ICT news

• VirtualBox 7.0 Adds First ARM Mac Client, Full Encryption, Windows 11 TPM

  13-10-2022 23:20 via tech.slashdot.org
  Nearly four years after its last major release, VirtualBox 7.0 arrives with a... host of new features. Chief among them are Windows 11 support via TPM, EFI Secure Boot support, full encryption for virtual machines, and a few Linux niceties. From a report: The big news is support for Secure Boot and TPM 1.2 and 2.0, which makes it easier to install Windows 11 without registry hacks (the kind Oracle recommended for 6.1 users). It's strange to think about people unable to satisfy Windows 11's secur
  
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• Firefox's New Service Gives You a Burner Phone Number To Cut Down on Spam

  13-10-2022 22:40 via news.slashdot.org
  Firefox Relay, a Mozilla service designed to hide your "real" email address by giving you virtual ones to hand out, is expanding to offer virtual phone numbers. From a report: In a blog post Mozilla product manager Tony Amaral-Cinotto explains that the relay service generates a phone number for you to give out to companies if you suspect they might use it to send you spam messages in the future, or if you think they might share it with others who will. The idea is that handing out this alternati
  
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• Greenland Ice Sheet May Be More Vulnerable To Climate Change, Study Finds

  13-10-2022 22:00 via news.slashdot.org
  Climate change may be having more impact on the melting Greenland ice sheet than previously thought, new research suggests. From a report: The study found rising air temperatures amplify the effects of melting caused by ocean warming, leading to greater ice loss from the world's second largest ice sheet. Experts liken the effect to how ice cubes melt more quickly if they are in a drink that is being stirred -- the combination of warmer liquid and movement accelerates the melting process. Previou
  
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• In the Ultimate Amazon Smart Home, Each Device Collects Your Data

  13-10-2022 21:21 via yro.slashdot.org
  Geoffrey Fowler, writing for The Washington Post: You may not realize all the ways Amazon is watching you. No other Big Tech company reaches deeper into domestic life. Two-thirds of Americans who shop on Amazon own at least one of its smart gadgets, according to Consumer Intelligence Research Partners. Amazon now makes (or has acquired) more than two dozen types of domestic devices and services, from the garage to the bathroom. All devices generate data. But from years of reviewing technology, I
  
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• World's Top Chip Equipment Suppliers Halt Business With China

  13-10-2022 20:40 via tech.slashdot.org
  Leading chip equipment suppliers have suspended sales and services to semiconductor manufacturers in China, as new US export controls disrupt the Chinese tech industry and global companies' operations. From a report: Lam Research, Applied Materials and KLA Corporation, US companies which hold dominant shares in certain segments of the semiconductor manufacturing process, have all taken immediate measures to comply with the new rules, according to several people with direct knowledge of the matte
  
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• Netflix's Ad Tier Will Cost $7 a Month and Launch in November

  13-10-2022 20:00 via entertainment.slashdot.org
  Starting in November, Netflix will roll out its ad-supported tier for $6.99 a month, yet another sign that the onetime disruptive upstart streaming service has slowly become a cable package by another name. From a report: Netflix announced today that its new Basic with Ads tier is slated to launch on November 3rd, 2022, for $6.99 in the US, Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Spain, and the UK. In exchange for making you watch an average of four to five ads p
  
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• Microsoft's Army Goggles Left US Soldiers With Nausea, Headaches in Test

  13-10-2022 19:20 via tech.slashdot.org
  US soldiers using Microsoft's new goggles in their latest field test suffered "mission-affecting physical impairments" including headaches, eyestrain and nausea, according to a summary of the exercise compiled by the Pentagon's testing office. From a report: More than 80% of those who experienced discomfort had symptoms after less than three hours using the customized version of Microsoft's HoloLens goggles, Nickolas Guertin, director of Operation Test and Evaluation, said in a summary for Army
  
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• Inflation Sits at 8.2% as Core Prices Hit Four-Decade High

  13-10-2022 18:22 via news.slashdot.org
  U.S. consumer inflation excluding energy and food accelerated to a new four-decade high in September as prices continued to surge, a sign that persistent cost increases are becoming entrenched in the economy. From a report: The Labor Department on Thursday said that the so-called core measure of the consumer price index -- which excludes volatile energy and food prices -- gained 6.6% in September from a year earlier [PDF], up from 6.3% in August. That marked the biggest increase since August 198
  
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• CISA Releases Twenty-Five Industrial Control Systems Advisories

  13-10-2022 18:13 via us-cert.cisa.gov
  Original release date: October 13, 2022
  CISA has released twenty-five (25) Industrial Control Systems (ICS) advisories on October 13, 2022. These advisories provide timely information about current security issues, vulnerabilities, and exploits surrounding ICS.CISA encourages users and administrators to review the newly released ICS advisories for technical details and mitigations:•    ICSA-22-286-01 Siemens LOGO!•    ICSA-22-286-02 Siemens Industrial Edge
  
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• Carmack: 'There's a Bunch That I'm Grumpy About' in Virtual Reality

  13-10-2022 18:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader shares a report: Last year, former Oculus CTO (and current company advisor) John Carmack threw down the gauntlet for Meta's near-term metaverse plans. By the 2022 Meta Connect conference, Carmack said last October, he hoped he'd be in his headset, "walking around the [virtual] halls or walking around the stage as my avatar in front of thousands of people getting the feed across multiple platforms." Carmack's vision didn't come to pass Tuesday, as a jerky and awkward Carmack a
  
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• Microsoft Office Will Become Microsoft 365 in Major Brand Overhaul

  13-10-2022 17:10 via slashdot.org
  Microsoft is making a major change to its Microsoft Office branding. After more than 30 years, Microsoft Office is being renamed "Microsoft 365" to mark the software giant's collection of growing productivity apps. From a report: While Office apps like Excel, Outlook, Word, and PowerPoint aren't going away, Microsoft will now mostly refer to these apps as part of Microsoft 365 instead of Microsoft Office. Microsoft has been pushing this new branding for years, after renaming Office 365 subscript
  
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• FCC Poised To Ban All US Sales of New Huawei and ZTE Equipment

  13-10-2022 16:40 via tech.slashdot.org
  The Federal Communications Commission plans to ban all sales of new Huawei and ZTE telecommunications devices in the U.S. -- as well as some sales of video surveillance equipment from three other Chinese firms -- out of national security concerns, Axios reported Thursday, citing sources. From the report: The move, which marks the first time the FCC has banned electronics equipment on national security grounds, closes a vise on the two Chinese companies that began tightening during the Trump admi
  
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• Signal To Phase Out SMS Support From the Android App

  13-10-2022 16:01 via yro.slashdot.org
  schwit1 shares a blog post from Signal, the popular instant messaging app: In the interest of privacy, security, and clarity we're beginning to phase out SMS support from the Android app. You'll have several months to export your messages and either find a new app for SMS or tell your friends to download Signal.
  [...] To give some context, when we started supporting SMS, Signal didn't exist yet. Our Android app was called TextSecure and the Signal encryption protocol was called Axolotl. Almost a
  
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• How Wi-Fi Spy Drones Snooped On Financial Firm

  13-10-2022 15:00 via mobile.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Register: Modified off-the-shelf drones have been found carrying wireless network-intrusion kit in a very unlikely place. Greg Linares, a security researcher, recently recounted an incident that he said occurred over the summer at a US East Coast financial firm focused on private investment. He told The Register that he was not involved directly with the investigation but interacted with those involved as part of his work in the finance sector. In a T
  
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• Greece Runs On 100% Renewables For the First Time On Record

  13-10-2022 12:00 via hardware.slashdot.org
  Greece was powered entirely by renewables for the first time ever last week, according to the country's independent power transmission operator (IPTO). Electrek reports: On Monday, IPTO said that renewables accounted for 100% of power generation in Greece for at least five hours, reaching a record high of 3,106 megawatt hours at 0800 GMT: "For the first time in the history of the Greek electricity system, the demand was covered 100% from renewable energy sources. With the interconnections implem
  
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• SpaceX Announces a Second Private Flight To the Moon Aboard Starship

  13-10-2022 09:00 via science.slashdot.org
  Entrepreneur Dennis Tito and his wife, Akiko Tito, announced Wednesday that they purchased two tickets on the second of SpaceX's planned circumlunar flights later this decade. Dennis Tito made history when he became the first person to pay for his own ride into space more than two decades ago. He flew aboard a Soyuz vehicle and spent a week on the International Space Station. As for his wife, Akiko Tito, she becomes the first woman confirmed to fly on Starship, notes Ars Technica. From the repor
  
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• Brooklyn Quantum Network May Hold Key To an Untappable Internet

  13-10-2022 05:30 via tech.slashdot.org
  tedlistens shares a report from Fast Company: Two corners of Brooklyn's historic Navy Yard will be connected by a small test bed for quantum networking, a first step toward a future "quantum internet" that promises to transform computing and make communications untappable. The effort, by a startup company called Qunnect, will join dozens of experiments around the U.S., Europe, and China, but would be the first commercial quantum network in the country, and the first to use only small, room-tempe
  
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• Honda's New $4.4 Billion EV Battery Plant Will Be Built In Ohio

  13-10-2022 04:02 via hardware.slashdot.org
  Honda Motor and LG Energy Solution on Tuesday said a new multibillion-dollar plant to produce batteries for electric vehicles will be located in Ohio. CNBC reports: Construction of the new facility -- located about 40 miles southwest of Columbus -- is expected to begin in early 2023, followed by mass production of lithium-ion batteries by the end of 2025. The battery plant is expected to cost $3.5 billion, with overall investment by the unnamed joint venture eventually reaching $4.4 billion, the
  
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• New Apple Services and Apps Are Rolling Out On Windows 11 and Xbox

  13-10-2022 03:25 via apple.slashdot.org
  Today, Microsoft and Apple announced a number of deeper integrations of Apple services on both Windows PCs and Xbox game consoles, including Music and TV apps for both platforms and the ability to browse your iCloud Photo Library within the Windows 11 Photos app. Ars Technica reports: The Apple Music app for Xbox is already available. Existing users can download the app and start listening to their playlists and stations, while new users can sign up for a one-month trial. The user interface for
  
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• Microsoft Unveils Surface Pro 9 With Choice of Intel or ARM Models, No Headphone Jack

  13-10-2022 02:45 via slashdot.org
  Earlier today, Microsoft unveiled three new Surface computers: the Surface Pro 9, Surface Laptop 5, and Surface Studio 2+. While this year's Surface Pro 9 remains very similar to last year's Surface Pro 8, it's being offered with refreshed Intel 12th-gen CPUs or a "new 5G-equipped model with a custom SQ 3 Arm chip," reports Engadget. From the report: If that sounds confusing to you, well, it is. We last saw the company's SQ chip in the 2020 Surface Pro X, a computer that we found both beautiful
  
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• TikTok Chases Amazon With Plans For US Fulfillment Centers

  13-10-2022 02:02 via news.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Axios: TikTok is planning to build its own product fulfillment centers in the U.S., creating an e-commerce supply chain system that could directly challenge Amazon, as indicated by more than a dozen new job openings posted in the past two weeks to LinkedIn. The move signifies TikTok's commitment to e-commerce as its next major revenue stream, following the explosive growth of its ads business. "By providing warehousing, delivery, and customer service retu
  
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• GM Created a New Energy Business To Sell Batteries, Solar Panels

  13-10-2022 01:33 via hardware.slashdot.org
  General Motors is creating a new energy business to sell batteries, charging equipment, solar panels, and software to residential and commercial customers in a broad-based effort to create a range of accessories that can help sell its lineup of electric vehicles. The Verge reports: The new division, GM Energy, is also a direct shot at Tesla as a major player in renewable energy generation and storage. GM has said it intends to eventually overtake Elon Musk's company in vehicles sales -- and now
  
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• Trump's Truth Social Now Allowed in Google's Play Store

  13-10-2022 01:11 via tech.slashdot.org
  Google has approved Donald Trump's Truth Social app for release in its Play Store, opening up a key distribution channel for the social network ahead of US midterm elections. Bloomberg reports: Google had previously declined to distribute the app, saying it needed to address the fact that it hosted violent threats and other content that goes against Google's standards. Google, which is owned by Alphabet Inc., confirmed on Wednesday that Truth Social was now available. Truth Social has agreed to
  
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• Android Leaks Some Traffic Even When 'Always-On VPN' Is Enabled

  13-10-2022 00:40 via tech.slashdot.org
  Mullvad VPN has discovered that Android leaks traffic every time the device connects to a WiFi network, even if the "Block connections without VPN," or "Always-on VPN," features is enabled. BleepingComputer reports: The data being leaked outside VPN tunnels includes source IP addresses, DNS lookups, HTTPS traffic, and likely also NTP traffic. This behavior is built into the Android operating system and is a design choice. However, Android users likely didn't know this until now due to the inaccu
  
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• Lab-Grown Brain Cells Play Video Game Pong

  13-10-2022 00:00 via games.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: Researchers have grown brain cells in a lab that have learned to play the 1970s tennis-like video game, Pong. They say their "mini-brain" can sense and respond to its environment. Writing in the journal Neuron, Dr Brett Kagan, of the company Cortical Labs, claims to have created the first ''sentient'' lab-grown brain in a dish. Other experts describe the work as ''exciting'' but say calling the brain cells sentient is going too far. "We could fin
  
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