ICT news

• GitLab Loses One-Third of Its Value After Weak Revenue Forecast

  14-03-2023 23:40 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  GitLab shares plunged as much as 38% in extended trading after the provider of source code management software gave full-year revenue guidance that fell short of expectations. CNBC reports: Here's how the company did:Earnings: Loss of 3 cents per share, adjusted, vs. loss of 14 cents per share as expected by analysts, according to Refinitiv.Revenue: $122.9 million, vs. $119.6 million as expected by analysts, according to Refinitiv.
  Revenue increased 58% year over year in the quarter that ended J
  
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• Microsoft Signs Another Call of Duty Deal In Bid To Impress Regulators

  14-03-2023 23:00 via games.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Microsoft announced Tuesday that it has signed a 10-year deal to bring its Xbox PC games to little-known Ukraine-based streaming platform Boosteroid. The move is being positioned in part to "mak[e] even more clear to regulators that our acquisition of Activision Blizzard will make Call of Duty available on far more devices than before," as Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith said in a statement. "If the only argument is that Micros
  
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• Mozilla Releases Security Updates for Firefox 111 and Firefox ESR 102.9

  14-03-2023 22:27 via cisa.gov
  Mozilla has released security updates to address vulnerabilities in Firefox 111 and Firefox ESR 102.9. An attacker could exploit some of these vulnerabilities to take control of an affected system.
  CISA encourages users and administrators to review Mozilla’s security advisories for Firefox 111 and Firefox ESR 102.9 for more information and apply the necessary updates.
  Please share your thoughts. We recently updated our anonymous Product Feedback Survey and we'd wel
  
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• Anthropic Launches Claude, a Chatbot To Rival OpenAI's ChatGPT

  14-03-2023 22:20 via slashdot.org
  
  Anthropic, a startup co-founded by ex-OpenAI employees, today launched something of a rival to the viral sensation ChatGPT. From a report: Called Claude, Anthropic's AI -- a chatbot -- can be instructed to perform a range of tasks, including searching across documents, summarizing, writing and coding, and answering questions about particular topics. In these ways, it's similar to OpenAI's ChatGPT. But Anthropic makes the case that Claude is "much less likely to produce harmful outputs," "easier
  
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• Reddit Has Been Down For More Than An Hour

  14-03-2023 21:58 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Reddit is currently experiencing a big outage affecting its websites and apps, according to the company's status page. The Verge reports: "We've identified an internal systems issue and are working to determine a fix," the company wrote at 12:56PM ET on its status page. The preceding message, from nearly 40 minutes before, notes that Reddit is "is currently offline." The problem appears to be widespread, with about 50,000 people reporting issues on Downdetector.Read more of this story at Slashdo
  
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• Ransomware Attacks Have Entered a Heinous New Phase

  14-03-2023 21:40 via it.slashdot.org
  
  Cybercriminal gangs now releasing stolen photos of cancer patients, student records. From a report: In February, attackers from the Russia-based BlackCat ransomware group hit a physician practice in Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, that's part of the Lehigh Valley Health Network (LVHN). At the time, LVHN said that the attack "involved" a patient photo system related to radiation oncology treatment. The health care group said that BlackCat had issued a ransom demand, "but LVHN refused to pay this
  
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• Microsoft Releases March 2023 Security Updates

  14-03-2023 21:19 via cisa.gov
  Microsoft has released updates to address multiple vulnerabilities in Microsoft software. An attacker can exploit some of these vulnerabilities to take control of an affected system.
  CISA encourages users and administrators to review Microsoft’s March 2023 Security Update Guide and Deployment Information and apply the necessary updates.
  
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• EPA To Limit Toxic 'Forever Chemicals' in Drinking Water

  14-03-2023 21:00 via news.slashdot.org
  
  The Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday proposed the first federal limits on harmful "forever chemicals" in drinking water, a long-awaited protection the agency said will save thousands of lives and prevent serious illnesses, including cancer. From a report: The plan would limit toxic PFAS chemicals to the lowest level that tests can detect. PFAS, or per- and polyfluorinated substances, are a group of compounds that are widespread, dangerous and expensive to remove from water. They don't
  
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• Google To Reportedly Launch Foldable Phone in June

  14-03-2023 19:40 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader shares a report: The Google Pixel Fold could be available as soon as the second week in June, according to WinFuture's Roland Quandt. The reliable leaker tweeted on Tuesday that the phone will come with 256GB base storage and that you'll be able to get it in either a black / dark gray color or white. The foldable has been rumored for a long time, and there have been whispers that it would be announced sometime in the next few months. However, a January report from The Elec th
  
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• Credit Suisse Finds 'Material Weakness' in Its Financial Reporting

  14-03-2023 19:00 via slashdot.org
  
  Credit Suisse acknowledged "material weakness" in its financial reporting Tuesday as it scrapped bonuses for top executives in the wake of the bank's worst annual performance since the global financial crisis. From a report: The embattled Swiss lender also said chairman Axel Lehmann had proposed to "voluntarily waive" a share award worth 1.5 million Swiss francs ($1.6 million) for the 2022-2023 financial year, given the firm's "poor financial performance." Credit Suisse (CSGKF) said in its annua
  
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• OpenAI Announces GPT-4

  14-03-2023 18:31 via slashdot.org
  
  After months of rumors and speculation, OpenAI has announced GPT-4: the latest in its line of AI language models that power applications like ChatGPT and the new Bing. From a report: The company claims the model is "more creative and collaborative than ever before," and "can solve difficult problems with greater accuracy, thanks to its broader general knowledge and problem solving abilities." OpenAI says it's already partnered with a number of companies to integrate GPT-4 into their products, in
  
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• Zuckerberg Encourages Employees To Get Back To the Office

  14-03-2023 18:22 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader writes: Facebook parent company Meta, which emerged as an outspoken advocate of remote work during the pandemic, is encouraging employees to come back to the office. Some early analysis "suggests that engineers who either joined Meta in-person and then transferred to remote or remained in-person performed better on average than people who joined remotely," Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg said in a statement Tuesday. Zuckerberg cautioned that the data requires further
  
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• India Plans New Security Testing For Smartphones, Crackdown on Pre-Installed Apps

  14-03-2023 17:40 via it.slashdot.org
  
  India plans to force smartphone makers to allow removal of pre-installed apps and mandate screening of major operating system updates under proposed new security rules, according to two people and a government document seen by Reuters. From a report: The new rules, details of which have not been previously reported, could extend launch timelines in the world's No.2 smartphone market and lead to losses in business from pre-installed apps for players including Samsung, Xiaomi, Vivo, and Apple. Ind
  
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• Google Is Rolling Out More AI Features for Customers on the Cloud

  14-03-2023 17:04 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Google announced a raft of new artificial intelligence-powered features for customers of its cloud-computing business, as the technology giant jostles for dominance in the burgeoning field with rivals such as Microsoft and startup OpenAI. From a report: As Silicon Valley buzzes about so-called generative AI -- software that can create images, text and video based on user prompts -- Google Cloud offered a glimpse of what it's doing to keep up in the race. In a demonstration, the company showed ho
  
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• KPMG Gave SVB, Signature Bank Clean Bill of Health Weeks Before Collapse

  14-03-2023 15:40 via slashdot.org
  
  Silicon Valley Bank failed just 14 days after KPMG gave the lender a clean bill of health. Signature Bank went down 11 days after the accounting firm signed off on its audit. From a report: What KPMG knew about the two banks' financial situation and what it missed will likely be the subject of regulatory scrutiny and lawsuits. KPMG signed the audit report for Silicon Valley Bank's parent, SVB Financial Group on Feb. 24. Regulators seized the bank on March 10 after a surge of withdrawals threaten
  
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• Meta To Cut Another 10,000 Jobs and Cancel 'Low Priority Projects'

  14-03-2023 15:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Meta plans to cut its workforce by another 10,000 people, withdraw around 5,000 open roles that it has not filled and cancel some projects, company co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg said Tuesday, confirming recent rumors that another round of layoffs was imminent. From a report: The announcement comes just four months after Meta revealed that it was eliminating about 11,000 roles as the social networking giant pushes to become more efficient this year. Combined, this means that Meta has effecti
  
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• You Can Now Run a GPT-3 Level AI Model On Your Laptop, Phone, and Raspberry Pi

  14-03-2023 14:00 via slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: On Friday, a software developer named Georgi Gerganov created a tool called "llama.cpp" that can run Meta's new GPT-3-class AI large language model, LLaMA, locally on a Mac laptop. Soon thereafter, people worked out how to run LLaMA on Windows as well. Then someone showed it running on a Pixel 6 phone, and next came a Raspberry Pi (albeit running very slowly). If this keeps up, we may be looking at a pocket-sized ChatGPT competitor before we
  
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• US Core CPI Tops Estimates, Pressuring Fed as It Weighs Hike

  14-03-2023 13:43 via news.slashdot.org
  
  Underlying US consumer prices rose in February by the most in five months, an acceleration that leaves the Federal Reserve in a tough position as it tries to thwart still-rapid inflation without adding to the turmoil in the banking sector. From a report: The consumer price index, excluding food and energy, increased 0.5% last month and 5.5% from a year earlier, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data out Tuesday. Economists see the gauge -- known as the core CPI -- as a better indicator of
  
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• AI's Victories In Go Inspire Better Human Game Playing

  14-03-2023 11:00 via games.slashdot.org
  
  Emily Willingham writes via Scientific American: In 2016 a computer named AlphaGo made headlines for defeating then world champion Lee Sedol at the ancient, popular strategy game Go. The "superhuman" artificial intelligence, developed by Google DeepMind, lost only one of the five rounds to Sedol, generating comparisons to Garry Kasparov's 1997 chess loss to IBM's Deep Blue. Go, which involves players facing off by moving black and white pieces called stones with the goal of occupying territory o
  
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• SpaceX Is Getting Ready To Test Its Starlink Satellite-To-Cellphone Service

  14-03-2023 08:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Last summer, Elon Musk and T-Mobile CEO Mike Sievert announced "Coverage Above and Beyond," a joint initiative that aimed to bring Starlink satellite coverage compatible T-Mobile devices. Now, SpaceX is getting ready to begin testing its satellite-to-cellular service. Engadget reports: During a panel at the Satellite Conference and Exhibition 2023, SpaceX VP of Starlink enterprise sales Jonathan Hofeller said the company had plans to "start getting into testing" its satellite-to-cell service thi
  
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• US Court Rules Uber and Lyft Workers Are Contractors

  14-03-2023 06:00 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  A US court has ruled (PDF) that "gig" economy giants including Uber and Lyft can continue treating their workers as independent contractors in the state of California. The BBC reports: The California appeals court found that a labor measure, known as Proposition 22, was largely constitutional. Labour groups and some workers had opposed the measure, saying it robbed them of rights like sick leave. The firms say the proposition protects other benefits such as flexibility.The latest ruling overturn
  
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• How Medicare Advantage Plans Use Algorithms To Cut Off Care For Seniors In Need

  14-03-2023 04:30 via science.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from STAT News: Health insurance companies have rejected medical claims for as long as they've been around. But a STAT investigation found artificial intelligence is now driving their denials to new heights in Medicare Advantage, the taxpayer-funded alternative to traditional Medicare that covers more than 31 million people. Behind the scenes, insurers are using unregulated predictive algorithms, under the guise of scientific rigor, to pinpoint the precise mom
  
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• Online Tests Suggest IQ Scores In US Dropped For the First Time In Nearly a Century

  14-03-2023 03:02 via science.slashdot.org
  
  A group of psychologists, two from Northwestern University and the third from the University of Oregon, has found via online testing that IQ scores in the U.S. may be dropping for the first time in nearly a century. Phys.Org reports: In this new effort, the researchers studied the results of online IQ tests taken by adults participating in the Synthetic Aperture Personality Assessment Project over a 12-year period. They found that IQ scores have dropped for all age groups, regardless of gender.
  
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• Justice Department Investigating TerraUSD Stablecoin Collapse

  14-03-2023 02:25 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  The U.S. Justice Department is probing last year's collapse of the TerraUSD stablecoin, raising the possibility of criminal charges being filed against the stablecoin's creator, Do Kwon, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing sources familiar with the matter. CoinDesk reports: The FBI and the Southern District of New York have interviewed former employees of Terraform Labs, the company behind TerraUSD, and sought to interview others, according to the Journal. Manhattan federal prosecutors
  
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• Meta Winds Down Support For NFTs

  14-03-2023 01:45 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Meta's head of commerce and financial technologies Stephane Kasriel posted on Twitter that the company will sunset its NFT and digital collectibles features on Instagram and Facebook. TechCrunch reports: This short-lived product only began testing with select Instagram creators last May, plus some Facebook users in June. By July, Meta expanded NFT support on Instagram for creators in 100 countries. Less than a year later, Meta is moving on from NFTs. "We're winding down digital collectibles (NFT
  
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• Marvel Wants Reddit To Expose Mods Suspected of Ant-Man 3 Leak

  14-03-2023 01:02 via entertainment.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from TorrentFreak: In January, a month before Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania was released in theaters, a link to a leaked script was posted on the Marvel Studios Spoilers subreddit. Last Friday, a Marvel Studios affiliate filed DMCA subpoena applications to compel Reddit and Google to expose the leakers. One named user account is shared among the subreddit's moderator team. Court documents indicate the plan is to force Reddit to expose them all. [...]When i
  
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• Discord Promises Outraged Users It Won't Store Call Recordings -- For Now

  14-03-2023 00:20 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  Discord updated their privacy policy to quietly drop their promise to alert users "in advance" if the company ever started storing contents of video calls, voice calls, or channels. Naturally, this alarmed some users who wondered if the company plans to start retaining call recordings. According to a Discord spokesperson, the answer is no. Ars Technica reports: "There has not been a change in Discord's position on how we store or record the contents of video or voice channels," a Discord spokesp
  
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