Europe's new General Data Protection Regulation or GDPR has gone in effect, and it has some teeth as companies who fail to comply will face a fine of 4% of their annual income. Leo says that larger companies could face fines in the millions. Leo also says that companies have 72 hours to report all data breaches and give customers the right to have their data deleted upon request.
Google I/O kicks off a busy developer season this week. Followed by Microsoft's developer conference later this week, then Facebook's F8 and finishing up with Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference in June. Leo says that both Google and Microsoft will have a message on Progressive Web Apps. These are apps that will be web centric, with the idea that you can download pieces of the app that will operate off line, but with the rest of the work on a backend in the cloud. Leo says that it's no longer about the operating system.
April has been a bad month for self driving cars, as both a driver and pedestrian have died from accidents. Leo says that California is giving Google a permit for a self driving car called WayMo, which will have no safety driver. The irony isn't lost on Leo, and while he believes that self driving cars are better than human control, they're never going to be 100%. There's more testing that needs to be done and they should have a safety driver until the bugs are ironed out.
Now that pin numbers have been associated with credit cards via the chip, the major credit card companies have announced that effective today, they will no longer require a signature when using a credit card. Leo says that's not only not surprising, but merchants rarely check anyway. But those who do, can still require it for their own records.
In light of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg has continued apologizing for allowing user data breaches that violated people's privacy. The problem though, according to Leo, is that he's been apologizing for the same thing since college. He's really learned nothing.
News has come out the US Department of Homeland Security is compiling a list of press, influencers, and bloggers to just keep track of what they report in pertaining to National Security. Leo says that this is something that we should be vigilant in watching because it could be very easy to misuse such data.
With 1 in 5 wearable devices sold last quarter, the Apple Watch is the best selling wearable device. Leo says that in spite of Android Wear, Apple sold eight million in the last quarter, making the smartwatch war albeit over.
In a move that is causing concern with privacy advocates, Apple has announced it will store iCloud recovery keys in China. Leo says that it's really no different from what Apple does here, but it will make it easier for the Chinese government, or any government for that matter, to gain access to someone's data. Apple does protect your privacy from selling to advertisers, but if the government really pushes, Apple will cave to what they consider an "appropriate" law enforcement request.
Sending unsolicited text messages is bad form, and Facebook got caught using their 2 Factor Authentication database to send out ads and other notifications.
Facebook admitted their faux pas and apologized. Leo says that's become the modus operandi of Facebook: move fast and break things, then apologize. In other words, better to ask forgiveness than ask permission.
Leo says that the Space X Falcon Heavy rocket launch, with two boosters automatically landing afterwards, was a triumph of engineering (even though one crashed in the ocean). The fun part was using Elon Musk's Tesla Roadster as ballast with a mannequin dressed in a spacesuit, playing Bowie's Space Oddity on the stereo. What a great test, and the PR stunt of the century for Tesla, with hundreds of thousands watching the live stream of StarMan orbiting the earth before heading off to Mars.
