ICT news

• AWS Teases Mysterious Mil-Spec 'Snowblade' Server

  07-06-2023 23:20 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Amazon Web Services has announced a new member of its "Snow" family of on-prem hardware -- but the specs of the machine appear not to be available to eyes outside the US military. From a report: AWS announced the "Snowblade" on Tuesday, revealing it's a "portable, compact 5U, half-rack width form-factor" that can offer up to 209 vCPUs running "AWS compute, storage, and other hybrid services in remote locations, including Denied, Disrupted, Intermittent, and Limited (DDIL) environments."
  The boxe
  
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• Reddit Will Exempt Accessibility-Focused Apps From Its Unpopular API Pricing Changes

  07-06-2023 22:40 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Reddit is creating an exemption to its unpopular new API pricing terms for makers of accessibility apps, which could come as a big relief for some developers worried about how to afford the potentially expensive fees and the users that rely on the apps to browse Reddit. From a report: As long as those apps are noncommercial and "address accessibility needs," they won't have to pay to access Reddit's data. "We've connected with select developers of non-commercial apps that address accessibility n
  
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• Checks Will Be Phased Out in Australia By 2030

  07-06-2023 22:00 via news.slashdot.org
  
  Australia is set to be a cheque-less society by the end of the decade, if the federal government has its way. From a report Treasurer Jim Chalmers announced on Wednesday morning that his government would be moving to phase out cheques by no later than 2030. "We know that usage of cheques has been declining," he said. "This is largely because digital transactions are easier, cheaper and more accessible. "In fact, 98 per cent of retail cheques could be serviced through internet or mobile banking."
  
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• New York City Sues Kia and Hyundai Over Car Thefts That Went Viral on TikTok

  07-06-2023 21:25 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  New York City became the latest city to file suit against Hyundai and Kia over a rash of vehicle thefts that went viral on TikTok and other social media platforms in recent years, according to The Wall Street Journal. From a report: In its lawsuit, the US attorney's office for the Southern District of New York claims the automakers were guilty of negligence by failing to include anti-theft devices in their cars that would have made them much harder to steal. The so-called "Kia Challenge" has led
  
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• Google Cloud is Partnering With Mayo Clinic

  07-06-2023 20:44 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Google's cloud business is expanding its use of new artificial intelligence technologies in health care, giving medical professionals at Mayo Clinic the ability to quickly find patient information using the types of tools powering the latest chatbots. From a report: On Wednesday, Google Cloud said Mayo Clinic is testing a new service called Enterprise Search on Generative AI App Builder, which was introduced Tuesday. The tool effectively lets clients create their own chatbots using Google's tech
  
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• Minecraft Officially Launches for Chromebooks

  07-06-2023 20:01 via games.slashdot.org
  
  Minecraft: Bedrock Edition is now available for Chromebooks, Google announced on Wednesday, following the launch of an early access version in March. From a report: The official Chromebook release makes the game even more widely available -- and thanks to included crossplay functionality, you can play with your friends on other platforms. You can get the game now on the Play Store for ChromeOS. It costs $19.99 in a bundle that comes with the Android version, but if you already have the Android v
  
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• Pornhub Attacks States for Passing 'Unsafe' Age-Verification Laws

  07-06-2023 19:31 via news.slashdot.org
  
  Pornhub visitors in Virginia, Mississippi, and Arkansas will see a "very important message" on the adult website's homepage starting today. From a report: Pornhub's public service announcement prompts visitors to contact representatives and oppose recently passed age-verification laws in these states that Pornhub claims puts children and all users' privacy at risk. If users don't support Pornhub before laws go into effect, the company says, Pornhub could potentially restrict access in these stat
  
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• OpenAI Privately Tells Developers Using Company's Tech That It Won't Compete With Them Beyond ChatGPT

  07-06-2023 18:40 via slashdot.org
  
  Sam Altman, the erudite cofounder and chief executive of OpenAI, has a message for software developers that should set them at ease: The company has no plans to roll out any more consumer-facing products like ChatGPT, according to a now taken-down blog post by a startup founder who attended a private meeting with Altman. From a report: On a stop in London in May, he met behind closed doors with a small group of developers and startup founders, giving them a sneak peek at OpenAI's roadmap and big
  
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• Urban Air-Taxi Pilot Training Outlined in US FAA Proposal

  07-06-2023 18:00 via news.slashdot.org
  
  US aviation regulators on Wednesday unveiled their first framework for how to train pilots for the expected new breed of electric-powered urban air taxis designed to revolutionize short-hop travel in cities. From a report: The Federal Aviation Administration published a proposed set of regulations that attempt to create an orderly process for building a pipeline of pilots on the devices, which don't currently fit into existing regulations. It would allow flight crews trained on existing aircraft
  
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• Wildfire Smoke and Haze in the Eastern United States Should Peak This Week

  07-06-2023 17:23 via news.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader shares a report: There is nothing new about Canadian wildfires in the spring and summer, but what is extraordinary about this year's fires is that so many are active in Quebec, the country's largest province. Typically wildfire season in Canada affects mostly western provinces, such as Alberta. However, this year nearly half of the 423 active wildfires in Canada are in the eastern part of the country, according to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre. Many of these fir
  
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• Apple's New Proton-like Tool Can Run Windows Games on a Mac

  07-06-2023 16:47 via apple.slashdot.org
  
  If you're hoping to see more Windows games on Mac then those dreams might finally come true soon. From a report: Apple has dropped some big news for game developers at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) this week, making it far easier and quicker to port Windows games to Mac thanks to a Proton-like environment that can translate and run the latest DirectX 12 Windows games on macOS. Apple has created a new Game Porting Toolkit that's similar to the work Valve has done with Proton a
  
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• OpenAI Still Not Training GPT-5, Says Sam Altman

  07-06-2023 16:00 via slashdot.org
  
  OpenAI is still not training GPT-5, months after the Microsoft-backed startup pledged to not work on the successor to GPT-4Â"for some time" after many industry executives and academics expressed concerns about the fast-rate of advancements by Sam Altman's large language models. From a report: "We have a lot of work to do before we start that model," Altman, the chief executive of OpenAI, said at a conference hosted by Indian newspaper Economic Times. "We're working on the new ideas that we
  
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• Dell In Hot Water For Making Shoppers Think Overpriced Monitors Were Discounted

  07-06-2023 15:00 via hardware.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Dell Technologies' Australia subsidiary misled online shoppers into thinking that adding a monitor to their purchase would get them a discount on the display, even though doing so sometimes resulted in customers paying a higher price for the monitor than if they had bought it on its own. That's according to a declaration by the Australian Federal Court on Monday. The deceptive practices happened on Dell's Australian website, but they serve a
  
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• CISA and FBI Release #StopRansomware: CL0P Ransomware Gang Exploits MOVEit Vulnerability

  07-06-2023 14:00 via cisa.gov
  CISA and FBI released a joint Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) [CL0P Ransomware Gang Exploits MOVEit Vulnerability] in response to a recent vulnerability exploitation attributed to CL0P Ransomware Gang. This [joint guide] provides indicators of compromise (IOCs) and tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) identified through FBI investigations as recently as May this year. Additionally, it provides immediate actions to help reduce the impact of CL0P ransomware. 
  The CL0P Ransom
  
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• TSA Expands Controversial Facial Recognition Program

  07-06-2023 12:00 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  SonicSpike shares a report from CBS News: As possible record-setting crowds fill airports nationwide, passengers may encounter new technology at the security line. At 25 airports in the U.S. and Puerto Rico, the TSA is expanding a controversial digital identification program that uses facial recognition. This comes as the TSA and other divisions of Homeland Security are under pressure from lawmakers to update technology and cybersecurity. "We view this as better for security, much more efficient
  
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• Satellite Beams Solar Power Down To Earth, In First-of-a-Kind Demonstration

  07-06-2023 09:00 via science.slashdot.org
  
  Researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have successfully demonstrated the capability of steering power in a microwave beam from a satellite to targets in space, as well as transmitting some of that power to a detector on Earth. Science Magazine reports: The Caltech mission, funded by the Donald Bren Foundation and Northrop Grumman Corporation, aimed to go a step further with lightweight, inexpensive, and flexible components. The microwave transmitter was an array of 32 f
  
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• Health Firm 'Grail' Wrongly Told Hundreds of People They Might Have Cancer

  07-06-2023 05:30 via science.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from CBS News: A biotechnology company selling a $949 blood test that it bills as a "first of its kind" to detect cancer said it incorrectly informed about 400 customers that they might have the disease. The Menlo Park, California, company, called Grail, said it sent a form letter to some customers who had bought its Galleri test, which detects a marker for more than 50 types of cancer, "stating incorrectly that a cancer signal was detected," a company spokesw
  
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• Healthcare Org With Over 100 Clinics Uses OpenAI's GPT-4 To Write Medical Records

  07-06-2023 04:02 via science.slashdot.org
  
  US healthcare chain Carbon Health has implemented an AI tool named Carby, powered by OpenAI's GPT-4 language model, to automatically generate medical records from conversations between physicians and patients. The Register reports: If a patient consents to having their meeting recorded and transcribed, the audio recording is passed to Amazon's AWS Transcribe Medical cloud service, which converts the speech to text. The transcript -- along with data from the patient's medical records, including r
  
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• Apple Makes Developer Betas Free To Download and Install

  07-06-2023 03:25 via apple.slashdot.org
  
  Apple has made the Apple Developer Program available for anyone with an Apple ID. Previously, the company limited developer betas to developers who have a paid account that costs $99 per year. MacRumors reports: "OS beta releases" is now listed as an available resource even for those who are not members of the Apple Developer Program. This change means that anyone with an Apple ID can download and install the iOS 17, iPadOS 17, and macOS Sonoma betas without waiting for the public betas to launc
  
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• SEC Asks For Emergency Order To Freeze Binance US Assets Anywhere In the World

  07-06-2023 02:45 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has filed an emergency motion seeking to freeze the assets of Binance's U.S. platform and repatriate the funds held by its customers, including both fiat currency and cryptocurrencies. CNBC reports: The freezing order only applies Binance's two U.S. holding companies, not to the non-U.S. regulated international exchange. The order would apply to dozens of accounts held at Axos Bank, the defunct Silvergate Bank, Prime Trust, and other institutions
  
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• OpenAI CEO Has No IPO Plan Due To 'Strange' Company Structure

  07-06-2023 02:02 via slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Microsoft-backed OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, has no plans to go public any time soon, Chief Executive Sam Altman said at a conference in Abu Dhabi. "When we develop super intelligence, we are likely to make some decisions that most investors would look at very strangely," Altman said. "I don't want to be sued by ... public market, Wall Street etc, so no, not that interested," he said in response to a question on whether he will take OpenA
  
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• Apple's New iOS 17 Will Warn You If Someone Tries To Send Unsolicited Nudes

  07-06-2023 01:20 via apple.slashdot.org
  
  Apple's new iOS 17 includes a Sensitive Content Warning feature that notifies users when they receive unsolicited nude images. Insider reports: Apple said in a press release that the Sensitive Content Warning would help adult users avoid seeing unwanted nude images and videos. The company would not get access to the content as processing for the new feature occurred on the user's device, the press release added. The tech giant is also expanding Communication Safety, a feature aimed at protecting
  
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• Microsoft To Pay $20 Million Settlement For Illegally Collecting Children's Personal Data

  07-06-2023 00:40 via games.slashdot.org
  
  Microsoft has agreed to pay $20 million to settle charges by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) that it illegally collected personal information from children without parental consent and retained it for extended periods. TechCrunch reports: The federal consumer watchdog said Microsoft violated the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), the federal law that governs the online privacy protections for children under the age of 13, which requires companies notify parents about the data t
  
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• Redditor Creates Working Anime QR Codes Using Stable Diffusion

  07-06-2023 00:00 via entertainment.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: On Tuesday, a Reddit user named "nhciao" posted a series of artistic QR codes created using the Stable Diffusion AI image-synthesis model that can still be read as functional QR codes by smartphone camera apps. The functional pieces reflect artistic styles in anime and Asian art. [...] In this case, despite the presence of intricate AI-generated designs and patterns in the images created by nhciao, we've found that smartphone camera apps on
  
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