Innholdsfortegnelse for January 2018 i Macworld UK

In November, a macOS 10.13.1 security issue was revealed – a flaw that allows root access to a Mac without the need for a password. Developer Lemi Orhan Ergin tweeted that anyone can log into a Mac by entering the user name root without a password. The first time you try to login, it won’t work. But if you try it again, you will be granted access. Here’s Ergin’s tweet: Dear @AppleSupport, we noticed a HUGE security issue at macOS High Sierra. Anyone can login as “root” with empty password after clicking on login button several times. Are you aware of it @Apple? As Apple’s support document notes, root is a ‘superuser’ that grants access to areas of the system that are often used by system administrators. At Macworld, we…

Maintaining privacy and keeping data secure are hugely important. Yet many of us give it scant attention and do little more than the bare minimum, if anything at all to ensure that hackers, opportunists and, yes, even the authorities are able to access as little of our personal data as possible. Yet, macOS makes securing your data very simple, thanks to a host of tools in System Preferences and Safari, and third-party apps. There are two places threats to your data are likely to come from: over a network like the internet, or from someone with direct access to your Mac. Taking steps to protect yourself will minimize both. One thing we’d normally recommend when it comes to Mac security is to make sure the macOS software is up-to-date, however,…

WHY PHOTO COUNTS MIGHT DIFFER BETWEEN PHOTOS IN IOS, MACOS, AND ICLOUD.COM Computers are supposed to be good at counting, right? So why do the numbers sometimes not add up for photos? Macworld reader Jeffrey asks a question that’s similar to ones asked by others: The photo count between my Mac and my iPhone are not the same. I use iTunes syncing along with My Photo Stream to keep the devices identical. Something has gone amiss. I don’t have any idea how to troubleshoot the image counts since iTunes is supposed to be syncing the images. How might I determine if a problem really exists, and if so, how do I fix it? There are long-running discussions on Apple’s forums about iTunes syncing not matching up numbers in…

The dividing lines between Apple products are clear. Apple makes phones and tablets that run iOS, and laptops and desktop computers than run macOS. But it’s time for Apple to start breaking down those barriers and experimenting with new kinds of products that cross the streams. It’s time for Apple to expand beyond the MacBook and MacBook Pro. It’s time for the first iOS laptop. Consider the iPad Pro. With screens that measure 10.5 and 12.9 inches diagonally, they’re practically the size of Apple’s old MacBook Air models. The iPad Pro was the first iOS to ship with an Apple-designed keyboard, the Smart Keyboard. When the Smart Keyboard is engaged, at a glance the iPad Pro already looks like a strange laptop. The problem with the iPad Pro is that…

Here’s one Apple product you won’t find under the tree this year: HomePod. While Apple had originally planned to release its HomePod smart speaker in December, it has now announced that it will be pushed back until early 2018. In a statement to Macworld, Apple said, “We can’t wait for people to experience HomePod, Apple’s breakthrough wireless speaker for the home, but we need a little more time before it’s ready for our customers. We’ll start shipping in the US, UK and Australia in early 2018.” HomePod might not quite have the appeal of iPhone X, Apple Watch Series 3, or even Apple TV 4K, but it’s still an important product in Apple’s catalogue. It’s more important, however, to get it right. We’ve already seen Google deal with issues related…

When Apple comes to mind, it probably conjures images of slick, carefully engineered devices with innovative, envelope-pushing features. And the company’s surely had more than its fair share of those, but it’s also managed to pull off a subtler but far greater feat that goes under appreciated. The company has not only figured out how to make us eat our vegetables – technologically speaking – but it’s also turned those very features into selling points. Because it’s one thing to sell a flashy, shiny device; it’s quite another to get people excited about the mundane necessities of the technology world. Baby got backups In autumn 2007, I’d only recently started working at Macworld, and I was assigned to cover what was the biggest of big deals in those days: the…

Computer security is a major concern for consumers of late, following the WannaCry ransomware attack that hit huge organizations including the NHS earlier this year, and Petya, a second big ransomware attack. The good news is that if you take steps to keep your machine patched and up to date and install a good security software product you have nothing to worry about. If you’ve got a Mac and are wondering whether you need an antivirus, and which Mac antivirus you should choose, you’ve come to the right place. Here, we reveal the best AV programs for macOS. How we test We use AV-Test.org’s own testing data to ascertain the effectiveness of each antivirus when it comes to preventing malware from infecting your Mac. But security is only half the…

Apple’s cloud services (iTunes, iCloud, and so on) require you to create an Apple ID, which is essentially your key to access. Each person using Apple’s services should have a unique Apple ID, but sometimes people share IDs for convenience. That could led to some issues, however. For example, if an Apple ID is being shared by a couple, it can create a problem if the couple breaks up. A reader writes in with such a story: My partner and I broke up. We shared the same iTunes account. Everything downloaded on one phone appears on the other. How do I stop this? While the question is about iTunes, an iTunes account is a form of Apple ID: you can use it just for purchasing, or with iCloud for calendar,…

Normally, It’s that time of year, and chances are good that your next few weeks will be packed with spending time and money on gifts for loved ones. But while that’s all well and good, you should also gift yourself something to keep yourself entertained. This month, we’ve a nice variety of options, including the seriously slick racing simulation Dirt Rally, the newly free-to-play version of Blizzard’s brilliant StarCraft II, an expanded edition of Hitman, and plenty more. 1. Dirt Rally Price: £39.99 from Steam (fave.co/2BAiizc) Codemasters’ previous Dirt off-road racing games skirted the line between hardcore and accessible, presenting rally racing amidst other types of events and keeping the challenge fairly approachable. But Dirt Rally delivers arguably the most realistic rally racing game experience to date. And now you…

Wi-Fi hotpots: as convenient as they are, they can be very annoying, as well. Especially when you’re using a Mac or iPhone that’s trying to connect to a hotspot when you don’t want it to. Macworld reader Martin Joseph wants to ditch one company’s Wi-Fi hotspot in particular: I wonder if you can figure out a way to set a Mac to never ever connect to Xfinity Wi-Fi? It would be great to eliminate this in my iPhone, too. I have found that deleting it from the list of known networks isn’t the best choice, and I usually resort to leaving it, but at lowest priority. Apple’s Wi-Fi network control in macOS became kind of primitive many releases ago, and then Apple made it worse, removing a few features that…