In the ongoing controversy over Apple’s refusal to unlock the San Bernardino suspect’s iPhone on behalf of FBI, today Apple’s General Counsel Bruce Sewell will appear before the House Judiciary Committee at a hearing titled “The Encryption Tightrope: Balancing Americans’ Security and Privacy,” as will FBI Director James Comey.

A live stream of the hearing (embedded above) will begin today at 9:30AM PT/12:30PM ET. more…

Filed under: AAPL Company Tagged: Apple, balancing americans’ security and privacy, Bruce Sewell, Congress, Encryption, hearing, James Comey, live stream, San Bernardino

If you have an iPhone issued by your employer, you might find both your dock and homescreen being populated by the apps your organization wants to make front and center. Developer Steve Stroughton-Smith noticed that iOS 9.3 gives organizations greater control over the way apps are presented on the iPhones they control.

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Filed under: Apps, iOS Tagged: dock, homescreen, iOS, iOS 9.3, iPhone, iPhone apps

The WSJ, which has seen an advance copy of a speech being made by Attorney General Loretta Lynch later today, says that while she strongly hints at being on the FBI’s side of the dispute, she will not directly say so. This somewhat surprising fact may reflect her audience – a cybersecurity conference whose delegates are likely to be on Apple’s side.

In her speech, Ms. Lynch won’t explicitly take on the encryption issue or Apple, but instead will promise continuing “frank dialogue and fruitful partnership” between the government and the industry on issues of cybersecurity.

Lynch’s remarks, though, do make it clear on which side her sympathies fall …

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Filed under: AAPL Company, iOS Devices

Let’s face it, a robot vacuum cleaner is fairly hi-tech, but these days we want more. Like the ability to start and stop cleaning cycles with our Apple Watch, and have it alert us the same way when it’s done.

Neato is the first robo-cleaner company to offer this facility with the latest update to the Botvac Connected …

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Filed under: Apple Watch Tagged: Botvac Connected, iRobot, Neato, robo-cleaners, robot cleaners, robot vacuum cleaners, Roomba, Roomba 980

Facebook’s Moments app, launched last summer, makes it easier to share photos with your friends by using both location data and face-recognition to identify which friends were with you when the photos were taken. The latest version of the app now lets you include videos too – but it can’t yet recognize faces in those, so you’ll have to add them manually.

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Filed under: Apps Tagged: Facebook, facebook moments, Moments

Sony told us back in November that it would be offering Remote Play on both Mac and PC, allowing PlayStation 4 owners to stream games to their Macs, but it didn’t give any clue as to when this would be available. It still hasn’t given a definite date, but today confirmed that it will be coming in the next major update, v3.50.

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Filed under: Apps Tagged: PlayStation, playstation 4, PlayStation 4 Remote Play, PlayStation 4 Remote Play Mac, PS4, PS4 Remote Play Mac, Sony

Reuters reports that both Republican and Democratic party members of the House Judiciary Committee support Apple’s view that Congress, not the courts, should decide the FBI case – and plan to file a legal brief to say so. The committee is responsible for overseeing the administration of justice within federal courts, and most of its members have a legal background.

Members of the House Judiciary Committee are considering filing a “friend of the court” brief in Apple’s encryption dispute with the U.S. government to argue that the case should be decided by Congress and not the courts, five sources familiar with the matter said […]

They said the brief would come from individual committee members of both Republican and Democratic parties but not the judiciary committee itself. Reuters could not determine which members were likely to be included … 

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Filed under: AAPL Company, iOS Devices Tagged: Apple Inc, FBI, Federal Bureau of Investigation, iPhone, San Bernardino, United States House Committee on the Judiciary

Corroborating a report from KGI analyst Ming-Chi Kuo from last September, Macotakara reports this evening that the iPhone 7 is expected to be 1mm thinner than the iPhone 6s. Furthermore, the report adds that the device will visually be similar to the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6s, retaining the same metal design with the same height and width, and will not be waterproof.

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Filed under: iOS Devices Tagged: Apple, iPhone 6s, iPhone 7, rumor

Throughout Apple’s fight with the FBI over unlocking an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino gunmen, many have doubted the likelihood that there’s anything valuable on the device to begin with. The iPhone 5c used by the gunman was issued by the County of San Bernardino, which gives iPhones to all of its employees. Now, the husband to a survivor of the fatal attacks has spoken out and written a letter, obtained by BuzzFeed, to the court explaining that there is likely nothing of note on the iPhone in question.

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Filed under: iOS Devices Tagged: Apple, Encryption, FBI

Google today has rolled out an update to Google Maps on iOS, bringing the app to version 4.16 and introducing a pair of new features. The update adds detour/pit stop support to the app, as well as adds support for 3D Touch on the iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus.

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Filed under: iOS Tagged: Apps, Google, Google Maps, iOS, update