Rains County Leader (Emory, Tex.), Vol. 129, No. 33, Ed. 1 Tuesday, February 2, 2016 Page: 3 of 12
twelve pages : ill.View a full description of this newspaper.
Extracted Text
The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
MY TAKE ON TECH
Smartphone App Permissions
By JOHN KELLY, CISSP
AE,)a
a
By Jim Miller
Tough, experienced leader devoted to community& family
Republican Candidate for the 354th Judicial District Court
• Currently serves as Hunt County’s First Assistant District Attorney
• Only candidate who has never represented criminals in the courts
T
I
•IEIITHHII•
O
District Court.
KE COUNTRY SYMPHONIC BAND
2016 Season Tickets are ON SALE now!
3
d
-
G
keliaiken.com
Political advertisement paid for by Keli Aiken, who complies with the Judicial Campaign Fairness Act. Political advertisement paid for by the Keli Aiken Campaign, Joey Aiken, Treasurer, 602 Angela Lane, Greenville, TX 75402.
SAVVY SENIOR
How to keep track of an elderly parent
STATE CAPITAL HIGHLIGHTS
TxDOT awaits go-ahead signal for projects
Serving the residents of Hunt County is my life’s
work. My journey began with the District Attorney’s
office as a law student in 2003, and I’ve dedicated
my entire legal career as a prosecutor for our
community. As a passionate advocate for victims
rights and unrelenting prosecutor of criminals,
I want to use my unequalled experience to continue
serving the people of Hunt and Rains County by
becoming the next judge of the 354th Judicial
Tough on Criminals. Strong for Victims.
Keli Aiken is endorsed by Greenville Municipal Police
Association and Hunt County Sheriff Randy Meeks.
AUSTIN - On January 27, the Texas Depart-
ment of Transportation (TxDOT) reported that on
average, Texas drivers in five of the state’s largest
• Devoted over a decade of service to Hunt County as a Felony Prosecutor
and served as Special Prosecutor in Rains County
• Married to Joey Aiken, Greenville Brookshire’s store director, and mother
of Joseph and Andrew Aiken
• Practiced all areas of law heard by a District Court in Texas; including
criminal, civil, family and appeals
metropolitan areas lose about
52 hours and $1,200 annually
due to traffic congestion.
Upon approval by its over-
sight body, the Texas Trans-
portation Commission, TxDOT
plans to improve drive times
and reduce costs through what
it calls an accelerated $1.3 bil-
lion effort addressing gridlock
in some of the state’s most con-
Dear Savvy Senior,
Can you recommend some good home video
monitoring devices that can help my sister and
me keep an eye on our elderly mother? Over the
holidays, we noticed that her health has slipped
technology to be an invasion of privacy, while
others don’t mind and even welcome the idea.
With that said, here are some top monitoring
devices for keeping tabs on your mom.
Video Monitoring - As the technology has
improved and the costs have come down, video
monitoring/surveillance cameras have become
very popular for keeping an eye on your home,
business, child or pet (via smartphone, tablet or
computer), but they also work well for monitor-
ing an elderly loved one who lives alone.
Most home video monitoring cameras today
are sleek, small and easy to set up, but do require
home Wi-Fi.
Although camera capabilities will vary, the
best devices all provide wide-view angles, HD
quality video, night vision, built-in motion and
sound detection that can notify you when some-
thing is happening, and two-way audio that let’s
you talk and listen.
And, they also offer a video recording option
(for an extra fee) that saves past video to a cloud,
so you can rewind and review what you missed.
One of the best products available today that
It seems that finally some smartphone owners,
besides me, are getting concerned about protection
from cyber criminals. Those criminals run wild in
the various “app stores” that offer hundreds of thou-
sands of apps that are either free or inexpensive.
A number of reports in the recent past have
warned that there are a fairly significant number of
apps available in the various app stores for smart
phone products that in many cases harbor spyware
or malware. Those have definite malicious intent
but look innocent enough on the surface and we pay
little attention to them.
Cyber criminals have found that they don’t even
have to break into our smart phones to take advan-
tage of us because, to their delight, they are find-
ing that their malicious apps are often invited into
our phones. They are given a nice seat at the table,
something cool to drink and access to our most
sensitive information. How? By offering sneaky or
malicious apps in the various smart phone applica-
tion stores that we just cannot resist. On the surface
they look so innocent and harmless - but they are
not.
Free apps are especially lucrative for cyber
criminals because a free application that has a fairly
decent interface and function, can have millions or
even tens of millions of downloads. Examples of
very popularly downloaded apps are the so-called
“flashlight” apps that allow you to control your
smart phone’s camera-related LED light. It is used
typically for taking pictures or videos in low light
areas. When controlling that LED light using an app
downloaded, you more easily see that door lock at
night, or find where you dropped the keys between
the seats of your car, or many other uses for a
handy bright light in low-light environments.
Looking at those free “flashlight” apps in the
Google Play Store, for example, I saw that some
had millions of downloads. Based on the people I
know, I’m guessing that a huge plurality of smart
phones have a flashlight app that has been down-
loaded for free. Even if such an app is actually
ultimately malicious, on the surface it appears to be
harmless and actually does work. I’m certainly not
claiming that all flashlight apps are malware dis-
guised as a flashlight, but some organizations have
raised the red flag on many of the so-called inno-
cent apps found in app stores. Even spiritually-ori-
ented apps, such as Bible apps, may not be trusted.
In the past, I have passed on many apps that
were otherwise appealing because the permissions
requested seemed excessive and intrusive. Quite
frankly, I did not trust them at all to do the right
thing and not steal and pass personal data from my
phone to a server somewhere to be viewed, sold,
processed or used to steal my identity.
A flashlight app should not have access to phone
and email contacts, or be able to send SMS mes-
sages or even make phone calls. Some flashlight
apps go too far by demanding much more access to
data than seems reasonable.
I looked at a number of flashlight apps in the
app store to see which permissions were needed to
install or use the app. One of the popular flashlight
apps is very intrusive - suspiciously so. If I have
my GPS service running, it wants to know my exact
location. A flashlight app needs to know exactly
where I am to within a few feet? Seriously? That
makes no sense. Furthermore, it also wants to be
able to read, modify or delete anything on my SD
card (which is typically used to store things like
personal pictures, videos and personal documents).
Talk about intrusive potential for mischief or evil
deeds!
It also wants to be able to take pictures or videos
(smile!). I can see where it may need to control
the “flash” associated with the camera, but do I
want anything taking pictures or videos without
my knowledge or permission? It apparently can do
that according to the permissions list. And to top it
off, it wants to view Wi-Fi connections, read phone
status and identity, having full network access, it
could send pictures or videos, or anything on my
16GB SD card, to some server somewhere for who-
knows-what purpose - all of this for a flashlight
application? Are they serious? Do they have no
shame?
We take non-trivial risks by installing apps with-
out checking very carefully to make sure the per-
missions pass the “smell test” of whether they seem
reasonable or not. I don’t care what anyone says,
a flashlight app should not be accessing all my SD
card data, or my contact list, or my emails. Period.
The fact is that when you install any apps, you
are actually agreeing that they can do pretty much
anything they state in the permissions list associated
with that app. In too many cases an app may, as
part of the “price” you pay for it being free, retrieve
and send to a remote server things from your phone
that you never intended for that app to share with
unknown people for unknown reasons, which may
or may not be legitimate.
There is some good news though. The recently
released Android “Marshmallow” version (6.0) has
a few new features that help consumers get better
information about their apps, and a bit better con-
trol over them. I think we need more control, and
the latest version of Android appears to be moving
in the right direction in that.
I also want the app stores to have filters so that
I can filter the permissions I absolutely don’t want
to grant an app. For example, let’s say I want a
scientific calculator app, but don’t want one that
accesses my camera, microphone or SD card. But
it’s ok if the microphone is used only when the app
is in the foreground so you can work the calculator
by voice. I would use filtering to eliminate the apps
from consideration that I simply don’t trust due to
permission issues I see.
Smartphone security is getting a bit better with
each release. Let’s work on cleaning up the app
stores, and allow filters to control which apps we
see based on what permissions we are willing to
give to apps we are looking for. That would be a
huge improvement in how the app stores worked, in
my opinion.
UKE^DUNTRYPLAYHaUSEE
‘€
hi J
2 4
A
“Marches, Movies, Musicals and More March 20 * “Eanmed Band in M Imola" Juno 5
"YUu Askod For it October 9 • -Fostive Favorites" Decomber 16
LONE^STAR
L 0 YE' \POTiaN
’ 5 s
Division, in response to the federal government’s
acknowledgement that a family of seven Syr-
ian refugees had arrived in Texas on January 22
without state authorities being officially informed
in compliance with a December 7 court order
requiring such notification.
The state agency contends that because the
group of refugees “presumably includes a mili-
tary-aged male,” the state’s security has been
harmed, and at a minimum, “Texas is entitled
to see the person-specific information related to
Syrian refugees the Defendants intend to resettle
to Texas.”
Disaster assistance sought
On January 26, Gov. Greg Abbott declared a
state of disaster and requested individual assis-
tance for Collin, Dallas, Ellis, Franklin, Rockwall
and Van Zandt Counties. Abbott also requested
public assistance for Bailey, Castro, Childress,
Cochran, Dallas, Deaf Smith, Dickens, Ellis,
Hall, Hardeman, Harrison, Henderson, Hopkins,
Kaufman, Kent, King, Lamb, Lubbock, Navarro,
Parmer, Rains, Red River, Rockwall, Titus and
Van Zandt counties.
The declaration comes after preliminary dam-
age assessments were finalized and federal dec-
laration criteria were met. If President Obama
grants Abbott’s request, affected citizens in
those counties may apply for federal individual
assistance grants of up to $33,000 and low-inter-
est disaster loans from the U.S. Small Business
Administration.
In addition to the counties included in the
presidential disaster declaration request, Abbott
added Hockley, Liberty, Terry and Wichita coun-
ties to the state disaster declaration issued on
December 27. “Public Assistance” grants can be
for emergency work (debris removal and emer-
gency protective measures) and permanent work
on roads and bridges, water control facilities,
buildings and equipment, utilities, parks, recre-
ational facilities and other items.
“The severe weather that swept through Texas
last December devastated many homes, busi-
nesses and lives,” Abbott said. “A disaster decla-
ration will provide Texans the resources needed
to begin rebuilding after this tragedy.”
Registration deadline passes
February 1 was the deadline to register to vote
in Texas’ March 1 Primary Election and the May
26 primary runoff election.
Those whose registration was completed on
time are free to vote in either the Republican or
Democratic Primary, but not both. Early voting
begins February 16 and continues through Febru-
ary 26.
The deadline to request a ballot by mail is
February 19.
gested areas.
“The major metro areas of Texas - Austin,
Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston and San Antonio
- represent more than two-thirds of the state’s
population and 97 percent of the state’s most
congested roads,” said Texas Transportation
Commissioner J. Bruce Bugg Jr.
“These areas see some of the worst conges-
tion in the nation. We’ve just completed a listen-
ing tour in these major areas and have gathered
valuable local input from transportation lead-
ers regarding their priorities and where we can
quickly address some needs. This is the initial
phase of a new statewide plan to address conges-
tion,” he said.
If adopted, those metro area projects will
begin construction to enhance existing efforts
and address gridlock on the state highway sys-
tem. The projects, which add up to more than 42
miles, include interchanges, flyovers and conges-
tion relief efforts at some of the state’s worst
choke points. They will be funded using $1.3
billion made available through ending the use of
diversions of highway money by other agencies,
according to TxDOT.
“For years we’ve been committed to address-
ing congestion, and this year we’re getting a
jumpstart on that part of our core mission,” said
TxDOT Executive Director James Bass. “As the
severity of congestion in the Lone Star State con-
tinues to grow, we are committed to delivering
projects many Texans need and deserve to reduce
the amount of time they spend in traffic.”
The Texas Transportation Commission also
will consider another $800 million in additional
funding for connectivity and safety, maintenance,
repairs to the energy sector and border infrastruc-
ture funding. The commission is expected to vote
on all those projects when it considers the quar-
terly Unified Transportation Plan at its monthly
meeting on Feb. 25.
Resettlement prompts suit
On January 26, the Texas Health & Human
Services Commission filed suit in the U.S. Dis-
trict Court, Northern District of Texas, Dallas
0
— aS
fsi
AJINGLEJANGLE CHRISTMAS
nmenama•u- MezA4,nman
I
By Ed Sterling
TEXAS PRESS ASSOCIATION
a bit, and would like to keep
a closer eye on her.
Worried Daughters
Dear Worried,
There are a lot of great
video monitoring cameras
that can help families keep
a watchful eye on an elderly
parent from afar, but make
sure it’s okay with your mom
first. Many seniors find this
type of “I’m watching you”
does all this and more is the Nest Cam (nest,
com), which costs $199, but if you want their
video recording option, it’s an extra $100 per
year for a 10-day video history, or $300/year for
30 days.
Also check out the Piper NV (getpiper.com),
which - at $279 - is more expensive than the
Nest Cam but allows free Internet cloud storage.
And the Simplicam (simplicam.com), which is
the cheapest of the three but the video quality
isn’t quite as good. They charge $150 for the
camera, or $200 for the camera plus 24-hour
video storage for one year.
Sensor Monitoring - If your mom is uncom-
fortable with video monitoring, and doesn’t want
you to be able to peek in on her whenever you
want, another less invasive option to consider is a
“sensor” monitoring system.
These systems use small wireless sensors (not
cameras) placed in key areas of your mom’s
home that can detect changes in her activity pat-
terns, and will notify you via text message, email
or phone call if something out of the ordinary is
happening.
A great company that offers this technology is
Silver Mother (sen.se/silvermother), which pro-
vides small sensors that you attach to commonly
used household objects like her pillbox, refrigera-
tor door, TV remote, front door, etc.
So, for example, if your mom didn’t pick up
her pillbox to get her medicine or didn’t open
the refrigerator door to make breakfast like she
usually does, or if she left the house at a peculiar
time you would be notified and could check on
her. You can also check up on her anytime you
want online or through their mobile app. Silver
Mother costs $299 for four sensors, with no
ongoing monthly service fees.
Send your senior questions to: Savvy Senior, P.O. Box
5443, Norman, OK 73070, or visit SavvySenior.org. Jim
Miller is a contributor to the NBC Today show and author of
"The Savvy Senior” book.
aukbiFMAksn,
nuuemnwuuMMI- wuraz,_1,1421
g VOTE March 1,2016
L• Early Voting is February 16-26
ATf2g
KeliRiken
(.7
T' TL F
■ rm "MD 4 M A r
mcunuu-n,n:mME2
oes °
« "*
smpem
-
I V 'I
Mk - /
P) z
F* _
4
• • • ‘
eg
•c ■
Ae. Uk
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 2016 RamS COOHtfi Eoto
Upcoming Pages
Here’s what’s next.
Search Inside
This issue can be searched. Note: Results may vary based on the legibility of text within the document.
Tools / Downloads
Get a copy of this page or view the extracted text.
Citing and Sharing
Basic information for referencing this web page. We also provide extended guidance on usage rights, references, copying or embedding.
Reference the current page of this Newspaper.
Hill, Trey. Rains County Leader (Emory, Tex.), Vol. 129, No. 33, Ed. 1 Tuesday, February 2, 2016, newspaper, February 2, 2016; Emory, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1471046/m1/3/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Rains County Library.