Pre-production concept art from the film...

I really thought Hollywood was scraping the bottom of the barrel when it announced a movie based on the tabletop game Battleship a few years ago. Then that film went on to make over $300 million internationally, seemingly proving there is no gaming license dumb enough that it can't be turned into a successful big-budget blockbuster.

Thus, the recent news that Warner Bros. has apparently purchased the film rights to Space Invaders is somehow unsurprising. Never mind that the 1978 arcade classic is not exactly known for its deep plot or rich character development or that the concept of aliens invading Earth from space is not exactly a brilliant new film concept that requires a video game license. No, this business deal is obviously more about trying to hit the nostalgia-zone of the 40- and 50-somethings who remember wasting endless quarters on the game in their youth and hopefully translating those warm memories to box office sales.

The Wrap reports that heavy-hitter producers Akiva Goldsmith (Winter's Tale), Joby Harold (Edge of Tomorrow), and Tory Tunnell (Awake) are already attached to the project, which might increase its chances of actually reaching theaters at some point. Then again, films based on classic gaming franchises seem to have a habit of getting caught in development hell indefinitely; there's no hint of progress on previously announced Asteroids and Spy Hunter film adaptations, not to mention the J.J. Abrams Portal and Half-Life film project plans that seem to have been immediately pushed aside for more Star Wars.

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Zdziarski

Apple has endowed iPhones with undocumented functions that allow unauthorized people in privileged positions to wirelessly connect and harvest pictures, text messages, and other sensitive data without entering a password or PIN, a forensic scientist warned over the weekend.

Jonathan Zdziarski, an iOS jailbreaker and forensic expert, told attendees of the Hope X conference that he can't be sure Apple engineers enabled the mechanisms with the intention of accommodating surveillance by the National Security Agency and law enforcement groups. Still, he said some of the services serve little or no purpose other than to make huge amounts of data available to anyone who has access to a computer, alarm clock, or other device that has ever been paired with a targeted device.

Zdziarski said the service that raises the most concern is known as com.apple.mobile.file_relay. It dishes out a staggering amount of data—including account data for e-mail, Twitter, iCloud, and other services, a full copy of the address book including deleted entries, the user cache folder, logs of geographic positions, and a complete dump of the user photo album—all without requiring a backup password to be entered. He said two other services dubbed com.apple.pcapd and com.apple.mobile.house_arrest may have legitimate uses for app developers or support people but can also be used to spy on users by government agencies or even jilted ex-lovers. The Pcapd service, for instance, allows people to wirelessly monitor all network traffic traveling into and out of the device, even when it's not running in a special developer or support mode. House_arrest, meanwhile, allows the copying of sensitive files and documents from Twitter, Facebook, and many other applications.

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Civilian drones are being tested across Africa's game reserves in a hi-tech battle with poachers threatening the continent's wildlife tourism industry.

Civilian drones are being tested across Africa's game reserves in a hi-tech battle with poachers threatening the continent's wildlife tourism industry.

No matter how much I love Plex, there's still nothing that comes close to XBMC for usability when it comes to watching your network media on a television. I've probably written a dozen articles on Plex during the last few years, so you know that's tough for me to admit. more>>

A comparison of the graphical differences between the PS3 and PS4 versions of the Destiny beta.

Console gamers are used to being unable to play online against others on competing platforms, thanks more to business arrangements than any underlying technical issues. But with Bungie's MMO shooter Destiny launching across two overlapping console generations, one might think that PlayStation 4 users could expect to be able to play against their friends using the PlayStation 3 through the PlayStation Network (or across the Xbox One/Xbox 360 divide using Xbox Live).

Even that kind of cross-platform play is not available in Destiny, though, a state of affairs that Bungie attributes to a sense of fair play across different gameplay resolutions.

“I’ll speak for the hypothetical player. I have a disadvantage sniping across the map because [my opponent with a next-gen console] is only two pixels on my screen and I’m four pixels on his," Bungie engineer Roger Wolfson told Digital Trends. "You see that in the world of PC gaming, where people are always racing to the best video card to give themselves the advantage."

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Verizon has boosted FiOS upload speeds to make them match download speeds, the company announced today. Both existing customers and new subscribers will get the speed upgrade. The increase is "free to current customers," Verizon said.

For example, the 15/5Mbps tier (15Mbps downstream and 5Mbps upstream) will now be 15Mbps in both directions. Other tiers before the upgrade were 50/25, 75/35, 150/65, 300/65, and 500/100. In all cases, the second number will be increased to match the first.

Additionally, a new 25/25 tier will be the entry level package for new customers, starting at $64.99 a month standalone, the "same pricing as current levels for 15/5," a Verizon spokesperson told Ars.

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Western Digital launched the first NAS-specific 6 TB drive today. In expanding their Red portfolio, they have brought 6 TB drives suitable for 24x7 operation into the hands of home consumers. Some enterprise-specific 6 TB drives have been around since late last year. Today's introduction provides us an opportunity to see how the WD Red compares against those offerings. Read on for our evaluation of the currently available 6 TB drives suitable for NAS units.

Back in July 2012, Western Digital began the trend of hard drive manufacturers bringing out dedicated units for the burgeoning NAS market with the 3.5" Red hard drive lineup. They specifically catered to units having 1-5 bays. The firmware was tuned for 24x7 operation in SOHO and consumer NAS units. 1 TB, 2 TB and 3 TB versions were made available at launch. Later, Seagate also jumped into the fray with a hard drive series carrying similar firmware features. Their differentiating aspect was the availability of a 4 TB version. Western Digital responded in September 2013 with their own 4 TB version (as well as a 2.5" lineup in capacities up to 1 TB).

Today, Western Digital is making updates to their Red lineup for the third straight year in a row. The Red lineup gets the following updates:

• New capacities (5 TB and 6 TB versions)
• New firmware (NASware 3.0)
• Official sanction for use in 1-8 bay tower form factor NAS units

In addition, a new category is also being introduced, the Red Pro. Available in 2 - 4 TB capacities, this is targeted towards rackmount units with 8 - 16 bays (though nothing precludes it from use in tower form factor units with lower number of bays).

WD Red Updates

Even though 6 TB drives have been around (HGST introduced the Helium drives last November, while Seagate has been shipping Enterprise Capacity and Desktop HDD 6 TB versions for a few months now), Western Digital is the first to claim a NAS-specific 6 TB drive. The updated firmware (NASware 3.0) puts in some features related to vibration compensation, which allows the Red drives to now be used in 1 - 8 bay desktop NAS systems (earlier versions were officially sanctioned only for 1 - 5 bay units). NASware 3.0 also has some new features to help with data integrity protection in case of power loss. The unfortunate aspect here is that units with NASware 2.0 can't be upgraded to NASware 3.0 (since NASware 3.0 requires some recalibration of internal components that can only be done in the factory).

The 6 TB version of the WD Red has 5 platters, which makes it the first drive we have seen to have an areal density of more than 1 TB/platter (1.2 TB/platter in this case). This areal density increase is achieved using the plain old Perpendicular Magnetic Recording (PMR) technology. Western Digital has not yet found reason to move to any of the new technologies such as SMR (Shingled Magnetic Recording), HAMR (Heat-assisted Magnetic Recording) or Helium-filling for the WD Red lineup.The 5 TB and 6 TB versions also have WD's StableTrac technology (securing of the motor shaft at both ends in order to minimize vibration). As usual, the drive comes with a 3 year warranty. Other aspects such as the rotation speed, buffer capacity and qualification process remain the same as that of the previous generation units.

WD Red Pro

The Red Pro targets medium and large business NAS systems which require more performance by moving to a rotation speed of 7200 rpm. Like the enterprise drives, the Red Pro comes with hardware-assisted vibration compensation, undergoes extended thermal burn-in testing and carries a 5-year warranty. 2, 3 and 4 TB versions are available, with the 4 TB version being a five platter design (800 GB/platter).

The WD Green drives are also getting a capacity boost to 5 TB and 6 TB. WD also specifically mentioned that their in-house NAS and DAS units (My Cloud EX2 / EX4, My Book Duo etc.) are also getting new models with these higher capacity drives pre-installed. The MSRPs for the newly introduced drives are provided below

WD Red Lineup 2014 Updates - Manufacturer Suggested Retail Prices Model Model Number Price (USD) WD Red - 5 TB WD50EFRX $249 WD Red - 6 TB WD60EFRX $299 WD Red Pro - 2 TB WD2001FFSX $159 WD Red Pro - 3 TB WD3001FFSX $199 WD Red Pro - 4 TB WD4001FFSX $259

We do have review units of both the 6 TB WD Red and the 4 TB WD Red Pro. Look out for the hands-on coverage in the reviews section over the next couple of weeks.

 

Fergal Keane reports from Donetsk in eastern Ukraine where heavy fighting has been heard and "people are panicking".

Paul Adams reports from the almost deserted streets of Sha'af in Gaza where rockets are "coming in all the time".

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A BBC reporter at the site of the MH17 crash was handed passengers' documents, as fears mount that vital evidence will be lost.

Isis Sunni militants gave Christians an ultimatum: convert to Islam or face death.

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At least 50 people have been killed in fighting at Tripoli airport since it began a week ago, according to the health ministry.

Continuity changes how your iPhones, iPads, and Macs interact with one another. Let's look at the technology underneath all these features. Apple

Apple wants you to buy Apple devices. It insists, mostly successfully, that computers, tablets, and phones are fully separate product categories with separate use cases and that “you should be able to use the right device for the moment.” The company brags on its earnings calls that first-time iPhone buyers are more likely to pick up additional Apple devices in the future. It’s selling a vision in which everything works best if you own an iPhone and an iPad and a Mac rather than mixing and matching.

If you subscribe to Apple’s philosophy, iOS 8 and OS X Yosemite will reward your faith. While iOS and OS X have shared certain services and features since 2011 or so, this year’s releases will take that interoperability to the next level under the “Continuity” banner.

Yes, for those of us who prefer to live in between ecosystems, Continuity takes today’s vendor lock-in problems and makes them even worse. For the large number of people who own and use multiple Apple products, though, it promises to make your devices work together in ways beyond simple data synchronization.

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The BBC has been shown pictures filmed by pro-Russian rebels at the scene of the MH17 crash immediately after the plane came down.

Israel and Gaza have both suffered their bloodiest day since the beginning of the current offensive, with the death of 13 Israeli soldiers and at least 87 Gazans.

Gaza has suffered the highest death toll since the offensive by Israel began, with at least 87 people reported killed on Sunday.