Photo courtesy of Getty Images Family Features Special to Valley News With the aid of modern technology, it’s now possible to convert virtually any ordinary house into a smart home filled with features that make daily tasks more convenient. These technologies allow for greener living, customization of your living space to personal tastes and the

Over the past year, the Amazon Echo has taken the world of smart home tech by storm. In November, Google finally released its long-awaited competitor. The Google Home is a $130 smart home speaker that showcases the artificially intelligent, voice-activated Google Assistant. This clever bit of software lets you set timers, control lights and thermostats,

| Share | Share | Share | Share Back in June, a lot of us got a nice chuckle when George DeMarco, chairman of the Electronic Security Expo (ESX), opened the Ft. Worth, Texas, show by having an on-stage conversation with Alexa as part of a three-person – err…entity – roundtable discussion. Turns out, a

HTC marked a new year with a new smartphone series, simply called “U,” and its design deviates from just about everything else we’ve seen from HTC. The HTC U comes in two varieties. The more powerful, larger (and more interesting) HTC U Ultra has a 5.7-inch display and many flagship features, although HTC was reluctant

I’m pretty obsessed with both the word and the idea of kompromat right now. It is, of course, the Russian art of collecting compromising material – images, audio, video – of individuals to blackmail them with at a later date. And it got me thinking about the new-ish trend of putting always-listening smart speakers in