Apple’s Next Launch Event To Take Place On 14 September

For the past week or two, there have been rampant rumours claiming that Apple has planned to have a special launch event this month. True enough, the company has just officially announced the date for its next event.

According to the media invite as well as its US website, the event is scheduled to take place at 10:00 AM PDT on 14 September which is equivalent to 1:00 AM Malaysia time on 15 September. This round of Apple’s special event will once again take place virtually as the threat of COVID-19 is still at large throughout the world.

Greg Joswiak, the company’s Senior Vice President of Worldwide Marketing tweeted a short clip to mark the occasion. The clip is essentially a demonstration of the AR feature that you can activate through your iPhone and iPad by tapping the glowing Apple logo on the event section of Apple US website.

It is really hard to guess what Apple is trying to hint through the images and AR easter egg that accompanied today’s announcement. However, the “California streaming” tagline does remind us of a very famous song from the 1960s, California Dreamin’ which was made famous by The Mamas and The Papas.

At the moment, among new products that are expected to be revealed at the upcoming event includes iPhone 13 (or iPhone 12s, depending on who you ask), Apple Watch Series 7, and next-generation AirPods. Expect to hear more rumours as they make their way into the Internet, now that there is only one week to go before the event takes place.

Old CS:GO Vulnerability Allows Hackers To Take Control Of Your PC

A group of white hat hackers known as the Secret Club recently took to Twitter to point out what seems to be a critical security flaw, found within Source 3D, the game engine of Valve’s popular Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO).

According to the group, the bug can be exploited by less-than-savoury hackers to trick gamers who play the game, by sending them a fake Steam invite. Upon accepting the invite, the hackers can then proceed to take over a user’s PC or laptop, effectively locking them out of their machine.

While the existence of the bug is troubling, it isn’t the most alarming aspect of it. Secret Club says that the exploit was reported by one of its members, Florian, back in 2019. Florian said that they had reported the bug to Valve via HackerOne, a bug bounty platform used by the studio that owns Steam. Florian was paid the bounty for its discovery but as per the report, the bug is still there. And it seems that little or next-to-nothing has been done about it.

To that end, the Secret Club accuses Valve of ignoring the problem outright, even after a more recent report this month was filed once more. At the time of writing, Valve still has not commented on the matter.

Apple WWDC Event To Take Place Virtually From 7 To 11 June 2021

Apple has announced that it will hold its annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) from 7 until 11 June 2021. Much like last year, the event will be an online-only virtual keynote due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. 

Unlike the company’s usual events that we’re accustomed to, WWDC usually covers Apple’s upcoming software offerings for the year.  These include updates and new features that are inbound to its iOS, iPadOS, macOS, tvOS and watchOS platforms. The Cupertino-based tech firm did not disclose what are the highlights to be expected from the event, but noted that it will be “the biggest and best yet.” 

New hardware announcements during a WWDC keynote are rare but not unheard of. Apple cunningly snuck in reveals of updated iMac and iPad Pro models in WWDC 2017, the then-new Mac Pro in 2019, and announced its Mac line-up transition to Apple Silicon chips in 2020.

On that regard, there have been plenty of rumours suggesting new Apple hardware that are planned to be unveiled this year. These range from redesigned iPad mini and MacBook Pro, a VR/AR/mixed reality headset, to the ever elusive Air Tags. Most of which were tipped to be revealed during a supposed “surprise” keynote on 23 March, which never happened.

As to whether Apple will announce a new piece of hardware remains to be seen. Regardless, we’ll eventually find out when WWDC 2021 kicks off in another two months time.