Sci-Tech news

• Oxford University scientist explains the reason behind his bizarre experiments

  04-10-2016 12:23 via dailymail.co.uk
  
  Charles Foster, a Research Associate at Oxford University, says hewanted to better understand how various animals see the world, including badgers, otters and swifts.
  
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• Millions urged to prepare NOW as violent storms threaten more than a dozen US states on July 4th

  03-07-2026 22:44 via dailymail.com
  
  Millions of people are being urged to prepare now for severe thunderstorms, flash flooding and damaging winds through the Fourth of July weekend.
  
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• Fecal contamination at East Coast beaches triggers 'do not swim' warnings for July 4th weekend

  03-07-2026 20:19 via dailymail.com
  
  Multiple beaches along the US East Coast have issued 'do not swim' warnings due to high levels of fecal bacteria in the water.
  
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• David Potter, the man who put Psion in the palm of your hand, logs off at 82

  03-07-2026 19:24 via theregister.com
  
  OBITUARY South African-born pioneer of the British tech industry David Potter, the man behind the iconic Psion pocket computers, passed away on 28th June, six days before his 83rd birthday. Potter was the founder of the company of the same name, a pivotal firm in the British technology industry from the 1980s to the 2000s. Psion supplied software for the early computers from Sinclair Research, the ZX80 and the ZX81, including a Flight Simulator that you can play online. In 1982, Psion supplied t
  
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• Women with these six physical traits get the most attention from men, reveals new research

  03-07-2026 19:09 via dailymail.com
  
  New research has found that women with six specific physical traits may get more attention from men than others.
  
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• Technocracy’s Digital ID Is Being Smuggled In On The Backs Of Children

  03-07-2026 19:01 via technocracy.news
  
  I have spent more than fifteen years analyzing technocracy as a system of rule by engineered administration, where the credential replaces the citizen, and the dashboard replaces the vote. Technocrats have their requirements, and they keep hammering on them until they get their way.
  In all those years, how many times have we seen digital ID come up? Just about every year!
  The fact is, Technocrats need digital identity to work. Without it, Technocracy is dead. You cannot administer what you canno
  
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• Outrage as brightly lit MSG hosts Taylor Swift's wedding while thousands of 'poor' New Yorkers sit in the dark amid heat-driven power cuts

  03-07-2026 18:17 via dailymail.com
  
  Many New Yorkers have been left in the dark and are calling out the hypocrisy of hosting Taylor Swift's wedding while residents had their power cut off due to the heat.
  
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• Amazon Leo constellation nears 400 satellites as broadband launch looms

  03-07-2026 18:06 via theregister.com
  
  Amazon says it is preparing to roll out satellite broadband this year after the latest rocket launch brought its Leo constellation up to 396 units. The digital bazaar and cloud computing giant reports that an Atlas V rocket launch on July 2 successfully propelled 29 satellites into low Earth orbit for the Amazon Leo network, formerly known as Project Kuiper until November last. Amazon hasn't finished flinging its hardware into orbit just yet, but said it is planning to begin providing an actual
  
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• 'Zombie squirrels' carrying deadly virus are appearing in neighborhoods across America

  03-07-2026 17:43 via dailymail.com
  
  WARNING - GRAPHIC CONTENT: There has been a surge in 'zombie squirrel' sightings across the US, with the animals covered in oozing sores caused by a deadly virus.
  
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• Controversial plan to dim the sun could choke airlines with clouds of 'hazardous' sulphuric acid, putting passengers and crews at risk

  03-07-2026 17:12 via dailymail.com
  
  A controversial plan to fight climate change by dimming the sun could choke the airlines with clouds of sulphuric acid, scientists have warned.
  
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• Terrifying 'zombie squirrels' carrying deadly virus invade Americans' backyards

  03-07-2026 16:49 via dailymail.com
  
  WARNING - GRAPHIC CONTENT: There has been a surge in 'zombie squirrel' sightings across the US, with the animals covered in oozing sores caused by a deadly virus.
  
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• AdaptHealth says attackers sweet-talked their way into cloud systems and stole patient data

  03-07-2026 16:29 via theregister.com
  
  AdaptHealth says attackers used social engineering to breach its systems and steal sensitive patient data, including passwords associated with insurance billing. The medical equipment company disclosed the attack to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Thursday, noting that attackers accessed internal patient management systems, document storage platforms, and external electronic health record system portals. The attack targeted an unwitting third-party contractor, through which the c
  
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• Startup targets datacenters with 3D-printed nuclear reactor module

  03-07-2026 15:36 via theregister.com
  
  US startup Ampera has produced what it claims is the first 3D-printed nuclear reactor module. The firm says it is working towards delivering scalable, emission-free power for datacenters, defense applications, and off-grid sites. Ampera unveiled its first nuclear reactor module during an event at the firm's innovation center in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. More than 100 people attended, including local officials, business leaders and employees. Founder and CEO Brian Matthews revealed the prototy
  
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• Millions told to stay indoors as eye-burning toxins fill the air in 16 US states TODAY

  03-07-2026 14:47 via dailymail.com
  
  Millions of Americans across 16 US states are being urged to stay indoors if possible as toxic air sweeps a large swath of the nation.
  
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• Heatwave scam warning: Criminals target desperate Britons with fake air conditioner bargains that leave victims out of pocket

  03-07-2026 14:38 via dailymail.com
  
  While Britain's sweltering heatwaves might have been unbearable, rushing to grab an air conditioner bargain leaves you seriously at risk of getting fleeced.
  
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• NetNut cracked as Google and FBI target 2 million-device botnet

  03-07-2026 14:03 via theregister.com
  
  Tech companies working with US law enforcement "significantly degraded" the NetNut residential proxy network as part of an ongoing effort to disrupt the tools cybercriminals use to conceal their activity, say researchers. The work was carried out by Google, Lumen, Shadowserver, the FBI, and others, and marks a continuation of the IPIDEA proxy network disruption from January. According to Google Cloud, those working on the operation believe NetNut was among the most popular residential proxy netw
  
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• AI bills are baffling the C-suite after shift to usage-based pricing

  03-07-2026 12:35 via theregister.com
  
  Nearly a third of corporate leaders report difficulty understanding and controlling operating costs when implementing business AI at scale, according to a survey from KPMG. In recent months, Anthropic, OpenAI, and GitHub have shifted some services away from flat-rate subscriptions toward usage-based billing. "As usage-based pricing models become more common, many organizations are still building the capabilities required to forecast, monitor, and manage AI spending effectively," KPMG said. The s
  
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• The brain scan that could reveal a cold-blooded killer: Scientists discover key difference in people who commit premeditated murder

  03-07-2026 12:34 via dailymail.com
  
  Scientists have uncovered the brain structure that could reveal whether someone is a cold-blooded killer.
  
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• Male runners are twice as likely to hit the wall during a marathon, and scientists say their egos might be to blame

  03-07-2026 11:50 via dailymail.com
  
  Suddenly hitting the wall when the race seemed to be going so well is a sensation many marathon runners will know and dread.
  
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• EU appears to find datacenter emissions easier to offset than lobbyists

  03-07-2026 11:15 via theregister.com
  
  The European Union's proposed environmental rating system for datacenters may be amended in response to lobbying from IT industry heavyweights, making it easier to offset greenhouse gas emissions using clean energy certificates. According to the Financial Times, the European Commission is weakening its original proposals after pressure from datacenter operators and tech giants. The newspaper claims to have seen the revised draft of the regulations, set to be discussed by representatives of membe
  
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• El Niño is RAPIDLY strengthening, experts say - and the consequences could be catastrophic

  03-07-2026 10:32 via dailymail.com
  
  Super El Niño has officially begun in the tropical Pacific and is now rapidly strengthening, scientists warn.
  
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• Databricks unifies OLTP and OLAP, depending on what counts as a copy

  03-07-2026 10:30 via theregister.com
  
  When Databricks claimed to have cracked an age-old database problem, it came with a clear marketing message: "One data, zero compromises, zero copies." Inevitably, that led engineers to search for clarity. After all, the company claimed to have unified OLTP and OLAP with "no data duplication." Databricks, which was founded around the open source unified analytics engine Apache Spark, called its invention LTAP, which stands for lake transactional/analytical processing. It works with Reyden &ndash
  
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• User swore hacker called General Failure had invaded his PC

  03-07-2026 08:30 via theregister.com
  
  ON CALL Fronting up to work on Friday morning can feel like a mistake, but The Register tries to make it worthwhile by bringing you a new installment of On Call – the reader-contributed column that shares your tech support stories. This week, meet a reader we'll Regomize as "Lee" who told us about his time as sysadmin at the headquarters of a retail company. "It was about the year 2000 and I was a newly minted Certified NetWare Engineer administering Novell servers," Lee reminisced. Before
  
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• Failed blockchain project ends with big fine for fibs about it being on track

  03-07-2026 06:35 via theregister.com
  
  The attempt by Australia’s Securities Exchange (ASX) to replace its core trading platform with a blockchain-based system has ended with an A$20.5 million fine ($14.2 million/£10.6 million), further humiliation after the project flopped. The ASX runs a platform called the Clearing House Electronic Subregister System (CHESS) to process and track trades on its exchange. In 2017, the ASX decided to replace CHESS, citing difficulties maintaining the application, which the bourse coded in
  
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• Brace for weather chaos! El Niño is RAPIDLY strengthening, experts say - and the consequences could be catastrophic

  03-07-2026 06:00 via dailymail.com
  
  Super El Niño has officially begun in the tropical Pacific and is now rapidly strengthening, scientists warn.
  
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• Amazon’s Mechanical Turk to stop accepting new customers – and not even AI can save it

  03-07-2026 04:22 via theregister.com
  
  Amazon Web Services will stop accepting new customers for its Mechanical Turk crowdsourcing service, and not even AI can save it. Mechanical Turk is a crowdsourcing marketplace that allows users to post gigs, and workers to bid for the chance to do them. The service's name references an 18th-century machine that its inventor claimed could play chess - but which was actually operated remotely by a human. AWS launched Mechanical Turk in November 2005 – a time when the cloudy concern focused
  
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• In a volatile world, a consistent sustainability policy is critical

  03-07-2026 03:00 via theregister.com
  
  Sustainability demands progress on several fronts at once. For example, societies must reduce factory energy use, roll out EVs, and ensure that communications equipment can operate off-grid to extend educational opportunities to children in remote areas. China-based telecoms giant ZTE pursues all of these. CDP, a non-profit that runs an environmental disclosure system, has included the company on its CDP A list for the last three years. ZTE's progress against ambitious goals for carbon emissions
  
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• Dev says Google warned him about account hijack – then charged him $11,000 anyway

  03-07-2026 01:08 via theregister.com
  
  During a 48-hour period from June 7 to 8, developer Charles Jones's Google Cloud account registered $11,089.77 in charges - most related to the use of Gemini image-generation models. Yet Jones, a solo developer who runs programmatic SEO and insurance sites, told The Register that he doesn't have any workflow that generates AI images. Google suspended his account anyway. A suspension notification sent to Jones on June 7 justified the decision by stating his account "was engaged in abusive activit
  
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• Startup sues Palo Alto Networks' Koi Security, saying an AI-hallucinated report falsely linked it to Chinese espionage

  03-07-2026 00:47 via theregister.com
  
  MeetingTV has sued Palo Alto Networks after its newly acquired Koi Security threat-intelligence biz published a blog that linked the video conferencing and webinar startup to a Chinese corporate espionage operation. The legal complaint filed against Koi Security, its researchers, and Palo Alto Networks alleges that Koi used an LLM to generate the threat report, the AI system hallucinated findings about MeetingTV, and the security shop then published those as facts in a December 30 blog. It accus
  
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• Nvidia floats double-dipping datacenter financing scheme

  02-07-2026 23:55 via theregister.com
  
  AI infrastructure doesn't come cheap. To keep up, rent-a-GPU outfits such as CoreWeave and Lambda have had to borrow billions of dollars from venture capitalists and hedge funds to bankroll their datacenter build outs. So long as their revenues are greater than the interest payments on the loans, they have the potential to make a profit. Unfortunately for entrepreneurs looking to cash in on the AI hype, not everyone with a bright idea can tap into this kind of funding. But don’t worry, Nvi
  
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