MacRumors

Apple is joining forces with Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter, and several other technology companies and civil liberties groups to request via letter that the U.S. government offer greater surveillance transparency, allowing Internet, telephone, and Web-based service providers to give consumers regular reports on security related requests, reports AllThingsD.

"Basic information about how the government uses its various law enforcement–related investigative authorities has been published for years without any apparent disruption to criminal investigations," a copy of the letter obtained by AllThingsD reads. "We seek permission for the same information to be made available regarding the government’s national security–related authorities."

The alliance is made up of 63 different companies, investors, non-profits, and trade organizations that will publish a missive on Thursday asking President Obama and congressional leaders to allow them to report on the following:

-The number of government requests for information about their users
-The number of individuals, accounts, or devices for which information was requested
-The number of requests that sought communications content, basic subscriber information, and/or other information.

The request comes after news of a top secret intelligence gathering program called 'PRISM' leaked in June, where a number of tech companies, including Apple, were accused of providing the U.S. government with direct access to user data.

Apple later clarified its position with a statement of its "Commitment to Customer Privacy," denying participation in PRISM and noting that the company conducts a thorough evaluation of each law enforcement request for data and aims to "retrieve and deliver the narrowest possible set of information to the authorities."

Update: The full letter has now been published. Direct link: [PDF]

Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the comment thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues forum. All MacRumors forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Tim Cook is reportedly trying to sell more iPhones through Apple Stores instead of via carrier partners -- but that could be an uphill task according to an analysis from Consumer Intelligence Research Partners.

In the U.S., Apple has roughly 250 retail stores, compared to more than 10,000 third-party retail outlets that sell the iPhone. In addition to that, Apple's retail stores are extremely busy and it remains to be seen if the company can dramatically ramp up its iPhone sales without hiring more staff or opening more locations.

"We don’t know, exactly, how Apple can realistically meet Cook’s goals," CIRP co-founder Michael Levin told AllThingsD. "However one defines those goals, we can’t see how their mostly jammed stores can handle more customers, sales associates and inventory."

[…]

As CIRP observes, when Apple debuts a new iPhone, its stores typically run at capacity — canceling vacations, hiring part-time staff, etc. Pushing the percentage of all iPhones sold through Apple Stores from 20 percent to 50 percent would likely require similar efforts.

One issue for Apple is that many iPhone owners still see Apple Retail Stores as places to get service, not buy a phone. Some research shows 90% of first-time iPhone buyers purchase their phones at carrier retail stores.

In order to jumpstart iPhone sales during the company's important back-to-school season, it has, for the first time, included the iPhone on its list of devices that come with an App Store Gift Card when sold to students. Apple is also rumored to be launching a new in-store smartphone trade-in program.

Back in 2010, Apple signed an agreement with Caltech spinoff Liquidmetal Technologies, giving Apple exclusive access to the firm's unique metal alloys for consumer electronics applications. Liquidmetal's "amorphous metal alloys", sometimes referred to as "metallic glass" due to their non-crystalline molecular structures, offer several advantages over many other metals, including superior strength and durability. Apple had quietly tested Liquidmetal by using it in the SIM card eject tool for the iPhone 3G, but the material has yet to make any additional appearances in Apple's products.

The agreement between Apple and Liquidmetal funneled the covered intellectual property through a subsidiary known as Crucible Intellectual Property, LLC, and Liquidmetal is required to submit all of its newly developed intellectual property to that subsidiary through at least February 2014.

As pointed out by MacDailyNews, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office yesterday issued a patent assigned to Crucible covering processes for mass producing thin sheets of amorphous metal alloys, suggesting that Apple and Liquidmetal are indeed making progress with the material. Of the five inventors listed on the patent, which was filed in May 2012, two are Apple product design engineers and three are engineers at Liquidmetal Technologies.

A conventional method for making a BMG [bulk metallic glass] sheet requires casting a amorphous metal alloy at or above the melting temperature of the amorphous metal alloy, freezing the molten amorphous metal alloy in a sheet mold to form a sheet, and then using a cutting tool to remove the gate portion of the cast sheet and shape the cast sheet into the desired final geometry. However, casting requires melting and cooling of the amorphous metal alloy in a sheet mold, and this can cause uncontrolled amount of amorphicity in the BMG sheet. Furthermore, the post-processing cost for removing the gate and runner overflow and shaping the cast sheet into the desired final sheet geometry can be quite high. Therefore, new methods for making BMG sheets that overcome the above mentioned limitations of the casting process are desirable. [...]

A proposed solution according to embodiments herein for the manufacture of bulk-solidifying amorphous sheets is to use a float glass process and/or a conveyor belt-type process.

The patent describes how molten BMG could be continuously poured onto a shallow bath of molten tin, where it would flow to form a sheet. The thickness of the sheets would be controlled by the speed at which cooling BMG is removed from the tin bath. The patent specifically claims that such a float plant could operate continuously for 10-15 years, producing approximately 6,000 kilometers of BMG per year in thicknesses ranging from 0.1 mm to 25 mm and widths up to 3 meters.

Rumors of Liquidmetal's alloys being used for Apple's iPhone have surfaced a number of times, but last year Liquidmetal's Atakan Peker noted that Apple was unlikely to use the alloys as major design materials for at least 2-4 years due to the production scale needed for such parts as MacBook casings. With yesterday's patent, however, it does appear that Apple and Liquidmetal may have developed processes to overcome that hurdle.

Bloomberg highlights a new report from Taiwan's Commercial Times claiming that Apple may be pushing back the launch of the iPhone 5S to the end of this year in order to increase the size of the device's display from the current 4 inches to 4.3 inches.

Apple Inc. (AAPL) may delay the introduction of the iPhone 5S until the end of the year after the design was changed to feature a bigger 4.3-inch retina display screen, the Commercial Times reported.

The company previously scheduled the release for September or October, the Taiwanese newspaper reported, citing unidentified people in the semiconductor industry. Takashi Takebayashi, a spokesman for Apple in Tokyo, wasn’t immediately available to comment to Bloomberg News.

The claim is highly unlikely to be true, as Apple undoubtedly finalized the designed of the iPhone 5S months ago and the company will reportedly begin mass production later this month. Regardless, the fact that the report was picked up by Bloomberg is giving it wide visibility.

A number of reports have also indicated that the iPhone 5S will look largely identical to the iPhone 5, as seen in a prototype device manufactured last December. Photos of display assemblies claimed to be for the iPhone 5S have also surfaced, with those parts appearing nearly identical to the corresponding iPhone 5 parts with the exception of a change in orientation of the flex cable connectors that is compatible with the logic board layout from the prototype iPhone 5S.

As announced last week, Google has begun rolling out a revamped version of its Maps app for iOS, adding support for the larger screen of the iPad, enhanced navigation features, and a new Explore feature.

Google Maps 2.0 for iOS includes both live traffic updates and incident reports that offer details on current traffic conditions. Unlike the Android version of the app, it does not include on-the-fly rerouting, but Google has said that it plans to add the feature in the future. The new version of Maps also offers indoor directions and maps for malls, airports, transit stations, and more.

Explore, which was first introduced at Google I/O earlier this year, offers users a way to discover nearby businesses and restaurants. It incorporates Zagat ratings and deals through integration with Google Offers.

The old version of Google Maps has been removed from the App Store, and while the revamped version is available in several countries in Asia at the current point in time, it is not expected to be available in the U.S. until later. As noted by 9to5Mac, however, the app can be acquired immediately by deleting the old app and re-downloading it from iCloud.

Update: Google Maps can now be downloaded from the U.S. App Store.

According to AllThingsD, a production ramp up of the next generation iPhone should begin around the end of this month, confirming a recent report from Jefferies' Peter Misek.

Misek believes that Apple started small batch production of the iPhone 5S last month, but with the company now gearing up for mass production, it appears to be making final preparations for a launch later this year.

A report from earlier today suggested that iPhone 5S supplies will be constrained at launch, as it is with many new Apple product releases, perhaps because of low yields on a new fingerprint sensor that is expected in the device.

Some iPhone 5S prototypes have previously leaked, showcasing features such as a dual-LED flash and a slightly larger battery, as well as an A7 chip. Misek, for his part, believes that the 5S production ramp is in addition to one that's in progress for the rumored lower-cost iPhone. From AllThingsD:

Interestingly, Misek says that iPhone production ramp up will follow one that’s already under way for Apple’s long-rumored lower-cost iPhone, a device he figures the company will price somewhere between $300 and $400 — without a subsidy. He estimates production plans at 25 million to 30 million units, split pretty much evenly across the 5s and its new lower-cost sibling. And he says the new entry probably won’t be competitive with the truly low-end handsets popular in emerging markets.

Last year, at roughly this same point in the July, we saw similar reports of increased production ahead of the release of the iPhone 5.

Malwarebytes takes a look at a method cyber-criminals have begun using to target Mac users with "ransomware", hijacking the user's browser with a notice demanding payment of $300 in order to release control of the application. While similar malware has affected Windows systems for a number of years, Mac users have only rarely seen such efforts targeted at themselves.

The ransomware page is being pushed onto unsuspecting users browsing regular sites but in particular when searching for popular keywords.

Warnings appearing to be from the FBI tell the victim: “you have been viewing or distributing prohibited Pornographic content.. To unlock your computer and to avoid other legal consequences, you are obligated to pay a release fee of $300.”

Rather than a sophisticated hijack of the actual browser software or an installation of a trojan, the ransomware is merely a simple webpage using JavaScript to load 150 iframes that require confirmation to be dismissed, with the authors hoping that users will give up long before they dismiss all of the dialog boxes and simply pay the ransom. As the report notes, a feature on OS X that reopens previously open windows after relaunching an app means that users generally can not simply close and reopen Safari in order to escape the ransomware.

The report details one method to escape the ransomware involving resetting Safari, but misses a far simpler tactic: Simply holding down the Shift key while relaunching Safari will prevent it from reopening windows and tabs from the previous session. Users can also completely disable the reopening feature across OS X from the General pane of System Preferences. Many OS X users may, however, be unfamiliar with such options and find themselves trapped by the ransomware webpage.

Apple today announced the launch of Logic Pro X, the next-generation version of its professional audio software. The release brings a completely revamped Logic Pro application including a new virtual drummer and integrated pitch editing, as well as an iPad companion app.

Apple today unveiled Logic Pro X, the most advanced version of Logic Pro to date, featuring a new interface designed for pros, powerful new creative tools for musicians, and an expanded collection of instruments and effects. Logic Pro X includes Drummer, a revolutionary new feature that provides a virtual session player that automatically plays along with your song in a wide variety of drumming styles and techniques, and Flex Pitch, which provides integrated pitch editing for audio recordings. Apple also introduced Logic Remote, an innovative new way to play and control Logic Pro X from your iPad, giving musicians the flexibility to create and mix their music from anywhere in the room.

The Loop has a full review of the new software.

Logic Pro X is the best music software release I’ve seen from Apple in a while. They added a lot of pro features, but at the same time managed to make the app more approachable—that’s a difficult thing to do.

Being a guitar player, I would liked to have seen some more attention on Amp Designer—I don’t use it much at all because I don’t like the amps much—but I can wait for the next release for that.

Overall, Logic Pro X is a great release and for $199, you can’t go wrong.

Macworld also has a review of Logic Pro X and Logic Remote.

Logic Pro X [Direct Link] launches in the Mac App Store today for $199.99, with live performance companion app MainStage 3 [Direct Link] priced at $29.99. The Logic Remote companion app for iPad [Direct Link] is available free through the iOS App Store. Apple has also removed the previous versions of Logic Pro and MainStage from the Mac App Store.

Israeli business newspaper Calcalist reports [Google translation, via 9to5Mac] that Apple is in early-stage negotiations to acquire 3D body sensing firm PrimeSense, with any deal likely to command a price in the range of $280 million. PrimeSense is the firm that developed the original technology behind Microsoft's Kinect motion sensing and control system.

The report indicates that a delegation of senior Apple executives visited PrimeSense earlier this month, after Calcalist had reported [Google translation] that the company was looking to negotiate its sale with Apple, Sony, and Samsung as prospective suitors. Apple is presumably interested in the technology as it makes a more significant push into the living room, with the company rumored to be trying to launch its own television hardware and content delivery services.

Interestingly, Apple's interest in PrimeSense appears to extend back many years, with Cult of Mac's Leander Kahney having related in November 2010 how he sat next to PrimeSense CEO Inon Beracha on a June 2008 flight, where Beracha talked about how his company had viewed Apple as the most natural fit when PrimeSense was shopping its technology around Silicon Valley.

In fact, he’d already had several meetings at Apple. It was the first place he and his engineers thought of. “It was the most natural place for the technology,” he said. [...]

Yet the initial meetings hadn’t gone so well. Obsessed with secrecy, Apple had already asked Beracha to sign a stack of crippling legal agreements and NDAs.

He shook his head. Why didn’t he want to do a deal with Apple? No need. The technology was hot. He could sell it to anyone.

Apple has expressed interest in motion sensing and control in the past, having acquired several patents and patent applications from inventor Timothy Pryor, including filings addressing Kinect-like control of home appliances and vehicles. Apple has also been rumored to be including some motion control functionality in its long-rumored television set project.

Update 6:30 AM: A source at PrimeSense tells TechCrunch that rumors of an Apple acquisition are premature, if not incorrect altogether.

The Calcalist’s report notes that this is based around some meetings between the two companies, and that the price for the deal would be around $280 million. But a source at the company described the report as “BS.”

“Journalist delusion based on unverified and twisted hints,” the source added, also questioning the valuation: “280M? Come on! We’re worth 10 times that. :)”

Update 9:35 AM: Mashable reports that a PrimeSense representative has now officially denied the claim.

A rep for PrimeSense denied the report to Mashable and said the company would release a statement later on Tuesday. Apple did not immediately respond to our request for comment.