Tech News 2Night 176 (Transcript)

[Top TN2 Animation ] Tonight! the Alibaba IPO broke records, huge lines for the new iPhones, and who is selling drugs on Instagram... Tech News 2Night is Next! [TWiT Open] [Main TN2 Open] This is Tech News 2Night Episode 176, for Friday September 19, 2014 This episode of Tech News 2Night is brought to you by NatureBox. NatureBox ships great-tasting, healthy snacks right to your door. Forget the vending machine, and start snacking smarter with healthy, delicious treats like Honey Dijon Pretzels! To get your free NatureBox sampler go to naturebox.com/twit. That’s naturebox.com/twit. I'm Jason Howell, Let's get right to the Tech Feed! Alibaba's big IPO was indeed big - the company closed on its first day of trading as a public company at $93.89, with a valuation of more than $231 billion. Bloomberg notes that it is now worth more than Facebook, which passed $200 billion in market value earlier this month, and is worth $201.6 billion as of today’s close. As for Alibaba's U.S.-based e-commerce rivals. Amazon is valued at about $153 billion, while EBay is worth $65 billion. Alibaba’s $21.8 billion sale was the biggest-ever IPO for a technology company. At an IPO price of $68 a share, Alibaba was valued at 29 times expected earnings for the year through March, and analysts forecast that Alibaba’s earnings will grow 50 percent in fiscal 2015 from the previous 12 months. / Apple's new iPhone 6 and 6 Plus officially went on sale today to predictably long store lines at Apple stores around the world. Apple CEO Tim Cook made an appearance at the company’s local Apple Store in Palo Alto, California, while Apple’s new SVP of Retail and Online Stores Angela Ahrendts oversaw the iPhones' launch to world's first customers in Sydney, Australia. Although the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus launched today in the U.S., Hong Kong, Japan and Australia, there is no release date set for China, which is the world’s biggest smartphone market. That creates opportunities for outside vendors with access to the supply chain big returns on marked up black market iPhone models. Bloomberg reports Beijing-based vendors are already offering two-day delivery of a 16-gigabyte iPhone 6 for 8,000 YOU-WAN ($1,303), and the 128-gigabyte iPhone 6 for delivery on Sept. 20 at the equivalent of about $2,441. That's a lot higher than the Hong Kong price of about $927. China's Xinhua News Agency said yesterday that iPhones have cleared just two of three regulatory steps necessary to be sold in the country, and still need network access licenses from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. / But enough about iPhones...it's Friday, let's talk about Android! The next generation of Google’s Android OS, the L-release, is due for release next month, and the company has announced it will encrypt data by default for the first time, meaning that encryption happens automatically for new Android devices, and only someone who enters a device's password will be able to see pictures, videos and other data stored on those smartphones. Google joins Apple with a new form of encryption that in many cases makes it impossible for law enforcement to collect evidence off the phones, even with the necessary search warrants. The newest Android devices will likely ship with default encryption after October. / One Bitcoin Ponzi scheme, down! A U.S. federal judge has ordered Bitcoin Savings and Trust and its owner to pay a combined $40.7 million after the Securities and Exchange Commission established that the company as a Ponzi scheme, using Bitcoins to sell investments. The SEC said Bitcoin Savings and Trust owner Trendon Shavers used the online handle "pirateat40" to raise over 732,000 bitcoin from February 2011 to August 2012, promising investors up to 7 percent in weekly interest to be paid based on his ability to trade the currency. Shavers and his company are now liable to give up $38.6 million of illegal profits plus $1.8 million in interest. Each defendant in the Texas case was also fined $150,000. / Later in the show, coming to a state trooper near you, a radar gun that detects texting drivers. And next I'll talk with Fletcher Babb from Venture Beat about why Instagram seems to be a haven for illegal drugs sales.. [AD] Drop the candy bar, drop the potato chips – they’re not good for you! Do what I do – get natural, delicious snacks at naturebox.com I’m going to give you the chance to get free snacks with a sampler box featuring five of their most popular snacks. NatureBox has hundreds of delicious snacks. I don’t feel guilty about eating them, because they’re better for me. They’ve got zero artificial ingredients, zero trans fats and zero high fructose corn syrup. You’ll even find snacks that are low in sugar and gluten free. So in the afternoon when you’re hungry, do what I do - grab Dark Cocoa Nom Noms from NatureBox. Or Tart Apple Mango Crispy Chews. Or Sea Salt Sun-Crunch. So good and so good for you! [[Offer/ Call to Action]] Start your free trial and get a free sampler box at naturebox.com/twit. Stay full. Stay strong. Start snacking smarter. Go to naturebox.com/twit. And we thank Nature Box for their support of Tech News 2Night" [Segment #2] Joining me now is Fletcher Babb, a contributor to VentureBeat. Selling illegal things on the internet or social media is not necessarily a new thing. Fletcher, you wrote a story today that detailed the selling and marketing of illegal drugs on Instagram. - So walk us through what's happening on Instagram and how these dealers are pulling this off. - Dealers are doing this out in the open. How exactly are they able to do this without being caught and are law enforcement doing anything about it? - Is there any way to know how many dealers are out there participating in this Instagram drug trade? - You mention in your piece that there is even a bit of self-regulation happening. Explain what's going on there. - And finally, what is the response from Facebook- Instagram’s parent company? ## Thanks Fletcher Babb, a Contributor at VentureBeat [Kicker!] Finally, it's no surprise that car accidents increasingly involve cell phones. Here's a potential deterrent - a company called ComSonics is developing a new type of radar gun that could help law enforcement sniff out distracted drivers. The device monitors and identifies radio signals associated with cellphone use. According to ComSonics, cell phones emit different frequencies when sending a text, making a call, or transferring data, which could allow police to single out illegal driving activities. For example, in ComSonics’ home state of Virigina, texting is illegal but talking while driving is still ok. The technology has some questions to tackle though - what if it's a passenger that's texting, or the driver has data pings on their iPhone or Android but isn't responding? And does voice-to-text software get picked up by radar? All good questions. Or how about this: If you're driving, and doing something that you think might get you pulled over... um... don't do it? [good bye] That's it for this edition of Tech News 2Night. Subscribe to this show at Twit.tv/tn2, and write us at tn2@twit.tv Don't miss our morning news program, Tech News Today, tomorrow and every weekday at 10am Pacific, 1 pm Eastern. I'm Sarah Lane, thanks for watching.