Gadgetory

packing fears keep many up at night worried about everything from malware to phishing but it's easy to overlook the most primitive form of hacking simply eyeballing someone's computer screen while they enter passwords or read confidential material if you've ever sat in a crowded coffee shop or used a laptop on a plane with someone seated in the row behind you it could have already happened to you a simple privacy filter which makes your screen near impossible to read from a side angle it's a simple solution but it requires you to carry around a big floppy rectangle a filter material and it often makes your screen harder to read even if you're directly in front of it HP is adding what it calls the world's only integrated PC privacy screen to a pair of professional laptops the HP EliteBook 840 and 1040 developed using technology from 3m the privacy filter is embedded in the screen itself but can be turned off and on it will when it's off the laptop screen looks as bright and clear as normal then hit function + f2 and the privacy filter turns on the direct viewed slightly dimmer as if you had a separate filter placed over the screen but from the side the screen is nearly completely blocked out these two EliteBook models are the first to add this new feature but it's something that could definitely come - more laptops in the future