ICT news

• Google Agrees To Compliance Reforms in DOJ Settlement

  26-10-2022 23:20 via tech.slashdot.org
  Alphabet's Google has agreed to improve its compliance program in a settlement with the U.S. Justice Department, which said the search giant lost data federal investigators sought in connection with a probe into a cryptocurrency exchange. From a report: The DOJ said Tuesday that a third-party independent compliance professional will monitor whether Google holds up its end of the deal. Under the agreement, Google will be required to reform and upgrade the compliance program that handles responses
  
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• EPA Awarding Nearly $1 Billion To Schools For Electric Buses

  26-10-2022 22:41 via news.slashdot.org
  Nearly 400 school districts spanning all 50 states and Washington, D.C., along with several tribes and U.S. territories, are receiving roughly $1 billion in grants to purchase about 2,500 "clean" school buses under a new federal program. From a report: The Biden administration is making the grants available as part of a wider effort to accelerate the transition to zero-emission vehicles and reduce air pollution near schools and communities. Vice President Kamala Harris and Environmental Protecti
  
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• Systemd Supremo Proposes Tightening up Linux Boot Process

  26-10-2022 22:00 via it.slashdot.org
  Lennart Poettering's latest blog post proposes moving the Linux boot process into a "Brave New Trusted Boot World" of cryptographically signed Unified Kernel Images. From a report: Agent Poettering offers a mechanism for tightening up the security of the system startup process on Linux machines, using TPM 2.0 hardware. In brief, what he sees as the problem is that on hardware with Secure Boot enabled, while the boot process up to and including the kernel is signed, the next step, loading the ini
  
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• Saudi Arabia Pushes Ahead With Its Sci-fi City Vision

  26-10-2022 21:20 via news.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader shares a report: If you've been seeing mysterious Bladerunner-type ads popping up on your phone recently for Neom in Saudi Arabia and wondered what on earth you're looking at it's not surprising -- this futuristic desert development is eye-popping in its ambition. With a mammoth budget of $500 billion, Neom is a key element of Saudi's Vision 2030 plan originally launched back in 2016 as part of the kingdom's mission to diversify away from its oil-dependent economy. Excavation
  
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• Atmospheric Levels of All Three Greenhouse Gases Hit Record High

  26-10-2022 20:40 via news.slashdot.org
  Atmospheric levels of all three greenhouse gases have reached record highs, according to a study by the World Meteorological Organization, which scientists say means the world is "heading in the wrong direction." From a report: The WMO found there was the biggest year-on-year jump in methane concentrations in 2020 and 2021 since systematic measurements began almost 40 years ago. Methane levels have risen rapidly in recent years, puzzling scientists. Some blamed it on an increase in fracking in t
  
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• Seagate To Cut 3,000 Jobs, Faces Charge of Violating Sanctions

  26-10-2022 20:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  Seagate, the biggest maker of computer hard drives, said it's eliminating about 3,000 jobs and that big buyers of technology are cutting orders on concerns the economy is worsening. From a report: "Global economic uncertainties and broad-based customer inventory corrections worsened in the latter stages of the September quarter, and these dynamics are reflected in both near-term industry demand and Seagate's financial performance," Chief Executive Officer Dave Mosley said in a statement. "We hav
  
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• Apple Is Working on a 16-Inch iPad, Further Blurring Line With Laptops

  26-10-2022 19:21 via apple.slashdot.org
  Wayne Ma, reporting for The Information: Apple is developing its largest iPad yet, a model with a 16-inch screen that it hopes to release in the fourth quarter of next year, according to a person familiar with the project. The device would further blur the line between the iPad and MacBook, bringing the tablet's screen size in line with that of Apple's largest laptop, which also features a 16-inch display. Apple's biggest iPad currently sports a 12.9-inch screen.Read more of this story at Slashd
  
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• Apple Developers Are Frustrated With Gambling Ads Appearing Across the App Store

  26-10-2022 18:40 via apple.slashdot.org
  Apple just launched new ad placements on the App Store, and developers aren't happy with the types of ads surfacing beneath their apps. From a report: As spotted by MacRumors, several app developers have pointed out that ads for gambling have started appearing in the "You Might Also Like" sections beneath their App Store listings, which is just one of the new places Apple has started sticking ads. Developer Simon B. Stovring posted a screenshot of an ad for an online casino app appearing beneath
  
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• Apple Confirms the iPhone is Getting USB-C, But Isn't Happy About the Reason Why

  26-10-2022 18:00 via apple.slashdot.org
  Apple has given its most direct confirmation yet that a USB-C-equipped iPhone will happen, now that the European Union is mandating that all phones sold in its member countries use the connector if they have a physical charger. From a report: When asked by The Wall Street Journal if the company would replace Lightning, Apple's senior vp of worldwide marketing, Greg Joswiak, answered by saying: "Obviously, we'll have to comply; we have no choice."
  WSJ brought the law up during a talk with Joswiak
  
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• Singapore May Soon Require Retail Investors To Take Test Before Trading Crypto

  26-10-2022 17:20 via slashdot.org
  Singapore may soon require retail investors to take a test and not use credit card payments and other forms of borrowing for trading cryptocurrencies, the central bank proposed on Wednesday in a series of stringent measures as the island nation looks to make citizens aware of the risks surrounding volatile assets. From a report: The Monetary Authority of Singapore said in a set of consultation papers that it's worried that many retail customers may "not have sufficient knowledge of the risks of
  
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• Andreessen Horowitz Went All In on Crypto at the Worst Possible Time

  26-10-2022 16:40 via news.slashdot.org
  As cryptocurrency prices soared last year, no investor bet more on the sector than Andreessen Horowitz. The timing wasn't good. From a report: The storied venture-capital firm had developed a reputation as Silicon Valley's greatest crypto bull, thanks largely to a 50-year-old partner named Chris Dixon who was one of the earliest evangelists for how the blockchain technology powering cryptocurrencies could change business. His unit was one of the most-active crypto investors last year, and in May
  
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• Square Sells Access To Your Inbox. No One Seems To Know If the Law Cares.

  26-10-2022 16:01 via yro.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader shares a report: I wanted to know how all these merchants had gotten my professional contact info. What I discovered was both unsurprising in today's world of relentless online marketing and aggressive consumer data sharing, and also a bit disquieting. It also had less to do with these small shops than I might have expected: Square's parent company, Block, was selling access to customers' inboxes, even if all we do is elect to receive a receipt from a single transaction (more
  
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• Australia's Medibank Says Data of All 4 Million Customers Accessed By Hacker

  26-10-2022 15:00 via it.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Australia's biggest health insurer, said on Wednesday a cyber hack had compromised the data of all of its of its nearly 4 million customers, as it warned of a $16 million to $22.3 million hit to first-half earnings. It said on Wednesday that all personal and significant amounts of health claims data of all its customers were compromised in the breach reported this month, a day after it warned the number of customers affected would grow.Medibank,
  
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• Age of Empires 2, 4 Are Headed To Xbox Next Year

  26-10-2022 12:00 via games.slashdot.org
  Over two decades after its initial release, Age of Empires 2 is finally headed to consoles, alongside the significantly more recent Age of Empires 4. IGN reports: Announced today during the Age of Empires 25th Anniversary Broadcast, we learned that Age of Empires 2: Definitive Edition will launch on Xbox consoles on January 31, 2023, while Age of Empires 4 will follow later in the same year. We're also getting Age of Mythology Retold, a definitive edition of the original 2002 Age of Mythology. T
  
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• New Discovery Could Reduce the Number of Potentially Habitable Planets

  26-10-2022 09:00 via science.slashdot.org
  Longtime Slashdot reader Tablizer shares a report from CNN: The hunt for planets that could harbor life may have just narrowed dramatically. Scientists had long hoped and theorized that the most common type of star in our universe -- called an M dwarf -- could host nearby planets with atmospheres, potentially rich with carbon and perfect for the creation of life. But in a new study of a world orbiting an M dwarf 66 light-years from Earth, researchers found no indication such a planet could hold
  
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• New Zealand Uber Drivers Win Landmark Case Declaring Them Employees

  26-10-2022 05:30 via yro.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Guardian: A group of New Zealand Uber drivers have won a landmark case against the global ridesharing company, forcing it to treat them as employees, not contractors, and entitling them to a suite of worker rights and protections. New Zealand's employment court ruled on Tuesday that the drivers were employees, not independent contractors. While the ruling applies specifically to the case of four drivers, the court noted that it may have wider implicat
  
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• FAA Warns of Aviation Safety Risks Without US Mandate On 5G Limits

  26-10-2022 04:02 via tech.slashdot.org
  The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) wants the U.S. telecommunications regulatory agency to ensure a delay in some 5G C-Band transmissions from smaller operators. Reuters reports: Acting FAA Administrator Billy Nolen said the agency wants the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to mandate voluntary mitigations that AT&T and Verizon agreed to earlier this year mandated for 19 smaller telecoms and other spectrum holders. In a previously unreported letter dated Friday, Nolen cited indu
  
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• Nvidia RTX 4090's Power Draw May Be Too Much For Its Power Connector To Handle

  26-10-2022 03:25 via it.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader shares a report: Nvidia's $1,599 GeForce RTX 4090 is an incredibly powerful graphics card, but its performance comes at the cost of high power draw. Like a few of the RTX 3000-series cards, Nvidia uses a new kind of 16-pin 12VHPWR power connector to supply all that power to the card -- you can plug up to four 8-pin GPU power cables into the 12VHPWR adapter, which then plugs into the connector on the GPU, saving some board space.
  But at least two RT 4090 users are now reportin
  
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• Rishi Sunak Is the First Crypto Enthusiast To Serve In UK's Top Office

  26-10-2022 02:45 via news.slashdot.org
  Gizmodo points out that the United Kingdom's next prime minister, Rishi Sunak, "is a certified Crypto Bro who once requested that the Royal Mint issue an NFT." From the report: During his tenure as finance minister under former PM Boris Johnson, Sunak was in charge of advancing a number of crypto-related initiatives that sought to normalize digital currencies and integrate them into the British economy. By all accounts, he is the first crypto enthusiast to serve in the UK's top office. He's also
  
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• The Largest Electric School Bus Fleet In the US Launches In Maryland

  26-10-2022 02:02 via tech.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Electrek: Montgomery County Public Schools, one of the largest school districts in the US, has deployed the single largest electric school bus fleet in the country. Last school year, the school district saw the delivery of its first 25 electric buses and installed electric infrastructure at one of its transportation depots. It's now added 61 more electric buses to its fleet, for a total of 86. Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) will replace 326 diese
  
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• Oculus Founder Palmer Luckey Compares Facebook's Metaverse To a 'Project Car'

  26-10-2022 01:20 via tech.slashdot.org
  Palmer Luckey is not a fan of what Mark Zuckerberg has so far produced for the metaverse, although he does think it could eventually succeed. Insider reports: The Oculus founder, speaking Monday during The Wall Street Journal conference Tech Live, said of Horizon Worlds, Facebook's core metaverse product: "I don't think it's a good product." "It's not good, it's not fun," Luckey said of Horizon. "Most people on the team would agree it's not a good product." "Mark Zuckerberg is the number one vir
  
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• Chrome To Drop Support For Windows 7 In 2023

  26-10-2022 00:40 via tech.slashdot.org
  Chrome will no longer support Windows 7 nor Windows 8.1 upon the release of Chrome 110, currently scheduled to hit stable on February 7, 2023. From that point on, you'll need to be running at least Windows 10 to maintain access to new builds. Android Police reports: While Google won't be doing anything to stop users of older platforms from continuing to install and run earlier releases of Chrome, they'd be missing out on the latest critical security and usability enhancements.Read more of this s
  
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• Passkeys Are Finally Here

  26-10-2022 00:00 via yro.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Generically, passkeys refer to various schemes for storing authenticating information in hardware, a concept that has existed for more than a decade. What's different now is that Microsoft, Apple, Google, and a consortium of other companies have unified around a single passkey standard shepherded by the FIDO Alliance. Not only are passkeys easier for most people to use than passwords; they are also completely resistant to credential phishing
  
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