How to enable your phone’s ‘kill switch’ to frustrate thieves
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What are the recent changes in WhatsApp regarding usernames?
The Clare Byrne Show on Newstalk. With Aviva Insurance.
I'm joined in the studio by Irish independent technology correspondent Adrian Weckler. Adrian, thanks for coming in. We've loads of tech stuff to discuss, but there's a breaking news story that I know you want to tell us about. It's going to cost a little more to charge your EV.
Yeah, so the ESB, which runs the biggest network of public chargers, if you're out on the road or if you live in a terraced house or you live in an apartment and you rely on public EV chargers, they've announced a price hike of up to 14% on their public chargers. in addition to which they're going to charge you more if you want to pay by contactless on your phone or on your card so the net result of that is i did the sums and it'll cost you on a car like mine an electric car like mine it'll cost me around 12 euro for every 100 kilometers that i do in an electric car now for diesel or petrol it's probably about 10 euro or 11 euro that's at the higher rate that they're charging. The normal pay-as-you-go rate if you don't have one of these subscriptions or memberships where they charge you a few extra euro per month.
And that's the second price hike.
It's costly a bit more then.
It's costly. If you want to charge your electric car using a high-speed charger... And you don't have, you know, the array of different memberships for different services.
How will the new EV charging costs affect users?
You just want to rock up like you would for petrol or diesel. It now charges, it now costs you more than petrol or diesel for the high speed charger. And when I say high speed, I mean, you'll get, say, half a car's charge in maybe 10 to 15 minutes. I don't mean 45 seconds. There's a lot more slower charges around the country, which are cheaper, which people will see. But that could take you an hour and a half.
Now, if you can charge at home, though, the advantage is still there if you're on a night rate and all of that.
It's much cheaper than petrol or diesel if you have a driveway and you can charge at home. It's probably a third of the cost or a quarter of the cost.
OK. Have they said why they're doing this?
Yeah, they did. They said that it's continued increases in energy and operational costs. They're not the only one. Ionity is another example.
What is the significance of the EV charging price hike?
EV charging chain. They raised their prices last week to a whopping 85 cents per kilowatt. I know that sounds like jargon. That would raise the cost per 100 kilometres to about 14 euro for 100 kilometres for my car.
Versus 12 for the ESB.
Versus 12 euro for the ESB versus around a tenner or 11 euro if I was paying petrol or diesel.
Okay, so there's a lot to think about there for somebody who is thinking about getting an EV and maybe doesn't have the ability to have the charger at home.
Yeah, now look, we... There are balancing arguments. There's a much bigger grant now, €8,500 if you have a car, a petrol or diesel car that's over 13 years of age. Minister Dara O'Brien says that he's also going to consider ways of charging your car if you live in a terraced house to allow you legally to trail a wire somehow across. It's illegal at the moment. So there are other balancing arguments there. But just on the public charging bit, it's now more expensive.
OK.
How can users protect their phones from theft?
Good to know. Now WhatsApp has announced that users will be able to chat to someone using a username rather than a phone number in the coming months. Now they say that some users are uncomfortable with their phone number being visible in a group chat, for example. But is this more about competition from the likes of Signal and those sorts of operators?
It could be. I would take them at their word on this one because there's so many WhatsApp group chats. The minute you walk into a new parents group, a club, an association, a school, even at work, there's you. I'd say the average Irish person conservatively has 10 to 15 WhatsApp groups. And that's a very conservative figure. And these are people who they mightn't be close friends. They might just be associates. And the problem with WhatsApp groups at the moment is
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What are the recent changes in WhatsApp regarding usernames?
0:01–1:27
2
How will the new EV charging costs affect users?
1:27–2:13
3
What is the significance of the EV charging price hike?
2:13–3:09
4
How can users protect their phones from theft?
3:09–4:04
5
What is a 'kill switch' and how does it work on phones?
4:04–5:16
6
How do you activate stolen device protection on an iPhone?
5:16–6:09
7
What steps can you take to retrieve your phone's IMEI number?
6:09–7:02
8
What should you do if your phone gets stolen?
7:02–12:36