ICT news

• Biden To Pledge $500 Million To Stop Deforestation In Brazil

  20-04-2023 23:30 via news.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from the New York Times: President Biden on Thursday will pledge $500 million over five years to fight deforestation in Brazil, a White House official said, in a move that would make the United States one of the largest donors to the global Amazon Fund. But the pledge would require approval from Congress, where Republicans are overwhelmingly opposed to international climate assistance and have made it difficult for President Biden to deliver on his promises to
  
  Read more

• PlayStation To Acquire AAA Multiplayer Developer Firewalk Studios

  20-04-2023 22:53 via games.slashdot.org
  
  PlayStation has agreed to acquire Firewalk Studios, the AAA multiplayer developer that is working on a live service game for PS5 and PC. From a report: If the name sounds familiar, it's because Sony had already announced it would be publishing Firewalk's first game back in April 2021. It is the third dedicated live-service game studio that PlayStation has acquired over the last 18 months, alongside Bungie and Haven Studios. Firewalk was set-up in 2018 as part of ProbablyMonsters (a collective of
  
  Read more

• Proton Launches an End-to-End Encrypted Password Manager

  20-04-2023 20:40 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  Proton, the company behind Proton Mail, has announced the launch of a new password manager: Proton Pass. While the service will eventually become free for everyone to use, it's currently only available as a beta to Proton's Lifetime and Visionary users for now. From a report: As is the case with Proton's other products, Proton Pass uses end-to-end encryption (E2EE) that's supposed to keep your personal information away from prying eyes, including third parties and Proton itself. In addition to l
  
  Read more

• Google To Deploy Generative AI To Create Sophisticated Ad Campaigns

  20-04-2023 20:08 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Google plans to introduce generative artificial intelligence into its advertising business over the coming months, as Big Tech groups rush to incorporate the groundbreaking technology into their products. From a report: According to an internal presentation to advertisers seen by the Financial Times, the Alphabet-owned company intends to begin using the AI to create novel advertisements based on materials produced by human marketers. "Generative AI is unlocking a world of creativity," the compan
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Google Consolidates AI Research Divisions Into Google DeepMind

  20-04-2023 19:25 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  As Google looks to maintain pace in AI with the rest of the tech giants, it's consolidating its AI research divisions. From a report: Google today announced Google DeepMind, a new unit made up of the DeepMind team and the Google Brain team from Google Research. In a blog post, DeepMind co-founder and CEO Demis Hassabis said that Google DeepMind will work "in close collaboration ... across the Google product areas" to "deliver AI research and products." As a part of Google DeepMind's formation, G
  
  Read more

• Amazon Launches Program To Identify and Track Counterfeiters

  20-04-2023 18:48 via slashdot.org
  
  Amazon has launched its Anti-Counterfeiting Exchange (ACX), an initiative to help retail stores label and track marketplace counterfeits as part of the e-commerce giant's efforts to crack down on organized crime on its platform, the company announced on Thursday. From a report: Online marketplaces in the United States including Amazon face hurdles in keeping counterfeiters off their platforms and fake merchandise from entering their warehouses. The new program mimics data exchange programs by th
  
  Read more

• When Apple Comes Calling, 'It's the Kiss of Death'

  20-04-2023 18:00 via apple.slashdot.org
  
  Aspiring partners accuse Apple of copying their ideas. From a report: It sounded like a dream partnership when Apple reached out to Joe Kiani, the founder of a company that makes blood-oxygen measurement devices. He figured his technology was a perfect fit for the Apple Watch. Soon after meeting him, Apple began hiring employees from his company, Masimo, including engineers and its chief medical officer. Apple offered to double their salaries, Mr. Kiani said. In 2019, Apple published patents und
  
  Read more

• A Tech Industry Pioneer Sees a Way for the US To Lead in Advanced Chips

  20-04-2023 17:20 via news.slashdot.org
  
  Ivan Sutherland played a key role in foundational computer technologies. Now he sees a path for America to claim the mantle in "superconducting" chips. From a report: It has been six decades since Ivan Sutherland created Sketchpad, a software system that foretold the future of interactive and graphical computing. In the 1970s, he played a role in rallying the computer industry to build a new type of microchip with hundreds of thousands of circuits that would become the foundation of today's semi
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Google Calls for Relaxing of Australia's Copyright Laws So AI Can Mine Websites For Information

  20-04-2023 16:40 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Google and other tech giants have called on the Australian government to relax copyright laws to allow artificial intelligence to mine websites for information across the internet. From a report: In a submission to the government's review of copyright enforcement published this week, Google argued the government needs to consider whether copyright law has "the necessary flexibilities" to support the development of AI. The company has called for the introduction of a fair dealing exception for te
  
  Read more

• SpaceX Launches Debut Flight of Starship Rocket System

  20-04-2023 15:53 via science.slashdot.org
  
  SpaceX on Thursday launched its next-generation Starship cruise vehicle for the first time atop the company's powerful new Super Heavy booster rocket, in a highly anticipated, uncrewed test flight from the Gulf Coast of Texas. From a report: The two-stage rocketship, standing taller than the Statue of Liberty at 394 feet (120 m) high, blasted off from the company's Starbase spaceport and test facility east of Brownsville, Texas, on a planned 90-minute debut flight into space. A live SpaceX webca
  
  Read more

• Seagate To Pay $300 Million Penalty For Shipping Huawei 7 Million Hard Drives

  20-04-2023 15:00 via hardware.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Seagate has agreed to pay a $300 million penalty in a settlement with U.S. authorities for shipping over $1.1 billion worth of hard disk drives to China's Huawei in violation of U.S. export control laws, the Department of Commerce said on Wednesday. Seagate sold the drives to Huawei between August 2020 and September 2021 despite an August 2020 rule that restricted sales of certain foreign items made with U.S. technology to the company. Huawei was
  
  Read more

• CISA to Continue and Enhance U.K.’s Logging Made Easy Tool

  20-04-2023 14:00 via cisa.gov
  CISA has announced plans to continue and enhance the Logging Made Easy (LME) tool, a service originally developed and maintained by the United Kingdom’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC-UK). NCSC-UK stopped supporting the open-source log management solution for Windows-based devices tool on March 31, 2023. LME reduces log management burden and provides greater transparency into operating system and network security across deployed devices.
  CISA’s enhanced LME tool will be availab
  
  Read more

• CISA Releases Malware Analysis Report on ICONICSTEALER

  20-04-2023 14:00 via cisa.gov
   CISA has released a new Malware Analysis Report (MAR) on an infostealer known as ICONICSTEALER. This trojan has been identified as a variant of malware used in the supply chain attack against 3CX’s Desktop App.
  CISA recommends users and administrators to review the following resources for more information, and hunt for the listed indicators of compromise (IOCs) for potential malicious activity:
  MAR-10435108.r1.v1 – ICONICSTEALER
  Supply Chain Attack Against 3CXDesktopApp
  
  Read more

• ICANN/Verisign Proposal Would Allow Any Government To Seize Domain Names

  20-04-2023 12:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Longtime Slashdot reader GeorgeK and author at FreeSpeech.com writes: ICANN and Verisign have quietly proposed enormous changes to global domain name policy in their proposed renewal of the .NET registry agreement, which is now open for public comments. They've proposed allowing any government in the world to cancel, redirect, or transfer to their control applicable domain names. This is an outrageous and dangerous proposal that must be stopped, as it does not respect due process. While this pro
  
  Read more

• Defunct NASA Satellite Returns To Earth After 21 Years

  20-04-2023 09:00 via science.slashdot.org
  
  A NASA satellite that observed solar flares and helped scientists understand the sun's powerful bursts of energy will fall to Earth this week, almost 21 years after it was launched. CNN reports: The retired Reuven Ramaty High Energy Solar Spectroscopic Imager (RHESSI) spacecraft, which launched in 2002 and was decommissioned in 2018, is expected to reenter Earth's atmosphere Wednesday at approximately 9:30 p.m. ET, according to NASA. The spacecraft was equipped with an imaging spectrometer, whic
  
  Read more

• Scientists Identify Mind-Body Nexus In Human Brain

  20-04-2023 05:30 via science.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Researchers said on Wednesday they have discovered that parts of the brain region called the motor cortex that govern body movement are connected with a network involved in thinking, planning, mental arousal, pain, and control of internal organs, as well as functions such as blood pressure and heart rate. They identified a previously unknown system within the motor cortex manifested in multiple nodes that are located in between areas of the brain
  
  Read more

• Google Fi Gets Third Rebrand In 8 Years

  20-04-2023 03:25 via mobile.slashdot.org
  
  Google Fi, Google's cellular service, is getting its third rebrand in eight years. Ars Technica reports: First it was Project Fi, then Google Fi, and now it's "Google Fi Wireless." It also has its third logo, and this one's kind of clever: It's an "F" styled to look like sideways signal bars and in Google's trademark rainbow colors. There is also now a free trial mode. Google is harnessing the power of remotely configurable eSIMs to give anyone with an eSIM-compatible phone a seven-day/10GB free
  
  Read more

• Why Video Editors Are Switching To DaVinci Resolve In Droves

  20-04-2023 02:45 via news.slashdot.org
  
  Video editors are flocking to DaVinci Resolve in droves, marking a major paradigm shift in the editing landscape that we haven't seen since the dreadful launch of Final Cut Pro X drove users to Adobe Premiere Pro. PetaPixel reports: Resolve has taken a convoluted path to becoming the main rival of the world's biggest non-linear editing (NLE) tool. More a conglomeration of tools than a single program, Resolve came through some acquisitions Blackmagic made when creating a broadcast and cine ecosys
  
  Read more

• Facebook Users Can Now File a Claim For $725 Million Privacy Settlement

  20-04-2023 02:02 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNBC: Facebook users have until August to claim their share of a $725 million class-action settlement of a lawsuit alleging privacy violations by the social media company, a new website reveals. The lawsuit was prompted in 2018 after Facebook disclosed that the information of 87 million users was improperly shared with Cambridge Analytica.People who had an active U.S. Facebook account between May 2007 and December 2022 have until Aug. 25 to enter a claim.
  
  Read more

• Apple's VR Headset Might Run Tweaked Versions of iPad Apps

  20-04-2023 01:20 via apple.slashdot.org
  
  Apple's long-rumored VR / AR headset might run adapted versions of iPad apps, according to a new report from Bloomberg. The mixed reality device's new interface will also apparently let users access "millions" of already-available apps on the App Store. And the headset's apps might not be the only thing that might remind you of the iPad; the Home Screen and Control Center will apparently look like the iPad's as well, Bloomberg says. The Verge reports: Here are some of the apps you can expect, ac
  
  Read more

• Chromebook Expiration Date, Repair Issues 'Bad For People and Planet'

  20-04-2023 00:40 via hardware.slashdot.org
  
  Google Chromebooks expire too soon, saddling taxpayer-funded public schools with excessive expenses and inflicting unnecessary environmental damage, according to the US Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) Education Fund. The Register reports: In a report on Tuesday, titled "Chromebook Churn," US PIRG contends that Chromebooks don't last as long as they should, because Google stops providing updates after five to eight years and because device repairability is hindered by the scarcity of spare
  
  Read more

• Imgur To Ban Nudity Or Sexually Explicit Content Next Month

  20-04-2023 00:20 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  "Imgurians" were sent an email recently letting them know about new changes to the image hosting service's Terms of Service on May 15, 2023. The most apparent new change: nudity and sexually explicit content will not be permitted anywhere on Imgur. Here's what the company has to say about it: Imgur welcomes a diverse audience. We don't want to create a bad experience for someone that might stumble across explicit images, nor is it in our company ethos to support explicit content, so some lascivi
  
  Read more

• Why Universities Should Return To Oral Exams In the AI and ChatGPT Era

  20-04-2023 00:00 via news.slashdot.org
  
  In an op-ed via The Conversation, Stephen Dobson, professor and Dean of Education and the Arts at CQUniversity, Australia, argues that it is time for universities to return to oral exams in the AI and ChatGPT era. An anonymous Slashdot reader shares an excerpt from the report: Imagine the following scenario. You are a student and enter a room or Zoom meeting. A panel of examiners who have read your essay or viewed your performance, are waiting inside. You answer a series of questions as they pro
  
  Read more

Follow @newslocke_ict on Twitter!