 13 released in early 2019 features a fingerprint reader on the power button. The same feature has not been available in the Linux edition until now.
While I was testing the late 2019 Developer Edition update, Dell announced another update. The new 2020 version (the 10th-gen XPS 13 Developer Edition for those of you keeping track), gets Ice Lake processors with Gen11 graphics, and a new, larger screen. This 2020 Developer Edition will also be available with up to 32 GB of RAM, up from 16 GB in the model I tested. Better late than never, support for the fingerprint reader is also coming. It won't be available at launch in mid-February, but Dell says that support will arrive soon after.
As the company has in the past, Dell will continue to sell both the new and previous XPS 13 DE releases this year—this time the two devices just happen to go live four months apart (the 2019 in November; the 2020 this month). Laptop seekers need to know their model numbers: the late 2019 release I primarily tested is the 7390, and the coming 2020 version is the 9300 (yes, Dell told me the model numbers start over at 9300 in 2020—the same model number used in 2016).
Luckily, I had a chance to play with the new 9300 hardware recently at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. (Linux fans will be happy to know: it had a prominent spot on the display, right next to the Windows version.) Even a small amount of in-person tinkering time allows me to make some notable comparisons with the 2019 model.
Enlarge/ Dell's 2020 CES lineup: two of the new XPS 13 laptops next to the new XPS 13 Developer Edition laptop (in black).
Valentina Palladino
What's new: 2019 version v. 2020 version
The XPS 13 line has stuck with largely the same design since it launched. The bezel seems to always diminish by some nearly immeasurable amount, but otherwise the hardware has looked about the same for years now. The 2019 model is no exception to this trend. Side-by-side it's impossible to tell apart from the 2018 model I own, save for one little detail: no more nose cam.
As Ars noted last year when the Windows model was released, the webcam is no longer at the base of the screen staring straight up your nose. Instead the webcam is where it belongs, at the top of the screen.
The iteration of the XPS 13 line I've been testing features Intel's Comet Lake 6-core i7-10710U processor. It's a marginal step up from the previous version, but in outside benchmarks I haven't really noticed a huge speed increase. What I have noticed is that this version runs consistently cooler than my 2018 version (both running Ubuntu 18.04).
So what of those two extra cores? It may not sound like much, but if you push your processor (whether editing video, gaming, or compiling software), you're going to want six cores. I happened to be editing a video while reviewing this laptop and, using Lightworks, what took 38 minutes to export on my 2018 XPS 13 took a mere 19 minutes on the Comet Lake chip.
The model Dell sent for testing had the max 16GB of RAM and a 1TB solid state drive. As configured, the test machine would set you back $1899.99. The lowest model, which has the 1080p display, an i5 chip, 128GB SSD, and only 8GB of RAM, can be had for $975.
The build quality hasn't changed, and the XPS 13 remains a solidly built machine. The construction is excellent and the underlying aluminum frame provides a stiffness that makes it feel solid even though it's so light. The finish holds up quite well, too. My 2018 model has bounced around in my bag, slid across many a table, and scraped over tile counters in the kitchen all without leaving many marks. I expect the same will be true of the latest model.
Though I've been using one for years now, the XPS 13's InfinityEdge display still amazes me, too. No, it's not OLED, but it manages to pack a 13-inch screen into a body that otherwise looks and feels more like an 11-inch laptop. Dell has always sent me the version with the 4K IPS touch panel. You can get the XPS 13 with a 1920x1080 screen, and it will get better battery life (more on that in a minute), but I think the higher res display is worth the extra money.
Previously there were quite a few pain points with HiDPI screens in Ubuntu, but that's largely a thing of the past. The grub menu and boot screens are still impossibly small, and every now and then there's an app that doesn't scale properly—Zoom, I'm looking at you here. But by and large, the combination of work done by the GNOME project, Ubuntu, and Dell have sorted out these issues.
I do find the brightest setting to be overwhelming when working indoors (the XPS 13 maxes out at 472 nits brightness), though it does mitigate the glare somewhat if you're working outside. For me, I'd say this is a screen you want to keep indoors—it's very high gloss and glare is an issue outside. I tend to keep the screen at 70 percent brightness, which helps with battery life and is still plenty bright.
As for the 2020 version of the XPS 13 Developer Edition, again it features 10th generation Intel Core 10nm mobile processors along with a new, larger display.
That new screen is one of those"of course" changes. Once you see it, you'll wonder why it wasn't that way from the beginning. Gone is the Dell logo that used to grace the wider bottom bezel. Instead, you get more screen real estate with a new 16:10 aspect ratio (up from 16:9 on the 2019 and prior models).
It's a small gain, but at this screen size, frankly, anything is welcome. For that alone, I would pick the 2020 model over the 2019 version (model 7390). But evidently the dimensions of the XPS 13 have been tweaked slightly as well. I couldn't tell much difference holding it, but the keyboard keys are noticeably bigger. They're also somewhat springier than previous versions (no, thankfully it's not the same as the 2-in-1 model the Internet loves to hate on).
I can't speak the performance of the 2020 model since my hands-on time was limited, but the 2019 version's 6-core Comet Lake i7 chip brings some speed improvements over prior releases. Another bit of welcome news is the option to get 32 GB of RAM, because really, can you ever have too much RAM?
The other area of improvement is with battery life. Dell claims some crazy numbers for XPS battery life with these updates. The battery in the 1080p version of the XPS 13 purportedly lasts 18 hours. The 4K display must be a massive battery drain because I did not get anywhere near that number in testing mine. Playing back a 1080p video full screen on the loop, the 2019 model managed just over nine hours. That's very good, especially for Linux, but it's nowhere near the claimed max life.
There are plenty of things you can do to squeeze some more life out of the battery though. Under my normal work load—terminal running tmux with vim, mpd, and mutt, a Web browser (qutebrowser), and Slack—with the screen at 70 percent, and Bluetooth off, I managed several hours more. So long as this laptop was fully charged in the morning, I never worried about running the battery low over the course of a workday.
That said, if you're compiling software, editing video, or otherwise pushing the CPU, your battery life will decline. In these use cases, it may be worth considering the 1080p model, though personally I'd rather carry a cord and have the 4K screen.
Another change worth noting is support for WiFi 6. Yes, WiFi has version numbers now. What's being called WiFi 6 is actually 802.11ax and is already shipping in many routers. Unfortunately I didn't have one to test with, but in testing I've done seperately I've seen about 20-30 percent speed boosts over 802.11ac. If you have or plan to upgrade your router in the near future, either of the new models will see the benefit.
It's time for an upgrade to Bionic Beaver.
Ubuntu 18.04 follows the lead set by 17.10 and uses the GNOME interface, but it defaults to the Xorg rendering engine instead of Wayland (which was used in the previous release).
The major interface changes to Ubuntu in 18.04 will be familiar territory to GNOME users—especially those who have used recent Debian distributions and Ubuntu 17.10 (Artful Aardvark). To those who are used to Ubuntu 16.04 (and liked it), it will take a little getting used to.
Here's the application trays and settings screens of 16.04 and 18.04 side by side to highlight the differences.
Ubuntu 18.04 offers an alternate minimum install that includes just the basics and the Firefox Web browser—an install that makes it simpler to make corporate images.
As with previous releases, you can encrypt the entire boot disk for security...
...and unlock it with a password at power-up.
The full install of Bionic Beaver includes some of the usual software package suspects, including the RhythmBox music application and Shotwell photo manager.
LibreOffice is also part of the default (non-minimal) install.
But full integration of the Snap universal Linux software package installer in Ubuntu's Apps store now means it's easier to add new, containerized applications—without concerns about dependency issues.
These applications are all available as "snaps" now, including Slack.
Can't live without Slack, now, can we?
Livepatch, a feature that automatically applies security patches without a need for a reboot, is now included as part of the Ubuntu LTS default install. It requires creating an Ubuntu One account.
You can opt out of sending metrics back, but Mark Shuttleworth says that the metadata will help guide decisions about future releases and give Canonical a picture of what kind of hardware people are installing Ubuntu on.
What's not new: Ubuntu 18.04
If you want official support for Ubuntu, you're always going to be looking at LTS releases. For the XPS 13s shipping now and in the near future, that means Ubuntu 18.04 will be the default operating system.
While 18.04 is a solid release, recent updates (particularly 19.10, which arrived in October 2019) bring some huge performance improvements that would make these updated hardware profiles even better. I looked at Ubuntu 19.10 for Ars last year, and some of the highlights include much snappier GNOME desktop, experimental support for ZFS, and more default applications shipped as self-contained Snap packages.
Shortly after the 2020 XPS 13 is available, Ubuntu 20.04 will arrive as Canonical's next LTS release. Everything that made 19.10 such a welcome update will be in 20.04, so at least there is that to look forward to. And quite frankly, Dell's hardware upgrades to the XPS 13 might well pale next to the software upgrade that 20.04 will bring. If previous Ubuntu/Dell upgrade cycles are anything to go by, look for 20.04 to come to the XPS line in late Summer of 2020.
However... I am impatient. As I always do with new XPS machines, I attempted to bring my 2019 XPS 13 up to Ubuntu 19.10. Unfortunately, for the first time I can recall when upgrading an XPS 13, I failed. Or rather, I hit enough roadblocks that I gave up.
Somehow in the move from 18.04 to 19.04, the drivers for the WiFi card disappeared, and while the drivers for Ethernet showed up and claimed to work, I could never actually connect to download any updates. I could download the drivers to another machine, copied them over, and then installed them, but honestly, it shouldn't have been that hard. I'd have a hard time suggesting anyone else attempt doing that.
Dell's selling point on the XPS 13 Developer Edition is that it "just works," and to achieve that Dell does not support anything other than Ubuntu 18.04 LTS at the moment.
I would suggest that, if you want that simplicity and the company guarantee, users should stick with 18.04 until the official upgrades arrive. If you are prepared to resolve "just doesn't work" scenarios, then you could try making the jump to 19.10. But if you do, my suggestion would be to do a clean install rather than trying to upgrade through Ubuntu Software.
I should note that I installed both Fedora 32 and Arch Linux without issue. And one thing I definitely think is worth pointing out is how trivially easy it is to re-install the original system thanks to Dell's recovery tools. The ability to recover so easily does make the XPS 13 a good system to experiment on, even if your experiments sometimes end in frustration.
So, upgrade or wait for the 2020 model?
At this point, I would wait the two or so weeks for the 2020 model to arrive. At the very least, whether or not you want the slightly larger screen and new keyboard, the 2019 model is likely to drop slightly in price when a new version hits the market.
Unfortunately, the price of this model may not drop much given it's also pretty new and contains some notable upgrades. And if you have the extra cash, I'd suggest going for the new screen anyway. It doesn't sound like much, but it surprised me in day-to-day usage. If you're used to working on a 16:9 screen, it really does give you a noticeable bump in headroom.
Whichever XPS 13 Developer Edition model you decide to get, ultimately you're going to have a lot more configuration options than you used to. Dell has been expanding its Ubuntu-based offerings with every release, and currently, the site offers no fewer than 18 different models and configurations for the XPS 13 Developer Edition. There's a lot more opportunity to customize and tailor the hardware to your needs than there used to be, and these two latest releases seem to address a lot of prior user demands.
In under three weeks, the collective eyes of the tech industry will turn to Barcelona for Mobile World Congress, the biggest and most important trade show in the world of mobile communications. More than 100,000 attendees from nearly 200 countries are expected every year, and unlike CES in recent times, MWC still regularly manages to entice major manufacturers into announcing their most important devices at the show.
That’s the plan, at least — but this year, things may be a little different. The outbreak of the coronavirus in China and subsequent spread to other countries has claimed hundreds of lives. It’s also disrupting supply chains vital to the development of smartphones, and wreaking travel havoc in Asia, where most of MWC’s marquee exhibitors are based; many countries are restricting flights to and from China. LG and ZTE have already cancelled some plans for the show. It’s hard to imagine there won’t be further disruption.
MWC 2020 was set to feature an even larger Chinese contingent than ever before, with all of the country’s major smartphone brands planning a meaningful presence. As of today, that appears still to be the case. Xiaomi, Vivo, and Honor all tell The Verge that they remain intent on attending. Huawei is also still planning to make announcements at the show despite recently cancelling its Shenzhen developer conference, although sources familiar with the situation say the company is likely to axe certain events and significantly reduce the number of employees who travel. Qualcomm, Lenovo, and Motorola also tell The Verge that plans remain in place for MWC.
The GSM Association, which organizes MWC, maintains it’ll be business as usual in Barcelona. That’s understandable given the show has a big economic impact of 492 million euros this year, and also generates 14,100 part-time jobs, according to the GSMA. The GSMA is an industry trade body that represents more than 1,200 companies across the mobile ecosystem, and MWC is the chance for thousands to gather for partnerships, deals, and product launches for the global press.
“There is minimal impact on the event thus far,” the association said in a statement yesterday. “MWC Barcelona 24-27 February 2020 will proceed as planned across all venues.” The GSMA says it will be increasing medical support and disinfection measures on site and communicating best practices to attendees. Speakers will be subject to a new microphone changing protocol. A “no-handshake policy” is also being advised for all at the show, though that sounds impractical to enforce.
It’s no surprise to see an everything-is-fine statement from the GSMA at this point. MWC has been hit by public transport strikes multiple times in the past, causing chaos as attendees attempt to get around the city, and the association puts out identical press releases ahead of time to try to assuage fears with talk of contingency plans, which in The Verge’s experience tend not to be too effective. All the escalator handrail disinfectant in the world isn’t going to convince people they’re safe from an airborne virus.
Regardless of reassurances from the organizers and exhibitors, it seems inevitable that the coronavirus will have an effect on MWC. Cases have been surging in recent days, with no sign of the spread of the virus slowing down. It’s incredibly easy to get sick at trade shows at the best of times, and this is very much not the best of times. Various authorities are already advising people to avoid public gatherings, let alone events where tens of thousands of attendees are flying around the world to gather shoulder-to-shoulder in the same rooms. With cases of the new coronavirus confirmed in neighboring France and the nearby Canary Islands, a Spanish autonomous community, it’d be understandable if people were to think twice about attending.
LG alluded to that in its announcement, citing “the safety of its employees and [the] general public” and saying it wanted to “prevent needlessly exposing hundreds of LG employees to international travel, which most health experts have advised.” ZTE, meanwhile, said it was cancelling its press conference because it tends to be “an overly courteous company and simply [doesn’t] want to make people uncomfortable.”
It has to be mentioned, too, that Asian people around the world are experiencing a marked increase in xenophobia and racist attacks as a result of the outbreak, as was the case with the SARS virus in 2003. Employees of Chinese companies make up a huge proportion of the hundred-thousand-plus attendees at MWC every year, and racial discrimination is likely to increase at this year’s event. If MWC is to go ahead this month, the GSMA must do everything within its capabilities to crack down on this kind of unacceptable behavior.
Whether or not more companies decide to pull out of the show, MWC 2020 is likely to have a very different atmosphere to previous years. As ever, The Verge is planning to attend as long as we expect there to be news to cover — safely. But we already have two fewer companies to meet with than we thought we would, and we’d be surprised if that number didn’t grow.
Four years ago, security researchers showed how a flying drone could hack an entire room full of Philips Hue smart light bulbs from outside a building, by setting off a virus-like chain reaction that jumped from bulb to bulb. Today, we’re learning that vulnerability never got fully fixed — and now, researchers have figured out a way to exploit that very same issue to potentially infiltrate your home or corporate network, unless you install a patch.
That’s the word from cybersecurity research firm Check Point Software, and the good news is you should already be safe from the worst part of the hack. If the Philips Hue Hub that controls your bulbs is connected to the internet, it should have automatically updated itself to version 1935144040 by now, which contains the patch you want. (Check Point informed Philips in November, and a patch was issued mid-January.) I just checked my own hub’s firmware version in the Philips Hue app, and I’m good.
It’s also nice to know it might have taken a fairly clever, patient hacker to exploit this vulnerability in the first place. In addition to presumably uploading a malicious over-the-air update to a Hue bulb (the technique used in 2016), it relies on messing with that hacked bulb’s color and brightness long enough to trick the owner into resetting and re-adding that bulb to their own network, at which point the hacked bulb overwhelms the Hue Hub with data, taking control of the Hub in turn. Here’s how Check Point explains that part:
The hacker-controlled bulb with updated firmware then uses the ZigBee protocol vulnerabilities to trigger a heap-based buffer overflow on the control bridge, by sending a large amount of data to it. This data also enables the hacker to install malware on the bridge – which is in turn connected to the target business or home network.
But it appears that once again, the bulbs themselves may still be vulnerable to hacks. When that flying drone set off a miniature IoT virus in 2016, companies found a way to solve for that worst-case scenario by restricting those bulb-to-bulb hops, writes Check Point. But “due to design limitations”, the bulb’s vulnerability remained, leading to the new hack — and perhaps other yet-to-be-discovered hacks in our future, as long as these bulbs remain in service. Leaving these bulbs vulnerable might be more dangerous than simply letting a hacker flick on and off your lights at will.
And though Check Point hasn’t necessarily tested other brands yet, its researchers claim this vulnerability may not be limited to Philips Hue bulbs and hubs. It’s in the Zigbee communications protocol used by loads of smart home brands, including Amazon’s Ring, Samsung SmartThings, Ikea Tradfri, Belkin’s WeMo, as well as Yale locks, Honeywell thermostats, and Comcast’s Xfinity Home alarm system.
It’s going to be interesting to see how many of the devices homeowners and businesses have purchased — ones they presumably expect to last for years — might open them up to security vulnerabilities years down the road. And we’re still wondering when the next massive IoT botnet built from insecure gadgets might rear its ugly head, as well.
:format(webp):no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/16016751/akrales_190404_3345_0221.jpg)
