ICT news

• Bipartisan Bill Denies Section 230 Protection for AI

  14-06-2023 23:20 via news.slashdot.org
  
  Sens. Josh Hawley and Richard Blumenthal want to clarify that the internet's bedrock liability law does not apply to generative AI, per a new bill introduced Wednesday. From a report: Legal experts and lawmakers have questioned whether AI-created works would qualify for legal immunity under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the law that largely shields platforms from lawsuits over third-party content. It's a newly urgent issue thanks to the explosive of generative AI. The new bipart
  
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• Logitech CEO Bracken Darrell Resigns

  14-06-2023 22:40 via slashdot.org
  
  Logitech made a major announcement this week, revealing that Bracken Darrell, the company's president and CEO, will be leaving to pursue a new opportunity. From a report: Darrell's resignation from his positions as president, CEO, and board member is effective immediately. However, he will stay with the company for the next month to ensure a smooth transition. As part of their succession planning process, Logitech has appointed board member Guy Gecht as the interim CEO while they conduct a globa
  
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• Google Is Weaving Generative AI Into Online Shopping Features

  14-06-2023 22:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Google is bringing generative AI technology to shopping, aiming to get a jump on e-commerce sites like Amazon. From a report: The Alphabet-owned company announced features Wednesday aimed at helping people understand how apparel will fit on them, no matter their body size, and added capabilities for finding products using its search and image-recognition technology. Additionally, Google introduced new ways to research travel destinations and map routes using generative AI -- technology that can
  
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• Microsoft Now Sells Surface Replacement Parts, Including Displays, Batteries, and SSDs

  14-06-2023 21:22 via hardware.slashdot.org
  
  Microsoft is starting to sell replacement components for its Surface devices. The software giant now supplies replacement parts in the Microsoft Store, allowing Surface owners to replace their displays, batteries, SSDs, and more. From a report: "We are excited to offer replacement components to technically inclined consumers for out-of-warranty, self repair," says Tim McGuiggan, VP of devices services and product engineering at Microsoft. "When purchasing a replacement component, you will receiv
  
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• Comcast Complains To FCC That Listing All of Its Monthly Fees is Too Hard

  14-06-2023 20:45 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  mschaffer shares a report: Comcast and other ISPs have annoyed customers for many years by advertising low prices and then charging much bigger monthly bills by tacking on a variety of fees. While some of these fees are related to government-issued requirements and others are not, poorly trained customer service reps have been known to falsely tell customers that fees created by Comcast are mandated by the government. The FCC rules will force ISPs to accurately describe fees in labels given to c
  
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• Fed Pauses Rate Hikes But Signals More Tightening To Come

  14-06-2023 20:12 via news.slashdot.org
  
  Federal Reserve officials paused on Wednesday following 15 months of interest-rate hikes but signaled they would likely resume tightening to cool inflation, projecting more increases than economists and investors expected. From a report: "Holding the target range steady at this meeting allows the committee to assess additional information and its implications for monetary policy," the Federal Open Market Committee said in a statement released in Washington Wednesday. Policymakers also adjusted t
  
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• Quantum Computing Advance Begins New Era, IBM Says

  14-06-2023 19:20 via slashdot.org
  
  Because of their intrinsic ability to consider many possibilities at once, quantum computers do not have to be very large to tackle certain prickly problems of computation, and on Wednesday, IBM researchers announced that they had devised a method to manage the unreliability in a way that would lead to reliable, useful answers. From a report: "What IBM showed here is really an amazingly important step in that direction of making progress towards serious quantum algorithmic design," said Dorit Ah
  
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• Sony Starts Testing Cloud Streaming PS5 Games

  14-06-2023 18:56 via games.slashdot.org
  
  Sony says it has started testing the ability to stream PS5 games from the cloud. The PlayStation maker says it's testing cloud streaming for PS5 games and is planning to add this as a feature to its PlayStation Plus Premium subscription. From a report: "We're currently testing cloud streaming for supported PS5 games -- this includes PS5 titles from the PlayStation Plus Game Catalog and Game Trials, as well as supported digital PS5 titles that players own," says Nick Maguire, VP of global service
  
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• Google Faces EU Break-Up Order Over Anti-Competitive Adtech Practices

  14-06-2023 18:07 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Alphabet's Google may have to sell part of its lucrative adtech business to address concerns about anti-competitive practices, EU regulators said on Wednesday, threatening the company with its harshest regulatory penalty to date. From a report: The European Commission set out its charges in a statement of objections to Google two years after opening an investigation into behaviours such as favouring its own advertising services, which could also lead to a fine of as much as 10% of Google's annua
  
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• Hotel Owners Start To Write Off San Francisco as Business Nosedives

  14-06-2023 17:20 via slashdot.org
  
  San Francisco's once thriving hotel market is suffering its worst stretch in at least 15 years, pummeled by the same forces that have emptied out the city's office towers and closed many retail stores. From a report: Hotel owners in New York and Los Angeles are filling nearly as many rooms this year as they did in 2019, according to hotel-data firm STR. Their revenue per available room exceeds what it was before the pandemic. But in San Francisco, hotels are still struggling badly in both occupa
  
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• AWS is Considering AMD's New AI Chips

  14-06-2023 16:43 via slashdot.org
  
  Amazon Web Services, the world's largest cloud computing provider, is considering using new artificial intelligence chips from AMD, though it has not made a final decision, an AWS executive told Reuters. From the report: The remarks came during an AMD event where the chip company outlined its strategy for the AI market, which is dominated by rival Nvidia. In interviews with Reuters, AMD Chief Executive Lisa Su outlined an approach to winning over major cloud computing customers by offering a men
  
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• Europeans Take a Major Step Toward Regulating AI

  14-06-2023 16:03 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  The European Union took an important step on Wednesday toward passing what would be one of the first major laws to regulate artificial intelligence, a potential model for policymakers around the world as they grapple with how to put guardrails on the rapidly developing technology. From a report: The European Parliament, a main legislative branch of the E.U., passed a draft law known as the A.I. Act, which would put new restrictions on what are seen as the technology's riskiest uses. It would sev
  
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• Apple Faces Trademark Battle With Huawei To Use 'Vision Pro' Name In China

  14-06-2023 15:00 via apple.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from MacRumors: Apple may be forced to change the name of its new mixed reality headset in China unless it can come to an agreement with Huawei, which already owns the "Vision Pro" trademark in the country. Originally spotted by MyDrivers, the trademark was originally granted to Huawei on May 16, 2019, and gives the company exclusive rights to its use in China from November 28, 2021 to November 27, 2031. Huawei actively uses the trademark in China, and offers
  
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• CISA and Partners Release Joint Advisory on Understanding Ransomware Threat Actors: LockBit

  14-06-2023 14:00 via cisa.gov
  Today, CISA, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center (MS-ISAC), and international partners released Understanding Ransomware Threat Actors: LockBit, a joint Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) to help organizations understand and defend against threat actors using LockBit, the most globally used and prolific Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) in 2022 and 2023. This guide is a comprehensive resource detailing the observed common vulnerabilities and
  
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• CISA and NSA Release Joint Guidance on Hardening Baseboard Management Controllers (BMCs)

  14-06-2023 14:00 via cisa.gov
  Today, CISA, together with the National Security Agency (NSA), released a Cybersecurity Information Sheet (CSI), highlighting threats to Baseboard Management Controller (BMC) implementations and detailing actions organizations can use to harden them. 
  BMCs are trusted components designed into a computer's hardware that operate separately from the operating system (OS) and firmware to allow for remote management and control, even when the system is shut down. Hardened credentials, firmware u
  
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• 'Breakthrough' Could Explain Why Life Molecules Are Left- Or Right-Handed

  14-06-2023 12:00 via science.slashdot.org
  
  Researchers have proposed a new explanation for the origin of biological handedness or "homochirality," reports Science Magazine. "In three new papers, researchers suggest magnetic minerals common on early Earth could have caused key biomolecules to accumulate on their surface in just one mirror image form, setting off a positive feedback that continued to favor the same form." From the report: Chemical reactions are typically unbiased, yielding equal amounts of right- and left-handed molecules.
  
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• Meta Open Sources An AI-Powered Music Generator

  14-06-2023 09:00 via news.slashdot.org
  
  TechCrunch's Kyle Wiggers writes: Not to be outdone by Google, Meta has released its own AI-powered music generator -- and, unlike Google, open-sourced it. Called MusicGen, Meta's music-generating tool, a demo of which can be found here, can turn a text description (e.g. "An '80s driving pop song with heavy drums and synth pads in the background") into about 12 seconds of audio, give or take. MusicGen can optionally be "steered" with reference audio, like an existing song, in which case it'll tr
  
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• Ocean Temperatures Are Off the Charts

  14-06-2023 05:30 via news.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Phys.Org: In a world of worsening climate extremes, a single red line has caught many people's attention. The line, which charts sea surface temperatures in the North Atlantic Ocean, went viral over the weekend for its startling display of unprecedented warming -- nearly 2 degrees (1.09 Celsius) above the mean dating back to 1982, the earliest year with comparable data. Ocean temperatures are so anomalously high that Eliot Jacobson, a retired mathematics
  
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• US Judge Temporarily Blocks Microsoft Acquisition of Activision

  14-06-2023 04:02 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  A U.S. judge has granted the FTC request to temporarily block Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard, scheduling a hearing for a preliminary injunction and preventing the deal from closing until a court ruling is made. Reuters reports: U.S. District Judge Edward Davila scheduled a two-day evidentiary hearing on the FTC's request for a preliminary injunction for June 22-23 in San Francisco. Without a court order, Microsoft could have closed on the $69 billion deal as early as Friday. Davi
  
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• Google Home's Script Editor Is Now Live

  14-06-2023 03:25 via developers.slashdot.org
  
  Google has launched its script editor tool, offering advanced automations for Google Home-powered smart homes. The Verge reports: Available starting Tuesday, June 13th, to those in the Google Home public preview, the script editor is part of Google's new home.google.com web interface, which also has live feeds for any Nest cams on your account. The script editor will be coming to the new Google Home app preview starting June 14th. There's no date for general availability.Along with allowing for
  
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• McDonald's Releases a New Game Boy Color Game

  14-06-2023 02:45 via games.slashdot.org
  
  Hmmmmmm writes: Fast food giant McDonald's has released a new retro-style game featuring Grimace, the purple milkshake blob. While it's clearly meant to be played in a browser on a phone or computer, it's also a fully working Game Boy Color game that you can download and play on the original hardware. Grimace's Birthday was developed by Krool Toys, a Brooklyn-based independent game studio and "creative engineering team" with a history of creating playable Game Boy games as unique PR for music ar
  
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• Reddit Communities With Millions of Followers Plan To Extend the Blackout Indefinitely

  14-06-2023 02:02 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Moderators of many Reddit communities are pledging to keep their subreddits private or restricted indefinitely. For the vast majority of subreddits, the blackout to protest Reddit's expensive API pricing changes was expected to last from Monday until Wednesday. But in response to a Tuesday post on the r/ModCoord subreddit, users are chiming in to say that their subreddits will remain dark past that 48-hour window. "Reddit has budged microscopic
  
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• NYC Establishes First Minimum Wage For Food Delivery Workers

  14-06-2023 01:20 via news.slashdot.org
  
  New York City's food delivery workers will be guaranteed a minimum wage for the first time under new regulations announced by Mayor Eric Adams. Gothamist reports: Tens of thousands of delivery workers are slated to make at least $17.96 per hour plus tips by July 12, and at least $19.96 an hour by 2025, city officials said. That's a sharp increase from what delivery workers make now. Many take home less than the city's minimum wage of $15 an hour. The $19.96 hourly rate is less than the $23.82 th
  
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• Researchers Warn of 'Model Collapse' As AI Trains On AI-Generated Content

  14-06-2023 00:40 via slashdot.org
  
  schwit1 shares a report from VentureBeat: [A]s those following the burgeoning industry and its underlying research know, the data used to train the large language models (LLMs) and other transformer models underpinning products such as ChatGPT, Stable Diffusion and Midjourney comes initially from human sources -- books, articles, photographs and so on -- that were created without the help of artificial intelligence. Now, as more people use AI to produce and publish content, an obvious question a
  
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• Hackers Can Steal Cryptographic Keys By Video-Recording Power LEDs 60 Feet Away

  14-06-2023 00:00 via it.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Researchers have devised a novel attack that recovers the secret encryption keys stored in smart cards and smartphones by using cameras in iPhones or commercial surveillance systems to video record power LEDs that show when the card reader or smartphone is turned on. The attacks enable a new way to exploit two previously disclosed side channels, a class of attack that measures physical effects that leak from a device as it performs a cryptog
  
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