ICT news

• 61-Year-Old Shot, Killed After Tracking Stolen Vehicle With Apple AirTag

  24-06-2023 23:34 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader shares news from Bakersfield, California:
  Four men were arrested in the shooting death of a 61-year-old Bakersfield woman who died after police said she confronted suspects who reportedly stole her car, according to a news release issued Wednesday. Victoria Anne Marie Hampton tracked her reportedly stolen car with an Apple air tag on March 19 without telling law enforcement, according to the Bakersfield Police Department.
  The coroner reported she was shot at 6:32 p.m.
  Two of
  
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• San Francisco Mayor: Tear Down Abandoned Retail Spaces Downtown

  24-06-2023 22:34 via it.slashdot.org
  
  On Thursday San Francisco's mayor London Breed "proposed remaking the city's struggling downtown by tearing down abandoned retail space..." reports CNN, "and building new structures to reshape the struggling city..."Breed's comments come as San Francisco faces empty offices, a cratering commercial real estate market, and an exodus of retailers from its once-bustling downtown area, especially as pandemic work-from-home policies saw many residents leaving for less expensive parts of the country...
  
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• Harvard Scholar Who Studies Honesty Is Accused of Fabricating Findings

  24-06-2023 21:34 via science.slashdot.org
  
  "Harvard Scholar Who Studies Honesty Is Accused of Fabricating Findings," writes the New York Times. The Harvard Crimson student newspaper has the details:At least four papers authored by Harvard Business School professor Francesca Gino contain fraudulent data, three business school professors allege... The professors wrote that they first contacted Harvard Business School in fall 2021 with concerns of academic misconduct by Gino. "Specifically, we wrote a report about four studies for which we
  
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• Red Hat Enterprised Linux Sources Will Now Be Available To Paying Customers Only

  24-06-2023 20:34 via linux.slashdot.org
  
  "CentOS Stream will now be the sole repository for public RHEL-related source code releases..." Red Hat posted this week on its blog, arguing that "The engagement around CentOS Stream, the engineering levels of investment, and the new priorities we're addressing for customers and partners now make maintaining separate, redundant, repositories inefficient."
  Long-time Slashdot reader slack_justyb notes this means patches and changes will now hit CentOS Stream before actually hitting RHEL, which "w
  
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• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Sources Will Now Be Available To Paying Customers Only

  24-06-2023 20:34 via linux.slashdot.org
  
  "CentOS Stream will now be the sole repository for public RHEL-related source code releases..." Red Hat posted this week on its blog, arguing that "The engagement around CentOS Stream, the engineering levels of investment, and the new priorities we're addressing for customers and partners now make maintaining separate, redundant, repositories inefficient."
  Long-time Slashdot reader slack_justyb notes this means patches and changes will now hit CentOS Stream before actually hitting RHEL, which "w
  
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• Are Energy-Saving LED Lights Also Creating Glaring Problems?

  24-06-2023 19:34 via news.slashdot.org
  
  LED streetlights "shine brightly while using less energy than traditional bulbs," reports the Washington Post. After switching to LED streetlights one county in Washington state conserved 2,612,491 kilowatt-hours.
  But they also discovered a downside. "One year after the change began, the additional glare masked about half of the previously visible stars."Over the past decade, scientists found, the night sky has become nearly 10% brighter each year because of artificial lights, mainly LEDs emitti
  
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• Russian Coup Aided by Telegram, VPNs as Government Blocks Google News

  24-06-2023 18:24 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Yevgeny V. Prigozhin heads the Russia-backed paramilitary Wagner Group — and was also "a close confidant of Russian president Vladimir Putin until he launched an alleged coup," according to Wikipedia.
  The New York Times notes Prigozhin's remarkable ability to bypass government censorship:
  Despite years of creeping Kremlin control over the internet, the mercenary tycoon Yevgeny V. Prigozhin continued to comment live on Saturday through videos, audio recordings and statements posted on the m
  
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• Bitcoin Hits Its Highest Level in a Year

  24-06-2023 17:34 via slashdot.org
  
  "Bitcoin on Friday shot up to its highest level in about a year," reports CNN:The cryptocurrency rose above $31,400 a coin on Friday, its highest level since 2022, before paring back its gains. Bitcoin, the world's largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, earlier this week traded above $30,000 for the first time since April, when the collapses of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank sent investors in search of safer places to hold their cash.
  Bitcoin is up by about 87% this year. Its m
  
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• New Study Bolsters Room-Temperature Superconductor Claim

  24-06-2023 16:34 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: A magical material that could effortlessly conduct electricity at room temperatures would likely transform civilization, reclaiming energy otherwise lost to electrical resistance and opening possibilities for novel technologies. Yet a claim of such a room-temperature superconductor published in March in the prestigious journal Nature, drew doubts, even suspicion by some that the results had been fabricated. But now, a group of research
  
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• US Seeks 70-Month Prison Sentence For YouTube Content ID Scammer

  24-06-2023 15:00 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from TorrentFreak: By pretending to be legitimate music rightsholders, two men managed to extract over $23 million in revenue from YouTube's content-ID system. Both were arrested, pleaded guilty (PDF), and now face multi-year prison terms. This week, the U.S. requested a 70-month sentence against the 'number two' of the operation, in part to deter future fraud. [...] Last year, one of the defendants confessed to his part in the copyright swindle by pleading gu
  
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• 3M Reaches $10.3 Billion Settlement Over Contamination of Water Systems

  24-06-2023 12:00 via science.slashdot.org
  
  3M will pay $10.3 billion to settle lawsuits over contamination of drinking water with PFAS, a class of chemicals known as "forever chemicals" that have been linked to health problems. NPR reports: The deal would compensate water providers for pollution with per- and polyfluorinated substances, known collectively as PFAS -- a broad class of chemicals used in nonstick, water- and grease-resistant products such as clothing and cookware. Described as "forever chemicals" because they don't degrade n
  
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• Amazon Plans To Invest Another $15 Billion in India By 2030

  24-06-2023 10:00 via slashdot.org
  
  Amazon plans to more than double its investment in India in the next seven years, the e-commerce group said, joining a roster of other high-profile American giants ramping up commitment to the South Asian market after meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi this week. From a report: The e-commerce group has invested about $11 billion in India to date and plans to pour another $15 billion more by 2030, Amazon chief executive Andy Jassy said Friday. The vast majority of the new capital is likely
  
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• Eight Teams of Hackers Will Compete To Breach U.S. Satellite In Space

  24-06-2023 09:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  In August, white-hat hackers at the DEFCON hacker convention will compete to try and breach the computer systems on a satellite in orbit. It took four years, but "this year, we are in space for real," said Steve Colenzo, Technology Transfer Lead for the Air Force Research Laboratory's Information Directorate in Rome, New York, and one of the contest organizers. From a report: Hack-A-Sat 4, taking place live at DEFCON Aug. 10-13 in Las Vegas, will be the first-ever hacking contest staged on a veh
  
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• Social App IRL, Which Raised $200 Million, Shuts Down After CEO Misconduct Probe

  24-06-2023 07:30 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Last year, the CEO of messaging app IRL repeatedly said it had 20 million monthly active users, who chatted about shared interests and planned real-world events together. Today, a spokesperson for the startup said an investigation by the board of directors concluded 95% of those users were "automated or from bots." The Information: As a result of the probe, the spokesperson said the company would shut down and return capital to shareholders, two months after it suspended the founder and CEO, Abr
  
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• Declassified US Intelligence: Still No Evidence for Covid 'Lab Leak' Theory

  24-06-2023 05:30 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  Reuters reports:U.S. intelligence agencies found no direct evidence that the COVID-19 pandemic stemmed from an incident at China's Wuhan Institute of Virology, a report declassified on Friday said.
  America's Director of National Intelligence was responding to March legislation requiring declassification (within 90 days) of any information on possible links between the Wuhan Institute of Virology (or "WIV") and the origin of the COVID-19 pandemic. One key finding in the just-released report?
  "We
  
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• Windows 11 Preview Adds Better Passkey Support, Rolls Back File Explorer Changes

  24-06-2023 02:20 via build.slashdot.org
  
  The latest Windows 11 Insider Preview build includes improved support for passkeys, a new standard for passwordless authentication, as well as support for Unicode 15 emoji, changes to Windows' location-based time zone setting, and a handful of bug fixes. Microsoft has also rolled back proposed changes to the File Explorer that would have removed several relatively obscure settings from the Folder Options window. Ars Technica reports: Though the Microsoft Edge browser has supported passkeys for a
  
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• Apple Vision Pro Will Support WebXR For Fully Immersive Experiences In the Browser

  24-06-2023 01:00 via apple.slashdot.org
  
  Ben Lang, writing for Road to VR: In a somewhat surprising move, Apple confirmed that Safari on Vision Pro will support WebXR. Prior to the reveal of the headset, it was an open question whether the company would entertain the idea of XR experiences through the browser, and even more so if the company would adopt the relatively new WebXR standard. But now Apple has confirmed that Safari on Vision Pro will indeed support WebXR. The company confirmed as much in its WWDC 2023 developer talk titled
  
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• NFC Payments Are About To Become Faster, Easier, and Truly Contactless

  24-06-2023 00:20 via mobile.slashdot.org
  
  The NFC Forum has revealed a roadmap for NFC technology that extends from now to 2028. The roadmap outlines five key initiatives for the direction of the technology over the next two to five years, including increasing the range of NFC connections, increasing wireless charging over NFC, enabling multiple-purpose taps, giving NFC-enabled smartphones Point-of-Sale functionality, and the ability to share how products should be recycled. Android Authority reports: Currently, NFC connections only wor
  
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