Archive for November 2013

Viber stickers

Messaging app Viber updates version, launches premium stickers for sale

Posted on November 12, 2013 by

 

This press release has been published without editing

Mumbai, India, November 12, 2013: Viber announces today the release of version 4.0 of its platform on iPhone and Android. This is an important update to the platform since it brings two, new core features including a brand new Sticker Market with many new stickers available for free and for purchase, and a new Push To Talk feature for instant voice messaging. The release also provides support for Android tablets, taking advantage of the new form factor.

Additionally, this is the first release in which Viber will introduce a monetization feature to its millions of users. “This version of Viber is all about expressing yourself in more fun, exciting ways. Our new Sticker Market offers over 1000 unique, fun, expressive characters, many of which were designed specifically for our users in Asia,” said Talmon Marco, CEO of Viber. “Also, we are the first of the major messaging services to add Live Push To Talk, streamed instantly between users. No sending, no waiting.”

Viber Sticker Market – More Stickers And More Fun

Viber users love the multiple stickers they can share with other users of the platform. With the release of the Viber Sticker Market, users can access an even larger selection of fun and playful stickers. Additionally, the market will feature exclusive content tied into timely events and holidays throughout the year and will be regularly updated with new content to make messaging relevant and more personal. Viber users have reacted enthusiastically to the stickers the company has already released, including Viber’s signature character – Violet. As part of today’s release, the company unveiled Mayo and Blu, two new featured characters, as well as many more new personalities that expand the cast of playful stickers Viber users can share with their friends.

Push To Talk (Instant Voice Messaging)

Communicate For Free, Instantly Viber users’ favorite contacts are just a tap away with the introduction of Push To Talk, an instant form of communication that lets Viber users send short voice messages to each other.

Viber’s Push To Talk is significantly better than that of other messaging apps. Typically, Push To Talk is a four-step process – record, send, download, play. Viber does all four at the same time. This way, the average response time to a 15 second message is 4-6 seconds, rather than 45-60 seconds.

“This is the most exciting release we’ve had for Viber since we launched the platform. Today’s updated version brings a vast new range of features and functionality to Viber,” said Talmon Marco. “Viber has always aimed to provide a complete communications experience. With the new features we’ve brought to the platform, Viber lets users connect and stay connected in more ways than ever.”

Upgrades And Enhancements From Top-To-Bottom

In addition to the major new features, Viber 4.0 is packed with upgrades, enhancements and new features that take the platform to a whole new level. New features include:

• Message forwarding to any group or contact

• Choose new conversation backgrounds from a custom background gallery

• Group conversations with up to 100 participants

Viber on Android, Now Optimized for Tablets

Version 4.0 of Viber includes several new features available only on Android. Top amongst these is support for Android tablets. The new version of Viber has been designed to take advantage of the tablet form factor and users can now enjoy Viber on an unlimited number of Android tablets in addition to their smartphone. Viber’s support of Android tablets is similar to that of desktops, bringing the user’s mobile contacts to the tablet and providing full synchronization with messages and calls on the other devices. Other Android specific enhancements include:

• Improved notifications for Android 4.0 and up

• Light Up Screen setting for incoming messages

• Use Viber messaging while on a Viber call

About Viber:

Viber is developed by Viber Media, a pioneering mobile messaging and VoIP company. Viber lets everyone in the world connect. Freely. Viber users can send free text messages, photo messages, voice messages, share locations anywhere in the world, and make free, HD-quality calls on iPhone®, Android phones and tablets,™ Windows Phone, Blackberry®, Windows®, Mac, Linux, Symbian, Nokia S40 and Bada devices over 3G/4G or WiFi connections. With more than 200 million users in 193 countries, Viber is constantly innovating by introducing new platforms and adding fun new features including stickers and emoticons.

 

 

 

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Carnegie Mellon researchers use inkblots to improve security of Online passwords

Posted on November 8, 2013 by

 

This press release has been published without editing

PITTSBURGH—Carnegie Mellon University computer scientists have developed a new password system that incorporates inkblots to provide an extra measure of protection when, as so often occurs, lists of passwords get stolen from websites.

inkbotThis new type of password, dubbed a GOTCHA (Generating panOptic Turing Tests to Tell Computers and Humans Apart), would be suitable for protecting high-value accounts, such as bank accounts, medical records and other sensitive information.

To create a GOTCHA, a user chooses a password and a computer then generates several random, multi-colored inkblots. The user describes each inkblot with a text phrase. These phrases are then stored in a random order along with the password. When the user returns to the site and signs in with the password, the inkblots are displayed again along with the list of descriptive phrases; the user then matches each phrase with the appropriate inkblot.

“These are puzzles that are easy for a human to solve, but hard for a computer to solve, even if it has the random bits used to generate the puzzle,” said Jeremiah Blocki, a Ph.D. student in computer science who developed GOTCHAs along with Manuel Blum, professor of computer science, and Anupam Datta, associate professor of computer science and electrical and computer engineering.

These puzzles would prove significant when security breaches of websites result in the loss of millions of user passwords – a common occurrence that has plagued such companies as LinkedIn, Sony and Gawker. These passwords are stored as cryptographic hash functions, in which passwords of any length are converted into strings of bits of uniform length. A thief can’t readily decipher these hashes, but can mount what’s called an automated offline dictionary attack. Computers today can evaluate as many as 250 million possible hash values every second, Blocki noted.

Given the continued popularity of easy passwords, such as “123456” or “password,” it’s not always difficult to crack these hashes. But even hard passwords are vulnerable to the latest brute force methods, Blocki said.

In the case of a GOTCHA, however, a computer program alone wouldn’t be enough to break into an account.

“To crack the user’s password offline, the adversary must simultaneously guess the user’s password and the answer to the corresponding puzzle,” Datta said. “A computer can’t do that alone. And if the computer must constantly interact with a human to solve the puzzle, it no longer can bring its brute force to bear to crack hashes.”

The researchers described GOTCHAs at the Association for Computing Machinery’s Workshop on Artificial Intelligence and Security in Berlin, Germany, Nov. 4.

Because the user’s descriptive phrases for inkblots are stored, users don’t have to memorize their descriptions, but have to be able to pick them out from a list. To see if people could do this reliably, the researchers performed a user study with 70 people hired through Mechanical Turk. First, each user was asked to describe 10 inkblots with creative titles, such as “evil clown” or “lady with poofy dress.” Ten days later, they were asked to match those titles with the inkblots. Of the 58 participants who participated in the second round of testing, one-third correctly matched all of the inkblots and more than two-thirds got half right.

Blocki said the design of the user study, including financial incentives that were too low, might account for the less-than-stellar performance. But he said there also are ways to make descriptions more memorable. One way would be to use more elaborate stories, such as “a happy guy on the ground protecting himself from ticklers.”

The researchers also have invited fellow security researchers to apply artificial intelligence techniques to try to attack the GOTCHA password scheme. Their GOTCHA Challenge is online at http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~jblocki/GOTCHA-Challenge.html.

GOTCHAs sound much like CAPTCHAs, the scrambled-letter puzzles that Blum and his CMU colleagues created to protect websites from rogue automated programs. Like GOTCHAs, the widely used CAPTCHAs rely on people having visual skills that are superior to those of computers. But the researchers emphasized that GOTCHAs don’t do the same task and are not an alternative to CAPTCHAs.

This research was supported by the National Science Foundation and the Air Force Office of Scientific Research.

Follow the School of Computer Science on Twitter @SCSatCMU.

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