172 Information Technology Trivia Questions (Ranked from Easiest to Hardest)

Information Technology (IT) is the use of computers and software to manage and process information. It has become an essential part of modern society and is used in almost every industry and field. There is a wide range of IT trivia questions that can be asked, whether you're an IT professional or someone who is curious about the field.

Here are some examples of IT trivia questions you might come across: What is the most widely used programming language? Who created the World Wide Web? What is the name of the first computer virus? What was the first search engine? These questions cover a wide range of IT topics, including programming languages, software development, internet, and computer security.

In addition to the technical aspects of IT, there are also many fun and interesting facts to learn about. For example, did you know that the most widely used programming language is JavaScript? Or that the World Wide Web was created by Tim Berners-Lee in 1989? These trivia questions will not only test your knowledge, but also give you a glimpse into the many fascinating aspects of IT and its impact on our society, culture, and everyday life.

172 Information Technology Trivia Questions Ranked From Easiest to Hardest (Updated for 2024)

1. Although the keyboard shortcut for copying information is Ctrl + C, the shortcut for pasting information is not Ctrl + P (that's a shortcut for printing). Instead, the shortcut letter for pasting is closer to the shortcuts for copying and cutting. What letter is used to paste information when clicked synchronously with Ctrl?
   
   Answer: V
   
   
2. Legend has it that the QWERTY keyboard layout was designed to make typists slow down so they wouldn’t jam up their typewriters. However, the origin of the keyboard arrangement actually goes back to telegraph operators who used which code to type out messages one dot-dash at a time?
   
   Answer: Morse
   
   
3. What thread count-soundin' free program in the Google Docs Editors suite corresponds to Excel in Microsoft's Office suite of software?
   
   Answer: Sheets
   
   
4. In 1999 Shigetaka Kurita invented what keyboard additions for cell phones that would eventually replace emoticons and even get their own movie?
   
   Answer: Emojis
   
   
5. According to news reports, what social media company fired half of its employees on Friday, November 4, only to ask some of the fired employees to come back less than a week later?
   
   Answer: Twitter
   
   
6. It sounds like a circus performer from Taos and allows you to download PDFs with the greatest of ease. I'm talking about what A-word family of software?
   
   Answer: Adobe Acrobat
   
   
7. Which acronym for a computer’s main memory system sounds like a Daft Punk album or a horned mountain animal?
   
   Answer: RAM
   
   
8. What computer and printer giant was founded in 1939 in Palo, Alto, CA? It is sometimes better known by the two-letter acronym based on its founders' names.
   
   Answer: Hewlett-Packard
   
   
9. While building magnetrons at MIT in the 1940s, Percy Spencer noticed a melting chocolate bar in his pocket. Deeper investigation and exploration led to the invention of what household device? Spencer received no royalties for this invention, first marketed as the Radarange.
   
   Answer: Microwave
   
   
10. Integrated Digital Enhanced Network (iDEN) is a cellular technology developed by which American telecommunications company that also brought you the RAZR flip phone?
    
    Answer: Motorola
    
    
11. In the acronym BIOS, which refers to the firmware that provides runtime services for operating systems and programs, the "B" stands for "Basic" and the "S" for "System." What two words do the "I" and "O" stand for?
    
    Answer: Input and Output
    
    
12. Supposedly pronounced as "wizziwig," what is the meaning of the acronym WYSIWYG? The phrase largely means that the printer will print what you see on your monitor.
    
    Answer: What you see is what you get
    
    
13. According to Michael Scott, there have been eight "IT guys," including Lozenge, Shorts, and Nick, at what fictional company on "The Office?"
    
    Answer: Dunder Mifflin
    
    
14. Dutch programmer Guido van Rossum is the main author of what programming language that’s named after a famous group of British comedians?
    
    Answer: Python
    
    
15. Although the exact origin is unknown, this piece of technology and calculating tool used beans or stones moved in grooves of sand to perform calculations. Although computers have mostly replaced it, this tool is still in use for teaching arithmetic to children in many parts of the world. What is it?
    
    Answer: Abacus
    
    
16. Which American tech conglomerate that starts with C and is headquartered in San Jose, was founded in 1984 by a couple of Stanford computer scientists, and is known for its products and services like Jabber and Webex?
    
    Answer: Cisco
    
    
17. A pre-cursor to Wi-Fi was an ethernet connection, and a precursor to ethernet was the ALOHAnet which used a UHF wireless packet network to connect parts of what U.S. state?
    
    Answer: Hawaii
    
    
18. Typically considered the successor to dial-up internet access in many American homes, what was the "B" term for wide bandwidth data transmission which was able to transport multiple signals and traffic types? This replacement technology allowed for always-on and faster internet.
    
    Answer: Broadband
    
    
19. What delicious computer term did web browser programmer Lou Montulli coin to refer to information that is sent from the browser to the web server?
    
    Answer: Cookie
    
    
20. Which video game console released in 2006 pioneered the use of motion controls in its gameplay?
    
    Answer: Nintendo Wii
    
    
21. SQL is based on the relational form of which kind of math that starts with A?
    
    Answer: Algebra
    
    
22. The first Android-powered device from Samsung Mobile also became the first in a long-running product line for the company. What was the name of this device?
    
    Answer: Samsung Galaxy
    
    
23. Now appearing prophetic, what device was announced in 2007 with the following slogan? "This is only the beginning."
    
    Answer: iPhone
    
    
24. Drew Houston and Arash Ferdowsi were MIT students that founded a file hosting service in 2007. Fast forward 11 years, and they were taking this company public with an Initial Public Offering. What is the name of this "D" company?
    
    Answer: Dropbox
    
    
25. What “M” computer security company, founded by namesake John in 1987 before being acquired by Intel in 2011, is well known for its anti-virus software that is available to individual consumers?
    
    Answer: McAfee
    
    
26. In the early 2000s, Motorola pioneered the concept of a flip phone (or “fashion phone”) with which sharp-looking and sounding cellphone model?
    
    Answer: Razr
    
    
27. A Rochester, New York developed what open-source operating system written in way more than three lines of code and named for what short poetry form?
    
    Answer: Haiku
    
    
28. THINK was the company motto for more than 40 years, for the company often referred to as "Big Blue." What is this frequently-acronym'd company?
    
    Answer: IBM
    
    
29. What is the typical four-letter word that is occasionally referred to as "Whole Home" Wi-Fi which leverages a main router and a series of nodes placed around a home for full coverage? These all share the same SSID and password.
    
    Answer: Mesh Wi-Fi
    
    
30. Wi-Fi is a family of wireless network protocols modeled after the IEEE 802 set of LAN protocols. What does the initialism LAN stand for?
    
    Answer: Local Area Network
    
    
31. What term is used for the most basic level or core of an operating system, responsible for resource allocation, file management and security? In a different context, this word can also mean the seed and hard husk of a cereal.
    
    Answer: Kernel
    
    
32. Known for its computers that were shipped in black-and-white cow-printed boxes, what tech company was founded by Ted Waitt and Mike Hammond in 1985 under its original name “TIPC Network”?
    
    Answer: Gateway
    
    
33. Steve Jobs is famously one of the two men who co-founded Apple in 1976. The other co-founder was also named Steve. What was this other man's surname?
    
    Answer: Wozniak
    
    
34. British-born geophysicist Cecil Green lived in Toronto and San Francisco growing up, and ultimately earned two college degrees from M.I.T. However, when he cofounded a company, the firm included what other state in its name? You might be most familiar with one of their products from algebra class.
    
    Answer: Texas Instruments
    
    
35. Larry Ellison co-founded a company in 1977 with the rather boring name of Software Development Laboratories (SDL). In 1983, the company introduced what word into its official name? This new word is the name of the company today and also means a person considered to provide wise counsel or prophetic predictions.
    
    Answer: Oracle
    
    
36. In what early computer game did pioneers often die of dysentery? The game was later inducted into the World Video Game Hall of Fame.
    
    Answer: Oregon Trail
    
    
37. The 2.0 version of the Android operating system was nicknamed "Eclair," and the 2.3 version was nicknamed "Gingerbread." In between was the five-letter name of a cold dessert which exploded in popularity in the 2000s with self-serve toppings. What dessert is this?
    
    Answer: Froyo
    
    
38. Released in 2004 by Blizzard Entertainment and set in the fictional universe of Azeroth, what is the name of the computer game that became the world's most popular "MMORPG" (massively multiplayer online role-playing game) within a few years and continues to be referenced in popular culture with its three-letter abbreviation?
    
    Answer: World of Warcraft
    
    
39. What five-letter tech term is better known as temporary memory storage on a computer and whose homophone counterpart is defined by Merriam-Webster as “ready money”?
    
    Answer: Cache
    
    
40. A collection of local-area networks is commonly known as a WAN, which stands for what type of broad-reaching network?
    
    Answer: Wide-area network
    
    
41. Pocket, Light, Color, and Advance were all styles or variants of what video game hardware system?
    
    Answer: Game Boy
    
    
42. What four-letter "C" app for guided meditations was founded in 2012 by Michael Acton Smith and Alex Tew? It hopes to instill an inner sense of peace.
    
    Answer: Calm
    
    
43. Titan Rain was a series of attacks on U.S. computers that started in 2003. The hackers gained access to defense networks at places like Lockheed Martin and NASA. Which country did the attacks originate from?
    
    Answer: China
    
    
44. Saying that you sent an “e-mail” (or email) is so common that it’s easy to forget the word is actually a shortened version of which term?
    
    Answer: Electronic Mail
    
    
45. Which type of computing uses techniques like “fuzzy logic” and estimates instead of precise data to work out tough-to-solve problems? (Hint: It’s the opposite of “hard” computing)
    
    Answer: Soft
    
    
46. What “A” antivirus software is a freeware solution available across multiple platforms, with an amoeba like orange “A” as a logo? It is also a pirate word meaning “Stop.”
    
    Answer: Avast
    
    
47. Andy Rubin is known as one of the three founders of what massively popular cell phone operating system?
    
    Answer: Android
    
    
48. How many times would you have had to hit the 4 button to text the word “Hi” on a flip phone’s non-T9 number pad?
    
    Answer: 5 times
    
    
49. What is the somewhat-logical term for the internet prank and meme in which an unexpected appearance of the music video for the 1987 Rick Astley song "Never Gonna Give You Up" is "planted" into an unrelated link? The meme's popularity dates back to 2008.
    
    Answer: Rickrolling
    
    
50. It sounds like how you’d describe a waterfall or the train of a beautiful gown, but CSS is actually a must-know acronym for web designers. What does CSS stand for?
    
    Answer: Cascading Style Sheet
    
    
51. What is the 6-letter term for a group of computers that is networked together and used by hackers to steal information?
    
    Answer: Botnet
    
    
52. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is the majority owner of what manufacturing company which predominantly sells audio equipment? The company was founded by an associate professor who later in life donated his shares to the school.
    
    Answer: Bose
    
    
53. Doug Engelbart was the inventor of what computer accessory? The first one was made from wood.
    
    Answer: Mouse
    
    
54. In the early days of the Internet, BBS was an electronic way to share messages with other people on a network. The S is for "system," and the BB stands for which physical poster location you’d find in a community hub like an office breakroom or grocery store?
    
    Answer: Bulletin Board
    
    
55. The IdeaPad laptop and ThinkCenter desktop are models offered by what Hong Kong hardware company?
    
    Answer: Lenovo
    
    
56. The four principle wireless encryption standards available at most access points are WPA, WPA2, WPA3, and which less-secure fourth option?
    
    Answer: WEP
    
    
57. To go to a website, you know to type in its URL. What’s the technical term for the text in the web address that comes after the “www” part?
    
    Answer: Domain name
    
    
58. TSMC, the world most valuable semiconductor company, is based in which country whose political status is contested?
    
    Answer: Taiwan
    
    
59. Today, Gmail is far and above the most popular email service in the world, with 1.5 billion users worldwide, but it's not the first Gmail. In 2004, the original Gmail was a service for fans of what lasagna-addicted comic strip character?
    
    Answer: Garfield
    
    
60. If you get a 404 error, don’t bother going looking! What two-word phrase does the HTTP code mean?
    
    Answer: Not Found
    
    
61. In the 1960s, Donald Davies came up with the idea of what kind of switching that’s basically the foundation for transmitting data over the Internet, and more or less involves breaking down data into smaller groups so it can travel more efficiently over a network?
    
    Answer: Packet
    
    
62. What technology publication was founded by Louis Rossetto and has a title one letter away from a synonym for "sleepy?"
    
    Answer: Wired
    
    
63. The tiny town of Green Bank, West Virginia is located within the National Radio QZ because it is home to the world's largest fully steerable radio telescope. This means that there are strict Wi-Fi and cell phone restrictions in the city. What does QZ stand for in this context?
    
    Answer: Quiet Zone
    
    
64. Which term describes binary (e.g., yes/no, true/false) data, values, and operators that are helpful for web searches and programming?
    
    Answer: Boolean
    
    
65. In October 2020, a San Francisco-based company named Whisper raised $35 million in Series B funding. Coincidentally, Quiet Ventures led the fundraising round for Whisper and the company is known as a manufacturer of what piece of medical technology?
    
    Answer: Hearing aids
    
    
66. In 2014, what language did Apple develop for developers (and no, it's not a homage to the "Blank Space" singer, though you could check your code for those with isEmpty)?
    
    Answer: Swift
    
    
67. What type of printer works by implementing a moving head that prints in a line-by-line motion, but in contrast to inkjets, employ an impact ‘head and ribbon’ method of printing, punching tiny holes through the ribbon and into the page, leaving a mark?
    
    Answer: Dot Matrix
    
    
68. I didn't know Hansel and Gretel were web designers. What name is given to secondary navigation aids that assist users in understanding the relationship between their location on a page, and higher-level pages?
    
    Answer: Breadcrumbs
    
    
69. What is the seven-letter branded software standard created by Apple that enables a car radio or touchscreen to be a display and a controller for an iOS device?
    
    Answer: CarPlay
    
    
70. One Terabyte drives were necessary when 1000 Gigabytes of memory was necessary. However, what is the term for 1000 terabytes?
    
    Answer: Petabyte
    
    
71. No flexibility on your answers: launched in 2006, Amazon's EC2 stands for WHAT Compute Cloud?
    
    Answer: Elastic
    
    
72. According to a former Facebook employee, the company used to have a master password that could unlock any user's account. This password was a variation on the name of what martial artist and actor, perhaps because he definitely couldn't be considered "too weak"?
    
    Answer: Chuck Norris
    
    
73. After Dayton, Ohio served as home for 125 years, the electronics company NCR relocated to Duluth, Georgia in 2009. What do these initials stand for? The company grew by selling the value proposition that their product would help stores deter theft from retail clerks, and they were the first to sell the mechanical version of their flagship product.
    
    Answer: National Cash Register
    
    
74. What American tech company had a microprocessor facility in Costa Rica that at one time was responsible for 20% of Costa Rican exports and 5% of the country's GDP?
    
    Answer: Intel
    
    
75. What is the tasty name of the series of small single-board computers developed by an eponymous foundation in the UK and often used for the promotion of teaching computer science concepts in schools and developing countries?
    
    Answer: Raspberry Pi
    
    
76. Aye, aye, captain! Abbreviated as the C64, what 8-bit home computer and gaming device was named “the best-selling single computer model of all time” by the Guinness Book of World Records in 2011?
    
    Answer: Commodore 64
    
    
77. While working at Motorola in the 1970s, Martin Cooper invented what is typically considered the first cell phone. Cooper is a graduate of IIT: an Institute of Technology located in what state?
    
    Answer: Illinois
    
    
78. Although the company maintains and distributes many types of open-source software, it is most well-known for its enterprise Linux and virtualization products. What is this company headquartered in Raleigh and purchased by IBM in 2019? You might also see their name written when visiting a haberdasher.
    
    Answer: Red Hat
    
    
79. The U.S. National Cyber Security Division opened for the first time in 2003 and is currently housed within what Federal Department? John Kelly, Kirstjen Nielsen, and Kevin McAleenan all served as Secretary of this Department during the Trump administration.
    
    Answer: Department of Homeland Security
    
    
80. Ridley Scott directed the dystopian, Orwell-inspired, hammer-tossing commercial for what now-behemoth but then-underdog company during the 1984 Super Bowl?
    
    Answer: Apple
    
    
81. The Fugaku supercomputer has topped the list of the fastest computers in the world since 2020. Reaching such an explosive height makes its name fitting, since it was named after what stratovolcano in Japan?
    
    Answer: Mount Fuji
    
    
82. Used in electronic messages and web pages, they are similar to emoticons but are actual pictures instead of typographics. What are they?
    
    Answer: Emojis
    
    
83. In 2005, Linus Torvalds created software for tracking changes on files in order to improve development of the Linux kernel. Since 2005, the open-source software has had Junio Hamano as the core maintainer. What is the three-letter name of this uber-popular software among developers?
    
    Answer: Git
    
    
84. While working at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center during the 1970s, computer scientist Larry Tesler coined what three common computer commands first used to edit documents on a word processor he co-created called Gypsy?
    
    Answer: Cut, copy, paste
    
    
85. Which password recovery tool, developed for Microsoft Windows, is named after the first two sons of Adam and Eve in the biblical Book of Genesis?
    
    Answer: Cain and Abel
    
    
86. Introduced in 1985, what line of Commodore personal computers has a name that means "friend" in English?
    
    Answer: Amiga
    
    
87. Which computer company based in Tawain is known for its PCs, including the ZenBook, VivoBook, and Republic of Gamers laptop?
    
    Answer: Asus
    
    
88. Norton AntiVirus is an anti-malware and anti-virus software package that has been developed and distributed by what company since 1991? This parent company has a portmanteau'd name and was first publicly traded in 1989.
    
    Answer: Symantec
    
    
89. For some reason, it wasn't until 2016 that Tim Berners-Lee won the Association for Computing Machinery's top "Nobel-level" award, named for what British mathematician and computer scientist?
    
    Answer: Alan Turing
    
    
90. The integrated circuit intended to securely store information and a key on a mobile phone is widely known as a SIM card. Name ANY of the three words that SIM stands for.
    
    Answer: Subscriber Identity Module
    
    
91. Known as Presenter when it was initially put out, Microsoft PowerPoint was first released in which year of the 1980s? One year either way accepted.
    
    Answer: 1987
    
    
92. With an initial release in 2003, what is the free open-source content management system written in PHP and paired with a MySQL (or MariaDB) database that features numerous plugins and templates known as "Themes" and is currently used by 39% of the 10 million most-popular websites in the world?
    
    Answer: WordPress
    
    
93. What technology company was founded in 1993 with the vision that the next wave of computing would be graphics-based? The company took its name from the Latin word for "envy" and features product families GeForce, Quadro, and Tegra.
    
    Answer: Nvidia
    
    
94. What smartphone app and fintech company was founded by father and son duo Walter Wemple Cruttenden III and Jeffrey James Cruttenden to promote incremental and passive investing in 2014? The company's app features a light green color scheme and shares its name with a seed enclosed in a tough, leathery shell. The portfolio options the company offers were designed in part by Nobel laureate Harry Markowitz.
    
    Answer: Acorns
    
    
95. LiMux was a project for migrating what huge Bavarian city from Windows to Linux?
    
    Answer: Munich
    
    
96. The =COUNT function in Microsoft Excel only tallies up cells that contain numeric values. If you want to tally the cells containing numeric and non-numeric values, what slightly altered formulas would you use instead?
    
    Answer: =COUNTA()
    
    
97. What is the name of the research and advisory firm that puts out "magic quadrants" ranking different enterprises software products?
    
    Answer: Gartner
    
    
98. Ad Astra Rocket, Avantica, and Nimiq are all companies that are part of the economic shift from cattle ranching to information technology in what Costa Rican province?
    
    Answer: Guanacaste
    
    
99. What is the name of the software that can screen an image or document for text and make it readable and searchable (For example, converting a PDF to a text file)?
    
    Answer: Optical Character Recognition
    
    
100. Also used to describe your mental capacity to take on tasks, what "B" word means the maximum amount of data that can be transmitted over an internet connection in a given amount of time?
     
     Answer: Bandwidth
     
     
101. Which Chinese search engine is the second largest in the world and has a name that means “100 times?”
     
     Answer: Baidu
     
     
102. With an estimated $38 billion in damage caused, what 2004 computer virus has been ranked the worst of all time? NB: For the computer fans this was technically a worm, not a virus, but it appears on the virus lists.
     
     Answer: Mydoom
     
     
103. First released in April 2008, and up to version 15.1, what is the name of the open-sourced chess engine that as of February 2023 has been recognized as the strongest chess engine in the world?
     
     Answer: Stockfish
     
     
104. If you’re not an Apple fan, which Android-powered, spacey-sounding line of Samsung smartphones might meet your technological needs?
     
     Answer: Galaxy
     
     
105. Which tech from the ’70s and ‘80s is considered to have lost the “videotape format war” to VHS? (Hint: Even though they’d long been obsolete, Sony only stopped selling them in 2002)
     
     Answer: Betamax
     
     
106. What part of the human body is also a term that is often used to describe the main network connections that comprise the Internet or other major network?
     
     Answer: Backbone
     
     
107. Starting with "The Girl in the Spider's Web" in 2015, what Swedish author took over from the late Stieg Larsson in telling the story of fictional emo superhacker Lisbeth Salander?
     
     Answer: David Lagercrantz
     
     
108. While designing the IBM Stretch computer in 1956, computer scientist Werner Buchholz was one of the first people to coin what four-letter term that is equivalent to eight bits?
     
     Answer: Byte
     
     
109. Elk Cloner was one of the first microcomputer viruses that ended up “in the wild,” having escaped the computer system it was written on. It started as a joke written by a high school student, who put it on what now obsolete piece of tech that also ended up being the means through which the virus was spread from one machine to the next?
     
     Answer: Floppy disk
     
     
110. When Douglas Engelbart came up with the first computer mouse in the 1960s, he probably should have considered the possibility of hand splinters, since the prototype was made of what material?
     
     Answer: Wood
     
     
111. In 1997, IBM’s Deep Blue had all the right moves and became the first computer to be a champion player at what game?
     
     Answer: Chess
     
     
112. What term is given to a malicious software or code that is considered to fall in the category between normal software and a virus?
     
     Answer: Grayware
     
     
113. In January 2024, the AI startup ElevenLabs achieved unicorn status as people are getting stoked about its tech that clones what human feature?
     
     Answer: Voice
     
     
114. The Atanasoff-Berry Computer, the world’s first electronic digital computer, was built during the 1930s in what U.S. state nicknamed the “Hawkeye State”?
     
     Answer: Iowa
     
     
115. Loon is a company working on providing Internet access to rural and remote areas by using high-altitude balloons in the stratosphere that create an aerial wireless network. Loon is a subsidiary of what much larger company?
     
     Answer: Alphabet
     
     
116. If you have an iPhone and send a text to another iPhone user via iMessage, the bubbles look blue. If you send a text to an Android user, the bubble is green because it’s being sent as which kind of message?
     
     Answer: SMS
     
     
117. What company providing hosting for software development and distributed version control familiar to computer programmers is known for its iconic Octocat (part cat, part octopus) logo?
     
     Answer: GitHub
     
     
118. A hexadecimal numbering system is useful if you have some “big bits” to wrangle and want shorter binary strings. Which base number does the system use?
     
     Answer: 16
     
     
119. What “A” term describes a program capable of running on any computer regardless of its operating system? It kind of sounds like a round tree fruit that comes in red and green.
     
     Answer: Applet
     
     
120. C++, Java, and Python are just a few of many examples of which kind of computer coding language that’s abbreviated OOP?
     
     Answer: Object-Oriented Programming
     
     
121. What is the "double O" name of the web testing and diagnostics company founded in Seattle in 2006 that has a well-known, eponymous internet speedtest?
     
     Answer: Ookla
     
     
122. A November 1998 article titled "New CYBERSCAPE: Digital Assistants Get Sophisticated" was the first article in the New York Times's archive to use what now-ubiquitous word which, despite its name, does not necessarily refer to the IQ of a pocket computer?
     
     Answer: Smartphone
     
     
123. What is the common alphanumeric abbreviation for the "predictive text technology" developed by Tegic Communications and used on mobile phones prior to the widespread adoption of touchscreen keyboards?
     
     Answer: T9
     
     
124. Which adjective is used to describe computer memory that only retains data while the device is powered? This adjective can be used to describe a person liable to display rapid changes of emotion.
     
     Answer: Volatile
     
     
125. Google Buzz, Google Friend Connect, and Orkut were all Google products that were retired attempts at a social media platform. The fourth attempt was named what?
     
     Answer: Google+
     
     
126. Unicode, the standard for character encoding used to represent multilingual text as binary, is the successor of what U.S. encoding standard?
     
     Answer: ASCII
     
     
127. What cult British TV series focused on three members of the IT department at the fictional Reynholm Industries?
     
     Answer: The IT Crowd
     
     
128. Headquartered in Colorado, what repetitively named company claims to be the world's leading provider of in-flight Internet and entertainment?
     
     Answer: Gogo
     
     
129. Which Ancient Greek philosopher do we have to thank for the word “technology” since he coined the term “technologia” over 2,000 years ago?
     
     Answer: Aristotle
     
     
130. AMD is an American semiconductor company based in Santa Clara that has been an industry-leader for developing computer processors. The company is a primary competitor to both Intel and Nvidia. What does AMD stand for?
     
     Answer: Advanced Micro Devices
     
     
131. What term is used in place of the traditional "manufacturing" when referring to the production of steel or semiconductors?
     
     Answer: Fabrication
     
     
132. Vinod Khosla, a billionaire and founder of an eponymous venture capital firm, is also a cofounder of what company that created the Java programming language?
     
     Answer: Sun Microsystems
     
     
133. Which computer networking equipment manufacturer that was founded by Patrick Lo in 1996 sells products like “Orbi” and “Nighthawk” routers, modems, cable switches, and network-attached storage devices?
     
     Answer: Netgear
     
     
134. Formally approved by the U.S. Department of Defense, what is the name of the information security certification known by a five-letter initialism with ~148,000 qualified holders as of January 20211? The organization overseeing this certification was formed in mid-1989 as a non-profit.
     
     Answer: CISSP
     
     
135. What “divide” refers to the gaps in access to technology like smartphones and computers that contribute to inequalities in accessing resources and knowledge that’s available through the Internet?
     
     Answer: Digital
     
     
136. Not to be confused with rubber gloves, what document preparation software system that uses plain text is pronounced “lay tech?”
     
     Answer: LaTeX
     
     
137. IEEE 802.3 is a collection of standards produced to define the physical layer and data link of wired Ethernet. The standards are named for the group which drafted them, IEEE. What does this acronym stand for?
     
     Answer: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
     
     
138. Called a "giant brain" by the media, ENIAC was a pioneering computer that debuted in 1946 after being built in secret at what southernmost Ivy League university?
     
     Answer: University of Pennsylvania
     
     
139. In what year did the first AWS (Amazon Web Services) service launch to the public?
     
     Answer: 2004
     
     
140. According to Fast Metrics, the fastest internet in the world was considered to be in the country where the highest % of Wi-Fi connections had a speed of at least 4 Mbps. The leading country met this qualification with more than 95% of its internet connections as of 2015. What is this eastern hemisphere nation?
     
     Answer: South Korea
     
     
141. Which type of electrical cable can be used with your modem to provide a continuous Internet connection by hooking you up to your ISP through a landline, like your TV?
     
     Answer: Coaxial
     
     
142. According to an analysis by the UK's National Cyber Security Centre that investigated passwords belonging to hacked accounts worldwide, what is the most common six-letter "word" that is used for passwords that don't require numbers or punctuation?
     
     Answer: Qwerty
     
     
143. Following his political career, Al Gore achieved meme infamy status when he claimed to invent the internet. However, he is widely credited with coining what 2-word automotive phrase for the internet?
     
     Answer: Information Superhighway
     
     
144. Deeper Insights, Five AI, and Beyond Analysis are some of the top AI companies in what international city?
     
     Answer: London
     
     
145. In what year did Apple standardize its chargers with the introduction of the Lightening cable?
     
     Answer: 2012
     
     
146. Which kind of interface is slow because transmits digital information bit by bit over a wire?
     
     Answer: Serial
     
     
147. Before the name Java, the coding language was known by what arboreal name that also has poignancy in the Pokémon universe?
     
     Answer: Oak
     
     
148. In Excel, you can use the UNICHAR function to get a character from which ubiquitous information technology standard by its number?
     
     Answer: Unicode
     
     
149. The Computer Museum was a museum that opened in 1979 and operated in three different locations until 1999. It closed in 2000 and sent much of its collection across the country to the Computer History Museum in California. In what city would you have found the Computer Museum while it was open?
     
     Answer: Boston
     
     
150. Headquartered (somewhat ironically?) in Santa Clara, California, what is the name of the American cybersecurity company that serves 85 of the Fortune 100 and is the home to both the Unit 42 threat research team and the Ignite cybersecurity conference?
     
     Answer: Palo Alto Networks
     
     
151. When the full extent of the 2020 SolarWinds-focused cyberattack on the U.S. federal government was starting to be understood, Microsoft's president described the attack as "largest and most sophisticated the world has ever seen." The malware responsible for the attack was named for what astronomical-sounding explosion?
     
     Answer: Sunburst
     
     
152. The Alto computer released in 1973 was the first to feature a GUI (graphical user interface). Although Apple's far more successful Macintosh system brought the GUI to wider acclaim, what was the company that released the Alto?
     
     Answer: Xerox
     
     
153. What British computer scientist with a hyphenated surname is known as the founder of the World Wide Web?
     
     Answer: Tim Berners-Lee
     
     
154. Officially announced in February 2019, the "Mate X" folding cell phone will be manufactured and sold by what electronics giant?
     
     Answer: Huawei
     
     
155. Long before Kindles, the first of what type of digital reading material was published in 1971 by the founder of Project Gutenberg? (Bonus fact: The content of the technological tome? The U.S. Declaration of Independence!)
     
     Answer: E-book
     
     
156. The radix is the number of unique digits, including zero, used to represent numbers in a "positional numeral system." By what term is this concept more often referred? This other, more common term is also an acronym for a risky type of athletic feat and functions as a Microsoft Excel formula.
     
     Answer: Base
     
     
157. How many bits would you have if you added two nibbles and one crumb?
     
     Answer: 10 bits (nibble = 4 bits, crumb = 2 bits)
     
     
158. Written in Python and used as an open-source workflow management platform, what is the name of the "ventilated" Apache-managed project started at Airbnb in 2014 and designed under the "configuration as code" principle?
     
     Answer: Airflow
     
     
159. Which 3-letter server scripting language is used to code dynamic web pages?
     
     Answer: PHP
     
     
160. What “C” cybersecurity, founded in Sunnyvale, CA in 2011, has a two-word name that implies it can attack problems quickly across a variety of software? Its logo is a red hawk swooping in.
     
     Answer: Crowdstrike
     
     
161. What is the "sunny" parent company of InvestorInfo, PitchBook, and ByAllAccounts?
     
     Answer: Morningstar
     
     
162. What English man was a mathematician, philosopher, inventor and mechanical engineer, and is largely considered the originator of the concept of a digital programmable computer? Hint: His name rhymes with a common vegetable.
     
     Answer: Charles Babbage
     
     
163. There’s a pretty obvious hint for the name of the Earth-orbiting telecom unit that the Luxembourg-based multinational tech co Intelsat S.A. is known for in its name. What is it?
     
     Answer: Satellite
     
     
164. What “A” technology from Microsoft allows desktop applications to link to the web? Its name is a word followed by a letter that is late in the alphabet.
     
     Answer: ActiveX
     
     
165. Allied codebreakers at Bletchley Park and 1990s programmers trying to establish anonymous Internet banking create the storylines in what 1999 Neal Stephenson novel with a 13-letter title?
     
     Answer: Cryptonomicon
     
     
166. To combat shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic, Bill Dally developed an open-source, low-cost ventilator as Chief Scientist at which American tech giant?
     
     Answer: Nvidia
     
     
167. What university initially maintained the text file named HOSTS.TXT that mapped host names to the numerical addresses of computers on the ARPANET?
     
     Answer: Stanford
     
     
168. 50/50 shot: Research has shown that more than half of passwords created by humans contain which type of letter?
     
     Answer: Vowel
     
     
169. When it was built in the 1950s, the Weizmann Automatic Computer (WEIZAC) was one of the first computers of its kind in the world and the actual first in which Western Asian country?
     
     Answer: Israel
     
     
170. Software developers at Disney created Hyperion, a program to produce more realistic animated scenes by determining the correct angle and intensity of light and shadows, that is Disney’s in-house version of what type of software?
     
     Answer: Renderer
     
     
171. The H-Store system is considered one of the most prominent examples in the class of parallel database management systems which are typically known by what six-letter name?
     
     Answer: NewSQL
     
     
172. What “K” IT infrastructure technology company, based out of Armonk, New York, started as a spinoff of IBM? Its logo is its own name, spelled out in lowercase orange letters.
     
     Answer: Kyndryl
     

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