Android market passes 10 billion downloads

[DoYouKubuntu]

Just read this article about Android's market passing 10 billion downloads and have to admit to feeling a bit smug after reading this paragraph:

More than 200 million Android smartphones and tablets have been sold and about 550,000 new Android activations take place each day, Google has said.

Late last year and early this year that number was 300,000. I hadn't seen a statistic recently but somehow assumed that the number had probably DROPPED since then. So imagine my surprise when I read that it's practically doubled.

OF COURSE I know that many [most?] Android users have no idea they're using Linux but, still, it's gratifying to see "my" OS leapfrogging over all others. I've been a staunch Linux supporter since its earliest days and right now, yeah, I'm feeling slightly smug.

[SteveRiley]

Re: Android market passes 10 billion downloads

Now we just need to get the damn banks to realize that running an out-of-date operating system on ATMs is a really bad idea.

[DoYouKubuntu]

Re: Android market passes 10 billion downloads

I never use ATMs, and now that I know they're likely running window$, I'm glad! (I use my debit card all the time, just not at ATMs.)

[SteveRiley]

Re: Android market passes 10 billion downloads

Favorite story from my conference speaking days...


A few years ago, a couple guys went to a surplus store and purchased a decommissioned ATM (the stand-alone kind). They gave it a spiffied up paint job and made some modifications to the software inside. Then they put the ATM in their pick-up truck, drove to a mall in another state, placed the ATM in a busy area, plugged the power cord into an electrical outlet, and departed.

People would approach the ATM and insert their card. The software would prompt for the PIN, then display the message "Please wait, contacting bank for authorization." As you can probably guess, the software would do nothing more than spin an empty do-while loop. Read what I wrote before: the guys plugged in only the power cord. There was no network connection! After a few seconds the machine would display an error message and return the card.

A couple weeks later the guys retrieved their machine. At the same surplus store they purchased several hundred blank magnetic cards. Using the stored data in the ATM, they programmed these cards with hundreds of card numbers and PINs. Returning to the other state, they embarked on a wild "withdraw spree," purloining hundreds of thousands of dollars from the bank accounts of their victims.

Back home one evening they went to a bar. They got drunk and began bragging about their exploit. Too bad for them: within earshot was an off-duty police officer. Busted!


To this day, I try to avoid free-standing ATMs whenever possible. It's a lot more difficult for a thief to construct a 40-story bank building and embed his spoofing machine into the concrete exterior wall

[DoYouKubuntu]

Re: Android market passes 10 billion downloads

I knew at this point, "People would approach the ATM and insert their card. The software would prompt for the PIN" where it was going!

Don't you love it when criminals just can't stop themselves from bragging about their exploits? I don't know how many times I've heard of people being caught for crimes that otherwise would've gone unsolved if they had just kept their big mouths shut.