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A Huawei executive was arrested in Poland; Anonymous hacker sentenced to 10 years in prison; Chinese retailers put iPhone on sale to clear stock.
It’s all the tech news that’s popular right now. Welcome to Hashtag Trending. It’s Monday, January 14th, and I’m your host, Tom Li.
Issues surrounding Huawei’s shaky security reputation are getting worse by the day. Trending everywhere, a Huawei executive was arrested for espionage in Poland on Tuesday. The Chinese sales director sold network gear to the Polish government and was an active member of the local business community. In addition, a Polish ex-security officer has also been arrested in connection with the case. Both are facing espionage charges and if convicted, could look at a 10-year prison sentence. Huawei says it’s aware of the situation and is looking into it, but provided no further comment.
Trending on Reddit, a Massachusetts hacker was sentenced to 10 years in prison for launching DDoS attacks against children’s hospitals in 2014. The attack was a part of #OpJustina, a campaign backed by the hacker group Anonymous. DDoS attacks, an acronym for denial of service attacks, overload servers with so much fake traffic that they render them inoperable. Due to his actions, the Boston Children’s Hospital was crippled for days. On top of his prison term, the 34-year-old Massachusetts resident was also ordered to pay $443,000 in damages.
Trending on Google, due to the iPhones dwindling popularity, retailers across China are putting the iPhone on sale to clear stock. The situation is a brew of the iPhone’s high-prices, value from Chinese phone competitors, and the lack of enticing features. Both online and physical retailers are cutting prices of the iPhone XR, XS, and XS Max by up to 20 per cent. Still, China represents one of Apple’s biggest markets, generating $11.4 billion dollars for the tech giant in Q4 2018 alone.
If you’re an IT pro interested in cloud security, don’t forget to attend the Jan. 17 Cloud Security Summit being held in downtown Toronto. ITWC’s own CIO Jim Love will be one of the many speakers. Admission is free and registration details can be found on the events page of www.ITWorldCanada.com.