🛰️ iPhone 14’s Emergency SOS Service: Apple Cuts Users Off After 2 Years Free
At its “Far Out” event on Wednesday, Apple announced a new safety feature for the iPhone 14 — Emergency SOS via satellite. When you are outside of cell phone service or don’t have reception, your iPhone will be able to send messages via satellite that will be routed to emergency responders.
Emergency SOS service for iPhone 14 will be available in Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, but it will not be available at launch in Guam or American Samoa. Foreign travelers will be able to use the Emergency SOS service when visiting the US and Canada, unless they bought their iPhone 14 in China, Hong Kong or Macao.
Anyone who purchases an iPhone 14, iPhone 14 Plus, iPhone 14 Pro or iPhone 14 Pro Max will receive the two free years of service. It’s not clear yet how long the offer of two free years of service will last, but Apple’s press releases indicate that, at least for now, all iPhone 14 owners will get two free years of Emergency SOS services after the purchase of their iPhones. (CNET)
Feds’ New Cybersecurity Recommendations Target Hardware, OTA Updates for Cars
On Wednesday, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration published a set of best practices for automakers to follow when building new vehicles and the software stacks that underpin them. The document, which was first published in the Federal Register last year, is an update to the agency’s 2016 guidance and focuses heavily on interconnected vehicles and their respective safety systems.
Perhaps one of the most crucial areas that the NHTSA is focusing on involves vehicle sensors. The agency calls out sensor tampering as an emerging area of concern related to vehicle cybersecurity and notes that the potential to manipulate sensor data could result in a risk to safety-critical systems. The areas that the NHTSA calls for automakers to protect against are Lidar and radar jamming, GPS spoofing, road sign modification, camera blinding, and the excitation of machine learning false positives.
Vehicles with over-the-air (OTA) update capabilities are also on the NHTSA’s radar. Specifically, the agency says that the automaker should maintain not just the integrity of crucial vehicle updates, but also the underlying servers that host the OTA updates, as well as the transmission mechanism between the vehicle and the servers, as well as the updating process that takes place on the vehicle. (The Drive)
Furniture excess contributes to landfill waste, students moving weigh cheap, eco-friendly alternatives
Many movers aren’t aware of the environmental impact their choice to throw out furniture has, with bulk items packing landfills. In Gainesville, a city with a frequent base of students moving in and out of furnished and unfurnished apartments, strategies like furniture recycling and thrifting have become popular options.  Â
Angela Cloonan, a 22-year-old UF entrepreneurship master’s student, is a member of the Buy Nothing Project. Several Buy Nothing Facebook pages in Gainesville are dedicated to different neighborhoods, and members can post gifts or asks. In the midst of the desperation to get their cars packed before moving out, students will choose not to sort through their belongings and dump everything, she said. For Cloonan, this is an indication people own too much in excess but don’t realize it until it’s too late.
Stores like Reuse Planet and the Habitat for Humanity ReStore thrive around the city. These stores divert hundreds of thousands of pounds of waste from landfills and nature corridors and provide cheaper alternatives to students, as well as low-income families. (Alligator.org)
eBay partners with clothing repair and resale company Reskinned
Online marketplace eBay has expanded its beloved clothing offering, after inking a deal with Reskinned, a company that specialises in repairing and reselling used branded clothing.
Announcing the tie-up this morning, eBay said it would connect the 20 million shoppers that browse its site with second-hand clothing items sold by Reskinned through a dedicated, online shopfront. It said the partnership would help shoppers make more sustainable choices whilst saving money, noting that items from Reskinned are generally priced around 40 per cent lower than their high street price.
“Pairing eBay’s reach to conscious customers, with Reskinned’s expertise in garment repair, resale and recycling will help extend the lifecycle of products, reduce waste and showcase the variety of routes into a kinder way to shop for the shopper’s wallet and the planet,” said Jemma Tadd, head of fashion at eBay.
Reskinned takes back worn items from shoppers from more than 30 brands – including Finisterre, Sweaty Betty, River Island, and Joules – and then reconditions them for resale, repurposing, or recycling.
eBay said consumers were increasingly looking for ways to save money and reduce the environmental impact of their shopping habits, noting that it had sold one pre-loved fashion sale every second during 2022. (Business Green)